~Adrift from Abafar~

[Kirpo]

~Adrift from Abafar~​

Leaning against the healing hut, Kirpo stared up at the ever orange sky. Every day the same. Every hour the same. Always, the sky was the same. He could not imagine what a blue sky would look like, or what the sun would be like moving through the sky, that darkness would envelope the land just like his bunk space. One day….

Kirpo did not need the metal man to tell him that Shaman Trippet was dead. He could feel it. The loss, the emptiness that had appeared where he used to lie deep in Kirpo’s chest. He knew what this meant.

His master had kept him around much longer than he had originally promised Shaman Trippet. Perhaps he had grown to pity the old man as he broke down under miner’s labor, or perhaps he had too much heart to kill and eat a child in front of his father figure. Whatever it was, Master had let Kirpo grow to adulthood and his dark eyes had only grown hungrier and hungrier as the wokling grew. Sometimes, Master would stare at Kirpo as he ate his gruel, as if wishing he were devouring Kirpo’s juicy flesh instead.

He had always known he’d be on the menu one day. The question was just when.

As if on cue, Master came striding out of the drinking hut, wiping his hands on the messy apron tied around his bulging belly. The swallow man was odd to look at, almost entirely skin and bone, except for his protruding tummy, swollen like a dead corpse in the heat. He said nothing as he stomped through the sand, ducking his head into the healing hut and barking something at the metal man before popping out, hands on hips, as he stared down at Kirpo.

“Tak Trippet dah dah semerdee. Bury im gad. No wallalin, hear?” Kirpo nodded his head, grunting his understanding. Shaman Trippet could speak like Master, but he spoke his home tongue to Kirpo, and Kirpo only knew some words here and there. Enough to understand he was being given permission to bury Shaman Trippet.

Suppressing a groan, he pushed himself off the wall and entered the healing hut. Metal Man had powered down in a corner, connected to a blinking light, and Shaman Trippet laid with his eyes closed, arms slack on his sides. He had never shaved his fur like Kirpo had, the long locks pale as the sand, and covered in it too. Where Kirpo wore his head gear to protect from sand pelting in the wind, Shaman Trippet wore a leather hood with beautiful blue feathers sticking out. Leaning against the bed beside him, was a stick, the only piece of Endor Kirpo had ever known.

Gently, Kirpo placed the staff in Shaman Trippet’s chest and pulled his hands up to grasp it. Like a doll, Shaman Trippet obeyed, all life entirely gone. He had lived a long life, a hard one, but ultimately he had died a good death, passing peacefully of old age.

Kirpo braced his legs, sliding his arms under Shaman Trippet’s corpse and hoisting him up and cradling him with all the tenderness one might cradle a wokling. With his age, Shaman Trippet had lost much weight, he felt so small in Kirpo’s arms, and yet the weight of his legacy and loss weighed heavily on Kirpo’s heart.

The moment they were outside, the wind picked up, whistling across the landscape in a high pitched tone. Without thinking, Kirpo began to sing in a low harmony, every step harder and harder, the sound escaping from his chest growing and growing. By the time they reached the field of the dead, it had shattered into an all out wail.

He had been so ensnared by his emotions, he had shut his eyes, suddenly walking straight into a wall of metal. The balance off-set was enough to send Kirpo crashing backwards into the sand. He clutched Shaman Trippet tightly so he wouldn’t go tumbling.

Clenching his abs, Kirpo pulled himself up, slowly pushing up off his knees to stand again, blinking at the metal wall. It was dirty, needing a good scrub down, and seemed to have been patched up over and over again, many chunks of metal melded together in patches. The Ewok looked around, searching for the owner, noise twitching to see if he could sniff them out. The closest person was over in the drinking hut where music blasted out into the Void. Curiosity got the best of him.

Waddling as quickly as his feet would allow, Kirpo scuttled up a ramp into the square hut. Bright lights blinked up by a window overseeing the mining village. Kirpo cocked his head, laying Shaman Trippet carefully down onto a bench just in front of and to the left of the ramp. Quickly, quickly, sniffing around for danger, he approached the lights, seeing switches and buttons. Shaman Trippet knew many buttons. He had pressed them to control the metal strider. But Shaman Trippet was gone.

Shaman Trippet… had his life force gone back to Endor, back to his tree?

Kirpo looked back at the man’s neutral features. What if it hadn’t? Did he need to be buried by the tree? What would happen if Kirp buried him here? Would he be stuck in the sand forever, doomed to never see a blue sky again, never know his tree?

“No.” Kirpo barked out, determined. There was no one around, this was a metal strider, he was sure. He would use it to go to Endor. Surely they could make it there. Flipping one switch, Kirpo waited, listening for a reaction. He heard a low hum but no movement. Frowning, he flicked more, pressing buttons, smashing his fingers against the sudden array of blinking lights, the metal hut began to rumble, the ramp rising up and the whole hut tilting forward just enough for Shaman Trippet’s staff to go rolling away.

Kirpo lurched towards it, grasping it and awkwardly stumbling back to Shaman Trippet’s still blank face as the metal hut rumbled and rumbled. Outside he saw only orange sky. A deafening roar filled his ears, the only smell left his and Shaman Trippet’s, and a twinge of Junker.

Panic snuck in. Where to go? What to do? Normally Shaman Trippet would step in at this point. Or Master would come stomping over and smack him in the back of the head before putting everything back together. But he was alone. The metal hut was roaring and shaking and rumbling as if a herd of Void Striders were stampeding the village.

Kirpo launched himself at the ramp, pounding on it with his fists. No response. Heart thumping in his chest, he waddled as fast as he could back to the buttons and the switches and the flashing lights. Trying to remember what all he had hit, he wanted to go backward, but all he got was a metal woman belting out nonsense in another tongue.

“Stop. Stop. Stop. Stop. Stop!” He pounded on the shelf of switches, and just as suddenly as it had all begun, it settled. The metal hut quieted, the orange sky disappeared, and the window was filled with the most beautiful thing Kirpo had ever seen.

Black. True blackness. Dotted with little specks of lights.

Stars.

 

[Mlow Eman'outther]

The Annihilator starfigher came screaming out of hyperspace, blinking from beyond the edge of the system before rattling back into realspace. The vessel was a relic from a time long past, the original One-Sith having crafted the series of starfighters and the shakes that rolled through it’s frame once it settled back into reality told it’s age. Surplus worked when you had barely enough credits to get food in your stomach each nights end. Life on the edge of the Rim had been harsh, darting between here and there in the Unknown Regions and the edges of the Core, never daring to reach too close to any centralized Galactic government, least they send a pack of would be bounty hunters or law abiding officers to bring him in. His existence was a sin itself in much of the Galaxy, though times were changing.

The New Imperial Order opened a wound across the northern sections of Sith-Imperial space, they proved a point to Mlow with every last incursion into Sith space, that they were failable, that they could be defeated and put to the sword. He heard news, drifting in from port towns and musty bars, murmured by lowlifes and spacers. Kyber Dark they called it. A culling of the Sith within New Imperial space, slowly inching it’s way across the borders of Sith Space.

Zambrano Regime or not, he wouldn’t live to see the artifacts of his people, his creed, fall into the hands of marauders and pillagers. No matter how much he agreed with the sentiment of the New Imperial Order’s policy, breaking the state of the Sith Empire seemed an impossibility to the man. He had lived that life, he had served in their armies, heard their propaganda. He knew how far the claws of the Sith Empire reached, how deep the state had corrupted the minds of each and every last soul within their territories.

Though, the Imperials march onwards.

And against all odds, here he came, his vessel booming into Sith-Imperial space once again. Right along the border with the New Imperial Order. He supposed that he expected more of a military presence, though with how things had been with the passing months, Sith assets were bound to be concentrated in more important sections of the border.

Abafar was a stop of necessity. The fuel gauges in the Annihilator begged for him to stop at a fueling port. He could only hope that Pons Ora held something. Or else, it looked as if he would be stuck in the Void doing odd jobs for the locals. Leaning back in his seat, he let his eyes dance across the surface of the world if just for a moment. The spiced drink he held, something that went down burning and harsh, being taken in dreadful swallows. He long forgot the name of the brew that he picked up at his last stop, but it kept him warm, full, and was close enough to a friend to keep his mind off of things for the moment.

It’s painfully quiet.

He sat up slightly in the cockpit of the starfighter as it idled. He turned his head back and forth across the viewport, waiting, wondering. Something was off, something wasn’t quite right. Not immediate danger… but something else.

<“Legionnaire-34601, power down your vessel and submit to custody.”> Came the transmission, filling up his entire vessel with an emotionless, nearly tired voice.

The Sith finding him? Something he expected. Them knowing it was him? Not something he had planned on.

He could just make out the outlines of three starfighters creeping closer and closer over the horizon of the planet, the sunbeams playing off of their platework. His computer registered them as Caedus-class fighters. Military models. Though anything past that was classified. His hands went to the controls of the starfighter as his engine kicked back to life.

“Don’t think so. Turn your vessels around and I won’t smoke you.” He spoke in return, rather arrogant for himself.

The first burst of well-deserved blaster fire slammed into the brunt face of the Annihilator, sending the shields into a frenzy before Mlow threw the controls into a roll, screaming forward through the void. His drink was dropped from his hand and allowed to skitter onto the floor of the cockpit.

Pulling down on the triggers of his joysticks, bolts screamed from the front of his starfighter and slammed into the furthest left of the Sith-Imperial line as he moved to pass the squadron. The first onslaught bounding against the shielding of the vessel before a scant few of the bolts slammed home into the plate metal. Bursts of light coming from the back of the starfighters as the began to chase after Mlow. Red streaks streaming through the empty space around Mlow’s fighter as he shifted and alternated his speed. He wasn’t a good pilot by any measure, but with the conflict with the New Imperial Order, he figured this had to have been the backlog of proper pilots the Sith Empire had to actually offer. By all accounts he should have been blown out of the air by now, sent screaming into a million pieces into the planets surface. He was amazed his starfighter even allowed him to fire, he hadn’t had to test that as of yet in his ownership. The feedback the blaster cannon gave was poor, with little feedback that the weapons had actually fired.

He did get the ship for a bargain.

He kept his starfighter pointed at the planet as he descended, faster and faster, with the Sith in hot pursuit. The burns of reentry burning on the front of his starfighter at breakneck pace, the starfighters in dead sprints to keep up with one another. He wasn’t given time to register the breaking of the atmosphere and his arrival to the sky of the desolate planet. Only greeted with rapidly approaching white sands as the starfighters rained blaster fire into the ground. Giving texture and purpose to the blank landscape. He came down hard, pulling the controls up at the last second, the nose of the fighting nearly scraping against the floor. One of the zealou pilots, who had been dead set on keeping a close trail on Mlow, failed to have as quick reaction times as the Kudon pilot did. Slamming into the sand at such fast speeds it may as well had been stone, reducing his vessel to a crumpled mess of explosions and flames as the chase screamed past the scene.

The starfighter rocked hard, again and again as the starfighters rapid fire bursts slammed home again and again. Breaking through shields and bursting off paneling and armor. If they kept this pace up there would be a risk of them bursting Mlow’s engines. Not something he was willing to gamble on.

Thus he began to climb again, throttling his speed as he fought against gravity. The Sith keeping their pace behind him. Again to the sky they went, defying the heaven’s as they broke the atmosphere as nearly quickly as they had entered it. Mlow pulled the thrust back as far as he could and sent the starfighter into a spin just as they made it over the edge. Keeping his backwards projection as he came to face the approaching Sith starfighters. Another burst of blaster fire from the Annihilator as his viewport filled up with the very same from the Sith. Rending through their protections at this close and intimate range, popping both starfighters as if they were nothing.

In the grand scheme of things, he had wished they were open to talk.

The annihilator slowly rolled through the empty void of real space above the planet as Mlow allowed himself to relax. Taking in the sight of the stars as the ship danced between them.

“Gonna have to clean the spill…” He groaned to himself as he went about righting the ship with little adjustments, just enough to get it to stop rolling. To settle his vision.

And then it dawned on him.

Glancing at the fuel cells? He probably had just enough to suggest a direction for the vessel to limp to, not anything proper to an actual landing.

Was he really destined to crash the damned junker into the void…?

Reach out, search your surroundings, there is more to this field, Mlow.

And for a moment, he felt something. Passing, small, but there was another sign of life out here in the dark with him. Not too far outside of his skirmish zone, there was a small freighter that had seemingly just made it’s way to the outer portions of the planet’s hold as well.

Not much to do besides hail them, he supposed…

“Local comms broadcast, drifting here on fumes. Anyway you could lend a hand? Spare cell… maybe tow me back into port?”

Of course, this offer coming from someone that just dogfought some local Sith patrols would seem odd at most...

\\\

Kirpo

 

[Kirpo]

“Lahcel kumz bradcahts…”

Who was that? Kirpo whipped his head around, looking for the intruder, nose on high alert. Nothing, the sound coming from the same place as the metal woman’s voice. Yet it sounded nothing like her. It sounded real, alive, like one of the many creatures that had stumbled its way in and out of the drinking hut.

“Difteen here on foom…”

Kirpo stumbled to where the voice was coming from, sniffing again to see if he could scent the species, nothing. He glanced back at Shaman Trippet, at the black nothingness outside, at the big shelf of buttons he didn’t know how to use. “Help!” he shouted in Ewokese, waving his arms as if that could somehow bring the attention of this hidden voice to him.

“Enway you kud lend uh hand?”

Hand? Kirpo froze, drawing his arms back in, shoulders rising in defense. Hand what? The metal hut? The body? Did they think he had stolen this metal hut on purpose? He supposed… no! He had just been upset! He hadn’t been thinking! He would never steal a metal strider, never never. He was a good Ewok. He didn’t steal. Not once. Not ever.

“Spar cell…”

Cell!

This was it. The end. If Master had been unsure whether or not to eat him before, this had surely sealed his fate. Stealing a cell... he knew how precious they were, everybody wanted them. People complained about having to come to Abafar to get them. That’s why they lived in the Void in the first place, for cells, to make cells! Shaman Trippet had always said the Void was the most dreadful place to live, for any creature and only the cells were worth being there.

They were going to eat him. Probably beat him tender first and tie him up over the fire to roast alive. They were going to pick his toes off first and make necklaces with his teeth and serve his eyeballs in soup and sell his jerky to the Angry folk. All because he had wanted to take Shaman Trippet back to the trees. What had he been thinking?

“Why can’t you just be a good, Kirpo?” He bashed his fists into his head, a wailing building in his chest. Shaman Trippet was going to be trapped in the sand, and his hood would be turned into a purse, and his staff would be used as firewood, probably the same firewood they’d use to roast Kirpo. All because of Kirpo. Because Kirpo was a bad, bad, bad, Ewok!

“Maybe toe meh bek entuh por?”

Wait.

His hands dropped from his face.

That was a question. This invisible person wanted something. Kirpo glanced at the cells. This thing wanted a cell. One of his cells. He wanted to trade! Oh, yes! Kirpo loved to trade! In a fit of excitement he jumped for joy, but midleap the metal hut jolted forward, the scratchy woman’s voice back,

“Juk dudutded.”

The little Ewok fell hard on his back, spine cracking in distaste, unused to being flat in its proper form. Wondering if the spirits would ever give him a break, Kirpo rolled over onto his belly, pushing himself up one dreadful foot at a time. What had Shaman Trippet always said? “If you can’t avoid it, you must face it.”

Kirpo turned to face the next disaster. Up where the lights were flashing, he could see out the window that the stars were moving. A big ball of beige came into view. He didn’t need anyone to name it for him, that was the Void. Why had anyone decided to go there?

Was the metal hut taking them back?

Gingerly, Kirpo stumbled towards the window. No. Not quite. Something outside was getting closer, but all it appeared to be was a gray blob. Latching onto the levers that littered this front shelf, Kirpo hauled himself up, scrambling closer to the glass so he could press his face against. Eyeballs desperately trying to bring the blob into focus.

Yes, there was something there, something big and gray. Another metal hut? He couldn’t be sure. Yet, in it, Kirpo knew, was something alive. Had this been the invisible voice? Not invisible, just too far away to be seen? How could it yell so loud? How BIG was something that could yell that loud?

With a shriek, he hopped off the shelf of buttons and practically crawled back to Shaman Trippet, brain trying to move faster than his feet could carry him.

Big thing could eat him. Big thing wanted the cells. Big thing would take the cells AND eat him. No. NO. NO! They would not eat Shaman Trippet! He had to get Shaman Trippet back to Endor, back to his tree. He had too, he had too, he had too.

He would.

Determined, Kirpo took the stick from Shaman Trippet’s hands and straddled his legs best he could over his elder’s body. Whoever or whatever this big voice was, it’d have to go through him before it got to Shaman Trippet, and Kirpo could beat off a Void Strider as good as anyone.

“Dodeen” Metal woman announced flatly.

There was a sickening lurch followed by the scrape of metal. If it hadn’t been for Shaman Trippet’s stick, Kirpo would’ve been sent rolling across the floor, but as it was he wobbled but remained standing.

Bring it on, Big Voice, he thought to himself, knuckles straining from the force of his grip. He raised the staff up behind him. And waited.

 

[Mlow Eman'outther]

Mlow’s fingers were drumming on the edge of the cockpit dashboard as he watched the freighter in the distance rumble and shake. No response from the comms, but the lights were certainly on inside of the craft. Maybe it was an automated skiff of some sort, running fuel and whatever else may be important for the trade route between here and Force knows where else across the system. This was a desolate world, afterall, and Mlow found himself more and more curious about why there would be any form of civilization that even wished to set themselves up this far from the Galactic Core, or any other aspect of civilization.

Another world that the Sith subjugated and left to it’s own devices, he imagined. It fit with their concept of imperialism.

Then, the freighter started to move, it’s engines puffing along as it began to push through realspace in the direction of Mlow’s aging One Sith era fighter. He sighed a bit of relief as the fighter began to power down more and more with each passing second. A quick check, nervously so, of his helmet to assure that it was properly secured and locked to prevent depressurization. A flickering light, and a moment later, he was in pitch black darkness. Nothing besides the freighter eclipsing out the lights of the stars as it slowly worked it’s way to him.

“Looks like you’ve got an entry point on the bottom of your craft there. Link up, pressurize the lock, and I should be able to pop in. My fighter’s junked at this rate. Going to need to land to pop open the ass end and do whatever repa-” He was caught short, the fighter suddenly jerking under the persuasion of a tractor beam. Not a single comment coming from the freighter so far.

Calming himself, Mlow reached out, ever so curiously, into the Living Force. Breathing in deeply, slowly, letting the vastness of the Great Empty fill him.

There was panic, blind and uncontrolled before it was whipped into place. Determination? It was difficult to pin down the exact emotion. It was coming from a tiny heartbeat within the Living Force, just a pinprick, a sentient so small you could blink and miss it.

Loss. Overwhelming loss.

He figured, at the least, he could try to call out one more time on comms.

“If there’s anyone there, respond.”

\\ Kirpo

 

[Kirpo]

Nothing.

The voice came again, garbling utter nonsense, nothing of importance that Kirpo could make out anyway. But no monster had appeared. Slowly, Kirpo edged towards where the ramp had been, now just a smooth part of the floor.

“Hello?” He called out in the emptiness of the metal hut. It’s lights seemed to loom out in the distance, mimicking the emptiness outside, where the stars were. Kirpo quite liked the empty. But Shaman Trippet had always hated it, had always spoken of the fullness of the forest, of the never ending connections between one form of life and another. Shaman Trippet would not like to be left in the Void or any empty place by himself. And yet… “If you can’t avoid it, face it.” Big Voice would find him one way or another, Kirpo could feel it, could sense it out there, in the seemingly endless hut. Sooner or later they would find each other, but Kirpo was determined to find Big Voice first.

Pressing his back up as much as he could against the wall, Kirpo slowly scooted forward, staff drawn and ready to strike. He’d find Big Voice. He’d find him and… and… and beat his face in so hard he’d never remember Kirpo existed at all! Then he’d figure out how to drive this strider and go home. Finally, home, laying Shaman Trippet to rest under his tree...

No, no. Kirpo shook his head. Shaman Trippet wouldn’t want that. He didn’t know Big Voice. Maybe Big Voice was another Ewok with a loud horn? Maybe Big Voice could help Kirpo. Maybe Big Voice could help Kirpo return the metal hut and say he’d taken it!

OH NO! What if this was Big Voice’s hut?!

Before he knew it, his knees were trembling,

“I have to do this. I have to. I have to. To get Shaman Trippet home.”

A steady breath and he began to move again. Edging down the hall. Something caught in Kirpo’s nose. Something… ravenous. Fear tingled up Kirpo’s spine. He knew what Big Voice was. He had met his kind before in the drinking huts. They had big teeth and hungry eyes. A tongue that licked over their lips every time they caught sight of him.

“For Shaman Trippet. For Shaman Trippet. For Shaman Trippet…” he repeated over and over again as he creeped towards the smell. Towards the panic inducing sent that had entered the metal hut from some horrible back door.

He was close now. So close. Before his heart could fail him, he ran around the corner, catching sight of a metal triangle, before promptly falling flat on his face.