Generator Room ( [member="Onyx"], [member="Diamond"] )
Allies: [member="Jessica Matthews"], [member="Kaili Talith"], [member="Rekha Kaarde"], [member="Allyson Locke"], [member="Audren Sykes"], [member="Muad Dib"], @Everyone else
Kurayami chuckled as Jessica regained her footing. He watched as she got her helmet back in place and put it back in place on her head.
"No need for thanks. It has been a bit since I had to really work as part of a team in this capacity. However, what you say about the bridge between the gods and men is true. It is a powerful thing indeed, far moreso than we know, but many times the simple solutions end up being the best. I've only managed to live this long by learning to balance reliance on the Force with reliance on other means. I am not claiming that it doesn't lead to mistakes and overconfidence at times, yet even then I've managed to scrape by...usually just barely."
What she said about being clear headed for what was coming next...that would seem to be the definition of irony as he watched how the gas started to affect those around him who had been exposed to enough of it. Clear headed would not be his chosen description of them at this point. Especially the lady who damn near shot herself with her own blaster. Poor girl, gotta be some serious mental issues there. There was talk of the lever having been found in one of the turrets. Well that looked like a bit of a bright spot in this hell hole.
And then everything went dark. His first reaction was to utilize an overlay on his HUD of a combination of low light amplification, infrared, and bioscanner data. It would at least let him see a bit better than others. He sighed as the mechanical dog seemed to get angry at someone, then howl. Also what [member="Archim Calixis"] did to the dog, well he wouldn't dwell on that idea. The two who had appeared with the dog seemed to be dark side aligned in some way. Not that he cared particularly. The man was used to working with people whose moral compass was best compared to a roulette wheel.
A low grinding noise became apparent, and by the sound of it it was moving something rather heavy. Eventually he noticed that the hallway seemed to be getting longer...wait no, not the hallway. The blast door was opening to welcome them deeper into the complex. While all that happened, he quickly reloaded the pistols with ion rounds, and made sure both underbarrel launchers had ion grenades loaded. A smirk played over the Corellian's features as he did this, the memory from how he had earned his first class bloodstripes quickly erasing that.
It was a routine patrol. Boring as usual, escorting drunks home, making sure any bar room fights were broken up, checking ID's of ships in the spaceport or those wanting to enter. Normal every day drudgery. It was near the end of the shift that the call came about an unidentififed freighter having landed nearby, on the outskirts of Coronet. He had volunteered to go check the disturbance. When he asked who would be with him the assurance was that all nearby units would be dispatched. He pushed the throttle of the old landing craft up to military power as he made his way toward the indicated point of interest. An eternity seemed to pass in the few minutes it took him to reach the freighter. Once he had done so the place looked like a set for a really bad B-level horror film. The ship hadn't so much landed as it had slammed into the ground nose first.
Climbing off the landing craft he began walking around the debris field, right hand on the weapon holstered on his hip. A small stun pistol. Nothing overly powerful was usually needed. Today would be no different. As the others arrived there was talk of searching the wreckage. Again he would volunteer for the job, taking along two colleagues. The three of them took their time searching through the ship. What sent chills down his spine though is that there were no bodies. No signs of crew. It was empty. The decision was made to check the cargo hold last. Granted it was not the best of ideas. As they entered there was the smell of large amounts of fuel...but something else was off about the hold. The containers were empty, or so it seemed. Scanners showed nothing. As the power in the ships main reactor slowly went offline another sound could be heard. Beeping. This whole ship was loaded with explosives. How long until detonation he didn't know, but he guessed it couldn't be too long. Containment was absolutely necessary. Grabbing a computer spike he told the other two to leave.
He didn't wait to head to the engine room and work on getting just enough power to the terminal to try and bring back the generator and shields for the ship. Tim was of the essence, and was becoming a more precious resource by the moment. The sound was slowly getting faster, time was running out. The main generator finally came back online, but the shields were shot. He could get them up to 20 percent strength, over the whole of the ship. A crazy idea struck and he set them to only cover the cargo hold, still only at 20 percent strength, but it should hold. He began sprinting from the doomed freighter screaming for everyone else to get out. His LAAT wasn't far now...
Sliding into the pilot's seat, he started the old bird up up, and made a quick pass by the ship to make sure his comrades had gotten out safely. Though they had left the ship, they had gotten turned around while getting out, meaning his was the last craft that was available.He made a call to them over the radio, telling them he would set down as close as he could, but to start moving. Finding a suitable landing point about 10 meters from them he watched as they got in sliding the side door shut remotely as he lifted off. It wasn't smooth to say the least. The generator was almost completely dead onboard the freighter, the shield power having dropped almost completely. As the freighter detonated the shockwave threw the small LAAT towards the treeline. There wasn't much he could do as he strained to bring the ship around, scraping along the sides of multiple trees, bouncing off some of the larger ones. Eventually he regained some control. Much of the damage had been contained, but a small piece of debris had damaged to control linkage, which had been further weakened by the imitation of a ping pong ball. As he made the turn to head home it snapped fully. The world slowly faded to black as he fought with the controls.
His next memory had been waking up unable to move. Once he figured out how to speak again he asked about his comrades. Burns, broken collarbone, shattered ribs, broken arms, and legs seemed the order of the day for his injuries. Theirs had been far more minor. broken bones and dislocations. For returning to the site and rescuing his comrades, as well as managing to keep the damage contained to a small area at great personal risk they awarded the first class stripes.
The official story was that a training exercise had gone terribly wrong due to improper maintenance on the LAAT the Kurayami had been assigned. He and few others knew the truth, and he may be the last one alive now who did. In the end it mattered little, and it seemed for some reason the Force had seen fit to force such a memory on him. Why was something he would likely never understand as he started towards the now opened blast door.
