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Thunderous rain pours from the heavens, drenching the dense forest surrounding the mercenary compound now in ruin.
Explosions echo in the distance, muffled screams from aching mercenaries in their struggle to fight off wave after wave of mechanical opponents that didn't seem to stop coming. Fiery bursts illuminate the misty air with intermittent flashes revealing a lone figure, wielding a vibro-blade against the backdrop of shadows cast on the sides of the buildings. Making his way closer and closer to his intended target, like a phantom on the prowl.
The once formidable compound was now a maze as the mercenary leader looked back, his heart drumming into his ears, spurring him on as his apparatus hand clutched at his side. Interconnected buildings and bunkers lay scared by the ravages of the battle. Hastily constructed compound exterior made from salvaged materials from previously fought battles with the First Order and Resistance, allowed them to recreate their base of operations, camouflaged by netting that made their location undiscoverable.
The mercenary leader's sloshing feet continued to become eaten by the dirt, like a Tatooine desert swallowing him whole with every step. Stumbling in and out of deep and jagged craters still freshly smelling of the whiff of explosives used filled his nostrils as he heard his men calling out his name all around him. He couldn't see anyone, he couldn't find anyone.
Suddenly his foot caught something that sent him splashing into a muddied puddle. And as he turned a flash of white stuck to his shoe. A stormtrooper helmet with a damaged visor that his foot had lodged itself through. The plastic of the helmet caught the fabric of his pant leg that was already sticking to his soaking body like glue that refused to budge.
Looking around, the mercenary leader noticed more and more helmets scattered like fallen leaves. And to think upon redecoration he'd propped these helmets on spikes to deter unwanted visitors. Now they were the stuff of nightmares having no life to wear them for the past ten years since the fall of the First Order. To his credit the helmets were terrifying, the only problem was that they weren't scaring off unwanted guests. They were scaring him. He could share the same fate of being a hollowed shell of a man if he didn't keep going.
Crawling helplessly on the ground, his arms dragging his body as he attempted to kick off the helmet. The rain pelting his skin filling his ears with cotton, but also musically bouncing off his metallic arm as his palace crumbled around him.
A gentle splash made him turn, and the lone figure emerged from the smoke and wreckage. A silhouette defined by cascading rain droplets coursing down his darkened jacket. Each step across the ground was effortless as if the man walked on water. It sent ripples across the soggy path, that to his eyes looked like a monster from the deepest, darkest, pits.
