The Coming Fire

[Narsi]

Gorman grinned as the reply came in over the comms. The lovely-sounding lady had said he was free to go, so long as he "stayed out of the way" and that was all he needed. Letting out a loud whoop, he flipped on the thusters and sent his fighter blasting out of the debris and into open space. Doing a few stylish twirls, he was understandably eager about his imminent freedom from the cramped cockpit, he aimed planetside on full power.

As he flew Gorman glanced over at the republic ship. They were also descending, albeit at a much slower pace, with what seemed to be a great sense of urgency. After considering the much larger vessel for several moments Gorman turned his ship to head into a different direction than previously. He had no intention of meeting up with the enemy in such a possibly dangerous situation. Instead he was aiming for location a good distance from where he perceived the vessel from before had gone. He was pretty sure the Republic were gonna touch down near that ship so he was heading the other way.

His little stunts had the averse affect of giving the Republic at exactly what ship he was flying but that was immaterial at the moment. His start from a general position behind the corvette along with his greater speed ensured he was homefree even if they changed their minds. He supposed that it could cast some uncertainy on Karma but from what Gorman had heard it didn't matter, that boy couldn't play friendly if his life depended on it.

 

[Xersos]

The command was simple. Take the Phantom and kill any survivors on the crashed ship.

The smoke and ash was all around the debris. Signaling the other Phantom to cover them from above while they land and made perimeter around the entrance point. The ship was badly damage with multiple entrance point made from explosions.

First to exit the drop-ship were grunts. The small aliens originated from the planet Balaho, small and not very intelligent they primary role is a cannon fodder. 5 minor class Grunts slowly steeped afraid of the derelict ship in front of them. Being small and fragile they were not brave. Unless in company of senior beings. Shouting from the drop-ship made them move forward in circular defense perimeter around on the major hole in the crashed ship. The 3 grunt major rushed behind them with their Unggoy combat harness that acts as their armor and environmental suit.

5 jackals went out behind the grunts. Primary snipers and scouts of the Covenant. 2 major Jackals shouted commands as other 3 minor jackals obeyed and made defensive formation around drop-ship. Carrying their Point defense gauntlets they deployed blue shields in defensive formations.

The last to exit the drop ship of the covenant army were highest and most formidable warriors nicknamed Elites. 3 minor Elites clad in blue armor lead by 1 clad in red armor which was the highest rank and the leader of the team. The red one pointed at the hole in the ship and 1 major grunt followed by the 3 minor ones entered the ship. Next were jackals followed by the Elites.

Inside of the ship was a mess. Broken pieces of equipment laid all around it. Power was occasionally surging through the ship and the light flashed. No sign of the survivors yet. To better cover the ground they split. The 3 minor elites took command of small units of grunts and jackals and go to separated ways. One to the bridge of the craft and other searching for any survival members of the crew. The Elite Major stood still for a second and waited for his active camouflage to take effect. Slowly blending with the surroundings of the ship he went on the hunt for humans.

Across the ship the screams and plasma bolts can be heard as they done they duty.

 

[Tristyn]

The second phantom that hovered behind the wreckage lifted off and provided some air support and slowly few in circles around the ship and opened fire on any survivors it could find. The three light plasma cannons mounted under the dropshop would easily burn through the unshielded hull of nearly any ship, and would kill a sentient instantly. The plasma fire from the dropshop was also explosive.

Meanwhile in the distance away from the Republic corvette, Gorman would pick up three contacts on his scanners. Fighters. These purple tear shaped fighters left a blue trail behind them so they were no doubt easy to spot, but they were dangerously fast. They didn't come from the surface, but they seemed to materialize high in the atmosphere. Just like the phantom, they fired deadly explosive blue plasma. The only thing that would be keeping Gorman alive was his shields, but not for long. Covenant plasma drains shields at an alarming rate. The shields on his fighter would be gone in less than fifteen seconds, and the plasma rounds will burn and destroy the ship even quicker, or at least render it inoperable. Once the fighters were in range of Gorman, they would open fire.

Just as Gorman was engaged, something lightning began to form in the air where the fighters had originated. There was a bright flash of white that dominated the entire region. Once everyone's eyes had readjusted, a massive ship had uncloaked and was in the sky with them. This ship was hundreds of kilometers away, and yet it casted a shadow over both the wreckage and the Republic corvette. After a few seconds eery silence, the enemy warship fired a beam at the corvette, destroying the shields and the back half of the ship instantly. The corvette would suffer the same fate as the research ship, and it too was sent plummeting to the surface.

 

[Algarus]

"Sir, multiple discharges have been reported in the hanger bay!"
Adun's head shot over towards the officer who had made the announcement.
"What? Pull it up on screen!" He ordered as he moved towards the railing on the command deck. In an instant, a live holofeed from the hanger was shown for the entire crew to watch; causing a few to gasp in shock and horror. Adun felt his blood run cold at the senseless slaughter of his men by Karma, as he gripped the steel rail tightly. Seeing the Sith leave the hanger after the massacure was finished, Adun had made up his mind. His inability to take action and stop the sith had lead to this, once again the blood of innocents was on his hands. He clentched his eyes shut to calm the rage within himself as he let go of the rail and began to make his way to exit the bridge.
"I'll handle that. Isolate the section of the he's in, and lock him in there. Blast doors and vent sealing as well."
"Yes sir!"
Wherever Karma was currently, he would find the doors to be unresponsive and then quickly be sealed as heavy blast doors would drop over them. Just as he was about to leave the bridge, a low toned chirping would occur from the sensor crew.
Reguile Tiamaties was only a mere ensign, but even then he was considered one of the most skilled sensor operators on the ship. The Twi'lek officer looked at the strange distortion that had mysterious just appeared on his console and called out for jedi knight Alexandria.The Twi'lek moved his head closer at the screen trying to figure out what he was looking at. "Master jedi, somethings not-"
He was cut off as a massive thud rocked the ship, knocking a few of the crew members who hadn't been buckled into their seats. Tiamaties was jerked forward by the impact, as he smashed his head into his work station. In a moment, the young Twi'lek officer was dead, as his head had been sent through the screen; crushing his skull and electrocuting him if he happened to live through the brutal impact.
Adun was sent sprawling forward by the impact, and just managed to land on his hands and knees before springing back up to his feet.
Wailing sirens echoed all about the ship and bridge as the lights flickered for a moment.
"Status report! What was that?"
He shouted as he helped a fallen soldier to his feet. A small hologram of the ship's design flashed up on the command console as red colored areas appeared where damage had been reported.
"Something just hit us, shields are down to ten percent, multiple hull breaches! Fire on decks one through fifty seven, auxili-"
Another impact shook the ship, this one harder then the previous one, as the entire ship went dark and began to tilt forward on a crash course to the planet below. After a few tense moments, filled with screams of terror and agony, emergency lights would kick on and provide a faint light source for the crew members on board the ship. Adun saw the amount of dead through the force, their once colored aura's now reduced to a lifeless gray. Out of the seventy crew and soldiers on the bridge, twenty were dead, with many more injured. Nearly every console on this level had been blown apart, causing sparks and smoke to begin pouring out of the broken equipment. "What the hell just happened?" Someone shouted. "Damage report?" Adun coughed out as he found himself once again on the ground.
Adun pushed himself back up once again, and noticed that his console was still active. Some coughing and groans were heard from the numerous bridge members and no doubt through out the ship. The surviving crew members tried to get themselves reorganized and evaluate what had just occurred.
Adun leaned over his console and glanced at the numerous damage reports that were on the screen. One thing was clear to the jedi knight; this ship was lost. With a heavy heart, Adun pressed down on the intercom and made the announcement.
"Attention, all crew members, this is your commander. Abandon ship, all units get to an escape pod. This is a direct order."
With that done, the knight would turn his attention to the men under his command and begin helping to move the wounded into the deck escape pods. Adun knew they didn't have much time, maybe ten minutes at the most before they crashed. Rear stabilizers would help slow the descent, but that was all that was going for them. He'd call out for knight Alexandria and order her into a pod, no doubt she was concerned for her students, but they didn't have time to get to them. Adun took comfort in one thing, the Sith on this ship was essentially trapped. Auxiliary power was down, which meant opening the blast doors was impossible. As the knight would get into his pod, he would try to comfort his clearly upset friend.
"Do not let such troubles weigh on your heart young Alex. You have taught them well, and the force shall surely guide them to us."
As the various pods were launched, Adun would give one last glance towards their doomed ship before attending to the wounded that were with him.

 

[Cheshire]

Karma was certainly shocked to find the blast doors sealing him in. It certainly was an annoyance, so he would atta- i mean politely talk to him while stabbing him multiple times with his umbrella before celebrating his victory by jumping on him a few times. That's how much the situation annoyed him. He quietly laughed when he unsheathed his lightsaber and started to carve a hole in the wall. He had just finished carving it before the full ship seemed to falter. He fell back in shock just to have the lovely hole that he had carved collapse on him. It hurt, massively considering he had the body of a pubescent sixteen year old. His leg was the one thing that was in complete agony, bloody hell. That was sore and he was going to completely kill someone over that, just to get his mind off the pain that was coursing through his body. He used the force to try and get the bloody blast door hole off his bloody leg. Once he had finally removed it, he chucked it against the opposing wall in frustration.

He picked himself up off the floor in annoyance as he used his umbrella as a crutch. He limped in annoyance up to the bridge. When he finally made it up the bridge he had noticed that everyone had left in the escape pods. He did notice one last available one as he quickly limped his way over there. He leaped in and jetted off from the ship watching it descend towards the planet

 

[Narsi]

Gorman swore loudly as his fighter shook, the shields screaming in protest at the barrage of plasma. When he had first seen the three fighters appear, he had wasted no time in turning around and zooming back towards the republic vessel, he was all to aware of his limited piloting skills. One ship was doable, two would be a problem, three? No chance. He had better odds with the Republic Corvette, they at least weren't hostile, yet.

Thanks to his turnaround however, the purple ships had quickly closed the distance and were currently testing his shields. Swerving madly, Gorman managed to dodge another volley when white light flooded the inside of the cockpit. Blinded, Gorman's next dodge failed and his shields dropped as several successive bolts found their mark on his ship. Shaking his head, Gorman cleared his eyes and jerked at the controls sending his ship spiraling sideways, momentarily breaking away from the three fighters. Glancing down at his sensor panel, his eyes widened at the large mass appearing on the radar and he turned in the cramped space to look behind him in horror.

"NO! NO! NO!," Shouting, Gorman hit the thruster to the max ignoring the three fighters which were curving back in an ominous arc. Reaching the corvette he began flying down the side of it, praying the much larger ship would provide some degree of protection from the death machine behind him. His ploy worked in that it managed to fend off the smaller ships which broke off in response. His "escape" flight was interrupted however, when massive beam of energy consumed the back half of the corvette, the shockwave shaking and jostling him, as he tried to avoid a direct collision with the shuddering republic vessel.

When he regained control, Gorman kept close to the corvettes remaining hull as it fell, zigzagging around the planet side of the ship in an attempt to remain hidden. At this moment, he was simply heading for the front end of the doomed vessel. If he could just make it far enough then he could jump into hyperspace, that part of his ship still functioned. There was nothing that could be done here, not by himself. Sighing loudly, Gorman started priming the hyperdrive. "Forgive me brother," The words filled the cockpit, though there was no one to hear them. What he was doing was a dishonorable thing, running while his brother possibly burned, it made him feel like scum.

His silent musing was interrupted when the escape pods began to erupt from the side of the republics ship, the side Gorman was on. He had no time to react as a host of pods ejected around him. One of which struck his wingtip, ruining it and spinning him around. In slow motion as he spun, Gorman made eye contact with the porthole of the pod. His eyes widened in horror as he saw the face of a small child gazing back, little mouth stretching in a scream. With a loud crack, Gorman's blue head smacked the dash and he blacked out. His fighter, still careening widely, collided with another pod. This damaged the Ziost Hunters thrusters and it too began to fall, heading planet side with the pods it had struck.

 

[Rae Anne Jarrus]

As one of the Twi'lek officers got a hold of Alexandra's attention, she turned and stood to see what he was talking about, only to next feel the ship shake violently which made Alex trip and fall, her leg getting caught on the station as it twisted the very slightest, just enough to render it broken. It was luckily not very serious, as she would be able to limp-run to a pod, but it hurt enough to cause her to fall behind a little bit.

Once Alex got her head about herself, she looked up to find that the officer's head had smashed through his work station and she found that he was dead, by just being able to sense his spirit lifting away from his body. Alex then got up and used her station as a little bit of support just to be able to help her stand. She heard Adun yelling for a status report and another officer reporting that the shields had gone down to ten percent. But then another hit to the ship, rocked it enough causing everyone to fall once more, including Alex. Smashed glass came falling towards her and she covered her head , the glass falling like a waterfall over her back.

Alex stood once more, making her way out of the area to a spot where a meta railing was and she held onto it as she made her way away from where any glass would fall on top of her. Hearing Adun's order for everyone to abandon ship, broke her heart, but she had hoped that her padawans had gotten the memo and got into escape pods.

She ran over helping the injured off, even though she herself had been injured and then once everyone was off, Alex had gone to check on the children until Adun called for her and she turned around going back to him. He apparently knew what she was going to ask.

"I just hope they got off..." she responded quietly.

 

[Xersos]

The mission was progressing as expected. Ever since they entered in this system they encountered only minor resistance. Ships in orbit were strange something they didn't see with other humans. But still their technology was not on pair with the glorious of the Covenant. Theirs plasma bolts easy shredded their hulls. The ground troops were nothing much. No shield of cloaking fields they were easily killed and the planet were theirs in couple of hours.

Even those survivors were nothing much, just screaming and running for their lives only to meet the plasma of his troops. But still somebody needed to do it. Handpicked by the fleet master he was honored to do it. But now nearing the bridge he was getting excited. Who ever is in command will be something more then screaming individual.

The twitching of the body in front of him realized he was still holding his energy sword inside of the last survivor who he came across. Deactivating it the body slumped to the ground lifeless. Turn towards the sigh that said bridge he entered the small corridor leading to it flanked by two of his elites who he personal picked for hunt.

''This is Anton Saric, Czerka Research No.998. Come in, I repeat, come in!'

The voice was booming across the corridor. The red commander grimed and send his two blue guards forward, activating his cloaking field he prepared for the fire. The blue guards run to the room their plasma pistol aimed at the survivors in the bridge.

On the other side of the part of the ship.

Squad of grunts and jackals were roaming the ship in search of the reaming survivors. Behind them the powerful elites pushed them forward. No easy life for grunts the grunt commander thanked. Ever since his race is serving the covenant their are being used as little better then slaves. But some day they will be equal in the empire. His thoughts stooped as his attention was diverted to the shadow that quickly passed in the nearby corridor. Some sort of animal or something.

Then voice boomed loud : "Anyone here? I'd really like to help you lot out of this hell hole."

The elites laugh and send the reaming grunts backed by the jackals shiny shield towards it. Seams that another of the survivors were there and it needs to be dealt fast or they will be punished.
Slowly approaching from the way they heard the voice they saw a doorway with blown doors. Another sight of small shadow was enough to set the to panic mode and they started shooting plasma bolts all around the doorway.

 

[Algarus]

Within moments, the pods breached the atmosphere, as Adun ordered the twenty or so crew inside to remain in their seats. Having finished healing Alex's leg, the knight felt a bit winded as he had spent almost the entire time healing the wounded crew members. He laid back into his the pilot seat and yanked the harness over him as the warning light began to go off. He looked down at the small view screen and looked at their crash projections. Weither it be through luck or just bad positioning, they were heading straight for the downed Czerka ship. The knight would wait until there were within 50 meters, then pull up on the yoke, and shoot what little fuel there was in the maneuvering jets into the bottom most thruster. The passengers would feel a hard jerk, as the pod straightened out and would begin to skip along the glassed surface of the planet. This would allow them to stay far enough from the ship, but still make reaching the area possible, as they were only a few hundred feet away from the ship. To those on the ground below, it would appear as if a red hot comet had come sailing in over head before impacting and skidding along the ground. A few lights would short out, and no doubt some unlucky crew mate would vomit from the rough motions, but all in all it was as good as landings got when in an escape pod. After a few tense moments, the shaking would stop, and the passangers would be allowed to take a sigh of relief. Adun had been fortunate enough to ensure they ended up within a glassed valley, allowing them to perhaps establish a small outpost within the ridges of the valley and send a response team to check out the crash site. The knights arms shook as he loosened his grip on the controls, his strength had slightly tapped from healing, but he would be back at it after a few moments to rest. He took a long breath to steady himself before hoisting himself out of his chair. He spun his head towards his crew and went about establishing a set of goals.
"Alright people listen up, this isn't how we wanted things to go, but we are here now and we gotta make the best out of this situation. There are twenty three of us in this pod, and we need to split into teams. I need three groups, one group set up the distress beacon and comm channels to find the other pods, another group will form up with Jedi Knight Alexandria to clear the parameter, another group will grab the previsions on board and find a location to store them. Once we are secured, I will take another group with me. We are going to figure out what the hell is going on down here. Any questions?"
A shaky corporeal in combat arm raised his hand nervously. Adun could tell he was young, perhaps not even twenty years old yet.
"Yes, corporeal?
The young man's hand fell into his lap, as he asked his question; his voice was full of fear. "Y-yes S-sir....h-how are...we going to..get off this planet? W-What are w-we going to d-do now?"
Adun summed up his reserves as he walked towards the young man, a fierce look upon his face. He wasn't angry at the boy for asking the question, nor anyone else on his team for that matter. He was enraged at whoever had attacked them, to deprive those young men and women of their lives with no sense to the slaughter. He was well aware that he could die here, but that wasn't a concern. There is death, yet the force. He would place his hand upon the young man's shoulder, and activate his Force valor, as everyone in the pod would feel a sense of hope and pride at the job that awaited them.
"I'll tell you how we are getting off, together."
He walked towards the end of the pod and opened the door, as the hell of what was once a habitable planet loomed before them.

Where he should of felt fear, he instead felt grief. So much life lost...and for what reason? He could hardly feel the force on this blasted surface, but he would not let this discourage him. He turned back to the crew as a few of them began to unstrap their harness and stand up to look at what laid before them. A few mumble words of disbelief, but Adun ensured that their will would not be broken so long as he kept his power up.
"We came here on a mission to investigate and launch a rescue mission, now we are the one's needing rescue. I want you to look around at the people around you, and remember that we are in this together. I don't care what planet your from, or what species you are. You are part of the republic, and a brother in arms. When work together, we can accomplish anything. This planet is just one of many that will follow should we fail today, so when you think about slugging the person next to you, or just giving up I want you to look at this scene and think of your family or friends being trapped in this."
He called Alexandria up beside him so she could say a few words if she wished as well, before being the first to leave the pod. The ground beneath him crunched as if he stepped on gravel. The ground here was warm, perhaps an after math of whatever had transformed the planet into this. He wondered for a moment if he would live to see his wife and children again, but cast those thoughts aside. He had men and women depending on him, and he'd sooner die than let them down.