The shared tactical display no longer resembled a conventional battlefield map. It had become a web of signals spread across the rain-soaked ruins of Humbarine City, each point shifting independently while the same awareness followed them all. Aurek crossed the rooftops toward the next isolated anti-aircraft position. Besh held the maintenance tunnels while wounded
vode moved south through the passage beneath the avenue. Cresh guided the survivors from the depot complex along the industrial service lanes. Dorn followed the intermittent transponders still flickering deeper within the fog.
Rain fell in dense sheets beneath the eclipsed sky. Crimson lightning briefly turned the towers into black silhouettes before the miasma swallowed them again. Somewhere in the distance, something enormous moved between the buildings, its footfalls traveling through the pavement as low tremors that shook debris from fractured walls. The pressure hanging over Humbarine had deepened as well. It followed the wounded through the tunnels and alleys, visible in the tension of their movements and the way helmets turned too sharply toward sounds with no obvious source. They kept moving regardless.
Static flared across the Covenant channels before Watcher's voice cut through the interference.
AWACS Watcher
«Watcher to all units, the Fleet is clearing a corridor. Execute now!»
The message passed through every branch of Jericho's awareness at once. Aurek marked the active batteries across the northern rooftops. Besh recalculated the fastest route from the tunnels to the landing zone. Cresh shifted behind the exhausted recon team, placing himself between them and anything following through the depot. Dorn slowed within the miasma as the intermittent signals ahead of him separated into several distinct points.
Farther south, Gold remained above the withdrawal route as another dropship descended through the storm. Her broad wings adjusted constantly against the turbulent air while armored escorts guided the wounded toward the landing zone beneath her. The first six
vode Jericho had recovered from the southern intersection were already aboard a shuttle climbing toward the Fleet, including the two Gold had carried through the ruined district herself. Three more survivor pockets converged upon her position through separate routes: Besh's tunnel group, Cresh's depot team, and the Mandalorians Dorn had already directed away from the first transit station.
A second troop ship settled onto the ferrocrete as the first vanished between the towers. Gold turned toward the survivors still moving through the streets.
://: Next ship. Stay together and keep moving. We are almost there. :\\:
The scream of engines cut through the thunder overhead. Sith fighters emerged from the fog at low altitude and banked toward the descending ships, weapons beginning to track. Covenant starfighters and Basilisk war droids tore through the storm to meet them, filling the darkness with cannon fire and streaking concussion missiles. One hostile fighter slipped through the opening and angled toward the landing zone. Gold's cannons snapped upward and fired across its attack vector. The fighter rolled sharply away before it could acquire a clean firing solution, disappearing into the fog rather than risk another pass through the Basilisk's line of fire. Gold did not pursue. Another transport needed her protection more than the enemy fighter needed to die.
The artillery strike landed before the echoes of the dogfight had faded. The first impact turned the fog white beyond the landing zone. A second followed before the thunder of the first had finished rolling between the towers. Grounded Mandalorian vessels vanished from the tactical network one after another, their transponders collapsing into static as fire spread across the ferrocrete. Gold stared toward the burning silhouettes for less than a second before returning her attention to the surviving dropships. The ships still on the ground could not afford her grief.
://: Board quickly. There will be another ship. Keep the lane clear. :\\:
North of the landing zone, Aurek reached the next anti-aircraft emplacement as its targeting assembly rotated toward the lower flight lanes. The weapon had been built into the upper floor of a reinforced office tower, protected by armored shutters and overlapping firing angles that would have made a direct assault costly. Aurek never approached it directly. Thrusters flared briefly as he crossed the gap between rooftops, landed against the exterior wall beneath the platform, and climbed above the weapon's blind spot.
The M.I. Model 38 barked twice as Aurek cleared the upper level. The first burst dropped the gunner drawing a sidearm. The second drove the remaining crew away from the controls. Aurek crossed the platform without slowing, drew the DD-557 Droid Decimater, and fired into the exposed targeting system. Amber ion energy crawled through the connected machinery in jagged arcs. The weapon seized halfway through its rotation and sagged toward the street below as power failed across the emplacement.
The faint hum reached Aurek before he marked the battery as disabled. A probe droid hovered behind a fractured wall overlooking the rooftop, its camera eye peering through a split in the duracrete. Reflec blurred Aurek's outline against the rain and darkness, denying the machine's passive sensors anything clean enough to hold at range. It had drawn close enough to see what distant scans could not.
Aurek turned, raised the DD-557, and fired once. Amber energy struck the probe through its central chassis. Electricity crawled across its frame in branching arcs as it dropped from the air. He caught the disabled droid before it fell beyond the edge of the rooftop.
The coordinates had almost certainly been transmitted already. Aurek treated that as a certainty rather than a possibility. He tore open the probe's access panel and established a direct interface with its damaged processor. Security barriers collapsed beneath the intrusion as Jericho's interface suite tore through the local cache in seconds, extracting everything immediately useful before the machine's failing circuits could lock him out.
Fragments resolved across the shared tactical display: a completed transmission, the location of the compromised AA tower, a Legion detachment converging upon the coordinates, and a Sith Covenant gunship already descending through the storm. Additional scraps of data followed behind them — local map overlays, communications metadata, and partial records retained for later analysis once the evacuation no longer demanded his full attention.
Aurek discarded the inert chassis and moved before the response could arrive. Of course the collapsing batteries had drawn attention. They protected the evacuation route. Removing them had never been subtle work. That did not make the job unnecessary.
Engines rose above the thunder seconds later. A gunship descended through the storm, its armored silhouette briefly outlined by crimson lightning. A searchlight snapped on beneath the hull and swept across the rooftop while the rotary laser cannon spun into motion.
The gunship had found one Jericho.
That would have to be enough for it.
The first stream of plasma tore across the emplacement before the searchlight had fully settled. Aurek dropped beneath the edge of the rooftop, struck the exterior wall with both boots, and ignited his thrusters in a short burst that carried him through the shattered windows of the neighboring tower. Cannon fire followed him through the opening, carving a molten path across the abandoned offices and filling the darkness with burning debris. Aurek did not immediately return fire. The gunship had committed to the chase. Every second it spent hunting one reflec-painted Mandalorian through the towers was another second it was not firing upon the wounded or the troop ships descending toward the landing zone.
Beneath the avenue, Besh continued leading the wounded through the maintenance tunnels. One Mandalorian carried an injured
vod across his shoulders while another supported the third between them, boots splashing through shallow water running along the passage. The pressure in the air followed them underground. One of the wounded turned suddenly toward an empty branch of the tunnel with his rifle raised, breath coming too quickly through his helmet filters.
"Movement."
Besh watched the darkened passage through his thermal overlay. Nothing moved there.
"Stay with the group."
The Mandalorian held his aim for another second before lowering the rifle and continuing forward. Besh did not offer reassurance. The route ahead mattered more. His display showed several hostile signatures approaching from behind, erratic and fast. He waited until the wounded had cleared the next junction, then released a controlled shockwave into the weakened ceiling. Ferrocrete collapsed across the tunnel in a dense wall of debris, sealing the pursuing Imperials on the other side without threatening the withdrawal route ahead.
Cresh followed the depot survivors through the industrial district, moving parallel to the group through shadowed loading bays while his rifle remained trained upon the broken windows above them. The disabled war-walker lay twisted against the outer wall behind them, electricity still crawling across its chassis through the rain. The Mandalorians moved carefully but steadily, one supporting another beneath the arm while the third checked each corner before advancing.
They stopped at the end of the service lane. The boulevard ahead had been empty minutes earlier. It was not empty now. Civilians poured through the fog in scattered groups, some running without any clear destination and others turning upon anyone unfortunate enough to cross their path. Imperial soldiers fired into the crowd from a barricade farther down the street until figures in unfamiliar armor emerged behind them. Crescent markings showed clearly across their plates whenever crimson lightning flashed above the rooftops. The newcomers struck the Imperial position from the rear without slowing, carving through the defenders before spreading into the surrounding streets.
One of the depot survivors stared toward them.
"That route is gone."
Cresh marked the movement across the shared tactical display and shifted toward a narrower passage between the adjacent structures.
"Then we use another."
Dorn saw the aftermath of the same advance several blocks deeper within the city. The intermittent signals he had followed belonged to another group of Mandalorians trapped inside the remains of a transit terminal, but the street outside was littered with bodies. Imperial dead lay among civilians and armored Mandalorians alike. Some of the fallen
vode had been stripped of their plates, their
beskar'gam torn apart and scattered across the broken pavement while the crescent-marked attackers carried trophies deeper into the fog.
Dorn crouched beside one of the fallen long enough to retrieve the ironheart from the ruined chestplate. He secured it carefully against his armor, then raised the Model 38 and moved toward the terminal. The surviving Mandalorians had barricaded the main entrance with shattered benches and pieces of the collapsed security gate. Their transponders flickered weakly through the storm, close enough now for Dorn to resolve seven distinct signatures. Several were wounded. Two were no longer moving. Outside, the crescent-marked attackers searched methodically, closing around the terminal from multiple angles.
Dorn entered through the upper concourse and descended toward the survivors. One of the Mandalorians turned toward him with a rifle raised, then lowered it when his HUD confirmed the friendly signal.
"More of them outside. Too many to push through."
"Not for long."
The shared tactical display shifted. Four additional designations resolved across the network in rapid succession: Esk, Forn, Grek, and Herf. Somewhere within the miasma, four more identical silhouettes stepped into the rain. Nothing on the display identified their point of origin. Nothing distinguished one from another. The distinction did not matter.
Esk changed direction immediately, crossing the upper levels of the surrounding towers toward the gunship's engine noise. Forn moved toward the transit terminal from the neighboring rooftops, tracking the hostile formation gathering in the street below. Grek entered the industrial service lanes behind Cresh and took responsibility for guiding the depot survivors through the alternate route. Herf moved toward the Legion detachment Aurek had identified within the probe droid's local cache rather than away from it.
The gunship banked around the neighboring tower as Aurek emerged through a shattered office wall and crossed the next rooftop. Its searchlight found him again. The rotary cannon began turning toward the exposed silhouette.
Esk opened fire from another angle before it could settle. The shoulder-mounted cannon unfolded from his armor and launched a controlled blast into the gunship's flank. The impact struck armor rather than anything vital, but destruction was not the immediate objective. The vessel lurched away from Aurek and turned toward the new threat, its searchlight sweeping across the rain-soaked rooftops as the rotary cannon followed.
Esk had already moved.
Aurek reappeared behind the vessel as Esk vanished below the opposite roofline. The DD-557 barked twice. Amber ion bolts struck the gunship's rear quarter and sent jagged arcs of electricity crawling across the hull. The attack did not bring the vessel down, but it shuddered unevenly before recovering its course. Its rotary cannon began turning toward Aurek again.
Esk fired from another rooftop before the weapon could settle.
The two Jerichos shifted constantly through the surrounding towers, alternating angles and elevations whenever the gunship attempted to commit its weapons against either one. Neither remained exposed long enough to become an easy target. Neither chased the vessel beyond the district. Their purpose was not to destroy it at any cost. They kept it circling above the wrong rooftops, firing into empty offices and hunting reflec-painted silhouettes through the fog while the evacuation continued farther south.
Herf reached the route identified within the probe droid's local cache as the Legion detachment crossed the next intersection below him. The soldiers still moved with more discipline than the collapsing remnants of the Imperial garrison, but the city had already begun working against them. Their formation fractured as blaster fire erupted from a nearby checkpoint where maddened soldiers fought among themselves. Several troopers turned sharply toward movement within the fog. Others hesitated as shouted orders contradicted one another across their channels.
Herf did not give them time to recover. Reflec blurred his outline against the rain as he moved through the upper floors overlooking their route. The M.I. Model 38 fired in short, disciplined bursts from one shattered window and then another. The first shots removed the soldiers carrying the heaviest weapons. The next struck the officer trying to force the detachment back into formation. By the time the survivors returned fire, Herf had already crossed the ruined interior of the building and emerged from a different angle.
The Legion troops scattered into cover, dangerous but no longer coherent. Several pushed into an adjoining alley in an attempt to flank him and found the street already occupied by maddened Imperials firing at anything moving through the fog. Others continued toward the AA tower in smaller groups, only to discover that the Mandalorian they had been sent to kill was no longer there. Herf followed them through the rain, reducing the detachment one fractured piece at a time. He did not need to destroy every soldier. He only needed to keep them away from the withdrawal corridor.
Forn reached the edge of the roof overlooking the transit terminal and looked down upon the crescent-marked attackers closing around the survivors. His shoulder-mounted cannon unfolded from the reflec-painted armor and fired into the empty pavement ahead of their advance. The blast struck with a concussive crack, scattering the nearest formation and filling the street with shattered ferrocrete. Before the attackers could reorganize, smoke bombs fell among them and burst into dense clouds that merged with the existing fog. The street disappeared behind an opaque curtain.
Dorn opened the terminal doors from within.
"Move. Stay close and do not stop in the street."
The surviving
vode emerged in a tight group, carrying their wounded between them. Dorn led them into the smoke toward the service passage Grek had already marked as clear. Forn descended from the rooftop and remained near the rear of the formation with the Model 38 raised. Thermal signatures flickered through the fog as the crescent-marked attackers pushed through the smoke with unsettling speed. The first emerged close enough to reach for the wounded Mandalorian at the back of the group.
Forn fired at close range. The burst struck the attacker across the chest and drove it backward without immediately dropping it. A second figure appeared behind the first, then a third. Their armor carried the same crescent marking. Their movements were too coordinated to mistake for the cursed civilians tearing through the surrounding streets.
Dorn fired into the advancing figures while the wounded continued toward the service passage. The first attacker fell beneath the combined fire. Another crossed the distance too quickly and struck Forn hard enough to throw him sideways against the fractured wall of the terminal. Ferrocrete cracked beneath the impact. Forn regained his footing immediately and released a focused shockwave at close range, hurling the attacker backward into the smoke and buying the retreating
vode several more seconds.
Jericho did not chase. The attackers were dangerous, but destroying them was not the objective. Every moment spent pursuing them was another moment the wounded remained exposed in the street.
Mission first.
The thought passed across the shared network without needing to be spoken aloud. Dorn guided the terminal survivors through the service lane while Grek redirected the group around the crowds spilling across the boulevard. Cresh remained with the depot survivors as they joined the same route from the west. Besh emerged from the maintenance tunnels farther south with the wounded he had recovered below the avenue. Herf continued fragmenting the Legion response before it could threaten the withdrawal corridor. Above the district, Aurek and Esk kept the gunship circling between the towers while local AA batteries remained silent behind them.
Gold's tactical display filled with friendly transponders converging upon the southern route. The numbers increased faster than the arriving dropships could carry them away. She shifted from the landing zone to the mouth of the avenue, placing her armored bulk between the wounded and the fog while the next transport settled onto the ferrocrete behind her.
://: Wounded aboard first. Everyone else maintains the perimeter. There is room if you make room. :\\:
Blaster fire emerged from the miasma ahead of her. Gold answered with controlled cannon bursts that walked across the street without straying into the surrounding buildings. The shots drove the attackers into cover long enough for the wounded Mandalorians to reach the dropship. Besh's tunnel group arrived through the access road, followed by the survivors Dorn had directed away from the first transit station. Cresh brought the depot team through the western route while Grek guided the newest terminal survivors toward the landing zone behind them.
The next two shuttles lifted in succession, climbing through the rain with recovered
vode aboard. Gold watched their signals rise across the tactical display until the storm swallowed them. Four survivor pockets had now made it off Humbarine through Jericho's sector: the six Mandalorians recovered from the southern intersection, the wounded extracted from the maintenance tunnels, the depot team Cresh had guided through the industrial district, and the survivors recovered from the first transit station. The fifth pocket was almost at the LZ, moving through the final service lane beneath the cover of the surrounding towers.
Static crackled across the channel.
<Shuttles airborne. Second wave is away.>
Another dropship descended behind the departing ships. The evacuation corridor remained narrow and unstable, but it remained open.
<We are getting our vode home.>
Watcher's words passed through the network as rain continued to fall across Humbarine City. Aurek and Esk kept the gunship occupied above the wrong rooftops. Herf followed the scattered Legion troops through the ruins, refusing to let them reorganize into a threat against the wounded. Besh and Cresh escorted survivors through the final intersections. Grek guided the terminal pocket toward the landing zone while Dorn and Forn moved through the smoke behind them as a rearguard.
The tactical display changed as the extraction continued. Friendly signals that had remained stationary for hours began moving south. Others disappeared only after boarding transports and climbing toward the Fleet. The web across Jericho's awareness steadily contracted as each surviving group reached the dropships. Not every transponder answered. Jericho recorded the locations of those that did not. The dead deserved to be remembered, even if the living could not afford to retrieve them yet.
Another tremor rolled through the city as the distant titan moved between the towers. Lightning split the sky above it, turning the fog crimson for a heartbeat before darkness returned. Humbarine continued tearing itself apart beneath the storm, but the withdrawal route held.
Eight reflec-painted Mandalorians moved through separate corners of the ruined district with the same quiet purpose. Every route cleared brought another wounded
vod closer to safety. Every battery disabled gave another dropship a chance to escape the city. Every moment the gunship spent chasing shadows and every second the rearguard held gave the Covenant more time to bring its people home.
The fifth pocket reached the landing zone. The remaining signals in Jericho's sector were moving south now.
Lily Rhodes
Arris Windrun
Acier Moonbound
Varin Mortifer
Tamsin Starfall
