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14-04-2026, 06:09 PM
(This post was last modified: Yesterday, 02:51 PM by Krassus Horuset.)
Part II:
The thorns did not simply cut, they clung, grabbed and tore at the body as if they were the claws of some hungry abomination spawned from the deepest of hells. They hooked into flesh and cloth alike, barbed tendrils tearing at him as though the jungle itself wished to claim its due. The Twi’lek tore forward regardless, breath ragged, lungs burning in the wet, suffocating heat. Each step was a gamble, each stride a tearing of skin as hooked vines snagged his robes... or what remained of them.. Ripping at the man beneath.
Refusing to release without taking something with them.
By the time he tore free of one snare, another had already claimed him, leaving thin, burning lines of blood trailing across his chest, his arms, even along the length of his lekku, one of which now hung slick and darkened where the skin had split open under repeated strain.
Still, he ran.
His breath came in ragged bursts, lungs screaming against the thick, humid air that clung to him as much as the jungle itself. The heat was suffocating, the ground uneven beneath his boots, yet he barely felt it now. There was no room left for pain. He could only focus on the next step, and then the next. He had to keep moving, for no matter what agony the jungle itself bestowed on him, It would all pale to the fate that would befall him if he slowed down. The shouts of the Imperial soldiers cut sharply through the undergrowth, their commands and coordination precise and measured. Guiding the chaos rather than being a part of it. They were not chasing the chaos blindly. They were directing it. Driving it forward.
Driving them forward.
Yet the shouting was the least of his worries. For they were all continuously drowned out by the choir of hellish, hungry snarls. The Akk Dogs. He could hear the way they tore through the brush, hear the wet snaps of branches beneath their weight, the guttural hunger in their throats as they charged through the shrubbery. The barbed vines sliding off of their scales, unable to find leverage. The hounds gaining on the aliens with a logic defying cruelty. They were close enough now that he no longer needed the Force to feel them. They were right behind him and he knew it...
Yet he reached for the Force anyway.
Whether out of reflex, training or desperation he could not tell. For he had long since given up his belief in the Force as a force for good, on the belief that it would aid him, get him and the others out of this barbed hell. Time and time again had he tried to call upon the Force, his ally, his sole companion, and time again nothing answered him. Or rather, not the current he had known, that he had looked for. There was no serenity, no peace, no steady guiding presence his Master had taught him to trust. If the Force was his ally, it had abandoned him. And when he reached out now, all he was answered by was Fear, and terror. Fractured and distant, as though buried beneath the pounding of his own heart. Yet there is not supposed to be chaos... There is harmony...
The words came unbidden, a memory forced into the present, fragile and out of place in this cruel world. An echo of softer times that would not help him now as he stumbled, catching himself against the trunk of a low tree as the jungle tore another strip of cloth from his back. And as he looked to his side, for but a fleeting moment, he saw them again. The others. The ones who had been released into this hellish jungle with him three hours ago... Or at least those that were left of them.
He had tried in vain to keep them together. Tried to steady them as they fled through the choking undergrowth of barbed vines and toxic trees. An elder Rodian who could barely who could barely walk... A young Iridonian girl whose hands would not stop shaking as their prison transport descended... A Devaronian who had laughed too loudly, too wildly, as the Imperial guards joked and jeered as they told the aliens they had a 5 minute headstart, as though madness might shield him from fear...
He had told them to breathe. To focus. To trust him... To trust in the Force.
He had told them they would survive... He had not meant to lie...
The Rodian had fallen first. dragged down in a tangle of limbs and teeth as the hounds were unleashed before the others could even turn. The girl had frozen soon after, her wide eyes locked on something he could not see until it was too late. And the Devaronian... He had run, yes, run until his strength failed him, run until the jungle itself rose up to hold him in place. Laughing until his voice went hoarse as the beasts claimed him too..
And to his greatest shame... He himself hadn't even stopped to help them. He had not looked back. Because in his heart he knew that to do so would have been to die with them. He had to keep moving. He had to run... And he did.
A branch whipped across his face, snapping him back to the present as the undergrowth began to thin. The dense canopy above fractured as beams of harsh sunlight pierced through for the first time since the chase had begun. Blinding him, his vision overwhelmed as he pushed forward without thought until the jungle ended. Abrupt and sudden, as if he had fallen off the world.
Stumbling into the clearing with a sharp intake of breath, the sudden openness disorientating after the suffocating press of the jungle. Light flooded his vision, the sky wide and merciless above him, and for a brief confused moment he simply stood there as the other tattered and torn aliens darted out of the jungle, flushed out into the open as the Akk Dogs closed in.
Emerging besides him, behind him. Figures just as desperate spilling from the treeline. No one spoke. Others froze in place at the harsh light. Others simply continued running in mindless, desperate silence. A silence that lasted only a heartbeat until a loud crack splitting through the sky broke it like the blow of a hammer.
A sharp, echoing crack of Blaster fire pierced through the sky as the Rodian beside him collapsed mid-stride, a smoking wound punched clean through his torso. The Twi'lek Padawan turned instinctively, confusion giving way to understanding just as the second shot rang out and the barrage began...
Blaster fire rained down from above, precise and unrelenting. Cutting through the scattered group with brutal efficiency. One after another they fell, bodies jerking, collapsing, screams rising and vanishing just as quickly as the bolts that silenced them... And then the hounds emerged... There was no cover, no direction to flee that was not watched. This clearing a killing field. This wasn't a battle... It was a hunt.
His danger senses flared! He moved on instinct alone, reacting to that invisible pull on his body, twisting as a bolt tore past him close enough that he felt the heat of it against his skin. He lost his footing, crashing hard into the dirt as the world narrowed into fragments of sound and motion. A hellscape of screams, snarls, blasterfire and distant cheers. Cheers from above... Above... He looked and saw them.
A line of figures standing upon the ridge overlooking the clearing, the silhouettes of them and their camp stark against the sky. They did not move like soldiers in the battles he had trained for. They did not advance, they did not take cover... They all simply stood, watched and fired. As if he and the others were nothing more but a good sport.
In that moment of brutal understanding something broke with him. Fractured. Not a clean break, but a slow, grinding collapse as everything he had taught, everything he had held on to, found no place in the reality around him. There was no serenity here. No balance. No guiding light. There was only fear and beneath it something much darker. An akk Dog Lunged at him as he lay on the floor, jaws wide, its body pouncing with lethal intent. Drool and blood spilling from his mouth and clinging to his claws. He saw it too late to think, too late to reach for the calm he no longer possessed. But as he reached out in fear, terror and rage... The Dark answered anyways. Not as a whisper of a peaceful serene wind, but as a violent surge as he screamed in anger and the creature was wrenched sideways mid-leap, thrown back into the ground with such force that the telekinetic force alone shattered it. Tearing the creature limb from limb in a tangle of broken limbs that did not rise again. The Twi'lek staggered back staring his breath hitching as something unfamilar coursed through him, as fear made way for Power.
And as he looked to his side to another movement, another threat, the Imperial Handler at the edge of the clearing raising his blaster as his hound was torn asunder the Padawan answered its call. His hand shot outward in rage as the Soldier choked, pulled upwards into the air by his neck with such Force that it might have snapped it outright. His weapon slipping from nerveless fingers as he clawed at his throat in silent panic. The Twi'lek did not hesitate, pulling, dragging the man toward him with brutal force before slamming him into the ground once. Twice. Again until the body went limp, the neck twisted at an unnatural angle. In haste he reached down to seize the Blaster without thought, sending a suppressing hail to the Other Imperial handlers that now shot at him before he turned and aimed upward toward the ridge. Towards them.
A scream tore from his throat, raw and defiant as he fired. The bolts streaking upwards, before they suddenly struck the shimmering ray shield that enclosed the camp. Each impact flaring brightly against its surface.
--
Kemma noted that the reaction to the fire was imminent. Officers of high military rank, their chests decorated with medals, Governors and Imperial Noblers all flinched, dodged and screamed. The illusion of detached amusement shattered in an instant. She remained still however... And so did the Moff. His lips curled up in sly amusement even as his Bodyguarding commandos suddenly sprung to attention, ready to take out the threat. "Not so hasty, not so hasty!" He bellowed out. "This prize is mine~" He almost purred out, tongue stuck out of his mouth in focus as he pulled the trigger.
The Twi'lek down below fell silent in an instant. As the Moff's bolt tore through his chest, his legs gave out... And the alien fell to the ground. The Imperial handlers below gunning down the last of the straggling aliens...
Moff Graush lowered his rifle with a faint grown, handing it back to his human bipod as the kneeling commando rose. He sighed as he removed his hunting gloves slowly, his expression shifting from his previous excitement to one of mild annoyance as he turned toward Colonel Cabbel. "Have a letter written... Inform the family of the fallen Soldier that their son died a heroic death defending the Empire... Killed in action in the fighting on Nam'ta. The Empire thanks him for his service." His thick tone even, as though reciting a routine order.
Then, after a brief pause he snapped his fingers. "And have the Twi'lek's corpse collected! I would study the creature's brain... I would like to have it displayed in my palace."
The colonel snapped to attention, offering a sharp salute. "At once, your Excellency."
Graush dismissed him with a flick of his hand, already turning away as attendants moved to restore order to the gather following the unexpected rush of excitement. "My friends, my friends! Calm yourself... A new chance to hunt will present itself a few hours from now! For now, eat your meals, share in the drinks and hospitalities of Horuz, yes?" He offered with a boisterous laugh that made his gibs tremble like puddings.
Yet as he turned away from the crowd his face fell instantly into its familiar cruelty, Kemma noted, as his gaze shifted back to the Governors. "You as well, Governors... Return to the festivities." He ordered before his tone softened by a fraction as his eyes lingered on kemma. "Governor Ralter and I have things to discus... Walk with me, Kemma Dear."
He commanded before he strode off towards his tent. The Largest pavilion of them all, cresting the top of the hill. Kemma followed him.
The thorns did not simply cut, they clung, grabbed and tore at the body as if they were the claws of some hungry abomination spawned from the deepest of hells. They hooked into flesh and cloth alike, barbed tendrils tearing at him as though the jungle itself wished to claim its due. The Twi’lek tore forward regardless, breath ragged, lungs burning in the wet, suffocating heat. Each step was a gamble, each stride a tearing of skin as hooked vines snagged his robes... or what remained of them.. Ripping at the man beneath.
Refusing to release without taking something with them.
By the time he tore free of one snare, another had already claimed him, leaving thin, burning lines of blood trailing across his chest, his arms, even along the length of his lekku, one of which now hung slick and darkened where the skin had split open under repeated strain.
Still, he ran.
His breath came in ragged bursts, lungs screaming against the thick, humid air that clung to him as much as the jungle itself. The heat was suffocating, the ground uneven beneath his boots, yet he barely felt it now. There was no room left for pain. He could only focus on the next step, and then the next. He had to keep moving, for no matter what agony the jungle itself bestowed on him, It would all pale to the fate that would befall him if he slowed down. The shouts of the Imperial soldiers cut sharply through the undergrowth, their commands and coordination precise and measured. Guiding the chaos rather than being a part of it. They were not chasing the chaos blindly. They were directing it. Driving it forward.
Driving them forward.
Yet the shouting was the least of his worries. For they were all continuously drowned out by the choir of hellish, hungry snarls. The Akk Dogs. He could hear the way they tore through the brush, hear the wet snaps of branches beneath their weight, the guttural hunger in their throats as they charged through the shrubbery. The barbed vines sliding off of their scales, unable to find leverage. The hounds gaining on the aliens with a logic defying cruelty. They were close enough now that he no longer needed the Force to feel them. They were right behind him and he knew it...
Yet he reached for the Force anyway.
Whether out of reflex, training or desperation he could not tell. For he had long since given up his belief in the Force as a force for good, on the belief that it would aid him, get him and the others out of this barbed hell. Time and time again had he tried to call upon the Force, his ally, his sole companion, and time again nothing answered him. Or rather, not the current he had known, that he had looked for. There was no serenity, no peace, no steady guiding presence his Master had taught him to trust. If the Force was his ally, it had abandoned him. And when he reached out now, all he was answered by was Fear, and terror. Fractured and distant, as though buried beneath the pounding of his own heart. Yet there is not supposed to be chaos... There is harmony...
The words came unbidden, a memory forced into the present, fragile and out of place in this cruel world. An echo of softer times that would not help him now as he stumbled, catching himself against the trunk of a low tree as the jungle tore another strip of cloth from his back. And as he looked to his side, for but a fleeting moment, he saw them again. The others. The ones who had been released into this hellish jungle with him three hours ago... Or at least those that were left of them.
He had tried in vain to keep them together. Tried to steady them as they fled through the choking undergrowth of barbed vines and toxic trees. An elder Rodian who could barely who could barely walk... A young Iridonian girl whose hands would not stop shaking as their prison transport descended... A Devaronian who had laughed too loudly, too wildly, as the Imperial guards joked and jeered as they told the aliens they had a 5 minute headstart, as though madness might shield him from fear...
He had told them to breathe. To focus. To trust him... To trust in the Force.
He had told them they would survive... He had not meant to lie...
The Rodian had fallen first. dragged down in a tangle of limbs and teeth as the hounds were unleashed before the others could even turn. The girl had frozen soon after, her wide eyes locked on something he could not see until it was too late. And the Devaronian... He had run, yes, run until his strength failed him, run until the jungle itself rose up to hold him in place. Laughing until his voice went hoarse as the beasts claimed him too..
And to his greatest shame... He himself hadn't even stopped to help them. He had not looked back. Because in his heart he knew that to do so would have been to die with them. He had to keep moving. He had to run... And he did.
A branch whipped across his face, snapping him back to the present as the undergrowth began to thin. The dense canopy above fractured as beams of harsh sunlight pierced through for the first time since the chase had begun. Blinding him, his vision overwhelmed as he pushed forward without thought until the jungle ended. Abrupt and sudden, as if he had fallen off the world.
Stumbling into the clearing with a sharp intake of breath, the sudden openness disorientating after the suffocating press of the jungle. Light flooded his vision, the sky wide and merciless above him, and for a brief confused moment he simply stood there as the other tattered and torn aliens darted out of the jungle, flushed out into the open as the Akk Dogs closed in.
Emerging besides him, behind him. Figures just as desperate spilling from the treeline. No one spoke. Others froze in place at the harsh light. Others simply continued running in mindless, desperate silence. A silence that lasted only a heartbeat until a loud crack splitting through the sky broke it like the blow of a hammer.
A sharp, echoing crack of Blaster fire pierced through the sky as the Rodian beside him collapsed mid-stride, a smoking wound punched clean through his torso. The Twi'lek Padawan turned instinctively, confusion giving way to understanding just as the second shot rang out and the barrage began...
Blaster fire rained down from above, precise and unrelenting. Cutting through the scattered group with brutal efficiency. One after another they fell, bodies jerking, collapsing, screams rising and vanishing just as quickly as the bolts that silenced them... And then the hounds emerged... There was no cover, no direction to flee that was not watched. This clearing a killing field. This wasn't a battle... It was a hunt.
His danger senses flared! He moved on instinct alone, reacting to that invisible pull on his body, twisting as a bolt tore past him close enough that he felt the heat of it against his skin. He lost his footing, crashing hard into the dirt as the world narrowed into fragments of sound and motion. A hellscape of screams, snarls, blasterfire and distant cheers. Cheers from above... Above... He looked and saw them.
A line of figures standing upon the ridge overlooking the clearing, the silhouettes of them and their camp stark against the sky. They did not move like soldiers in the battles he had trained for. They did not advance, they did not take cover... They all simply stood, watched and fired. As if he and the others were nothing more but a good sport.
In that moment of brutal understanding something broke with him. Fractured. Not a clean break, but a slow, grinding collapse as everything he had taught, everything he had held on to, found no place in the reality around him. There was no serenity here. No balance. No guiding light. There was only fear and beneath it something much darker. An akk Dog Lunged at him as he lay on the floor, jaws wide, its body pouncing with lethal intent. Drool and blood spilling from his mouth and clinging to his claws. He saw it too late to think, too late to reach for the calm he no longer possessed. But as he reached out in fear, terror and rage... The Dark answered anyways. Not as a whisper of a peaceful serene wind, but as a violent surge as he screamed in anger and the creature was wrenched sideways mid-leap, thrown back into the ground with such force that the telekinetic force alone shattered it. Tearing the creature limb from limb in a tangle of broken limbs that did not rise again. The Twi'lek staggered back staring his breath hitching as something unfamilar coursed through him, as fear made way for Power.
And as he looked to his side to another movement, another threat, the Imperial Handler at the edge of the clearing raising his blaster as his hound was torn asunder the Padawan answered its call. His hand shot outward in rage as the Soldier choked, pulled upwards into the air by his neck with such Force that it might have snapped it outright. His weapon slipping from nerveless fingers as he clawed at his throat in silent panic. The Twi'lek did not hesitate, pulling, dragging the man toward him with brutal force before slamming him into the ground once. Twice. Again until the body went limp, the neck twisted at an unnatural angle. In haste he reached down to seize the Blaster without thought, sending a suppressing hail to the Other Imperial handlers that now shot at him before he turned and aimed upward toward the ridge. Towards them.
A scream tore from his throat, raw and defiant as he fired. The bolts streaking upwards, before they suddenly struck the shimmering ray shield that enclosed the camp. Each impact flaring brightly against its surface.
--
Kemma noted that the reaction to the fire was imminent. Officers of high military rank, their chests decorated with medals, Governors and Imperial Noblers all flinched, dodged and screamed. The illusion of detached amusement shattered in an instant. She remained still however... And so did the Moff. His lips curled up in sly amusement even as his Bodyguarding commandos suddenly sprung to attention, ready to take out the threat. "Not so hasty, not so hasty!" He bellowed out. "This prize is mine~" He almost purred out, tongue stuck out of his mouth in focus as he pulled the trigger.
The Twi'lek down below fell silent in an instant. As the Moff's bolt tore through his chest, his legs gave out... And the alien fell to the ground. The Imperial handlers below gunning down the last of the straggling aliens...
Moff Graush lowered his rifle with a faint grown, handing it back to his human bipod as the kneeling commando rose. He sighed as he removed his hunting gloves slowly, his expression shifting from his previous excitement to one of mild annoyance as he turned toward Colonel Cabbel. "Have a letter written... Inform the family of the fallen Soldier that their son died a heroic death defending the Empire... Killed in action in the fighting on Nam'ta. The Empire thanks him for his service." His thick tone even, as though reciting a routine order.
Then, after a brief pause he snapped his fingers. "And have the Twi'lek's corpse collected! I would study the creature's brain... I would like to have it displayed in my palace."
The colonel snapped to attention, offering a sharp salute. "At once, your Excellency."
Graush dismissed him with a flick of his hand, already turning away as attendants moved to restore order to the gather following the unexpected rush of excitement. "My friends, my friends! Calm yourself... A new chance to hunt will present itself a few hours from now! For now, eat your meals, share in the drinks and hospitalities of Horuz, yes?" He offered with a boisterous laugh that made his gibs tremble like puddings.
Yet as he turned away from the crowd his face fell instantly into its familiar cruelty, Kemma noted, as his gaze shifted back to the Governors. "You as well, Governors... Return to the festivities." He ordered before his tone softened by a fraction as his eyes lingered on kemma. "Governor Ralter and I have things to discus... Walk with me, Kemma Dear."
He commanded before he strode off towards his tent. The Largest pavilion of them all, cresting the top of the hill. Kemma followed him.
