Fools' Gold

[OneoftheLost]

Patriots always talk of dying for their country, and never of killing for their country.
-Bertrand Russell

-Outer Rim
-Inanis Colony
- 0900 Hours

Cpl. Yale walked down the small alleyway, his rifle slung over his shoulder. Stepping over an overturned chemical barrel, the soldier emerged from the alleyway onto the snow covered street. Making his way down the slanted sidewalk, Kevin found himself studying the surroundings.

The city had been under construction for 23 years, settlers trying to put buildings and skyscrapers up. You could see dozens of unfinished skyscrapers and buildings. The workers had stopped during the Outbreak.

Twilight Disease.....

Kevin shook his head. The colony was quarentined, just like the rest of this miserable, cold rock. Suddenly his shoulder radio crackled.

* Command to Alpha, zzzck!-ommand to Alpha return to base. I re-ZZZCK!*

Yawning, Cpl. Yale made his way back to the two man speeder.

Waiting for him was Sgt. Talisman. The non-commisioned officer was hunched over the heavy repeater mounted on the back of the speeder.

Approaching, Kevin laughed, startling the other man awake.

<span style="color:#008000">"Well old man, looks like you found somebody else to sleep with!"

Grunting, Sgt. Talisman crawled into the operator's seat of the speeder. He was exausted, 52 hours of patrolling had the man beat. The Govenor had issued a decree that sentries be put on each corner of the city, to suppress rebels the official had said. So naturally the Inanis Militia was called up to do it.

In his defense, rebel attacks had been getting more frequent, bombs, shoulder mounted rockets, laser fire during speeches. The local populace was on the fringe, the qaurantine had everyone on edge, and with twilight disease killing off roughly 50 a week, things where quickly spiraling out of the govenors hands. To make matters worse, the populace believed the govenor was witholding the cure. None of the man's family had been affected, even Kevin wasn't so sure the man was entirely innocent...

Sighing, Kevin crawled in the side seat. Two more days until a Sith Inspector arrived to asses the situation...

Laying back, Kevin closed his eyes in preperation for the long ride back to the barracks.

-----------

WHABOOM!

Startled awake, Yale gripped his rifle, his finger moving the selector switch from safety to semi.
Speaking very calmy Yale looked over at the sargeant

"What the hell was that?"

Sgt. Talisman didn't answer for a very long moment.

"A ship, looked like one of those big space cruise ships, she was flying overhead, and suddenly an anti-air battery opened up...."

"Why would the goven- oh god. The rebels have AA batteries!?"

Sgt. Talisman sped up.

"I'm calling it in."

As the sargeant got on the comms, Yale checked his battery packs.

What was a cruise ship doing landing on the outer colonies? Fuel? Running? All those people....in the middle of a plague....they would have to act fast, or the rebels would be taking hostages.......</span>

 

[Eddy]

Onimi was shaken by a sound so loud he thought his ears would split, he was right near close to one of the anti-air batteries. The Ex-Jedi was not on either side of the conflict, but trapped on the planet nevertheless, as he could not seem to find a way back offworld since he landed. Not a single craft had been seen enter the atmosphere for a few days, not one that came close enough for him to sneak aboard, that is.

Even now, he remained unseen, hidden behind a couple barrels of whatever was the drink of choice for these 'rebels'. Every now and then one of them would walk by, pretty kriffin' close to him, but Onimi'd just throw up a quick mental picture of the space he occupied being empty, and they wouldn't notice a thing. Sooner or later he would have to go looking for another place to take scraps from, because the chance was too great that more than one individual would walk by at a time, or a more strong willed 'rebel' would notice something off with the mental picture.

Well, now actually seemed as good a time as ever, what with a new distraction for the men arising. Wait, as Onimi stood up, he finally realised what was going on, the batteries had opened up on a star cruiser, interesting...

 

[OneoftheLost]

Inanis Colony - Downtown
1015 Hours

Yale held on to his seat as the speeder took a turn sharply. Using the momentum from the turn, Sgt. Talisman hit the accelerator.

"One more block to go, and we should be out of the city."

The star cruiser had made an emergency landing just on the outskirts of the city itself, out near the mines.

Cpl. Yale felt something cold on his glove.

Snow.

Wonderful, that meant the forecast had been right for once. Looking up Kevin studied the cloud buildup coming from the south. Yup, a snowstorm was coming. On Inanis snowstorms where no joke, the wind picked up all of the loose ash from the mines and flung it around with the snow, some citizens had even died out in the open because they had breathed too much of the concoction in.

Suddenly Yale caught something out of the corner of his eye....

Left window, second story.

"Sergeant! -"

laser fire erupted from the window, quickly tearing the front of the speeder to shreds. Sgt. Talisman quickly swerved. Suddenly Cpl. Yale felt himself flung from the vehicle, with a loud thud he landed.

Quickley rolling to his side, Yale found himself in a ditch, Sgt. Talisman had aimed for it. Yale crawled over to the other soldier. His legs were caught under the speeder itself. He looked unconscious. Making sure the man was breathing, Yale checked for blood quickly, he could hear the laser fire striking off to his left. Using the ditch as cover, the young man poked his head over the edge....

...and almost got a blast to the face as the weapon opened up again.

Someone had set up a repeater up on the second story, it was watching the small maintanance exit from the city. Normally Regis and his boys wern't this well organized, or equipped.... damn rebels.. Yale bent over and picked up his rifle.

It was going to be one of those days.....

 

[Eddy]

ooc: I'm going to post a big one tomorrow/today. It's like 3am here, lol.

 

[Solus]

((Ah, what exactly is the cruiser? Sith, Republic, Independent, etc.?))

 

[OneoftheLost]

((OOC: Civillian, you know, like those cruise ships in the carribean? not a war cruiser.. it might have a few republic guards.))

 

[Solus]

((Oh. Thanks. Only problem is that with my char it would have to have an important civilian on board, so I'll just wait. Heh, I'll have to come up with a more practical person))

 

[Eddy]

Seeing as there was no way he'd have been able to Force persuade an entire army, Onimi Neris rushed out from his hiding place in the supply depot, and silently overtook a passing soldier, stripping him of his gear and ragtag uniform.

Now inconspicuous, Neris was able to pass through the ranks without taking too much notice, moving actually away from the conflict, as to come around towards the space cruiser from another angle. There was no way he was going to board the ship if he went in with the rebel strike force. Though, he would follow them, for now.

Onimi felt the anticipation rise in the Force as he and the rebels neared the outskirts of the city, toward the mines, where the cruiser had evidently executed an emergency landing. Most of the soldiers had begun pulling out makeshift breathing masks or devices, for reasons unknown to the Ex-Jedi, as he had not yet been on the planet long enough to know the usual routines of the environment and atmosphere. He would just have to take it as it comes, and react to his surroundings, like he was trained to do so long ago. Those days as a Jedi Knight seemed almost like decades prior to the present day, where he was out with his Master and friend, fighting against those who sought to disrupt the peace that the Jedi had tried to instill and maintain. Looking back now, he realised how foolish he had been. There was no way the Jedi Order could just keep sending out liaisons to foreign worlds on peace missions, or to treat everything with the same reverence of life. Some people were beyond redemption, or would just never want it, and some times, the ends did justify the means. Some times evil must be fought with evil, as your enemy will not stop or pause with his blade to your neck; he will strike to kill, so you must do the same.

But as for now, Onimi had to get to that space cruiser, it was his way offworld, and onward with his duty to the galaxy. All he had to do was commandeer it before the rebels or militia did, and he could be on his way. Or, better yet, he could ride along with the ship, and at an ideal time, steal one of its transports, if the cruiser had any with hyperdrive capabilities.

Ahh, this was where he would break off, just as the strike force was heading out of the city, past the building in which a few others were firing the laser cannons into some ditch, apparently they had just caught a militia vehicle heading towards the cruiser. Taking this opportunity to "investigate" the wreckage of the vehicle, Onimi was issued two other soldiers to go with him down into the ditch, to check for any survivors. Neris would have to take them out once they got down there, as he was planning to go on foot by himself from here, as to not get caught in any real firefight that would be going on by the cruiser itself. He could feel the presences of two militia men down in the ditch, one badly injured, the other, just a little jostled.

Following the men, Onimi raced along with them, from the cover of other blasted vehicles and chunks of buildings that had been blown out by aerial bombardment, they were just outside firing range, coming in from the rear of the disabled vehicle, and behind the two men, so as not to get caught in their own suppressing fire coming from the laser cannon that was still being fired. But as soon as they charged in, the Ex-Jedi stopped dead, taking careful aim with his rebel blaster and shot the lead man from behind, and yelled out "watch out, militia!" to let the two men in the trench know they were being ambushed. This left the other rebel bamboozled, he hadn't a clue what had just happened, as a betrayal from one of his fellow rebels seemed unfathomable. That would be his downfall, the hesitation showed would not be shared by the men pinned down in front of him...

 

[Eddy]

Bump

 

[OneoftheLost]

-Inanis Colony - Downtown
-1015 Hours

"Watch out, militia!"

Cpl. Yale cursed as a rebel...shot his leader? Kevin hadn't even noticed the damn rebels flanking them. Turning, Kevin brought his rifle up to his shoulder, not even aiming, he squeezed the trigger.

The rifle bucked as it fired several shots into the unlcuky rebel. Kevin heard another shout, and he charged forward, striking the dying man in the face with his rifle, Cpl. Yale let his rage carry him, leaping out of the ditch he fired wildly while running for cover.

The heavy repeater opened up...then stopped as it paused to reload. This was his chance.

Kevin raced forward, he was now directly under the window. Pulling out a phase grenade, he aimed for the little out cropping just above the window. Pulling the pin, and pressing the activation button, Kevin held the explosive for several seconds, then threw as hard as he could.

The grenade spun in mid-air, flashing red as it gained elevation, then at the apex of the spin, hit the little out cropping...and exploded.

A bright flash and several screams told the story of the unfortunate rebel gun crew.

Kevin slowly walked back to the ditch. The soldier studied the road, all the rebels were gone except for the one standing near the ditch. Cpl. Yale aimed his rifle as he walked.

The young soldier spoke in a raspy voice. He was tired, pissed off, and worried.

<span style="color:#008000">"Who are you?"</span>

 

[Darca]

Trajan had came to the planet in order to pay weapons, of course the conflict here would make them common however the demand was still great. Trajan quickly drop to the ground when he blaster fire. Damn rebells he thought. They had no sense of thought when doing raids, no plans but to flank. Trajan notice that in front of him was two guards of some sort but couldn't get a good enough look. Maybe there was a third one but Trajan couldn't tell. However the fire fight lasted shorter then he had expected. If they kept in the buildings with cover and possible higher ground then the soldiers they would had been more effective. The flank to Trajan's eye was sloppy, the soldiers should had no time to react, if they caught them off guard by using stealth chances are there would be two coffins not two piss off soldiers with superior fire power. However the soldiers did had skill.

"Why is it where ever I go I get into some kind of fight?"

Trajan was just talking to himself to clam himself down. With the storm coming in he had to move fast. He push himself off of the ground and slowly walk towards the armed men. He threw his hands up in a non threating way. Even the wind was kicking up more and more with the passing moment, making Trajan almost shouting to the arm soldiers just a couple of feet away from him.

"Lt. Trajan April of Sons of Oppression, the storm is coming faster then I expected. Perhaps you can give me a left to shelter? I wouldn't want to be trap out here."