Star Wars: Dar'Aliit

Chapter Five: Cogs in the Machine

20 BBY Unknown Outpost

"Pack it in!" Mer'en waves to the transport.

The sound of boots is familiar. I fall in behind Kit and look back as the sergeant steps into the LAAT/i. Less than a week and action again. I don't know if I can imagine anything other than the shadows of Umbara no matter how many times I try.

But this time there isn't a planet, just an outpost, and our goal is to get there before the separatists do. We have to secure it.

Kit looks back at me. He hardly ever talks about anything, but I catch him reading up on tech mags sometimes. I say that like I've been here for months but in reality it's only been half a week. I still barley know these guys. Doesn't make them any less my brothers.

The transport lifts off. I can feel my stomach tighten at the sensation of rising off the ground and it hits me. We're really deploying again.

I'm deploying again. How many times? How many more trips before it's me down there rotting in the dirt?

Unconsciously, I reach over with my free hand and touch my right shoulder pauldron.

"Nervous flying?" Kit asks in a quiet tone.

I blink. "Huh?" Looking up, it's clear Kit has a death grip on the netting.

"You look nervous," Kit repeats. "I'm asking if you're afraid of flying."

"Are you?"

He nods and taps the side of his helmet. "Music, keeps me from worrying about it."

I nod. "I'm not nervous," I tell him, but I can't shake the knots in my gut anyway. "Not about flying anyway."

"I get it," Kit whispers. To be honest, I think it's the longest conversation I've ever had with him. Other than that time I asked him to explain a basic encryption. That conversation lasted three hours.

"We'll be making our descent shortly," the pilot says over the comm. "Hold on tight because the atmosphere here might as well be made of a muddy Kaminoan ocean!"

My grip tightens. Kit goes stiff in front of me, and I almost feel like I should hold my breath. I'm waiting for it to hit me. The jolt, or tossing, something to follow the fear that's bottled itself inside my throat.

Instead, there's a light tremor under my feet. It isn't so bad. I let myself relax.

First mistake.

The whole transport rocks off kilter. We're twisting on our side. I flail for the net over our heads and grab it with both hands as all sense of gravity goes out the window.

"Hold on!" Mer'en yells. He's echoed by the pilots, but their voices are lost in the sound of a scream and an explosion.

There's flashing red lights. Everything is wrong. There's no up, no down, no left, or right. We're free falling caught in a metal death trap. I admit, I really thought I'd at least die staring my enemy in the face. Not on some forsaken rock in the backside of the galaxy.

With a scrape of metal and screaming that likely isn't human, we're all thrown forward. I think I'm on my feet. The only thing I do know amid the red and the kalxons is that my hand is caught in the net. That alone may be the only reason I'm alive when the world comes to an eerie standstill.

The klaxon is still blaring. There's still a macabre red washed over everything and sparks falling, but we are not moving. Metal groans under my feet.

I hold my breath.

Someone coughs and I feel my heart flip, but we don't go anywhere. There's a dent busted in the wall. Shadows move in the darkness and some of them look familiar.