Improper Maintenance

[Cassanova]

This thread is for Kor-Sha-Di (Nephill Killer) and myself. If you would like to do a mission, please PM me and we'll work something out.​

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Settled into the pilot's seat of one of the Order's Class 720 Freighters, sat Jedi Weapon Master Juno Armstrong, gingerly piloting the vessel through hyperspace. Having been assigned a myriad of missions back-to-back, in addition to all her classes and having been assigned a troubled Padawan to alleviate the strain upon a Councillor, Juno couldn't recall the last day she'd been able to properly sit and meditate. Even whilst sitting in the pilot's chair aboard this unnamed 720 freighter, Juno found herself meditating for moments at a time, giving herself the clarity that was needed in front of her. While she possessed the skill to fall into a deeper, more insightful meditation, she simply did not have the time.

A friend of hers, Asalla Laoni, another Knight within the Order had recently been appointed to a mission which required her to go on alone. In lieu of leaving her Padawan, Kor-Sha-Di, alone and unmotivated, Asalla asked Juno if she were able to take her place on another mission, taking the reptilian Padawan along with her. Naturally, Juno would not refuse.

The mission itself, was remarkably simple; take a freighter from Coruscant, fly it to Bespin, collect some resources and supplies, and deliver them to Ison, along the Corellian Trade Spine. A mission, which was destined to fail...

Ω​

Having collected their goods from Bespin, currently in hyperspace, Juno and Kor-Sha-Di had exchanged greetings and introductions much earlier in their flight. Juno had instructed Kor to refer to one another using their first names, and they shared idle gossip that floated around the four various Jedi Temples. Once they had left Bespin, Juno instructed the Tiss'shar to return to one of the sleeping quarters and collect some sleep, as there was little to do in the cockpit but be rendered into a vegetative state with boredom.

Several hours on, Juno finally managed to find the time to fall into a decent state of meditation.

It was abruptly halted by the sound of an alarm and light flashing upon the consoles that lined the cockpit. The Jedi Weapon Master's eyes darted open and honed in upon the alarm. Sighing with exasperation Juno swore as she calmly, yet with lightning efficiency, clasped the flight harness over her body. Forcefully kicking some panels and switches, Juno then reached for a ship-wide PA broadcaster and shouted into it, "Kor! Get up here, now!"

Upon the Padawan's arrival to the cockpit, Juno merely turned around and smiled, "You might want to take a seat and strap in," she flinched as a console sparked. Turning to the Padawan, she merely asked, "Have you ever crash-landed before?"

 

[Nephill Kilner]

Once again Kor-Sha-Di found himself on a mission with a Master who was not his own. However, this mission differed from the others in its benign nature. It seemed odd that the Force (and the Jedi Masters who interpreted its will) found him worthy for babysitting a simple freight mission. But Kor was obedient, and deferred to the will of the Force. It was his experience that when he did so, everything else would fall into place.

After offering his usual stiffly formal greeting, complete with a regal bow and High Galactic language, he had been once again found himself paired up with a...mellow Master, who had insisted on first names. Kor was learning to adhere to this particular preference for informality, although he knew he would always take the cautious route and be professional as possible. It couldn't hurt.

After Cularin, and the battle there, Kor had taken a much needed week of R & R on Tython, his favorite of all the Jedi temples. That time had well spent, with every second spent restoring his body and mind to mission-capable levels. His blade had finally felled true disciples of the Dark Side. And he felt...okay.

Following the battle, in which Kor had personally slain several Dark Jedi, the violent killings and disturbing confrontation with antitheses of himself, the Tiss'shar had been left conflicted and remorseful. Despite pre-mission feelings that could only be called bloodthirstiness, cultivated from years of combat-oriented training, he had been shaken to discover what it was really like to kill the equals of the Jedi.

His confrontation with the Acolyte over the smuggler had been mostly defensive, and Kor hadn't been place in a position to actually end the Dark Sider's life. But now he knew what it felt like.

And it had made him a better Jedi. That had been evident. Spending most of the week meditating on the relived battle sequences, he knew that the entire experience, in conclusion, had been key to his development as a Jedi. He would no longer kill if unnecessary, and had lost his vengeful feelings, leaving only calm and grounded emotions. He felt that his success epitomized his training, displaying his skill, while giving him the wisdom to use that skill correctly.

Exchanging what Kor could only call 'gossip' with Master Armstrong had been...refreshing. In truth, she intimidated Kor. She was renowned for her battle prowess, and Kor was curious to see her in action - doubtful, considering the mission. Only an extremely skilled Jedi could master use of so many versions of the lightsaber.

Their conversation had mostly been on the Masters who seemed to never leave the temples, the quality of training, and the hygiene of some of the more..."illuminated" Jedi.

Still, Kor didn't feel completely rejuvenated from the exhausting Cularin mission. He felt he could have used another week, but duty called. Asalla was still on her mission, and the mission was supposed to be a cakewalk anyways. Master Armstrong had seen it in his face, not even needing her more than capable Force powers, and ordered him to sleep.

After several hours of refreshing rest, a loud voice shook him awake from dreamlessness.

The sleep fading from his mind in the time it took him to flip onto his feet, the Padawan dashed to the cockpit in record time.

He could hear the alarms out in the hallway, and followed her first order soundlessly. It seemed his suspicions were correct. There would be much more to the mission then he thought.

"Yes, Ma - ...Juno. It wasn't to my liking," he said matter-of-factually, strapping into the seat closest to her. "What seems to be the problem and what will happen next?"

 

[Cassanova]

Gripping the controls with a loose grip, but steady arms saw Juno bouncing in her chair, along with the entire ship, "It seems that we've lost... all of the external inertial dampeners, a few panels have come loose and..." a heavy grunt came from Juno as she yanked on a manual override lever which deployed the atmospheric brakes, "And to top it all off, we've lost pretty much all power to the engines and the internal inertial dampeners. In short, we're crashing... fast."

As the 720 settled itself into the planet's atmosphere, the ship started to ionise particles of the planet's cold atmosphere and make itself known to the ship's passengers with a dull orange glow forming on the outside of the ship. "Entering the atmosphere... This is where it gets bad," Juno knew exactly what would come next as she had crash-landed several times from outside a planet's atmosphere. She didn't enjoy it on any occasion.

As soon as the ship slowed itself down to terminal velocity inside the planet's atmosphere, with no where else to go, the ship began to teeter and roll on every axis available to it. Inside the cockpit, Juno struggled to keep the ship flying in anything resembling a straight line. Grunting in disapproval, she strained her voice and yelled over the racket that was the tumbling death ball of metal hurtling towards the planet's surface at an excruciatingly slow speed of only a hundred and forty miles per hour, "Kor, take the controls. I need to level this junker out!"

Without waiting for his response, Juno flicked a switch which transferred control to his side of the cockpit. A trick she had done before, albeit with a much smaller craft and in a far less dangerous scenario, Juno planted a hand on the chair underneath her, and leaning forward, the other on the console. The Jedi Master closed her eyes and dove into the Force.

 

[Nephill Kilner]

Kor had actually been pretty calm at first.

That didn't last long.

He wondered if he was getting too complacent, just because he felt "at peace" with the Force. At any rate, he was definitely feeling terror as the ship began to speed up and jink and roll uncontrollably, all while an orange haze coated the entire exterior.

And then Master Armstrong gave him the controls.

He actually froze a bit when she first did, but then he dove into the task with all of the courage he had, approaching it like any other task. With that, his brief moment of fear faded back into determined peace. Whatever Juno had in mind, he trusted her. And he trusted the Force.

He strained to control the ship, his entire body rattling with the vibrations as he pulled with all of his might on the controls to try to keep them from descending into a devastating dive. But he knew he wouldn't last indefinitely. He only had to hope his trust in Juno was well-founded...

 

[Cassanova]

As Kor took up a huge responsibility amidst the chaos and took the reigns, Juno's deep concentration could be easily felt, her aura burning brightly within the Force. As the ship began to tumble and roll faster and faster to the planet's surface, Juno was forced to telekinetically balance the ship. The turning, over and over would have many most people sick. Juno, however, was used to her body being treated like a sock in a dryer, and merely kept her focus.

After several minutes of seeming to not actually accomplish anything, the ship began to stop teetering forward over on itself, but now simply rolled side to side. As the soft snow, packed snow, ice, and mountains began looming in the viewport of the freighter, Juno grimaced and gripped her chair tightly. She took a moment to point out the view port to Kor exactly what her plan was, "That mountain, we're going to set down on the opposite face, use the slope as our run way. I need you, just before we land, to deploy everything. Escape pods, hatches, landing gear, boarding ramp -- the works, alright?"

The ship gently came to a more silent glide as it ceased its rolling under Juno's use of the Force, and now seemed to point directly down the face of a mountainside. As the freighter, leaving a smoking trail of debris and aerosol fuel, glided silently over the top of the mountaintop, it seemed all was going well. The ship was gently coming down onto the slope... gently.... gently...

Until it touched down.

 

[Nephill Kilner]

Kor quicly had to turn to the Force to enhance the abilities of his muscles. Calling upon it's power, he was able to center his mind and keep himself calm amidst the chaos around him. He saw the way. His arms held the controls in a rock-solid grip, barely wavering despite heavy resistance.

Acknowledging the Master's instructions wordlessly, he carefully timed the ship's movement as they slowly passed over the mountain's peak. With that done, he pushed hard on the controls to bring them to the proximity they needed to be at to utilize the slope. As the ship hovered meters above the snow and rock, Kor's hands danced over the ship's dashboard.

Landing struts, weapons turrets, boarding ramp, sensory arrays, and even their escape pods went flying out of the ship, all in an attempt to produce drag and reduce their extreme speed as much as possible before attempting a landing.

Even with all of that, Kor could see easily that it wouldn't be enough. Not by far...

His job done, he closed his mind and readied himself for all-too-possible death. It was all in the hands of the Force now. The sound of the ship around him faded to nothingness, and he felt as if he was in the Room of a Thousand Fountains once again, cool spray dancing on his skin, ever so refreshing....

 

[Cassanova]

Juno felt the ship lurch to a slower speed as the ship attempted to become an air drag. Failing as such, they were still careening along at much too fast a speed. Not showing signs of concern as yet, the Jedi Master merely refocused her attention to the back of the ship. Obediently, the 720 freighter lifted its nose, and dropped its back, coming in as though it were an unpowered glider dropping in from high altitude - so exactly what they were, without the benefit of being designed for gliding.

That being said, when the tail end of the sizeable freighter touched down and all seemed smooth, it was. Until, of course, the landing gear dug into the snow and ice. The ship lurched forward as it dug in, tossing Juno from her chair. Despite being slammed hard up against the console, Juno still reached out through the Force, willing the ship to stop. Begrudgingly, it began to obey her commands, skidding to a halt upon the edge of a cliff.

Slowly but surely, Juno, beginning to feel the affects of slamming headfirst into the bulkhead, opened her eyes. "Kor… Kor! Are you alright?!" Juno's eyes struggled to make any sense of what was in front of her as the dizzying effects of the crash still took their toll upon her. She attempted to stand up, but awkwardly slipped off the console upon which she had landed and braced herself against it, "Kor?!"

 

[Nephill Kilner]

Kor couldn't even bring himself to look at the instruments displaying their speed - it was still much to high. They would run out of mountain face...

Out of nowhere, the ship lurched itself at an angle with nose upwards, in a landing process of older times. There were a few surprisingly calm moments as the ship cruised - but that ended quickly. As soon as the landing gear connected with the surface of the planet, the brief facade of calmness was shattered violently. The whole ship slammed forward with all of its weight, and Kor's body was thrown forward and then snapped back against the seat by his restraints.

His vision went dark for a few moments then faded back in at this, and his head began to ache and spin. Closing his eyes voluntarily, it took him several seconds to regain his bearings after the tossing about.

The sound of a female voice suddenly became apparent to him.

"Master..Armstrong. Are you alright?" he asked with a groan. As the Tiss'shar focused more on the source of the voice, he could see that she was rather worse for ware.

His body pumped with purpose now, he swiftly untangled himself from the seat's restraints to rush to her aid. "Master! Are you alright?"

Looking out of the transparisteel, he could see nothing but unforgiving white. Kor hated snow worlds. And he had a sinking feeling that there stay here would be longer than desired.

 

[Cassanova]

Juno frowned and leant against the console, "I'm fine, Kor. A little spun about. Yourself?"

Upon hearing his response Juno took a moment to do the maths on their location, their situation and everything else that is relevant to their survival. "I'd bet credits to cookies that we're on Hoth. Without the ship's navigation system, we won't have a really good idea of where we are. We're going to need high ground," Juno grimaced, knowing that it meant a climb up the very mountain that they just came crashing down. "We'll need a catalogue of all the gear we've got, including whatever flammable fuels are onboard the ship."

Grimacing as the dizziness came back to her, Juno frowned and rubbed her eyes with her thumb and index finger. Her armour was a unique design, Kinetic inhibition was its purpose. Essentially, her arms, legs, and body were left comfortably safe during the entire ordeal, but as Juno insisted on not wearing a helmet, it was the blow to the head that was causing her discomfort. Knowing with time, and a little drain upon the Force, she would heal in a matter of hours, Juno wasted no time assessing the situation.

Turning herself around to see the white expanse that was one of the largest valleys on the planet, Juno frowned. Pausing momentarily, Juno passed a quick look to Kor, and asked an unnessecarily personal question, "Forgive me, Kor. Are your species cold-blooded?"

 

[Nephill Kilner]

"Perfectly fine. It's a good thing you advised me to strap myself in; I owe you thanks, Master," Kor said in his usual graceful diction, surveying her with intelligent eyes. It seemed that she was a bit spun about, and Kor was about to offer some assistance with the Force when he felt her begin the healing process himself. Knowing that she was bound to be many times more skilled at this art then he, he shifted his weight uncomfortably, feeling slightly awkward.

Nodding at her instructions, he replied, "Fortunately, we are warm-blooded, like the Ssi-ruu. That being said, we are built for humid forests. Without any type of protection against the elements, my metabolism will be working at double-time in a futile effort to maintain my body temperature. This of course means, Master, that I will succumb to the environment faster than yourself," he said matter-of-factly. "Perhaps the ship has capable cold-weather coats available?" Even so, this presented a significant problem - there was unlikely to be any boots he could fit, and the coat would be awkward on his non-humanoid frame. He wouldn't be able to live long out in that snow.

Already, he could feel the chill of Hoth creeping into the ship slowly but steadily, and he gave his first shiver.

 

[Cassanova]

Juno, contemplating the same 'fitting' issues that Kor was, came to a simple solution. She shrugged off the 'robe-ring' that held her crimson cloak in place and offered it to to the Tiss-shar, "If you use this, and wear it zipped it will help keep your body temperature high enough. If you set it to about sixty, you'll get around four days from it's power supply - i've got spares if we're here longer."

Juno's KIA (Kinetic Inhibition Armour) had a unique feature, specific to the model she wore; the R3 variant. The R-3 meant Robe, Type-3. Which in this case, was a complex fibre capable of hardening, maintaining an environment, and even keeping the wearer slightly warm. In the event of a snowstorm, the robe-ring which powered and held the robe, was capable of generating a magnetic field strong enough to withstand orbital re-entry. Why anyone would enter a planet's atmosphere without a ship, and wearing only this armour was beyond Juno, but it was comforting to know that the field was certainly strong. Kor, wearing this armour would be, at the least, capable of surviving a few days, if they travelled at the right times of day, at the right foods, and a dozen other factors - very few of which were accessible or even feasible for the stranded Jedi.

"Alright. I'll go up the mountain and get our bearings. If you catalogue the gear by the time I get back, and stay within the confines of the ship, you'll be less likely to succumb to the cold. We're going to have to plan our movements carefully..." Juno said as she moved towards some nondescript packages in the cockpit and gently tore a decent-sized piece of fabric from it and wrapped it around her neck. "...Remember, Kor. Protection - anything that will be good to wear, or use during the nights. Rescue - anything that can signal for help - location beacons, flares, commlinks. Water - how much do we have? Food - the same. We need to know how long we've got to get out of here, and how long we can make it last."

Juno calmly stood, kicking some broken panels that lay across her lightsaber pike which had been flung from its stowing area in the landing. With it, and her myriad of other lightsabers at her disposal, Juno offered a final bow to Kor, "May the Force be with you."

 

[Nephill Kilner]

Kor took the proffered cloak in hand, looking it over with scrutiny before hesitantly slipping it over his form.

Listening to her instructions, he nodded simply as he formulated a mental checklist for himself.

When she left, Kor bowed lower and returned her words in a low tone, before turning away towards the ship's console.

Taking out a small set of tools in his utility belt, he removed the plating to the ship's offline logs. Once done, he hooked up his personal datapad to the logs, and using a set of power cells from his utility belt to generate energy for the transfer, he moved all storage information and inventory information to his datapad.

That done, he powered everything down and set off to scour the entire ship. He dug out various odds and ends that could be of any use, checking items off or marking them as absent. The Padawan found useful bits of things stowed away in the personal quarters, the cargo bay, storage compartments, cabinets, offline fridge units, utility lockers, and even behind false walls and floors.

After some time, he had assembled his finds into neat piles in the cockpit, which he assumed would be their de facto "command center" of sorts. His items included maintenance tools, electronic and mechanical parts, energy and power cells, food (he dragged out a still chilly portable refrigeration unit to maintain the condition of the perishables), several utility belts (which contained matches, small knives, x3 flares, and simple commlinks), about twenty gallon jugs of fresh water, several space blankets, four foldable entrenching tools, a pile of medical supplies (ranging from first aid to various separated pieces of surgical equipment), one very large and over insulated sleeping bag, one folded tent, and a wicked looking piece of heavy jagged metal for which Kor could only guess at for a purpose.

That done, he powered down his datapad to conserve its energy, and folded his legs into a meditative position. There seemed to be a hull breach somewhere; the chill had increased significantly, and even under Master Armstrong's cloak he was shivering. His breath was beginning to mist at the ends.

As soon as he closed his eyes and connected to the Force, those problems faded away. The frustration that had been building at the hopelessness of the situation faded, and he was carried away from his current location to a much warmer, hopeful place.

 

[Cassanova]

The ship was notably warmer than the exterior of the planet. Probably well below -20ºC, not counting the blistering wind that seared past the Jedi Master as she gathered her footing and clambered from the broken vessel that once was a Ghtroc 720. The climb was marginally easy, but time consuming. Needing to use her arms and legs to clamber up the soft-packed snow slope, Juno found herself breaking into a shiver, simply due to the fact her armour was only able to keep her so warm, and her head had barely any protection at all.

Fighting back the chills with the assistance of the Force, Juno fought her way to the mountain top via several unpleasant obstacles, including a rock face, a wide crevasse, and a nasty incident with an overhanging piece of ice. However, once to the peak of the mountain, something like a kilometre and a half higher than the crash site, and somewhere in the realms of two kilometres of treacherous mountain face, Juno stood atop it, and slowly gauged her bearings on the planet. A datapad synchronised to a datapad allowed Juno to begin constructing a digital map, and comparing altitudes to gravitational effect allowing for a semi-accurate three-dimensional map.

It took some time, but with careful checking and rechecking, Juno determined a rough comparison to some memories she had of the planet when she did a survival class in the frozen wastelands and realised that they were only a few days hike from an Alliance outpost. Of course, Juno's estimates could prove fatal if they were anything more than one degree off on their direction. They'd walk right by the outpost without being any the wiser. If all went to plan, it'd be about 16 hours until they realised that the 720 went off course, another 12 before they realised WHERE they might be, and then start a planet wide search. Juno's estimates figured that they would probably arrive the Alliance outpost just as their search teams would find the broken freighter on the side of the mountain.

Once she had the information she needed, Juno set herself to going back down the mountain. While faster, it was much more strenuous. One wrong step and she wasn't just falling on her face - she would likely fall off the mountain entirely. While Jedi may be resilient, Juno doubted that she would survive such a fall, and with her not capable of helping Kor make it to the Alliance base, she had no doubt that he would die a slow and painful death at the hands of the biting cold that Hoth provided.

Using the motivation of making it out alive, both she and Kor that is, Juno doubled her efforts and made it back down to the 720 with much fewer incidents than on her journey up. Upon her entry to the vessel she started calling softly, calling Kor from his meditation, "Kor! I'm back. Good news and bad news."

Upon arrival to the bridge, which had become the warmest part of the vessel, Juno layed out the plan; a 3 day hike, using only the warmest 8 hours of the day to move, the other hours are spent keeping warm and well-fed. After showing Kor the map she had generated - which only spanned about 14 kilometres of the required 40 kilometre journey - Juno confessed that the duo was very lucky. Juno had trekked this pass before, and knew it pretty well. That being said, it would still be unpredictable, dangerous, and they would be considered very lucky to travel at three kilometres per hour, and should really, expect less than half of that.