3963 years before the Battle of Yavin, in Gthrak, a planet of the Colonies Region of the Galaxy, in the Galactic Republic...

IRSOG-37 was, along with IRSOG-23 and IRSOG-9, parceled into small freighters, smuggling craft, basically, of diverse types; the pilot for the craft Zhiss was packed into, a KT-350 type assault shuttle piloted a Twi'lek that went by the callsign "Suicide" and seemed to fly like that. The ride was what one might expect on the so-called "Duct Tape Express" (or so was stenciled on the fuselage), but Zhiss was centered within herself; she had her lightsaber and a tool belt, along with the jump packs that the Colonel, a Bothan, had insisted upon. There was little to see in the troop bay itself, bathed in the soft red light that militaries seemed to insist on using in operations, but they had at least a viewport to see out of -- so she looked. Gthrak, a ball of green, purple and blue that hung in space, grew closer, she stayed out of the conversation between the Republic troopers in the troop bay, along with a couple of the other Jedi and Padawans. Soon, the ship seemed to shudder as it hit resistance, along with a belated intercom warning to 'strap in, we're going down steep' from the Twi'lek, who was affecting a Coruscanti accent.

Much of the interior of the ship was taken up by pallets of extra supplies with parachutes rigged to them -- after the troops jumped with their packs, the Suicide would fly low and deploy the chutes behind him, which would pull the cargo right out of the bay. The Republic military had some acronym for it, but Zhiss didn't remember. But it seemed a fast way to unload everything and give Suicide a chance to shoot out of the system, hopefully past the Mandalorian air defenses, too quickly to be easily tracked.

The last shudder wasn't atmosphere, nor were the subsequent booms or the flying sparks inside the Duct Tape Express, or the flames that started to eat away at the interior of the ship as a klaxon screamed in a cargo bay now lit by flame as well as red light. Someone was yelling, "JUMP! JUMP! JUMP!" as the cargo doors were whirring open, letting in a whoosh of the Gthraki atmosphere to fight against as those who could staggered to the edge and jumped. Looking up as her rocket pack started to flare jets at far too high an altitude, she saw the flames and the smoke trail as the Duct Tape Express plunged toward the giant flowering pink, purple and green trees of the huge jungle, seemingly very far away from the plateau of Mt. Hanlo, where their target was. Down below was a dangerous, fetid swamp full of introduced Nexu and various native beasts.

...and, of course, the Mandalorians. The same orbital defenses they were supposed to disable managed to shoot small shuttles down, which meant that they were considerably better than expected. They were only supposed to sabotage the Ion cannon batteries of Hanlo, but it looked to Zhiss like their job just doubled, because whatever took the freighters of three whole IRSOGs wasn't going to let them get picked up after the job was done on Hanlo.

The HUD display that came with the jump pack's oxygen mask advised the deployment of a chute due to a lack of fuel to properly cushion the landing safely. She was an experienced paraglider and jumper, but nothing ever prepared her for jumping out of a flaming freighter at a too-high altitude for jump pack use into a huge jungle with trees all over. The best she could do was aim for the water -- that wasn't the safest sort of landing, but at least she'd survive that first and then have a moment to avoid any local wildlife. She throttled her jet pack to give her a good angle of approach and then waited to deploy the chute, relying on the Force to give her a good idea when. She wouldn't drown; Falleen were amphibious. She didn't fancy sustaining an injury trying to land among trees.

And the Force was right -- some of the others popped the chute too early and made themselves floating targets for Mandalorian gunships with open doors. She could feel their deaths in the force even as she recited the Code in her mind -- it wasn't much, but it was what she had.

She got to "There is no death" when she popped the chute and suddenly realized that she'd just seen a refutation of that. There was plenty of death to be had by all.

It was a grim realization to hit the water with and then she had no time for realization. Something swam close by her as she tore off the straps to the depleted rocket pack and the emergency parachute, and kicked herself toward whatever shore she could see -- treeline and moss, which was good enough. Whatever it was swimming at her, and the Force gave her the sense of a beast whose kind had spent millions of years evolved to hunt in these waters, she gave it a kick to a spot that the Force guided her to as she used every bit of strength she had to pull herself through the water and onto dry land.

She was safe for the moment, but sodden from water and not alone; she felt that in the Force too, a familiar presence, which meant someone off the Intruder, the home base of IRSOG-37. "Who is that?" she asked as she took her saber in hand, though she didn't ignite it yet.

"I'm here," Valsil replied, loudly but without excitement. He was silhouetted against a fiery sky, facing the battle in the air, giving Zhiss a clear view of his back. His jetpack was scored with burn marks near the top, and one of the shoulder straps was damaged enough that the pack sagged to the left, but otherwise the Twi'lek seemed none the worse for wear. Shattered bits of plant matter and smoldering remains of a parachute at his feet hinted at the violent manner by which he'd come through the canopy -- but if it bothered him at all, he gave no hint. Instead, he seemed to suddenly come to life as he turned around and helped Zhiss find her footing through the muck shore.

In his head, Valsil was checking his comrade for signs of injury. Her rocket pack was gone -- just as well, since his own pack was damaged beyond use. The hard landing hadn't done her any serious injury, he judged. And she hadn't lost emotional control, which meant that she wasn't useless. "Careful next time. There are swamp slugs in that water." He paused. "Well, there could be, next time." He reached out with the force, trying to gauge the locations of their team and their target. The fighting confused all his senses -- he could feel too much to gather any sort of clarity with his mind, so he turned instead to math.

"We were flying east, heading 110 when the doors opened," he mumbled, tapping on his datapad. "But the weapons array is..... heading 085, from here. Suicide flew us off-course. Which means we need to go that way," he said, gesturing with his nose, "but any other survivors must have landed that way." He brought up his hands, about 45 degrees apart, to visualize. "At 150 knots they could be scattered for..." He trailed off. All of this he had said aloud, but really he was speaking to himself while he sorted out the scenario. Now, though, he turned his attention towards Zhiss and spoke loudly.

"We have two decisions," he explained, as if the other Jedi didn't already understand the situation. "We need to regroup with our allies -- the more we find, the better our odds of success. We can head towards the crash site -- the supply drop is probably still inside -- but doing so will take us away from the target. If the others decide to continue the mission, we might not find them at all. At the same time, if we head straight for the gun battery and the others head for the crash, we'll arrive alone and empty-handed." He closed his eyes.

"That's the first decision. The second: our positions in the dropship were near the door, but not the furthest back. There is a unit of Republic commandos somewhere in the jungle behind us. With so much chaos, I can't tell if they are alive or dead. If we choose to wait for them, they can help us on the attack; but if we wait too long, our allies may move without us, and I believe in our absence they would fail." He said this matter-of-factly, as if unaware that it could be considered rather insulting to the rest of the party, which included his own new padawan. "What would you do?" he asked.

Nero Acerbi
…

How long had it been? It felt like more than a few hours since the emergency-evac but it was far less; he knew that to be true. He stood in the middle of a dense jungle, his white hair still styled, his clothes near perfect. Moist soil slid underneath his boots as he pushed aside a few large plants and made it onto the shore. The waters were several hundred meters wide, he looked off to the opposite shore. That was intense, He thought to himself, placing a gloved hand on a moist tree nearby

Master Rose, what have I gotten myself into?

He looked in the direction of several billowing columns of smoke. “I need to find other Jedi or comrades. I can't do this alone.” He knew he wouldn't have much time to himself so he checked his own supplies before igniting both his Lightsabers to make sure they were working. The hum of their blades filled the small area for just a moment before he cut them off, clipped them back on, and started back into the small jungle.

Exotic plant-life grew around him, the jungle and waters was teeming with deadly creatures. He could practically taste the predatory instincts lurking meters upon meters around him. They were developed; savage. If he had slipped up even once in that first encounter, he would had been chow for the beasts.

If nothing else he was cautious, so when he heard the quiet growl of a animal nearby, he un-clipped his Lightsabers from his belt and halted his advance. Glancing from side to side, he reached out with the force, picked up a chalky brown rock, and chucked towards a canopy of large leaves two meters away. As he expected the large creature reacted on instinct and leaped out of the brush and into the bundle.

Nero took a step back. Looking at the long snout, large tusks, and razor sharp teeth protruding from the six-legged beast; it was difficult to say what species it belonged to. He had never seen anything like it before. Two flicks of both his Lightsaber ignited them. “Easy there,” He muttered softly, careful of his steps and surroundings. “I'm not here to hurt you.”

The beast turned towards him, circling him like it would any other prey. He felt fear, doubt, and a odd sense of survival surge through him. Holding both the blades out to his side, he spun them gracefully like he had practiced with Master Rose. The humming of the blades, coupled with its bright green shapes, and searing carvings brought confusion to the beast, it was wry of him now. That was good.

I might make it out of this alive, He told himself.

Angron sighed as he looked down at the jungle floor he was dangling above.

He had been on quite a few jobs in the past that had gone straight to Hutta before this had to be... For a moment, the trandoshan had to pause and consider some of the screw ups of the past in order to put this one into perspective... the third worst starting point of a job he had ever be on. Mode of transport shot down, enemy anti air preventing back up or pick up and whatever friendlies he did have were either dead or scattered around a jungle that was filled with enemy combatants and hostile fortified positions... not to mention the wild life and the fact that most of their supplies had been on the ship.

Yep, definitely the third worst job he had been on.

Sighing again as the straps of his trapped parachute was starting to grow uncomfortable, Angron turned his head around to figure out which of the trees were the nearest to him currently. With some care, he started to rock backwards and forwards in order to get some swinging in motion. Once he guessed he had enough momentum and timing to make it to the trunk and not just plummet to his death on the ground, he took a deep breath, reached up to take hold of his straps and cut them with his claws.

For a few horrible seconds, all Angron felt was weightlessness and the air moving past him as he felt gravity start to take hold. Then, acting on animal instinct he reached up to imbed the claws of both his hands and feet into the tree he was about to smack into. There was a moment in which he left some rather deep marks on the tree as his weight dragged him down but by gritting his teeth and refusing to let go Angron was rewarded by at last coming to a stop. He was still up a tree but he was now in a position to start climbing down. Compered to the moment of horrible uncertainty that was the earlier leap of faith, climbing down was a breeze and before long his feet were planted firmly on the jungle floor.

Now that he was freed from the threat of falling to hid death, Angron rolled his sore shoulders a little in order to try and loosen them up a little as he considered his next move. He was about to start going through his mental checklist of what to do in a situation like this when he heard the tell tale sounds of movement and the hiss of a lightsaber. Out of all the possible friendlies he could run into out here, it had to be one of the bloody 'holier then thou' Jedi. Still, he wasn't about to look a gift wookie pelt in the mouth.

Moving carefully towards the sound of a lightsaber due to the fact that if the jedi had it out there was most likely a reason for it, Angron stalked the jungles like the predator his people were. When he neared the jedi boy, he noticed that between him and the jedi was a strange beast that was no doubt native to the jungle world. Removing his sword from its sheath, Angron focused and waited for his moment to strike. One did not turn down free food after all.

The shuttle was going down, the cargo bay doors were opening slowly, and Joard was cursing the situation. Gritting his teeth, he followed his new Padawan out of the doors and jumped. His robes whipped around him as he fell toward the planet surface, using his jetpack to slow his descent. He watched as Republic soldiers deployed their chutes and were picked off as they become slow-moving targets. Using the Force, Joard timed the deployment of his chute until he was close enough to the jungle that he wouldn’t become a target for the Mandalorians, however his chute did not open when he tried to deploy it. Instead, Joard slammed into a tree and bounced from it into another tree and finally hit the ground on his back.

Luckily, he was using his jetpack to slow his descent and so didn’t hit as hard as he could have, though he definitely had some broken ribs and gashes across his body. With a groan he pulled himself up into a sitting position, holding his side. He felt the jetpack sagging on his back, no doubt broken by him landing on it. With a click, Joard unhooked the jetpack, which fell to the jungle floor sparking a bit. The Jedi looked over his body, watching as his gashes started to heal, leaving behind nothing but dried patches of blood and rips in his robes. His bones would take longer to heal, but he couldn’t sit around and wait. Joard closed his eyes and reached out with the Force, trying to find his Padawan or any other Jedi, but there was too much life in the jungle for him to center on any one of them.

With another groan, Joard pulled himself to his feet and looked up into the sky, watching other shuttles falling from the sky like so many shooting stars. It was ironic that he couldn’t pinpoint any one living being in the jungle with the confusion of battle going on, but he could feel each death going on far above him. Closing his eyes again, Joard tried to recall seeing which way his Padawan had fallen when they were tumbling through the air. His best guess was that Nero fell somewhere east of his current position. Joard started to limp eastward, his steps slowly becoming stronger as his bones began healing with pops and cracks. The young Jedi slowly made his way through the jungle, still attempting to reach out with the Force to try and find Nero; he was rewarded for his efforts when he heard the distinct sound of two lightsabers igniting off to his right.

Joard approached the noise as quietly as possible, coming upon the scene of his Padawan standing off against some beast with tusks and six legs. Looking around, Joard saw a Trandoshan Republic soldier nearby, who no doubt heard his approach, as he was not stealthy, despite his best attempts; the only reason the beast hadn’t noticed his approach was because of Nero’s lightsabers. He was on the verge of stepping out to help Nero, when he heard footsteps from behind. Joard turned, pulling his lightsaber from his belt and holding it at the ready without igniting it yet.

The jetpack had worked properly when the time had come to abandon the freighter. The parachute, not so much. It ¡deployed when Tamare needed it, but a burning piece from the freighter rendered it useless as he fell down, towards the endless green of Gthrak. The distance from the surface was not deadly, but it was painful.

It was an awful start to a mission he had been second-guessing the moment it had been announced, and had seriously considered deserting as he had entered the freighter along with his fellow IRSOG 37 members. Tamare had expected to be sent to participate in less bombastic endeavours, like inflitrating planets under Mandalorian occupation, contacting potential allies in nearby systems, or salvaging important historical sites before invaders came to destroy them. He had not felt ready for battles such as this, and now he felt even less prepared. Listening to his Master's lectures aboard the Duct Tape Express had not helped.

The days before had been marked by snide comments from the Republic soldiers and officers behind his back, and uncomfortable silences when faced with most fellow Jedi, except for a rather arrogant Firrerreo Jedi Knight, with whom he had exchanged a handful of strained words. IRSOG 37 had gladly taken him, if only because no Jedi Liturgists had joined their ranks thus far, and more lightsabers were always welcome. Clearly, however, they had not been expecting someone like Tamare, and that had been the first sign, as far as he was concerned, that he might have made a mistake, that he might have been better off on his own. He had always worked better on his own, save when in the company of his Master.

His jetpack obliterated by the fall, and the remains of his parachute burning alongside it, Tamare climbed down from the tree he had unceremoniously landed on with a hand on his hip, pressing on the pain, and walked towards where the fighting sounded the closest. He did not think he had broken any bones in his landing, but there would certainly be plenty of bruises, and both his ankles hurt in a way suspiciously reminiscent of his Master's description of sprains. His clothes, sufficed to say, had been noticeably damaged.

He perfectly remembered where the rest of IRSOG 37 had been headed to before the trees swallowed them all, but the whole world seemed in motion now, so all he had were his senses. He crawled and climbed his way through the thickness of the jungle, a hand always close to either his lightsaber or his blaster in case he found himself face to face with a Mandalorian, or predatory local wildlife. The air was so humid he felt as if his skin would melt, and the pools of mud he stepped into now and then had the foulest stench he had smelled in years, and it clinged to his boots.

His hearing was accompanied by the feeling of the presence of nearby fighters as he came closer to the sound he had been moving towards. He felt the Firrerreo and his Padawan, as well as that of a specimen of the planet's fauna. The creature was in a frenzy, one that had in no small part been caused by the cacophony of the grand battle taking place around them.

With a few more movements through branches, hollow trees, and holes in the ground, he reached them at last, the Firrerreo's back to him. With a quick, practised motion, he pulled his lightsaber and blaster from his belt, and walked towards them as quietly as he could, mostly to avoid enraging the ferocious creature even further.

When he felt he was close enough, Tamare merely hummed. For this situation, he felt any words would have been superfluous.

He dreamt of blba trees, thorny and hard, but offering harbor from the wind. He dreamt of the grasses rippling, susurrus, whispering an unspoken secret. He dreamt of cool waters. He dreamt of his father, with his regalia and cordons and ribbons and his wizened beard that he was always fingering. He dreamt of balmy summer evenings and sweet ices…

Where…

The staccato pulse of distant blaster fire awakened him. Through the lacunae of the jungle canopy above him, he could see Republic ships blazing to the surface, like the streamers of a comet. The silence, Leto thought, was what made it all the worse—the silence of the Mandalorian artillery fire, the silence of the paratroopers slowly falling to their deaths, the silence of the bombs bursting, unfurling like flowers…

I am on Gthrak.

It was not until then that Leto realized his lungs were full of smoke. Suddenly, he was seized by a violent fit of coughing. He had landed, it seemed, flat on his back on the jungle floor—the wind had been knocked out of him, and, he supposed, he had been temporarily unconscious. In agony, he craned his neck to ascertain the source of the smoke—his eyes watering, he could dimly make out the detritus of his parachute, opened too late, engulfed in flames, he assumed from the fuel which had leaked out from his rocket pack upon impact. I have to get away from the smoke, Leto realized. Carefully, he tested to see whether or not he could move, before a sharp pain from his right leg stopped him short. His eyes, red from the smoke, travelled down his leg, where he beheld, glistening with blood and dirt, a jutting bone. His leg was broken. Damnit!

He propped himself up, delicately, on his elbows, and his neck too stiff to look behind him, Leto made an attempt to slide away from the wreckage of his pack. He stifled a scream, falling to his back again, a dull force pulsing at his temples. The heat and humidity, along with the smoke, had drenched him in sweat, beading on his forehead and stinging at the corners of his eyes. He shuddered once more with a racking of coughs. If I stay here, I will suffocate. His throat hoarse, he began to gulp for air, but found nothing in the smoke and…The atmosphere! Desperately, he grasped for the respirator within the confines his utility belt.

Where is it? Where is it!? Leto was trembling. Finally, he felt the small, oblong form of the breather, and, taking hold of it, frantically raised it to his mouth. Fresh oxygen flooded his lungs, but the smoke still blinded him. Shaking, Leto raised himself once more upon his elbows, girding himself for the pain. In his mind, he took hold of the words of the Jedi Code, and began to heave away from the inferno. There is no emotion, there is peace. This time he could not stifle the scream. There is no ignorance, there is knowledge. The pain crushed his body from his head to his toes, pulsing at the edge of his vision. There is no passion, there is serenity. It was all he had in him not to retch. There is no chaos, there is harmony. The pain blinded him. There is no death, there is the Force. A whiteness flooded his vision, pounding at his temples, ferocious, a monstrous cadence relentless in its hammering. He released a final scream before collapsing, his body shaken with tremors.

Leto did not know how long he lay there, convulsed with the agony of his landing, his mind numb. Intermittently, a blaster would rattle off its report, or the sound of a distant explosion would boom dully, but for the most part, the only sound was the rise and fall of his cracked breath and the trilling of birds. Eventually, he opened his eyes, the canopy overhead once more. After regaining his senses and struggling to prop himself up, he was finally able to assess his situation—it seemed he had come down in a thick copse of trees which surrounded him on all sides, and, by the looks of it, far away from the drop zone. He remembered jumping from the Suicide, high in the atmosphere, his heart pounding as the flames licked at his heels—falling, falling, falling…Smoke was everywhere, and all he could see was the trees…The trees and the fire, and the smoke, and the open sky, could feel the rush of dead air as blaster rounds flew past. He remembered thinking, “I will die here.”

As Leto hurtled towards the canopy, he knew that to deploy his parachute would leave him vulnerable to Mandalorian fire. Closer and closer he came, and, judging it best then, he released the emergency chute—to no avail. It would not deploy. There was nothing. The limbs of the highest trees were now rushing up to meet him—frantically, attempting to keep his inner calm, he pulled and pulled until finally…The parachute erupted from his pack, just as his feet brushed the treetop. But it was too late. He fell even still, his chute getting tangled in the branches. His momentum maintained, the straps of the pack broke from the force of it. He was loose, tumbling through the canopy, and finally, he assumed, hurtled to the forest floor, whereupon he lost consciousness from the impact.

The pain of his leg had numbed, though it did not relent. Leto’s first task, he thought, was to ascertain the location of the rest of the squad and notify them as to his. That requires, of course, knowing where I am myself. The next: dealing with his wound. One of the healers could mend it, surely. But it would take time…and the mission required haste…he couldn’t help but think that he would be a burden to the squad, place them in danger…As if there wasn’t already enough going on here. And it would certainly make an…unsavory impression on his new Master, Valsil. As if the first impression wasn’t already unsavory. His hands shaking, he dug into his utility belt once more, and produced his comlink. His voice hoarse, he announced on the IRSOG-37 frequency, “This is Leto, a Padawan of the Mercy Corps requesting aid. I am wounded, and cannot move. Location unknown. Lots of…trees…”

He positioned himself upright against a tree trunk, unclipped his lightsaber from his belt, and waited.

Collab between Sep and Ellri

It would be almost impossible to count the times Elara Rahn had flown through a planets atmosphere and landed upon its surface. In fact, her earliest memories were of just such events. But of all of those, none could compare to the entry this time. Never before had she done so in a combat shuttle amidst a firestorm generated by planetary defense turrets. She had doubts as to just how safe it was, but quickly resolved that she could not change it. It was necessary.

As the shuttle began spiralling towards the surface he hit the last person on the shoulder to get out. He looked to the deactivated droids sitting at the other end of the ship however realising there was no real time to activate them and have them ready to use their own personal packs. Some of those droids were shiny and new, others had been part of the unit for as long as he had and while they were not living he could not help but feel some pain at leaving them behind. He turned, and instead of jumping he powered up his pack, while he flicked his helmet mic on “Get yourself out of there Lieutenant!”. At this height and with the time it had taken since the last Jedi had jumped simply using a parachute would result in injury, instead he shot off up into the air. Red alerts flashed on his hud indicating him to the lack of oxygen in the air due to the elevated terrain above the mountain. He let himself begin to glide in a downwards arch, cursing slightly at being so far away from the original DZ, heading straight for the canopy he gave a burst just above the tree tops slowing him to a near stop, then falling through. Grabbing on the first branch he could.

After the shuttle was, inevitably, hit several times, it had been apparent to all aboard that it would not survive to land. They had all jumped out, attempting to land one by one. Not used to such jumps, it had not surprised Elara much that she had rather quickly gotten herself separated from the most of the others. She had seen several others get shot out of the air, but had had enough fortune to not get hit herself. Granted, when she had finally landed, it was in a tree, with her chute firmly wrapped around some thick branches. It was not long afterwards that she had figured out that the chute’s auto-release was jammed. Thankfully, she had also seen their unit’s commander nearby. She had shouted out to him, after a few minutes getting his attention.

He had made his way, painfully to the bottom. Curling up into the smallest shape he could he made sure to try and prevent his pack from taking any damage. He shook his head, and gave himself a run down. There’d be some serious bruising but his armour had prevented any major injury from occurring. He flung of the jump pack straps, swinging it around and inspecting it. It had taken a couple of hits, useless. The last thing he wanted was to use a defective one and end up becoming a fire work for the Mandalorians to watch. He was about to flick on his helmet comm when he heard a yell from the tree tops, running towards the source he eventually looked up and there she was. The Jedi Rahn, the last one out besides himself stuck in a tree.

“Well don’t just sit there! We need to get moving. Cut yourself down already!”

With a quick thought to those she had left behind back on H’ratth, Elara unclasped her longer-than-average lightsaber, igniting its citrine-colored blade and easily slicing through the chords on the chute. This of course caused her to start falling down, so she took a rough tumble down numerous branches of severely varying thickness. She expected a few bruises, but nothing more troublesome from it. Deactivating her lightsaber mid-drop, she barely managed to twist around to land on her feet near the Colonel. “Ouch. That fifth branch stung a little.” She muttered, gently probing her right thigh where she had struck a particularly thick branch.

Traest put his hand down to his belt and pulled of a kolto-patch, he would have also went with synthflesh and a painkiller however he needed the Jedi lucid, he handed it to the Jedi. Then began checking his rifle, he turned his helmet to her “Wait one.” With that he clicked his helmet comm. “Jumpers, report in.” Static crackled, however he got the responses he needed. The Jedi were surprisingly quiet however with them just using standard commlinks he didn’t have faith that all of the Jedi Commlinks were operational. He flicked his tongue, clicking the comm off. Checking his hud he pointed in the direction off the compound. “The objective is that way, however-” He pointed slightly to the right. “-That is the dropships trajectory. We’ll follow it back along and pick up anyone else who is still alive and kicking.”

“No need…” Elara muttered, concentrating deeply for a moment, holding her left hand over the injury. To her Force-enhanced vision, the air underneath her hand glowed as the bruised blood vessels knit back together somewhat. The healing drained her a bit, but reduced the injury to a minor annoyance rather than a problem. It would of course be best to rest it away, but even a fool would realize that would not be possible here and now, and she was no fool. “Picking up the others is a good idea. I can vaguely sense some of the other Jedi in that direction, but nothing clear. Hopefully none have been killed or wounded.”

"Next time, use what I give you.” He stowed the patches back on his utility belt. “I know you Jedi have fancy pants powers but the last thing I need is you tiring yourself and then slowing us down.” He lowered his right hand from his blaster rifle and took the stock of his pistol, pulling it out he grabbed the barrel and offered the handle to the Jedi. “Your lightsaber is all well and good but it doesn’t really have the range of a blaster.” Once the gun was handed over he began walking in the direction that the falling dropship had taken, he could only hope that any of his men that had picked up his transmission could also pick up any Jedi while heading ot the rendezvous. Though he decided to leave the dropship as it was, whatever was left would be burned or would have been knocked about that it would all be useless.

Raising his rifle into a readiness stance, he began moving through the bush. He turned his head slightly to his companion. “Keep an eye on our six, they’ll be checking the crash site sooner or later, I don’t want them to get the drop on us.”

Elara nodded once, not confused by the military terminology, as some of it had been drilled into her head in the past. Their pace was steady, but not very fast through the treacherous landscape. There was no reliable trail to follow and they frequently had to climb over the massive roots of the towering trees. She could feel a few other bruises getting strained, but not enough to be of any trouble. She certainly did not want to get on the wrong side of that Colonel again, whatever his problem was.

There were times were it paid off being a member of a traditionally predatory species. Noticing the sounds of someone approaching over the humming of the jedi boy's lightsaber, Angron glanced towards to source to confirm if he would be killing it or not. The fact that another jedi had appeared in the area was not as easing as it might have been to anyone else in the republican task force. Angron considered himself rather fortunate that to date he hadn't run into a Jedi while on the job; Mind powers, enhanced reflexes and what appeared to be the ability sense and foresee personal danger were not traits you choose for your enemies lightly. The only thing worse then running into a Jedi on a job was going back to Blenjeel...

Shaking his head as he shook that unwanted memory out of his head, Angron noticed something new that made his blood run cold. The newly arrived jedi had drawn his weapon and turned around. There was only one reason he would do such a thing and that meant something was approaching him from a new front. It was either going to be a friendly (Other survivors of the crashed ships) or hostile (Either an enemy combatant or the wildlife); No neutral member of the wildlife on this planet was going to be approaching the sounds of combat.

With the threat of a new front appearing in the current stand off in progress, Angron held his blade at the ready as he started to walk towards the creature that was so focused on the jedi boy. Hopefully he would get close enough to strike before the creature figured out he was here but even if it did notice it would suddenly find itself having to split its attention to two different directions.

Nero Acerbi

Nero tilted his head when a new emotion flooded through the beast and into him. Its wry affliction had turned into a profound sense of unease. He watched its four wide nostrils inhale the air around it, its head sharply swiveling around towards a seemingly bland area of foliage.

It's torn, He assume, cause it certainly wasn't fear. The feeling was indecision; uncertainty.

This, however, did not keep him from blurring his emerald blades into impregnable shields. One of the benefits of having two lightsabers was, and always would be, more options. More opportunities for offense and defense. He was totally focused on the beast and the task of keeping himself from being blindly attacked by it, so when he took a minor step back and his foot slipped and buckled, sending him onto his knee; he dropped one of his lightsabers.

He cursed openly as he watched the monster snap its attention back onto him. Not even a beat skipping in its predatory veins. The large beast snarled quite loudly before pouncing towards him; its maw widening and aiming for his jugular. The situation seemed dire and with the presence of the imposing creature bearing down on him, he couldn't seem to find the gall to manifest the force; he had frozen up. But the beast had not, it was still lunging, ready to snatch its prey up and drag him into the dense forest. He could see his own death, and it was a gruesome one.

N-No, I can't die like this!

Ayessa Shayal experienced the descent to the planet quite differently to the other Jedi. To them, the durasteel shell of the starship marked the limits of their mundane senses, and so the limits of their world at that moment. For her, it was easy to extend her senses into the void of space. Without eyes as normal people understood, her perception came from the Force, and the Force was everywhere, even the dark expanse of space. Even an untrained Miraluka could easily look beyond the ship at the surrounding space should they wish to. Ayessa, however, specialised in perception based Force abilities. She could see further, clearer and focus on more at once than a normal Miraluka.

She had known the moment the first laser bolt had come even remotely close to the shuttle, and she had seen every blast that was aimed at the ship she was in since. The blast that had torn the craft from the sky was also visible to her, and she had known moments before that it would be the one to bring them down. Unfortunately, outside of the pilots chair, she could make no use of this sense. She had barely uttered the first word of a warning to her padawan when the ship rocked and tore apart, the scene playing out in sickening detail for her. She could see several troopers lifeforces wink out, the hull plating peeling away and the systems shattering into countless tiny fragments - all from every angle at once, felt in detail rather than seen with sight as most would know it.

The jump was as chaotic as it was for everyone else, perhaps even more so, because she desperately tried to track the descent of every one of her fellow Jedi even as she herself fell, wind tearing at her robes, drowning out all other sounds. When she activated the jetpack, she surrendered entirely to the Force, letting it guide her actions almost as she would while deflecting blaster bolts, though with lease due to the unfamiliar technology. She did not so much aim for any landing spot as accept that where she landed was where the Force wished her to land.

Catching only one branch on the way down, she landed on the edge of the swamp, hard enough to leave her legs jarred by impact, but there would be no permanent damage. Going from the emptiness of space and the upper atmosphere to a place so verdant and filled with all manner of life was difficult for her, and for a moment she was disoriented. The Force was generated by living things, and while nowhere near as bright as it was in a sentient being, plunging into the forest could be likened to going from darkness to a room filled with a thousand thousand tiny lights shining at her all at once. She took a few staggering steps towards more solid ground before kneeling to meditate.

All throughout the experience she could only watch helplessly, the chaos of it all proving overwhelming. She had not even fought a Mandalorian and already her illusions of what war was were being shattered. Lives being snuffed out in an instant without a chance to stop their demise. The thought that her new Padawan might’ve been one of those to suffer that fate was crushing. They had not been together long enough for a strong master-padawan link to develop, so she could not know easily if her charge was reduced to scattered ashes across the landscape. A shudder ran through her shoulders with the thoughts filling her mind, but as quickly as they came she forced them aside, steeling herself with the thought that she was here to ensure innocents in the worlds not yet struck need never suffer. Contemplation could wait until she was off the battlefield.

She cleared her mind and regulated her breathing, casting her mind out across the landscape. There was life everywhere, but with focus she could tune it out and search for the bright beacons that were her fellow Jedi. Their Force attunement made them stand out to her, even in the crowds of Coruscant she could hunt down a Force user, assuming they made no effort to hide it. There were many Jedi still alive it seemed, some closer than others. The knowledge was reassuring, but until they stood before her, safe, she would not stop worrying.

Fortunately, the closest of her fellow Jedi were not far at all. Rising to her feet, she began to walk along the coast, such as it was, towards them - a Twi’lek and a Falleen, she could not remember their names. Even that sedate activity told her that her diplomats robes were ruined, likely beyond recovery. They were designed with some capacity for action in mind, but leaping out of burning shuttle into a dense forest was well beyond anything a diplomat was expected to do. She arrived just in time to hear the end of the Twi’leks monologuing. Once he finished, she immediately stated “Save the others.” As though there was no debate at all. “The closest is that way.” She added, pointing towards the next closest of the Jedi that she could see, though otherwise making no move to start the search, for the others opinions mattered too. She remembered then that those with eyes expected to be looked at when they spoke, and turned her head to face the Falleen, though a moment later than what might be considered normal for such a motion.

“This is Leto, a Padawan of the Mercy Corps requesting aid. I am wounded, and cannot move. Location unknown. Lots of…trees…”

It was just as well Zhiss had turned on her commlink while Valsil verbally took himself through the exercise of what to do when the Miraluka, Shayal, interrupted him. Valsil and Zhiss were, until recently, Jedi in good standing with the Council, recent converts to the Revanchist cause, but she had the feeling that of the three, there was a need for her to stay rooted in the practicalities., "She's right. We rescue your padawan now. We see if anyone else is in the immediate vicinity without lingering, because the Mandos shot us down, and they're going to hunt us down. We press on toward the objective and hope to rendezvous with other survivors en route," even as she spoke, she was stripping off her sodden outer robes, figuring, perhaps, that they were wet and they would merely hinder her movement in this place. The image of the Jedi would simply have to suffer.

Personally, she hoped that she would avoid that Bothan colonel, if he survived, mostly because she could feel that the plan, which he certainly seemed keen on, no longer quite applied. She'd just learned a valuable lesson on what happened when Intelligence got it wrong and the pitfalls of depending on large organizations that deemed you expendable. Your fate was not quite your own. And being under the personal command of a martinet might...well, she and the Bothan didn't get on in the first place. Zhiss was too impulsive and arrogant for the man's liking. But she was decisive, at least.

The Miraluka turned to regard her a moment and the Falleen nodded back, and then, abruptly, she turned and started a jog in that direction, keeping her eyes on the surroundings -- this was a thickly layered beast of a jungle and that made her hesitate.

"Leto, this is Knight Zhiss. I am with your master. I want you to hide yourself as best you can. Once you do that, concentrate and focus on your master, so we can use the force to find you Do not call out and stay off the comms, the Mandos are probably already hunting us. May the Force be with you." There were other things, perhaps, a Padawan could do, but Zhiss didn't have time to carry out a lesson while she was on the run through a jungle after being shot down, with warriors on the way.

Just as they were reaching Leto's landing site, with the parachute hanging in the tree, they were greeted with bursts of repeating blaster fire, the boom of concussion and explosive grenades, and the high whine of a speeder skiff's engines mingled with the sound of jungle bursting into flame -- it was hard to see the thing above them through the canopy of green, purple and pink of the jungle's indigenous tree life, but it was easy enough to figure out what was happening. They were shooting at them from above, trying to get them at a distance rather than close and fight. But Mandos were tenacious. They'd come down eventually.

Zhiss didn't spring her lightsaber, but rather, tried to angle herself in a sprint away from Valsil and Ayessa, to draw the attention of the Mandos. She found purchase behind a tree trunk after the bolts started to follow her. Moments later, she head the sound of muffled explosions, the Mandos' jump packs igniting...

SYSTEM OFFLINE.....
DAMAGE DIAGNOSTICS IN PROGRESS....
FUNCTIONS RESTORED.......
REBOOTING.......

Onsole gasped awake. It took him a moment to get to grips with the situation: facedown at the bottom of a small slope, with a blaster mark at the side of borg-construct headpeice. A lucky escape then? And a splitting headache. The cyborg rolled onto his back awkwardly and slumped against a dead tree. It was beginning to come back to him now.

Designated transport ship had been taken down by the unexpectedly advanced anti-air defences of the Mando's, but not before approximately 40% of the squadron had been able to initiate an early evac. By separating himself from the main clusters of troops Onsole had been able to make a successful landing, he even estimated that he had a short 1.27 minute burst left in the jetpack fuel tank. Despite a weak connection to what was left of the ship mainframe he'd been able to triangulate the position of the downed 'duct tape express' and make his way to it to salvage what he could and meet up with survivors...So why had he been facedown in a ditch?

The distinctive crackle of blaster fire overhead broke Onsole's chain of thought and snapped him back to reality, of course, the mandos had gotten there first, that ruthless efficiency was something you could depend upon. He dove for a patch of damp undergrowth in the hopes of better cover and grunted as the wind was knocked out of him, a part of him wanted to just curl up and cry but it was swiftly overridden by higher electronics. In such occasions he found himself missing Coruscant.

They'd given him a clear choice, pay your time in dank off-planet Republic mining cells or say goodbye to your personality and serve the galaxy with pride; most opted for the cells Onsole thought grimly as he struggled with unstrapping his jetpack. Judging by the erratic trajectory of their shots his assailants didn't know his location, that slope had most likelu saved his life; it was probable they were lying in wait to mop up any survivors, Onsole had to get out a warning and if possible stay alive.

Waiting for the shots to die down Onsole rose to a crouch position and fired up the jetpack, after a brief but exact countdown in his head he let go and watched as the well angled rocket swirled into the sky. Thee, two, one. Suddenly there was a small click followed by the explosion of the thermal detonator he'd tied into the straps. The blast ignited the remaining fuel into a bright iridescent ball in the sky, hopefully working as an impromptu flare to signal any of the other survivors. Onsole was already running.

"Give that here, you slug." 9-Alpha-1 swiped the bottle from the Chadra-Fan to the laughter of the rest of the crew, swirled the contents at eye level with mock disapproval, and then swung it back, finishing off the alcohol in one gulp before carefully placing the bottle in the middle of the makeshift table that some of the others were using for their various games of cards. "Alright punks, time to get serious." He kicked at the Nautolan who tried to continue his game, and once he had everyone's attention, he continued.

"Easy mission, fellas. Get in, blow brix up, get out. They don't know that we're coming; they're not gonna know what hit them. Stay with your squads; Beta, you're going with Gamma; Zeta, you're with Alpha. 37 and 23 have the northern and southern batteries, we're taking the third and sixth objectives. Let's leave nothing of this frelling Mount Hanlo, right boys?" His underlings gave generally rowdy confirmation, and he clasped the last connector for his jump pack. "We jump in three minutes, get this brix cleaned up." He gestured to the cards and drinks and unholstered blasters that littered the craft's cargo area.

Lu, rank 9-Alpha-3, quickly completed the winnings transaction on her wallet, smiling as the number in her gambling account grew another few thousand credits. Having an AI whispering advice to you all the time certainly made winning easier. She was standing up when the ship took its first hit, sending her sprawling onto the Devaronian who was looking forlornly at his own wallet. "Captain, are we-" she asked, scrambling over the surprised red fellow to try to regain her footing.

"Shields activated," Wolf informed her, and then the world became a brilliant red and blue light show as a lucky blaster bolt ignited the ship's fuel tanks. The explosion jettisoned her high into the air, and as her shields recovered from the intense energy that they'd absorbed, she could see through their bright distortion. A fireball hung in the air where the ship had once been, blaster shots still piercing through the path the larger chunks of debris continued along. A few smoking contrails signaled the descent of some bits to the forest below. The smoking hulls of the other two ships hurtled beneath her, having not been immediately incinerated by a lucky shot as her transport had been, but obviously incapable of further flight. Suicide lasted the longest, falling beneath the reach of the anti-air cannons largely intact.

She only hovered for a few moments, and then turned herself to face downward, activating Wolf's thrusters to send her quickly down to the planet's surface before the enemy could start training weapons on her. She pulled up at the last moment with practiced ease, landing at a run and darting into the cover the trees might grant her.

"Frak," she muttered under her breath, glancing back up at the magnificent cloud of smoke that had once been her transport. Could anyone else have survived that? She certainly would have been killed had Wolf not activated her shield at the first sign of trouble. But surely someone else had survived, right? They were tough guys! Surely...

"Lu, I'm not detecting any distress signals on the 9 band," Wolf informed her, his electronic voice low and subdued.

She flicked her comm on, shortly pressing the distress signal and then following it verbally. "This is 9-Alpha-3, I landed without incident, roughly..." She checked her HUD for Wolf's estimation of her position. "... 16 clicks from the drop zone. How's everyone else doing?"

"Without incident?" Wolf's intonation was mildly accusatory.

"Well, beyond the obvious." Lu unholstered her rifle, giving it a quick once-over to make sure that nothing had been damage, and then repositioned it to a ready position, flipping the safety to Incinerate. Mandalorian armor cared little for any of the other settings. That done, she grabbed one of her drones and tossed it out into the open, where it quickly ascended and then began streaming her its video. She called it back as she set her heading for the nearest parachute that was caught in the dense canopy. Sure, the enemy was likely to look there, too, but she couldn't not check. Perhaps it was a squadmate, knocked out and incapable of responding to comms.

"Message on 37's band; apparently a Padawan is stuck... somewhere with trees." Wolf sounded like he smiled wryly at the last part, and Lu shared his amusement with a tense chuckle. " At least two Jedi are moving to his position."

"Keep me informed," Lu answered, picking her way quickly through the jungle until the crackle of blaster fire and the sound of speeders flying overhead forced her to slow down a bit for a more tactful approach. As she rounded a tree, she came face-to-face with a Jedi, a Falleen female who was just unholstering her weapon.

"Friendly," Lu called out, staking out her own tree to cover the Jedi's back, scoping out the speeders through the canopy. "What's the situation?"

The crackle of Zhiss’s voice through the comlink was exactly what Leto needed to hear. A rippling sigh of relief passed through his frame—only to be replaced by acute fear when he heard the distant whirr of speeders on the wind. He surveyed his surroundings once more, and judged that he was relatively well hidden; but, his still flaming rocket pack and parachute were a dead giveaway to the Mandos. If worse comes to worst, what will I do? I can’t even stand, much less fight… He tightened his grasp on his lightsaber, his only real defense—although adept in some Force powers, his Master had inculcated in him a strong predilection for saber combat, which had led him to…neglect some skills he now wished he had cultivated. A lesson for next time.

Suddenly, the whirr of speeders became a close roar. The Mandos were above him. A cacophony of blaster fire, the distant thud of jungle erupting into flames—the heat of it reached Leto even from this distance. Luckily, he knew the Mandos hadn’t noticed him yet. They were trying to pick off their targets from a distance, entrap them with the flames—who was it? Jedi, or Republic troops? Was it Zhiss and the others, come to rescue him? What if they were destroyed? What would he do then?

Leto felt completely helpless—in an instant, he felt as if his years of training had been rendered moot. Each possibility he turned over in his mind proved fruitless. He could do next to nothing if he could not stand. He told himself to place trust in the Code…to believe in Revan… Damn this mission, and damn that Bothan!

The volley of blaster fire had not subsided—each moment his situation grew more and more untenable. Out of the corner of his eyes, he could see the flames licking. Perhaps I’ll be burned alive. Suddenly, however, he heard the rushing of underbrush. Through the thick lianas of the jungle appeared Zhiss, his new master Valsil, and a Miraluka in Consular’s robes whose name escaped him. The jungle around them burst into prismatic fire, and the heat of it was nearly suffocating.
Before he knew it, the Mandos, outfitted in their typical scored blast armor, had quit their speeders and were descending to the jungle floor.

Leto could only watch the scene unfolding before him with gaping eyes, and hoped that the Force was with his companions, and with him.

Valek was falling. He did not realize when exactly he jumped out of the ship, but he could clearly remember his master's worried expression. The wind whipped at his face beneath his Karabbac mask, as he pulled at the parachute he had managed to acquire. A smirk etched itself to his lips, thinking of the scolding he was likely to receive. He knew she would have liked him to wait and do things with a level head, but that was not how he did things. A Lightsaber found it's way to his hand, and he willed the fall to soften through the force. It was not a comfortable landing, nor was it one he wished to repeat. Instantly the violet blade activated, and he scanned the surrounding area for aberrations inconsistent with the swampy surrounding.

Finding neither enemy nor predatory animal, he assessed his situation through the Force. There were animals here, but nothing he couldn't handle. His priority however, was regrouping with the others. If they were to take the control room, numbers made the most sense. Besides, he needed to know if his master had made it out. They hadn't known each other very long, but he had grown used to her, something that would be hard to do if he just kept getting a new master every single time.

Cracking his neck, he kept the violet Lightsaber activated, a warning against the predators as his hand curled around the com link. Running forward, a creature, quadripedal, a ferocious creature, carnivorous, certainly by the blood matted in its muzzle. It lunged at him. As he dodged,he activated his comlink, making sure it was tuned in to his master's frequency.

"Master Dreamer?"

The creature snarled at his words, lunging again. He rolled forward under the beast, slicing its stomach open. He was quick to notice that its snarl had attracted another beast of its kind, older, certainly, and larger. It had in turn, brought three other beasts, all circling

"Master Dreamer, this is Jedi Padawan Valek Xannoh, requesting coordinates for rally point. I'm surrounded by creatures. Nothing I can't handle, but help would be nice."

As soon as his words were done, he set his comlink back on his belt and ignited his second Lightsaber. Twin violet blades now ignited from twin hilts, crossing each other in a shower of sparks, making an X. The four living creatures lunged, and the fight began anew.

The hatchling had shown weakness. The beast had sensed it and had moved in for the kill as was the natural order of such things.

However, there was another predator in this deadly dance. Seeing the boy trip and fall and knowing full well what would be coming next, Angron abandoned all pretense of stealth and charged towards an interception. If the creature had been on the ground it might have been able to brace itself and resist the Trandosion slamming into its side with the fury of the Scorekeeper, but it had been in mid air when a large amount of bipedal humanoid reptile rammed into it. As both of them rolled on the ground in a tangle of claws and teeth, the advantage quickly went to Angron due to the sword that he had managed to jam into his targets throat. Letting go of the blade to free up his hands, Angron resorted to tooth and claw and started to really dig into the beast in order to speed up its death while hindering any attempt to strike back at him while it died.

It did attempt to struggle for a while but between the element of surprise, Angron's superior position and the loss of air and blood those struggles quickly grew weaker and weaker until finally it went limp and the life faded from its eyes. Angron's mouth and claws were covered in blood, his armor splattered heavily with it as he turned to look at the jedi hatchling, his eyes narrowed sharply while he spoke with the air of a disapproving parent. "You are like one of my clutch brotherss hatchling. He too was flasshy and cocky in the face of danger and he likewisse panicked the moment he losst control of the ssituation. He iss dead now. Do not follow hiss example little hatchling unlessss you sseek to join him."

Education dealt with, Angron pulled his sword out of the dead beast's throat and turned to see what had happened with the other jedi. One threat down, another one to be confirmed.

Zhiss moved first, drawing fire and gaining distance. Valsil was next. He dashed laterally, into a thick patch of brush, and emerging -- almost haphazardly -- in the midst of a squad of Republic troopers. His saber found its way into his hand.

"Friendly, friendly!" one of them shouted.

"I heard her the first time," Valsil replied brusquely, nodding in the direction of Lu. She'd asked Zhiss for a report just before the ambush, and Valsil assumed she was in charge. He gave her the quick version. "We have one wounded in the trees. They're coming down. Do something." Without any further explanation he ignited one of his blades, and leapt up onto a branch.

Valsil clamored up the tree with a combination of nimble footwork and force-jumps. His lightsaber seemed to act like a laser magnet, and more than once he had to pause his ascent to ward off a heavy barrage. Fortunately the Republic forces on the ground were able to level the playing field. It was slow going, but the jedi kept his feet and swatted away the enemy shots methodically. He was nearing Leto's position, but as he got closer, so did the Mandolorians. He closed his eyes. There is a lane, he sensed. Move fast.

He didn't stop to think about it; once the thought occurred, he extinguished his lightsaber and sprang off his branch. He landed on a clear limb, and snapped the saber onto his belt. Overhead was a dense patch of leaves, hiding him from the mandolorians, and within reach, a vine, running to Leto's tree. Valsil grasped it with both hands and swung his feet up, locking his ankles. He pulled himself out along the vine, several meters above the forest floor, now littered with fallen Mandolorians. He was exposed only briefly as he scrambled up the vine, and Republic fire helped cover his vulnerability. Soon he was finding footing on Leto's tree, just a few branches beneath the padawan.

Their eyes met. Leto wasn't exactly familiar yet -- but masters were masters, and padawans were padawans. "You need to stay calm," Valsil said, as a bolt singed the bark near his head. Something exploded below them, shaking the whole tree. "The most important thing is to control your emo-" The branch under Valsil's feet burst in a shower of splinters, and Valsil flew backwards, arms flailing. He caught himself on another vine, then dropped the rest of the way down to the ground, grimacing. "Emotions," he finished quietly, stifling something dangerously close to an annoyed tone. "Hmmm."

---

"Watch your aim, stupa, that's one of ours." Segan never took his eye from his scope, but he knew Stokes' shooting when he saw it. He followed the Jedi down to the ground to make sure he survived the fall. Then he cursed again. "You have any idea who that is?" he asked.

"How would I know who that is?" she replied. "Firing." She let a burst loose high and right. The Mandolorian on the receiving end ducked into cover left, where Segan had a better angle. His first shot did the trick -- the second and third were just for emphasis "Hit."

"It's a boy," Segan said, mimicking a midwife. He raised his aim and traded shots with an enemy behind cover.

"Malkina?" She said the name with disdain. "The hell is he doing out here?" She spotted friendly forces moving across the clearing. "There!" She said, motioning with her whole hand. "That's.... What unit is that?"

"Hell if I know," Segan replied, slapping the release on his power pack after besting his second Mando. "No one is where they're supposed to be. Get to them, be useful, I'll cover you."

"On three." Stokes checked the firing lanes, and then ran towards the nearest friendly uniform.

Nero Acerbi

He waited.

Yea, he had waited for death, to be united with the very thing that had shaped his existence; but it never came. He heard the horrified screeching, the battles of tooth, fangs, and animalistic warfare. Daring to peek open an icy eye, he was quick to close it at the gruesome sight. He turned his head from it all and slowly backed up. The reptile he had recognized as a sentient species: The T'doshok in their native language; were powerful and made for the wilderness like this. This place was his , or hers, playground.

He slid backwards with his hands leading the way, too afraid to turn his back on the situation. When he grasped the ornate, sterling silver, hilt of his dropped lightsaber; he pulled himself up to his knee-high boots and swallowed his fear. Fear was not suppose to reside in Jedi, that led to the Dark Side.

Still young and unrefined, he had taken the Trandosion's words to heart. They felt like they were coming from a place of caution, so he had no reason not to. With two shakes of his head, he replied. “Right, thank you.”

He was more than reluctant to leave the T'doshok's side, so he walked after him as he prowled forward. The dying creature's emotions were still lingering inside of him, the oncoming end had not felt unexpected to it. The quad-legged beast, while unready to die, had accepted it at the end.

Weird, He uttered, thinking that animals had such a profound way of dealing with the difficult.

With two clicks, he clipped his Lightsabers back into place. The Force was trembling in this area; fear and uncertainty, malice and resolve, it was all running rampant. It was scary to him, because he knew he shouldn't be capable of feeling it from their distance. It was directly above him; echoing from the central bundle forming in the Force. It growing overwhelming.

“We're in trouble,” He told himself, face contorted with irritation as he bumped into the back of the Reptile on accident

"Echuta!" she snarled as the fire raked the tree she was crouching behind -- the at least the Mandos took the bait and walked the fire toward her. But when the fire stopped. she steeled herself to ready the lightsaber. When the first Mando came down on plumes of jet exhaust, setting fire to the canopy, liana and underbrush of the jungle, she came out in a roll behind the tree, using the momentum to come into the sort of deliberate swing she used as a lightsaber technique. Powerful, deliberate strokes of the lightsaber that could, with effort, cut through the armor they wore -- it was heavy stuff, and laced with Mandalorian iron. It didn't cut easily, and left her mando alive.

She brought the saber around with the momentum of the backswing and aimed for a different point, turning the lightsaber with her wrists in mid air to generate more movement before steadying it, last moment, with her wrists so she could bring the blade through the relatively softer material under the helmet.

Zhiss was an accomplished lightsaber duelist, but Mandalorian armor was thick and these Mandos took some work to kill-- these were not the Hutt cartel thugs she'd had previous experience in dealing with, but real warriors, well equipped and at least decently trained. There were friendly blasters working now, putting Mandos down under fire and killing some, but it took several shots to get past the plates of durasteel and beskar to pull it off. That information filed away, she looked for her next Mandalorian, exchanging fire with some of the Republic soldiers, using a repeating blaster to suppress with rapid blaster bolts going *spack* against the cover of the Republic position when they hit a rock or tree trunk, but otherwise putting down a hail of fire that kept the return fire intermittent and snapped back quickly rather than aimed precisely -- which was the only real way to find the weak spots in Mando armor.

She used the opportunity on the flank to push the repeating blaster gunner with the Force as she launched herself in the air, lightsaber turned off again. The Republic soldiers would probably see it as the tactics of a suicide, a Jedi leaping into the air, soaring through it. At the end of her extended leap, she ignited the lightsaber and brought it down on the Mando gunner; it turned out that the signature 'guardian leap' put enough momentum into the strike to crack the armor on first try.

---

Dral was a veteran Mandalorian warrior, as the red armor among blues showed. They were expecting Republic forces when they jumped into what amounted to a clearing on this karking swamp pit of a planet, and had a general idea of what the tactics would be. Then he saw the blades -- glowing, lethal, and seemingly flying all over the place. He couldn't get an accurate count because they were moving that kriffing fast, in and out of trees. He'd never seen Jedi in action, and the mobility was the most disconcerting element of it. That and having the blaster bolts come back at them when someone deflected bolts.

"Watch it, boys, these are jetiise! Use grenades and get your blades out, you're going to need them!" But he'd gone in with a squad of twelve and was already down, by his count, something like four.

Five -- he saw Carud crumple under the force of one of the Jedi's assault. Kark, he had the repeating blaster. Well, the kriffing Jedi had to get in the fight sooner or later. In a sense, the Mandalorians relished the idea of fighting the Jedi. They were worthy warriors, dangerous opponents with abilities well beyond the normal ken of the average Republic soldier. Though, Dral noted as he got his vibrosword out and ready, scoping the field for likely opponents, he wasn't entirely sure about the Jedi with the eyes covered up. It was sort of cruel to send a blind woman into a battle, at least to his way of seeing it...