Chapter 45
Shili – The Restored Triumph forward crash site.
The Restored Triumph's chaotic landing had placed it in the middle of a v-shaped valley. Although the two surviving astromech droids could theoretically find out exactly where they were on a planet, with such a thick canopy and no nearby uplinks to find a planetary satellite, they were useless to expand on that description. As Arfive had quickly told them, they were astromechs. They needed the stars to navigate.
Telle hissed in frustration. It was a fair assessment, and she didn't blame the droids in any way. She didn't even blame Mark, or the Jedi. The Senator… he took some of the blame, in her opinion. If not for him, they would be on Pantora right now, helping his people instead of flying to Coruscant on a political manner. Politics took too long to get anything done.
She looked around. A thick and humid jungle surrounded them, the leafy canopy broken through by the ship's uncontrolled decent. Fallen branches lay haphazardly about the ship, their ends sheared off and splintered. The lower flora was a mixture of red-leafed bushes and dying leaves. Sheer walls of steep rock and dirt surrounded the ship, both the deep red of iron ore.
Iron Ore, Telle mused to herself. That could cause magnetic interference with electronics, which meant they had no comms, and no droid navigation. This entire valley was a giant dead zone! Talk about the worst place to crash a transport!
The Tholothian Jedi stood beside her, studying the terrain. She pointed towards the cliffs, tracing along them with her elegant finger, then tracing down them. "There are paths here. Thin, but climbable."
Telle nodded, following the lines. Unfortunately, even tracing them didn't lead her to the top of the valley. They were, for the foreseeable future, trapped in a valley of iron ore. Without comms. Or supplies. Or most of the galaxy knowing where they were! Fan-kriffing-tastic. And not only that, but she had also lost most of her men. She and Mark had been busy recovering as many of the Republic volunteers as they could, bring their body's out of the wreckage to bury them.
Bending down, she began to search the surviving supplies for a shovel. These were men of the Republic. They would not be left for the local creatures to chew up and digest. They would be honoured for the risks they took. That was not the way Telle had been taught.
Stass tried to make sense of it all. This was clearly Shili. The plant life: the Togg tree, the brown lotus, the red bushes known as either Miff or Tyth depending on which hemisphere they were in. Even the red hue of the iron ore deposits, and the small purple iron flowers that grew on them. It all pointed to Shili. But the Gundarks…
The beasts she and Telle had mutilated had not acted like the typical Gundarks. That worried her. Not because of when or where they were hunting. Creatures all over the galaxy chose the morning to hunt their prey. It was normal practice. It was also normal to avoid Gundarks whenever possible. But Stass was not a normal person.
She had encountered Gundarks before. Every time, whether of Vanquor, Torras III, Raveni and Kor Puluta, the beasts were solo hunters. The fact that they had adapted to hunt in packs here on Shili was worrisome. What could scare Gundarks into becoming pack hunters? She shuddered to think about it. She had heard about a creature known as an Akul. That might do it, though she wouldn't think so.
But the beasts were not her priority now. She looked around her at the surviving members of the crash. These were her priority. She needed to protect every survivor as best she could. She studied each face carefully, memorising them each.
Lawell – she had begun to warm to the lieutenant – and Mark were the only surviving members of the ship who hailed from the Republic Navy. The rest of crew had died as noble men. That was what Mark had told her as they buried the bodies. The two astromech droid survivors had worked hard, putting out the fires one at a time so that Stass, Mark and Talos could search for the bodies. There were few. Most were probably scattered through the jungle, somewhere between the sheered rear of the ship on the cliffs above and where their half of the wreck lay.
They had searched as far from the bulk of the ship as the lieutenant allowed them. Stass had seen fuel canisters, a few cases of luggage, and even her starfighter, ripped from the docking rings below the ship and now stranded in vines, dangling like a trophy over a cliff's edge high above. The bodies they found were carried to a single pile, next to where the two surviving Pantoran Guards were digging a hole the size of a small pool.
They dug with the small survival shovels and hands until Lawell told them to stop. Stass wanted to get moving, anxious about the dangers that surrounded them. No one verbally blamed her for that, and she never actually voiced her concerns, but Mark still found cause to stop her, saying, "These men must be remembered for their service. This is something we have to do to honour them."
She had simply nodded, shoving down her urgency and moving over to the other members of the crew who had survived.
Trav-iss sat on a rock, his leg elevated as one of the aides, the withered old crone who seemed to be in charge of the others, tended to a long, deep cut in the man's blue skin. Agatha, Stass remembered the aide's name, was tutting too much for her liking. The Senator's cut would be painful, but not impossible to walk on. As long as they kept a bacta salve on the wound, it would heal within a day, despite the workout that it would be going through once they began climbing.
Talos had found Mika in what remained of the observation deck. Her neck had snapped, and she seemed to have been shocked at some point. Perhaps one of the ceiling's electrical cables had dropped onto her and knocked her out. Either way, that meant that the young Senate Guard Talos had been elevated to head of the Senator's security. He was taking it stoically, pushing down his grief for a later time.
The other survivors were in better shape. Stass had not had the pleasure of meeting Miriam during the hyperspace jump, but it was clear that she was the kindest of the aides. The woman had received bruising from the crash and was favouring her right leg and arm from her left. She had most likely been slammed against the survival harness when they entered the atmosphere, the resulting tension causing stress across her body and muscles.
One of the other aides was in the worst shape. Her name was Luuna, a diminutive woman with three yellow lines forming a decorative right angle on both cheeks. According to the scanning equipment scavenged from the medical bay, her ribs were broken. Already, the skin of her sides had discoloured from her usual pale blue to an ugly mix of purple and yellow. Her breaths were shallow and pained. Stass had tried her best to help heal her with the Force, but there was only so much she could do with the limited strength she had left. The injured handmaiden was sleeping while they waited, resting on a makeshift hammock slung between two trees.
Riyo, the mischievous girl that had disappeared from the commissary, was fine. At least, she was fine medically. The scans had revealed that she had almost no injuries, just a tiny scratch on her hip and a deep cut across the palm of her hand. Mentally… Stass wasn't so sure. The child had been quiet ever since they got back to the rest of their… well, she supposed it was a crew. The Senator, seeing her, had immediately thrust a strange sphere at her, ordering her to fix it. There had been a string of angry words in a tongue too fast for the Jedi to recognise, but Riyo was nearby, bent over the object and inquisitively fiddling with the contraption's controls.
R5-D2 rolled up to her and she pat the droid's head. Thank goodness the droid had survived. If he hadn't, she didn't know what she would have done. He was the only one here that she felt she could truly trust. The other droid had a boxy, trapezoidal dome. She had checked both over, and had learned that it's designation was T3-C4. She had affectionately begun to call him Seefour, and he seemed to accept that willingly.
Finally, there was the final member of their crew. Rettensol. He was one of the mechanics, and was spending his time making a proper stretcher for Luuna. He seemed good with his hands, and he was ready to help in any way he could. A short Lepi, she had allowed him to work on the stretcher, keeping him busy. Even now, the two floppy ears were visible through the haze of sparks he was creating.
Stass wound her way back to the graves, where Chan, Mark, Talos, and the two Pantoran's were lowering the last of the crew in. There were over thirty crew who hadn't made it, droids included. Telle made a short speech, something about sending the men into the right afterlife and how their duties had been performed well during the attack. She and Mark both pulled a string of cord from their pouches, draping them near the edge of the grave. Stass ignited her blade and slashed across both cords, igniting them. The fire burned the brightest pink. Then the lieutenant unclipped a device from her ripped jacket, hit a button on it and threw it in. She gave a sharp nod at Stass, and the Jedi used the Force to move three heavy, flat stones over the mass grave. That would protect the bodies from scavengers.
The two navy officers waited until the pink fires died down. They sparked and flickered, disappearing below the flat rocks until finally just a thin stream of smoke dissipated into the air. Immediately, the lieutenant's posture changed. She straightened, chin coming up, and she marched over to the rest of the group, assessing the survivors as Stass had just done. There was a determined steel to her expression, one easily readable. As far as the lieutenant was concerned, they were done. If Trav-iss still alive, the mission continued. They just had to make it to civilisation and bargain for a ship. Sitting on one of the nearest rocks, she tried to figure out how to tell the rest of them.
Predictably, it was Trav-iss who raised an objection. For once, it was a short objection. "Why?"
Telle stared at him, her eyebrows creased in what she hoped was animosity. He averted his gaze, and she smiled thinly at the rest of them, "My mission was simple. I need to get you to the Senate on Coruscant. I still plan to do that."
"We are stranded.", Trav-iss pointed out, "Why bother?"
Telle rolled her eyes and bit back another curse, "Because we can still do it, Senator. We have a way out of here."
"It should only be a few days to the top of the valley.", Miriam said, looking up at the trees canopy. "We can make that easy."
"A settlement won't be much further than that.", Stass helpfully put in. "This valley would provide enough for a small village, surely. We have enough food and water to last that long, and there is plenty of game if it takes longer."
"Exactly.", Telle smiled at the two women in gratitude. "Now get ready to walk."
"Walk?", Trav-iss barked out a short laugh and gestured to his injured appendage. The leg was now wrapped in a thick bandage and had used up the remains of their limited bacta patches and swabs. It was overkill, even for the deep cut. Luuna needed those more, but Agatha had been placed in charge of the medical supplies. A foolish decision made without prior knowledge of that woman's dedication to the Senator.
Stass shook her head at the man. Telle had noticed that the Jedi had kept her personal supply of bacta and siloven away from the rest of them. No doubt she but would dole out the limited supply as they required it. Every Jedi carried enough medicine for themselves and maybe one other. If she planned on helping everyone in the group, it would need to stretch. Especially with an overzealous user like Agatha.
Telle looked down at the man's over-bandaged leg, waving her hand dismissively at it, "Yes, walk. I assume that you know how to do that. Or do you require your handmaidens to carry you?"
"Aides!", Agatha snapped, though it seemed an instinctive deflection.
"You cannot expect me to be walking with this injury to my leg, lieutenant.", Trav-iss continued to push his point, "If you could make me a stretcher, you could carry me. Personally, I don't know why we don't just wait here. I have a Jedi to protect me, and I have you for when she fails. I am important. The Republic will already be searching for me."
Stass answered this statement with a cough, drawing attention to her. "I imagine that the Republic would indeed attempt to find you, Senator. But surely they would only attempt rescue if they knew that you had been shot down."
"Why would they not know?", Trav-iss seemed appalled by the suggestion. "I had my personal bodyguards transmitting a constant bi-lateral code back to Pantora constantly."
"The same Pantora that has had no external comms for the past week?", Mark asked, an eyebrow comically raised. The expression was like a kick to the gut. It was the same one that Caloc often used when he spoke to Telle on the comm. It was a reminder of the one man who wasn't here, but that she wished with all her mind was. But it did the trick.
Trav-iss' confident expression fell, and his face went blue with rage. He went to speak, but Stass said something clever that stopped him. The Lieutenant wasn't really paying attention, but she shook that nostalgia from her head and faced him, putting steel into her voice.
"From what I know of politics, it is easier to elect a new Senator and mark you down as deceased. If your moon was officially allied with the Republic, this would have been a different story. As for why we should move, we are in danger. I ran into a pack of Gundarks earlier. They might not be the worst thing to stumble across in this jungle."
Mark gestured over to Luuna. "We can't carry you, either. We don't have to manpower to carry two stretchers, and your servant needs that one. You can walk, physically. It might be painful, but you can do it. So you will walk."
A very weak hand raised from the hammock. Luuna slowly swung herself out of it, standing on unsteady legs. Her skin had gone clammy, and she looked as though she would be ill at any moment, but she stood straight and said, "I can walk if the Senator needs the bed, sir."
A series of outcries came from the Jedi, the pilot and the Senate Commando. Telle frowned when she noticed that even though Miriam and Riyo looked appalled by the suggestion, they remained quiet, subservient to the Senator. That would need to be broken if they were to survive. Trav-iss would need to rough it, not be served the entire time.
Stepping quickly, Telle went to the hammock and placed a calm had on the injured aide's shoulder, gently pushing her back down into the makeshift bed, "Although I admire your strength and courage, I must insist that you not aggravate any internal injuries. We will carry you to the nearest doctor. We must carry you. There is no other option."
"We have the manpower for two stretchers.", Trav-iss persisted, pointing to the rest of them. "I am injured too."
Telle felt the final string of calm snap. Her spines extended quickly, springing out of her arms, her forehead and her spine. She whipped around and marched over to the Senator. Before he could react at her physical change, she had grabbed his collar and pushed him back until his back smacked into a tree. His feet were at an awkward angle, trying their best to straighten. He was taller than her. There was no way for her to hold him off the ground, but keeping him off balance was the next best thing. She knew her eyes would also have changed slightly with her adrenaline, expanding until her pupils were singular inky slits in a puddle of green.
Her voice came quiet, but she added a deep and menacing hiss to the words. "You will not take that stretcher, Senator. I can see that you are injured. But we are all injured. You can walk, and you have so much bacta on that wound that you could hop up and down on it and feel nothing. So instead of complaining. Why don't you do something useful, like say thank you that I am even considering taking you with me."
He opened his mouth to protest, but she cut him off and continued, "Get it, your highness? We need to leave before we become something's dinner. If you do not walk with us, then I will change my mind and leave you here. Those beasts hiding in the bushes can have you for their entrée. So the question you should be asking yourself is this: Do you want to get to the Senate or not?"
He swallowed at that. She could see the fear in his eyes. Good. If that is what it took to get him moving, then she would utilise that. The Jedi probably frown at her for using such a tool. Anger and fear were the Calacran way, not that of the Republic. But right now, she didn't care. It might be the only thing to get that damned senator moving.
She spun back around and stared challengingly at the Tholothian Jedi. Surprisingly, Stass's expression was one not of condemnation, but of mild respect. Perhaps this Jedi was more like herself than she had thought.
It took the rest of the morning until they were ready to begin their climb. First order of business: supplies. Talos, Mark and Stass scavenged what they could from the wreckage of the Restored Triumph. Deep in the crew quarter, they found a few spare bags. In the weapons cabinet were a couple of working DXR6 blaster carbines. Stass sent Talos to the kitchen for the emergency rations stocked there, then sent Mark up to the cockpit to see if any survival wear was hidden away in the wall compartments.
They both returned, Talos lugging a full pack of rations over his shoulders and Mark carrying three sets of small trekking boots and a pack of sleeping mats. At a gestured from Stass, he moved and gave the boots to Miriam, Agatha and Riyo. Stass made her way down to what remained of Caloc's quarters. The heads of the Gundarks still lay nearby, but she ignored them. Instead, she searched for anything that Riyo may have missed in her search.
Laying out the items stuffed into her padawan's satchel, she studied each carefully. A statuette of a half-completed Nexu, made from dragonsnake tooth. The bottom half of the statue's tooth base, snapped off upon impact. The holobook Madame Jocasta had given him, undamaged and still glowing red. A small dossier of designs for modifications to his starfighter. There was the pencilled in designs of a retrofitted freighter too – the one they had stolen on Hala. She put these back in the satchel. There was also a few handwritten letters, addressed to his sister. She skimmed the first few lines and frowned. So Caloc was writing home to teach his sister more about the Force? Good for him. Good for her. But if the Council found out…
She left those notes out, scrunching them up. They could be claimed by the forest.
Finally, there were remaining pieces of the decapitated hilt of Caloc's second lightsabre, which he had lost on Menach. Again, she frowned. It seemed to be in a state of disrepair. Quickly, she brushed it and the few loose metal pieces back inside the satchel, then turned and exited the ship.
She found everyone having a meal of dried ration cubes and water, the canteens being replenished in a nearby pond. She joined them, sitting next to Chan and ignoring the baleful glare that the Senator was fixing them both with. They ate quickly, and before long the Lieutenant ordered them up to begin their hike.
Talos took the lead, as he was the fittest and had trained the longest for these kinds of situations. Most people thought that the blue-armoured soldiers were simply employed to the Senate Building, and therefore they trained as such. Several Jedi even joked about the hardships an SG might face after a day of standing for too long.
The truth couldn't have been more different. Commandos trained in some of the harshest environments, becoming used to the harsh terrain and difficult climates. They fought each other and studied alien martial arts, learning hundreds of kinds of hand-to-hand combat. They could disassemble and reassemble an auto-fire turret in less than thirty seconds to cover a retreat. And now, as Talos was proving, they were good as scouts on unknown and hostile terrain. He leapt from rock to tree, grabbing branches as he tried to find a path up. Seefour had joined him up front, eager to start the climb. The little droid leapt forward, using his tiny thrusters to keep up with the man.
Telle and Mark had been elected to carry Luuna's stretcher for the first two hours. Stass and Rettensol would take over when they stopped for a midday meal, with Telle volunteering to scout for the next shift. The injured handmaiden had drifted back to a choppy sleep, drifting in and out of consciousness. It was the best she could do while laying on a sheet of canvas tied to a square of metal posts scavenged from the wreck. Rettensol had done excellent work with what he had. Both of the navy officers carrying her had their blasters holstered, but Stass noticed the points of Telle's spines still poking out of the tears in her uniform's sleeves. Perhaps it was from threatening Trav-iss earlier, though she suspected the woman was ready to drop the stretcher and fight in an instant.
Trav-iss, now leaning dramatically on a metallic walking stick he had grabbed off some part of the wreckage, followed them, the withered form of Agatha right beside his 'injured' form. If what Stass had observed earlier was true, the woman was usually strict and unkind. However, her adoration for the Senator was clearly second to none. She had managed to fin opportunity to change into something more fitting for their journey, a thicker set of trousers and a green tunic that might blend into the canopy. The other maidens had not been given that luxury.
The two Pantoran guards that had survived stepped behind the Senator, blaster pistols at the ready. Stass had taken time to speak with them and had learned they were twin brothers named Dorin and Hoss. Both were thankful that the other had survived the crash, but they seemed to view their duty simply as a job. They had been ordered to protect the Senator Trav-iss, and therefore did as such without caring about the man himself.
Stass brought up the rear, Arfive rolling beside her to keep her company and using his sensors to sweep the forest around them. Miram and Riyo had decided to join them, and were steadily keeping pace. Back at the camp, Talos had pulled the two aides aside and given them some of the blaster carbines they had scavenged.
Trained as aides, they were mostly appraised secretaries, given tasks to do that the Senator was too lazy to fulfill. Judging by the dresses that had boarded the Triumph in, these aides were little more than eye candy for Trav-iss to enjoy. Most planets prepared at least one of the aides as a last line of defence for a Senator. They ensured that this aide was able to use anything as a weapon: a blaster, a hidden knife, a coatrack. Stass knew that Naboo had a secret facility where this training occurred, overseen by Captain Panaka. Adi Gallia had told her about it after Qui-Gon Jinn's memorial. Pantora, though, was more traditional. They hadn't trained these people. Any blaster training they had came from their personal lives.
It was clear to see who had used their blaster before. Miriam seemed to grip her carbine firmly and without hesitation. Riyo was a little more uncertain. Her own grip was loose, and her head swung left and right as she nervously scanned the canopy.
"Master Jedi?", the taller aide asked. She was walking briskly, carrying the pack that held their water supply. Miriam's short maroon dress, embroidered with fancy gold stitching, was still fit to hike, and she had wrapped some smouldering cloth around her arms to protect them from cuts. Her leggings were utilitarian and the hiking boots would offer some support. Riyo wore the same dress in grey and leggings underneath a stylish maroon jacket.
Stass looked over at Miriam, head tilted in curiosity. "Yes?"
Miriam was sweating hard, and her hair was slick and sweaty. She was already exhausted. The crash had taken a lot out of all of them, and Pantoran's wouldn't deal with the humidity of Shili well. They would need to stop and rest for the night somewhere soon. Still the handmaiden swallowed air and managed to ask. "Lieutenant Lawell said that we are still in danger. Do you know why that is?"
"I believe that her thoughts are running along similar lines that mine are, Miriam.", Stass adjusted the straps of her own pack; the one holding their food rations. Caloc's satchel was also strapped across her body, a comfort yet a burden for her alone to carry. "Gundarks are not pack hunters. Adaptation like that doesn't happen overnight. Ergo, there are creatures in this jungle dangerous enough to scare Gundarks, and that is definitely worrying."
Riyo was staring at her now, the near constant head swivelling stopping as she studied the Jedi's expression, "But that is not what worries you, is it?"
Stass regarded the girl. She had an amazing and uncanny gift for reading facial features. It had to be useful in her position. "After we took down that Mining Guild freighter, another ship fired upon us. They could have destroyed us, but whether it was by design or by fluke, we survived. No one would leave the job half-finished. Whoever those people were, they will be trying to finish the job."
A loud rumble echoed over the trees, and everyone looked up. A ship? Was it a rescue ship? Stass somehow knew better. The sound was too deep for local ships or for a merchant flying above. It was a warship, and it was coming for them.
She told the girls as much. "Those people are coming for us now. We need to be on watch."
Riyo still seemed troubled, eyebrows and nose scrunched up in concentration. Finally, she bit her lip and looked up at the canopy. "If we survived, do you think Caloc did too?"
"I don't know.", Stass replied honestly, giving Arfive a look. The droid beeped sadly. "All I do know is that if he did survive, and those hunters are going after him, they have no idea how much trouble they are in."