Lone Wolf

The Best Laid Plans

Let me get this straight," said Grox, with her hands on her hips. "Your brilliant plan is to add a herd of rancors to the list of life forms trying to kill us?" The smuggler made a disgusted sound and muttered to Jones, "And you say I'm reckless."

"A group of rancors is called a crash, not a herd," corrected Kella.

"Well, that changes things," Grox muttered sarcastically. To Mando, she said, "I assume you've accounted for the crash in your plan."

"You're just angry because your throwing knives won't work on them," he pointed out as they exited the ship. "As for my plan, it starts with arming ourselves to the teeth." He indicated the haul of weapons from the Blaze that Jones was towing at the rear of the group. "There's an abandoned freighter north of here. The arms on that ship could equip an army. We take as many loads as we can before nightfall to that cliff," he pointed at the rocky peak in the distance. "Night's a long way off, so we'll have plenty of time. We get the high ground, fortify ourselves, and wait."

"And the rancors?" prompted Grox.

"They shouldn't bother us before dark," he said. "There are six of them that we know of. The Paravyn security forces won't be expecting them. Best case scenario, maybe the crash can whittle down their numbers for us."

Grox mumbled under breath, "Worst case scenario, we survive the humans who wanna kill us only to be eaten alive by rancors."

Peg shielded her eyes against the sun and pointed up. "Looks like the defence satellites did their job," she said.

The others followed her gaze and watched a smoking ship plummet across the sky. It disappeared from view, but there was no explosion upon impact.

"Looks like they managed a decent landing considering the damage," lamented Kella.

"But there had to be casualties. It'll bring their numbers down," said Grox. "Repairs will keep some of them busy too."

After three trips lugging weaponry to the cliff, their improvised fort looked downright formidable. The group dug in on an outcropping of rock. As the best marksmen, Mando and Jones took the heaviest weapons.

"They landed no more than ten kilometres out," murmured Grox just after nightfall. "If they're coming tonight, the attack could start any minute. They won't have trouble finding us with a tracker to follow."

Mando adjusted his cannon's position and said, "The longer they take, the more likely it is the rancors got to them."

"I've got movement," whispered Jones, who was taking the first watch. He wore the only pair of night vision goggles.

They all took up positions behind the rocks with their blasters. Kella squinted into the darkness below but couldn't see a thing.

Suddenly the night exploded in bursts of red. Blaster fire reflected eerily against the gray stones. The group returned fire. There wasn't much cover below, but it seemed to Kella that each soldier she hit was immediately replaced by five more.

"How many are there?" asked Peg, replacing her third power pack.

Mando answered grimly, "A lot, just keep shooting!"

"Peg, on your right!" shouted Grox. Peg hefted the heavy blaster to the side and mowed down the attackers trying to climb the steepest part of the cliff.

"High ground or not, we're going to be overrun at this rate," warned Grox.

The enemy line was advancing. Kella noticed they were using the bodies of fallen comrades for cover. The noise and heat of the blaster fire was more intense than she'd expected. She wiped sweat from her eyes and snapped a new power pack into her weapon. Then she heard something different from the battle sounds. There were sudden screams that ended abruptly. The enemy fire was slowing as well. No, not slowing. It was simply directed elsewhere. The soldiers were firing at something in the trees.