Chapter 3: Archaic

[Andy 60]

Aston grabbed his pack and slung it over his shoulder, then checked his blaster power - which was fine - before falling into line behind Aeric.

[Chickenman 9]

The med bay door slid open, causing the techs inside to look up. Casually striding in, Aeric took aim and dispatched each of the unarmed techs in turn. As the final one hit the floor, he searched the room, locating a Tak who was fully submerged in bacta.

"Eight, get him out of that tank. Two and Six, cover the door."

After checking to make sure the techs were staying dead, he went over to assist Nima with decanting Tak.

[Drake 53]

As soon as Nima and Aeric pulled him from the bacta, Takeshi yanked the breathing apparatus from his mouth. He coughed for several seconds until the bacta and saliva had cleared his throat. "Thanks," he said wearily. His body still hurt, especially the stab wound in his leg, which was only half-healed, but he didn't have the time to sit around. "Somebody get me a towel and some clothes. I have to find Layla."

Edited April 3, 2009 by Drake

[Mara 29]

Biting back another obscenity, Kaden worked feverishly at the controls of the ship as he crouched behind cover. Finally, he just sat back on his haunches, starting at the panel. How was he ever going to figure it out? Yeah, he used to fix ships, but never the electronic parts of them, only the engines and the like. Kaden wiped his arm across his forehead, and it came back wet. Either it was getting hotter in here, or he was severely stressed. He'd put his credits on the latter.

Sighing to himself, he bent down to look under the ship, trying to gauge how the others were doing. Nat, Jya and Jaim seemed to be holding their own, hunkered down behind their own cover at various spots in the hangar. Kaden felt horrible for leaving them there, but if he got this to work, it would be ten times better then lobbing their quickly depleting supply of grenades at the battle droids and emptying powerpacks into the other guards.

Resolved now to finish what he started or die trying, Kaden turned back to the control panel, pulling at the wires he had exposed, trying to figure out which ones would open the blasted thing up so he could get inside. He really just wanted to empty a blaster into the panel, but that wouldn't do any good. It would just lock the ship up for good. But then he remembered his shoulder bag, the bag where he kept his few possessions. His datapad was in there. If he could find something on the 'Net to help him hotwire it...

Kaden moved further into cover and turned the 'pad on, furiously scrolling through lists and databases, trying to find any information. He finally came across something. It was shady, but he had no other options right now. Glancing back and forth between the article on his datapad and the ship's control panel, he began reworking things. Suddenly, there was a whoosh as the front hatch slide open just a half meter next to him.

Stunned, Kaden didn't even realize it had opened right away, thinking the noise was another grenade or a firing droid. Then he noticed the empty space in the hull, the opening into the ship. Quickly, he gathered his things and jumped inside, making sure to lock the door back up behind him. It would hold, for a little while. He rushed through the ship, around a couple turns until he came up on the cockpit. Now to find the controls for the blaster cannon. Aha... He had found them and sat down in the pilot's chair as he warmed up the gun and activated the tracking system. The sound of the cannon coming online was the best sound he had heard all day. And seeing that the cannon was fully charged and armed, was the best thing he had seen.

He rotated the cannon around and aimed at one of the battle droids that was off to the side and not near any of his team members. Kaden wasn't 100% sure how powerful the cannon was and didn't want any friendly causalities. The blaster cannon locked onto the droid, and Kaden fired.

[Princess 35]

"Hold it right there flyboy. You're not going anywhere until I get a chance to put a bandage on that cut." Tak glared at her. "You're not any good to Layla in that condition Tak. Just shut up, let me put a bandage on it and pump you full of enough stim to keep a rancor going." Nima pulled a bacta dressing out of her bag and took a few seconds to put it on Tak and then jammed a hypo into his thigh. "There. That should keep you going long enough to get us out of here."

[Drake 53]

"Thanks," Tak said. "Though, I think my own adrenaline will get me by." A towel and a change of plain fatigues had appeared on the bed beside him so he toweled off what bacta he could then threw on the clothes.

There were wounded Archaic men on the beds around the medbay, being tended to by droids. The Revenants had subdued the few that remained capable and willing to fight. Tak took what weapons and equipment he could from the small stockpile of confiscated kit, including a pair of blasters, a plastoid chestplate and a vibro-dagger.

***

Deign frowned at what was taking place on his monitors. Someone had seemingly broken into one of his ships and was now using it to pick off his battle droids. According to the security logs, the intruder apparently stumbled their way into the ship completely through random luck. That meant that the person was no crack slicer. The security system was still intact and the computer could still accept commands from his station. With a smile, Deign sent a remote command for the ship to take off from the hangar, on a course leading out to sea where it would crash several kilometres out.

He then turned his attention to the events transpiring in the medbay. The Revenant team had arrived and freed the prisoner, now assumed to be Layla's boyfriend Takeshi. "Looks like your man is coming to find you," he said to Layla. "It's a shame the computer still says you're in your old cell." Deign opened up a commlink channel. "Jaing, head to the detention block. A group of the invaders are making their way there. The prisoner is with them. Kill the rest but bring him to me alive."

"Understood," came the reply.

[Radioactive Isotope 29]

Atuarre remained at the door, eyes and ears alert for any unwelcome company.

[Mara 29]

Kaden had just blown apart a third battle droid when a strange noise interrupted his thoughts. Not strange in the way that he didn't know what the sound was, but strange in the way that he was surprised to hear it. There was no mistaking the hum of engines beginning to warm up. And as if to make it more clear, a beeping sounded on the control panel in front of him. He scanned his eyes over it: the ship had been giving coordinates and was starting takeoff procedures. Not good.

He swore and ran his fingers over the controls, seeing if he could find a way to subvert the autopilot's instructions. But, no, it seemed that something was overruling everything. Something remote, so there was no way for him to change it. Not through the computer anyway. Kaden quickly thought about his surroundings. If the ship took off... it would blast into the closed hangar door, and that would cause all kinds of problems for the rest of his team. He had to avoid an explosion like that. And he had to avoid being taken through the hangar as well.

If he couldn't stop the ship through the computer... Kaden got up from the cockpit and ran to the other side of the ship, stopping only to place his last low-blast grenade into the bottom corner of the hatch's jamb. He didn't want to be stuck in here in case other components of the ship were remotely taken over. And he didn't want a blast too big that would destroy more than the hatch. Kaden taped the grenade in place. If the door closed on him, the grenade would still give him a way out.

Sprinting into the engine room, he surveyed his options. And the only one that came to him was not one he enjoyed, but it was the only way he could think of to stop this ship from moving and crashing into the hangar door. An explosion that would most likely make the entire hangar go up, including their way out and his team. Kaden took out his blaster and fired a clip into the engines, making sure to aim far away from the fuel cells, disabling the engines. They spluttered a b it, a sound that saddened Kaden. He never thought he would intentionally destroy a beautiful machine like this. But for security, he fired in another round, completely destroying the engines. They groaned and died.

He headed back up to the cockpit, hoping that he still had control over the blaster cannon. Kaden thought about blasting out the control panel, disabling the computer as well, but that would leave him weaponless with no sure-fire way to destroy the rest of the battle droids. Settling back down in the pilot's chair, he was grateful to find that so far the only thing that had been triggered was the takeoff command. A command he had rendered useless as the ship sat dead in the hangar without its engines. Kaden scanned the controls one more time before again taking ahold of the stick controlling the blaster cannon, aiming and firing at a fourth battle droid.

[Chickenman 9]

"Well that's one Revenant off our checklist," said Aeric, peeking out the doorway and glancing each way down the hall. "One to go." Without another word, he led his team towards the prison cells and, hopefully, to one of their own.

[Drake 53]

Deign sent another command to his ship, this one overriding door commands and sealing the cockpit. He then disabled the firing controls on the weapons and set the capacitors to charge. Without being able to fire, they overload in a matter of minutes and explode, taking much of the ship and surrounding hangar with them.

He activated the comm. "Cale, report."

***

Nat leaned out from his cover and squeezed off a trio of shots at a catwalk. One of those managed to hit an enemy, judging from the yelp of pain and muffled thud as the body toppled over the rail and hit the floor. He checked the charge on his blaster. Only half a dozen shots left and then he'd be out. They would need to either get through the blast-doors into the base or retreat.

It was then that he heard a low whine coming from the nearby ship. He also saw Kaden through the cockpit windows attempting to fire the cannons without any luck. Nat tried the comm, "Eleven, come in." There was no response. "Revenant Eleven, please respond." Still nothing. Stang. He doesn't have his comm. To the others, he shouted, "We have a problem! That ship's weapon capacitors are overloading and Kaden's trapped inside! Twelve, see what you can do about those guns. Seven, get us an explosive solution on that loading hatch. We need Eleven out of there asap!" He leaned back out and took an extra second to aim before firing twice, hitting one of the droids. "And somebody get me a blaster pack!"

"Sir!" Szen tossed Nat an extra power pack from her cover. "Do you want me to try to raise him through the ship's comm system?"

"That will take too long," Nat said, shaking his head. "Continue providing cover."

Szen nodded and scanned for more Archaic enemies. Her cybernetic eye could see farther than normal human vision so she managed to spot the man crouched down with a blaster and a commlink. She shot him in the leg.

***

Takeshi rounded a corner and fired his weapon, dropping a pair of Archaic men at the far end. He looked back and motioned for the rest of the team to advance. They were getting close to the prisoner hold. He was beginning to recognize their surroundings from his time there earlier in the day.

He peeked around the next corner but ducked back fast as a blaster bolt whizzed past where his head had been. "It's him," Tak said with a scowl. "The di'kut that took Layla. He's waiting for us."

Edited April 29, 2009 by Drake

[Radioactive Isotope 29]

Of course he's waiting for us, Atuarre thought. After all, we are invaders.

"Any suggestions on dealing with this....di'kut as you call him?"

[Andy 60]

Aston reached up to his head, reminded of the injury he sustained earlier that day; it seemed like forever ago. "Not him again," he groaned.

[Bad furday 57]

"Perhaps," offered Arlan, we should send a droid out to make sure that Lay is indeed in one of those cells, before we try to deal with the Mando?"

He reached into his pack.

"I don't think Archaic would use the old kind of barred cell door, mainly becasue that'd make it incredibly easy for us. If he's got automatic sliding doors, that's a problem too. However, I doubt there's any sort of shielding over the doors."

Here, Arlan held up an octangular device, with wheels and what appeared to be a large proboscis of some sort.

"We can use this to verify if Lay's heat signature, and pheromones are indeed behind any of these doors."

"But won't the Mando just shoot at it?" asked Aturarre.

"Probably, but hopefully we'll have gotten some useful information before he does." replied Arlan. "Captain?"

He waited for Aeric's response.

[Mara 29]

Kaden had detonated a fourth battle droid and was rotating the cannon around for another target when a loud noise suddenly filled his ears. It sounded both plural and singular, as if a dozen noises were happening simultaneously. When something slammed with a clang a half meter from his ear, he knew what it was: all the doors and hatches throughout the ships were closing up. A moment later, there was an explosion from the grenade he had left as the hatch slammed into the explosive device. He had a way out, if only he wasn't stuck in the cockpit. He slumped in his chair. Well, at least he could still use the blaster cannon...

A low whine now came to his attention as he tried to shoot down another battle droid. The trigger wasn't working, but the cannon was still on. Immediately, he let go of the device. It was like a blaster with a piece of permacrete stuck in its barrel, but much, much worse... Kaden tried not to panic too much as he thought of his options. Which seemed severely limited. His blaster wouldn't work against the cockpit door controls. Even if he shot them out, it would just keep them closed. The control panel was dead. He had also shot the engines to all parts of the galaxy. He paced around the small room.

But if he had another one of those low-impact grenades, he could try opening the cockpit hatch with that. But even with the low explosion, the cockpit wasn't very large. Kaden bit his lip, knowing his time was limited, and he had to come up with something fast. The rest of his team was down below fighting on two fronts, and he knew he was alone in this. Stupidly, he hadn't told any of them what he was doing, not exactly. With everything that happened on this mission, he was sure administrative leave, or worse, was in his future.

He sighed, pacing again. Of course, desk duty sounded a lot better when you were minutes from being blown to bits. Kaden looked at the blaster in his hand and then towards the viewport. Maybe... But it would be a drop to the hangar floor. And he wasn't sure how reinforced the plasteel was. For all he knew, the blots would just bounce right back to him and hit him in the head. Just his luck. So he had one option: use a grenade to try and open the door and hope he didn't blast himself in the process. And all this before the cannon blew.

Quickly, Kaden searched all his pockets, pulling out empty powerpacks and ration wrappers. Everything piled on the floor in front of him. He was beginning to think that he was all out of the grenades, when his fingers wrapped around something at the bottom of a pocket on the side of his knee. Thank the Force! He set the timer for as long as he dared; he needed it to blow and allow him enough time to duck from the blast and then get as far from the cockpit as possible quickly as possible. The blaster cannon's whine was getting louder, and he could feel heat coming off of it.

As he thumbed back the timer, he sought out a place to hide. The only available space large enough for his frame was under the console, in front of the pilot chair. He taped the grenade to the hatch door and almost jumped into the crevice, putting his hands over his head, praying dearly to any god that would listen.

There was a blast, and Kaden thought he was a goner, the cannon finally overloading. But the mere fact that he was thinking that, changed his mind. The grenade hadn't worked completely: there was just about a 2-meter round gap in the cockpit door. But Kaden didn't have any other choice, nor the time to get another grenade that he probably didn't have. He unscrewed himself from his hidey-hole, holstered his blaster and squeezed through the little opening, then ran full-tilt to the hatch where he had come in where he was meant by a similarly sized hole. Taking a deep breath, he worked his way through the opening and dropped to the hangar floor.

Hearing how loud the blaster cannon was even outside of the ship, Kaden felt it was good for his continued health if he headed to the other side of the hangar at a dead run. He ignored all of the enemies around him; soon, most of them would be gone, plus he didn't have the time to think about that. Getting behind cover was on his mind as he ran to the opposite corner of the hangar. But thinking of his team, he yelled just a couple meters before he reached a stack of metal containers, "Duck for cover!" He leapt over a small box and curled up in the corner against the wall, his hands covering his head once again, not realizing that what he thought was sweat was actually blooding trickling down the side of his face from the grenade. Nor feeling about a half dozen blaster burns that had hit him during his run for cover.

[Bad furday 57]

Jya had just figured out a solution towards getting kaden out of the ship, when there was a muffled blast mixed in with the repetitive screeching of the blaster cannon.

Turning to look, she spotted a blood soaked figure drop from the ship, and go running through the fracas, to dive behind a pile of containers.

"He's out, Lieutenant! He's out!" she yelled to Nat.

[Ender 8]

"I'll get him!" Jaim yelled. "Give me covering fire!"

Jaim took off at a sprint across the hangar, narrowly avoiding a flying stun grenade and assorted blaster fire, and dove legs-first behind the containers, almost taking Kaden in the mouth.

"Hi there, sparky. Brought you a present." He handed his battered and bloody wingmate a medpack.

[Mara 29]

Kaden slowly uncurled himself, checking himself for injuries as he did so. Nothing seemed to be broken, but he was sure he would feel it in the morning. As he sat up, he turned his head towards the man sitting across from him, blinking a few times until he recognized who it was: Jaim.

"Thanks," he made out eventually, taking ahold of the medpack. That was when he noticed his hand; it was all bloody. And he had no idea where it was coming from. Kaden stared at his hand a moment, almost dazed. He hadn't felt anything broken but began to scan his body again and felt his face. Up around his left temple, his head felt wet, and his hand came back wet. And bloody. Kaden didn't think it was too bad; he wasn't really feeling bad. But even so, he took a bandage out of the pack and began dabbing at his head, hoping to stop the trickle of blood.

[Drake 53]

Nat rushed over to Szen's side, tapped her on the shoulder and said, "Eleven is out! Let's get clear!"

The two Revenants rushed out of the firing line, taking potshots at the enemy while they ran and ducking behind as much cover as they could on the way. They both jumped over a low blast shield and covered their ears.

***

Cale Sano watched as his targets ran and leapt behind cover farther back in the hangar. It was when his men and the droids stopped firing that he heard the reason for the invaders' retreat. "Take cover!" he roared, aiming is feet in the direction away from the ship that was about to explode. He dove and rolled behind a stack of heavy crates.

A moment later, the cannons on the ship reached critical overload. The thermal casings melted through and the plasma, contained within, expanded in the blink of an eye. There was a thunderous roar and a blinding flash of light. Three nearby vessels were caught in the explosion, setting off smaller, secondary explosions across their hulls. Cargo, that was waiting to be loaded, was either obliterated or flung, on fire, to all corners of the hangar along with flaming fragments of debris.

[Princess 35]

"Captain? Does Arlan have the okay?" Nima asked him.

Aeric gave the affirmative for Arlan to start the droid. Nima, Artuarre and Aston spread out to provide cover.

[Ender 8]

Jaim poked his head out from his cover to check the enemy positions, and noted their confusion at the rather large explosion.

"We need to move, now, before they get their senses back. Can you move?"

[Mara 29]

He held a piece of gauze to his wound and wrapped some bandage around his head a few times, giving himself a very awkward-looking headband. Kaden felt it was tight enough and it didn't seem to be leaking or anything. Little did he know that the action was actually helping to dig a piece of shrapnel deeper into his temple. He still felt okay except for the little prickles of subsiding pain where the blaster bolts had gotten through, singeing past his layer of clothing. The head would didn't give him any problems at all.

Kaden moved slightly from his position and crouched closer to Jaim. The movement didn't spark any pain, so he felt all right. Just a little sore all over his body from diving to cover a few minutes before. He glanced over at the other man. "Yeah. Lead the way." Kaden pulled out one of his blasters, checking the power level.

[Ender 8]

Jaim raised an eyebrow, but nodded. "Keep close."

Jaim set off across the ruined scene, neatly weaving around the debris and shattered structure.

[Mara 29]

Kaden followed along closely behind his wingmate as they tried to quickly meet up with the rest of the team before the team of guards recovered from their shock of the blast. They headed for where Nat and Szen were hunkered down, waiting for Jya to come join them. Staying together could make them an easier target, but splitting up could be even worse for them. Plus, after the change of circumstances, it was best for them all to reform their game plan. Belatedly, though, Kaden did think that they were providing a pretty sufficient distraction for the captain and the other half of the team trying to rescue Layla.

There wasn't much left of the freighter he had been in just a few minutes before and the other ships nearby it weren't in any better shape. Glancing around quickly, Kaden guessed that about two-thirds of the ships in the hangar were no longer space worthy. But there were two or three, including the space yacht he had originally seen, that still looked mostly unscathed from the blast, being on the opposite end of the hangar. If they could just hold out here a bit longer and get that ship open, hopefully this whole mess would turn out well after all, and the whole squadron could get themselves out of her in one piece.

Reaching Szen and Nat, Kaden crouched behind some boxes of cargo next to Jaim, rechecking his blaster, the adrenaline now running through him making him forget his blaster burns from earlier. They had a job to complete; it wasn't over yet. Not until Layla was safe and sound. Until then, they had to hold off these soldiers and battle droids, the latter of which wasn't so stunned by the fact of the explosion and never stopped firing. Luckily the droids numbers were down, Kaden having blasted three of them with the late ship's cannon.

He felt a little pain in his head where his wound was wrapped up, but just figured it was normal. He had been bleeding after all. But Kaden moved his hand up there; no new blood seemed to be trickling down, though the area of the bandage covering his wound was soaked in blood, a small badge of courage for running like an idiot through the hangar after blowing up the cockpit door in the freighter. He glanced around the large room, checking for where the guards were hiding, waiting for Jya to find time to join them and for further instructions from Nat.

[Bad furday 57]

Arlan looked at the droid's live feed on a small monitor as it crawled along the edge of the corridor. The droid would turn its proboscis-like sensor array from side to side, sniffing for the chemical scents

the user specified.

"I've picked up Zeltron pheromones! Behind door eleven!" Arlan excitedly related the news to Aeric. Then, his face fell. " The pheromones are not fresh - they're a few hours old. " Arlan looked again at

the monitor, " There's also no heat signature. I'm sorry Captain, it seems Layla's not here."

Aeric felt like hanging his head, but knew it wouldn't help the rest of the team to see that. They'd been through so much, and to have a successfully completed mission teased away from them really hit home.

And they still had to deal with that Mando.

"Lay's got to be around here! They must be holding her somewhere else." mused Nima.

"If you were head of a galactic crime syndicate who captured your ex lover, wouldn't you want to keep as close an eye on them as possible?" Aston suggested.

Everyone in the team remained silent, as one by one, they put the pieces together, and came up with the same conclusion.

Deign Argos.

Argos had Layla; it was who he had wanted all along, and if they could find Deign Argos...they could find Layla Nasrin.

[Princess 35]

"You're right Aston! Arlan! Can you hack into the system and find out where that scumbag's personal quarters are?" Nima scowled. "No one kidnaps my drinking buddy and gets away with it. While he does that, how's everyone doing? Any aches and pains or gushing wounds for me to take care of?"