Welcome back, my loyal readers, to another installment of the fanfic that I hope you've come to love as much as I have! As it's coming upon a year since I first began this story, I have to reflect on what it has become. So many readers, so many favs, and I thank you all so much for your support! Whether on here, on my Youtube, or at my shows, my fans, readers, followers and subscribers are my raison d'etre. SO thank you again for your support and your love. Now let's hop back into the story, shall we?
Drakken leaned back against the bulkhead of The Huntsman and closed his eyes. The briefing was straightforward, if there was such a thing as a straightforward briefing. He had little doubt that the mission parameters could be achieved. That could be accomplished as always with the proper application of strategy and the right amount of firepower. No, that wasn't what drew his attention away from his attempt at resting his mind before the fight. It was something more dangerous.
"So, we just go in, hike through the woods a little, blast a bunch of rebs and boom, back on The Executor in time for dinner." Gallen commented. Tharcourt opened an eye and scowled.
"Cha…we're getting waaayyy too good at this wiping out rebel bases thing." Mets agreed. "Couple more…" He slowly shot out a flattened hand into the air. "Be like riding the solar winds. Easy sailing." Drakken exhaled through his nose. He glanced over to see Dall make a sour face at the troopers before diving back into his medic bag, probably recounting the contents again. 'At least somebody agrees' Drakken thought.
"Combat getting too boring for you troopers?" Felian asked, a slight growl to his tone.
"No sarn't." Mets answered. "Extreme as ever. It's just getting awful easy to do these quick DA jobs."
"It's because we're the best there is, that's why." Coleth added.
"Get shot that way." Drakken grumbled. The troopers turned their attention to their commander, who was still laying back, but was looking between the men across from him. "The minute you go thinking it's all routine work…start believing it's going to be easy…that's when things go to Hell, gentlemen." He sighed. "Experience trumps training and training beats a chip on the shoulder. I expect to see every one of you on the ground, treating every single, solitary moment like it's life or death, because it is. Tracking?"
"Yessir." Everyone in the compartment answered.
"The commander's right." Felian spoke. "Never let your guard down. You do, you die. Then you'll be in a world of dwang, because stormtroopers are not allowed to die without permission." Tharcourt closed his eyes again, and hoped that the scolding had helped. So what if the mission seemed routine? There was no such thing as a routine mission.
They touched down and exited the shuttle. After securing the area and leaving Glitch to guard the ship, Delta-7 made their way into the forest of the Outer-Rim world. After a five-kilometer hike, they halted just short of their objective. Tharcourt motioned for the team to go to cover, and each knelt or went prone in a suitable position. He made a hand signal and Daraay crawled over between Tharcourt and Thorne.
"Scanners indicate three warm bodies ahead, sir." She reported. "One at fifty. Two more at one hundred. Movements look to be that of roving guards."
"Right." Drakken nodded. He made a gesture with the finger of his right hand forming a circle, and a few moments later, Gallen slithered up. "Sergeant Daraay, I want you to take Gallen, Mets and Coleth. You four eliminate that enemy sentry at fifty meters from here. I want it silent as the grave. You have two more at a hundred out. Think you got it?"
"Yes sir." Daraay replied.
"You got it, sir." Gallen nodded.
"Alright, get it done." Drakken said in a low voice. The two disappeared off down the line in a low crawl. Drakken looked over to Freya. "You ready, sweetheart?" He whispered.
"Aye, sure, why not?" She shot back with a tiny smile. He nodded.
"Good thing you wore the helmet." He commented. "Your hair would stick out here like a reactor meltdown. She stifled a snicker.
"Yer third rule, me love." She whispered back. "Th' enemy shoots at anything wot looks strange…"
"And you look strange." Drakken completed the proverb from the list that he had taught her. They shared a silent look into each other's eyes for a few moments.
"First sentry down." Daraay's voice spoke over his headset. He took a deep breath and lightly pat Thorne's back. "Alright, let's move up."
They knelt down beside the dead rebel as the rest of the team formed a new line nearby. Drakken rolled the man onto his back and pat his clothing, searching for anything of importance. He pulled a small multitool from the rebel's trouser pocket, gave it a cursory examination, and stuck it in his small ditty pouch on his belt. A hundred credits went into the same pouch.
"Och. Robbin' the dead are ye, darlin'?" Freya asked with a little irritation. Drakken pulled a small packet of cigarras from a pocket on the man's vest, and smelled them before stuffing them into his own tunic pocket.
"Starting that new cache we talked about." Drakken muttered. "Ekks had it right…the Empire can't track what we take from the rebs. This uh…" He gestured to the dead body. "This poor departed soul has no use for this stuff anyhow." Thorne snorted and rolled her eyes.
"Oh, yer a ghoul, Drakken." He winked.
"Sentries down." The call came over the net, and Tharcourt motioned forward.
The rebel base was a small building made up of several prefab units stuck together into a workable compound. A lone sentry stood guard outside of what looked to be the entrance of the facility. A silent signal from Drakken, and Gallen got into position with his long-barreled blaster rifle. The rest of the team poised themselves for assault as the marksman lined up the glowing red reticle of his scope on the head of the rebel guard. He inhaled, let out half of the breath and squeezed.
As soon as the sentry hit the ground, Delta-7 was moving quickly out of the treeline to the building. With precision borne of repetition and training, Ekks immediately jacked his wrist-mounted device into the door control panel and tapped away on the screen as the rest of the team provided security. The door whooshed open, and within four seconds, all ten soldiers were inside.
"Contact left!" Felian announced as he fired his E-11 three times into a rebel.
"Felian, take your squad left. Daraay right." Drakken ordered. He and Freya joined Daraay, Lago, Dall and Ekks as they breached a weak door into a room. Two rebels in mottled green jackets stood from behind a pair of terminals, and attempted to raise blasters. The ensuing fusillade threw the two rebels into the computer bank behind them. The team moved on through the room to the next.
Felian and Mets rounded the corner first. A blaster bolt steaked past, impacting the wall nearby. The two scouts eliminated the female rebel before she could fire again. Sergeant Felian took mental note of the human woman's odd green tunic and the armored band around her tan cap. Soon they, along with Coleth and Gallen were making entry into the next room.
The rebel in the white helmet went down with two bolts from Ekks' E11 blaster, and Tharcourt gave a cursory glance at the hardened blast door. A door like that inside a building usually indicated something worth protecting. Tharcourt was about to give the order to breach when the team heard what sounded like an entire fire team in the next room. They all turned to the doorway, expecting at least a squad to come through blazing. The hatch on the far wall opened, and in ran a young rebel trooper, screaming at the top of his lungs.
"Imps! Imps! Rip and tear! Rip and tear!" He shouted, hip-firing two heavy blaster rifles on full-auto into the ceiling. He had barely gotten through the door when a single bolt from Drakken's SE14r blew through his cranium, stopping the would-be war hero instantly. Drakken turned his attention back to the armored hatch, and he motioned for Ekks to splice into the heavy blast door's control panel. The Corellian obliged, and as the hatch opened, Tharcourt was taken aback.
The large room was filled with A280 and A300 blaster rifles in ready racks, along with a dozen long-range field communication packs. Tan caps with metal armor rings and utilitarian blaster-resistant half-helmets filled one wall, and a stack of individual survival kits sat in a corner. Weapons, supplies, equipment, food...everywhere. His eyes darted across the collection as his mind processed what he was seeing. He spied six long-range blasters in sniper configuration and a pair of surface-to-air rocket launchers and it all came together.
"Wot's the problem, love?" Freya inquired, noticing his expression.
"This isn't a base." He stated grimly. "Oh for kriff's sake."
"What is it, boss?" Ekks asked. "Looks like an armory."
"Looks like our karkin' armory!" Tharcourt shot back. "This is new. This stuff is too high speed for the rebels." He darted into the room and drew a suppressed and scoped slugthrower from a rack. "This is an assassin's rifle…" He motioned to the wall by the door. "And when did the rebels start getting cases of bacta spray?" He tossed the rifle to the floor. "Those are encrypted multi-bandwith field comms packs."
"Yer sayin' the rebels here are better equipped than the others…" Thorne summarized.
"No." Drakken answered. "Not just better equipped. Something's up here. Come one, we need to take the rest of the building." They cleared the next two rooms, finding only barracks and a mess hall. A lone rebel officer emerged from a small office, only to be shot down by Lago and Ekks. The hatch on the far wall opened, and weapons were raised, only to be lowered when they saw that it was only the rest of the team.
"Building secure, sir." Felian reported. "Two enemy KIA." Drakken did some quick math.
"That makes twelve then." He said. "Where's the rest of them?"
"Sir?" The scout sergeant asked.
"You are referring to the stockpile of weapons and supplies, right sir?" Daraay offered.
"Yeah. Way too much hardware for a small outpost like this." He decided to fill in Felian's squad on the fly. "We found an armory with enough blasters and equipment for at least a platoon-sized element. High-end stuff, not the typical rebel firepower. Comms equipment, medical, the works. Something isn't adding up, and I don't like it."
"The rebs we took out were wearing a new kind of uniform, sir." Felian observed. "Camo stuff and light armor."
"Yeah, I saw that, sarn't." Drakken nodded. "I think this base is for a special unit."
"You mean like a special forces outfit?" Gallen whined. "Aw man…"
"Rebs kept getting spaced so they had to jack our style." Coleth quipped.
"Didn't seem like much, boss." Ekks shrugged.
"You kids just don't get it, do you?" Drakken growled. "If this is a special forces facility, then where the Hell are the soldiers?!"
"Ballocks." Freya gasped. "Ekks, Daraay, check the wee terminals. See if'n they have any records on th' number of troops 'ere! Smartly!" The two troopers ran back into the control room.
"Felian, we have no idea what we may be up against…" Tharcourt stated. "All of you reload and stand to. I want this place secured until we figure on a course of action. Copy?"
"Yes sir." The scout sergeant saluted.
"Freya…with me." Drakken folded his arms behind him and marched heatedly from the room. Freya followed close behind as the rest of the team took up positions covering the two entries into the building. Tharcourt and Thorne entered the small control room to find Ekks and Daraay tapping away on the two terminals. Drakken stopped and watched the two impatiently as they worked to uncover any useful information from the computers.
"Sir!" Daraay finally announced. "You were correct. This is an armory and training facility for a unit called "Pathfinders". They appear to be a rebel sapper and recon unit. Logs indicate a presence of twenty-five of these pathfinders, along with a small support and training staff of twelve here in this facility." Drakken began to feel a sense of dread, like some looming cataclysm was about to be unleashed.
"Where are they?" He barked. "Where the hell are the kriffin rebels?!"
"Got it, boss." Ekks responded, staring at the screen of his terminal. "The team is slated to be out on a training exercise today. Uh…" The Corellian took off his helmet and looked at the commander. "Ohhh dank farrik. Hey, I don't think is a good sign, bossman…it says it's a live-fire exercise." Drakken looked at Freya a moment, and she caught for a brief second a strange aura come over him. His breath hitched a little, and his eyes darted away from her and moved to and fro. To her, he looked almost frightened, something she had rarely seen in the man. He quickly composed himself.
"Freya, get everyone in here ASAP. We need to get back to the ship…now!"
The hatch slid open, and Felian was immediately outside and to the left of the doorway, scanning the treeline with his blaster. Three seconds later, Mets and Coleth had sprinted three meters out and dropped to prone positions, followed by Gallen, who took a kneeling supported position to the right of the hatch. Daraay charged out next, and ran to the edge of the forest, kneeling behind a large tree and leaning out with her massive MWC-35c. Tharcourt and Lago joined her, taking cover behind two more trees. As Thorne, Ekks and Dall moved up to the position, Felian's squad arose and ran past them, darting into the trees.
"All clear, sir." Felian said over his microphone.
"Copy." Drakken returned. "Return to the shuttle. Standard two-by-two formation. Stay frosty and be prepared for contact. Move!" It only took a matter of moments for the team to coalesce into their formation and begin the long and nerve-wracking trek back to The Huntsman.
They moved silently through the woods, trying to keep to the denser parts of the forest. Tharcourt felt Freya put a hand on his shoulder from behind and he turned his head slightly back and gave a small nod of encouragement. The troopers scanned their sectors as they moved, expecting at any moment for a band of rebels to come out of the trees firing. Freya could feel her heart pounding away in her chest. Daraay and Felian seemed to be the only two to be in a sense of calm readiness, moving forward with grim purpose.
Drakken hated this. He was ironically reminded of all of his big talks about hunting predators. He'd compared this kind of combat to a sentient stalking a dangerous beast, learning its habits, its instincts and using this knowledge and experience to track the quarry and destroy it. Now, he began to realize that the rebels had done the same thing. They had seen what units like Delta-7 could do, and had formed teams of their own. Now, on this woodland planet, the rebs were the hunters, and Drakken's team were the prey.
He had no doubt that the Pathfinders knew they were here. There was a good chance that some of their scouts were stalking his troopers right now. He knew because that's what he would to in their stead, and that revelation was sobering. What if they had already discovered the ship? What if The Huntsman was captured or destroyed and they were all walking blithely into an ambush? Drakken would do the same thing. A bird whistled out a call from somewhere deep in the woods, starling all of them for a brief moment.
"Whasat?!" Freya gasped.
"Wildlife." Dall whispered over the comms.
"It wasn't." Drakken muttered bitterly. Far off in another pert of the forest, another bird tweeted out a reply. He clenched his teeth. He felt like a B-1 battle droid traipsing through the forests of Garos on a routine patrol. He morbidly wondered if some angsty young kid with a chip on his shoulder had thrown the Pathfinders together. He switched off his comms and turned to Thorne.
"I love you, Freya." He whispered. Her lip trembled.
"Love you too, Drakken." She said back softly. He turned his comms back on and drew his second blaster pistol. "Listen up." He said in a low voice. "Keep moving. They're going to hit us soon. Trust me. Probably a pincer. They got the numbers. Soon as they do…" He knew the value of morale and the cost of telling the truth in this kind of situation. "…I want you all to put some fire down, get stuck in and kick their kriffing teeth in. Just because they have the hardware doesn't mean they have the experience."
"Copy sir." Daraay stated.
"Yessir, commander." Felian said back.
"This is a serious draaaag…" Gallen commented.
"Shut it, Gallen." Thorne ordered with a nervous tone.
They soon came to a clearing in the forest, a wide belt of grass and large rocks leading up to a hill on the far side of the small grassy plain. The group halted, and Drakken felt anger rising. So, this was it. This is what they had been waiting on. The rebels knew they had to pass through here, and would have little cover and no concealment. It was the perfect setup, the textbook example of using deadly terrain to one's advantage. He looked out over the dell, at the boulders and slight undulations in the ground.
"It isn't like you to wanna run from the enemy, Drak." Tay commented. Drakken simply grinned.
"Sometimes, the best thing you can do is make the enemy think they've won." He answered. "Chaucout, Tourbin, set those charges in the ground up here in the bend." He ordered. He turned back to his girlfriend and lieutenant. "You run, they chase. Last thing they'll expect is a hurt and scared boetay to turn around and bite their face off!"
"And where did you learn that, fearless leader?" The teenage resistance fighter asked teasingly. He shrugged.
"I just made it up."
"What is it, Drakken?" Freya asked in a hushed voice.
"Brainwaves." He replied. "Daraay, give me a few remote detonators. Be discreet about it."
"Yessir." The Death Trooper joined him, and Drakken pretended to walk with her, to look at a holomap of the area and point in several directions like a good bumbling officer should. Once they were between two large trees, where he was sure they were mostly obscured from any observation, he took several remote detonators and two breaching charges from Daraay, and sat them in a hollow between the roots of a large tree. He added one of his stun charges, a smoke grenade and a couple spare power cells for his blasters to the pile before standing and taking a detonator switch from the sergeant.
"That should make for some really nice fireworks." He remarked, then placed a hand on the tall woman's armored shoulder. "Meeka, should one or none of us make it out of this thing…" He began.
"Sir, I have been honored to serve…to know you." Daraay spoke. He nodded.
"You too, Sergeant." Drakken returned. "Well, lets get this over with." They rejoined the team, and Tharcourt drew his two blasters. "All right everyone." He announced over his mic, "…once the shooting starts, make for those boulders. The wide ring of them out there about halfway out. We only need to create enough chaos to exfil and get back to the ship. Freya, you stick with Felian and second squad."
"I wanna stay with you, Drakken!" Thorne pleaded.
"No! Something goes south, we need at least one officer up and running." He stared into her green eyes. "Don't argue with me on this, Freya." She felt tears rise in her eyes, and grabbed Drakken in a brief hug.
"Ye make it. Ye promised me, an ye've ne'er not made it yet, so ye'd better make it, darlin'." She commanded him.
"Don't think I wanna call it quits just yet sweetheart." He whispered. "We'll see each other when it's over, huh?" He turned back to the field before them. Freya caught the unconvincing and fatalistic tone to his voice, and felt sick to her stomach. If Drakken really believed that most if not all of them were going to die here, it was probably true. She couldn't even begin to grasp that concept. Not now, not when they had just started making a life together…
"At the double time, move out!" Drakken ordered, and charged forward, blasters in hand. The team followed, Freya falling in beside Sergeant Felian as they ran for the cover of the rocks, some thirty meters distant. They had only made it halfway to their objective when a blaster bolt passed by Mets' helmet, narrowly missing the scout trooper. Another hit the ground just behind Ekks, and he swore. They made it to the rocks, and found what little safe cervices they could in the cluster of boulders as enemy fire picked up. Freya looked for Drakken, and spied him on the far side of the rocky outcropping, firing periodically at the hidden enemy fighters. Beside her, Felian did the same, firing his blaster in the direction of incoming fire, and ducking down behind their rock.
Drakken noted the direction of the rebels' fire. They were converging in the woods, likely in a line of battle. They were almost close enough to the hidden charges to execute the second part of his strategy. He looked to the treeline, their next objective, forty meters away. If this worked, it would be a miracle. He drew the clacker from his belt and held it in his right hand. A few more moments, and he would test how smart the rebels had become…
"Delta-7 Actual to all troopers." He spoke over his headset. "Move on my mark. Use the rocks for cover. Make for the treeline. Mets, Coleth, Felian…when you hear the big boom, pop smoke in direction of the enemy. Daraay, Lago, pop smoke in our direction of travel. On my mark…" He chanced a peek around his boulder. Enemy fire was now coming from the general vicinity of his boobytrap. He readied his thumb over the clacker. "Smoke!" With that, he pressed the button. From the spot of forest they had moved from, a tremendous explosion shot up as high as the canopy, and the large tree he had planted the explosives beside was toppled. The smoke canister detonated, and filled the treeline with a white fog as his team's own smoke grenades began to pop around them. "Move! Move! Move!" He yelled, and began firing both of his blaster pistols wildly at the enemy position.
The troopers of Delta-7 ran from the cover of the rocks, using smaller boulders as cover and the thick white smoke as concealment as they made a mad dash for the safety of the treeline. Almost to the forest, Freya turned back to see where Drakken was. To her horror, she could see the bolts of his blasters still firing from the rocks as the smoke began to dissipate.
Drakken knew it was time. The rest of his team had made it clear, thanks to the smoke and the diversion caused by him firing from multiple positions in the boulders. Now he had to move before the smoke cleared up and gave away the ruse. He rolled across the open space between two of the large rocks, and fired over the top. Then he started for the next. He felt a blow to his left leg, like someone had kicked him in the thigh, followed by a burning sensation, and he fell to the ground. Drakken pulled himself behind the boulder and looked down to see a hold singed in the side of his leg.
"Gah…damnit…" He growled. He got to his feet and started to limp toward the next boulder. Suddenly, he felt a punch to the back of his armored cuirass, and he was knocked back down. A warm feeling running down his back told him that some wiseass had hit him with a heavy blaster, and the bolt had enough energy to imbed some armor spalling into his back.
"Drakken!" Freya's voice cried out over his earpiece. "Drakken come on! What are ye waitin' fer?!" He drew himself up against a rock and let out a cough.
"Love…" He hesitated for a moment. It was long enough to be decipherable.
"Drakken!" She called out frantically.
"I'm hit." He admitted. "Can't make it. Freya…Freya, take the team and get out. I can hold them a while. I'm…I'm sorry, Freya."
"Sir!" Daraay chimed in. "I can be there in…"
"Sergeant Daraay, do I have to repeat my order?!" He barked, and fired a few times at the rebels. "All of you exfil. Move your asses and get out of the hot zone now!" He felt a little choked up with emotion. "Thorne has command."
"Drakken…" He heard her voice say weakly.
"Love you." He spoke over the mic, no longer caring if the rest of the team heard. "Love you, Freya."
"Drakken!" She screamed. He tore off his helmet and headset, and picked up his second SE14r.
"Come get it…" He growled. Drakken used the boulder for leverage to force himself to stand. He swung his arms over the top of the rock, and spied two rebels in mottled green camo parkas moving toward him in a crouched position. He let fly a barrage of fire that dropped both. A bolt impacted the rock next to his arm, and Drakken turned slightly to see a rebel marksman with a long-barreled blaster in a kneeling position about thirty meters away. He dropped as a bolt streaked by where his head had been, and rolled out from behind the boulder. As he cleared the cover, he began firing from memory in the direction of the sniper, catching the woman in the chest before she could realign her sights.
"That's three!" He yelled out. "How many of you it take to get one Imperial officer, huh?!" More rounds flew in his direction, and Tharcourt forced his body to roll inside the ring of boulders. He tried to stand, but fell, and slid himself up onto another rock, and fired at a small group of four rebel soldiers moving in on his position. They dropped to prone and returned fire, forcing him to duck. He looked back to see another small group coming in from behind. He felt a heavy bolt strike the front of his chestplate painfully, probably just barely penetrating, and burning his chest. He fired a salvo in their direction, and the rebels dropped into the grass. One swung around one of the boulders, and fired a blaster pistol, the bolt glancing off of his chestplate before Drakken killed him with four aimed shots.
"I'm shot to hell, and I'm still winning!" He blurted out loudly. "You children! You pups! You damned little war pups! That all you got?!" A pathfinder leapt atop a nearby rock and Drakken swung about to fire. The rebel shot the blaster out of Drakken's left hand just as he fired his other pistol. The rebel dropped, wounded from the boulder. Tharcourt's hand stung like he had jammed it into a nest of bees. He tried again to stand, but fell back onto the grass. He glanced over to see a four-man team of rebels only a few meters away, their blasters shoulders, aimed at him. He turned his head to see another team approaching from the opposite side.
"Drop the weapon." One of the squad leaders commanded. Drakken looked down at his blaster, and back to the man who had spoken. "End of the line, Imp."
"My surprise catch any of you off-guard, boys?" Drakken chuckled weakly.
"Three, you bastard." One of the rebels answered. Another small squad appeared in the rocks. Tharcourt let his head fall back onto the grass and he let out a chuckle that caught the rebel soldiers off-guard.
"It took eight…" He laughed. "I'm dead as dust and I took eight of you with me. Talk about going out on top. Tarkin was right…I'm a hunter of men." His expression grew dark. "I'm sorry Freya…" He gripped the handle of his blaster tightly, preparing to take out at least one or two more rebels before they got him. Suddenly, the rebel squad leader jerked and dropped dead. An explosion threw up a cloud of dirt and rock, and a tall figure appeared like a phantom, emerging from the dust.
Freya held her staff in her right hand, her blaster pistol in her left as she leapt into the fray. Her metal staff swung in an arc, connecting with the nearest rebel's head before her feet had even touched ground. Her blaster fired almost point-blank into another rebel pathfinder, and she ducked as another fired at her, barely dodging his bolts before swinging her staff into his head and shooting him twice. The enemy soldiers were now fixated on this demon of a woman in their midst, and Thorne took a running leap, mounting one of the boulders as they began to fire. Drakken took the opportunity to roll clear and fire his blaster into one of the rebels. Another fell dead as Gallen pulled off a crack shot from forty meters away.
Freya pounced from the top of the boulder, landing and rolling into a group of three rebels. She swung out with her staff and fired her blaster upward into her foes simultaneously. She spun about, using her momentum to swing to her feet, and delivered a kick to the remaining rebel's stomach, parried his blaster and shot him in the head. She turned as a rebel fired an A280 blaster, and instinctively swung out her staff. The blue bolt of energy was redirected by the metal pole. She paused for a moment, and so did the rebel who had fired on her, both awkwardly confused at what had just happened. A blaster went off, and the rebel fell dead. Drakken panted on the ground with his SE14r in hand. The lone surviving rebel had retreated in a hurry in the direction of the treeline, where his remaining compatriots were sending grazing fire toward the cluster of boulders.
"Drakken…ye alright melove?" Freya exclaimed, dropping to a knee beside him and carefully helping him to sit up.
"Yeah…I think so. Just picked up a couple bolts there." He grunted. "Hurts like Hell. You shouldn't have…" He trailed off. Tears ran down Freya's cheeks, which now grew red with emotion. She slapped Drakken in the back of the head, not hard enough to add to his injury, but enough to get her point across.
"Don't ye EVER do that again, Drakken!" She scolded him. "Don't ye make me lose ye, you bloody fool!" She grabbed him by the front of his cuirass and planted a kiss on his lips. "Ye scared me alf t' death." He managed a small smile.
"Thank you." Drakken whispered. "Thanks for…"
"Disobeying orders?" She said with a knowing look. "You'd 'ave done the same."
"Yeah." Drakken sighed. She pressed her forehead against his. A hum overhead signaled that The Huntsman was coming in low. The shuttle drifted in, its rhomboid prow pointed at the treeline as the remaining pathfinders attempted to damage the Imperial ship with ground fire. The upgraded shields on the shuttle made their blaster bolts seem to Ekks like insects striking the windscreen. He grinned as he armed the weapons array, flipping all switches to 'on'.
"Know the problem with ground pounders?" He muttered, and squeezed both fire buttons at once. Four laser cannons lit up the forest, and proton torpedoes gave off low thrums as they launched once every two seconds. The treeline erupted in fire and concussive blasts. Ekks kept up the fire until he was more than sure that there wouldn't be a molecule left of the enemy's answer to his own team. He released the buttons. "You just can't carry a big enough blaster."
"Come on sir, ma'am!" Gallen called. Drakken looked up as the Huntsman came in for his and Freya's extraction, the ramp lowered fully. "Need a lift?" Gallen stood at the bottom of the ramp, holding onto a hydraulic strut, Daraay on the other side. At the top of the ramp, Dall was waiting with his medical bag in hand, shaking his head disappointedly. Freya helped Drakken to stand and as the shuttle hovered a meter off the ground, he was helped aboard by Daraay. Gallen offered a hand to Thorne to assist her on board. Drakken slumped to the deck inside as Dall began to treat his wounds.
"Daraay, tell Ekks to take us back to the base." He ordered in a tired voice. "I uh…I want to pick up some of that hardware for evidence."
That...was the closest Drakken has come to buying it in in a loooong time. Thank the Force Freya was there to save him, right? What a fight too. Up until now, Delta-7 has been up against regular rebel soldiers. This was the first time they've had an actual, competent opponent, and their foe certainly proved their mettle. What's in store for the team now? Tune in next time to find out! I'll have the next chapter up soon, so until then, Cheerio!