Geonosis' Open Terrain

This was a totally different experience than any Zed had before. Always the loner he was not used to responsibility. Yet here he was with this kid, connected to him for some unknown reason. As the duo walked outside he was immediately overwhelmed by the heat and the sun. There were few people outside right now, either because of the weather or the geopolitical climate of the planet the streets were not as busy as usual. Mainly droids walked to a fro, with the occasional sentient being. Looking down at Gor he felt a pit in his stomach, he did not know what it meant but it couldnt be good.

Seeing as you and I are together for the forseeable future Gor why don't we get to know each other?

Not saying anything for a few minutes Zed collected his thoughts before talking. The child had worked him into a corner, he had wanted to know more about Gor. Now he had to talk about himself.

I guess that is what happens when you are nearly two centuries old. You tend to see certain things common enough in most people, and I have spent a long time watching people from the side. My species, we aren't exactly loved by the galaxy as a whole.

Again there was some silence as he thought about the past ten years watching people, trying to just avoid everything.

I am part of an order that is slowly reforming out here in the Outer Rims. We are called the Jensaarai, we seek to learn the truth. I am actually the one who has started the reformation. Earlier in the prescient I had offered to teach you to control your powers and that offer still stands. The Jensaarai are all like me, and you. Force users. I wont force you into it but if you were to learn with us you may learn to find peace.

I have another question for you. Would you like to see your father one last time?

Zed walked forward a few more steps before realizing his new ward had stopped at the question. He knew it would be a difficult thing to face. He knew from experience how Gor would regret it had he said no. Once, he had said that very thing and to this day he wished he had looked upon his grandfathers face one last time.

Turning around he faced him and was proud of the boys choice.

Whenever you are ready we can go find him.

Walking into the sterile environment he was hit by how much different it was to the outside. Obviously the people who wished to allow people a final visit to their family cared. It would give a good last memory. However Gor remembered this though he could not guess. Looking down at the body of the man that used to be his father he felt nothing for him. Any man who would do wrong by his children deserved this.

Walking out the morgue he walked up to Gor and nodded towards him.

Gor I need to talk to you about something when you are ready. We may need to leave here for a while and I would like you to come.

Although the statement was rather vague he did not want to push so much on his new ward to fast. Between killing his father and facing him one more time just moments ago he imagined that the emotions where raw. Their relationship was still new and he needed to try and build on that trust before forcing anything on the lad.

Currently configured into bike-mode, the Professor's treads briefly swerved as Valefor's girthsome weight landed in the saddle, churning up the rough terrain beneath its growling tracks. As the HMP Gunships dropped the last of the Hellriders off, they let loose with a symphony of streaking missiles, emptying their racks to completion as they unleashed hell at the mouth of the gorge. As explosions ripped across the narrow chasm leading to the face of the Genosian Hive, rust brown metallic snails emerged from expanding clouds of smoke and fire, wreathed in flame but otherwise unaffected by it. These were Genosian Super Tanks, a rare breed of war machine that hadn't seen use since the invasion of this world during the outset of the Clone Wars. These armoured beetles numbered four wide and ran nearly the length of the gorge, emerging from a shielded vehicle garage at the base of the hive. The saucer shaped HMP gunships soon found the skies shared with streaking crimson bolts of hot laser fire, quickly succumbing to the lethal energy rain and exploding overhead.

Arachnus swerved right and left, dodging flaming droid debris falling in their path. The other Hellriders fell into a wedge shaped formation with the Legionis Hastae in Valefor's unbreakable grip serving as the spear point for their charge. The droid riders were appropriately named, for this was the truest sort of hell they were streaking into at 200 kilometers per hour, a veritable kill-zone as the enemy armour moved to meet them. The only advantage they had was their speed and guts of steel.


In the distance behind them at the top of a ridge cresting the far end of the valley opposite the gorge, three C-9979 landing craft filled the skies, two coming in to land atop the ridge, the other in the valley just below where it immediately began assembling a mobile command centre. The two landing craft above discharged artillery teams of HAGs and J-1 semi-autonomous proton cannons. By the time the Hellriders entered the gorge, titanic cracks of thunder echoed across the valley at the artillery began to open up, closing the way behind the lancers as they entered the gorge with unrelenting destructive ordnance that collapsed tunnels and cause tectonic tremors for miles.

A wall of destruction behind them, the only way to go was forward. Arachnus fed everything he had into his engines, spewing thick plumes of black exhaust from his backside as he propelled Valefor towards the first armoured caterpillar in their path. With thick plated armour that was additionally ray-shielded, these slow moving tanks were near indestructible when faced with modern weaponry. But a brave enough droid with a power lance that could get in close enough to penetrate their shields could punch a hole in that armour, ripping it open and possibly setting off the reactive ordnance stored inside its protective shell. "Fire and Steel! That is the Forge Master's promise!" Shrieked the Professor, plunging towards the tank.

The IG Lancer: reminiscent of the days of ancient feudal kingdoms where armoured knights of great nobilities charged into battle atop galloping steeds, eyes locked through the slit openings of iron war-helms as they rode down infantry, armed with sharpened lengths of iron tipped wood. In the Hellriders case their living breathing mounts had been replaced with exhaust belching treadspeeders that left tracks in the radiation baked Geonosian landscape. The Lancers long conical heads ended in crested plumes of coarse crimson dyed hair harvested from slave-meat bound for the foundries, who lice infested scalps were frankly better off without it, blowing behind the riders in the face of the barbed rocket troopers riding bitch behind them. Instead of wooden lances, these nightmaric droid knights wielded fire blackened power lances produced by the Dark Forge, etched in mysterious black-script that glowed a sinister red in anticipation of the carnage to come.

Glowing first furious orange, the lance's cone-like tip grew blistering white as it heated to an incredible temperature, functioning like a fast-acting cutting torch as it parted the metal of the Super Tanks armoured hide like wet parchment. A chorus of grating metallic shrieks echoed throughout the narrow armour strewn chasm as power lances punched steaming holes in dirt brown hulls, causing mass-reactions within the armoured units as the ordnance inside began to go off in a series of loud explosive pops. Explosions rippled throughout the gorge behind the streaking lancers, scattering metal shrapnel and armour plating across the hot alien sands of the bug world.

Behind the curtain of proton shells and razor hail that blanketed the front of the gorge from the artillery teams on the ridge at the far end of the valley, the tall thick plated walls of a SE CIS mobile command center were erected, raising the first of many secure outposts and landing zones as the invasion commenced in earnest. In the empty stretch of terrain between the recently raised base and the gorge mouth, an army of ant droids in faded red paint transformed the valley surface into a veritable no-mans land, replete with deep trenches lined with coils of razor-wire and concealed blaster cannon positions. Despite the ceaseless fire from the artillery positions, a few Super Tanks escorted by fast rolling IG-227 Hailfire-class droid tanks made it through the storm of overlapping explosive shells, only to have the mechanical guts blown out of them by anti-vehicles mines scattered across the no-mans land. The massive gates to the command centre swung inwards to omit marching columns of mechanical infantry, as feral B1 battle droids painted in Fabricator General's faded red, poured into the trenches. Blaster emplacements opened up across the valley.


"We're almost there, Forge Master!" Screeched the Professor over the rumble and roar of his growling treads, currently defying gravity as the spider-bike streaked across the gorge wall rather than on the ground, allowing Valefor to make full use of the Legionis Hastae as bolts of Force Lightning leapt from its blood red crystalline tip.


Another shield fizzled out as science gave ground to sorcery. The assault cannon barrels at the front of the bike snarled as Arachnus spat super-heated plasma rounds into a sonic cannon emplacement positioned on the gorge wall, blasting it to scrap before riding through the debris cloud as smoking bits peppered Valefor's leathery red flesh, no more an irritant to the darkside charged Demon than stinging nettles. There was a brief sensation of weightlessness as the spider-bike leapt from the gorge wall back down to the dusty dirt, as they neared the Geonosian Hive's battlements. Just as the tactical droids had surmised, the Golbah Hive was pitted with blaster emplacements. Crimson lances of deadly energy leapt from the vengeful mouths of swiveling turrets, racing towards them as Arachnus tried to turn and ended up drifting across the gorge.

Inwardly the Professor's program cursed in binaric frustration for allowing his over eagerness to spill Geonosian blood to have placed them in this deadly predicament. According to his calculations, there would be no avoiding the lethal barrage of hot laser, hatefully lashing towards them from the spitting barrels of countless emplacements across the Golbah Hive battlements, as time seemed to slow before their encroaching death. Yet instead of being reduced to ash and rendered to atoms, those scalding lances struck a shimmering kine-shield, erected by Valefor's savvy combat acumen and sorcerous ability. The Force barrier blunted and deflected the incoming bolts as the spider-bike's treads tore up the rocky terrain as it drifted across the open gorge, aiding in turning thanks to the Red Sage's planted spear, which allowed Arachnus to once more get traction and accelerate away from the ruinous hive defenses.

The spider-bike's engine growled in response to the Fabricator General's praise. His assault cannon barrels spat two bolts of hot plasma that punched holes in the carapace of a Genosian warrior attempting to climb free of a burning Super Tank, boiling the bugs innards to scalding insect stew. "All thanks to your tactical genius, Forge Master." A cloud of rust and dirt obscured their retreat as the Professor carried them well beyond the reach of the emplacements, then came to stop.

Trundling through the gorge towards them were reinforcements from the raised mobile command centre. Multi-Troop Transports in faded red pushed into the gorge, smashing aside exploded derelict Super Tanks like mobile battering rams as they pushed forwards, escorted on either side by Armoured Assault Tanks. Flaming wrecks were unceremoniously crushed under tread as the Legios Cybernetica's armour units advanced on the hive. Arachnus' plethora of crimson photo-receptors winked as the academically inclined assassin droid received a tactical update from Commander Beelzebub. According to the super tactical droid coordinating their assault from the Felstorm, their artillery was already being moved into position and bombardment of the Golbah Hive could soon begin in earnest. Thunder sounded in the distance as the first of the HAGs began to open up.

As Valefor climbed out of the saddle, Arachnus disengaged from the spider-bikes droid socket and crawled on eight razor tipped digits to lurk at the Fabricator General's side. Proton shells detonated against stone battlements, erupting in flaming blasts that buried the entrance to the vehicle garage at its base in a shower of shattered rock. Then the AATs opened up and things really got messy. The Professor looked up at Valefor's winged form, as much in awe of demonic figure as the day he first rolled out of the Dark Forge.

"Nothing like the smell of napalm in the morning, Master." Not that Arachnus actually had a nose to enjoy it.