GM

They come.

Twenty-legs. Spiked tails. Scything jaws and bruised-coloured, segmented carapace. Crawlers. Specimens from one to almost three metres long.

About nine emerge from the way back, a dozen or so from the way forward.

What Jix might have thought was tinnitus becomes clearer. His Verpine ears detect two distinct, scratchy waveforms and he realises the crawlers are broadcasting from their tail-spikes, one waveform or the other.

Two waveforms. Two distinct groups. Two hives? Just what do these creatures eat to survive?

Either way, Mirror Team are stuck in the middle.

Jix

He sums up in his own distinct manner.

"Two hives. If we are lucky, they eat each other. If not twice as many eat us."

Fight or flight? It is a good question.

Amos

He quickly sized up the situation, sheathing the machette and swinging the blaster off of his shoulder.

"Backs against the side wall. Fire if they turn on us!"

Jelly Bean

JB had to stop focusing on the room with the force. She didn't have near enough control to separate the lifeforms into unique entities and they didn't have the sentience to to convey anything more than primal base instinct. It was overwhelming and dizzying for the twi'lek

"We can't get pinned to the wall for long, Amos," she offered in the relative darkness. "Everything is food down here. We have to cut a path ahead. Security droids are coming soon. Let the creatures do what they do, fight with each other. As soon as they are enjoined, cut through them all... but watch the walls, they are coming out of them... cut a path... but we have to be out of here before the droids show up... I have the blades, I can sweep ahead. Blaster fire might be detected. Only use it if we have to. Yes?"

2BB-2

Grappling hook towards the ceiling, retracting just enough to avoid the crawlers. In doing so, he perhaps offered another solution for getting out of the pincer movement.

Amos

"JB and I with blades if they engage each other. May the force be with us." he said, nodding to the Twi'lik.

OOC- Neil, I could use a bit more visual help on this scene.

AJ- i am intrigued by your idea of going over the top- can you give me a little OOC- I'm sure actual characters, were they real, would have a better understanding, so I just want to be able to visualize your action

OOC: Imagine 2BB-2 as a swing or a pendulum, suspended by his grapple above the ground and above the height of the crawlers.

[No problem, guys. Visual reference: I guess if you imagined an upper floor of an office tower. What it would look like if it had been stripped, burnt out, and then the windows boarded up so no light could enter. Quite open but with a lot of debris and partially blocked sigh lines.]

GM

The crawlers attack without hesitation, disturbingly quick on their many, undulating legs.

They are predators sensing warm-blooded prey intruding in their domain but they are also two rival factions.

With swarms of crawlers emerging from the surroundings in pitch black, the team's grainy, 16-colour scanner-vision provides a chaotic picture.

This sublevel of the bunker has a lower ceiling than the one above. The team are following the primary power conduit that appears to run from the conveyex track, zig-zagging through the bunker, probably down to Ghidrah's databanks.

Scattered around are low piles of debris, punctuated by support columns and broken partitions. Decent cover against blaster fire but no use in preventing being overrun by poisonous, flesh-rending crawlers.

2BB-2 can reach the ceiling with his cables though there are no perches up there for the rest of the team.

Jix might wonder if these creatures communicate at Verpine frequencies can he disrupt them in anyway with his own voice?

They attack, but who? Heading toward us or toward each other?

[They're all attacking your team, at least until they have to fight a rival to get a taste of you.]

Jelly Bean

"We can't stay here," hissed Jelly bean as she activated her lightsabers again. There was no perfect strategy. They had to work fast get across the large room. The way forward was to follow the cable... not literally, because it snaked back and force as it appeared to have been laid down haphazardly. The point was, they had to wade through the creatures and cut a path. That seemed like the only option she could see. If they got far enough into them, then perhaps the two groups might fight each other. But, right now, the creatures were all focused on them.

Jelly Bean wheeled about to put her group behind her and slashed out (snicker-snack) as the vanguard to clear a path as fast as she could. She didn't wait to see kills, but rather cut and slashed and let her compatriots hold the sides and clean up any creatures who refused to die after her blades cut through them. The number seemed daunting, but maybe using force push at various moments could help as well.

Jix

He is thinking. They are insectoid. They are hive. Much as he hates to think this, maybe he has something in common with them? Would communication be possible?

He tries.

**We are Hive. We are poison to you. Leave us or die.**

2BB-2

The entirely inorganic team member watched carefully to see where Jelly Bean was attempting the breakthrough, and descended towards the path ahead of her, swinging out over the crawlers to deliver a blast of cryoban from above before retracting to calculate another run, or to work out a reposition.

Amos

Out came the vibro machette again and he struck out atany incoming vermin, protecting Jelly Beans side.

GM

The scanner-vision projects scan-rays that are visible to others with scanner-vision, so Mirror Team can easily see where every member of the team is.

A good thing because the crawlers are soon crashing into them like a biting, arthropoid wave.

They have every reason to panic but hold their nerve.

J.B.'s shoto lightsabers light up the darkness and the swarm of dripping mandibles.

There's a puff of liquid propellant and 2BB-2's harpoon shoots into the ceiling. The BB-unit reels himself into the air above the predators.

J.B. starts to cut a path, her blades sizzling.

Behind her Jix chitters in Verpine, sharing the same frequency as the crawlers. They definitely don't understand Jix but they do hear him and that confuses them.

A 2-metre long crawler throws itself at Jix without any clear purpose, not knowing whether the Verpine is a rival, prey, what. Jix's ultramesh armour absorbs most of the impact and as the crawler lunges again, he spears it with the bayonet on the end of his heavy blaster rifle.

The vibro-blade opens up the arthropod messily, spilling green guts.

2BB-2 swings passed with a bold, ulutating bleep, crawlers climbing over themselves to get at the droid but barely scratching the paint.

J.B. scythes through the swarm, blood and gore splattering her goggles.

Amos chops heads with his vibro-machete until a 3-metre long specimen rears up from amidst the others and strikes with wild ferocity.

Speed and weight. One of its mandibles find a chink in Amos's battle armour and sinks into flesh. Venom is pumped into him. With Amos's machete hand fending of the crawler, he has to rack the scatter blaster against the creature's carapace before jamming the muzzle under its jaw.

A bang and flash! The scatter blaster truncates the crawler in a fountain of bitty gloop that splashes against the ceiling.

J.B. kills, maims... the lightsabers so elegant, so unstoppable, so expressive. They are like an extension of her, aren't they? Or is this just the seductive power of the Dark Side?

Either way, she's cut a swathe through the crawlers, opening a path to another down ramp. The two crawler hives have also collided now and what was a hunt has turned into a primeval melee.

Jix

The sooner they clear this area the better. Numbers swamp however innocuous the enemy but these are far from innocuous. At least they seem intent on each other now.

"Well done JB. Everyone OK?"

He has to remind himself that he also has a role of medic.

Amos

The lean coated man leaned against the bulkhead for a moment, gritting his teeth.

"I got tagged but lets get out of here first."

Jix

"OK but let me know if you need help."

Jix thinks he will still need to be a soldier first but he will keep an eye on Amos too.

Jelly Bean

The Twi'lek wheeled about, the two short blades still humming at the ready. She didn't seem to notice the spackling of ichor across the front of her body, face, and lekku. There was a near feral look in her eyes, and her breathing was deep and even, as she inhaled and exhaled through her nose. After a moment, staring at Jixx, she nodded and her thumbs touched the control button to deactivated the two lightsabers. A shudder passed through her and she nodded again. Finally she smiled, albeit a thin one.

She fell in behind Amos as they moved on.

2BB-2

Dropping almost noiselessly to the ground, the slicer droid extended active sensors along the way ahead.

GM

Some smaller, rogue crawlers come scurrying out of the cracks in the walls but are easily kicked away and Mirror Team have soon put the chaos behind them.

Amos feels numbness from the bite in his shoulder, tingling up his neck and cheek and down the arm. He feels like he might throw up.

Being an experienced frontiersman, Amos might suspect some kind of neurotoxin. Fortunately not evolved to immobilise humans though and nothing that a stimpack can't counteract.

It would sure be nice to get a breath of clean air too but there's none of that on this planet.

Taking the final ramp down, they emerge into an ampitheatre-like space, constructed around a wide oblong viewport.

This is where the power conduit has led them.

The ampitheatre is filled with waist-high slave circuit modules, activity lights blinking like high tech tombstones.

Glaring, bright light spills through the viewport. Beyond is a large, open space about 30 metres across; a well-lit vertical shaft. The whole bunker must be built around it.

Suspended in the middle by aerodynamic struts is another massive cylinder, bristling with square-vaned heat sinks. These are wrapped around a towering stack of hard-processing computers.

Mirror Team have found Ghidrah's central databanks.

There is an airlock from the ampitheatre into the shaft, and anyone close to the viewport can see that at the bottom of the shaft are huge, spinning turbine blades, forcing cool air up over the heat sinks.

They can also see a foot-bridge protected by a curved fairing, spanning the gap from the airlock to the databanks and an engineer's direct access station.

The team can switch back to normal vision.

There are signs of extensive rennovation work here, so First Order droids can be expected sooner or later.

It should take some time to open the airlock though. That might give Jix time to check over Amos, J.B. time to skim the datapads from the lab, assuming 2BB-2 can handle an old Imperial code lock.

The team will then have to decide who goes through, who stays. There doesn't appear to be any way out of the bunker except back they way they came but that's not to say there isn't.

Jix

He pauses, his soldier mode immediately scanning for any danger signs but none are immediately apparent. Then he takes in the details, nodding slowly. Looks like they have found what they are looking for.

"We have a door to open, so a good time to look at that injury Amos."

She bends down placing his weapon to hand and start to get out the medkit.

Jelly Bean

The Twi'lek had settled herself and even had a moment to reflect that her emotions were an issue in her training before and they still were now. Maz had warned her of the consequences if she lost control completely, but it was more the incremental creep of darkness she she was realizing would be her hardest test to come. Emotions from childhood traumas that she was only recently remembering in fuller detail, and then years of slavery to the Hutts, and then the loss of Maljean after opening her heart to someone, anyone, for the first time in her life. Her sadness at the plight of the Purgill only renewed her anger at the First Order and their predecessors.

"Babay... I need your help," she said as she saw Jix taking a moment to address Amos' injury. They couldn't afford to lose too much time now that they had reached their objective, but she had made a promise and she hoped there would be some answers in the pads she gathered to help her keep it.

"I need these unlocked," she added as she showed the spherical droid a couple of pads. "Maybe even copied if you have space... They might help us free the Purgill."

2BB-2

The droid was busy working at the old Imperial code lock to enable them all to progress, but he ran his scanner over the datapads.

Amos

Once they reached their objective, the team leader leaned against the wall with his blaster in hand to keep watch while the tech-oriented members of the team got to work.

"It feels like a neurotoxin Jix." he murmurs to the medic as he shrugs the coat off of his shoulder so that Jix can have access to the wound.

Jix

She nods.

"Venom. A stimpack should sort it."

She rips the outer package and applies it directly to the wound.

"Shouldn't take long. Let me know as soon as you feel the effects fading."

Whilst there, she checks out the wound site to make sure there is nothing else, swabbing it just for safety.

GM

With a whir of servos and weebling of electronics, the BB-unit gets stuck into the lock, slicing the code like a falumpaset cheese.

Casting his droid eye over the datapads reveals that they are low-end MicroData models, typical of the cheap, race to the bottom technology once employed by the Galactic Empire.

J.B. quickly realises the same, since most of the pads are dead or have corrupted memory cells.

But she turns on one and finds it mid-restore and asking for a new thumb scan. Doing what it asks, J.B. soon has access to the datapad and its cached files.

While she reads, Jix jabs Amos with the stimpack. A hiss of gas and then a feeling of warmth, comfort and clarity suffuse the lanky ex-marshal.

They can then both look to defence. The slave-circuit modules are waist-high with heavy duty enclosures. Good cover for a fallback position but a better initial defence might be at the entrance to the ampitheatre, so any attack is bottlenecked first.

Jix has some Verpine knowledge of tech and brushing the dust off of one module can read the data plate. The modules are comptrollers, managing the Ghidrah subroutines distributed across the First Order's fleet.

The brain of the system is in the shaft beyond though, parsing hypercomms from across the Galaxy in real-time, ready to intercept, block or mutate. It must be the equivalent of thousands of droid brains working in sync.

J.B. reads about a similar topic.

Imperial researchers had studied Purgill song-lobes, how the creatures communicated through hyperspace. The Purgill sensory organs seem to constantly collect a massive amount of data yet pass only a fraction of it to the song-lobe. The song-lobe is able to interpolate meaning accurately (or accurately enough) from these tiny fragments by using a complex structure of branching neural pathways and gates. A complex organ, perhaps, but once grown the song-lobe is essentially free to use.

The Imperials weren't able to replicate this natural wonder though. Considering the high M-count in Purgill, they theorised some of the biological system might extend into the Force.

Here at GH-531, the Imps were experimenting with artificially pushing data through captive Purgill and acquiring translated results. A parallel route to an operational Ghidrah that required live Purgill calves.

Criminally, the one in the lab above is the nineteenth such specimen at this base alone.

Bleep! The light on the lock switches from red to green as 2BB-2 completes his task.

The airlock can be opened, Ghidrah accessed, but who will venture in?

Jix

Well medic job completed satisfactorily. She packs away her gear and then picks up his weapon. He casts his eye around for any potential signs of danger and looks for cover where he could mount a defence if needed. He takes a look at a module on his way to the amphitheatre.

"Not good JB. They are abusing the purgill race. We should definitely do what we can to end this."

He heads for the doorway.

Jelly Bean

What she read from the datapads was heartbreaking. The cold indifference to life was all too common in the Galaxy. Life seemed cheap and hundreds of thousands died in a blink of an eye at the hands of ego-maniacal despots. In response, those opposed to them also killed with little regard for anything other than standing fast on their position in the metaphysical morality compass, whilst losing their own souls along the way.

Jelly Bean could feel that simmering anger that never seemed to fade completely. She knew all too well, from Maz, that her emotions were a pathway to the Dark Side. Everyone, force-users and the non-force sensitives, could be led down a dark path if they gave in to the baser instincts and darker emotions. But the Force Wielders were especially susceptible to it because of the powers they wielded and the responsibilities that came with that. And the consequences seemed so much more severe. She took a few deep breaths and looked to Jix with a nod of agreement.

"I can go in with Babay... Or I can stand in the hall and keep the droids and troopers out," she added with her hands falling to her sabers. Part of her wanted the latter, the fight, the rush, the power. With blades in motion, she would be a fearsome foe in that hall. There was that voice telling her she could could probably cut through them and push them back, and keep pushing them back, killing every one of them until there were no more First Order soldiers or officers left in this whole base.

But the smarter move for everyone was probably the former option, send her in with Babay so she could assist him using her innate, force enhanced technical savant talents.

2BB-2

There was never a question in terms of the Slicer going in, it was what he was there for. The question that remained, what was the best disposition for the rest of them, in terms of completing their mission and freeing the innocents of their ancillary objective?

Amos

He sighed in relief as Jix dealt with the poisonous bite and pulled his coat back on.

"You need to be in there using your engineering skill aling with BB. Leave the protection to Jix and I. Do the most good you can for as long as you can. That is what my pappy taught me as a boy. And you have lots of good inside you Jelly Bean." he said with a gentle squeeze of her shoulder.

Jelly Bean

After a moment, where she stared at Amos and then his hand on her shoulder, she finally nodded.

She didn't know what a pappy was, but it must have been a village elder. She did not have any such figure in her life. she was born with the Lethan mutation in a remote tribe at the fringes of civilization, and her people were considerably more superstitious. Maybe a pappy could have helped them understand that she wasn't a ill omen. just a little girl. Did she really have good inside? Her own father didn't think so.

GM

Through the airlock. Twi'lek and BB-unit stand side by side as the shaft door slides open.

Out onto the bridge, they're buffetted by high speed updrafts and have to adjust to the much brighter ambient light.

In the ampitheatre, Jix takes up a firing position at the bottom of the ramp, flipping out the bipod of his DLT-19D heavy blaster rifle.

Amos has a SX-21 scatter blaster or his precision DT-29 heavy blaster pistol to choose from. Will he reinforce Jix at the entrance or hold a deeper defensive position?

2BB-2 rolls across the bridge to the engineer's direct access station. There is the Universal Socket Interface. On the other side of it could be a collective of over a hundred droid brains. Ghidrah.

It might just be the most dangerous slice the BB-unit has ever attempted.

Looking over the console, J.B. might be able to nerf any countermeasures by queuing up maintenance routines. Or she could try to actively block attacks using the Force to deadspot transitors as 2BB-2 progresses.

At the ramp, Jix hears rapid-fire blasters from above and the screeching of crawlers. It sounds like the sentry droids are on the scene.

Jix


"Sounds like trouble may be on the way. Time is limited."

This could be where he needs to make a stand. He lies prone, using the terrain to the best advantage, ready to buy the time his teammates need.

2BB-2

There was danger, and there was danger. Interface here, and, outnumbered and outgunned, his circuits could get charbroiled at the slightest misstep, inviting the attention of the array to his intrusion. But fail to make the attempt, and the galaxy would bear the brunt, worlds going out entirely in nihilistic blasts, the flow of information solely in the hands of those inimical to free or independent thought, using it to shape all of known space to their dark designs.

There was no hesitation as the slicer got to work, as quietly and as efficiently as he could.

Amos

He loosens his vibro machete in its scabbard and checked the charges on his pistol and scatter blaster, then took up position to one side of the door. Jix would draw their attention when they came in and he would shoot them up close from the side where his shorter ranged blaster would do the most good.

Amos said a silent prayer for their success and the safety of his boy, where ever he was.

Jelly Bean

Her affinity had always been more of a 'feel' thing. Later she would learn that it was called 'being Force sensitive'. To her it was just knowing and feeling her way around the equipment, droids, ships. Those kinds of systems just made sense to her. So, she would do what she innately knew, and use the Force to assist Babay. She could help at a component level, but she might also be able to watch for larger problems, even attacks from the Ghidrah system as a whole. The whole mission came down to this, and protecting Babay was her sole focus right now.

GM

J.B. rests her palm on the console as 2BB-2 slices in.

Under the droid's binary onslaught, access control comes apart quicker than an R5-unit. But then the console is located inside a top secret base in the Unknown Regions, guarded by a company of Stormtroopers. So maybe the designers thought security was assured?

But once through the first gate, the virtual vista opens up and it's like being catapulted into a maelstrom of chain blades. Each square, sharp-edged link a capsule of data.

It's chaos and yet 2BB-2 can see the patterns of intellect and purpose. It's a monstrous collective of droid brains, both insane and focused. It should overheat, burn up and die but the huge cooling system won't allow it.

The anti-intrusion system is terrifying. There isn't one. Instead Ghidrah skews, flexes, spins, trying to draw 2BB-2 into one of its process chains where the droid can either join the workflow or be shredded.

The BB-unit freefalls towards certain doom but then the chain in front of him stretches, fracturing into clusters, gaps in between. A misfiring transitor maybe. 2BB-2 can almost sense the Jelly Bean in the machine.

Chains, now more like sky lanes and airspeeders. 2BB-2's specialised hardware detects an eye of calm beyond. The relater system, where sense is made for the use of Ghidrah's human overseers. There 2BB-2 might highjack Ghidrah; he just has to cross multiple lanes of traffic first.

Outside in the real world, J.B. can sense it to. Her red lekku flail in the updraught. She might look down at the small, ball-like droid with his scratched blue paintjob. She's done her best but it's still a lethal barrier that 2BB-2 has to cross. They can both see it for what it is: A one way trip.

On the other side of the airlock, in the dimly-lit ampitheatre, Amos and Jix level their blasters as two First Order sentry droids motor down the ramp.

They look like short white pyramids with red scanner lights. At about the same time they come into sight, they detect the two lifeforms and extend upwards and outwards. Dual-linked blasters, four shock pulse emitters and the shimmer of deflector shields.

It appears they're assuming the fight is on. Is it?

[So, KenSeg and Gypsy, I think combat's about to ensue. When you go loud it's a safe assumption that an alert will be raised. KenSeg, also remember that Amos has a selection of grenades.]

2BB-2

The fear of death. It was a very Imperial thing, a very First Order thing. Obey us or die. Submit or millions will die. No amnesty riding along with that, either. Confronted with his own mortality, 2BB-2 remembered. Friends aboard the Raddus, those who had made it, those who hadn't. The end of that ship, with him and all but one of its crew debarked and trying to stay one step ahead. What had her final moments been like? When she pointed towards the biggest active ship known with her own, and unleashed c-fractional velocities in an undodgeable impact. At least it would have been quick, and it really hurt the First Order.

So, this was his lonely vigil on the bridge of the Raddus. There ahead was a objective that had the potential not just to hurt the First Order but to break them, to wrest a deadly weapon from their grasp and turn it against them. What was one Droid's existence weighed against the freedom of the galaxy?

There was only one way.
There was only One Way.

Jix

Unbeknown to the BB unit, Jix is in a similar mind set. He has been searching for some purpose in life since the Hive was destroyed. It is not death he fears but the emptiness, that soulless loneliness of total abandonment. Being with these others in recent times has softened the edges, allowed him to find some purpose. It has helped.

He does not know if this is his time to die but he is not afraid. Making the ultimate sacrifice for the Team seems a fitting way to go.

No point in waiting for them to shoot first.

He opens fire with purpose.

Jelly Bean

"No..."

Her voice was a whisper. Her sight was somewhere between two worlds, one being the world where she and Babay were huddled on a platform that lacked railings and was entirely unsafe for bipedal working conditions, and another work where her mind created a metaphor for a digital maze inside a storm of data. Oddly it reminded her of the ancient planet city of Taris. Perhaps Coruscant as well, but she had never been there before.

"Please... don't..."

Jelly Bean knew that even if his data construct made it across, it wouldn't make it back. But this was the mission. No one told them that it might be a one-way, but they all knew it was possible. Still she didn't want to think of a world where Babay was a memory she would have to treasure. She hadn't known him for long, but he was important to her. Why? Droids didn't show the same kind of affection and emotional attachment that Jelly bean so desperately needed. But Jelly Bean, through the Force, perceived the universe and life differently. a part of her saw things the way a droid did.

She didn't want to cry. Not again. it seemed she was doing that too much, and Twi'leks weren't good at it. The crying part that is. Her emotions were just a unpredictable and volatile as humanoid species, maybe more so if Maz was right about her.

"There must be another way... Maybe you can copy your matrix from over there and... and... I don't know... transmit it... and I can download it and restore you... Yes? Maybe?"

Amos

Close to the armed droids, Amos lets loose a blast at point blank range with his scatter blaster at the most unprotected portion of the droid and then plans to drop a grenade and dive aside.

2BB-2

The Jelly Bean in the machine. He'd felt her influence, her vital assistance ensuring he had gotten this far in the first place. Could he feel her doubts and fears? Could he sense her despairing questions in her influence and focus? His external sensors can definitely receive the input from her comms, though that's a lifetime away from this slice. Sure, he could activate subroutines to create a snapshot of his persona matrix, shove it into a memory bank and quarantine it, but that would take time and processing power, neither of which could be spared from the task ahead. The pre-existing backups would have to suffice, but in all honesty, the point was moot. How many lives lost at Yavin, at Endor, at Starkiller Base? one pilot and one astromech droid per fighter at Yavin, only three of the thirty attack craft survived. Entire capital ships annihilated in moments in the second death star's beam. This was no different. Another monstrous engine of galactic control, another desperate mission to end the threat it posed, whatever the cost.

Sometimes, the cost was you. You paid it. Survival wasn't important here. No, not quite accurate. Personal survival was outweighed by Galactic survival. And if she wanted him to survive? Wanted him to return? One last message, one last squirt of droidspeak chirping.

'Cover me. I'm going in.'

GM

Glowing red blaster fire lights up the ramp.

Jix's DLT-19D fires surgical bursts, one-two-three, one-two-three, punching the droid's deflector shield in exactly the same spot as it motors towards them.

Both sentry droids return fire, a blizzard of plasma bolts that blast holes in the plascrete walls. One bounces off of Jix's ultramesh but the Verpine keeps firing.

Biding his time, Amos waits until both droids are at critical range for his scatter blaster. BLAM! He catches them both, finally overwhelming the shield on Jix's target and throwing off the aim of the second droid.

A burst from Jix's heavy blaster rifle rips through the unshielded droid. It topples as the second droid gives up trying to hit Amos and accelerates to ramming speed with its claws sparking.

Plasma grenade in one hand, scatter blaster hanging from its sling--- Vibro-machete useless against alloy--- Amos has to duck the claws, whip out his heavy blaster pistol and cap the droid in the brain as it rolls passed.

Still under power, the droid crashes into one of the slab-like slave circuits and sputters into flame.

Tracking it, Amos's scanner vision also sees arthropod crawlers swarming into the ampitheatre from a crack in the ceiling.

"Intruder alert! Intruder alert!" Synthetic droid voices...

Tall, bipedal security droids appear at the top of the ramp, coming under immediate fire from Jix. They don't have deflector shields but their durasteel chassis soak a lot of ammo. Amos still has a plasma grenade in one hand. He also has a knockout and concussive grenade that would be more use against organics.

On the other side of the airlock, in the shaft, the blaster fire is muffled for J.B..

2BB-2 is concentrated on slicing Ghidrah but J.B. hears voice his droidspeak.

"Cover me. I'm going in." And he does.

The BB-unit dives into the traffic, moving at drift velocity across the lanes of lightspeed data.

Several times he has to pull back, hold his nerve in one lane with the workflow bearing down on him, until a gap opens up the next lane.

Finally he breaks through a fractal membrane into the calm eye of the storm. All white. But as he talks to Ghidrah he a sense of speeding up, the building of electrical pressure around him as he takes root in the monster's brain.

2BB-2 stays on mission. He hears that Lando Calrissian has rendesvoused with the citizen fleet mustering at Colossus Station. He hears the Mon Cala Fleet, battle-ready in another sector. Even a Guavian Death Fleet loitering in deep space. Thousands of starships, all waiting for the astrogation vectors that will lead them through the sub-hyperspace anomaly to Exegol.

2BB-2 hears that the Resistance led by Poe Dameron has already made the jump, rebroadcasting the vectors from the Sith Wayfinder to no avail.

Because Ghidrah is eating everything in between, all wide band hypercomms. And meanwhile, the Sith Eternal Fleet charges its planet-killing weaponry within the atmosphere of Exegol.

Poe would say that the good guys were all dressed up with nowhere to go. What will 2BB-2 do about it?

J.B. finds something else as she probes the machine. A keep-alive link from the central databanks to the Purgill experiment. The Imperial researchers had wired in their experiment so they could run tests at the press of a button. She could kill it.

At the same time she smells smoke, burning circuits and looking down sees black smoke uncoiling from of 2BB-2's orbiculate motor. Not good.

2BB-2

Not much time. But there's a moment to assess how and why the resistance data is being recognised and tagged for elimination. It needed to get through, so its parameters needed to be changed to keep from being intercepted, or the search parameters needed to be altered to keep them from registering the Resistance broadcasts. Failing that, modulating the Gidrah carrier signal itself, so the very means of denying the signal would become unwittingly the means of propagating it, or so that it would become a self-consuming ouroboros, locked on to its own tendrils and jamming itself to let the original broadcasts go through unmolested. Either way, every last moment he had, the slicer droid would be working on the problem.

GM

The HoloNets are infested by Ghidrah and via them so are most hypercomms. Distribution is handled by the slave circuits in the ampitheatre and first-pass decrypto handled by the astrogation computers of the First Order during their downtime.

But the central databanks are Ghidrah's conciousness, the rationality, where it can analyse a message and decided to block or moderate it.

2BB-2 can unblock citizen channels, allow the Resistance's message to get out. Allegiant General Pryde is now in executive command of the First Order and Sith Eternal Fleet, and by his order Ghidrah has flooded all communications with the Emperor's message.

So no-one is actively monitoring Ghidrah. If the Final Order want to hear the Emperor's message on wide band, they can, but the rest of the Galaxy doesn't have to. By the time they realise that Ghidrah's misbehaving, it will hopefully be too late.

Once the Resistance message is out, 2BB-2 could sabotage Ghidrah. He has sliced his way to top-level clearance. Issue a few complex instructions targeting the use of the words 'to' and 'be', technically two of the most common words in Galactic Basic. Disable safeguards. Watch as Ghidrah nodes across the Galaxy go into meltdown.

Putting out feelers, 2BB-2 can quickly isolate a few other BB-units he knows.

On a Resistance transport he hears BB-8 with Finn and Rose Tico. Trepidation, preparing for a ground assault.

On the Colossus he hears CB-23, another top flight slicer and partner of Resistance spy Kazuda Xiono. Frustration, waiting for the signal.

On Ajan Kloss, the Resistance base, he hears BB-19H with Maz Kanata. The Pirate Queen's own BB-unit and personal assistant. They're trying to organise a Coreward defence if any of the Xyston-class Star Destroyers escape Exegol.

And 2BB-2 also hears BB-H8. A droid he doesn't know but who is close by, supervising the droids in the Ghidrah bunker. The black BB-unit they saw on the railcrawler platform!

Apparently a red alert has been raised at the operating base---surely Smoke Team---and a TIE Echelon has just touched down outside the bunker.

Jix

He is single minded, used to being able to focus on just one thing as that is what the Hive usually demands of him.

Security droids now are the biggest threat. He concentrates, his weapon a part of him as he opens fire, one purpose in mind. Obliterate the enemy.

2BB-2

The top priority was opening the floodgates. Get the message through, make sure the assault on Exegol could go ahead. See that CB-23 and others registered it. Once that occurred, sabotage was the next objective, take Gidrah offline for good. Tertiary? See to it that the Resistance teams had the best chance they had at getting out safely. Flag the BB-H8 unit and the TIE Echelon as active enemy targets and see if the First Order droids and personnel could be turned against each other.

Amos

Seeing the new droids, they are the bigger danger over the bugs and he activates the plasma grenade, lobbing it toward the enemy and diving as far away as possible to avoid any shrapnel.

Jelly Bean

And then it was decided. Babay decided. It was his life and thus his choice to make. Without him, this would never get done. There was no way Jelly bean could do more than watch within that metaphor she envisioned. She wondered how Babay saw this data traffic nightmare. Living with an affinity for technology as she did, she found that droids were easier for her to understand than people and yet, she wasn't a droid herself. Her mind created a reality that she could understand.

She didn't even have time to say goodbye. That's what this was, right? Babay was going to complete the mission and his matrix would not survive it. Did Babay understand the meaning of sacrifice? She had to believe he did. But that he didn't attach the same emotional weight to it that she did. And again, her emotions dictated her own desires even toa point of selfishness. She didn't want Babay to die. She knew he had to do this task. She knew that he was the only one who could. She knew that if he didn't then millions and millions, maybe billions or even trillions of people and droids would be killed or enslaved to this despotic new universal order... a First Order, a Final Order... whatever... It was tyranny with a brand name and control of flow of information.

"You better have a backup somewhere Babay," she said aloud as she thought it into the datastream realm.

To whatever extent she might 'cover him' she did. Using the Force to bend the flows of data, she pressed against its own digital inertia to help Babay find the path he needed. When she pushed and pulled and fought to give Babay every chance she could give him she also found a particular cache of data related to the Purgill experiments. More like a set of operative commands structures. it didn't matter what they were, anything that was a link from the Imps or the FO to that poor creature or any of the creatures anywhere in the universe had to be neutralized... NO, it had to be destroyed, annihilated, with extreme prejudice... no mercy... no quarter... no absolution...

Jeleasi'Beni focused the Force through her connection to the Ghidrah machine. She could feel the emotions in her fueling the wrath she poured out through Ghidrah to anywhere this cruel operation existed. The emotions about the purgill, about losing Babay, about losing Maljean, about her enslavement and abuse by the Hutts, about her family abandoning her, selling her off to slavers... it all entwined as she edged ever closer to a dark precipice.

[OK, AJ, would you like to compose the message that 2BB-2 sends to the Citizens' Fleet? Obviously don't worry about the approach vectors for Exegol. We'll assume that's an attached data package.]

2BB-2

Certain species are better at certain things than certain other species. This is merely a factor of their physiology or construction. Wookies were considerably stronger than humans, but the latter had considerably sharper minds than the average baseline Gamorrean. So, there was more than a little irony in the need for a rousing speech... to be delivered by a unit programmed to converse in 27th generation Droidspeak. Then again, protocol droids were not necessarily the best slicers. The compressed beeps and trills lent themselves to a laconic style when translated back into Galactic Basic, as the header message on the Exegol approach data demonstrated.

"Make all speed to the destination. Be prepared for battle on arrival. Everyone's existence depends upon it. The Resistance cannot be silenced."

GM

The green Tibanna gas giant Kril'dor, at the fringe of the Western Reaches.

Orbiting the planet is a space station, looking like a grey alloy spike. Colossus.

It is surrounded by an armada of starships, starfighters, freighters, frigates.

The Millennium Falcon drops out of hyperspace and banks into a circuit of the space station.

In the cockpit, Lando Calrissian whistles in awe of the assembled citizens' fleet.

"Would you look at that!" He says to Chewbacca in the co-pilot seat.

Like Lando, Chewbacca peers out at the ships though seems less impressed, grumbling to himself.

"Every pirate, smuggler, every bounty hunter and rebel without a cause in the Western Reaches!" Lando notes as they pass an old VCX-100 light freighter he recognises.

Chewie grumbles louder this time, turning to Lando. The old Socorran gambler smirks, saying "Well that was below the belt." to which the Wookiee chuckles.

On their starboard, a yellow chopshop fighter pulls alongside. It looks like an X-Wing collided with a Z-75 Headhunter. A fresh young voice hails them.

«Millennium Falcon, this is Kaz Xiono of Colossus Aces Squadron. I hope you have some news for us, Lando, because people here are getting fired up.»

Lando and Chewie swap an awkward look.

"Sorry Kaz." Replies Lando, "I got the Mining Guild to join us but... no co-ordinates yet."

Kaz sounds disappointed, afraid, «I don't know how much longer we can hold this thing together.»

Chewie sighs, sharing Kaz's concern but Lando hides any doubts he has.

"Rey will come through for us, Kaz," he says, "trust me."

Lando knows that the Resistance, the Free Galaxy, are relying on more than Rey and her team. Somewhere amongst the stars, a team of Force Awakened are trying to destroy the First Order's most insidious weapon and unsilence hypercomms. So much depends on the Ghidrah mission that only Resistance Command are aware of it.

Since returning from Pasaana, that number includes Lando Calrissian. But he has a very good Sabacc face and redirects.

"Is this everyone?" He asks Kaz.

«The navies of Mon Cala and Hynestia are on standby in other systems, though hypercomms are a mudscuffer. We even have a Guavian Death Fleet waiting for the greenlight.»

"Guavians!? How'd you drag those Gank-killers into this?" Says Lando, grinning.

«I kinda just told them I'd be at the fight and after that they were keen to be there.»

"Hah, you got some nerve---"

Chewie interrupts with a growl, adjusting his headset and dialling in a knob on the console.

Lando looks excited, "What?"

Outside in the yellow starfighter, Fireball, Kaz mutes the comlink to the Millennium Falcon as his Astromech droid starts jabbering in excitement.

"What is it, Ceebee? Um, I should get ready to be impressed!?"

Teal and orange CB-23 relays the message coming in over hypercomm, Kaz reading it aloud as it scrolls across the ticker in the cockpit.

"'Make all speed to the destination. Be prepared for battle on arrival. Everyone's existence depends upon it. The Resistance cannot be silenced'---

"Stars!" Kaz gasps, "This is the package. Co-ordinates, vectors, the shortcut to Exegol--- Lando!!"

In the Millennium Falcon Lando and Chewie are already cheering and laughing.

"We got the message, Kaz..." Lando says into the comlink, catching his breath.

Chewie woofs and nods to the portside. Every ship in the citizens' fleet is adjusting angle to the new astrogation co-ordinates.

Lando grins, all white teeth and moustache.

"Everyone got the message."

Pressing buttons, he loads the data package into the ship's navicomputer and gives it an affectionate pat. If Vuffi's still in there, they'll need her tenacity for this next jump!

That done, Lando looks to Chewbacca.

"If Han could see us now, hey, Chewie?"

The Wookiee nods silently, still feeling loss, anger.

"That Emperor better have another life up his sleeve; it's our turn to strike back." Says Lando.

Chewbacca growls in fierce agreement, twisting a lever to vent tachyons in preparation for the jump to lightspeed.

Hypercomms are coming through loud and clear; they've been patchy for years. Lando spares a thought for the Resistance team who've slain Ghidrah, praying aloud: "Let's hope the team who got the message out get themselves out."

He opens a channel to his fleet:

"Citizens' fleet, this is the Millennium Falcon. Synchronise rate at one and follow me in. Have your finger on the trigger and may the Force be with us."

The Millennium Falcon zooms into hyperspace.

The Fireball jumps.

Thousands of starships, of all shapes and sizes and allegiances jump.

The Battle of Exegol awaits.


[I plan to post in your storyline tomorrow and we'll learn what's become of Mirror Team, under attack by Security Droids, crawlers and Ghidrah itself.]

GM

Rather than burning more ammo on autofire, Jix takes aim down the teleoptic and puts a clean shot into a Security Droid's photoreceptor, exploding its head.

Another rank of droids appears behind the first and Amos hurls his plasma grenade. It detonates with a white flash and torrent of red plasmic shrapnel.

Two of the droids are obliterated and the rearmost droid stops mid-stride, its head twitching as it receives a sudden burst of conflicting orders.

Somewhere in the bunker above, the shiny black BB-H8 bleeps and buzzes furiously as it command of the Sentry and Security Droids is disrupted.

It rolls along a plascrete corridor, behind it stomp a squad of Stormtroopers. Sergeant in the lead with a black pauldron and supported by deployable Megablasters.

BB-H8 wants to show the situation is under control, that droids can get the job done, but the bunker's comms net has been been compromised. Somehow a slicer droid with bleeding-edge custom hardware is flooding the command queue with spurious orders.

BB-H8 and the newly arrived Stormtroopers are being flagged as imposters. BB-H8 bawls back over the Binary comlink:

«Any individual not bearing the insignia of the First Order must be terminated on sight.»

For Mirror Team, it's enough confusion to give them the edge. If the droids take a millisecond to scan them for insignia, that's a millisecond for Mirror Team to shoot first.

They'll need it.

Jix is suddenly dragged backwards from his prone position, a three-metre long crawler has its fangs sunk in the Verpine's boot.

Amos barely has time to dust himself off. Most of the crawlers rush at the Security Droids, having some animal hatred of their exterminators.

But some are more hungry than others. A fast, one-metre specimens cascades down the wall towards Amos.

J.B. can sense 2BB-2 efforts, can sense the rewards. She feels the message to the Reistance released. She feels Ghidrah shift like a krayt dragon swallowing a Bantha-bomb.

There's an erruption happening inside its databanks that has yet to manifest in the real world.

Concentrating, she confirms that the operating base at the other end of the mountain range is alerted to a Resistance attack. Smoke Team are rumbled too.

Inside the machine, 2BB-2 senses J.B. one last time then the environment starts to crash, the white torn apart by black glitches as the destructive surge hammers into the higher systems.

He is alone as his life comes to an end. But Ghidrah delivers a final message. He hears CB-23, he hears BB-8, he hears BB-19H, he even hears BB-00 out in Wild Space.

«We will remember you.» They say.

Outside, flames jet from 2BB-2's ports as his selenium drive melts down. His head unit loses contact and slides off to clatter on the floor.

The lens of the photoreceptor contracts.

But in the those last moments, it isn't darkness that 2BB-2 sees. Instead the darkness is lit by his unspooling memories. His life, his deeds, his friendships. It might feel like a pre-flight check. Reviewing his memories, the droid can say that all's well, he is good for take-off.

2BB-2 shuts down.

J.B. feels him go.

She's shaking. Literally, the platform she stands on is shaking. Glancing over the side, up and down she can see the central databanks jettisoning molten heat sinks.

The only thing worth salvaging from Ghidrah now is 2BB-2's head unit. Turning to the viewport she'd see a crawler scurry across it, and blaster fire and burning wreckage higher up in the ampitheatre where Jix and Amos set their defensive line.

As far as Mirror Team can tell, there are one and half ways out of this sublevel, the lowest in the bunker.

One is to fight their way back up the ramp to the surface.

The half is to scale the cooling shaft that houses the central databanks. It must run all the way up to the hyperwave antenna.

[Thank you, AJ. It has been a complete pleasure.]

Jix

He has no idea what the current situation is.. except bad. All he knows is he has a job to do and these crawlers are getting in the way. He twists and takes aim, firing at the crawler attached to his boot at point blank range.

It felt like the chasm was both real and metaphor. Babay's spherical body was right beside her, but she could see him across the chaotic data-stream where he had delivered a fatal blow to Ghidrah, and sacrificed himself at the same time. Her emotions wavered and buckled her restraint. Her whole life seemed to be scratching and clawing to find some semblance of normalcy amidst the grief and suffering of loss and abandonment. Knowing that Babay would not survive and actually bearing witness to it were profoundly different things. She wanted to, even tried to, use the force to disrupt the data stream gauntlet that was killing the little droid as he delivered his own fatal spike that would open hypercomms to give the Resistance a chance. But... but it would be too little, too late. In fact, the droid knowingly crossed the path to his death, sacrificing himself in a way that was more 'flesh and blood' than any other being she had ever known since Mal'jean and even before him. In fact, in her whole life, outside of those two instances, she had never known anyone to act so selfless.

Feeling Babay shutting down, his 'consciousness' fading from her senses in this hyperwave reality, brought her emotions forth in a torrent. A Jedi had to control the emotions, or else the emotions would overwhelm the Jedi. She had struggled with this since Maz Kanata first started her training. Maz knew it and Leia knew it as well. But the needed her talents and potential as much as she needed them and their resources. Jeleasi was a bomb waiting to detonate. An ill-fitting candidate o become a Jedi, one that would have never been trained as child in the age of the Republic, before the Empire. The Resistance trained her anyway... Desperate times require desperate measures...

Jeleasi was no Jedi.

She screamed in fury as the last trace of Babay faded from her mind's grasp. Tears welled in her eyes, thin of water, for Twi'leks were born of the desert climes and water was jealously kept inside the body. And yet, she had cried more tears this mission than she had ever done so in her whole life before.

She took up the head unit of her little friend, stuffing it into her pouch as she kept another hand on the machine. She hoped he had made a copy of himself somewhere. She hoped that he might be reborn, with some wisp of who he truly was to reignite his droid 'life force' again. But the reality of this moment was very clear now. The chances any of them might survive this were as narrow as getting a fair deal at a pazaak table on Nal Hutta.

Jeleasi seized control of her emotions and turned them into a cyclone of strength in her own mind, in the same way she learned to use her fear and anger to protect herself as a child slave. Ride the tempest and own it... find the balance within it. She reached out into the Force to find the Purgill. She realized the creature knew its fate despite the glimmer of hope that Jeleasi tried to offer. Now, the twi'lek accepted it as well. Its fate might her own as well, but she would go out on her own terms, just as Babay did. And she would give the same to the Purgill.

I am sorry and saddened that such a beautiful creature as yourself has been chained in slavery. I feel your pain and know it as my own. But the suffering can end and I can release you to the Force. I am truly sorry that I can not do what I hoped for you. I do not know if I will survive myself. I can only offer you peace...

Feeling the life force of the creature through the link, she tries to offer comfort, but she has little peace of her own within the barely constrained torrent of her embattled soul. Perhaps the Purgill has more comfort, peace, and solace to offer her than she does to it. When she is confident they understand each other, Jeleasi terminated the creature through the 'kill-switch' adding yet another current of emotion to her personal storm.

She stood there for a long moment, within the well of Ghidrah, standing in the furious winds that drove upwards in the futile effort to keep the overheating super-machine cool. Those moments were needed to focus herself. She didn't believe she would get control again, not in the way she had before coming on this mission. She might never be the same person again. Control was an illusion anyway. She had to learn to master the storm and not try to block it or hide it. She stared up the shaft as her lekku were whipped about her. And she then had an idea...

She ran back across the bridge, up the amphitheater steps to the exit-lock. Her companions were on the other side and the forces of the First Order were bearing down on them.

Her lightsabers snapped into her hands as she used the Force to push the button that opened the door. With a determination of fury, she brought the storm with her. Her two shoto blades ignited as she jumped across the room to engage the droids in a force driven whirlwind of collimated amber plasma. Slash, pierce, force push, force pull, slash, twist and turn, like the dancer she was trained to be. There was no fear within her, their was no anger inside. All of it was spun about her psyche, woven through the Force... Eliminate the threat. Protect her companions... See them to a chance for escape...


*******

OOC Note- I was very deliberate in the use of Jelly Bean's real name through out the post. I am probably being too cutesy by half in doing this but I wanted a way to convey her progression between the Light and the Dark on a color scale. The use of her name represents where she is on that scale.

Amos

The stink of melting circuits from his plasmatic grenade fills the air around him as he looks up from where he landed on the ramp. Coughing out the stench, the weathered lawman grinned ferociously at the mayhem he had caused but then cursed as yet another of those 'dang creepy crawlies' came for him, causing him to shift the aim of his blaster and fire.

Jeleasi landed in the fray between her team and the remaining droids, just as the Stormtroopers were arriving at the top of the ramp. Chaos and confusion on their part gave Amos and Jix a moment. But even that was quickly consumed by the attack of the crawlers. If there was any blessing of the Goddess to be found, the crawlers were more anxious to attack the First Order forces than her own team, most of them anyway.

"Amos... it's done... the message is sent..."

Her voice was a shout, as she wheeled about, lightsabers slashing anything in her path. She had placed herself between her team and the enemy on purpose. Oh sure, killing every last fanatical believer was reason enough right now, but Jeleasi had the speed and the Force abilities to act as cover right in the middle of the battle.

"Contact Winta... and fall back to the Ghidrah chamber... I found a way out!"

The fact that they probably wouldn't like her escape route was a minor inconvenience, and they didn't need to know that right now. Bad or not, it was better than the three of them trying to fight their way up from the lowest levels, against an unknown and quite possibly a seemingly limitless number of droids, stormtroopers and crawlers. Her plan had the benefit of surprise in that she was sure no sane person had ever thought this was a means of escape before.

"GO! GO NOW!"

Tossing droids away from herself, she held her ground. She parried blaster shots as best she could and tried not to think of the impossible odds against her even surviving this onslaught. She jumped here and she could jump away again, once her team reached the chamber airlock. To anyone close enough to see the twi'lek's blue eyes eyes, they will notice a thin circle of yellow, like the corona of a sunburst, surrounding the iris at the center.

Jix

Jelly Bean arrives in front of them, lightsabres already making a different. He is just wondering where BB was when he hears her command to fall back to the chamber. He is still hive conditioned. As a member of the hive, you obey the queen without question. Any member failing that duty will bring catastrophe on the hive. So he retreats but watches out for crawlers on him or on Amos.

Amos

You trusted the members of your team. It was an axiom that you lived or died by and one that Amos believed in. If JB said she knew the way then that was it.

"Go!" he said to Jix, bringing his comm unit up and calling out to Winta.

"Mirror Team calling Smoke. Mission Accomplished. Bug out!" he said to her as he shot at another crawler and followed Jix toward the chamber.

GM

Caught between the swarm of crawlers and the First Order droids, Mirror Team sees fierce, close fighting. No tactics, just aggression and tempo.

But over their comlinks they hear Winta:

«Mirror Team, this is Smoke. Roger. We'll see if we can manage that.

«You are not on the outside of the gun tower by any chance?»

Nice to know they've found a gun tower.

[I'll resolve your combat round and push on asap. It's taking some fancy footwork to keep the team's synched while they communicate but both threads should be untethered again shortly.]

GM

Amos has no time to reply, whipping up his scatterblaster and plastering the crawler across the wall.

Opposite, Jix feels the gargantuan crawler bite into his ankle as it drags him across the floor. He feels his exoskeleton crack but the fangs don't pierce his ultramesh armour.

Autofire. The Verpine empties the rest of his blaster's Dedlanite power cell, tearing the three-metre long crawler apart.

J.B. meanwhile cuts the legs out from under a Security Droid and hurls a newly-arrived Sentry Droid back up the ramp as it's trying to deploy blasters and shield.

Suddenly a jet of liquid flame sprays the wall next to her, washing over ramp, crawlers, droids and only a backwards Force jump saves her.

She lands between Amos and Jix, her arm ablaze. Both her fellow Resistance fighters are their feet, reloading weapons as they fight a withdrawal.

At the far end of the ramp a squad of Stormtroopers appear. Gleaming white, fresh from their Star Destroyer.

With them is a Flametrooper, D-93 Incinerator turning the ramp into an inferno.

The squad sergeant signals and the other Stormtroopers advance, whilst two Heavy Assault Troopers activate the servo-stands on their Megablasters.

The volume of fire from the ramp increases exponentially.

Using the slave circuits as cover, Mirror Team arrive at the airlock.

What is J.B.'s plan? And just how consumed by the Dark Side is she?

Jix

He will try to smother the flames, knowing she will need a stimpack but maybe not this second.

[OOC Anyway to close the door? ]

Amos

Dropping his scatterblaster to hang by its strap, Amos pulls his last two plasma grenades, activates them and throws them at the arriving imperial troops. He hopes to buy them enough time to withdraw and escape but if nothing else he is going to at least take a few more of the bastards along with him on his trip to Hell.

The twi'lek was the last through the door. She had already been in the amphitheater before. Looking out across the expanse, on the other side of the catwalk bridge, she saw Babay's spherical drive orb. The central tower of Ghidrah cooling well still screamed with the turbine driven winds. Her eyes were fixed on the remains of the droid though. It was a slag of metal, a carcass. Whatever consciousness or soul Babay had was probably gone now. The chance that the head unit she tucked away in her pack contained a retrievable copy of him was slim. But it was one she was determined to defend all the same. Enough. She tore her eyes away from Babay.

"Out to the catwalk," she commanded in a loud voice to overcome he noise as she crossed the threshold herself. Babay had sliced the door control, but it was still working. Once inside, she closed the heavy transparent door so that it would seal, and then she pushed the tip of her lightsaber through the control assembly, from front to back so it couldn't be used again. The troopers and the droids would have to blast through.


"Move... You aren't going to like this plan... but it's he best we've got."

Once the others saw Babay across the bridge, they would understand his sacrifice and her ire. She caught up with them at the edge, before the bridge to the central platform that wrapped around the Ghidrah tower.

"This is a vertical wind tunnel," she yelled over the noise. "I haven't time to teach you everything... But trust me, I did this a lot when I performed for Tenga the Hutt."

She faced them, knowing that the big heavy gun the troopers were moving would do a lot of damage to the the barrier.

"You will step out, lean out and step... step into the wind. That's the hardest part. Relax and step forward, as though you were going to let yourself fall. Trust me." The fact that Amos was wearing that big heavy, billowing coat, was not going to make it easy for him to get the balance. He would rise quickly if he wasn't careful.

"Tie that off tight around your body or leave it behind," she commanded as she pointed to Amos' jacket. It would be what it would be.

She glanced up at the progress the troopers were making.There was no mirth, no joy, in her voice anymore. She sounded cold and distant... entirely focused and determined.

"You control your ascent and descent by how much resistance you present to the wind. Spread your arms and legs out far and it will slow you, and lift you. Bring them closer to your body, and you will drop.... Find your balance, first. Get out there and find how much you have to spread out to stay in one place. That's balance. Once you know that, you can change your position, up or down. We want up... only up. This thing is very strong so there might not be a lot of down even possible. Just step out like you are laying out onto a bed, on your belly. Flat out, arms and legs like this," she said as she mimicked an hour glass shape. "Don't try to stand up straight. Fight the urge to panic. Focus and feel the wind. That's all you need for now. I will be the last and help get you stable from here.... Once you both are stable, I will follow. We'll figure out the rest of the escape from there."

iFly Baltimore - Belly Flying - Beg...ng - Vertical Wind Tunnel - RW - YouTube

Jix

His compound eyes looked for the BB unit and found him, or what was left of him. His emotions are not the same as a human but he felt.. less. Their team had diminished.

"Stimpack first."

She shrugs off the pack and applies one to Jellybean.

"No good to you in my pack."

Then he rests his hand on her shoulder just for a moment. Words are inadequate at a time like this.

The pack is back on in seconds. He decides to carry the weapon even though he is not sure he can use it accurately in uncontrolled flight. Maybe as a deterrent? Hopefully not needed.

Someone has to go first and he trusts Jellybean. It will work or it will not. He replays the instructions in his head and steps forward.

Amos

The lanky man moves to the side for a moment as Jix sees to JB, pausing to look at their fallen droid.

"Drift in electric dreams my friend." he said softly, then tightened his weapons and coat about himself to prevent drag and waited as Jix headed out first.

"You next lass." he said to the twi'lek.

Jeleasi'Beni

As Jix administered the stimpack, JB disengaged one of her sabers. She had felt the pain but used it to fuel her intensity.

As soon as Jix leaned out into the wind tunnel, JB reached out with the Force. She didn't have time to teach them how to do this properly and she knew she would have to help them. She wrapped Jix in the Force and cradled the Verpine. When Amos called her 'Lass' she narrowed her eyes and turned her head ever so slightly to look at him. Those blue eyes were different. That ring of yellow fire closest to her irises appeared to flare ever so slightly. Had Amos ever seen a Force User on the precipice of falling to the Dark Side?

"I said... I'm last. I have to be last... to get you both stable."

While holding one hand out as though she was reaching for Jix, Jeleasi's concentration was intense but now divided over two different tasks. "I have Jix. You need to be out there as well to learn how to move. Now. Resistance chain of command is irrelevant to me. Keeping you both alive is all that matters. Now get out there, or I will toss you out there."

Amos

"No need to get your knickers in a bunch. You are the boss JB." he said and followed suit after Jix.

Jeleasi'Beni

JB put away the other light saber and extended that hand to guide her efforts to stabilize Amos. She now had both of them in a loose hold so they didn't accidentally lose control and dive down to the turbine blades below them, Has either of them actually looked down there? That could be a moment of consternation. This wind tunnel wasn't built for defying gravity. It wasn't an entertainment model.

Once they had both practiced a bit, she walked up to the edge herself. When she was ready to enter, she knew she would have to release them. They would be on their own until she could get settled in the wind herself. If they could avoid panicking or over correcting, they might avoid bouncing off the walls.

With the Troopers getting ready to to breach the the chamber's transparent walls and airlock hatch, Jeleasi stepped forward with effortless grace as her body conformed to the rushing wind and she took control of it. She whipped around the chamber as though she were a dancer defying gravity. She wheeled about using the wind and her body to flow together as one.

Dancing with GRAVITY by Inka Tiitto | Aerodium - YouTube


She positioned herself between them as a life-guard might do in a pool so that she could see them both. Finding an important use for one of the talents and skills she learned as a slave hadn't ever seemed likely. Sure she used her agility and grace, but the actual trained talent of dancing in a tube of rushing air seemed something she would never do again. Under any other circumstances she probably would never go back to those skills and talents again. But flying in the tube was peaceful. She could tune out the leering and jeering patrons of Tenga the Hutt who often wanted the dancers to fail so that Tenga would turn off the tube and send them plummeting back to the floor. But JB learned to be very good at it and that enabled her to spend a lot of time in the tube.

This wasn't then, She wasn't a slave. She had to get two novices up the shaft to wherever it lead before the troopers got in to shoot them, or found a way to shut it off.

JB motioned for them to watch her. she extended herself and began to rise. Simple basic lesson. She wanted hem to follow suit. She would use the Force to keep them stable but the goal was to rise up the shaft as quickly as they could.

Jix

This is a very alien environment to him. Tunnels yes.. but not flying.. and it seems every time he moves an exaggerated counter move takes place. But he is gradually learning to make him movements less and to realise what effect his movements have. He does not look down. Best he doesn't see. It is probably a long way down, so fly he must. He envies JellyBean's grace and control in the air. The best he can manage is not to career everywhere out of control.

He watches her carefully, trying to follow her example and instructions.. whilst praying it will soon be over.

GM

In the chaos, Amos might have forgotten that his last two grenades aren't plasma. Having changed his loadout after Jakku, he had a sonic imploder and a dioxis knockout grenade.

They'd do the job though. He cooked off the sonic imploder, so that it detonated before the dioxis grenade then threw them both up the ramp.

There was a burst of intense blue light then a concussive shockwave that flattened the front rank of Stormtroopers, cracking seals on helmets throughout the squad. Then an instant later, pop and the ramp flooded with a green swamp-like gas.

The sergeant led his squad from the murk, sweeping the way ahead with the glowrod on his F-11D blaster. Most emerged battered but alive, several emerged coughing staggering and falling unconscious. Some had been killed by the sonic imploder, their bodies stepped over by their squad-mates.

The Flametrooper cursed, shaking his incinerator as its pilot lights sputtered.

Panicked cries from the squad. The Flametrooper's fuel tanks were ruptured and spraying Conflagrine-14.

BB-H8 rolled out of the gas behind the squad, bleeping angrily, his photoreceptor broken and shedding sparks---

The Stormtroopers threw themselves to the floor as the ramp was engulfed in a fiery, thermobaric explosion.

---BB-H8 turned to shrapnel. The explosion sent smaller crawlers hurtling through the air, splatting against the viewport between the ampitheatre and shaft.

By this time, Mirror Team are taking off.

Leaving 2BB-2's burnt out wreckage behind, Jix and Amos step off of the platform into space.

Far below them, they can see the turbine spinning in overdrive as Ghidrah goes into meltdown. Molten metal showers from above.

Focusing, J.B. is able to stabilise her team-mates in those first crucial seconds and then she must follow them.

Jix and Amos might not be aerial dancers but they are spacers and have experienced their share of zero-gravity.

Freefall is like being inside a starship when the gravity generators fail, except the air resistance is colossal.

Spreading arms and legs and sucking in the gut creates more drag and pushes them into the air.

As they rise, the airlock is breached by fuming Detonite and the Stormtroopers assault, firing their blasters blindly.

They're quickly presented by a lack of targets. Where are Mirror Team?

Suspended in the air over the heads of the Stormtroopers.

Will you open fire or try to escape undetected?

Jeleasi'Beni

With the massive volume of airflow there was no way JB could communicate directly, and, by the same token, no way for the troopers to hear them below. But, if they delyaed or chose to engage from above, they then presented themselves as targets. The increasing heat would aid to updraft but soon enough it would become unbearable in this shaft. It was a ticking clock. One that could go to zero very fast if the little droid realized where they were and tried to shut the airflow down before they found an egress. In her thoughts, she imagined this was a one way system. Ghidrah generated so much heat that it was unlikely they recirculated the same air in a loop like the entertainment tubes do. Getting to the exit was critical. It was the only task.

In a graceful move to ease the profile her body and to minimize the changes that profile presented to this uncalibrated wind tunnel, she tapped her comm in her head wear. "Keep going... They don't know where we are. If they become a threat, I will deal with them..."

As much as she wanted anyone and everyone associated with the First Order to die horribly painful deaths for all the misery they have inflicted, even just for their association with such a group, she knew that her only self determined goal and mission right now was to see Jix and Amos to safety. She was not going to lose anyone else...

Jix

"OK"

It was only a small word, as Jix was focusing all his attention on stability. A small word but a big meaning. He trusted her.

Amos

He didn't even use a small word, simply continuing to work at maintaining his stability while he kept an eye on the enemy below.

GM

The wind speed in the shaft must be almost 200 kph and drives Mirror Team upwards.

Embers of molten metal flit around them like fireflies.

Jix and Amos are both stimmed, a fresh, reinvigorated feeling that quells pain and discomfort. Although the carahide on Jix's leg might have split, the stiffened Verpine ultramesh should prevent a break and there's no weight on it in freefall anyway.

Amos can't be sure how his physiology is coping with the crawler's venom but the stimpack seems to be repairing cell damage as quickly as it occurs. It's still one crazy ride.

J.B. is riding on memories and emotion as much as the air. She's agile, well-practiced but 2BB-2's loss and flashbacks to Hutt slavery have dragged her mind into a dark place.

She might even be thankful for the burns on her arm. Her mechanic's utility suit is flame retardent but the D-93 incinarator has left her sleeve glued to her skin.

And sometimes pain is just what you need to stay focused on the here and now.

Mirror Team are climbing fast.

Below them, molten metal splashes the platform, causing the Stormtrooper squad to look up. They see Mirror Team's spread-eagled silhouettes.

Shouts of "There!" "Get after them!".

The sergeant can be distinguished by his black pauldron. He claps a subordinate on the shoulder. Go first! The Stormtrooper jumps off the platform expecting to be catapulted upwards. Instead he tombstones straight down into the whirring turbine blade to gruesome effect.

Giant turbine blades can be added to the list of things Stormtrooper armour is not proof against.

The sergeant goes next. Perhaps having jump pack training, he spreads out and shoots upwards after the Resistance fighters.

Another two Stormtroopers follow his lead without tombstoning, and the last, a heavy assault, deploys his FWMB-10 Megablaster.

The air around Mirror Team is suddenly filled with blaster bolts.

Not only is the Megablaster firing, the sergeant is able to roll onto his back, maintaining lift and aiming his Sonn-Blas rifle.

Mirror Team are about medium range from the sergeant and his two men, long range from the Megablaster. They can return fire, they can evade. Might there be other hazards in the shaft they can use (or create) to their advantage?

GM

With the deafening roar of the wind, Mirror Team can barely hear each other if they shout. But their headsets work, allowing communication not just within their team but with Smoke Team too. Winta's voice crackles over the comlink.

«Just to let you know, guys, we may not get out of the gun tower in one piece....

We won't think any the worse of you all if you take the opportunity of our distraction to make good your escape.»

She sounds hurt but focused.

Jix

**Well they now know where we are.**

Jix considers his options as he hears the transmission from Winta, leaving it to JellyBean or Amos to respond.

**Might as well see if I can use a weapon in this environment? Could serve as a distraction at least.**

He takes a moment to consider angles, the updraft and the capabilities of the weapon and then selects a target who is firing on them. He lets off a short burst, ensuring his Team are not close. He keeps his movements contained, aware that movement and recoil may well bounce back on him.

Amos

Given the distance and the imbalance, Amos pulls out his blaster pistol and uses that to try and send some fire down at the First Order as he replies to his commander.

"Same here. See you on the other side sir."

Jeleasi'Beni

JB could hold her position in the buffeting currents of wind from below because she had learned how to take advantage of the subtle movements of her body and how they affected her performance in the Hutt's entertainment tubes. She wheeled about, circling the whole tube around the rising central frame of Ghidrah's framework. The massive banks of heat sinks were overheating and melting.

"Go, keep going... find the exterior vent port... look for maintenance handrails..."

JB then focused on those below. Using the force she began yanking the heat sinks out, and hurling and pushing them hard against the currents of air to hit the rising enemies. Knock them out, or diver them into a bad position that caused a fall. She couldn't afford to let the heat sinks plummet into the fan blades below, even though they were a softer metal and already melting into slag because if they took the turbine blades out below, then everyone was going to come hurtling down hard. Mirror team couldn't afford to linger here for much longer before the whole of Ghidrah overwhelmed the failing cooling systems and cascaded into an massive fireball.

[You won't find any handrails in an Imperial facility. I'm writing up your next round-up, Mirror team. Bare with.]

GM

Jix loses some climb rate as he brings his heavy blaster rifle down to harry the pursuing Stormtroopers. Returning fire in short, controlled bursts, the Verpine ensures their enemy can't stabilise to shoot without presenting a target.

For a moment it's a hurricane of blaster bolts and molten metal, Mirror Team and the Stormtroopers circling the shaft at high speed, evading and firing.

Amos snaps off shots with his DT-29 heavy blaster pistol, mostly missing until he catches a Stormtrooper on the foot. The impact and shock send the Stormtrooper spinning off, crashing into the wall headfirst.

J.B. concentrates on the central databanks and the huge heatsinks cooling thousands of droid brains, intuiting which are softest, loosest, until she grabs onto one with the Force as she flies passed.

Glowing red hot, the heatsink launches from its socket. The roaring in J.B.'s ears twists into laughter, bloated, bileful Hutt laughter. Audible hallucinations of her past, the Dark Side creeping forward in her mind.

Old Kaltho the Hutt. Smelled like a soggy bag of rotten fruit....

The heatsink plummets towards the Stormtroopers throwing off their aim as they dodge aside.

Down on the platform, the heavy assault revs the foregrip on his Megablaster, increasing ROF into a constant stream of over ten bolts a second.

Amos is hit in the abs, armoured coat and plates in his battle armour soaking most of the damage. It feels like he's just been kicked in the guts by a fathier.

Below, the heavy assault trooper curses and stops firing as hot gas jets from the XCiter of his Megablaster. Overheated. He waves his hand at it, trying to cool it down until J.B.'s 25-kilo heatsink lands on him.

Above, Jix splashes through a gout of molten metal. It shorts out the rigidifying field in his ultramesh, the armour becoming soft, textile-like again.

But his next burst strafes the pursuing Stormtroopers as they avoid the same gout. Hit in the groin, the sergeant flings his blaster and grabs his choobies. As he plummets, his subordinate takes two shots to the chestplate, the plastoid armour easily pierced. Trailing smoke, he drops like a dead weight.

Amos notices the walls of the shaft closing in. Looking up, he sees the top of the shaft closing in fast. Around the circumference are smaller, roughly man-sized vents, probably ducting to the outer atmosphere.

Do they keep going fast and be expelled from the ducts fast? Or slow down?

And J.B., can she overcome the darkness inside herself?

[OOC Has Jix noticed how close they are to the top? ]

[We can assume even if Jix hasn't that shouts and hand-signals would be instinctual and part of the subtext. i.e., You don't need to write that your characters are communicating in general, we'll assume they are. It's only when you want them to say something specific or in a specific way that you write dialogue for it.

Thus Jix would surmise that he needs to look up. ]

Jix

Reacting to those around him, Jix glances up to see how far they still have to go and is surprised that they are almost there. Best to slow down a bit. He lessens his profile slightly, resisting the urge to overreact as he learned earlier that this can result in chaos. He uses his compound eyes to examine what must be Jelly Bean's way out and tries to get himself into a better position.

Jeleasi'Beni

The heat from below was building up the tower of Ghidrah's brain. When the turbine driven air could no longer shed heat at all, then there would be a critical mass effect. But she so wanted to end them all.

"Go... get out..." Her breathing was clipped and her words, short and to the point. Her focus was divided and that wasn't a good thing. Ex-fil her team... Amos's team... Part of Kweekuni Winta's team... whatever... Her team right now. Kill every last one of these soulless monsters who could spread such vile hate, who could treat life in any form with such flagrant callousness and disdain. Moth breathing as she growled through an open comm let everyone experience her anger whether or not that was ever her intention. In fact she really wasn't aware of it as she 'swam' through the air current, circling and weaving around the tower.

If she stayed she knew she was sacrificing herself for them, so they might survive.

That was a lie... and she knew it. They could all get out now, they were close to he vent exhaust ports. Why then? Because she knew it would be so hard to come back from the ledge she found herself? Maz warned her that if she couldn't control her emotions them she was opening herself to the temptations of the Dark Side. Leia as well, just, not in so many words, and not directly to her. Her observations when Maz first brought her to the Resistance base were clear though. And yet, here she was, allowing emotions to dictate her actions through the Force. What if it were the acceptance of a fear that had lingered for four years now, one that whispered in her dreams, one that old her Maljean was dead? What was the point of living then? Especially living as someone that people would fear no matter how much her intentions were founded in purpose and resolve to do good things. The ends are not justified by the means? Why not? Then, to the ends that good is achieved in a universe where evil adheres to no rules, shouldn't one be willing to sacrifice themself to stand in that metaphorical mountain pass?


"Kriff that!" hissed the Twi'lek through clenched teeth.

If that was to be her fate, killing the pestilence called the First Order, then she wasn't going to out on a pyre lit by druk-swilling bucket heads. She would hunt the leaders and make them pay. She would not give up on Maljean. She promised him that. From that very moment when she towed his derelict pod into her stolen transport their fates were entangled. She saved him, and he saved her. Even if he was dead, she would not give in to her own darkness until she had proof, and until that day came there would be no rest in her quest for the truth. If she had to kill every First Order miscreant to get the truth, then so be it.

JB tuned her newly focused attention to what was above her now, and rocketed up the shaft to Jix and Amos, hands outstretched to use the Force to guide them to he vent portal more smoothly so they could use their energies in navigating the exit tube. The narrower the tube became, the more intense the air flow was.

Her last act before following her team, was to arm and force push her thermal detonator back down the shaft toward the bridge. Bury them here and make this evil place their grave...

Amos

"Air vents to the sides!" he called out, angling himself to head toward one of them as he groans at the pain in his guts from the absorbed hit he had taken.

"I am getting too old for this shit." he grumbled.

GM

Decceleration.

Much longer and Mirror Team will have no choice, either hitting the ceiling or falling when the turbine dies.

Jix's Verpine eyes and brain make a quick study of the exhaust ducts as he soars towards them. The long barrel and stock of his DLT-19D might be a problem but he lines himself up as best as possible.

He flies into the duct with a loud slam. Behind him, Amos has stubby weapons and flies into the duct, his longcoat acting almost like wadding.

J.B. is last, hurtling upwards in a controlled flat-spin, away from Ghidrah, away from the Dark Side, away from her thermal detonator.

Nothing says Go kriff yourself like a thermal detonator.

It explodes in the shaft beneath her, tearing the central databanks from their moorings, buckling the shaft's walls. Fire and destruction climb up the shaft supersonic, chasing the Twi'lek but pushing air ahead.

Ghidrah is slain.

Your team got the message out to the Galaxy. Even now the astrogation co-ordinates recovered by Rey must have spread across the Western Reaches. The citizen fleet led by Lando Calrissian would be able to fly through the sub-hyperspace rip, avoiding the constraints of time altogether, to arrive deep in the Unknown Regions. Poe Dameron's Resistance assault on Exegol would not be a forlorn hope. 2BB-2's sacrifice is not in vane.

But it's time to go. Get out while you can. You must hope that Smoke Team have done their part, disrupted the enemy forces at the operating base, preventing an effective response from the First Order.

At best, all you have done is balance the sides in the coming battle. But that is not nothing. It may prove to be everything.

J.B. whooshes into the exhaust duct, barely touching the sides.

[Go to CFH12m: Don't let them escape!]