Hv3 - Knight's Shadow

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_______Dusk, she realized, was sweeping across the large desert-scape of Verda-three. That meant she'd be traveling for almost two days. Traveling on foot at that.
_______She slowed her trudging walk through the sand, pulling back the sleeve of her tunic and glancing at her chrono. Yes, two days. It wasn't always easy keeping track of time out here in the middle of nowhere. A quick tap of a button on her chrono showed that she was still traveling west. Good. If she had read out all the maps correctly this would be, at very least, the general direction of her destination.
_______She tugged the tunic sleeve back down over her wrist quickly, ignoring the pain that the blowing sand had caused to her exposed skin.
_______She looked ahead and again trudged forward and against the blowing sands of Verda-three's desert. With good reason this whole trip reminded her of the old stories of Tatoonie's Dune Sea. And the riffraff back at Denara Kel - Verda-three's largest of it's few cities - only confirmed what she was told she could expect on a planet so close to the rim territories.
_______She squinted through the narrow visor of her protective mask. The mask impaired her vision more than she was comfortable with, but it was either put up or have the desert winds and sands wreak havoc on her exposed skin and eyes. Not to mention the fact that, without the air-filter the mask provided, she'd end up suffocating anyway. She had considered, before, many ways one could die, but suffocation wasn't one of the ways she'd want to leave the living.
_______She squinted harder behind the mask and the blowing sands. She took a jagged breath of the stale air the mask's filter provided. Ever since she had left Nar Shaddaa to go on this wild dakra chase, she had continuously wondered if she was just being stupid. The whole thing didn't make much sense as it was. And the anonynmous call she had received two weeks ago, was probably some sick prank. But she very well couldn't just sit on her ass. If Crel was still alive, he wouldn't be for long.
_______She reached up and tapped the side of her mask quickly, switching the vision to microbinoculars. Looking ahead, she hit the zoom button. And there, through the falling darkness and blowing sands, it was clear as day: a large six story building about five times the size of a hanger bay. A citadel.
_______A tight grin crossed her face behind the dark colored mask, "Gotcha." she mumbled.
_______She zoomed in further, sweeping her gaze across the citadel. No doubt, it was big enough to harbor quite a few ships. She guessed somewhere around twelve small freighters and perhaps seven or more Z-95 class fighter ships.
_______If Crel was there, she was going to rip him from throat to - she cut herself off harshly and consciously forced herself to stop thinking vengfuly. Right now, she had to think rationally: If Crel was there, then so were the rest of the Sendra Besh. Every last one of them deserved to be slaughtered, there was no doubt in her mind about that. And she'd do it if she could. But alone, she hadn't a chance. She would be immensely lucky if she could get into the citadel long enough to get to Crel. No matter about the other Sendra Besh, Crel was who she was after. All that ultimately mattered, was making sure she didn't leave Verda-Three, or this life, without seeing Crel gasp his last breath.
_______Unconsciously she let her right hand drop to her side and finger the holstered blaster through her tunic, just to make sure it was still there.
_______She let her gaze drop down to the base of the citadel. Interesting, she hadn't seen it before but if she wasn't mistaken....
_______She reached up to the controls on her mask again and zoomed in once more. And there through the blowing haze of the desert sand stood a city.
_______She stifled a gasp. A whole city of Sendra Besh? This definitely wasn't what she was hoping to find out here. The city wasn't huge, but it wasn't small either. In fact it was pretty impressive to have something of that size out in the middle of a desert. Surveying, she figured the population could be up to maybe two hundred to four hundred. Or if there was an underground facility: many many more.
_______She felt a nervous knot form in her throat, suddenly wishing she had brought company. She pushed that thought away. She was alone here, this was her problem and she was going to deal with it.
_______She tapped the controls to the mask again and the microbinoculars shut down, returning the vision to normal - or at least as normal as it could get through the mask.
_______And with a deep intake of the mask's stale air, she again, trudged forward and up a particularly large sand dune. When she reach the top, she stopped dead in her tracks. Looking down at where the down slope of the sand dune should have been was a extra steep decline into thrity-foot deep stone valley. She sighed then looked back up and at the distant city: at least another five hour walk in this weather and on foot. And now she had to either make the trip longer by going around the valley. Or just simply slide down the thrity-foot slope and hope she didn't end up impaled by one of the various jagged rocks at the bottom.
_______She drew a deep breath, glanced over her shoulder then back to the slope hesitantly. Then with a rush of bravery, lept forward spreading her arms for balance and lining her feet up as if she were snow-boarding without a board. Her feet hit the sand and the beginning of the steep slope, and she started down faster than she really liked. It was right then - much too late - that she remembered: she had no idea how to snow-board.
_______She let out a strangled scream through the filtered mask as she fought to keep her balance. She was going too fast. Ahead she could make out where a jagged rock poked from the valley's slope, right in her line of motion. She was just to the point where she was really going to panic, when suddenly a calm washed over her. She was going to get out of this alive. With her new and sudden clearness, she quickly leaned to her right, careening off and away from the stone by only two feet.
_______Her downward motion kept up, gaining more speed and sending sand flying up in her wake. Without much thought, she dropped her right leg down to it's knee, using it as a type of break and keeping her left leg in front of her, toes forward, using it as a way to control her direction.
_______Her speed slowed slightly as she pressed her knee harder to the slope, sending a larger wake of sand behind her. She wedged her left leg to one side, sending her to the left this time and out of the path of another rock poking from the slope.
_______Looking up, she saw the bottom of the valley quickly coming up. Along with it, a huge pointed stone.
_______Impalement. She could die like that. Like this.
_______Her mind began racing. Nearly ten feet from the bottom and death. She started searching her repertoire of every single ingenious or ingenuitive thing she'd ever done. But her search came up empty of anything that could ever help her out with this.
_______A split second later and about five feet to the bottom she was ready to die - with only one exception, the only thing she ever truly regretted not doing in her life, the one thing she had opportunity after opportunity to do in the past three years, was to say how she felt. And with the last few seconds of her life droning by, she sent out how she felt as purely as she knew how through what she prayed was the Force and only hoped the message would get through.
_______And then suddenly her whole body jerked forward and into the air, being pulling with blurring speed away from the slope. Throwing her well over the jagged stone, that was to be her certain death. Somehow she landed neatly in a crouch at the bottom of the valley. She was alive!
_______What the hell just happened?
_______She kept still for a moment, turning the whole thing over in her head. How did she ever survive that? She shook her head, tucking the happenings of the last few minutes away. Something to figure out later.
_______She looked up. To the barrel of a blaster pistol pointing directly at her masked face.
_______"Don't move." came a filtered voice. She guessed it was male.
_______She lifted her head a tad more to see a large humanoid figure in front of her, holding the blaster steadily. His face was masked much like hers was and he wore a tunic similar to her own as well.
_______"Her weapons." the man grunted as she realized that there were more than on of them. She felt hands slide under her tunic and with effort held still as they pulled her blaster from his holster and her vibro-blade from the sheath at her belt.
_______She glared at the man in front of her. These could be settlers, only protecting their land, or petty thieves. Or they could be Sendra Besh. Her eyes ran down the man's tunic and stopped as she spotted what she was hoping she wouldn't see so soon: The Sendra Besh insignia.
_______"Sendra Besh." She commented coolly, "just the crime syndicate I was looking for."
_______"Actually, we thought you might be looking for an Ewok village." the man's filtered voice countered dryly.
_______Her eyes again darted to the blaster pointed at her face. There were three men right there, but she guessed there were quite a few more around in the valley. And it did make sense that there would be Sendra Besh in the valley: The deepness kept the whole area unaffected by the sand storm raging overhead.
_______The man's voice broke into her thoughts, "What do you want with the Sendra Besh, girl?"
_______She looked up again to the man standing in front of her, "What else does someone that comes this far to find the Sendra Besh want, but revenge?"
_______The man huffed, "Ha! Stand up, girl." he motioned for her to stand stepping back once and keeping his blaster trained on her, "To your feet!"
_______Slowly she stood, risking a glance around her. She was right, three of them. She turned back to the man in front of her and smiled tightly beneath her her mask, but said nothing, flexing her fingers under her tunic.
_______"We've been through a thousand situations like this before, girl. And no one's been able to extract anything that remotely resembles 'revenge' on the Sendra Besh." the man pointed out, "if you think your gonna be the one to change that, then your sadly mistaken. Now lets move." he jerked his chin to his left and down the valley.
_______She turned in the direction of his gesture, clenching a gloved fist under her tunic as she walked slowly in the direction the man had motioned her to go. She let her eyes scan the valley as she walked slowly, the man behind her and his two friends flanking her on either side. Their blasters trained on her the whole time.
_______As they walked she could see up ahead about thirty meters along the valley a group of three empty speeders.
_______Must be their transports.
_______Slowly she placed her hands together and with her left hand slowly tugged her right glove off, finger by finger. A sharp shove from the man behind her made her stumble for balance. "Keep moving!" he spat.
_______She clenched her teeth tightly as she regained her balance kept working on discretely pulling her right glove off. All three of the men laughed at her and the one behind her spoke again, "So you really thought you could take on all of us with a blaster pistol and a lousy vibro-blade?"
_______Slowly she worked her index finger out of her glove, just her thumb left. She let a grin cross her face underneath the mask. "Of course not."
_______The men laughed harder. "What were you planning on? Blasting us with the raging heat of your hair drier?" the man to her left spoke this time, with a sarcastic tone. The men continued to laugh.
_______She laughed too this time, "Something like that." and with that her right hand was free from the glove as she let the glove drop to the ground softly. She slowed her pace as the man behind her snarled, "Hey, you dropped your glove, girl!"
_______She stopped walking standing there motionless and gathering her composure for the split second she had, "I know."
_______The man to her left paced over to her and bent over to pick her glove up and in that instant she made her move.
_______She dropped back and to her right quickly, backing off from the man to her left two steps. She brought her right hand up to bear on the man's chest, palm outward, fingers spread.
_______The man looked up and before he had a chance to react a flare of intense heat seared into his chest, sending him backward and through the air some ten meters. The Sendra Besh's blackened and charred, body hit the ground with an unsettling thud and smoke rolled from his mouth and the gaping hole in his chest.
_______The man behind her was the first to react, swinging his blaster in her direction and firing off a salvo of bolts. She dropped to her knees, the oncoming blaster fire whizzing over her head and past her ears as she brought her right hand around to point at the man firing bolts at her.
_______Her fingertips flared in unison and a blast of flames lept out at her attacker. When the flames dissipated nothing remained but a charred body.
_______She started to her feet and began to spin and take out the last man, but she was too late. As she was turning in the other Sendra Besh's direction a blaster bolt sizzled into her right shoulder. She let out a small howl of pain, then fell back to her knees, grasping the fingers of her left hand where the bolt hit.
_______She glanced over to see no blood, but her entire arm was totally numb and a dull pain was surging through it. A stun bolt.
_______She looked up as the last Sendra Besh walked in front of her and placed the barrel of his blaster to her forehead, "I dunno what the kriff you are. But your gonna be dead." she cringed as she saw his thumb move across a small panel on the side of his blaster, flipping the charge to full.
_______She shut her eyes and waited.
_______A loud sizzle followed and a spilt second later a soft thud.
_______That was it? She had died?
_______Slowly she opened her eyes to see the last of the Sendra Besh lying on the valley floor in front of her, his blaster still held tightly in his hand and a pool of blood forming under his body. Her forehead creased into a frown as she slowly rolled the body over with her left hand. As she rolled the body onto it's back, she scrabbled back slightly at the sight of a large slash across the man's throat. It looked like the work of a vibro-blade, and a good job with the blade at that. Whoever did that knew what the hell they were doing.
_______Slowly she looked up and around the dark valley, only to see a large group of perhaps fifteen men rush around the bend in the valley. Just slightly ahead of the speeders she had spotted earlier. The scouting group was bigger than she thought, and they must have just set up camp up the valley way for the night, when she came falling in.
_______"Shit." she mumbled behind clenched teeth as she stared at the oncoming group for a second longer. Then quickly scrambled to her feet, spun, and ran.
_______She doubted she'd be able to outrun them on foot, but she had a good thirty meters on them to begin with, if she could just make it far enough up the valley to find a cave, or a place to scale back up into the dunes....
_______She ran as quickly as she could, hearing thumping foot falls increase behind her, glow-rods ignite and shouting voices. Then an upcoming whine of repulsor lifts, followed by the roar of speeders. Less than a second later a group of five swoops ripped up to her. Two of the swoops pulled ahead of her then arced back around quickly to face her. Two more swoops flanked her on either side and the last kept behind.
_______She stopped dead in her tracks, looking around quickly at the swoop riders. Each of them holding a blaster pistol or a wicked looking rifle.
_______For a moment she considered surrender, but why? She was at least going to go out with a fight..
_______One of the swoops suddenly accelerated toward her, his blaster tracking in her direction then flaring wildly. She dropped onto her back and brought her left hand around to bear on the rider. Her glove would most likely catch fire, but her powers were the only thing she had to fight these people.
_______Just as she was about to let her fingers flare the oncoming swoop suddenly jerked hard to it's left, carrying off and into the valley wall. The swoop exploded in a bight flash of flames and shrapnel.
_______She pushed herself back to her feet and took a glance at the other swoop riders. And stared in amazement as one of the rider's heads jerked sharply to one side the his lifeless body fall from the saddle of his swoop. The next rider in line was suddenly thrown from the saddle to hit the ground with a thud, he scrambled to his feet quickly and spun pulling his blaster and pointing it in the direction of his swoop.
_______She squinted behind the glare of the still burning swoop wreckage as a translucent humanoid figure rushed toward the rider. The swoop rider shot off bolt after bolt at the figure. The figured slowly walked toward the rider, ignoring the salvo of blaster fire zipping past it's head. It's right hand jerked forward suddenly and very slightly and an instant later a vibro-blade was buried deep into the swoop rider's throat.
_______The figure ran toward her, extending a hand toward the dead swoop rider's body. Suddenly the vibro-blade pulled free of the rider's throat and soared to the translucent figures hand. She watched as the figure ran toward her and slowly the translucent to his form melted away to reveal a man, his body was shrouded in a dark cloak. His head was covered by the hood and face by his breathing mask.
_______Quickly he grabbed her shoulder with his left hand and with his right peeled back the hood of his cloak and his breathing mask.
_______She started at the young man for a moment, a face she recognized well, then snarled at him, "Jed! What the kriff are you doing here?!"
_______His answer was grabbing her arm tightly then jerking her quickly around. He pushed her behind him and stepped forward as an oncoming swoop zoomed toward them. He raised a hand then clenched his fist tightly and suddenly. She had seen him do some amazing things with his powers in the past three years she'd known him, but never had she seen him use his powers so violently.
_______She watched as the swoop rider suddenly crumpled forward and the swoop veered off and roared over their heads by a mere four meters. As the swoop passed she could hear the rider's bones snap and crumble, his whole body being compressed down. Like the first swoop Jed had taken out this out careened off and into the valley wall exploding in a ball of flames.
_______Jed spun to face her quickly, a blaster pistol suddenly spinning around in his hand to face her, handle forward, "Take it." he demanded coldly. She looked at him for a moment then grabbed the blaster quickly, swinging it around in her hand and getting a tight grip on the handle. She looked down at the blaster quickly to check the charge as she realized it was her blaster.
_______Suddenly a hailstorm of blaster fire poured across the valley at them. She ducked down and fired her blaster blindly behind her. A loud snap-hiss erupted beside her and a violet glow washed across the valley, accompanying the blaster fire's red glow.
_______She looked up to see Jed in a standard Jedi defense stance, his lightsaber swinging around wildly in his hands, blocking bolt after bolt of incoming blaster fire with easy. His face was hard and his teeth clenched tight. The saber swung and twisted in his hands continuing to keep each blaster bolt back. She watched in amazement and wondered for a moment if he was ever going to get around to teaching her that trick.
_______Without warning a blaster bolt splashed on the ground just in front of her. She jumped and bit back a curse as she pulled her blaster up, tracking it into the group of Sendra Besh working their way down the valley toward them.
_______"Anya!" Jed spat over the blaster fire and his lightsaber's hum. She turned and looked at him as he dropped one hand from his saber's handle and pulled his heavy blaster from his cloak. The whole time blocking the blaster bolts with his saber in a tight one-handed grip. His wrist snapped in her direction and his blaster soared to land on the ground in front of her. "Lay down cover fire for me!" he demanded as she picked up his blaster and clicked the safety off.
_______"Your crazy, Jed!" she spat back over the roar of attacking blaster fire.
_______"I know that! Now, lay down cover fire, damnit!!" he yelled as he suddenly rushed forward and into the group of Sendra Besh. The group was probably down to about thirteen men now, due to reflected blaster bolts from Jed's saber. But she doubted anyone would be able to take them all out.
_______Quickly she spun toward the group of Sendra Besh and fired the blasters in unison. Jed's heavy blaster she noticed had a bit more of a kick to it but it fired just as rapidly as hers did. She couldn't see well through the glare of flaring lights, but she could make out Jed's violet-white lightsaber swinging madly around in the group. She heard screams, and a few various snapping sounds.
_______Then suddenly a soft whooshing, a type of suction sound. The sound of Jed's lightsaber closing down. She stopped firing and dropped her hands to her sides, squinting back the spots hovering over her eyes from the light flares. She blinked several times then slowly stood up.
_______She saw Jed in the middle of the group of dead Sendra Besh. Her mouth dropped open for a moment. Then she slowly walked toward him as he stood there, breathing hard and sweating. He kept a tight grip on his un-ignited saber. Jed looked up at her as she stopped in front of him.
_______He smiled slightly, "Hi."
_______She dropped the blasters to the ground, then quickly stepped forward swinging her arm up and her fist tight into his jaw.
_______Jed turned his head with the punch then slowly turned back around to face her, wiping blood from his mouth with his left hand. His eyes darted down to look at his blood dabbed fingers for a moment then back up to her. He ran his tongue along the inside of his bottom lip and stared at her, "I'll take that as a thank you."
_______"No!" she spat bringing her other fist up for another punch to his jaw. This time he didn't let her get that far, glaring at her. Ten inches from his jaw her whole arm froze in mid-motion and she snarled, "Let my arm go!"
_______He glared at her for a moment longer, then slowly let her arm go with the Force power he was holding it with.
_______"That's not fair," she mumbled rubbing her right hand, the one she had actually hit him with, "I can't do that."
_______Jed watched her, "Yes, you can. You just haven't tried."
_______"Shut the hell up, Jed." she turned her back to him then bent down and picked up the blasters again, holstering hers and throwing him his.
_______Jed caught his blaster then slid it back under his cloak, "I'm sorry."
_______She glared at him then jerked a finger in his direction, "No. You aren't!" she scowled, "I told you I didn't want you coming with me! This is my problem!". She sighed then rubbed her face, "How long have you been following me?".
_______Jed frowned slightly as he wiped more blood from his lip. "Ever since you left Nar Shaddaa." he answered. He stepped forward and placed a hand on her shoulder, "Anya, I just wanted to make sure you were safe."
_______She pulled away quickly and walked away from him and down the bend in the valley, toward the hopefully empty Sendra Besh scout camp. "No, Jed. I can take care of myself. You wanted to baby-sit me."
_______Jed sighed then paced after her following close behind, "Listen, your powers are unstable. You can't just rely on them! You've had so little combat training and the Sendra Besh are experts!"
_______Anya scoffed and kept walking, "Jed, you have no idea what the hell your talking about!"
_______"Bullshit! I know exactly what I'm talking about. Your powers are unstable, I can sense it!"
_______Anya laughed bitterly as they reached the group of tents that the Sendra Besh had set up, "And like yours aren't way more unstable than mine. At least I don't go crushing people with a thought like a trash compactor!"
_______"It had to be done!" he spat from behind her, "It was them or us. Next time, I'll call a time-out so we can discuss our next move over Del Tea and crackers!" he continued sarcastically.
_______Anya didn't give a response and she glanced around the fairly large camp casually, then pulled back the flap from one of the larger tents and walked inside. The interior was pretty barren and badly lit, with low-level glow-pannels placed around the tent's interior at random intervals. She took a glance up at the tents six meter tall roof, then back down and across the room.
_______Less than a second later Jed was beside her, the low glow-pannels playing an eerie light against his dull black cloak, "Communications Tent." he commented coolly as he walked across the room and to a computer console that lined the tent's left wall.
_______"No really?" she commented sarcastically, "I didn't notice. What with the array and console and all."
_______Jed shot her as cold look, "Level out, okay?" he looked back to the console, "I'm on your side here."
_______Anya scoffed and walked over to a different console, playing her fingertips over the dirty screen, then wincing and wiping them off on her tunic, "Really. Would'a surprised me."
_______She took a casual glance at Jed over her shoulder, then turned toward the front flap of the tent again and quietly paced for an exit.
_______Suddenly there was a blur of black fabric and a rustle of plasti-steel armor as Jed stepped in front of her, "Where are you going?"
_______Anya stopped and looked up at him, "To find a working speeder." she glared.
_______Jed held her look, glaring back, "Not alone, you aren't."
_______"Yes. Alone." quickly she brushed past him and out the tent flap.
_______Jed was right behind her in an instant, "Anya! Damnit. Your so kriffing stubborn!"
_______Anya spun and leveled a finger at Jed, "No, Jed, your the stubborn one! I told you I didn't want you coming with me! I said I want to do this alone! Your the one that was so blasted stubborn as to follow me to the hell forsaken rim!"
_______Jed snarled raising his voice, "You told me you changed your mind about coming on this kriffing trip then you sneaked off!"
_______"And you followed me!!" Anya yelled in his face.
_______"Of course I followed you!!" Jed yelled back, his eyes flashing a dull, translucent yellow with anger, "Your not a kriffing warrior!! You can't take all these head hunters and mercs!!!"
_______Anya stepped back from Jed quickly, a look of horror on her face.
_______"What?!" Jed demanded, watching her.
_______"....It scares me when you do that." she commented, staring at him.
_______"Do what?" he ask his anger seeming to simmer off some.
_______"Your eyes -" Anya started but was only cut off at a loud thunderclap on the far end of the camp.
_______She spun quickly in time to see the valley flare with a bright explosion at the edge of the camp, she squinted behind the glare, "What's going on?" She ask hastily.
_______A sharp kick to her back, was her only answer. She caught herself with the palms of her hands and rolled around as a blaster bolt splashed into the area where she was only a split second ago.
_______"It's called a distraction." she heard Jed's voice mumble as he grabbed her arm and jerked her to her feet quickly. Things seemed to spin as he pulled her some ten meters across the camp, his blaster flaring twice. A second later she was huddled next to Jed as they ducked behind the backside of a tent, "Hey, what happened to the guy -" she stared to ask wearily, only to be cut of by Jed.
_______" - The one that kicked you?" he whispered, turning his head and peering around the corner of the tent. She could hear voices shouting across the camp, but that kick had disoriented her more than she'd ever thought something like that could.
_______"Yeah." she responded quietly, slowly bringing two fingers up to her temple and rubbing slowly.
_______"Dead." Jed commented coldly, pulling his blaster pistol and peering around the corner again.
_______"And the one that shot at me?" she ask.
_______"He's dead too." Jed answered casually. He turned back to face her, "There's a two man fighting swoop twenty meters down." he jerked his chin in the direction of the speeder. "That's our ride."
_______Anya turned slowly and looked in the direction of Jed's gesture and squinted through the darkness of night, "There is? How can you see it?"
_______"Jedi sight enhancement." Jed commented stepping around the corner and pulling her with him, "Now, C'mon."
_______Anya groaned weakly as she fought to keep her footing, "Ungh...Jed, I feel really dizzy."
_______Jed paused then frowned, he turned behind her a lifted the back of her tunic slowly, then the back of her shirt, he looked at her bare back. He slowly ran his finger tips over her spine.
_______Anya whimpered, "Jed, that hurts."
_______Jed only frowned as his ran his fingers over the back end of a small needle that was engorged in her back. He looked closer, maybe half an inch of the needle's end was sticking out of her flesh.
_______Anya groaned painfully, "Stop, that it hurts!".
_______Jed frowned then dropped her shirt and tunic back down, wrapping his arms around her and pulling her up and over his shoulder, "Just relax. This will be over in a second, I promise."
_______"Wha?" Anya ask her eye's falling half shut, "What's wrong, Jed?"
_______"Don't worry about it." Jed whispered, "I'll explain in a little bit. For right now just relax and try to stay conscious. Okay?"
_______"Ungh...kay." was her only response and she slumped slightly.
_______Just as things started to get fuzzy, almost pleasantly so, there was a sudden execration.
_______The ground below her rushed and blurred and a breeze whipped over her face. She bit her tongue as she felt sick.
_______She could faintly hear blasters sounding and people shouting. But the ground stayed a blur. Then everything spun. Spun again, then came to a harsh halt. She felt herself being laid on her site into a thin and uncomfortable seat. A belt being wrapped around her waist and then Jed's voice faintly say to her, "Anya.......listen to me..... stay laying on your side.... okay? It's important..... stay.... on... your side."
_______The seconds droned on for what seemed like hours and then suddenly the world rushed again and a welcome breeze swept over her face and dry lips.

_______Jed lept into the swoop's pilot seat, using the Force to pull the safety belts across his chest quickly and click them into place. Without hesitation he tapped the control board, igniting the twin engines. His right foot stomped down hard against the axcel-pedal as the engine charged full and with a heaving lurch the swoop roared away from the Sendra Besh camp and down the valley.
_______It didn't last but thirty-seconds before a group of three Sendra Besh swoops of the same design were in tight formation behind Jed and Anya's swoop.
_______Jed took a quick glance at the rear scanners then pulled the swoop hard to the left as a salvo of laser fire scored past the swoops right side. The firing Sendra Besh swoop followed, coming up on Jed's left.
_______Jed cursed silently, then arched the swoop around a hard bend in the valley. The Sendra Besh swoop followed behind Jed with amazing control, firing off bolt after bolt from the swoop's blasters. A bolt scarred the left of Jed's swoop taking out his left blaster mount and making the swoop arc a little too hard to the left.
_______Jed pulled up on the control sticks, pulling his swoop up and out of the valley completely. The raging sandstorm hit the swoop from all sides, making it spin uncontrollably. The Sendra Besh behind Jed followed his movement up and out of the valley, the sandstorm hitting the swoop hard and making it careen off and through the desert.
_______Jed clenched his teeth tightly, pushing down on the sticks now and angling the swoop back towards the valley. Using the Force he held his swoop steady through the sandstorm, doing his best not to end up like the foolish swoop pilot that followed him up and into the storm.
_______He pulled the swoop back into the valley hard, then leveled it out, right behind the last two Sendra Besh swoops. He grinned tightly as he squeezed the triggers of the blaster mounts hard. The damaged blaster only sputtered, but the right flared brightly. He squeezed the right trigger three more times. Each of the four well placed blaster bolts hit the rightmost swoop making it flash in a bright ball of flames.
_______Jed pulled his swoop down and below the explosion as he roared by. He blinked back the bright glare as he pulled his swoop back up and in a tight formation behind the last swoop. He just had his right blaster lined up for a perfect hit when the valley arched hard to the right and down slightly.
_______The swoop ahead of him followed the valley with ease, the pilot knew the valley well. Jed followed just as well. The G-force of the hard turn pressing against his chest. He gasp for breath then clenched his teeth tight. Quickly he reach back to the rear-gunner seat with the Force, wrapping a protective bubble around Anya's body to keep the G-forces from injuring her anymore than she already was.
_______Soon enough the turn was over and Jed again started to line up for a shot at the swoop ahead of him. But too late, the swoop's rear gun turrets swung around to bear on Jed's swoop quickly then fired in unison. The forward engines flared brightly and the whole swoop careened off hard toward the valley wall.
_______With blurring speed, Jed reach down and beside the pilot seat and pulled the eject lever. The whole cockpit lurched hard as it detached from the swoop, using it's underside thruster to propel Jed and Anya across the valley just as the swoop body and engines hit the valley wall and exploded in a bright flash of light.
_______They didn't quite make it past the top of the valley before the underside thrusters burned out and the whole cockpit fell quickly toward the valley floor. Jed swore aloud, "Where the hell is the parachute!?".
_______The cockpit fell quicker toward the valley floor and still no parachute expelled. Without wasting anymore time, Jed pulled on the Force. He spun the Force around the cockpit quickly and pulled hard, leveling the nose end of the cockpit out and slowing their freefall as much as he could. It was too late to slow though and they hit the ground with a jarring thud. The cockpit slid across the valley floor quickly, sending a wake of sand up behind it. Then a split second later the nose of the cockpit slammed into a jagged outcropping of stone from the valley floor.
_______Jed shook his head, and unlatched the safety belts, stepping out of the swoops detached cockpit and walking back to the rear-gunner seat.
_______Gently he unlatched Anya's safety belts and picked her up, "Anya?".
_______She groaned.
_______Jed frowned as he walked toward the valley wall and away from the downed cockpit.
_______Suddenly Jed ducked down, holding Anya tightly as the last swoop roared over their heads and down the valley quickly. Back toward the camp, no doubt.
_______Jed watched the swoop roar down the valley and out of sight, "Right. Go tell them we're dead." he smiled tightly, then stood again and walked toward the valley wall again and toward a small cave opening.