Engines of Heaven: Unorthodox

Posted on Wed Mar 18th, 2020 @ 12:36am by Thane & Bomoor Thort
Edited on on Wed Jun 8th, 2022 @ 2:03pm

3,656 words; about a 18 minute read

Chapter: Additional Stories
Location: Aloxor, Aloxor Sector, Mid Rim
Timeline: Concurrent with "High Promise"

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This post takes place in 1,213 ABY, around four years before Thane and Bomoor encountered the Cult of Axion on Nar Shaddaa, during their earliest years as Jedi Knights.

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"If a being has a stubborn and rebellious scion that will not obey the voice of their kin, and, though they discipline them, will not listen to them, then their kin shall take hold of them and bring them out to the Faithful of their Parish, at the border where they live, and they shall say to the Faithful of their Parish, 'This, our child, is stubborn and rebellious; they will not bathe in Her Terrible Glare; they are gluttonous and minded of the Renunciate'. Then all the Faithful of the Parish shall stone them until they are returned to Her Glare. So shall You purge the evil from your midst, and all Creation shall hear, and fear."

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The explosion ripped through the duracrete wall, metalwork and rivets warping and twisting as the heat and kinetic forces obliterated metres of the structure, leaving a steaming, gaping hole in the side of the stately building.

Jedi Knights Thane and Bomoor were thrown unceremoniously through the newly formed hole, straight into another wall that served as an outer perimeter to the local governor’s quasi-military complex. Klaxons resonated from all angles, from within the main structure that they had just been explosively launched out of, and also from the wider circumference of the governor’s establishment. Blaster bolts of all colours followed the two Jedi, blindly zooming at various angles from behind the thick smoke that obscured their pursuers, who were furiously giving chase to the two young men from still within the building.

Battle cries, orders and roars of rage came from the governor’s men, all of whom were Humans, whilst the sound of stampeding boots could be heard reverberating from other nearby quarters within the complex, more soldiers coming to support their leader’s warriors in dispatching the Jedi. Clad in a variety of armours, cloths and padding, the governor’s folk were either loyal or just well-paid, but they seemed to pay no mind to the fact they were pursuing Knights of the Reborn Order. This far from the Core, in this troubled part of the galaxy, the regional fighters of Aloxor were quite typical of the ‘wilder’ Mid Rim.

Thane, with a deft physical application of the Force, swept himself up in one acrobatic motion, going from a lying prone position into a standing, ready posture, a feat made to appear insignificant by the smoothness of his execution. His lightsaber, gleaming violet and sizzling with the occasional dusting of post-explosion debris settling onto it, was clasped in one hand, whilst he proffered his other to Bomoor. Tucked under the arm of the free hand was a peculiar stone effigy, squashed tightly into his body as he waited for his Ithorian friend to up his offer of assistance, a wide, smarmy grin stretched across his dust-coated face. Nearby, the voices of their pursuers were getting louder, as was the pounding of the boots and the zaps of their foes’ blasters.

Shaking his elongated head to bring himself back into focus after the blast impact, Bomoor then looked up towards his colleague with one eye-stalk raised as a Humanoid would raise an eyebrow, "I suppose you're happy with this turn of events?" The older sentient spoke as he took Thane's hand, careful to use another support so as not to pull the lighter man down.

He rose up and brushed a hand down himself, only a cursory attempt at removing the dust and dirt that clung to his beige Jedi tunic, "Oh well; I can't pretend the Governor doesn't deserve every ounce of trouble that comes his way after explaining his attitude towards the natives. But perhaps..."

Bomoor ducked suddenly as a sudden blaster bolt scorched a blackened circle into the perimeter wall beside them. He instinctively ignited his own viridian-coloured blade and held it up in a guarded position across the direction of the shot.

"Right, no. Let's discuss this later," Bomoor gestured firmly in the other direction, "There was another exit through the gardens, wasn't there?"

The reports of more blaster fire drew their attention towards the first wave of fighters that caught up to them. Thane whirled his lightsaber round in a one-handed Niman grip, artful and fluid swirling motions neatly catching, deflecting and redirecting the multi-toned energy bolts as they flew towards the Jedi pair. Several well-placed returned blaster shots collided with the weapons that had loosed them, causing the weapons to explode or simply knocking them from their wielders' hands, rendering them practically harmless as immediate threats.

"You know," Thane began, as the last couple of soldiers were felled or retreated, shifting positions to await their close-by backup, "there's this neat trick you do, Bomoor. Your mouths move, and Master Sotah's voice comes tumbling out!"

“I have to at least make an effort to take a moral standpoint,” Bomoor’s voice took on a droll tone as he cautiously lowered his guard an inch, “Even if Master Thurius did also teach me the value of more aggressive negotiations.”

Thane did not get a chance to reply, as he and his friend's eyes were drawn to the new threat emerging from the newly-created hole from which they had so recently been blasted. The governor's local militia had hauled with them a heavy, and highly-illegal, customised repeating blaster, hoisted by two of the larger male combatants, who were now quickly going about attaching to an emplacement.

"Yeah, the gardens sound good," Thane said quickly, patting Bomoor's shoulder urgently, pushing him gently towards the direction of the gardens - not that the Ithorian needed any such encouragement.

They both then heard the warbling of the weapon's batteries charging, which was, naturally, accompanied by the sinister cackling of the man powering the oversized weapon up. Not for the first time in his short Jedi career, Thane wondered why so many hired goons were always so enthusiastic about gunning down Jedi Knights. Almost certainly, they had had no experience with the monastic warriors, but it almost seemed like a prerequisite for their applications into these villainous organisations.

The gun unleashed a hellish volley of unrepenting blaster fire at the two Jedi, the overwhelming impact of the harsh repeating bolts causing numerous small explosions to erupt from the floor and nearby perimeter wall. Through a combination of that explosive energy and the tactical application of the Force, both Thane and Bomoor launched themselves out of harm's way, although this new blast carried the pair somewhat higher and further than expected, and they landed somewhat awkwardly several metres away.

Thane, being lighter and marginally more gifted with such things, was just about able to recover the second unceremonious fall they had experienced that day into a small somersault and roll, bringing himself back up to full height fairly quickly. Less conveniently, his dark outer robes had caught fire, and his own swearing joined that of the soldiers they had just escaped, as he quickly flung the garments away, still managing to keep hold of the stone effigy.

"Every time!" He growled when he caught Bomoor watching, ice-blue eyes flashing with irritation.

“I’m more concerned about that ornament you’re holding, rather than our clothes,” the Ithorian dusted down his own lighter-coloured garb, which had some very visible signs of scorching, “But we can go cape-shopping later. Look there.”

Thane’s eye was drawn backwards to where Bomoor was pointing, above the military complex with its new smoking hole in the side, where a small but wide gunship was just peering into view. The craft’s front mounted guns were coming into alignment, nearly ready to rain fire down upon the two Jedi, presumably by another trigger-happy thug at the controls.

“The locals didn’t mention him owning a gunship,” the consular raised his voice as the engine of the ship became louder, “You’d think they might have mentioned that.”

"I, uhh, don't think the locals have a word for 'gunship'!" Thane replied quickly, examining the encroaching vehicle was quickly as he could, before danger completely overwhelmed them.

It looked to be a stripped-down Verpine P101-series gunship, akin to the armed transports he knew the Outer Rim Alliance had favoured during the Second Conflict. This one, however, was a sorrier sight: its holding compartment's doors had been torn off to expose the warriors carried within, meaning it was no longer space-worth, and as probably unsuitable for even long-distance excursions planetside. The upper-central turret was also absent, leaving a lone gunner physically poking out of the top, his handheld heavy weapon a poor replacement for the industrial gun that was once there. The paintwork was shoddy and chipped, with unsavoury colours splashed haphazardly across its armaments and armouring.

To Thane, it still posed a very credible threat, however. He glanced at the plasma of his lightsaber quickly, thinking now how insignificant its thin blade appeared against such heavy-duty equipment.

Bomoor swept his head around, looking over the garden that had been carefully manicured by the locals at the governor’s behest in what appeared to be an attempt at classical Alderaanian landscaping through the eyes of an individual that had never set foot on another planet, let alone New Alderaan itself. At the far end, was an archway with a classical metal gate set into it where they had originally been paraded through as ‘honoured guests’ before their favour with their host had soured.

There was quite a way between where they stood and their escape and they would struggle to reach it before the guns began firing, even with their enhanced Jedi speed, “Find some cover, quickly. We’ll have to edge our way to the gate. Think you can keep a hold of that thing?”

Although an obviously inopportune time, Thane was unable to prevent himself from offering a little inappropriate grin to Bomoor, and he spun the totem (with some assistance from the Force) on a finger, to make an empty point. "Come, Bomoor. You know m-"

His comments were cut short by the first salvo of missiles being launched from the gunship. Whilst Thane was able to quickly recover the effigy and throw himself out of harm's way, Bomoor deftly swept the projectiles nearest to him away through the tactical application of the Force. The gunship left them little more chance to find the afore-discussed cover, though, before unleashing several salvos of blaster fire towards them. The pair did managed to fling themselves behind a nearby small building, but the gunship seemed to pay no mind to the reckless destruction it was causing to its master's compound.

The noise of the relentless bolts impacting the nearby wall was hard to be heard over, but Thane managed to shout, "Can you distract it for me?" He threw a thumb towards where the gunship would be, behind the building. "There's a radio antenna nearby. I could-" A loud blast of something exploding nearby drowned out his words, but the young Human Jedi held up the hilt of his lightsaber, and he made a very tasteless throwing gesture with it. "-Should buy us enough time to get out of here!"

With a firm nod of his wide, flat head, Bomoor turned away and, timing his movements with a break in the gunfire, he shot out from the building and towards the western wall of the complex and towards the communications bunker Thane had motioned towards. He kept his motion slower than normal so that he would be a clear target for the gunship which, sure enough, began to track towards him, leaving Thane a clearer path.

Descending closer towards the ground, the gunship veered towards the Ithorian Jedi, as planned, as he stayed low but visible to the vessel. Another volley of blaster fire began to rain down on him, collapsing an arbour and forcing Bomoor to leap the final few metres into cover behind another nearby wall, debris falling down over the Jedi. The young consular drew his blade out, ready for combat.

Now that he was out of sight of the gunship, it would have to re-position again in order to get a clear shot at him. This section of the complex was a dead end and, if the pilot of the ship knew this too, he would almost certainly bring himself in closer in order to cut off Bomoor's escape. Fortunately, that would lead him right into the trap. The tall radio antennae was crude; the sort of communications method used only for local planetary communications and probably used by the governor to issue commands to the locals. But it was tall, heavy and, most-importantly, held up almost entirely by one central support.

Staying carefully positioned to minimise any injury, he made a good show of quickly exposing himself and his lightsaber, which was easily spotted by the looming gunship. As its primary weapons began spiralling and heating up for another barrage, a bright spinning beam of violet plasma smashed into the central strut, its superheated blade slicing through the metal as though it were soft butter, before Thane's thrown lightsaber then tumbled out of view. Immediately, the sheer unsupported weight of the antenna collapsed on itself and tipped towards the hovering gunship, various cables and equipment sparking as they tore away from the falling machine.

The gunship's crew could be seen to visibly panic at the impending danger but they did not react quickly enough. The sudden shift the pilot had attempted to take only served to expose one of the broad engines of the vehicle, causing it to explode on impact and send the gunship spiralling out of control, just as Thane and Bomoor had planned.

Having brought himself out from his cover to watch the spectacle, Bomoor was joined by Thane as he darted over to stand beside his friend. Thane called his weapon back to his hand, giving the electrum hilt a few cursory brushes with his sleeve, as he also watched the crashing gunship with some pride - although his self-satisfied grin quickly turned to open-mouthed shock as it smashed straight into the primary arch to the gardens, the subsequent explosion and numerous madly-fired last-second random missiles obliterating their escape route.

"No!" Thane shouted, an outstretched, incredulous hand reached out towards the wreckage and blocked pathway. "Come on!"

Bomoor tugged at Thane, breaking his alarmed expression, and the pair bounded down through the ruined gardens until they stood close enough to the glowing wreck to feel the heat radiating from the tangle of metal and machinery, which had partly fused with the remains of the gate of the complex. Unless anyone escaped before the crash, all aboard were surely now dead.

"Gruesome," Bomoor observed, "and also unfortunate that it has cut off our escape."

Behind them, more of the governor's men were hurriedly congregating, perhaps realising that the Jedi were now trapped inside and awaiting greater numbers before they pressed a final attack.

Actually wiping away sweat that had formed on his brown from the heat and commotion of the afternoon's antics, Thane looked around hurriedly, options slim and time fast fading. After a few seconds of his wide blue eyes flitting this way and that, he spotted more dark smoke rising from a part of the compound's perimeter. At its source was a small section of cracked wall, the narrow sight of woodland beyond.

"There!" Thane said, already running towards the opening, realising one of the stray missiles from the crashing gunship must have conveniently blasted them an alternative escape route, thick with smoke from burning rubble as it was. Limited breathing and hazardous materials seemed to be the order of the day, anyway.

The collapsed and still-smouldering section of the wall opened onto an unknown forest set upon a hillside. Down below was a river just a short distance from the tiny fishing settlement the two offworlders had passed through on their journey up to the governor's perch atop the valley.

When Thane and Bomoor reached it and peered through, they saw that the recent rainfall had made the ground sodden and slippery. Much of the surrounding earth had been displaced to this side when the complex had been constructed making it particularly loose.

"Down there?" queried the Ithorian.

"Down there," his Human friend confirmed with a nod, rediscovering some of his cheer.

"It'll be quite a wild ride, if we don't immediately hit a tree in that dense wood."

"Says the man with a swoop season ticket," Thane rebuked with a smile, although he did not yet turn away from the steep mudslide before them. Admittedly, like when one was stood at the edge of a cliff or at a high height, there was something pulling back at him, willing him to not leap forth. He assumed it was his survival instinct, making its daily token effort to preserve the Jedi Guardian.

His Ithorian friend allowed himself a light chuckle, just audible above the growing voices a short distance behind them, "I think we seem to have far more thrills than the average Jedi. Not that I'm complaining."

The pair stepped through and felt the sodden ground beneath their feet as they stared at their only escape route, "I'm not entirely sure where this will take us, mind."

"Oop!" Thane exclaimed, suddenly, but successfully, preternaturally ducking out of the way of a bright plasma bolt flying towards where his head had been a second before. It collided with a tall tree some metres away from the pair of Jedi, splitting its bark, singed leaves tumbling away. "None of that really matters now!" He said, seeing that their opponents were now filtering through the gap after them, marching orders being barked from behind the wall and within the compound. He glanced back down the slope, noticing with dissatisfaction that he could not spy the conclusion of the improvised trail. "Jump!"

Thane pulled Bomoor down with himself before Bomoor could reconsider or take any action of his own, and they both fell onto their backs into the mud, careering down the muddy decline with increasing speed. With small influences of the Force and the occasional shifting of his frame, Thane narrowly avoiding colliding with several trees as they slipped down away from the compound. Blaster fire continued to rain over them, smashing into the wet earth, causing all manner of mud and stone to flick up over the two Jedi.

Beside him, Bomoor's already muddy-brown form carved a channel down the slope slightly slower than Thane's more streamlined humanoid form. The Ithorian appeared to notice his lagging speed and began contorting his body more to slip faster and faster, dodging the various obstacles, much like the bikes at the swoop races Thane had referenced.

As they reached the trough of the valley, the ground began to level out, a short distance from the river and the pair found themselves coming to a natural halt as the slippery earth became more gritty and friction finally overcame gravity. There was a peaceful silence here, down by the water and neither Jedi spoke for a moment as they took in all that had happened in the last few minutes before, as if on cue, they both erupted in merry laughter.

Bomoor arose and shook his arms firmly downwards to push away the worst of the mud that clung to him, "Okay, I think that is my favourite hastily-improvised escape plan yet."

Thane rose with his friend. Where most of his facial features were obscured by the thick wet earth that clung to most of his body, it was only the pearly-white glean of his teeth that gave away his wide grin as he joined Bomoor and flicking thick globs of mud away. Part of the laughter was from agreement, a part of it was from the sheer joy of the escape plan, and another big part of it was that there was clearly a catalogue of hastily-improvised Thane and Bomoor escape plans that Bomoor was able to flick through.

He brought a friendly free hand to rest on Bomoor's soily hump and raised the effigy in the other, holding it up to the cloud-covered sun in the sky far above. Like the two Jedi that had 'rescued' the artefact, it was slick with mud, its ancient faded features entirely covered in brown dirt and indiscernible. Even so, Thane held it up as though it were some great victory they had achieved, which evoked a couple more chuckles from the Jedi pair.

As they were enjoying themselves a little too much, they almost missed the telltale chirping of their communicators. Gesturing that he would answer, Thane fumbled within the remnants of his sodden, wet and singed robes to retrieve the small device, causing mud to be smeared over its little projector. It only took a couple of seconds for a small holographic blue image to take shape, indicating a reasonable proximity to the source's location, although a few flecks of mud obscured the depiction of the recognisable figure.

"Thane, Bomoor," the avatar of Jedi Master Hale said, inclining his head to them both. He only offered the briefest of raised brows at the state of the pair before continuing, his tone graver than its norm. "I need you to finish your... business... on Aloxor as soon as possible, and come out to meet me at Ord Yutani." The Neimoidian master glowered with half-hidden amusement at the younger Jedi, before concluding, with a gesture towards the dirtied robes adorning them, "I need your, uhh, unique perspective..."

TBC

 

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