When the Cavalry Comes.

XVIII

No air recyclers. That meant life support was out. She had heard the horror stories of people trapped in ships like this. The silence was like a terrible, tangible thing. Then there was a flash of light that blinded her.

She blinked, switching off night vision. Fives kicked off of the wall and the Commander reached out, catching his arm. They were carried by his momentum to a wall. She passes the source of light, her shorter yellow saber, to the captain.

"Hold this." She commanded, and he took it with a startled expression.

"Uh... Cy- er... Commander?" He asked, holding it at nearly arms length. She rolled her eyes.

"Hold this and don't be stupid." She revised, moving to the doors and inspecting them. After a moment she drew her main saber and cut through them like they were butter, shoving them back with her mind powers. The force of it pushed her backwards and into the wall.

Captain Rex suddenly seemed much more nervous about the blade in his hand. There was a yelp and a clang from the hallway. The general himself crawled through the doorway.

"Really, snips? Ow." He complained, pushing his way around the door. He looked to be sure that everyone was ok in the safe room, his own saber giving light. He fished around in his pockets with his left, ungloved hand and pulled out a few flashlights. Ahsoka crawled back to the Captain, and he pushed her lightsaber back at her. She laughed.

"No offence, but I'll leave the lazer swords to you." Rex commented dryly. Skywalker ungloved his right hand, passing his saber to his left. Cavalry gave a jolt, seeing it to be a metal prosthetic. It was apparently magnetized, and he used it to grip the ceiling so he was in the middle of the room.

"Listen up men." Skywalker started, his blue blade casting strange and terrifying shadows on his already grim face. "We have our work cut out for us. The main reactor is offline, and we have no power. We had to make a stop in our hyperspace jump when we were ambushed, so we are quite literally in the middle of nowhere in space. We have no comms, no power, no life support. The life support is the first priority, so we can get the air recyclers going. After that, the hyperdrive so we can get back in inhabited space."

He paused, the stale air already making them breath a bit harder. "All mechanics, divide into two groups. The first group will get to work right away, and the second one will rest." Cav shivered. Temperature was dropping fast too.

"Infantry troops," The General continued, "Or any of you who have no mechanical experience, find someone who does and give them a hand. Internal comms, from your helmets and what not should still work, with in the ship. We have no way to recharge them as of yet, so only use the comm in case of an emergency."

He turned to Ahsoka. "I will lead the first group. Commander Tano will lead the second. Worst case scenario, we have four standard rotations of oxygen left. A week tops, if we take every precaution that we can and will take." He looked at each man in turn, his eyes settling on Commander Tano. "Dismissed."

Cav shivered. Neon tugged her a bit closer. "Which group would you rather go with?" He asked.

"The first one. I don't know if I'd be able to sleep at the moment." She said after a moment. Neon nodded.

"Me neither." They followed the group to the mechanical rooms. Within minutes Cavalry found herself elbow deep in black scum in one of the air recyclers that was caught in the blast as she scrubbed.

It was a mess. She was shivering now despite her armor. Neon looked up from his recycler part.

"Your lips are blue." He noted. "I'm going to go see if Kix has any extra blankets." He kicked off the ground. Cav grabbed his foot and dragged him back.

"I'm fine Neon. It's just a little cold and the air is starting to get damp." She admonished. "Other people need them more." She almost bit her tongue off with chattering teeth. She forced herself to relax and stop shivering for a couple seconds so her muscles wouldn't start cramping.

"Cavalry, those 'other people' are twice your size." Neon sighed. "Here." He kicked off again and disappeared down the hall. A few minutes later he returned with blankets taken from the barracks. The numbers pressed into the bottom of the blankets clearly read 5745 on one and 7080.

"Here." He handed them both to her. "They aren't reflective or anything but it will be better than nothing." Cav took them with a frown.

"Neon, this is your blanket though." She protested.

"Here. Like this." He wrapped them around her shoulders despite her protests. It didn't help much but it was better. Cav begrudgingly accepted the blankets and kept working.

She turned her head away to cough, wiping at her face in an attempt to rid it of accumulated moisture. The black foul smelling sludge on her hands happily transferred itself to her face, making her groan in annoyance. Neon snickered and silently passed her a rag to clean up with. The water on her face and hands was startlingly cold. She was sure she'd never get all the black out of her armor from this.

After a second she took off her gauntlets and vambraces and rolled up her blacks just a bit to get a better grip on the sponge. Neon sighed.

"This would be a lot easier if we could just acid splash it." He sighed.

"The acid would damage the parts though." Cav sighed. "But yeah. Acid would make this easier."

She scrubbed hard at the sludge, her muscles starting to tire from the cold and exertion. It was shaping up to be a long night pretty fast.