Beginners Luck

Chapter 3

POV: Rex

As me and Cody landed on the ground in front of the wreckage of our ships, five figures emerged. It appeared to be clones, but after those commando droids, you can never be too careful. We pointed our blasters at them. "Take off your helmets!" I ordered. "Uh, sir? Asked one of them. He sounded like a clone... "I said take off your helmets, nice and slow." Four of the five clones did, revealing the faces of fellow brothers. I noticed the remaining clone seemed more alert than the others. Blaster out and he seemed to be scanning the terrain for something.

Cody lowered his blaster, but I was still cautious. "What about that last man?" I asked. "I don't like it when people stare." He stated coldly, turning to look at me. "Lucky." Said one of the clones sternly. "Do as he says." He started to reach for his helmet, but paused and crouched down, putting his hand on the ground. Then he straightened just as a large eel lurched out of the ground and lunged at us. We shot at the same time, both aiming for an eye. The eel shrieked before falling limp to the ground. The clone holstered his blaster. "Hate those things." He muttered before pulling off his helmet. He was different from the rest of his brothers. While the average clone had tanned skin, dark brown hair, and brown eyes. He had black hair that had a streak of white through it and a silver right eye with a scar through it, and a golden left eye.

There was something about this soldier that just screamed dangerous. Maybe it was the way he stared at me, the way his eyes glittered menacingly, the calm, but calculating glint. Either way, Rex decided that he should probably keep an eye on this one. "My name is Rex, but you'll address us me as Captain, or sir." They all said "Sir, yes sir!" In unison. Cody stepped forward, "I'm commander Cody, your new boss." One trooper spoke, "My designation is CT-5555."

Another trooper spoke up, "We call him Fives, I'm Hevy. This is Echo and Cutup." He pointed at the respective clones. "And this ball of sunshine, is a Lucky." By now Lucky had started to rub his fingers over something around his neck. I took a note of it for later. "Where's your Sargent?" Asked Cody. "Dead sir. We're all that's left." Rex had already dipped his hand in one ruined eye of the eel and his hand was now covered in blue as he approached them. "Well commander, it looks like we've gotten ourselves a batch of shinies." Echo, clearly confused, asked "Shinies, sir?" I walked up to him, putting a blue handprint on his armor. "That's right. Your armor, it's shiny and new, just like you."

"With all due respect," Said Hevy, "We'll take back the base, shiny or not. And Lucky is no shiny!" I looked at Hevy "Then there may be hope for you yet." I turned to Lucky, "What battle were you in?" Cutup turned curiously towards Lucky as well. "Yeah. What battle was it."

"You mean you don't know?!" Exclaimed Cody. "I never told them" Said Lucky, "because it just brought back bad memories. But if you must know, it was the Siege on Hebekrr Minor." I sucked in air between my teeth and exchanged a glance with Cody. The Siege on Hebekrr Minor was a horrible battle during which many of our brothers had been lost. I realized with an internal wince that his batchmates had probably died there. "Anyways." Said Lucky, dragging everyone out of their thoughts. "Can we get started now?"

When we got back on the landing platform, I tried to get them to open the doors with a helmet and broken droid head. It didn't really work, but they opened the door. We shot the droids at the bottom and stealthily made our way up the stairs before starting a shootout. Lucky was at the front and the first one to take down a droid. I heard him mutter, almost wistfully, "Beginner's luck huh, Boost?" After that he tucked and rolled behind a crate and shot another two droids with the help of Cutup. Soon, the battle was all over and all that was left, was scrap.

Lucky took off his helmet and walked to the window, staring out. "What is it?" Asked Hevy, walking up to stand next to him. In response, he pointed out side. Out at the huge ship flying over. The separatists were planning an invasion. Echo went to try to disable the all clear signal. I thought I saw his silver eye glow for a second. Then he muttered under his breath, mostly to himself, "It- it won't work. We have to blow up the base." Just then, Echo looked up with a growl. "They fixed it so it only will transmit the all clear signal. I can't change it." Then Cody said "Then we have to destroy this base." The shinies, minus Lucky (I still thought of him as a shiny, no matter what he's done) all exchanged a look. Hevy stepped forward "Sir, with all do respect, our mission is to protect the station."

"Well there's no other way to alert the Generals. Do you have any explosives?" Echo made a face, "Not enough." He thought for a second. "Wait. We store liquid Tibanna here for the heating system. Think that would work?" Me and Cody exchanged a look, "Liquid Tibanna, highly explosive. Get all you can here, we can set a timer and be out before-" He was cut off by Cutup peering out the window. "Before that ship full of droids gets in here?" We raced back to the window to watch the ship start to get closer. "I guess we better work fast, huh?" Remarked Hevy.

After a bit of creative distracting from me and Cody. The boys got all of the highly explosive liquid together. There was the slight problem of with the timer though. "You guys all go ahead." Said Hevy. "I'll fix it, and be right behind." We all went into the vents and when I was heading in, I saw Lucky hug Hevy fiercely and whisper something to him. Before following me into the vents we waited a little. But suddenly Lucky's head jerked up just as the station was engulfed in flames. "Hevy always did hate that place." Said one of the boys, Echo maybe, or Fives.

"No. No nonononono. Damn it Hevy!" Lucky slammed his fist against a wall. To my surprise, there was a dent in the wall. "Why do you care so much?" I asked him, "You act like you hate everyone." He turned and glared at me, but I could see his eyes were full of tears. "I pushed you and Cody away, not them. I never could." He chuckled sadly. "I saw his death you know." I turned to him, startled. "What?"

"I SAW his death. I thought it was just a nightmare, but as all the pieces fell into place, I couldn't ignore it anymore. I wasn't sure until moments before." He picked up his helmet and pulled it back on, but not before I saw his silver eye glow, once more. "The ship's coming. Wave when they come." Then I heard the ship descending. Everyone but Lucky jumped and waved as it descended to pick us up.