Harini Bralor
The Mandalorian Assembly
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Affiliation: The Mando'ade
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Post by Harini Bralor on Jun 3, 2023 20:50:09 GMT -8
Norgal-dûr
As he watches the nightmarish abominations of greying, rotten tumor scarred flesh and metal rising from the smoking rubble strewn ruins of the tower, Niall orders his Mandalorian companions to fire on them while falling back to the trees at the edge of the dark forest leading up to the mountains in which the tower had been built. Their jetpacks will have little fuel remaining after the flight to the tower, and though sustaining an aerial assault on the technobeasts that begin hurling rock and stone at them as they emerge from the debris is not possible, taking to the treetops will allow them to gain the high ground and assault the nightmarish mechanical zombies who are armed only with melee weapons with relative impunity.
As their jetpacks flare and their thrusters swivel to take them backwards towards the treetops, Niall and his comrades fire mercilessly down upon the shambling zombie-like technobeasts, streaks of red, green and blue light piercing the smoky haze their fearless mechanical foes emerge from and begin walking, then running after them while sending chunks of rock and stone sailing up and out towards them steadily, occasionally spoiling the aim of the Mando'ade as they fire blaster rifles, rotary blaster cannons and anti-personnel rockets at the horde of obscenities surging after them.
As he drops into the leafy uppermost branches of a tall tree, his comrades doing the same in trees of their own to either side of him, Niall briefly considers taking a moment to reconfigure his A280-CFE into its sniper rifle mode, but as he watches the remaining technobeasts - some now missing limbs or showing exposed muscle and bone as well as wires and cables leaking foul fluids from horrific, gaping wounds that would have felled normal foes - doggedly advancing for the treeline even though blaster bolts and rockets pour relentlessly down on them as the Mandalorians continue firing while dropping into the treetops, he thinks it better to use what time he has before the monstrosities are at the treeline and the possibility of being drawn into a melee battle becomes more certain to continue using its assault rifle configuration.
The Kaden Senaar
Tadgh is sighting in on a buzz droid scuttling like a disturbingly large metal spider across the back of the Kom'rk towards him with its central red eye seeming to stare right at him as it raises its screeching drill cutter and continues speeding at him. Firing his KD-30, Tadgh feels relief wash through him when the slug hits the Pistoeka's glowing red eye and reduces it to bits of inanimate acid scorched metal tinkling and smoking as it rains down on and then slides off the ship.
Before he can take aim for one of the three remaining mechanical pests that he can see sawing or drilling into the starboard wing, center of the cockpit and port side forward mandible of the starfighter, Tadgh hears the fourth droid - which he had lost track of while focusing on the mechanical pest just destroyed - chitter in what sounds suspiciously like mischievous laughter before its saw whirrs and cuts through his grapple line.
Groaning in frustration as Tadgh sails off the back of the Kom'rk, narrowly avoiding being cooked in his armor by the starfighter's flaring engines by activating his jetpack and rolling into an upward spin that saves his life but makes it improbable at best that he will be able to catch back up to the Kaden Senaar in time to help deal with the remaining buzz droids, Ksenia takes the Kom'rk into a stomach churning spin while diving downwards to try and throw some of the pesky Pistoeka's off the ship before they tear it apart even though the maneuver takes her further and further away from the enemy Arquitens.
The Abiik Marev
Conaodh calls out anxiously, ::Enemy fighter on our six! as one of the Shadow Droids that had launched from the Arquitens appears behind them and causes their threat indicator to warble a warning that comes an instant before its first volley of electromagnetic pulse gun fire strikes their shields. Shields down to 45%!! the Bimm cries out in alarm, turning his head to try and get a look at their foe and practically feeling his face go pale beneath his buy'ce as he says in a dread filled tone, Shadow Droid:: Having encountered the Shadow Droid's on Obroa Skai, Conaodh is all too well aware of their capabilities, and even though he knows Harini is a skilled pilot finds himself wishing as icy tendrils of fear begin to worm their way through his usual confident self-assurance that he had been assigned a part on one of the strike teams instead of being put back into a starfighter.
Haar'chak, Harini hisses, knowing that the Shadow Droid's weaponry will overload their Kom'rks electronics if it lands another round or two of electromagnetic pulse gun fire. Banking hard to port while maxing out the fighter's speed to get away from their cyborg pursuer for a moment, Harini tells Conaodh in Mando'a, Get ready with the heat-seekers, adding, and hang on, a bit belatedly as she immediately throttles way back on the Kom'rks speed suddenly while turning back to starboard so that their pursuing foe streaks right past them.
Blinking away the sweat pouring into his eyes beneath his buy'ce, Conaodh sees the Kom'rks crosshairs settling on the Shadow Droid as Harini maneuvers to keep them on its six o'clock after they have exchanged the roles of hunter and hunted with the cyborg, then fires a pair of heat seeking missiles as the joyous pinging of a target lock sounds forth. ::Missiles away,:: Conaodh says, not realizing he then starts to hold his breath as they wait to learn whether or not their foe has been dispatched.
Iron Shrike
Zdzislaw's mistaken assumption that any fighters the Arquitens might deploy would be drawn off by the Kom'rks proves to be a costly one, five of his comrades killed when the Shadow Droid wreathed in smoke and ions emerges ominously like a bird of prey within the cruiser's shields behind them and opens fire with its repeating blaster cannon.
As three of the Mandalorians target the cyborg starfighter with their jetpacks homing missiles and fire them, Zdislaw and the remaining 12 Mandalorians winch rapidly up towards the viewports atop the control tower, kick away from the structure, then blast away at the viewports while they fire their jetpacks thrusters to launch themselves forward.
The almost musical tinkling of the shards of transparisteel shattering and falling to the floor on the bridge accompany the Mandalorians as they crash onto the bridge of the Arquitens, green fog washing out of the ship as it is drawn into the sky outside while, bits of transparisteel crunching and popping beneath their boots, the Mandalorians open fire on the bridge crew. Zdzislaw sends a type-12 A anti-personnel rocket streaking out at the grotesque hulking blob in the command chair as his comrades use their A280 blaster rifles or Z-6 rotary blaster cannons to spray the bridge with deadly lances of blue and green laser fire flitting like the play of lightning in storm clouds through the green fog still swirling around the bridge, aiming for any members of the bridge crew as well as the control consoles or chairs they occupy or seek cover behind; the Mando'ade have not come to take control of the cruiser, but to destroy enough of the ship's vital control systems on the bridge, or kill enough of its crew, to render it inoperable . . . |
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Otto Von Bralor
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That which we cannot destroy, we will defile.
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Post by Otto Von Bralor on Jun 4, 2023 9:09:31 GMT -8
Rockets proved the most effective weapon against the cadaverous chimera of diseased flesh and sacred steel, the explosive force of those blasts proving enough to scatter the animate parts of the technobeasts across the battlefield. Oddly, even after an arm or leg was blown from the pox-scarred chassis of one of these walking nightmares, they still seemed possessed by some shred of animation. A great many went down under the hail of rotary blaster fire, mowed down by searing bolts and the kinetic force that drove them home. Even as the smoke still poured from puncturing rents across their carbon scored surface, those that could began to rise, a marching mass of death incarnate moving at a slow but unrelenting pace. Even as expertly aimed shots took some of them square centre in the forehead, impossibly they continued forwards, the nanogene spore acting like a living virus as it drove its host onwards despite enduring catastrophic wounds that wound have dropped almost any other foe. The only sign of sentient desire in this enslaved fusion of meat and metal was the way their lower jaws drooped, dripping diseased juices from rust ridden teeth, snapping their jaws as they neared.The Mandalorians ranged weaponry and diverse arsenal could not be discounted, however, as half the technobeasts numbers had been felled by the time the marching mass of maggoty mush and blaster blanched iron reached the tree line. The vibrosaws attached to their left wrists roared in a furious chorus as as combination of triangular shaped quadanium steel teeth and bone shards spun faster than the eye could follow, biting into the bark of the trees their foes roosted upon. Sawdust and wooden splinters sprayed in all directions, turned into kindling around the feet of the technobeasts, causing what flesh remain there to sizzle and flake, filling the forest's edge with the scent of burning human. Oblivious to pain, those with damaged saw blades hacked at the base of trees with their other limb, using the entrenching tools adhered to their right wrist stumps like axe blades, hacking and chipping away at wooden trunks without pause. Fatigue was for the living. Still more fell, overwhelming blaster fire finally causing metal skeletons to run hot enough where steel bones wept liquid metal pus. The numbers were almost even at this point, with the technobeasts still having that slight edge, whereas the Mandalorians maintained the advantage of position and weaponry.There was a creak as the mechanical zombies-turned-lumberjacks managed to finally shear through some of the trees, separating trunks from stumps as several towering veshoks began to fall. Timber!
Three homing missiles were more than enough to fell the Shadow Droid stalking the Mandalorians adhered to the Shrike. The first erupted against its shields, nearly overwhelming them as it struck dead centre. When the second hit, the energy barrier shattered and the resulting explosion damaged the droids left wing strut, causing it to list awkwardly to the side. Finally the third and last impacted square in the red visor like slash of lens running horizontally across its body, blasting open its hull and tearing into its mechanical guts. The lobotomized brain serving in place of a droid brain or pilot had just enough time to utter another string of hateful binary before its smoking form descended to the forest below and exploded as it struck the lush green canopy, spilling fire and relec coated steel shrapnel.Eidolon had just enough time to comprehend what had happened when the ceiling above shattered in a shower of transparasteel shards, raining down around his bloated form on the command throne. Screaming blaster fire penetrated the green fog as Captain Skirata's slave cyborg crew became the unwitting victims of the Mandalorians ire. One brave soul even launched a wrist rocket directly at the mutant mass of diseased fat. It exploded in front of the Slug Lord's shaking jowls, detonating against the invisible barrier of a ray shield generated around the Captain of the Iron Shrike. The Mordolorians resident expert at void combat, most didn't expect much from the drooping former human, now little more than a bloated toad of condensed diseased tissue whose very presence offended all that was pure and right in the galaxy. That would be a mistaken assumption. Long before succumbing to the disease that afflicted each and every inhabitant of cursed Xeraxus, Eidolon had once served as the Pzobian coverts champion. As the other eleven heroes in blessed beskar gunned down his subordinates, inflicting quite a bit of damage to the bridge consoles and controls in the process much to the Captain's vexation, Eidolon stared down Zdzislaw. One mini-boss recognizes another. Slow as his plethora of blubbery rolls suggested, he reached one deceptively strong arm behind his throne and dragged into view the large cinderblock sized head of his dynamic hammer, expertly rendered in the hell-forges beneath Runnelsore Keep. The hammer's head radiated a prevailing wrongness, etched with dark imagery depicting an emblazoned eye, crackling with unnatural green lightning as Eidolon thumbed the activation stud on its large Sith iron haft. The hammer's head shrieked in hellish delight, becoming a visible motte of fiendish light as the Captain lifted his bloated mass from his seat.THUMP! The deck seemed to shake as it felt Eidolon's girthsome weight upon it, easily a full ton, possibly more with the large furious hammer held in his fat fingered grip. In that moment the ray shield switched off, exposing the Slug Lord to the same perils his cybernetic slaves endured. Baster bolts peppered his fat flesh, singing where it struck black, but not dropping the mutated Captain."OH HO HO HO!" Boomed his shaking rolls as he vented a laughing croak, wading forwards with hammer in hand, oblivious to damage and danger as he strode towards Zdzislaw. At six and half feet tall and nearly as wide across, the unstoppable mutant mass lumbered towards his foe, sweeping his hammer haphazardly from right to left. So unconcerned was Eidolon that several of his strikes sent his own cybernetic slaves hurling in all directions, his heavy footsteps leaving dents in the deck with every step.
Conaodh target lock was true. Shadow Droids were effective killing machines, versatile, but they had an awful lot of hardware packed into a rather small space. Something had to be given in exchange for its varied arsenal, which in this case was the shields. Both missiles struck, in conscecutive order rather than all at once. The first punched through its deflectors, mostly erupting against it but penetrating just enough to scald its engine nozzles. The second took it right in the arse, causing the cybernetic snubfighter to explode as the missile serving in place of a proctologists finger detonated deep in its metal guts. Its corpse scattered over the forest, what didn't vaporize fell as detritus to the ground below.
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Harini Bralor
The Mandalorian Assembly
Posts: 165
Affiliation: The Mando'ade
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Post by Harini Bralor on Jun 5, 2023 6:34:05 GMT -8
Norgal-dûr
Niall's tree is among the first to succumb to the saws or serrated shovels that cut or hack at its trunk, and as it begins to topple over he uses the last bit of fuel remaining in his jetpack to leap from his perch and sail behind the mangled mechanical horrors that have already turned to shamble after him as he drops to the ground. Dropping into a crouch, Niall fires steady, well aimed bursts of laser bolts from his A280-CFE at the knees of the relentless, maimed and mutilated terrors that have pursued him to slow their advance. ::Gayiylir dayn! Niall shouts to his comrades as three of the nightmarish zombies crumple to the ground and, undeterred by their amputated or shattered lower limbs, begin crawling towards him. Ve'ganir lo ehn jag paru!:: * Spreading out and working in teams, Niall hopes, will give them the best chances of defeating what remains of the horde of technobeasts, making them divide to pursue the Mandalorians and preventing a swarm that could overwhelm them if they were clustered tightly together.
Abiageal, her jetpack currently merely ornamental as its fuel was spent reaching the trees, calls out to two of her comrades in a tree beside hers as the technobeasts hack and slash away at the trunks of their perches, ::Ti ni!:: ** and then, letting her rifle drop to hang from its sling at her side, unsheathes her beskar kal and activates her personal combat shield before dropping to the side of the tree as it begins falling backwards. Blocking a whirring saw with her shield, she drives her beskar dagger into the side of the head of the foul monstrosity wielding it and then leans back to kick it away from her, sending it sprawling to the ground.
Mynah and Dzyun'spitak, dropping to the forest floor in response to Abiageal's summons, find themselves separated from the Lorrdian when six technobeasts shamble away from the stump of the tree they leapt down from before it was cut down and moan as they shamble for the three Mandalorians, saws and serrated entrenching tools raised menacingly as their slack jaws hang open with drool dripping from their lips or gnash in mindless, instinctive anticipation. Mynah, having exchanged her blaster rifle for her beskad, hacks the forearm from one technobeast and then ducks beneath the zombie's other limb as it swings its battered, wood and sap covered entrenching tool at her neck. Rolling forward to move behind the creature, Mynah pivots to give it a bilateral below the knee amputation that sends it toppling forward, the yellowed stumps of its remaining teeth gnashing as it uses its remaining limb to drag itself towards her. Mynah roars out in triumph as she swings her beskad down to behead the technobeast.
::Hiibir gar ca'nara,:: *** Dzyun'spitak, who dispatched three technobeasts with her twin beskar tomahawks, both now dripping with gore, pus, and befouled viscera that also decorates her beskar'gam, in the time it took Mynah to handle one, quips dryly as she gives Abiageal, coming over to join them after sending the remaining two zombies to whatever hell awaits such creatures when their unlife has ended, a nod. Their brief reprieve does not last long, more technobeasts appearing from the trees and shambling towards the trio that ready themselves to meet them.
Another trio of Mandalorians does not find themselves as fortunate as Abiageal and her clanswomen, their screams of pain or terror sounding out over Clan Bralor's encrypted comm frequency as the fall of one - when the whirring saw that he fails to block with his shield buries itself in his side and continues whirring as it cuts through muscle, bone and organs before severing his spine - leads to the fall of his comrades as they are overwhelmed by the seven technobeasts, undeterred by the gaping wounds or missing limbs the trio had given them before their fall, accompanying the one that turned the tide in their little battle - one of the many occurring near the forest's edge as the Mandalorians make their stand against the nightmares that have been unleashed on their homeworld.
Iron Shrike
Zdzislaw, over the sound of blaster bolts and the crackling hisses and pops of exploding consoles and control panels as he and his team continue to mercilessly lay waste to the Arquitens' bridge crew and their ship's nerve center, hears the battle or pained cries of the Mandalorians fighting against the technobeasts on the ground commingled with Ksenia's report that she was forced to land and dispatch the last of the buzz droids that nearly crippled her severely damaged Kom'rk before she could do so, and Harini's report that she is coming around to make an attack run on the Arquitens' shields protecting its engines as he fires a burst from his A280 at a cybernetic bridge crew member that rushes for him.
Berach and Jedrzej, inseparable on the field and off, fight their way side by side to the doors leading from the bridge and seal them before disabling the control panel to temporarily prevent any latecomers to the party from joining the chaos on the bridge, and then put their backs to the doors and engage any mutant cyborgs still remaining alive on the bridge to keep them from trying to force the doors back open.
Along with his own slaves that Eidolon sends sailing away with the swings of his mighty, evil-looking hammer, two Mandalorians that try to rush him with their beskads when blaster bolts seem to be absorbed harmlessly by his disgusting, slime ridden rolls of fat are also swept aside, one with a shattered arm and the other with a broken neck.
Zdzislaw, seeing that the massive, bloated captain of the Arquitens has singled him out, drops his rifle and draws his beskad from its sheath on his back as he readies himself for the clash that it appears he has been chosen to participate in.
The deck seeming to quake beneath his feet as his foe lumbers steadily towards him, Zdzislaw, who at six feet tall is not accustomed to looking up at many of his foes, tilts his neck from one side to the other, hearing it crackle as his hulking foe's shadow grows and seems to creep towards him. Turning his left side towards his advancing foe, Zdislaw points the beskad in his left hand out towards the flabby captain and then, with a sigh that could be bored or simply resigned to whatever will follow his opening gambit, quickly draws his KD-30 from its holster on his right hip, and, firing from the level of his hip in the hopes of his stance concealing the movements of his right hand for as long as possible, sends two acid filled rounds at his foe, one at the portly hulk's left knee and the other at his left. The likelihood of the acid filled rounds crippling the hulk, Zdzislaw gauges from the way the captain has shrugged off blaster bolts so far, is unlikely, but as he will almost certainly need any advantage he can find or create if he has any hopes of standing against the grotesque, gargantuan blob, Zdzislaw figures that even if the slugs only hinder the blob's movements they will have been worth taking the time to fire he could have used instead for a melee attack.
* Spread out! Get into three-man formations!
** With me!
*** Take your time |
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Otto Von Bralor
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Post by Otto Von Bralor on Jun 8, 2023 7:35:09 GMT -8
As the bridge doors of the Iron Shrike were sealed from the inside, the ravenous chimeric hordes outside beat on the blast door with pus slick fists and mechanical digits. Clambering out of just about every nook and cranny, they poured into the hall, funneled towards the locked bridge where the sheer mass of their numbers began to press against the blast doors surface. Amazingly, the frame began to groan. Metal shrieking from spinning saw blades grinding on the thick set doors could just be heard from inside the bridge, over the chorus of blaster fire as the last of the functional consoles exploded in sparking ruin, bleeding electrical smoke that mingled with the obscuring trihelxon fog. The controls now inoperable, there was no one to stop the slow dip of the Arquitens wedge shaped prow as it began to angle towards the forest below. Essential systems began to fail ship wide as the over taxed rakatan power core at the heart of the sinister vessel began to reach critical mass. The inertial compensators flickered off, exposing everyone aboard the ship to the momentum of its acceleration, forced to adjust their stance as the floor began to angle downwards.
There was nothing that would save the ship at this point, not that its Captain was paying that much attention. Eidolon's toad like laugh croaked over the insidious energies crackling around the head of his hammer after dispatching the two Mandalorians that had rushed him, finally squaring up with his intended foe. "OH HO HO...ARG!" His evil chortling was cut short as he felt a sharp sting in his knees, followed by a consistent scalding sizzle as acid ate away at his flesh. Enraged and engaged as he was, the wounds were fly bites to him, filling his phlegm filled nostrils with the scent of his own frying flesh. They stalled his charge as he staggered, his weight pressing down on the wounds, but there was so much momentum behind him now that even the pain was not enough to stop his advance. He raised the massive hammer's crackling head high over his own in a two-handed grip, fully exposing his prestigious gut, even as acid ate away at the bone of his knee caps.
Unlike his brothers he did not see their affliction as a curse. Its why he had never sought to slow the advance of the rot, nor replace diseased tissue with cybernetics. He embraced this change, recognizing it for what it was: a blessing. Before the change he had never possessed this sort of endurance, even if it had cost him his good looks.
"For Gorgoth!" He roared, spraying foul spittle as the hammer's head glowed with a sickly green light. "For the Eye!" Traitors though they technically were, it never hurt to cover all your bases.
With a bellowing roar as he stumbled into range of his opponent, even as his knees sluiced sizzling juices down his soiled blaster burnt shins, he swung the pestilent dynamic hammer downwards. An overhead vertical strike not aimed for Zdzislaw, but through him. Eidolon committed to the hammer swing as the ground tilted beneath their feet, aiming for the floor between his enemy's legs, rather than at him directly.
Against any other foe, the slow unrelenting horde of technobeasts might have proved too much. Infected with nanogene spore, a single bite could prove the end of most of their victims. Against armoured Mandalorians with suits that provided some protection against the elements, however, their threat was somewhat diminished. In order to spread, they'd first need to pull their heroic enemies from their beskar shells. Additionally, with Vitrius down for the count, there was no one to coordinate their efforts, meaning these horrific mutant machine men were essentially acting on their baser urges and instincts.
Another interesting development, the beskar alloy the Mandalorians employed in their weapons proved extremely effective against the creature, almost as if the pure iron was anathema to these foul diseased denizens. Where blaster bolts failed, beskads easily cut through metal cabling, spilling rancid offal, but also causing their enemies to immolate. Everywhere beskar struck, the technobeasts erupted in silver flame, as though the alloy harvested from the ancestral home-world of the Mandalorian people spiritually repelled these undead automatons. Switching to close quarters combat turned the tide more effectively than their initial assault even, for technobeasts struck down with a beskar blade did not seem to rise again. The numbers arrayed against the beleaguered protagonists began to dwindle until only a slow bleeding trickle of creatures came at them, and even these quickly fell.
As the dust settled over the shattered tower and the last of the technobeasts met the true death, an explosive blast rang out from the black mountain in the background, still choking the sky with the stench of sulphur and brimstone. A cloud of smoke and dust belched from the entrance of the mine as something explosive was clearly set off inside.
At the base of the tower, Vitrius' ragged coughing gave away his position, with his legs still trapped beneath a massive stone block that had more than likely squished them into a meaty pâté. There were claw marks on the ground where his gloved hands still reached for his ruinous blade, the Lepur's Kiss, still inches from the tips of his fingers. He didn't have long, his skin had quite literally fused to his armour after being engulfed in blaster fire and subject to explosive blasts. Still he clung on to life, his hate the only thing keeping him going. Perhaps something could be gleaned from this general of Otto's, or perhaps his foes wouldn't care enough to interrogate him. Either way, his coughing and clawing at the ground was likely to be noticed by someone.
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Harini Bralor
The Mandalorian Assembly
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Post by Harini Bralor on Jun 9, 2023 1:56:56 GMT -8
Norgal-dûr
Flicking his beskar kal to clean some of the putrid filth the silver flames accompanying the end of the last technobeast he had dispatched by driving the short dagger up beneath it's chin had not burned away, Niall finishes cleansing the blade before sheathing it on his hip as Abiageal, standing near where the aru'e * who had first engaged them as they flew towards the tower, somehow still clinging to life despite the extensive wounds he has suffered, lays partially buried in the rubble, calls out to him, ::Ibic solus cuyir su oyayc.:: **
Niall tells one group of his Mando'ade to begin searching for Cian and Kayle's bodies, not wanting to leave them here in this foul place, and sends another to investigate the still smoking site of the explosion that boomed out as the battle with the technobeasts came at last to an end, and then walks over to where Vitrius coughs and claws for a blade just out of his reach. Niall studies the mortally wounded figure briefly, wondering if he and Otto chose their armor as a way to try and infiltrate Manda'yaim despite their brazen audacity in building a base of operations that so clearly pronounced their ill intent, or to mock those they had come to visit rack and ruin upon, before contemptuously kicking the sword further away from the dying warrior's questing, ruined fingers and kneeling down out of his reach. Speaking in Galactic Basic Standard to ensure he is understood, Niall waves a hand around to indicate the ruined tower and the mountainous lands that have been despoiled by these armored mockeries of Mando'ade and their foul technobeasts, asking first, simply, ::Why? There is nothing Niall can threaten the dying warrior with other than more pain, and has only a quicker, more merciful end to his suffering than he deserves to offer, and so he draws his KD-30 from it's holster so the warrior can see it and the release it offers as he asks more plainly, What were you hoping to accomplish here? Turning his head towards where the explosion came from, his comrades still making their way towards it, Niall asks, How many of your people survived the fall of the tower? Adding a final question, he reveals that the events today have been linked to the recent attack on Obroa-Skai when he asks, What were you looking for on Obroa-Skai?::
Iron Shrike
Berach and Jedrzej move to either side of the doors when they hear the pounding of the bodies and fists against the sealed doors they stand watch over, joined all too soon by the unsettling, hellish shrieks of saws being employed to allow whatever horrors have emerged from the bowels of the ship to burst onto the bridge of the severely crippled vessel, which, even as Berach and Jedrzej raise their weapons and prepare to engage them should they succeed in forcing their way in, begins to dip downwards.
The other Mandalorians on the bridge, having dispatched all but the doomed vessel's captain, begin moving behind cover to help Berach and Jedrzej should the doors give way before Zdzislaw, facing off against the grotesque giant that has yet to succumb to any wound he has sustained, gives the order to abandon the ship before it crashes into the forest it begins slowly plummeting towards. One of the Mandalorians, perhaps thinking more clearly than his comrades, goes to the command chair, they only thing still relatively untouched as it had been protected by the ray shield when the battle for the bridge began, to see if there is any way to access the ship's logs and learn more of their foes origins or intentions.
Zdzislaw lunges forward swiftly when the bloated, cackling, ponderous captain of the Arquitens raises his hammer and exposes his wobbling, portly belly, the beskad in Zdzislaw's left hand slashing at the exposed area from right to left even though he cannot be sure his blade will cut deeply enough to reach the blob's vital organs nestled beneath the slime coated rolls of fat and the muscle they cover. Using the momentum of the beskad's journey to carry him with a dancer's grace into his next movements, Zdzislaw nimbly steps to his left as the hammer hisses down through the air to crash into the floor where he had been standing when firing the acid rounds into the captain's hefty knees, his escape so narrow that, were it not for the black and gray buy'ce, dotted with his foe's spittle, covering his face, he would have felt the whoosh of air accompanying the mighty downward blow of the hammer.
Feeling the tremor rippling forth from the hammer's impact against the deck in his feet, Zdzislaw raises his beskad to the level of his shoulder and plants his right foot as he brings his left around so that he turns to face the captain's side and swings his blade out on a horizontal angle for the base of his foe's neck with enough surgical precision and force that, he hopes, it will cleave through the layers of fat and sever the cervical nerves beneath, paralyzing the blob's arms or, if he is truly fortunate, killing him by paralyzing the chest muscles needed for breathing.
* enemy
** this one is still alive |
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Otto Von Bralor
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That which we cannot destroy, we will defile.
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Post by Otto Von Bralor on Jun 13, 2023 7:42:48 GMT -8
When the dust settled at the mine, those investigating the scene would find the shaft had collapsed ten meters in, presenting a wall of fallen stone and debris that continued to shake as the volcanic mountain vented its awakened tectonic fury. Of the Mordolorians there was no sign, as they were likely buried deep beneath the unstable surface by their own actions. The explosion had triggered further instability, causing cracked shale to sweep down the sides of the black mountain's slope in rockslides of sharpened stone and dragon glass.It was hard to think through the pain, it was constant. Vitrius' hissed through scorched lips concealed by his still smoking helm as Niall kicked the sword well out of his reach. So much for dying with a sword in his hand. It was all he could do to look up as the Mandalorian knelt out of reach and questioned him. He had thought his affliction the worst sort of agony, but little else compared to having been cooked inside his armour. Flesh peeled away in charred flakes from pus oozing burns as he lifted his neck. His words came in a hoarse whisper, his lungs full of ash and blood."Obroa-Skai...ugh." A pained shudder wracked his ruined body. An expanding numbness was spreading from his lower half, almost soothing as his body struggled through stages of shock. "We found it. A cure, heh, that's what He called it. A way to purify our failing bodies." Slowly, for every movement carried with it a new wave of physical suffering, he reached his gloves to his steaming helmet and pulled it off his head. Exposed to the black and orange sky overhead was a hideously disfigured pox scarred head, the pale skin of his neck quite literally fused to the body glove underneath that had melted painfully to his flesh. Filthy brown fumes seeped from the top of his chest piece. "See for yourself." He grit his rot blackened teeth in a pain induced grimace. A milky ichor dripped from the corners of his eyes, pus in place of tears. "We are Afflicted, but soon the Reaper Prime will spread his Cure to all of Mandalore. That is why we came. We Mordolorians are the vanguard for his legions..." He wheezed, finding it harder to fill his ruined lungs with each struggled breath. "...and when Otto discovers the whereabouts of Mandalore's lost Infinity Gate, the diseased denizens of Xeraxus will spill over this world in a pestilent tide."A wet rip sounded as Vitrius clawed at the ground, the pulped meat of his legs tearing as he tried to pull himself closer to Niall, black sputum frothing on his lips. "A final offering to It before the Reaper Prime ascends to take his place...as the new Plague Lord." Had Vitrius not been so delirious with pain, he perhaps might not have revealed so much of their nefarious plan. There was little else to be gleaned from fallen Commander Woves, as his eyes were possessed with the fire of a mad zealot.
Bloated diseased flesh parted before Zdzislaw's beskad like a lightsaber blade through blue butter, spilling open Eidolon's enormous fat gut onto the deck at his feet in a sluicing eruption of stomach acid that sloshed across the floor as his wicked hammer struck the ground in an explosion of expanding shrapnel shards, scattering in all directions from the sheer kinetic force of the blow. Having a similar effect on the unclean energies permeating the chimeric Captain Skirata's bulbous plague-ridden form as it had with the technobeasts, at the touch of blessed beskar, silver flame erupted along the edges of his gaping wound. This even the disgusting giant's rot numbed nerves seemed to feel, shrieking an inhumane wail that encouraged the techno-hordes at the door. The dulled rusted edge of a technobeast entrenching tool finally managed to penetrate the blast doors seam, scraping down the centre in a grinding of sparks, just as Zdzislaw's follow up stroke bit into the back of the crazed mutant brute's neck. So thickened with filth covered fat, even such an impressive sword stroke was not enough to entirely sever his neck, only sinking half way. It did cleave through spine and nerves, effectively paralyzing Eidolon in place as he massive frame hunched forwards, sausage fingers still wrapped around the haft of his hammer buried in the deck.The Mandalorian accessing the command throne would have found coordinates for a deep space facility in the Unknown Regions, simply referred to as Terminus, the last place the Iron Shrike had stopped on its journey to Mandalore. There was little data available about the facility, though studying the Holo-Net would reveal it to be a former mining outpost and fuel refinery built into a hollowed out asteroid, with many a rumour circulating about its current use now as a haunt for all manner of fiends. Pirates, smugglers, renegades, and slavers...a veritable villains buffet where one might find a clue as to location of cursed Xeraxus.Further and further down its nose dipped, as the Arquitens picked up speed as it headed towards the surface, seconds away from crashing. All Eidolon could do was hunch in place, drowning on his own blood as the veshok trees of the forest floor reached towards him.
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Harini Bralor
The Mandalorian Assembly
Posts: 165
Affiliation: The Mando'ade
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Post by Harini Bralor on Jun 14, 2023 7:42:33 GMT -8
Norgal-dûr
Niall feels his blood run cold as he listens to the fallen Mordolorian's replies to his questions. As mad as the dying warriors claims sound, Niall thinks there is an undeniable tang of, if not truthfullness, then certainly conviction in his voice. The look of disgust on Niall's face when the Mordolorian reveals the malformed, disease ridden countenance previously concealed by the warrior's helm when it is removed to provide evidence of the affliction he suffers from and had sought and found a cure for on Obroa-Skai is hidden beneath the impassive T-visor of Niall's buy'ce, and the mounting sense of dread that he feels as what the Mordolorian has already revealed of the plan he was a part of only grows ever more dire with every pained word that escapes from the warrior's cracked lips.
::An offering to what? Niall asks, his tone no longer as detached as it had been before, desperation to learn as much as he can coupled with the hint of unease entering into it now as he tries to wrest all he can from the fallen Mordolorian before he succumbs to his grievous injuries and takes any more answers he might have along with him into whatever fate awaits him when death claims him at last. Almost shouting now, Niall asks, What . . .::
Abiageal, seeing what Niall does not as the Mordolorian's pain has reached the level where speaking is no longer possible, tells her comrade, ::He's done, Niall. Put him out of his misery.::
Dropping his head for a moment as he accepts that he will learn no more from the Mordoloran, Niall fulfills the silent promise he made when unholstering his KD-30, lifting his head and firing three acid filled rounds into the back of the warrior's head. Standing up and holstering his Dissuader, Niall says, ::We need to gather the Clans. This is more than we can handle alone. Looking towards where the Mandalorians he had sent to the mines are returning, Niall tells Abiageal, Report in to Torin, tell him everything we heard.::
The report from the Mandalorians he had sent to the mines gives Niall no comfort, the fact that the surviving Mordolorians are now beyond their reach given that the blast sealing the mine's entrance has destabilized the mountain, leaving them free to continue their search for the lost infinity gate dispelling any hope here may have been that this battle would have ended the threat which has been revealed. Looking towards the ruins of the tower, too unstable to make a search for any additional intelligence that might be left within its shattered and broken walls possible until they can bring out the equipment a safe excavation will require, Niall waves Mynah over and instructs her to gather their surviving comrades up and wait for any orders Torin might give to Abiageal.
Iron Shrike
Zdzislaw frees his blade from the back of the gargantuan, bloated captain of the Arquitens' neck, watching the silver flames dancing along the edges of the wound and then looking down at the beskar sword in his hand to see more pearlescent flames flickering in the ichor dripping from it. Before Zdzislaw has long to contemplate the meaning of the flames, however, he hears Berach calling out to him that they need to leave now or go down with the enemy ship.
Issuing the order to abandon the Arquitens, Zdzislaw activates his jetpack and takes flight, sailing out of the shattered viewport in time to see the ship has begun to shear the topmost branches from the trees in the forest below. The other Mandalorians follow suit, one carrying the body of their comrade who fell to the mighty hammer of the Arquitens' captain, and sail away from the ship as the crackling of trees broken beneath the weight of the doomed ship grows louder as it descends towards the ground waiting to meet it.
Zdzislaw turns in midair to watch the final moments of the Arquitens' plummet, the orange and yellow flames accompanying the ferocious explosion that announces its violent meeting with the forest floor reflected in the dark T-visor of his buy'ce as he hovers for a moment before contacting Harini to have her do a pass over the crash site to make a sensor sweep to ensure that nothing has survived the crash, and then has his comrades drop to the ground a safe distance from the crash to await whatever news Harini has once the sensor sweep has been completed. |
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Otto Von Bralor
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That which we cannot destroy, we will defile.
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Post by Otto Von Bralor on Jun 26, 2023 14:38:21 GMT -8
Hellish green lightning crackled around the stolen rakatan power core at the heart of the Iron Shrike as it pitched nose first towards the forest floor, its sinister smoke wreathed hull screaming a final cry of wretchedness before it slammed into the ground and erupted in a massive fireball as its overcharged engines propelled it its the Mandalorian shield. As its dying heart finally detonated, an unnatural spark pulsed from the expanding shock wave, briefly brightening the night sky with a bright flash of sorcerous light. The last of the trihexalon gas vented out from the dying wreck as black carcinogenic smoke wept from angry orange flames that roasted the Arquitens diseased skeleton, burning up some of the toxic gas into less harmful pollutants. Nothing living, or dead for that matter, survived the crash. Captain Eidolon Skirata's bloated corpse was vaporized into oblivion, his soul already condemned to chaos where it would be feasted upon by the dark denizens of that malefic dimension. Meat turned to cinder as the technobeasts were flash broiled, cooking circuits and sterilizing the nanogene spore as the microscopic bots boiled into mercury.
Even the Iron Shrike's corpse was a spiteful thing, whatever poisons it contained seeping into the ground acting as coals beneath it, releasing radioactive particulate as its hazardous fuel continued to pump contaminated ash into the clouds grown heavy with waiting black rain. Trees wilted and died, the grass yellowed before flaking away. Any animals caught in the region were considered fortunate if they chocked to death on their own blood, the alternative was far worse. What couldn't be so easily seen was the tidal wave of suffering released when that predator of the hyperlanes was finally put to rest, a legacy of rape and pillage brought to bloody conclusion by a destined foe. The tormented souls that clung to the chimeric techno-beasts were set free in that resulting destruction, no longer cursed to an agonized existence as unwilling slaves.
Of the Mordolorians there was no sign. With the death of Vitrius and Eidolon, along with the brothers whose rotten corpses now served a sort of ironic mortar for the collapsed stones of crumbling Norgal-dûr, their remaining presence above the surface was reduced to zero. The furious black mountain behind the broken tower continued to belch fire as the ground quaked and in places cracked, hissing scalding sulphuric fumes as flaming rocks and burning glops fell from the sky. The unnaturally birthed volcano was an attempt at recreation, a copy of Mt. Offalrot on plagued Xeraxus, minus the Plague Monks that lived in the caves that pitted its canker crusted slopes. Shale and streams of glowing red rock spilled down the sides of the mountain, the terrain utterly inhospitable.
The last sign of these sinister imitation Mandalorians had been when two of their number dragged Otto's screaming torso inside the mines, the change no doubt taking him in the depths below. After the mines collapse, it was anyone's guess what was happening beneath the ground, but judging by the way the earth continued to shake it involved seismic charges. A lot of seismic charges.
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Harini Bralor
The Mandalorian Assembly
Posts: 165
Affiliation: The Mando'ade
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Post by Harini Bralor on Jun 27, 2023 8:49:42 GMT -8
Norgal-dûr
Walking over to where Niall is standing and pensively looking at the ruins of the tower and the unnatural yet active volcano behind it, Abiageal claps her clansman on the shoulder as she says in Mando'a, ::These shebs'palon'e sure do like to shit on other people's lawns, don't they?:: Having been present during the fighting on Obroa-skai and witnessed the catastrophic damage their foes left in their wake, Abiageal suspects that they may have gotten off lightly in so far as the thwarted advance force assault on Manda'yaim is concerned; though given that some of the enemy forces survived and are burrowing deep underground as they search for the lost Infinity Gate, she knows that she cannot rest easy until the threat represented by the Mordolorians and their quest for the Gate has been dealt with in a decisive, final way.
Nodding, Niall turns away from the blight that the Mordolorians have visited upon Manda'yaim, telling Abiageal, ::We're lucky Cian and Kayle came across them when they did. Could have been a lot worse. Moving on from the subject of their enemy's tendency to leave their stain upon anywhere they set foot, Niall asks, What are Torin's orders?::
Abiageal, her A280 hanging from its sling in a patrol ready position, rests a gloved hand on the barrel as she tells Niall, ::We are clear to return to Norg Bral. Ksenia is inbound now, just finished repairing the Kaden Senaar, and Harini is picking up Zee's team to bring them back home too. Torin's got our fleet in orbit doing sensor sweeps to try and find out where the surviving Mordolorians are, and will start regular combat air patrols in atmosphere to increase the range of the sweeps, but, she sighs, with the interference from the terrain and some crap about mineral composition I didn't really follow, isn't too hopeful we will find them unless we get a better idea of where they are heading to look for the Infinity Gate. He's having an excavation team sent out to go through the ruins of the tower to see if anything of intelligence value can be recovered. Turning to watch as Ksenia's Kom'rk approaches and begins setting down, Abiageal punches Niall's shoulder and says, C'mon, let's get out of here. Place gives me the creeps::
Once Ksenia has set the Kaden Senaar down, Niall and the surviving members of his strike team board the vessel and begin the journey back to Norg Bral, the trip a predominantly silent one as they all remember their fallen comrades and think of the battles surely to come in the future as their foes continue their campaign to find the Infinity Gate in their quest to invade Manda'yaim from Xeraxus.
Near (but not too near) Iron Shrike Crash Site
After Harini's sensor sweep confirms that there are no survivors of the Arquiten's final flight, Zdzislaw has her set the Abiik Marev down so that he and those of his troops that survived the successful assault on the Iron Shrike can begin the journey back to Norg Bral. Having heard of the information recovered from the enemy ship's systems, Zdzislaw suspects that he and his squad have a journey to the Unknown Regions to search for Terminus in their near future; if they are to have any hope of defeating their enemy, Zdzislaw knows that they will need all the intel they can get their hands on, and all of the help they can get - the latter issue something Torin hopes the call he plans to put out to the leaders of the other Clans will help secure them.
Stopping to take a last look at the crash site in the distance, another mar upon Manda'yaim's surface the Mordolorians have left in their wake, Zdzislaw briefly wonders there was another way he could have handled the threat represented by the Arquiten's, but as he turns to board the Abiik Marev he consoles himself with the thought of what could have transpired had the Iron Shrike been allowed to get anywhere near Norg Bral or other inhabited areas. |
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Otto Von Bralor
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That which we cannot destroy, we will defile.
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Post by Otto Von Bralor on Aug 3, 2023 13:04:45 GMT -8
Location: Somewhere Beneath the Ruins of Norgal-dûr Tremors rained down dirt and ash on the fire blackened T-visor helm of Amyntor Kryze as the Mordolorian sergeant made his way through a poorly lit corridor hewn from the earth by the rusted claws of cybernetic mockeries of unlife, what the galaxy knew and rightfully feared as techo-beasts, the spawn of Belisarius Vilebroth. Treacherous was their new home beneath the surface, as sulphuric fissures and great rents in the planet's crust opened at infrequent intervals thanks due in part to the terrible toil taken place even further down, where titanic explosions from seismic charges burrowed ever deeper into the very heart of Mandalore, tapping into the geothermal flow where molten iron ran like water along riverbeds of shale and dragon glass. Lit candles of congealed human fat wept greasy wisps of smoke that settled into a haze, obscuring Amyntor's vision as he stepped through puddles of tallow to approach the guarded door of his master's lair. Two of his brethren stood between him and the Spider's sanctum, similarly garbed in carbon scored suits of Sith iron fashioned in a mimicry of the warriors they planned to supplant. Leaf headed spears with serrated tips atop barbed poles crossed before the door in front of him, arresting his walk as he took a moment to allow his visored glare to linger on either guard."Step aside!" Snarled Amyntor hatefully, resting his own spiked gauntlet on the jeweled hilt of the falchion sheathed on his hip. A relic of his fathers, like much of the personal gear and effects of his people, all passed down from one generation to the next in the Pzobian covert. Crafted by the zealot hands of hannite craftsmen in the hellforges beneath the Black Temple, the sword was imbued with a sliver of the old magics, transforming a simple lump of iron into a ruinous blade of unrivaled sharpness. Behind his helm, Amyntor's lips peeled back to bare rotten teeth as he dared either of the two guards to try him.He liked his chances. "Our brothers grow tired of waiting. The Spider will provide answers. Now step aside, lest you taste the bite of Butchersbreath." Unwavering even in the face of a blooded champion of the sergeants calibre, both guards dropped into combat stances with spear hafts in hand and poisoned tips already pointed at the joints of his armour where the coverage of his plate was limited. Snorting arrogantly, Amyntor drew his foul falchion from its oaken scabbard with a grating metallic scrape, performing a flippant flourish with Butchersbreath as he took it in both hands and bent his knees into a combat stance."Good." He cackled blackly. "I was hoping that was your answer. Now who dies first? Hmmm?" Enough. Sounded an unfamiliar voice, absent emotion in tone with an almost synthetic quality to it, as though spoken from the vocabulator of a droid. Let him pass.With some reluctance, both guards eased out of their aggressive postures and stood off to either side, spears held at their sides now rather than in the sergeants way. When it was clear he wasn't getting the fight he was hoping for, Amyntor returned his falchion to its scabbard with a derisive snort and stepped past both sentinels, swaggering arrogantly into the abode of Otto Von Bralor.Inside was another earthen chamber hewn from rock, though it was fair to say the shadows held greater sway here than in the poorly lit corridor leading up to the weaponsmith's inner sanctum. Amyntor was forced to rely on his helm's prey-sight, witnessing the room in the infrared spectrum, which only served to further confound his vision as the stifling heat of the master's domain was oppressive even through Amyntor's environmentally sealed body-glove. Through the murk the sergeant could just make out a figure on the far side of the room, seated in a grizzly looking throne that appeared to have been artfully crafted from discarded bones and repurposed sinew. Even Amyntor, who was no stranger to offensive odors like every other plague stricken citizen of blighted Xeraxus, was nearly knocked flat by the overwhelming stench of death that assailed him as he entered. A prevailing sense of wrongness wore at his warriors spirit; he could practically taste the sorcerers spore, an infectious rot of the soul. Not one to give into fear easy, the sergeant was surprised to find his trembling fingers fumbling for the human-hide bound handle of Butchersbreath, seeking succour in its presence."Do you intend to use that...trinket, against me, Amyntor?" Growled an inhumane voice from the shadows, accompanied by metallic clicks and the hissing of pneumatic joints. "Very bold, if not exceptionally bright. Heh heh heh."Mustering his courage, the sergeant took another step forwards, removing his hand from the handle of his sword to cup it over his T-visor, as though doing so would allow him to pierce the darkness. As he squinted, his diseased eyes beheld a small table next to the morbid throne, upon which rested the cadmium green helmet of their leader."Of...of course not! I merely seek answers, Otto. Obroa-Skai is now behind us and the conquest of Concord Dawn is well underway, yet here we remain, buried like corpses waiting to rot. We should be up on the surface bringing the war to our weak blooded brethren."From the shadows, the figure on the throne moved, shifting just beyond visible sight. Amyntor felt the leprous lesions of his pox scarred flesh itch as the creature focused its attention on him. It was almost impossible to describe. The closest comparison he could think of was to be a fly trapped in the web of some venomous arachnid, he stood at the mercy of a greater predator. The voice spoke again, spoken aloud and broadcast in his helm simultaneously, screeching with static distortion."Otto. That was the name my cruel hearted father gave me, but it is not the name you call me when you think I can not hear. What was it?" Leaning forwards in its cadaverous seat, a terror inducing visage revealed itself to Amyntor's horrified eyes, causing the already trembling sergeant to back away towards the door. "Oh that's right. Spider. Heh heh heh."Peeling from the darkness came four slender metallic legs like the limbs of some cybernetic arachnid, raising the broken figure on the throne from his seat to hover over the blood and bone strewn floor of Otto's chamber. Those long razor edged limbs appeared to sprout from the Mordolorian covert master's armoured backside, while the augmetics replacing his natural limbs seemed to dangle loosely from his hunched over torso. But his face, that was truly a cursed sight to witness. Gone was the weaponsmith's pox scarred features, replaced by a thin layer of synthskin that tore at the edges where cybernetic components thrust through, protruding from his false flesh like mechanical cankers. No more was his rot blackened mouth filled with toothy nubs, but his expression had been stretched into a rictus grin baring a mouth replete with gleaming metallic fangs from which a venomous ichor wept, steaming in caustic puddles on the floor. Haunting, corpse-grey eyes, rheumy with tears of pus that ran down surgically sutured cheeks beheld him with its reapers glare, accompanied by six hatefully blaring crimson photo-receptors. The monstrous figure of nightmare and steel given physical form lurched forwards, exposing the frail cadmium green body at its sinister centre. A pale silver flame rippled from its mechanical right arm, where the beskar axe of the hero Kayle Bralor remained firmly embedded in the cybernetic creature's metal bones, waging a silent war against the nanogene spore that threatened to consume it."Behold, Amyntor, this is the Reaper Prime's blessing. I offer it to you freely." Amyntor's armoured backside bumped into the door as he continued to step back all the way to the borders of the Spider's sanctum, his gauntlet encased hands pulling desperately on the handle of the door only to find it barred against him. Sparks and acrid steam hissed from the monstrous mechanical arachnid's joints as it crossed the room towards the sergeant, it fangs like daggers elongating to form sword blades in its mouth, spread apart as it sought to sink them in Amyntor's diseased flesh."AAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!" |
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Post by RandomMandoNPC on Jul 27, 2024 23:22:23 GMT -8
==Marev Bastion, North of Keldabe==
The whine and hum of repulsors droned about the bastion as various members of the Aliit went about their duties.
The Engineer Corps had been tasked with constructing additional hangar bays now that they had finished the reconstruction of the ruined structures as well as gotten the new family homesteads up and running.
A small lake nearby provided plenty of good fish.
A ways out into the forest, between the mountain and Marev Bastion, a section of forest 9km in diameter had been cordoned off to begin the first experiments on introducing Wroshyr trees to Mandalore's ecology. The Wookies that had come back on that trip were a surprise to the whole aliit, but the wookies had thrown in with assisting in the reconstruction without ever being asked. The Tree Carer's had been led to the forests to select the site for the experiment, and had taken up residence within the zone as soon as it was selected. The saplings that had been brought back remained in stasis within the bastion itself awaiting word from the Tree Carer's that they were needed. An interesting side effect of the Wookie's sudden arrival within the aliit was that the translation software Aloriya had bought was quickly picked up by most in order to manage the language barrier. It was discovered that three Mando'ade knew some small amount of Shriiwook, and they were immediately put to work as full time translators, while they began teaching a course in the language at night which a fair number attended.
Though the bastion itself protruded from the forest so as to be visible from the air, the rest of the homes and farms were far less obvious. The Farmers had some small fields for those grains we needed in great quantity, these largely could have been mistaken for natural clearings in the forest. A seldom few homes even stood entirely on the surface, most were either half sunken into the ground, or had little more than their roof sitting above the ground, the tops of which were covered with a foot of soil and some native foliage to assist in camouflaging the buildings from the air. A good number of the old houses had tunnels connecting them so that members of the aliit could move about the bastion without the need to expose themselves on the surface. The Engineer Corps had insisted that this be standard on all new constructions around the bastion, and they were working on the designs of the hangars in conjunction with the tunnels in order to ensure that there was an efficient evacuation route to reach the ships quickly.
As soon as the bastion had been rebuilt, the aliit had begun to ship down all the excess spare parts that had been held on the fleet. Mando'ade began to rework and modify their armor at the Triple Forge in the heart of the Bastion. Weapons were modified, and the armory's stockpiles began to grow again. Logistics and Maintenance droids split their time between the bastion and whichever ships of the fleet remained in orbit above the bastion at any given time. All ordinance transfers were conducted by a team which included a Battle Legionaire unit, a Strill and its accompanying beastmaster, two wookies, and two humans.
Some of the Wookies hadn't stayed long, They had found passage out of the system on some of our ships. The rest seemed keen on at least sticking around. About 30 of them had decided they wanted to join the aliit as Mandalorians. It was from this number that the Ordinance Transfer Team picked. Only two were chosen because of their size. It was going to take about twice as much Beskar to forge their armor. Once that had been completed though, everyone had to agree that a wookie in full Bes'kar'gam was a chilling sight to behold. There had been mutterings when it was learned that the armorers had chosen to incorporate crushgaunts into the Wookie's armor. Everyone wanted to see what a wookie with crushgaunts was capable of.
The rumor still circulated that Dral was looking for a contact that could get him a Rancor shipped to Mandalore for a hunt. A suitable location had been chosen with no nearby populations for the Rancor to be deposited in.
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