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Post by Whill Shaman Xixo on Feb 27, 2013 16:19:11 GMT -8
*The hypnotic blue and white swirls of hyperspace are all that exist here.*
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Dragus
The Sith Eternal
In front of the Empire, to all you Vader haters out there. We'll blow your planet up.
Posts: 1,406
Affiliation: Sith Eternal
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Post by Dragus on May 6, 2013 13:36:03 GMT -8
In the swirling radioactive miasma of the ghost nebula, the remnants of the Lord of Famine's fleet waited, separated by one half their whole. The yin to their yang was parked at Pzob, typical of the Saurian Sith who liked to have his blighted fortress close at hand. The remainder, that which included the Night Lord, Sword of Vengeance, and Pride of Pzob, had been otherwise forgotten. At least until today. Remarkably a transmission made it through the high interference of the nebula, reaching Dark Acolyte Jerec Cretin by means beyond normal. Having received his master's call, the wielder of malevolent magics gave the order to depart the nebula. In successive order, all three warships emerged from the thick cloud, setting coordinates for waters far more treacherous than that which they already tread. As one they streaked across the star line, rapidly accelerating to lightspeed, disappearing in a brilliant flash of light.
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Deleted
Deleted Member
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Post by Deleted on Jun 23, 2013 15:36:00 GMT -8
*I had been sitting idly at a table hovering over a bowl of soup and bread.*
"Thwump"
*I was sent sprawling head over heals, the contents of my bowl sent spilling as the crockery shattered and I piled onto the floor and slid into a nearby bulkhead which sent my head ringing.
I immediately attempted to stand, which was clearly a mistake since I ended back on my backside, my head and vision spinning and the cacophony of noise provided by a ceaseless wailing klaxon did little to alleviate my symptoms. A moment or two passed and then I rose again, this time successfully now having found my sea legs.
I rose to be surrounded by the scrambling of beings from personnel to members of the Jedi exploration corps and all seemed in some array. I grabbed the nearest man, about mid twenties wearing a navy blue crew uniform and demanded of him to tell me what had happened, the words "space mine" was all I got out of him before he tore himself free and proceeded to shoot off to my left. I leaned back against the bulkhead which as I recalled hot not been at this angle, that was when I realised the vessel was listing to her starboard bow and thus I imagined that the stabilisers and apparently by the reduction in audible hum so too had the engines.
I grasped my head and sunk it into my hands, a pirate attack was not what I had planned, but then none of this had been planned, some looked a little expectantly toward me, but what was I supposed to do exactly, talk them down.
I managed to begin to move my way haphazardly toward the closest door and stumbled into the corridor which was hissing with smoke, grabbing my sleeve I pulled my right arm across my mouth and dropped my head to attempt to prevent the spewing leak from obstructing me. I managed to make my way three quarters of the way toward the aft section where upon I met the apparent assembled defense force. I actually pitied them standing there as the white hot glow of a fusion cutter slowly made its way around the bulkhead cutting a rough rectangular pattern. I seriously doubted that a few most likely untrained ships crew could stand up to hardened space pirates.
I saw too a handful of Jedi make there way toward me once I had turned and begun to make in the opposite direction, sadly I feared they would not hold them off for long. It was only once I had made my way toward the prow of the vessel and toward the command deck that I realised the assault was to come on two fronts.
A gentle slow hissing came from my left and I turned to view the white hot light wind around as whomever held the operational end of the cutter nearly completed their cut. I sped around as a soft dull clang sounded out, and that was when blaster fire rang out behind me and worse still I heard the soft roll upon the ground which must have been some form of grenade.
I don't know what over took me, but something did and in that moment I dived twisting my body as I did so, thus I wound around midair and traveled backwards my back now turned to face the ground, I cast out my right hand and with venom the grenade exited back through the hole it had just come through and exploded with a deafening bang. I struck the ground fairly hard and almost had the wind knocked out of me, I rose as quickly as I was able and turned slapping my hand upon switch to my right opening up a side corridor.
I ran as fast as my legs would go, after a minute blaster fire soon followed. Pathetically I dropped my head to avoid it, somehow by the force not a single bolt landed and I literally dived into an escape pod on my left and slapped the emergency firing sequence. I was thrown unceremoniously against the bulkhead; having not had the luxury to strap myself in, my head by now was pounding and I wasn't sure if the stars I was now seeing were the stars of hyperspace or the onset of dizziness, after a moment true darkness took me and I passed out.*
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Xeonon Solomon
The First Order
Posts: 2,206 
Affiliation: First Order
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Post by Xeonon Solomon on Aug 14, 2015 17:39:45 GMT -8
 Xeonons head rose from the ground with a start. His head hurt like a sun of a bitch, and his chest was heavy. It was as if he could not get a deep enough breath. The last thing he remembered was dropping out of hyperspace ahead of schedule and falling to the planet below. Sitting up he propped himself up against the wall, and went to scratch the itch on his forehead when his arm didnt rise. He tried again, and again he couldnt raise his right arm. It couldnt be a dead battery, the battery inside would have taken months to run out without use. Still he reached over and flicked the switch to open the battery compartment. Nothing slid out. No. There was the possibility of damage to cell, but this part of the arm was built to not have problems.
The itch was forgotten for the moment and he stood up and stumbled back down to a knee. Something was really wrong here. He had not felt this disoriented since the Force had been stolen from him almost 20 years ago. What the fuck? Standing back up he braced himself against the wall and made his way to door and pressed the button. Hopefully it would open the door. It didnt. He was trapped inside. Sitting back down he had to clear his head and figure this out. |
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Deleted
Deleted Member
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Post by Deleted on Aug 14, 2015 18:34:04 GMT -8
A fiery hunk of scrap dropped from hyperspace above a forgotten and unknown planet; the ship heavily damaged from a recent attack and this was his attempt to escape by way of a lesser known space route. But . . . there was something eerily different about this place. Supernatural perhaps? Unique? Yes! But what made it so? This nagging hunch had Kal knotted up with feelings of uneasiness. He couldn't pin point it just yet as to why this place seemed so strange, but all of that would soon change as the hulk of his KR-TB "Doomtreader" freighter continue to hurl uncontrollably toward the planet's mass.
Kal's hand brush by his command panel and he threw the throttle forward and yanked the yoke in an attempt to free himself and his craft from this predicament but to no avail. "Meg tahla'ada?"1 The advanced HUD of his buy'ce faded into static now, leaving the piece of advanced technology useless, and more of a hindrance than a help. His right arm rose now and threw it from his head and to the side to reveal a bearded man with a gruff face, his eyes a deep, dark brown.
He was almost in a panic now, as his vessel began to pick up more and more speed, plummeting that much more quickly towards the planet's hard and cracked surface below. He turned to voice a command to the astromech droid that split the duties of maintaining the freighter with him, but what his eyes fell upon was a rather grim site. The droid, an R8 series unit, was lying on the flooring, lights and gadgets completely extinguished. A motionless and unrepairable pile of scrap metal. "Haar'chak!"2 His voice bellowed out as he spoke out in curses. Anger. Frustration. Fear. The emotions crept into his consciousness where he found it nearly impossible to control them and keep them from taking over him mentally. There was, however, only so much he could do when his ship and everything aboard it was obsolete and useless. No power. No Tech. Hell, it would be a wonder if his slugthrower would work. However, if none ofit would, he would at least be able to count on his beskad; there was no electronic or technological component that went into forging it. Only beskar and phrik, and a leatheris grip.
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Liya Tawaza
The Unfair Advantage
Posts: 772
Affiliation: The Unfair Advantage
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Post by Liya Tawaza on Aug 14, 2015 20:38:58 GMT -8
My quarry had taken a fairly recently discovered space route toward an uncharted planet. Smart. But his skirmish with one of my rivals had left behind enough evidence to point me in the direction he had fled, and with a damaged ship, there was really only one realistic destination. Once I had ripped the navigation data from the dead hulk of his previous attacker's ship, and inputted it into my admittedly outdated navicomputer, I was on my way. And so here I found myself, alone aboard a shiny, nearly new Starlight class light freighter, inbound for an unknown and presumably uninhabited (?) planet. The job itself was quite simple: Kalmann Vhett had absolutely wrecked Garbonzo the Hutt's summer residence on Nal Yeshu, razing the structure to the ground with fire and concussion weaponry. The Hutt wanted revenge, and he had put a 50 thousand credit bounty on the Mandalorian's head --- dead or alive. Two attempts (that I knew of) had been made to collect on the bounty, and both had ended catastrophically for the hunters. But I was a little more desperate, having lost many of my connections, and I had an ax to grind with the galaxy at large, so I had jumped at the chance. I might be legally dead as far as my former employers knew, but I could still have some fun with one time jobs like this.But nothing in the galaxy was ever simple, and today was about to become a prime example. After hailing the surface and receiving no response, and after scanning the sky for any sign of defenses (or other arrivals), I began a cautious descent into the unknown. I thought myself prepared, and close to invincible, but just before I hit 20,000 feet, everything that could go wrong went wrong at once. Every system in the freighter shut down at once, as if triggered by an off switch. And I don't just mean that engines shut off. The engine status lights themselves went out entirely. So did every indicator and instrument and gauge and computer. The helm went rigid and immovable in my hands. Everything just died. Completely.The next minute or two were a hazy blur, as the ship spiraled out of control, eventually colliding with some thick jungle vegetation and bouncing high into the air once more. The bounce probably saved my life, as the second descent was much slower, and when we finally did collide with an immovable rocky outcropping, the damage to the ship was limited. The entire side of the Starlight, starting with the starboard crew cabins, and the entire cargo hold to the far right, were sheered off and crushed flat. Every viewscreen in the cockpit shattered. My shoulder restraints almost choked me, and then there was an enormous bang, and everything went dark for a while.When I woke up, it was nearly dark, and the acrid smell of smoke was all-encompassing. I could feel sweat pouring from my body, and the heat inside the cockpit felt as if it would melt my face. I could see the flicker of fire from the corner of my eye. I had to get out. Now. Fumbling, I depressed the emergency release on my seatbelt, and nothing happened. Wincing, and beginning to panic, I looked madly about, then spotted a gash torn in the ceiling of the ship, and managed to pull myself straight upward, out of the restrains. Grabbing a survival kit, I ran out of the cockpit and jumped from the ship. Only then did I realize that I hadn't had to remove the hatch to get out. That meant whatever air I had, had already been vented into this unknown atmosphere.Stumbling clear of the burning wreck, I stared upward at the jungle, and let out a stream of Epicant curses.Little did I know, it was about to get much, much worse.
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Deleted
Deleted Member
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Post by Deleted on Aug 15, 2015 6:58:02 GMT -8
A night had passed now since Kalman and his vessel had come to a skidding stop along a rocky basin. a stop that put the Mandalorian into a bit of an unconscious state. As he awoke, he remembered bits and pieces as to what happened before his crash landing. A Hutt had placed a bounty on him a few weeks ago for razing its property on another world, and this bounty called for him dead or alive. So far he'd escaped a handful of attempts to capture or kill him for his "crimes" against Garbonzo on Nal Yeshu, but his most recent encounter had left his ship in quite the unfavorable condition. Heavily damaged. He winced before letting out a short chuckle; funny how fulfilling a bounty for the Hutt, Strogha, had left him with his own personal bounty now. These Hutts and their games of power. He'd known better than to get involved, but Kad did they have quite the pocketbook. I mean, seriously? A hundred-thousand credits to turn an estate into a pile of ash? How could a man refuse?
He looked around for a moment, taking in his surroundings, though only dimly lit by the rising sun of this unknown and uncharted planet. Every light was off. Everything engine and piece of machinery drained completely. Reaching down, he pressed the button for the release his restraints, but nothing happened. He did it once more, but still . . . nothing, so he pulled the beskar knife sheathed along his chest and sliced the straps away before pulling himself from his seated position.
Before he headed toward the gaping hole along the port side of his ship, he gathered what little more he could: a small set of combat rations, his beskad, his blaster buster slugthrower, and an adventurer slugthrower rifle, along with the gear implemented withing his beskargam. Little did he know, some of those items he carried wouldn't be functional in any capacity so long as he stayed in the area of this planet.
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Liya Tawaza
The Unfair Advantage
Posts: 772
Affiliation: The Unfair Advantage
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Post by Liya Tawaza on Aug 15, 2015 11:08:02 GMT -8
Blinking in the twilight (and wondering if this was sunrise or sunset --- I hoped it was sunrise!), I stared at the ruined ship for a moment, ruefully eyeing the smashed starboard side. There was no way she was flying again, without extensive repairs. I would have to find my bounty if I wanted to leave, and hope that his ship was still intact. But first things first: survival. Fortunately, I was well-equipped for roughing it, so long as the supplies had survived my crash-landing. Slowly, I walked around the ship, examining it for signs of danger, and decided that it was merely smoldering and not in imminent risk of explosion. Crawling back inside, my hand held over my face, I shoved another blaster pistol in my belt (to go along with the two already in their holsters), and began filling a knapsack with supplies: Handfuls of bantha broccoli ration bars (I'd picked out and eaten all the good flavors long ago, there were would be no more until I got paid), a knife, a blanket, and the survival kit I was already holding.
Then I made my way to a storage locker, and tried to turn the lock. Nothing. It must have broken during impact. Wiping sweat from my blistered face, I stepped back, drew my blaster, and squeezed the trigger. Nothing happened. Growling I tried again. Still nothing. A quick check of the charge meter showed there was no power remaining. Glaring, I shoved it back in its holster and tried the other two. All three were dead. The hair on the back of my neck began to stand on end as I detached the battery pack and hefted it. It was too heavy to be empty, and yet the gun wouldn't recognize it. Swearing violently, I wielded it like a hammer, and used the gun butt to cleave the lock from the locker, then threw the gun across the room, where it clattered away into the darkness.
Selecting several new battery packs from the locker, I tried them in each of the two remaining pistols, then gave up. A check of my sniper rifle proved that it was equally useless, except perhaps as a fishing pole. An eerie sense of something horrible wrong was beginning to settle into the pit of my empty stomach, and I hastened to grab a canteen of water, a jacket, a spool of rope, and a few other essentials. Leaving the smoldering ship behind, I scanned what was visible of the sky and the horizon through the trees. It was lighter now, and definitely sunrise, although the sky was weighted down with an eerie reddish-orange fog.
And in the distance, probably no more than a mile or two away, I could see a puff of smoke rising. Had someone else crashed, like me? Or were there natives close by?
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Xeonon Solomon
The First Order
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Affiliation: First Order
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Post by Xeonon Solomon on Aug 15, 2015 18:01:51 GMT -8
It was hot. Hot as dicks. Since discovering his plight Xeonon had stumbled aimlessly around the ship for a while before coming to his senses. Sweat beaded down his forehead and trickled down his back as he worked. It seemed that due to the crash all electronics in the ship were useless. Thankfully there had been a stack of glowsticks in the back he had found. Thankfully their chemical reaction was unaffected by the crash. Now that he had light, albeit green he could take stock of the ship he was in. The pilot was dead, a wooden stake through his chest. Something had smashed through the glass which now appeared to be buried in sand. He could be a few inches deep or dozens of meters there was no way to be sure.
So for several hours he had laboured to find a way out. If he had use of the force it would be no problem, or even his cybernetic arm could be of help. He did not have those and so he dug. Not thinking he used his hands to dig out the glass and sand. Using one hand to dig out dirt is not easy, and once one of the pieces of glass cut the skin it made it excruciating. Then he tried to use a shovel, or at least an improvised digging device. Have you ever dug with one hand? Its hard as fuck. They do not make them with the handicapped in mind, and so he had to sit down and take a breather within fifteen minutes. Detaching his right arm he heard it fall to the ground landing amoungst the clutter. Strapping the improvised shovel to his right arm with the pilots belt he gripped it with his left hand. Much easier. After that the digging went smoother.
Now though after several hours of digging he was sweating like a pig, he was forced to remove his coat and brigadine. They were to heavy and stifling, but this left his skin exposed to the sand which clung to him and itched like crazy. Xeonon knew he needed to keep digging but he just wanted to sleep, to stop what he was doing for just five minutes and rest. He took one more dirtfull and placed it behind him when he felt the dirt above him drip then crumble. Cold salty water rushed over his body and into his mouth, his eyes stung but he pulled himself out of the tunnel as it flooded. It did not take long for him to get out of the water, he stood up and was chest deep in the water. Turning around he saw his ship about 100 feet behind him at the edge of the jungle. If he had dug any further he very well could have drowned.
Walking out of the surf he fell onto his back exhausted and lay there for some time.
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Post by Sunrise Latakia on Aug 15, 2015 19:35:02 GMT -8
Blaring proximity alarms rang out around the cockpit. Struggling with a headache that could stop a bantha dead, Sunrise groaned as she lifted her head from the instrument panel. As her vision began to clear, she took in the sensor display. Static. She looked out the viewport, and saw the mass of a planet getting larger and larger. Cursing, she cut back the throttles and hauled on the yoke to try and stabilize her craft. It was only partially effective.
The battered Skipray Blastboat she'd borrowed from a pair of Rodian bounty hunters on Tatooine shuddered and rocked, making disturbing groaning sounds as its much abused drive units struggled to propel the craft toward it's destination. The blind jump she'd made out of the system when a Hutt cruiser had attempted to interdict her had been a last resort, and as was likely with such desperate strategy, it had almost been her end. Still, with a little luck, she'd get the craft down to the surface intact enough to survive the journey.
Stumpy! Where the hell are we? Her astromech tweetled a response that didn't sound promising.
As the Skipray reached the outer atmosphere, the heat of re-entry began to turn the viewport orange, and Sunrise muttered a few silent entreaties to Kad'Harangir to get this shabla bucket down intact. As if on cue, at that moment, the screens went dead, the yoke went limp in her hands, and the hum of the drives cut out completely.
Osik! With no choice but to hang on, she made sure her crash webbing was intact, then gripped the armrests of the pilot's couch with white-knuckled tension, and prepared to take the long drop to the surface.
Well, wherever we are, we'll have plenty of time to find out. Hang on! With pilot and droid unable to affect their fate, the Skipray scorched its way down across the sky of the world as it headed in for what would be its last planetary arrival.
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Post by Lishra Elaric on Aug 16, 2015 0:22:51 GMT -8
Slumped forward in the pilots chair, held in place by the crash webbing, Lishra jerked backwards into consciousness, choking at the sharp scent of burning wires and melted rubber that had built up in her nose and windpipe. Coming to was always an uncomfortable experience, all your senses suddenly surging to life on overdrive, mind grasping for clarity. It was disorienting.
Add a layer of thick, acrid smoke, and the situation gets much worse.
There was no time to stop and think and catch her breath. She had to get out. Now. Eyes and lungs burning, Lishra untangled herself from the webbing and ran from the bridge of their YZ-775 with only one thought in her mind.
Find Lex.
Easier said than done when you can barely see.
"Lex!?" She paused in the corridor, squinting through watery eyes, but it was too dark. Oddly dark, actually. Where were the emergency lights? Why weren't the scrubbers working to remove the smoke? It had to have something to do with the ship-wide loss of power before they'd..er..'landed'. But no time to think about it now. Needed air. Had to find Lex. Coughing, Lishra raked her hair back from her face and carefully but swiftly moved forward, sticking to the sides of the hallways, hand running along the bulkhead for guidance. She thought about calling out again but couldn't bring herself to waste oxygen. Alarm prickled inside her, visions of Lex trapped and wounded stabbed at her mind, but she shoved them away as her fingers scraped over the door to one of the passenger cabins. Relieved, she smacked a hand against the controls to open it. Nothing happened, of course. She tried to pry it, but couldn't get a good angle. Her head was swimming now, the air thickening by the second. Keep going.
Lishra tasted ash in her mouth as smoke coated her tongue. She plodded forward, checking room by room, one sleeved hand over her mouth and nose, the other groping the walls. He couldn't be far. She just hoped he hadn't gone and locked himself in one of the cabin rooms—Lishra's foot hit something softer than bulkhead, snagging the toe of her boot, but she managed not to fall on her face. Hope surged through her. She knelt, hand searching. A shoulder, an arm, chest, neck. He was sprawled across the hallway floor. She didn't even check to see if he was breathing, she just hooked her arms under his shoulders and started pulling him towards the exit, choking on the last bit of oxygen left. He was heavy. Or maybe that was just her out-of-breath body failing.
Thank the Whills for emergency manual release.
The hatch blew open with a hiss-bang, fell with a wet thud to whatever ground lay under the ship, and the brunette bailed out with her unconscious Umbaran cargo, gasping for air. She hauled him away from the smoking wreck until she didn't feel the ground sinking under her feet anymore, and then she collapsed next to him, heaving for air, disoriented, drained, eyes closed against the burning.
However long she laid there, it was not long enough. She kept waiting for some kind of breeze, for clean, fresh air to fill her lungs and stop her head pounding, but it never came. In fact, there was no movement of any kind. Just…heavy, wet, stagnant air. As the caustic smoke cleared from her airways, Lishra was left with a raw throat and a scent in her nostrils not unlike the gutters than ran through the Coruscant Undercity. Damp, soupy decay, sour liquids and rotting…well, everything. For a moment, she dreamed the past day had been just a nightmare. No brutal fights with Lex, no crashing ships, no near-death-by-smoke. Lishra opened her eyes.
Dark reds and oranges blanketed her vision. She blinked, thinking it was smoke damage, but it did not clear away. Her eyes narrowed in focus, looking for sky, but only glimmers peeped through the tiny cracks in the thick vegetation above her. Because that's what it was, she realized. Trees. Bare, dead, red-orange trees. They arched over the area like a trellis, so big and gnarled and twisted together that they formed a massive canopy, blocking out the sky. Gigantic, fat vines hung, roped chaotically from above. The only light flooded through the colossal hole their ship had made as it'd crashed through the treetops, and the smoke billowed through it. She flattened her hands against the ground, pushing her fingers against it. Spongy, muddy, wet. Water seeped around her palms the harder she pressed. And that smell…
She rolled over, coming slowly to her knees, and bent over Lex. He was breathing. Lishra blinked the blurry from her vision, trailing her fingers down his body, checking for blood. Nothing, as far as she could tell. Alive, and unhurt. Given the plummet they'd just endured, it was a miracle. The runaway watched him for a moment, traced the angular, familiar lines of his features with mixed feelings; seeing his pale face void of that sharp, brooding expression was a rare sight.
Her knees rather suddenly sank a few inches. Lukewarm water gathered around the indents.
She stared at the ground for a moment, startled. And then Lishra finally looked around her, and it all became very, very clear. The darkness, the odor, the stagnant air, the vegetation overgrowth, the watery, sinking ground…
It was a swamp. They'd crashed in a damn, stinking bog.
Suddenly, the marsh came to life all at once. Something splooshed into the black water a few feet from their little patch of solid (well, semi-solid) underbrush. Animal screeches called to each other. Wings beat higher in the treetops, branches swayed in the non-existent breeze, vines swung and curled like live snakes as unseen creatures clambered up them, things clicked and hissed and croaked and splashed from all angles and all Lishra could think about were the weapons inside the ship filled with fire and smoke. "Lex? …Lex, wake up," she whispered hoarsely. She crouched over him, now fully alert, brown eyes wide, patting him on the cheek. "Lex! Come on, wake up, please wake up…" The sound of failing engines and squealing metal wailed above her, and Lishra looked up through the hole in the canopy just in time to see another failing ship sail by. She peered into the darkness beyond the Endless Hazzard, trying to see where the swamp ended, but it was too dark. Wherever it ended up, she hoped it was better than here.
And now she had a problem. Because everything they needed to survive was inside the ship.
Anxiety peeled at her nerves. Did she wait until Lex woke? Did she leave him here and go back in alone? Usually, her deliberation went on for much longer when it came to such evaluations, but maybe smoke inhalation helped in making snap decisions. She pulled off her long sleeved shirt and tore it apart, dipped the cloth in the water around her knees, and tied it over her nose and mouth. Dowsing her tank top and her pants as well, Lishra screwed up her eyes and ran back into the Endless Hazard with a short list of things to grab. Four minutes later, she was back out, coughing much less, and with an armful of items. "Hey…Lex…" The young woman carefully set everything down in the least soggy place next to the Umbaran, keeping his guns close. "Can you hear me? Come on, I've got our stuff, we can't stay here." She waited. Nothing. Her limbs shook, her head ached, her throat was a desert. "Lex, God dammit, wake up!" she croaked loudly, smacking him on the chest.
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Xeonon Solomon
The First Order
Posts: 2,206
Affiliation: First Order
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Post by Xeonon Solomon on Aug 16, 2015 3:06:23 GMT -8
Xeonon did not know how long he was out. The sky above him was dark, but had it been dark when he came out of the surf? He couldnt really recall. When he came to though it was to sound of a Gizka. Looking to his right there was one of the small reptilian animals staring at him, it croaked one more time before jumping. Usually the species was very docile, preferring to chew on electrical wiring, this one did not seem interested in electronics. Its needle like teeth pierced into Xeonons cheek. Yelling in pain he instinctively reached up with his left hand and ranked the small creature off; he could feel the flesh tear as he ripped the beast off. Throwing it to the ground he split it in two with the shovel still attached to his arm.
God dammit, I just had that cheek repaired. FUCK!
If he had access to his ship he could get some bacta patches and put them on his cheek and a one on his forehead. As it was all his had was his pants, and his slugthrower which should work still as it did not use electronics. Turning around he looked into the forest behind him, he could hear thousands of chirping bugs in their search for a mate. The taste of rot and decay was on the breeze overpowering the smell of salt and even the smell of copper.
HELLO!
Looking back to the gizka he picked it up and walked towards the woods. If the pests on the beach were this violent he could only imagine what fun things the forest held. He needed light. He needed fire.
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Bloodrage Pirates
Member
Yo ho, yo ho a pirate's life for me!
Posts: 758
Affiliation: Piracy
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Post by Bloodrage Pirates on Aug 16, 2015 5:17:49 GMT -8
New hyperspace lanes, new planets to plunder and unsuspecting travellers and explorers to steal from. This was a good thing for Arkan and his crew. He had ordered the Cutlass to sail down this new route to find what new plunder he could before committing any more ships to the task. He was on the bridge when the light cruiser was pulled out of hyperspace unexpectedly. The helmsman quickly checked over his instruments but they gave him no clue as to why they had dropped from hyperspace. However he did notice the planet that almost filled the view screen and activated the thrusters in an attempt to move the ship into some sort of orbit. This was less successful than he had planned and soon the captain was walking over.
The current helmsman was a human male named Allen who had been in the job for only two months. Although this was long enough for him to have discovered what happened to the previous helmsman, not a pleasant story. Allen was sweating, he always did when the ship was at sub-light speeds but his brow was now visibly more moist due to the Captain's impending presence.
“What's this then Allen? Has this planet taken your fancy?”
The Captain spoken in his usually unnerving metallic tone from beneath his face mask. Allen was already rushing a diagnostic program to identify the problem in the navigation systems. However he had more pressing concerns.
“Cap'n, somethin' on that blasted rock is causin' this mess. I cannae even move into an orbit! Thrusters are buggered and the main drive seems to have one burst left in her.”
Allen was grasping at straws to avoid any punishment that may be coming his way. There was definitely something wrong with the ship but there was no way the helmsman knew it was the planet causing it. His sensor readings got nothing from the planet but seemed to be recording normal readings from everywhere else. The Captain was looking from the port view screen at the planet, it was a lot closer than if they were orbiting at a standard distance. He had a bad feeling about this place and his HUD was displaying some alarming calculations concerning their orbital pattern.
“Signal a landing party to meet me in the hanger, have the Firespray prepped and ready, we only have sixteen hours!”
The Captain gave his orders as he walked from the bridge, leaving more than a handful of the bridge crew confused and a bit worried. A few seconds later Allen worked out what the Captain meant. He ran an analysis on their orbit and the Cutlass only have sixteen hours and seventeen minutes until her orbit would decay to a point where she would enter the atmosphere. Add this issue to the list of failing systems and the crew had a very big problem.
Once Arkan had got to the hanger, what used to be cargo bay 3, a team had been assembled. It was his usual team that consisted of one of his Executioners (Xim), two of his Black Guard (Eldo and Sirca) and three Reavers (Graal, Baz and Adom). Xim quickly boarded the Firespray and prepared for launch. The rest of the team quickly followed Arkan onto the ship and soon they were out of the cruiser and heading towards the planet. They left behind a failing ship that would be doomed without a miracle. Very soon after leaving the Cutlass, the pirates Firespray started to shut down. Xim could do nothing as they began to plummet, uncontrolled towards the strange planet. Things were going from bad to worse!
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Lex Ryjin
Member
Posts: 32
Traffic Light: Red
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Post by Lex Ryjin on Aug 16, 2015 6:36:49 GMT -8
Lex's return to consciousness was anything but slow and peaceful as he sucked in a long breath of air, then immediately hacked up the smoke it was trying to replace in a violent fit of coughs. The acrid stench of the smoke still clung to his nostrils and the taste filled his mouth, but it wasn't the worst he'd ever experienced. Groaning, he forced all the sensations aside and opened his eyes, letting out a shuddering breath of relief when the first thing he saw was her. Without another thought, he wrapped her up in his arms and pulled her close as memory flooded back. He'd been in the engine room when the ship lost power, while she was piloting the ship from the cockpit. He'd been on his way to get her, knowing the cockpit was the worst place to be in a crash, and almost always the part that hit first and sustained the most damage, when the ceiling lurched down to attack him.
There was a time when he could have easily lived without her, not given a second thought about anyone but himself, but right now he couldn't remember for the life of him what that had been like.
When he finally released her, his hands cupped either side of her face as he studied her, checking her eyes for signs of concussion and her face and head for any cuts or bruises. He sighed audibly when he found none, and the tension seemed to drain out of his body. "What happened? The engines cut out and nothing I did got them going again." I knew this kriffing job was a bad idea. When he finally took the time to look around, he chastised himself for not doing it sooner. That kind of carelessness could get you killed. He found his guns lying next to her on the soggy ground and pulled the shoulder holsters over his shirt, then slid the revolver into the holster at his hip.
Then he turned his eyes to the brilliant magenta sky, or at least what could be seen of it through the swamp's canopy, and realized it must be close to evening. Or maybe morning. Personally, he would have preferred the former, but he knew Lishra lacked his ability to get by in the darkness. If it was the latter, he'd likely need his goggles before too long, which he found on top of the survival pack she'd set beside his guns. "This is why we don't take jobs based on how many whiny little brats beg for it."
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Post by Lishra Elaric on Aug 16, 2015 14:05:13 GMT -8
"This again?" Lishra ground her teeth, the warmth in her heart from his waking actions fading. "What were we supposed to do, Lex, ignore her? She was only five years old, her mother was all she had, and you know the government doesn't really care about making sure she's taken care of. She'll be on the streets in four months!" The brunette pulled the cloth from around her face, balled it up, and dropped it in his lap. "There was solid evidence her mother was alive. I mean, we found the ship, we followed it here, and…" Lishra looked around, anger deflating. "…well, now we're here, and if their ship went through what ours did, I…have no idea."
She looked crestfallen. Little Maia's scared, lost face flashed before her eyes, the way she clung to that ragged stuffed animal like it would make everything better, the way she'd shrunk away from the cold, clinical tones of the social worker. After a long discussion, they'd agreed to give them a few weeks to track down Maia's mother for a very small price. To say Lex hadn't been happy about it would have been an understatement, but they'd finally lost the bounty hunters that had trailed them for months, they still had a few credits, and Lishra wanted to do something good for someone other than themselves for a change. Besides, it would be a great opportunity to explore what was beyond the new hyperlane, she'd told him.
"Everything happened at once. There was no gradual power depletion, we were running in the green and all of the sudden, it was just not there," she said, rummaging through the things she'd snagged from the Endless Hazard. "And it wasn't just the ship power, it was everything. My digiclock died, my datapad, flashlight, the emergency lights…" She pulled out her DL-44, checked the power pack, took aim at a tree across the way, and pulled the trigger a few times. Nothing happened. "Even my blaster doesn't work. It's like everything we came here with is useless."
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Nux
Member
fixin' to cause some hurt.
Posts: 49
Traffic Light: Green
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Post by Nux on Aug 16, 2015 17:03:43 GMT -8
She had booked passage on one of the first bulk freighters sent out to 'colonize' the new world. Forty-five hardy souls ready to trade their blood, sweat and tears for a slice of the new world. Their talk was inane. Filled with the kind of directionless, generalized hope and false bravado that made her want to slit their throats in the night and silence their banter. But she held her tongue, kept to herself, and counted the hours. They were all fearful of her, but smiled their wide peasant smiles and shared the common areas amiably enough. She had told them she was 'Briana Loughton.' A frontiers lawman. Seemed plausible enough, 'specially if you'd never been on the frontier before, and these were as green as they came. She spent most of her time in the nav centre, plotting his possible courses.
If her intel was good (when wasn't it? Top dollar brought good intel. Her reputation for intolerance tended to keep the rest at bay) then he'd be here. Maybe not at first, but soon. And then she'd have him to herself. And not long after that, she'd be queen. The thought made her smile.
The first three days out of Espa were boring, the same deep space routine that took hold if there wasn't sufficient distraction and 'extra-curicular' activities for someone with sharp blades to keep occupied. It was supposed to be another day, two at the outside. Wouldn't be long now...
He surprised her in the nav suite, hacking classified documents. Shame, he was quiet. If she'd heard him coming, she would have continued the ruse. But he was just quiet enough to trigger her defenses. He began to ask her something, no hint of malice or authority in his voice -- maybe just interested in knowing what she'd like for supper. But before he had a chance to utter the second word, the blade in the toe of her boot had sliced neatly across his neck, and he drowned on his own blood.
She stood over him, silently wondering how this would change the rules of the game, when she remembered his name.
It's better this way, Franks. She said matter-of-factly, Basic deeply accented in an ugly patois tongue that was hard to place, even for a linguist like Franks. You never would have made it.
When he was gone, she looked about the small avionics cabin for a place to stash the body, when a violent jolt physically threw her against the ceiling and pinned her there. It was as if inertial damping and grav had been lost in an instant. They weren't under attack. That was no laser blast. Maybe an asteroid, a collision with another craft? It really took her a few seconds to get her bearings. She might've blacked out for a minute. O2 masks had dropped out of panels, so there must have been a breach in the old freighter somewhere, and it took all her strength to move across the ceiling and grab one. Placing it over her face, her hand came away bloody. She was injured, but it didn't matter. Had to move.
Only thing that could create this kind of grav shift was early re-entry and uncontrolled descent. Before managing to crawl out of the nav suite, she looked back over her shoulder once. All screens were dead. Not just static, dead. Same for the lights. They flickered intermittently, casting horrifying shadows through the cabin and the hallway beyond. There was a second lurch, and the ceiling became the wall, and Nux fell onto what had been the port bulkhead. Righting herself, she picked up the pace. The old ship was groaning in a way old people did when they broke a hip. This was bad. The lurches came faster, every ten or fifteen seconds, and increasing. It took a few moments to realize that the ship was falling end over end, uncontrolled. No thrust. That was certain death. Had to make it to the escape pods.
Even before she thought it, she knew she was a dead woman. The pods were on the other end of the ship, a five minute walk when you weren't having to contend with crawling on the ceiling / wall / floor and dodging anything that wasn't bolted down, and had become a flying weapon. One such item, unseen in the flashing darkness, struck her on the shoulder and the pain was immediate and intense. Still she pushed on. Something new in the near distance: wind. Wind inside. Light. Dim, but light for sure. She fought forward, deflecting two crates, lucking out both times that the crates didn't break an arm or cave in her skull. When she was close enough to see the breach, she knew she was dead. The ground was rushing at them, alternately flipping out of frame, replaced by a view of a deep azure sky devoid of clouds.
She had a vice-like hold on two conduits, and in that moment, seeing the world flip back into focus for an instant, she knew the craft would impact at this rate before one more full rotation. It was now or never. She let go, and was sucked through the huge breach, maybe three decks by 120' long. She closed her eyes, and waited for the end, falling end over end, flailing and lost in a hot, arid sky. A second later, she managed to stabilize her fall, extending her arms and legs, and opened her eyes to see what the instrument of her demise would be.
She had just enough time to knife into the water that filled every square inch of her vision, rather than hitting it pancake-flat.
When she surfaced, an agonizingly long thirty seconds later, there was little sign of the massive bulk freighter. One engine pod and the last of the superstructure were slipping below the surface. The waves created by the impact had churned the water into a roiling tempest, and she swam hard to crest a wave and try to sight land.
Nothing. Twisting around, two massive waves crashed down on her, and she lost all sense of up and down, night and day. Sputtering to the surface once more, she drew half a breath before being slammed by another two waves. It was surely the end. Then came the impact. She hit something. Hard. There was a crack, and she screamed wordlessly underwater. Over and over the waves battered her, and then there was something solid under her. A breath. Two. More waves. Next she was on the beach, the surf crashing down on her, driving her up the red sand until finally the sun beat down on her neck and back, and she fell mercifully unconscious.
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Lex Ryjin
Member
Posts: 32
Traffic Light: Red
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Post by Lex Ryjin on Aug 17, 2015 6:37:38 GMT -8
"I survived the streets. She'd be fine." His tone mirrored that of the social worker, cold and completely uncaring for the small girl that had shed so many tears she had none left to give. Once upon a time, almost longer ago than he could remember, he'd been the type of person to care about such things, but life had taught him early on that that was nothing more than a good way to get yourself killed. You couldn't be a survivor and still stop to help everyone who shed a tear.
"I'm willing to bet not everything is dead." He withdrew one of his slugthrowers as he spoke, taking aim at the same tree and squeezing the trigger once. The report of the gun sounded dull and lifeless in the mire of the bog, but the tree its projectile struck erupted in a shower of splinters. "Thought so." Flipping the gun in his grip and handing it to Lishra, he pushed himself to his feet once she took it and grabbed the survival pack she'd managed to salvage from their ship. "There are places in the underworld where the power lines for the upper city draw so much energy that the area around them gets saturated with EM interference. Makes blasters go glitchy, but anything without electronics still works fine. Another one of the reasons I prefer these." He glanced around the bog for a moment before speaking again. "We should get moving. You didn't happen to get a view of the area on the way down, did you?"
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Post by Sunrise Latakia on Aug 17, 2015 13:30:56 GMT -8
The smell of burning circuits and charred insulation awoke the only survivor of the crashed Skipray blast boat. Hanging sideways, still strapped into her seat, Sunrise began gingerly moving her arms and legs, and was pleasantly surprised to find nothing seemed to be broken, though her head was pounding. She looked at the instrument panel, totally dead. No sounds reached her ears, and for a long moment, she thought she might have been deafened in the crash. Then she released her restraints, and fell, catching her forehead on the yoke as she fell.
Dikut! She heard that, so nothing was wrong with her ears, but the silence troubled her. Normally her astromech would have awakened her, or at least have been making droid curses at her excuse for a landing, but she heard nothing from Stumpy.
Navigating her way through the detritus of the crashed blastboat, she found her astromech, dented, and completely powerless, lying against the hatch. She opened an access panel and attempted to restart the droid. Having no luck with that, she checked the power cells, and found them totally dead.
That was strange, she thought. Astromechs could go for days on standby, some even longer. Even damage shouldn't have drained the power cells, and the cells themselves appeared intact, not leaking or discharging in any way. On a hunch, she checked her blasters, and found them totally useless too. Something was definetely wrong. First the ship, now everything, was as dead as Alderaanian disco. Sunrise resolved that she wasn't going to join them.
It didn't take her long to make an inventory of her supplies. She kept her blaster, but discarded most of her belongings that required power, stowing them in a compartment. She still had her beskad, and some of her beskar'gam accessories would function without power, and to the weapons she added her meager food supplies and water rations. Securing these in pouches, she rolled the astromech out of the way, and triggered the manual release for the hatch, clambering down from the wreck, and headed out into the night.
Finding her HUD and other systems non-functional, she removed her buyce and clipped it to her belt. She took a moment to let her eyes adjust to the black night, listening for sounds. She heard them, animals, out there in the dark. So this planet wasn't devoid of life after all. That was a plus. But were they going to feed her, or decide she might make a tasty meal instead? She had little choice but to find out. Sitting around rarely accomplished anything, and she might even find a way off this world.
Shrugging, Sunrise drew her beskad, and stalked off into the night, another predator looking to find out where she stood on the food chain around here...
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Post by Lishra Elaric on Aug 17, 2015 16:07:27 GMT -8
"I survived the streets. She'd be fine." His tone mirrored that of the social worker, cold and completely uncaring for the small girl that had shed so many tears she had none left to give. Once upon a time, almost longer ago than he could remember, he'd been the type of person to care about such things, but life had taught him early on that that was nothing more than a good way to get yourself killed. You couldn't be a survivor and still stop to help everyone who shed a tear."I'm willing to bet not everything is dead." He withdrew one of his slugthrowers as he spoke, taking aim at the same tree and squeezing the trigger once. The report of the gun sounded dull and lifeless in the mire of the bog, but the tree its projectile struck erupted in a shower of splinters. "Thought so." Flipping the gun in his grip and handing it to Lishra, he pushed himself to his feet once she took it and grabbed the survival pack she'd managed to salvage from their ship. "There are places in the underworld where the power lines for the upper city draw so much energy that the area around them gets saturated with EM interference. Makes blasters go glitchy, but anything without electronics still works fine. Another one of the reasons I prefer these." He glanced around the bog for a moment before speaking again. "We should get moving. You didn't happen to get a view of the area on the way down, did you?"
Then she stared mournfully at their ship. The black smoke still poured out of the open hatch, though at a slower rate, and its thickness seemed to have diminished too. The hull had taken damage, but nothing too bad, and the rest of it looked in-tact. But there was nothing they could do to fix the shot interior computer systems if none of their tools worked. "I saw at least two other ships on our way in, and another crashed somewhere north of us when I was pulling you out, but I have no idea where The Ballistic is. I lost tracking power before I could pinpoint it." She looked at him, her skin all smudged with dirt and ash, jaw set determinedly. "We should find higher ground, see what we're working with here. There could be others hurt. Maybe someone knows why none of our tech works. And then we're going to find The Ballistic, get Maia's mother, and get her back to her daughter."
Lishra took a quick swig from her water canteen, tucked it back into the pack he'd slung over his shoulder, and peered thoughtfully up into the dark red glow of the canopy. "I have no idea how wide this bog is… could be hundreds and hundreds of miles until we hit high ground…" A quick scan of the area around them, and the young woman headed for the massive tree Lex had tested his slugthrower on. She grabbed at the thick vines that ran all the way up the trunk and hung down from the canopy ceiling, pulling at them, testing their strength. She put a booted foot up, easily scaling a few feet. "I could climb up, take a look through the treetops," she said, looking down at Lex. |
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Post by Sunrise Latakia on Aug 18, 2015 13:39:28 GMT -8
Eyes. The night was full of them. Still, none had resolved themselves into any recognizable animal form, and so Sunrise had continued on her trek across this unknown world. Though the night was plenty dark, she could tell she was in what seemed to be a large forest. Large, because despite walking for hours, the terrain had continued to be heavily wooded. The alien sounds of nocturnal animal life began to fade, as glimmers of dawn's first light appeared on the horizon, finding gaps in the canopy of trees, which seemed to change colour from black to red as the light of day approached.
Sunrise halted her march in a small clearing, finding a convenient log to sit on while she took a drink and munched on a ration bar. As the light grew, she noticed that not only were the leaves on the trees of a reddish hue, but there seemed to be a light swirling reddish fog around.
This is a strange place alright. What I wouldn't give for a cantina. She muttered to herself.
Talking to herself was a habit she'd picked up over many long solo hyperspace flights, and the habit returned now that she was sans astromech and marooned on this world. She figured she'd covered about fifteen kilometers since leaving her wrecked craft, though she'd been careful to blaze the trail so she could find the ship again. Every hundred meters or so she'd carved a footlong double slash into a trunk, and she'd counted a hundred and fifty three markers thus far. Having been unmolested by predators, she figured it was safe enough to keep travelling at night, so she began to think about building a shelter to get some rest.
There was no telling how hot the days were, and the nights seemed pleasant enough. She'd also need to find water pretty soon. Her suit recycler was as dead as her other tech, so she had about two or three days before she was completely out, and that included draining the beskar'gam's waste reservoirs, something she wasn't looking forward to. Seeing some mountains on the horizon, she decided those were as good an objective as anything, and figuring on another night's travel, she'd be there in a day or so. Nothing too urgent to worry about then.
She finished off her ration bar, tucked her canteen away, and tossed the wrapper behind her as she stood up from the log.
Suddenly, there was a deep, rumbling growl from directly behind her, and her blood ran cold as ice...
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