The Mine: Part One Author: Savage Prelude The Beacon They were all dead. Everyone was dead. Or were they? It didn't matter anymore. All that mattered was that he was alive. But he didn't want to be alive in the same way they were. No, never in that way. And so he looked down the barrel of the disruptor pistol. It was a nice blaster, it had taken him forever to find one like it. He'd had to go down to the fifth level of Nar Shadda to find a black market piece like this. He smiled momentarily at the memory. It seemed like years ago now. There was metallic scraping at the door. Screeching really, almost like souls of the damned crying out in torment. He looked away from the barrel of his precious disruptor, and gazed at the blast doors that were firmly locked at the far side of the room. It was trying to get in. "I did what you wanted damn you!" The man screamed at the blast door and the metallic scraping noises coming from the other side. He hurled the liquor bottle in his hand, and it shattered against the durasteel. He grabbed at another liquor bottle that was sitting on the desktop in front of him, and stared into the blinking red light of the beacon. Maybe it will bring help? He thought morosely as he took a swig from the bottle with his free hand. His other hand still on the handle of his blaster. You fool. You know why you lit the beacon. Another part of his mind responded. And, he knew that he was right. Though to which thought he accredited the correct judgment he was too far gone to have been able to distinguish. For both were correct to his mind, and both were still utterly beside the point. "I won't be taken." He said as the scraping continued on the other side of the blast door. There was a loud blast, and a flash of light inside the locked room. And then, all was silent. Chapter 1 Ghost Tales Savage wasn't too good at taking downtime. They'd been given a whole week of shore leave, and the only thing he could think to do was check over his U-wing. Something had been bothering him since the last mission, but he couldn't quite put his finger on it. Some inner sense of anxiety perhaps. Normally, he'd simply drink until the vague uneasiness left him, but he had decided to do something productive instead. Which was how he found himself inspecting the bolts, and rivets on his U-wing in a nearly empty hangar bay onboard the Vigilant while everyone else was out blowing off steam. It came as some surprise when he noticed the only other workers in the hangar walking over to him. They looked unfamiliar, but that was hardly surprising. The New Republic had hired on a good deal of contractors from the local Toseng populace to help repair battle damaged ships and the like. Supposedly it was to try and offer jobs to the Tosengers, but Savage figured it was just as likely they wanted to give them something to do to keep them out of trouble. "They give you pilots leave for a week, and you're in here working?" One of the contractors asked as they walked up to Savage's U-wing. Savage looked up to see a human male, in dirty workers overalls. Followed by a human female, and a Falleen who were also in work clothes stained with oil, and grease. "Yeah, well, wandering around Toseng didn't seem interesting to me." Savage responded without looking back up as he continued tightening a loose bolt in the manual release for the boarding ramp. "You're Savage right?" He heard the human woman ask. "Heard your flight had some trouble recently." Savage looked up, she had long black hair tied up behind her head, and somewhat pinched features about her face. If he had to guess, he'd say she was somewhere in her twenties. The other two looked about the same age, though it was hard to tell with the Falleen. Their reptilian green skin didn't age quite like most humanoids. "You could say that. Imps came at us twice, before and after our insertions. Didn't think word got around much about it." Savage answered indifferently as he worked. "Word got around that you kicked a stormtrooper out of that bay door. That how that lever you're working on got messed up?" The human male asked with a grin. "Something like that." Savage responded. He had a quick flash of memory of his dead door gunner's leg caught up on the manual release lever, and the stormtrooper attempting to board them. The look in the stormtroopers eyes as he fell out of the bay door to his certain death was vivid in his mind. "There something you want exactly?" "We have a proposition for you actually." The human male said with the grin still on his face before continuing. "My name is Dawson, and this here is Rieva and Tonor." "We find ourselves in need of a pilot, and we figured since you don't look like you have much to do around here that we'd ask you." Dawson said. "What do a couple of contractors need with a pilot? Can't you just take the shuttle down to Toseng when you need to?" Savage asked. "Not for what we had in mind. You see, it's like this, one of our friends located an old asteroid mining facility, and we're trying to put together a salvage crew. We have a pilot, but he's not comfortable flying the size freighter we need to load everything up. We were hoping you might have some experience there." "Salvage?" Savage asked incredulously. "Doesn't sound like there's too much money in that. Especially if the place has been abandoned for a while." "Well that's the thing, we have a man on the ground already so to speak. A buddy of ours, Tannis, flew out there. He just contacted us this morning. The mining equipment alone is worth more than any of us make in a year." That piqued his interest, and it explained why they needed another pilot since they already had one man flying out there. "What kind of freighter would I be flying?" Savage asked as he set down his tool, and tested the give on the manual release lever. He figured it would have to be a bulk freighter of some sort given what little he knew about mining equipment. He knew the equipment had to be large if nothing else. "We have access to an old ZV-9 bulk freighter. It even has some aftermarket weaponry and shielding on it." Dawson replied. Savage considered what he said. Now why would they need an armed freighter for a simple salvage job? He looked Dawson in the eye to see if the man had any tell that he could read, but the human just looked eager and sure of himself. "Where is the mine?" Savage asked after a few seconds. He had a hunch. "It's in the Cularin System. Not too far away, coincidentally, only about a day's trip in hyper." Dawson said, still grinning. It took him a few seconds, but he finally placed where he had heard about the system. In his old profession he had heard mention of the tactics certain pirate crews used there. Namely they lay in wait using the topography of the asteroid belt for easy ambushes. If he recalled correctly the hyperspace lanes forced outgoing pilots to navigate the belt first before entering hyperspace, which made them easy targets. That explains why they approached me. Now the question is, how much do they know about my past? He thought. "There still pirates out in those parts?" Savage probed questioningly. "Feth, not in twenty years. That's the whole reason they were able to start mining again out there." Dawson said. Savage watched the man as he talked, and he could tell he still seemed certain of himself. The woman next to him tellingly narrowed her eyes a bit at the mention of pirates. "Even if some showed up though, you're a combat pilot right? They can't be as bad as those Imps your squadron just fought." Rieva said. So they are concerned about someone interfering with their salvage operation. Still, it wasn't like he was doing much here. He looked back into the U-wing crew cabin while he considered it. There were still scorch marks on the ceiling. "What's the pay?" He asked. "Even shares, once we sell what we can take off the thing." Dawson said confidently. "And you don't have to worry about finding us for your cut. We all work in the same hangar after all. It's not like we can give you the slip after our guy auctions everything off planetside." "You're planning on selling it here?" Savage asked. "Sure, why not? Toseng needs a lot of fixing. There's construction crews everywhere you look. And, a lot of this stuff can be used just as well for construction as it can for digging." Dawson explained. He seemed to have thought out most of the operation. Ah, war profiteering Savage thought as the clues fit together. He didn't have any real issue with it though. It made for a less risky venture if everything was brought back here to sell after all, what with the New Republic funding the re-building projects all over the planet. Plus, it would be helping in the long run. If he got his cut along the way, then who cares if they took advantage of a bad situation. "You know I only have one week of leave right?" Savage asked. For that matter, considering they were all contractors, he wondered how long they could be missing before someone noticed. "Like I said, we already have a man on the ground scoping things out for us. One day to get there, a few days to load things up and secure them, and one day back. We'll all be back here with time to spare." Dawson replied. Savage leaned back while he considered it. He wasn't doing anything with his leave anyway, and he had no interest in going down into Toseng. Hell, he might as well make some money on the side. "Alright then, when do we ship out?" Savage asked in agreement to the proposition. *** Charon> was a sight to behold, and instilled wonder in all who saw it. In that one wondered how a ship could be literally held together by rust and still function. "This is your freighter?" Savage asked incredulously. "We were able to get it quick, and with no questions asked. So what if it's missing a few bolts?" Tonor said. The Falleen had been the one to come get Savage from his cabin early that morning. They had taken a shuttle planetside, and made a short walk across the spaceport to the commercial side of things. "As long as she flies." Savage replied as they walked on board. The cargo hold they entered was utilitarian, and rather expansive. He could see equipment neatly stacked at the edges that he assumed they would need for the salvage operation. They walked on into equally utilitarian hallways plated with durasteel. Thankfully the plating was decidedly less rusty than the hull. He could hear rhythmic bass music thumping from somewhere farther up the hallway. After a few twists and turns the Falleen brought him to the cockpit of the ship, and opened the hatch allowing the blaring glimmik music to spill out. A Weequay could be seen farther in, hunched over the controls running diagnostics, his head nodding to the tempo. "This is Crix, our engineer." Tonor shouted over the music and gestured at the Weequay who appeared to be splicing some wires together. The scene didn't exactly fill Savage with confidence in the state of the ship. "Crix. Crix!" Tonor shouted to get the man's attention. "Huh, what?" Crix asked as he looked up from his work. "Turn the damn music down! This is our pilot!" Tonor shouted back. "Hold on, I can't hear you. Let me turn the music down." Crix shouted back before reaching behind him and turning a knob. The deafening bass music lowered to a nearly tolerable noise level. Savage heard Tonor mumble something under his breath about the Weequay's mother, but he was more concerned about what the engineer was messing with. He had been under the assumption that the ship was ready to fly, but here this man was fiddling with the wiring. "What exactly are you doing there?" Savage asked, pointing at the wires in Crix's hand. He could see the diagnostic display running on one of the screens behind Crix, but they seemed like a separate task. "Oh this? Just fixing the rest of the on-board comms system so the pilot can communicate throughout the ship. It was a little finicky when I first got on, you had to shout down the hallway to get anyone's attention." Crix said as he finished splicing the wire and plugged in some sort of handheld device before nodding to himself. "Is the ship ready to fly or what?" Tonor asked, clearly running low on patience with the engineer. "Sure, diags look good. Just check with Dawson and Rieva to see if they got the last of the equipment on." Crix said, waving a hand at the control panel. Savage walked over and sat in the pilot's seat. The control panel was fairly standard, and it only took him a few moments to locate the important instruments. He had flown a few freighters planetside with their ship's plunder back in his pirating days, and it didn't seem like much had changed in the world of freighter design. "I'm Savage by the way. I'll be your Pilot." "Nice to meet you." Crix said without looking at him. Instead he punched a button on the control board and said, "Hey Dawson, we loaded up yet?" After a moment a voice replied over the speaker. "Loaded and ready to go. I see you got the comms working again." "Yup, sure did. And, I even upgraded them." Crix replied as he fiddled with something on the device in his hand. Savage wasn't paying too close attention. He was trying to remember the safe startup sequence these old bulk freighters followed. Thankfully the diagnostics were still pulled up so there wasn't much in the way to do for a pre-flight check. "What do you mean an upg—" Dawson began to ask over the comms before he was cut off by the blaring glimmik music. Savage could swear the whole ship was vibrating with the rhythmic bass beat. It took a minute or two but Dawson was soon at the cockpit yelling at Crix that the ship was not his personal sound system. Savage smiled a bit as he fired up the start-up sequence, and brought Charon online. At least it wouldn't be a boring trip. "We good to go?" Savage asked Dawson, who was still fuming at the engineer. "We're all aboard, and loaded up. Get us to space. Crix should be able to bring up the hyperspace coordinates for you." Dawson replied before continuing, "I'll go let Rieva know to get strapped in." Dawson walked out with Tonor as Savage brought the engines online. A subtle thrum reverberated through the deck plates. Whatever the outward appearance, the engines feel fine at least, Savage mused. Crix lifted himself into the co-pilot's seat from his place on the floor where he had been messing with the wiring. "Flown one of these before?" He asked. "Not this particular model, but I've flown other bulk freighters." Savage replied as the engines finished their sequence, and he punched in a clearance request for ground control. "Good, good. Couldn't none of us fly this thing well enough if the pirates decide to hit us." Crix said. "I thought Dawson said there hadn't been pirates spotted out in the Cularis system?" Savage asked innocently. "Well, not officially, no. But, pirates wouldn't be letting people go around letting the officials know they're out there now would they?" Crix said as he leaned back in his seat, and put on his safety harness. Savage knew only too well what Crix was talking about. Dead men tell no tales after all. He wasn't sure how much this small salvage crew knew about his past career as a pirate before he joined the Rebellion, but he wasn't going to volunteer that information anytime soon. "No, I suppose they wouldn't." Savage said noncommittally. He received clearance from ground control, and pulled in the landing struts. Soon the ship was hovering over the landing pad. He hit the comms button and continued, "Ladies and gentlemen prepare for liftoff." Charon made its cumbrous exit out of the docking bay, and out towards the high atmosphere. Toseng began retreating far below, and it wasn't long before they had cleared the atmosphere out among the stars into the planet's orbit. "Got those coordinates for me?" Savage asked Crix, who was less of a co-pilot, and more of a passenger. Despite being in the co-pilot's chair. "Sure, sure got them right here." Crix said as he punched them in after referencing his datapad. Savage glanced at them, and began flying the ship around the planet's orbit. He'd have to be on the far side to make the jump judging by what the nav computer was giving him. He heard the cockpit door open behind him. Rieva placed her hand on the back of his pilot's chair, and looked out the transparisteel window as he fed the engines a little more power to get them around Toseng's gravity well. "Ever hear about the Lethe Mines before this?" Rieva asked from behind him. "Nope. Not before Dawson mentioned it to me." Savage replied. It would be a minute or two before he reached the hyperspace translation point. "The story goes that it started out as a Sith outpost way back in the day. There was some splinter group in the system searching for ancient artifacts. They even had a whole fortress somewhere out there at one point. The Jedi put an end to it of course, but a lot of their infrastructure remained." Rieva said as she leaned on his pilot's seat. Savage only had the faintest idea who the Sith were. Best he could tell, they were some sort of space wizards like the Jedi were supposed to be. "Then just before the Clone Wars the Genarius Mining collective stumbled on it, and realized a lot of the asteroids in the area had valuable mineral compositions, and decided to add on to the old outpost. They even attached other asteroids to it to mine them without having to set up separate structures. At its height it housed over two hundred miners, and their families. Then… nothing." Rieva continued. "What do you mean nothing?" Crix asked skeptically. He had taken out one of the ear buds he had been listening to his glimmik music with. Savage thanked the force he wasn't blasting it over the entire ship again. "Thats just the thing, no one knows. Overnight everyone disappeared, and the mining colony went dark. The Mining Collective went to send out a rep to check of course, but the Clone Wars were popping off. Then with the system declaring itself independent, and getting drug into the conflict, the station kind of just got forgotten." Rieva explained. Stars moved slowly in the distance outside the cockpit as Savage brought the lumbering bulk freighter around the planet of Toseng. They were getting closer to their translation point now, and he let the momentum of the ship coast within the planet's orbital gravity. He wondered why no one had gone back to this colony since the Clone Wars. "No one tried to go back there after the war?" Savage asked. "No, pirates took over. The Cularin system has a lot of gravity anomalies in it, so pilots have to drop out of hyperspace before the asteroid belt, and fly in under sublight. It was easier to just fly through, and micro jump to the planet they wanted to go to. Of course, the belt became a prime hideout for pirates who wanted to prey on that anomaly. The empire cleared that up a while back of course. Now that the empire is otherwise engaged though there's no one to stop some freelancers from having a look around." Rieva said as he stopped leaning on his chair and stretched. Savage brought the ship out of orbit, and began flying her out of the planet's gravity well. The asteroid belt sounded like a smugglers dream for getting in and out of system. No wonder the Empire had maintained a presence even after driving out the pirates. He punched in the hyperspace coordinates. "Best part is Tannis already shot us a message back. The place looks pristine, almost as if it was just abandoned yesterday." Rieva said as she looked out the cockpit transparisteel at the stars. "He find out why they ditched the place?" Savage asked as he lined up the ship with their course. "Nope. Guess we'll find out ourselves." Rieva said cheerfully as the ship translated into hyperspace. Chapter 2 Denial The starlines faded, and the ship dropped into realspace. They had arrived in the Cularin system. Savage had spent the trip familiarizing himself with the ship. It was a fairly basic design thankfully. Not much more than a series of cargo bays, some ship cabins, a mess area, and the cockpit. True to their word, Savage found that the ship did have some half-decent armaments on it. He had notified the crew before dropping out, and everyone was crowding the cockpit to get a look at the asteroid belt which was now a thin line in the distance. The belt was massive judging by the long range scanners. It was several hundred kilometers thick even at its thinnest, and it stretched around the entire system. The comms chimed almost instantly upon dropping out into realspace. "That must be Tannis." Dawson said as he leaned over to hit the comms button. Savage bit back a retort about who was flying the ship. He didn't like people touching his control panel while he was flying. A holo image of a human male popped up on the console. "Glad you made it," Tannis began "Tannis! Hows it looking out there?" Dawson asked. "I'm probably deep in these tunnels firing up the old backup generators so I've left the coordinates attached to—" Tannis was saying. "Oh for the love of… its a kriffing recording." Dawson said angrily even as the nav computer binged with the received coordinates.Not the safest idea, setting up automatic coordinate transmission like this. I wonder if it was set to this ship's transponder? Hope it wasn't just for any ship that dropped out. Savage mused inwardly. "If I don't have the power back on yet you'll have to dock manually. There's a few docking airlocks that ought to fit standard bulk freighter bays. Thank the Force this place didn't rely on magcons. Anyway, see you when you get here. You're gonna love it." Tannis' message finished. "He knew when we'd be getting here. I mean kriff, we're right on schedule. And, here he goes leaving us a message." Dawson muttered to himself. Savage began flying Charon towards the specified area. As the asteroid field grew larger in the viewport he saw he'd have plenty of room to maneuver between the massive asteroids. "It looks like it'll be about ten minutes." Savage said as he glanced at the scanners that had pinged the location for him. "Let's get ready then." Dawson said as he walked out of the cockpit. "Ooo, I'm so excited." Rieva chimed in as they made their way to the cargo bay with Tonor. Then Savage noticed that something else was also chiming on his control panel. "Hold up. Something's wrong," Savage said as he read the readout. Dawson turned around in the hatchway, one arm grabbing the upper lip to keep his balance as Savage maneuvered the ship into the asteroid field. "What do you mean?" He asked. "There's a distress beacon coming from those same coordinates. It's got to be coming from the mining colony itself," Savage said as he double checked the beacon location. No doubt about it, the signal was coming from the colony. "Is it Tannis?" Rieva asked, concerned. "No, if it was Tannis the distress call would be coming from his personal ship. We'd see the transponder," Tonor said to calm her. "That doesn't make any sense," Dawson said. "Tannis wouldn't leave us a message, and also fire up a distress beacon." They all looked pensively through the cockpit viewport into the darkness of the asteroid field. Savage had kicked on the running lights which splayed out over the huge pockmarked surfaces of the asteroids he was navigating around. "Could be Tannis got the power running, and the beacon lit up on its own. Some sort of short circuit in the system. I mean this place hasn't been running since the Clone Wars after all," Crix said. Being the engineer of the group his words seemed to calm them. "That would make sense. I mean, Tannis would have mentioned when he first contacted us if there was a distress beacon out here," Tonor said once again trying to reassure them. "I'm gonna have words with him once we find him," Dawson growled before turning around to make preparations in the cargo bay. Tonor went with him, followed by Rieva after she cast one last concerned glance out the viewport to the dark asteroids about them. The bulk freighter passed among the asteroids as it made its way towards the abandoned mining colony. The ship glided in the void as Savage found the easiest route for the massive freighter. He kept an eye on his scanners the entire time, but so far no other ships had appeared. It seemed that they were entirely alone out here in the darkness. "Hey Savage, there's something I've been meaning to ask you," Crix asked from the co-pilots seat. "Shoot," Savage said after a moment. He didn't mind Crix, even if the man had strange taste in music. "Why'd you join the rebellion?" Crix asked. Then, when Savage gave him a side-eyed look he continued, "You don't really seem the type. I mean, did you just join for the thrill of the fight or…?" "Revenge I suppose," Savage said after a few moments of reflection. He remembered when the Imperials had laid a trap for him and his old crewmates. "The Empire killed everyone I knew. I was a… well, let's say I was a high risk trader. The Imps caught us by surprise, and took down the ship. I was the only survivor of all of it. If it weren't for a Rebel patrol happening by, I don't think I would have made it out alive." "Dank farrik. So you joined because they saved you?" Crix asked. "It was a bit of that, but if I'm being honest I just had nowhere to go. The Talon was my home. I couldn't even tell you where my homeworld is, but that ship and my crewmates were all I really had. Once it was all gone, I suppose I just latched on to the Rebellion," Savage said as he absentmindedly pulled back the left sleeve covering his arm to reveal his old pirate tattoo. It was three black slash marks as if the skin was ripped by a claw, in honor of the ship. Crix was silent, and Savage continued, "That's not why I stayed though. I could've jumped ship a few times and no one would have been the wiser. No, I stayed for revenge. Every Imperial bastard I kill is one for my old mates." "I can understand that. I lost some family on Toseng during the fighting there," Crix said. "You thinking about joining up? Or just staying on as a contractor?" Savage asked. "Well if this goes well I'll have the breathing room to figure that out won't I?" Crix joked, and Savage laughed. He couldn't blame the engineer for not wanting the soldier's life. "You good here?" Crix asked as he gestured at the controls. "Yup, you can join the others. I'll comm over when we're about to dock," Savage responded. Rather than get up though, Crix was messing with his datapad again. After a few moments he heard more glimmik music being played throughout the ship at the same obnoxious volume as before. Crix smiled, and hopped out of the co-pilot's seat to go join the rest of the crew in the cargo bay. "Turn that noise off," Dawson said over the comms a minute or so later. "Can't. I don't know how the feth he even got it playing over the speakers in the first place," Savage responded. Truth was, he really didn't know. He could override all the onboard comms if he felt like it, but a little music never hurt anyone. Plus, he was alone in the cockpit now. After some time they finally reached the mining colony, and Savage maneuvered the ship for the final approach. As he rounded the last large asteroid he could see the Lethe Mine in all its glory far in the distance floating amid a clearing in the asteroid field. The mining colony was a patchwork of asteroids connected by gantries and walkways, as well as large metal tubes which Savage assumed transported raw ore back and forth. On the largest asteroid he could see a blocky complex built on the surface. It was multi-storied and looked to cover the majority of the main asteroid's surface. He could only assume the entire thing was riddled with tunnels and compartments. As he flew closer he could see smaller structures on some of the attached asteroids. As well as airlocks here and there spread about with no apparent rhyme or reason. "We're making our final approach. Prepare to dock," Savage said over the comms to everyone waiting in the cargo bay. Flying in close he could see a shuttle of some sort already docked in one of the airlocks at what appeared to be the main hangar. Without one of the others there to confirm, he could only assume it was Tannis' personal ship. He brought Charoni> alongside one of the bulk airlocks, and began the docking sequence. The automatic locking mechanisms reached out, and clasped onto the mining colony's airlock and the ship came to rest with a dull thud that landed on beat with the glimmik music that was still playing throughout the ship. Looking at his cargo bay camera the airlock bay door was beginning to open, which meant that Tannis had succeeded in getting the emergency power generators running again. Fingers crossed that's what set off the distress signal, Savage thought. He saw the crew disembark into the mining colony, and began to shut down the ship. He left it running at a low idle in case they needed a quick exit though. Something about the place spooked him. Not to mention that until they found the distress beacon and shut it off it could be picked up by anyone else that might be out here, and he wasn't totally convinced there weren't any pirates in these parts. He unbuckled his safety harness, and stopped by his crew cabin before joining the others. He had brought a flight bag with a few changes of clothes and a handful of necessities. Like his FWG-5 Flechette pistol and his standard issue DH-17 blaster pistol the Alliance had issued him. He buckled on his leg holster for the blaster, and stuffed the flechette pistol in his belt. He already had his vibroknife sheathed on the back of his belt, but he rummaged to the bottom of his flight bag until he found his other vibro-weapon. Back in his pirating days he'd always liked to have a bit more than just his blasters for boarding actions, and this job had a similar feel to it. He found the handle and pulled out a vibro-machete he'd bought down on Toseng before they left. It was a standard agricultural model, but it would do the job should he need it. There shouldn't be any issues with a simple salvage mission, but he preferred to be safe rather than sorry. His boarding gear in place, he made his way to the cargo bay and threw on a thick nerf-hide jacket. No telling how cold it was going to be on this rock. He seriously doubted the heaters were fired up yet. Walking down the cargo bay ramp through the big industrial airlock he found the crew setting up work lights in the hangar bay, and setting out some crates with equipment in a rough staging area. The emergency power must only run certain systems, he thought to himself as he surveyed the dark hangar bay. Dawson saw him, and waved him over. "Welcome to Lethe," Rieva said with a grand gesture at their surroundings as Savage walked down to them. "You'll want a pair of these," Dawsonn said, reaching into a small crate and producing what looked to be night vision goggles. "Where did you get these?" Savage asked as he took the proffered tech. Sure enough, it had the Alliance stamp on the side. "I may or may not have sweet talked the girl in charge of inventory back aboard the Vigilant," Tonor said as he walked over. Falleen were known for their ability to influence most humanoid races after all. "You sly dog," Rieva said as she tried on a pair. "Just as well, take flashlights with you too. Just in case. Looks like most this place is still dark. Only the vital areas are going to be lit up. Grab a communicator too," Dawson said motioning to a case set next to him where he already had some handheld comms set out. Savage took a flashlight before walking over to help Crix set up the last of the work lights. Soon enough the hangar bay was well lit, and they could see how wide it was. It had certainly been used for industrial operations. There were old loader droids on the far side as well as random bits of machinery and equipment stacked aside. The floor was quite dirty, and scuffed from years of ore hauling across its surface. Looking up, Savage noticed the ceiling was the raw stone of the asteroid. "Tannis, come in," Tonor called over the communicator. "Tannis, do you hear me?" "He know what channel we're on?" Savage asked. "He should. We set this up in advance. He knew to have his communicator on so we could tell him when we arrived if he wasn't at the hangar. It was a contingency plan," Tonor explained. He was clearly getting frustrated with his tardy companion. "Well that's just great, he was supposed to have a map ready for us by now. Hey Crix, you want to set up the work lights in the hallways while we go in looking for Tannis?" Dawson asked. Savage noticed he had armed himself as well. Looking at the others, most had a sidearm of some kind on them. He wondered if this place put them on edge as well. "Sure. I'll start stringing them up the main hallway there," he said gesturing towards the open bay doors across the hangar. "Alright, let's go find Tannis," Tonor said as he made for the far end of the hangar. The others followed suit. Savage stood for a moment, but decided he was all in. He might as well go exploring with the rest of them. As they entered into the darkness of the hallway beyond the hangar the darkness enveloped them, and they were forced to don their night vision equipment. His vision took on a ghastly green glow as he looked about by aid of the goggles. The walls here were durasteel plated, and large bundles of cables lined the ceiling running deeper into the mining colony. The hallway curved slightly as they walked down it as it spiraled gently inwards towards the center of the asteroid. "What are we looking for exactly?" Rieva asked as they walked down the dark corridor into the bowels of the facility. "Well, the emergency power ought to have brought back the critical function of the facility so we need to find the control center. There's bound to be one here somewhere, keep an eye out for any signs on the walls. Or anything Tannis may have left behind for us," Dawson said. Savage scanned the walls as they walked. They occasionally passed closed doorways to unmarked side passages, or ones whose markings had faded to nothing. There was a lot of what looked to be safety information posted at intervals. At some point he noticed graffiti was becoming more and more commonplace, though he couldn't make it out. Some sort of stylized Aurebesh. "Got something," Tonor said from the other side of the hallway. There was a branching hallway that led off into the gloom. Savage could see the Falleen leaning over brushing dirt off of some letters on the wall that pointed off down the junction. "It says, ‘Foreman's Center' and points down this way. The way we're going reads, ‘Processing Plant'." "Well, the Foreman's Center sounds to be more in the right direction than the processing plant does," Dawson said and started down the side corridor. Savage looked down the hallway they had been following towards the processing plant. He thought he could make out another cross junction just farther ahead, but it was hard to tell with the goggles. They followed the corridor down a short distance until they reached a ‘Y' junction and yet again followed the writing on the walls. There was definitely more graffiti here, and Savage wondered why the miners would have bothered spray painting the walls this way. Eventually they reached a large sealed durasteel door at the end of the corridor they had been following. "This has got to be it. Just got to get in now," Dawson said while trying the access panel which clearly hadn't been brought back online like the airlock mechanisms. Savage walked closer to the door. There were strange markings on it, but the night vision goggles messed with his depth perception. He reached out a hand and realized the markings were grooved. It looked almost like something had slashed and gouged the metal on the door. There was also a large streak of some sort of paint that went down one side. His gaze followed the streak, and he saw that it ran down the door, and along the edge of the corridor. He had figured it was just more rust when they had walked up, but now he wasn't so sure. "Kriffin' good luck we're having. Tonor, you want to run back and get me something to open these doors with?" Dawson asked as he pulled at the centerline of the sliding hatch in the doorway to no avail. Tonor nodded, and began walking back the way they came to get something that would give them leverage. No doubt they had brought plenty of equipment for this sort of eventuality. "Something's not right about this," Savage said as he took a step back from the slash marks in the doorway, and began examining the rest of their surroundings in more detail. He noticed discarded bottles on the sides of the corridor as well. Maybe the miners had drinking problems? "What do you mean? Not getting spooked are you?" Dawson teased him as he leaned back against a durasteel plated wall for Tonor to get back with the tool he needed. The latter could still be seen at the edge of the field of view their goggles afforded them. Savage wondered if the man realized the gouges in the hatch weren't just more random graffiti. "No. Take off the goggles for a second, I'm going to shine some light," Savage said. "Dawson began to object, but Savage already had his goggles off and pulled out the flashlight he had grabbed earlier. For a moment absolute darkness engulfed him. He wondered how long it had been since light was last spilled in these empty corridors. He waited a second or two in the black to give Dawson and Rieva time, and he turned on his flashlight pointed at the door. "Oh, feth," Rieva said from behind them. "What in the Force did that?" In the stark light the depth of the gouges that had been hidden by the night vision became apparent. "Malfunctioning loader droid maybe? The forklift arms could have dug deep like that. Wild accidents happen in mines like these," Dawson said, unperturbed. "Might even have something to do with why these doors are jammed shut. Look next to it. That brown streak going down it is probably hydraulic fluid or something. No telling what happened." Savage looked closer as Rieva also turned on her flashlight. He brushed a finger along the brownish streak on the wall. It came away in flakes if he rubbed it. It certainly wasn't paint of any kind, and it wasn't oily enough to be hydraulic fluid, or anything else from a droid. He rubbed his fingers under his nose. It had a scent to it that was deeply familiar to him. Something in his subconscious was triggering alarm bells that his mind hadn't caught up with yet. "Uh-huh, and that droid then climbed up the wall into the ceiling." Rieva said. Savage noticed she was pointing her flashlight farther back behind them following where the brown streak had run along the corridor. About halfway down it abruptly went up the wall into a large crevasse in the ceiling big enough to fit a person through. "Maybe it fell out of there in the first place. That could lead to another level," Dawson said. "If stress fractures like these were opening up along the infrastructure it might explain why the mine was abandoned so quickly. "Think Tannis could have fallen down through a crack in the floor or something?" Savage asked. He wasn't convinced, but it would explain their missing scout. Crumbling mines certainly had a history of swallowing the unwary. Savage walked underneath the crevasse, and shined his light up into it. Something about that was bothering him too. "Got a pair of hydraulic jaws, coming back in," Tonor called over the comms which played simultaneously on all of their handhelds, and echoed down the corridor. The edges of the crevasse didn't look naturally formed to Savage. The more he looked the more he was certain that it looked excavated somehow. Dug out, even, or maybe ‘burrowed' was the right word. He could hear Rieva and Dawson chatting about something down by the closed hatch. The darkness beyond the reach of his flashlight seemed endless. He felt his palm rest on top of his blaster. He hadn't realized he had reached for it. "Why you all have your night vision off?" Tonor asked as he walked up while taking off his own night vision goggles. He had a large piece of equipment on a grav sled with him. Savage was momentarily disoriented. He could have sworn that Falleen had just called over comms. How long was I staring into that hole in the ceiling? He asked himself. No one else seemed to notice though so he simply walked up with Tonor. "Damn, something did a number on that thing," Tonor said as he wrestled the hydraulic jaws in place onto the centerline of the hatches. Savage lent him a hand in wedging it into the seam. "Crix getting the lighting up?" Dawson asked. "Yah, he's halfway down the first corridor before the junction. I told him to take the first left," Tonor replied as he finished getting the jaws in place. "That ought to do it, fire it up." Savage took a step back as Dawson turned on the hydraulic jaws, and began applying them to the doorway. A large spike shot out into the seam, wedging itself between them, and the claws bit into the durasteel. He rested his hand on the butt of his blaster again, just in case. With a loud screeching noise the doors began to part open from the middle. Light spilled out from the inside. "Well it's a good thing we took off the goggles. That would have blinded us." Rieva said as the doors opened wider to reveal the control room beyond. As the jaws reached their full extension Dawson killed the machine, and pulled it out and to the side. They all filed into the room together to see what they could find in the Foreman's center. The site they were greeted with made little sense to them, and the smell was worse. "Ugh, what is that stench?" Rieva asked as she stepped through the now opened hatchway. Inside the control center amid the blinking displays and screens there was trash everywhere. Littered papers and detritus as if someone had been living in the place for some time. Some of the screens were cracked like they had been bashed in, while others looked to be on standby. In the center of it all farther back in the room amid a screen bank was the dead body of a Sullustan splayed back in a large chair with a bottle to one side of him, and a blaster pistol on the other resting on the floor. "Poor bastard shot himself," Dawson said as he walked up to the dead body. "I thought this place was abandoned?" Tonor asked no one in particular. Suddenly Savage remembered why the smell of that odd residue streaking the corridor was familiar to him. It was blood, dried blood. In his career as a pirate he had found that most sentient species bled similarly. And, though there were some differences, they smelled similar too. "This man's been dead no longer than a month it looks like," Savage said as he walked up to the grisly scene. "I'd bet the station was still abandoned by the time your man got here." "And how would you know how long this guy's been dead?" Dawson asked. "You brought me on for my experience didn't you?" Savage asked with an appraising eye. He realized he might look somewhat intimidating at that moment with his hand still resting on his gun, and his horned visage casting shadows in the emergency lighting. "For your piloting experience!" Dawson exclaimed in slight confusion. Savage regarded him from across the corpse. Did these guys seriously recruit me because I was the only pilot hanging around the hangar? He was beginning to have less faith in this salvaging venture, but he simply shrugged in response and tried to figure out what to do next. "Is that what I think it is?" Rieva asked from behind them. She pointed at the desk below the screen bank where a slowly blinking red light could be seen. "Well that answers one question. Looks like this guy was the one to trigger the distress beacon," Dawson said as he walked over to the desk to inspect it. "We should probably turn this off, don't you think?" "Well, let's get this body out of here first. We can't get much work done on any of these control panels with this place reeking like it does," Savage said, looking down at the corpse in between him and Dawson. The Sullustan looked to have blown the right side of his face clean off. "Tonor, give me a hand? We can drag it down the hallway at least, maybe space it out an airlock later." Tonor grimaced at the prospect, but walked over to give him a hand. Savage grabbed the corpse by the arms, and Tonor lifted by the legs. Together they managed to carry the corpse out of the Foreman's Center, and onto the grav sled that Tonor had brought in the hydraulic jaws on. "I'll get it," Tonor said with a wrinkled nose. "You sure?" Savage asked. With a nod Tonor donned his night vision goggles and began pulling the grav sled into the blackness of the hallway beyond. Savage turned back to the others to inspect the room. Aside from the trash and other signs of recent inhabitation it didn't look too bad. The equipment seemed to be in fairly good shape at least. There was a loud beeping sound as Dawson managed to shut off the distress beacon. "What was he doing out here I wonder? How did he die?" Rieva asked no one in particular. "Well there's a massive hole in his head so…" Savage responded. "No kriff," Rieva said with a deadpan look directed at Savage. ‘What I mean is, why did he do it? He had an emergency beacon lit, he had food and water, he couldn't have just waited for someone to show up?" Savage pondered her question. As he looked around some more, there was indeed more food and drink lying about. He saw some cargo crates lining the far wall as well and decided to investigate. "Maybe the power went out on him, and he couldn't take the waiting," Dawson said as he attempted to fire up systems on the monitor display. "He could just walk down to the emergency backups and turn them on though. Doesn't make any sense. Also, you'd think Tannis would have found this by now, and told us about it," Rieva said, even more confused about the situation now. "Doesn't make any difference to us why he did it. We came here expecting to find an abandoned mining station, and that's exactly what we found. That guy may have occupied it a month ago, but it's up for grabs now regardless," Savage said as he kneeled down and fiddled a lock set on one of the cargo crates. He wondered why a lone man would bother locking anything in here. It wasn't like someone would sneak up on him and take anything. The station was abandoned after all. "That's a bit cold don't you think?" Rieva asked, putting a hand on her hip indignantly. Dawson regarded him from across the room. Savage shrugged. He pulled out his vibro-machete and gave the lock a good slash. There was a brief splash of sparks and the lock fell to the ground. Savage opened the crate, and let out a low whistle. "What is it?" Dawson asked. Savage stood up and moved aside so the others could see. Rieve and Dawson walked up and were equally dumbstruck. Inside were piles of credits neatly stacked, as well as random jewels, crystals, precious metals, jewelry, and other valuables. Savage could make out Imperial Credits, Calamari Flan, Druggats, and even some Old Republic Credits. "Now why would a lone Sullustan be sitting on a small fortune in an abandoned mining colony this far out in space?" Savage asked no one in particular. "We found something in the Foreman's Center, you guys have got to see this for yourselves," Dawson said over comms, the excitement evident in his voice. "And why would he shoot himself if he had all this?" Rieva asked as well while staring down at the amassed wealth. "What'd you find?" Tonor asked as he walked into the center. He'd apparently already been on the way back from dragging the body out of smelling distance. "Force be damned, but that's a score!" he exclaimed as his eyes focused on the newly discovered prize. "I'll be over in a minute. Almost done with stringing the work lights up to the first junction," Crix called over the comms. "I say we space the corpse and load this up first with the grav sled," Tonor said as they all stared down at the wealth. "No objections here," Dawson replied. Rieva and Savage both nodded. Tonor left the room to bring back the grav sled and Savage tried to piece things together. The mining station was definitely abandoned, and had been so for a while, yet here they found a single dead Sullustan sitting on a small fortune. He hadn't been alone though, all that blood in the hallway means there were others with him at some point. Savage walked over to the chair they had found the Sullustan in, and picked up the blaster off the floor while Dawson and Rieva excitedly counted the money they had found. It was a disruptor blaster pistol of some sort. An illegal weapon pretty much anywhere in the galaxy. He must have set it to low before he shot himself so he didn't have a painful disintegration. Save knew from experience only hardened criminals tended to carry weapons like these. Pieces were beginning to fall together in a pattern that was familiar to him. "Are there any other hangar bays on this rock you think?" Savage asked the other two. "I'm pretty sure, I mean there's definitely other airlocks. The bay we landed in is the one for offloading ore I think. It's likely there's a bay for personnel that's a bit smaller. Why?" Dawson replied. "I'm wondering if that Sullustan left a ship behind," Savage said. "If he had a ship he'd have flown out of here with all this cash." Dawson chuckled. Before Savage could respond Tonor walked briskly into the room with a vaguely concerned expression on his face. Savage noticed the Falleen's hand was resting on his sidearm. "So, the body is missing," Tonor said. "What? You just pulled it out there," Rieva said as she stood up from beside the crate where she was counting the credits. "You sure it's missing?" Dawson asked. "It's an empty damn grav sled in the middle of an empty damn hallway. Yes I'm sure it's missing," Tonor said, clearly aggravated. Dawson put his hands up placatingly. "Wasn't saying you're wrong. I just don't see how it could go anywhere. Dead bodies don't just get up and walk." "Unless we're not alone," Savage said. "This place is abandoned! Tannis said so on his first transmission. Everything was off when he got here, and he had to go fire up the backup power generators. There's no one else here," Rieva said. "Just come look for yourself," Tonor said and stalked out of the room. After a moment Dawson followed. Leaving Savage, and Rieva in the room to try and figure things out. "None of this is making any sense," Rieva said as she leaned back against a console. "Unless that Sullustan was a pirate. Think about it, there's all that cash for one. Two, this sector used to be a hotspot for pirate activity anyway. Three, he was carrying a disruptor. No one can even find those unless they have black market connections," Savage said as he motioned towards the crate full of credits against the wall. "No, there hasn't been any pirate activity here in ages," Rieve said, shaking her head. "It would explain all that blood in the hallway, and the damage this door took," Savage replied. "What blood?" Rieva asked. "You really think that huge streak in the hall was from a malfunctioning droid? That's blood. If I had to guess there must have been a mutiny, and someone tried to bust their way in here to get the cash and ended up dying in the process," Savage postulated. "Tannis checked this place out. He'd have told us back when we were planning all of this out if there were pirates. Plus, there would be reports," Rieva countered. "Not if they left no survivors," Savage said simply. That was when the screaming began. Chapter 3 Anger Savage and Rieva ran out into the corridor to see what was going on. He fumbled on his night vision goggles, and pulled out his blaster as he ran ahead. They heard someone screaming at the top of their lungs as well as overlapping cursing coming their way. Savage reached the junction first and was momentarily shocked by the sight so that he initially didn't react. At first all he saw was Dawson and Tonor sprinting at them from the end of the hallway screaming at them to run. The end of the hallway was blindingly bright under the night vision, and Savage realized that Crix must have strung the work lights all the way up to the first junction. Out of the intense light he saw Crix come flying at him, well part of Crix. The lower half was missing. "What are you doing, run!" Dawson yelled at Savage and Rieva who were standing at the junction trying to see what was going on. That's when Savage saw it. A huge creature was running up directly behind Dawson, and it was gaining. Being at the edge of what his night vision could pick up, and with the background light flare from the work lights interfering, Savage could vaguely see two massive claws and a large head of some sort reaching for Dawson. He had a quick impression of something dangling out of the teeth of the creature, two long somethings that bent at the middle and flapped as the creature pursued its next victim. That quick impression was all Savage needed, because he began firing on instinct. Blaster bolts flew down the hallway at the creature, briefly lighting up the corridor with each round. Still the creature gained on Dawson and Tonor. Savage was vaguely aware of Rieva screaming something next to him. He kept firing, but the light from his blaster bolts were causing the night vision to flare and he couldn't tell if he was hitting anything. Suddenly the creature caught up to Dawson. In the blink of an eye a massive, muscled tail terminating in large bonelike spikes whipped out and impaled Dawson at the waist. He screamed a wordless cry as he was pinned up against the durasteel wall of the hallway. Before Savage knew it Tonor was directly in front of him, and he didn't have a clear shot at whatever in the Force that thing was that just impaled Dawson, and ripped Crix in half. Tonor was screaming, "Run, leave him!" Savage paused, but was quickly shoved aside as Tonor barreled past down the side hallway at the junction they were standing in. Rieva ran with him, still screaming in horror. Then the creature roared over Dawson's screams of pain, and Savage heard a sickening crunch. Dawson's screams had stopped. Savage didn't want to look back, so he ran after Rieva and Tonor into the darkness of the side hallway. He could see them ahead of him running in a blind panic. He realized that he may be panicking too, and tried to think. Where the feth are we running to anyway? We haven't been down this way yet. We passed up this junction to go to the Foreman's Center. The mental image of Dawson getting impaled on the durasteel wall assailed his mind, and he pushed the thought aside. Any direction was better than that way. Tonor was outrunning Rieva who was looking over her shoulder to see if she was being chased. They came to a three-way split in the hallway, and Savage saw Tonor run left. Rieva didn't see him though and kept running straight full sprint, no doubt assuming he was still ahead of her. "Rieva, left! Go left!" Savage called out, but she didn't hear him. Oh kriff, she's panicking! Savage thought. He had a choice. He could follow Tonor, follow Rieva, or take his chances and take the third hallway in the junction. Following Tonor would have been the smart choice, he at least had a gun. He reached the junction that had split off just seconds before. "Tonor!" He called, but the corridor he had run down looked to be curved slightly downwards. Savage couldn't even see him. There was no time to waste standing there however, he knew that thing wasn't that far behind him. He made a snap decision, and ran dead ahead to catch up to Rieva who he could still see a little ways ahead. He resisted the urge to look behind him as he sprinted ahead. The hallways made a sharp turn to his left, but he didn't want to call out to Rieva again in case that creature was already on their tail wondering which hallways they had gone down. So he ran in silence willing himself to keep up with the younger human. I really should have kept up with the PT, he thought ruefully as he felt his lungs beginning to burn. He swore he could feel the malevolence of the creature bearing down on the back of his neck. It was everything he could do to keep his eyes pointed forward, and his mouth shut. At length the durasteel plates on the walls vanished and were replaced by rough hewn stone. Their footsteps began to clank as the durasteel plated floor became durasteel grate raised over the rocky ground of the asteroid. This isn't good. How far does this sound travel? He willed himself faster to catch up to the human. It took the last of energy, but he finally managed to make a burst of speed and reach out to grab her by the shoulder. She immediately began to yelp, but Savage put a gloved hand over her mouth. "We're running over grating, that damn thing will hear us. We need to slow down and figure something out," He whispered to her as he removed his hand. They were both breathing hard. She didn't respond at first, and Savage couldn't read her expression past the night vision goggles that took up half her face. He looked around. Up ahead there was a set of doors inset into the wall. He motioned for her to follow, and walked as quickly as he could without making too much noise. He hit the controls, and the doors opened before them. The doors must be a part of the emergency systems the backup generators brought online. They found themselves in a room full of lockers. There were old work uniforms and safety equipment lying around. Many of the locker doors were rusted shut, and the ceiling of the room was rough stone. The doors shut behind them, and Savage felt a small amount of relief that they were no longer in the open. "What in the force was that thing?" Rieva whispered shakily. She was holding herself, and staring at the doors as if the creature was going to burst through them at any moment. "Feth if I know. I could have swore I shot that damn thing," Savage whispered back as he recalled the brief encounter in the hallway. There was no way of telling if he had hit it with the way the goggles flared at the light from the blaster bolts. "How are we going to get out of here? That thing is between us and the ship," Rieva said, her voice no longer a whisper. Savage put a finger to his lips to remind her. This schutta is going to get me killed. He thought, before he dismissed the thought as intrusive. "Well we can wait here, and risk going back the way we came once we think the coast is clear or we can go deeper in and hope we get lucky," he mused. "I'm not going back out there," Rieva whispered as she stepped back, and began looking around the room. By which Savage assumed she meant back the way they had come. They certainly couldn't stay where they were. "Let's see what's in here first. Maybe we can find an exit out a different hallway than the one we ran down." Savage whispered, trying to calm her down. He could see her outlined in the green glow the goggles gave everything in his field of view as she frantically looked around the room. I knew I should have followed Tonor. They walked down the rows of lockers, Savage with his blaster drawn. There didn't seem to be anything useful in the lockers themselves unfortunately, though he kept his eyes open for anything Rieva could possibly use as a weapon. He had his flechette launcher as a backup weapon of course, but it was a single shot weapon, and he was loath to hand his blaster over to Rieva. He didn't really trust her to know how to use it in the first place. He took great care not to accidentally kick anything or bump into any rusty locker doors that might squeal on their hinges. They walked through a threshold into what looked to be a ready room of some sort. It was wide, and square, and the walls were lined with benches. Coats, gloves, and helmets hung sporadically on hooks along the wall. At the end of the room was a cage door that went to a platform of some sort. "That looks like a lift," Savage whispered as he pointed towards the platform. They walked over and he noticed the shaft below it only went down. Rieva noticed too, and began glancing behind her as if deciding if she wanted to run back out into the hallway. "Our only option is to go deeper in." She nodded and they pulled back the cage door which folded back on itself with a horrifying screech of rusted metal. They both froze for a moment, and looked at each other before hurrying onto the platform. Savage silently prayed to the forest gods of his homeworld that the power was working here. He pressed the button with a down arrow on it, and the lift whirred to life. He breathed a sigh of relief. He knew consciously that the screech of the gate opening couldn't have been that loud, and that it probably only sounded like that because he'd been in silence. But, the irrational part of his mind had jumped in fear that they might bring that creature down on them. The lift descended slowly, and Savage wondered how he was going to kill the thing. He had his blaster, his flechette launcher, and two vibro-weapons. Worse came to worse, he could attempt to chop off the thing's head. He briefly recalled how large the creature's claws had been through the haze of the light flare. That thing must have been at least three meters tall. It was nearly touching the ceiling, he reflected as he recalled the carnage just a few minutes prior in his mind's eye. They reached the first level below, and Savage looked out into a corridor of rough hewn stone.This must be the mining portion. How far down should we go? He wondered to himself. "That's the mine," Rieva whispered, mirroring his own thoughts. "I wish I knew which tunnel went back to the ship. Even open void would be better than going back up there." Something she said triggered Savage's thoughts. He remembered during the approach seeing multiple airlocks in the surrounding asteroids. If they could get to one, and find some void suits they might have a chance at crossing the asteroid's surface back to the ship! "Dank farrik, Rieva you're right," he whispered slightly louder than he'd intended. She looked over at him, in what he assumed was confusion given that he could only see half her face, so he explained himself more fully. "I saw some airlocks on the other asteroids when we flew in. If we can get to one we might be able to cross back to the ship from the outside." He hadn't thought it was possible for someone to visibly pale when looked at under night vision, but Rieva was proving him wrong. "I've never space-walked before." She whispered with a tremble. Oh you have got to be kriffing…" He cut off his own thoughts before he began growing angry with her. He reminded himself that she was still somewhat panicked. "Theres nothing to it," he said instead, in what he hoped was a comforting tone. "You just suit up and stick close to the surface. If you drift off there's air nozzles to bring you back." The lift dropped to a second level below, and clanged to the rocky floor. Both Savage and Rieva flinched. Thankfully the safety cage door was already folded back so they didn't have to worry about that. Savage stepped off first with his blaster leveled in front of him. Before him there were three separate mining corridors of rough hewn stone. It was anyone's guess which way to go. "I wonder if Tonor is still alive," Rieva whispered, musing aloud. "If he is, let's hope we get back to the ship before he does," Savage whispered as he picked a corridor, and began walking as silently as he could. "What do you mean? Don't we all need to get off this Force-forsaken rock?" Rieva whispered back angrily. Savage noticed she was getting louder. "Lets put it this way. If he outruns that creature, and gets back to the ship. You think he's going to wait for us?" Savage asked in a whisper. "Well let's just call him on the comms," Rieva whispered back matter of factly. Savage paused. He had forgotten about the comms. If Tonor called them at the wrong time, he could get them both killed. He reached over and turned down the volume as quickly as he could once he realized the danger. "What are you doing?" She whispered as he fumbled with the comm controls. "Turning the volume all the way down. What if he calls us and that fething beast is nearby? We'll be dead," Savage whispered to her. He briefly reflected on what he said. That creature really is a beast isn't it? "But, we have to see if he's alive," She whispered back. "Not if it gets him killed. What if he's hiding? You'd give him away instantly," Savage whispered in what he hoped was a reasonable tone. It didn't look to have the effect he was hoping for. "Oh so now you're worried about him, and let's say we do get to the ship first. What do you want to do, just leave Tonor!?" Rieva said angrily. "Keep your damn voice down. Look, when we get back to the ship we can just bar the airlock and wait for him." Savage said in response to her question, but inwardly thought, We'll burn that bridge when we get to it. They moved on in silence after that. Savage could tell Rieva was upset, but he had no desire to debate her on the issue while they were out in the open like this. I wonder if Tonor really would hang around and wait for us if he got back to the ship first? Savage wondered, trying to give the man the benefit of the doubt. The night vision goggles displayed shadows in odd ways along the rough hewn stone walls as they walked. His eyes constantly darted from one shape to the next as the baser parts of his mind looked for anything dangerous. No, he was running faster than a scorched mynock last we saw him, and he left us without a second thought. No way is he going to stick around if he makes it back to the ship first. He paused for a moment as he thought he heard something, but he decided his mind was playing tricks on him and continued on. Then theres all that cash we left in the Foreman's Center. If he gets there first theres no way he's going to wait for us just so he can split it three ways. No, we definitely have to get there first. Savage decided. There was a marking on the wall, he realised. It appeared to be red paint, but something seemed off about it. Savage brushed his fingers against it, and felt its texture. Blood. Definitely more blood, he realized. The real question was whether to mention it to the girl. She was probably freaked out enough already. "What is that?" Rieva asked in a low voice. "No idea," He replied. He didn't really know despite his first thought so it wasn't technically a lie. It looked to be a single letter in a language he had never seen before. "Maybe a symbol of some sort?" They'd been walking down the stone tunnel in the general direction he hoped was towards the back end of the mining colony for some time, until they had stumbled upon a durasteel hallway linking into the mining system. The strange symbol was the first thing they had seen since leaving the stony corridors of the mine. "Maybe it's a sign that we're getting out of the mine. It feels good to be back in a normal hallway at least," Savage didn't agree with her logic, but he did agree it was nice to be standing on durasteel again. The stone walls had an oppressiveness about them. Perhaps their naturalness seemed more wild to him, and his mind conjured the Beast lurking within their confines at home in the underground. He wondered idly how much battery life was in their night vision headsets, but pushed the thought away. It was best not to know the answer to that. The hallway came to an open blast door that emptied them into a rather large room that looked to be a lounge area of some sort. Savage immediately tried the controls on the door and gave a sigh of relief as the blast doors began grinding shut. They were momentarily safe. The blast doors shut with a soft clang and Savage placed one of the flashlights they had brought on a table, and took off his goggles before turning on the light which he had pointed at the ceiling. It was good to see natural light again. Well, maybe not natural but at least it wasn't a shade of green like he'd been seeing with the night vision. Rieva took off her goggles as well, and they looked about the room they found themselves in. The room was in shambles with empty bottles spilled all about a smattering of tables, and there was what appeared to be a liquor bar in one corner of the room. Along one wall there were wanted posters taped up. One of which had a handful of knives stuck into it as well as knives on the floor below it where someone had clearly used it for throwing practice. Or multiple people had, for that matter. Savage walked over to the bar to see if there was anything left in it, and to his surprise he found a half full bottle of Corellian brandy underneath. He placed it on the bar top and immediately set about finding two serviceable glasses. "What are you doing?" Rieva asked softly from across the room. "What does it look like?" Savage asked as he found two mismatching glasses on a nearby table. He noted there was no dust on them as he brought them back to the bar top where he began pouring brandy. "You finally find someplace safe from that thing out there and your first reaction is to start drinking?" Rieva continued her tone shifting from incredulous to angry. "Damn straight," Savage retorted as he looked her in the eye, and downed a shot of brandy. "Frankly, I don't know how you aren't drinking after seeing that osik," he replied as he gestured vaguely above them to the higher levels of the colony. Rieva stood there a moment, but no rebuttal came to her, and so she walked over and grabbed the other glass. They clinked them together before downing the rough brandy. It might have been Corellian, but it wasn't the top shelf Corellian. "What kind of place is this?" She asked as she nodded her chin towards a wall covered in blaster scorches. "Doesn't look like a place miners would be hanging out. I mean, they were operating equipment weren't they? Why have a full bar this close to the mines?" Savage pondered for a moment as he gazed at the wall covered in wanted posters. There was something tugging at his mind about it. "I don't think this place was used by the miners." He set down his glass and walked over to the wall and looked at the posters. They didn't look old, in fact, they looked fairly recent. Then he saw a familiar face on the wall, and he pulled down the poster and brought it over to the bar. "Look familiar?" He asked Rieva who was looking over into the corner of the room where it looked like there was a Sabacc table and a deck of cards. "Isn't that the dead guy we found?" Reiva asked as he held up the poster. On it was a Sullustan with a moderate bounty, and he was wanted for piracy. "To be honest, I'm not an expert in telling Sullustans apart, and the one we found was missing a good chunk of his face. But, I'd wager my share of the profits that's our man," Savage said as he took back the poster she was holding. Not that I'll be seeing any profits, he thought ruefully. "Hell, I'd bet this whole mining colony was a pirate base not that long ago." "You'd know about that wouldn't you?" Rieva stated more than asked as she walked over to the Sabacc table, drink in hand. "You hired me for my experience, remember?" Savage answered, not quite willing to reveal more than necessary even now. He took out his blaster and checked the charge. He also thought he knew what happened to that crew of pirates. "Hey, look at this," Rieva said suddenly. She was holding a small holodeck that she had found on the table and activated. Savage walked over, and took a look at the small holopic displayed. It showed a group of rough-looking beings on a hangar deck of some sort. All were armed to the teeth, and most were grinning, though some were too busy drinking to pose for the moment. But in the center of the group standing next to a Zabrak that had an arm thrown over its neck affectionately was another familiar face. It was the Beast. Well not necessarily the Beast. It was much smaller for one, and had a collar and chain around its neck. Savage had no idea what it was, but from the brief glimpse he got of the creature that had killed half their salvage team it looked strikingly similar. "Well I'll be damned," Savage said. "That's what it is. It's a roggwart! I didn't recognize it back there but you can tell by the tail. Look!" Rieva said excitedly as they looked at the holopic. "A what?" Savage asked her. "A roggwart. They're an apex predator on their homeworld. I saw one on a newsfeed once. Some crimelord had one as a pet, and when he got busted it was all over the holonet," Rieva explained. "Well whatever it is, it doesn't look like it stayed a pet for long." "You don't think…?" Rieva let the question hang in the air unanswered, and Savage unconsciously placed his hand on the grip of his blaster as he looked at the holopic. "Guess it got bigger than they were ready for. Damn thing must have killed them all once it came of age." Their scrutiny of the holopic was interrupted by a whisper of noise from their handheld comms. "Tonor!" Rieva said excitedly and held her comms up to her ear. Savage did the same, they both still had the volume turned all the way down, and he tentatively turned it up some to what he hoped was still a safe volume. "Is anyone there?" Tonor's voice whispered over the comms a second time. "We read you," Rieva whispered back, mindful that her friend might be in hiding as well. "Thank the Force. I was worried you were dead. Where are you?" "Me and the pilot are in some sort of break room two levels down outside of a mine entrance. Where are you? And have you seen that creature?" Savage made a further study of the room while they talked. There were two other blast doors on the far side, and he wondered where they led. He walked along the walls hoping to find a fallen map of some sort that might elucidate matters. "Not in a while. I think it chased me at first, but I was able to lose it. I went up a level. I found a maintenance bay with some loaders in them that had a working blast door. There's a lift in here though that goes down a few levels it looks like." "We were thinking about crossing to one of the other asteroids locked on here and finding an airlock where we could space walk back to the ship. Do you think you could do the same?" Savage looked back at her from where he stood near the far door. She still didn't realize that the first person to get to the ship was going to be the only one to leave. She had just made it a race between them, and Tonor. There was no way the Falleen would hang around and wait for them to escape as well. Not with that beast hunting them. "Can't say it's the best idea, but it beats wandering back the way we came," Tonor responded. "How should we call you if we find an airlock?" There was a pause for a moment, and then, "Just tap on the mic, if I tap back twice it's safe to talk. If I tap once, I'm not somewhere safe. I'll do the same for you." "Great, it sounds like a plan. We're going to get out of this." "Never doubted it, Rieva. Tonor, out," Tonor responded. Rieva was smiling now, some hope having been restored. Savage pitied her, but didn't want to stifle her hope. She was going to need it if they were going to survive. "Which way do we go?" Rieva asked as she walked over to the two doors Savage was standing by. "One way is as good as any when you don't know where you're going," Savage said as he walked over and hit the controls for both doors. The blast doors slid open, blessedly silently. One led into a durasteel hallway that angled downwards below them, and the other went on for a way and looked to lead to stairs going up. "I think we should go down. Last time we saw that beast it was on an upper level," Rieva said. Savage shrugged in agreement, and walked back to get his flashlight that was still on the table. "Time for the night vision again," he said as he clicked off the light, and plunged them into darkness. *** They walked in silence for some time going down the dark corridor. He didn't know when he had done it, but at some point he realized he was holding his blaster in his hand. The weight was comforting, and he found that he didn't want to re-holster the weapon. The gloom was all pervading, and he found himself wishing that they would come across some emergency lighting brought up by the generators. They had little idea of where they were going, except that they were continuing in the same vague direction. They occasionally took turns at junctures that they figured would keep them going in the same direction if the tunnel or hallway they were following seemed to be meandering off. It was apparent though that they were lost. "We're never going to find an airlock," Rieva murmured eventually as they walked out into the floor level of a large cavern. The ceiling of which was shrouded in darkness to them as it was beyond the reach of their goggles. There seemed to be mining equipment at the edges of it, and it looked like it used to be a main quarry when the mine was still active. Savage could see darker holes along the edges where it looked like multiple tunnels branched off at different levels. I wonder if that means we're at the lowest level of this place? "We'll find it eventually. It looks like we're at the bottom level of the mine, we just have to pick one of these tunnels," he whispered back. "Pick one!" Rieva whispered back fiercely. "Theres probably twenty of them up there. How are we supposed to know where they all go?" She's getting louder again. Dank farrik, but she's going to get us killed. He looked around the edge of the cavern they were in. There were two other tunnels on the floor level with him. On directly in front, and one on their right just past a large piece of mining equipment strewn with conveyor belts. Farther up he could see what appeared to be a double wide corridor with stone ramps leading up to it. "Look up there," he whispered while pointing. "That looks like a main corridor, it probably goes back to the processing plant we saw a sign for when we first came in. That means we should take one of these tunnels on the opposite side of this place." "You're just guessing!" We don't even know how far back the processing plant was!" Rieva whispered back slightly louder this time. "It's better than giving in to panic. We have to go somewhere," Savage bit back, annoyed at the human woman. "We'll be going around in circles! If the processing plant is that way then this is a main mining pit. All the tunnels probably come here. We'll just end up looping back right here." Savage was silent for a moment. The girl was probably right about that at least, and something about that realization bothered him. "You think most of the tunnels lead here?" He asked quietly. "Look at all the equipment!" Rieva said in not quite a whisper. "They could only bring this stuff down here if they were using main tunnels. They've clearly done more digging here than anywhere else. Where the hell else would all the tunnels go, except maybe back where we came from!" "Osik," Savage said as his fears finally crystalized in his mind. ‘We have to go. Now." He began moving towards the tunnel to their right across the rubble strewn floor of the cavern. "What, you're just going to pick a random tunnel, and expect me to follow? Who elected you leader of this outfit. We hired you after all," Rieva said angrily in a low voice. "Don't you realize what you just said? Dank farrik, woman, if all the tunnels lead here what the hell else do you think might be following them here?" Savage whispered back angrily. He felt very exposed in the open all of a sudden. Rieva stopped talking, and if Savage had to guess he would say her eyes were wide with fear as she picked up on his implications. Maybe she'll quiet down now before that roggwart hears her, he thought to himself. "Tonor?" Rieva asked in a low voice. "Oh, for feth's sake," Savage whispered angrily. There was a noise on a level above them as some rocks fell down Savage dropped to the ground next to a pile of rubble and leveled his blaster up towards where the rocks had tumbled. Rieva took out her comm and tapped the mic, still in the open, apparently hoping it was Tonor that had knocked down the rocks. Savage scanned the ledges above them, but could see nothing in the darkness. He turned down his comms as he slowly edged backwards towards the large piece of equipment he'd seen. Rieva tapped the mic on her comms once again after she received no reply from her crewmate. There was a scraping noise off to their left, closer to them from where the rocks had fallen. Savage had a very bad feeling about what it could mean. Still, Rieva stood in the middle trying to contact her friend. Slowly, so very slowly, Savage placed one foot behind the other and pulled out his vibroknife in his free hand and held it in a reverse grip as he rested the blaster over his forearm. He scarcely dared to whisper, "Rieva, we have to go." "Tonor could be here! If all these tunnels connect he might come through this spot. We have to wait for him." She spoke quietly, but it was still far too loud. On the ledge above her, two levels up Savage saw a shadow move in the darkness. Without thinking he squeezed the trigger and sent a blaster bolt flying at it, and the cavern was split by the concussive blast of his DH-17. Rieva screamed, and above her where a chunk of stone was blasted away next to its face, the Beast bellowed. The sound of its roar within the echoing cavern drowned out both Rieva's screams and the blasts of Savage's side arm as he continued to pour shots at the roggwart. His goggles were whiting out at the light from his bolts, but he didn't care. The Beast was running full force down the edge of the cavern towards them, no more than forty meters away. In between shots, as his night vision goggles struggled to cope, he caught glimpses of the large black roggwart bounding towards them. It leaped over the first ledge, and Savage shot below it in an attempt to lead it. He saw it again after the light adjusted as it crouched to sprint down a scree slope towards the ledge just above them. He caught a glimpse of a chain flapping off its neck attached to a large spiked collar of some sort. He got his first good look at the roggwart in that split second between his shots. It was bipedal and hunched forwards in an almost birdlike manner so that its leathery body was leaning lower towards the ground. There were two long arms curled up at its sides that were tipped in long curving claws. It had a sinuous muscular tail that thrashed behind it, which was tipped with three long bone spikes in a trident like pattern. Its large blocky head jutted forward from its body and Savage saw two rows of massive teeth in a mouth that nearly wrapped both sides of the thing's face. Atop its head were two huge horns. He had never seen anything like it before. He aimed for its center. Then something hit him, and he fell to the ground, nearly knocking his vibroknife out of his hand. Rieva was running past him at a panicked sprint towards the tunnel at the far end of the cavern floor, and had bowled him over in her attempt to escape. Savage twisted in the air, and hit his face hard on the stone rubble he had been crouching behind. There was a cracking noise as the night vision goggles shattered, glass lens against the stone leaving him in total darkness. He felt, more than heard, a huge thud as the beast leapt down to their level. He could hear its guttural breath as it sprinted for its prey, and he instinctively rolled his back towards the rubble in an attempt to hide. He didn't need to hide, however, because the Beast wasn't after him. Rieva was still running away screaming into the darkness, and the roggwart chased down its prey without a second thought. Savage could hear the gravel crunch underfoot as it chased Rieva, and he wasted no time. He remembered the other tunnel off to his right next to the equipment. All he had to do was find the equipment, and he could find the tunnel. He began scrambling on the rough hewn stone floor, not trusting himself to stand up and run. He kept his blaster out in front of him, and tried to move as quietly yet quickly as he could. His heart was pounding, and Rieva's screams continued. He could hear a slight echo to them now and knew she was inside the far tunnel running for her life. Suddenly, in the darkness his blaster barrel struck the metal of the machinery with a faint tink. The Beast bellowed from across the cavern floor, and Savage's heart leapt into his throat with the irrational thought that the roggwart had heard him and was turning around. He forced himself to reach out with his other hand and stand up. He shuffled around the edge of the machinery feeling its sides as he went. Rieva's screams were turning to sobs in the distance, and still onward Savage felt along the machine's surface in the pitch darkness. Pain exploded on his forehead as he struck something protruding off the machinery, and he ducked down before continuing on. His heart was beating a mile a minute now as the pain mixed with the fear of being caught by the Beast, but Rieva was still running. He felt a moment of guilt as he continued down the edge of the machine, but shoved it down. She left me, not the other way around. Now where is the damned tunnel? He was wracked with indecision on how far to go in the darkness before leaving the side of the mining equipment and making a blind run to where he hoped the tunnel might be. Rieva's screaming went up a pitch and then, abruptly, was silenced. That was enough for Savage. On the edge of panic he ran with one hand stretched out in front him. He ran for what seemed like a small eternity, not knowing exactly when he would reach the stone wall of the cavern floor. After a few seconds he began to wonder if the distance was greater than he remembered, but then stone brushed the side of his hand and he tripped over a loose rock. He nearly fell, but was able to right himself, and began trotting down the wall he felt. His hand brushed against it in the darkness, and he prayed he wasn't about to run face first into anything. He held his blaster out in his left hand in front of him, and groped along at a trot like a blind man with a death wish. How far until the tunnel? He was growing scared now. Scared that he had missed the tunnel entirely, and was actually going down the edge of the cavern floor towards the tunnel the Beast had gone down. Indecision gripped him and he slowed his pace. He didn't know if he should turn around and look for the tunnel entrance behind him or continue on hoping he found the entrance before the Beast found him. Or worse, if he found a tunnel entrance, and went into the very tunnel where the roggwart was, even now, eating the remains of Rieva. Fear and indecision were giving rise to panic, and Savage forcefully pushed the thoughts aside. He would have to take a risk there in the abandoned black depths of Lethe Mines. Abandoned by hope, he chose light. There was a click as he turned on his flashlight. Relief flooded through him as he saw a stone corridor stretch before him slightly curving to the right. He turned off the light and continued trotting as he felt his way along in the darkness. I must have ran directly into the tunnel's mouth until I brushed against its wall, he realized. The question now was where to go. He didn't have an answer to that, but he knew he had to continue on. The Beast was just around the bend behind him in a neighboring mining tunnel enjoying its freshly caught meal. Savage hoped the thing choked on her, and saved him the trouble. To Be Continued… Copyright © 1995 - 2025 Renegade Wing