Private You're Gonna Carry That Weight

[Amani Serys]

As Amani continued to distance herself, the ambience of battle was largely overtaken by the rustlings, trills, and creaks of forest flora and fauna. Most any other time she would have found it tranquil, but here it was only a distraction, a camouflage for what sinister elements may be lurking.

The mirialan stopped in her tracks and focused her senses. A pregnant pause held in the air, until the unmistakable whirring of servos and pistons hit her ear. Droids?

She spun around in search of a place to hide, before settling on a nearby tree. With the Force, Amani propelled herself upward, clambering onto a branch and nestled against the trunk. There was only a moment to grumble about aggravating the pain in her leg before she activated her communicator, "Hey, still alive?" Amani whispered, "I'm not alone out here. Sounds like droids incoming. I didn't even know the Maw used them." She opened her mouth to speak more, but cut herself off as the mechanical marching was about to burst forth from the nearby tangle of bushes and leaves. Meanwhile, the branch beneath her groaned precariously.

Hopefully these machines weren't programmed with a penchant for looking up.

Valery Noble​

 

[Valery Noble]

​

Location: Planetside
Appearance: Link
Outfit: Factory Link
Weapon: Double-Bladed Lightsaber
Tag: Amani Serys

"Hey, still alive?"

Valery just blinked at that, but quickly raised her comm device up to her lips. The second her channel opened, Amani could hear blaster fire in the background, as well as screaming and explosions from the ongoing fighting, "Mostly. I'm making ground and pushing through," Valery answered before she heard the real reason Amani contacted her.

She had company.

"Can you take them out or hide? Or do you need help?" Valery asked, but she knew that actually helping her out was going to be difficult. They were decently far apart at this point, and stepping away from the frontlines would leave the others in a troublesome position. So it was more probable that Amani would have to get through this alone.

The sound of another explosion then passed through their comlink, but it was a lot closer, and Amani would only hear static from the other end. Through the Force, she could probably feel that Valery was still perfectly fine, but she was either too focused on enemies around her or her equipment had been damaged.

This left the Mirialan with the droids that moved down below her, their scanners looking around for Jedi or soldiers. With how advanced they were, the vegetation was far less of a problem, but none of them were expecting the Jedi to be hiding up in the trees. So for now, they hadn't spotted her yet, but there was no real way for her to go either.

 

[Amani Serys]

Amani grimaced at the sounds of combat on the other end. Resistance had been even heavier than she imagined. The suggestion of help was immediately shot down, "No, no, I'll figure something out. Just keeping you updated." Besides, the mirialan needed to prove she could still be of use. Without any further sign-off, she went radio silent, watching as the droids got ever closer to her position.

Better to use the element of surprise while she had it.

After a moment of build up, Amani drew her pistol, hailing down upon multiple droids with precision only offered by the guiding hand of the Force. With only a single working arm, she simply discarded the weapon after and switched it out for her lightsaber, leaping down onto one of the droids blade-first. Hopefully, Valery's mess was a bit more manageable.

Valery Noble​

 

[Valery Noble]

​

Location: Planetside
Appearance: Link
Outfit: Factory Link
Weapon: Double-Bladed Lightsaber
Tag: Amani Serys

"Great..."

Valery looked down at her bleeding left thigh and sighed. After so much effort to deflect the intense volleys of blaster fire, a piece of shrapnel had struck her leg after a violent explosion. It wasn't too terrible, luckily, but to avoid infections she did need it to be taken care of soon. The only positive side to the current situation was that the Maw had decided to retreat.

Their ambush and remaining forces were more than enough to handle smaller groups of Alliance soldiers, but taking down Jedi was something a little beyond their expertise.

<Transmission> "Amani, I've gotten through and will be pushing to the crash site. Are you okay?" she asked before she figured another small update would be appropriate.

"I have a few injured with me, and took a small hit myself." She looked down at her leg — small was maybe an understatement, but it shouldn't be too difficult to treat a cut like this, right?

 

[Amani Serys]

The remaining two droids opened fire, forcing Amani to roll behind a tree for cover. An indiscriminate hail of bolts pelted the trunk, splintering wood in all directions. Around then Valery’s next update came in.

“Great. You okay?” The mirialan spoke as if her own predicament was void of any direness, an idea that was betrayed by the incessant shrieking of blaster fire Valery would hear from the other end. “I’m almost done here. Will proceed to the crash site soon. Meet you there?”

Amani waited until their heat sinks vented out, a distinct hiss signifying that the weapons had overheated. She emerged from behind the tree and threw her saber, which impaled through one droid and out the other. Their metallic bodies dropped to the ground, sinking through the blade of plasma as it remained hovering in place. With the last of them gone, and no sign of reinforcements, Amani retrieved her saber, and made way to the objective.

Valery Noble​

 

[Valery Noble]

​

Location: Planetside
Appearance: Link
Outfit: Factory Link
Weapon: Double-Bladed Lightsaber
Tag: Amani Serys

"I'm..." she thought about being her usual stubborn self and downplaying the injury, but Amani was a healer and Valery had met plenty of those to know that they didn't quite appreciate that. In fact, if there was one thing that could get a Jedi Healer to get aggressive, it had to be a patient who wasn't cooperating when they were in bad shape. "...I'll live but I could use your help. Meet you there."

With the wound still bleeding, Valery used the Force to push herself through the pain and effects of blood loss, allowing her to make the final push. Together with her allies, they broke the Maw lines and forced the survivors to retreat. But with the injuries they sustained and the people at the crash site needing help, the Jedi Master decided against pursuing them.

"Amani?" Valery asked as she approached the objective, her forehead covered in a cold sweat and her breathing somewhat erratic. She really needed to take more time off, before Kahlil Noble was going to send her on more forced vacations.

 

[Amani Serys]

The admission on Valery's part was a welcome surprise. Jedi just loved to bear the proverbial self-flagellation in the name of seeing their cause through. Amani was far from an exception, which often made her a bit hypocritical coming from both sides of the argument. After all, she was here, on this mission, despite her own condition. But regardless, the change of pace was quickly overshadowed by the implications of such an injury. She reached the crash site a short time after, and could only hope that its survivability was as Valery predicted.

Thankfully, it was, and some time after, the master and her cadre passed through the treeline. The ship was totaled, but most of the fires seemed to have died out already. Thankfully, the impact was not exceptionally lethal, and so most of the evacuees were mostly just in various states of injury. A bittersweet stroke of luck, but a significant one.

"Hey- woahwoahwoah," Like the flip of a switch Amani took charge; Seeing Valery in this state made her nervous, and she approached with a guiding hand, "Why don't you just sit down for a bit, 'kay?" Her gaze briefly turned to the other rescue team, "If you're uninjured, work on securing our perimeter or tending to the survivors. Some of these people can't be moved until we've stabilized things."

With a nod they set off to do just that, keeping watch for any more encroaching dangers, and triaging the wounded. Amani turned back to Val and reached out her hand, coagulating the flow of blood through the Force. "What happened?"

Valery Noble​

 

[Valery Noble]

​

Location: Planetside
Appearance: Link
Outfit: Factory Link
Weapon: Double-Bladed Lightsaber
Tag: Amani Serys

"It's... okay," she muttered while Amani helped her sit down. An immediate breath of relief followed and slowly, she withdrew the hand from her bleeding thigh. "Shrapnel from the explosion hit me. I think something may still be stuck." She knew better than to pull things from her owm body and potentially cause more damage, but it definitely wasn't comfortable.

"How are the evacuees?" she then asked, making it clear she was more worried about then than herself. Sure, she understood the injury looked bad, and the loss of blood was getting to her now that she stopped using the Force to sustain herself. But she was still a Jedi and cared about her mission.

Valery then finally sighed and looked at her thigh.

"How bad is it...? I'm feeling a bit lightheaded."

 

[Amani Serys]

“They’ll be alright. I’ve got the others helping them out,” Hopefully with the proper medical intervention they’d all make it out alive. But they couldn’t just up and leave without ensuring that everyone and everything was secure.

Her eyes were drawn to the gouge in Valery’s leg. It was torn and messy, definitely fitting the shrapnel story. It wasn’t too different from Amani’s own injury, actually, which was sort of reassuring, in its own strange way. Then again, that wound played a not insignificant part in her temporary death…

“It’s--” She looked back at her with a flat smile. Part of her wanted to downplay it, but that wouldn’t be helpful to anyone, “--It’s not great. But if I can survive a ship crash, you can survive a little grenade, yeah?” Amani forced a chuckle at her own expense. They’d both been through worse. Probably.

With another study of the wound, she grumbled, “Alright. It’s probably for the best that any smaller fragments are left inside. Over time your leg will heal over and it won’t matter, but trying to remove them now would only make things worse,” General information she assumed Valery was already familiar with, but it more so served to set up the next part, “However, what you’re feeling is something bigger. And that has the opposite problem,” A large, jagged shred of metal would not only be uncomfortable, but would risk tearing up muscles and tendons even further, bleeding more, and making the leg impossible to heal over while it remained inside.

“I can clot the blood loss as it's current rate, but it might take a little to remove the shrapnel without just ripping it straight out of you. Do that, or leave it in, and you'll probably bleed out anyway. Meaning we need to do this right here, and we need to do it methodically. What I’m trying to say is-” Amani hissed behind her teeth, “-This is probably going to hurt like hell.”

Valery Noble​

 

[Valery Noble]

​

Location: Planetside
Appearance: Link
Outfit: Factory Link
Weapon: Double-Bladed Lightsaber
Tag: Amani Serys

Valery chuckled at the joke, "I've been blown up before, so I can't let a grenade be the thing that ends me." Yeah, she had definitely been through worse — on Empress Teta, some of her fingers had been blown off, and she had been badly injured before. But the problem now was that she had been walking around like this for a bit, and they didn't have access to the best medical facilities.

Luckily though, Amani was here to offer help.

But helping clearly did not mean a painless operation. Amani explained what was going to happen next, and Valery just sighed. Part of her again wanted to be stubborn and shrug things off, but the pain was really getting to her, and she couldn't come home like this. Not again. "Alright, let's just get this over with, then."

She looked down and quickly removed her belt from her pants, so she could bring it up to her mouth and bite down on it, "Ready when you are..." It wasn't often that people could hear Valery genuinely scream from pain or watch her this miserable, and she really despised anybody seeing her in this kind of state. But there was simply no choice, and she'd scream, bite down or do whatever was necessary to handle the pain that was going to follow.

 

[Amani Serys]

"Perfect. 'Cause I don't wanna have to be the one to tell people you're dead." She forced another nervous chuckle. Continuing the joke, yes, but also very true.

Valery was ready, and while Amani was anxious, she knew best that this was their only shot. So the healer steeled her nerves, and played her part, "Force be with you," and with little more fanfare, she placed one hand against Valery's thigh, and raised the other above her injury. The shard was found, and through the Force it was slowly, steadily raised up. Her technique was precise and meticulous, like that of any surgeon's. But the damage was deep, and indiscriminate. It took all her focus to guide the metal through the path of least resistance, and even then there was no avoiding the pain left in its wake. A perfect extraction was simply impossible, and so the shrapnel, jagged and twisted on its edges, continued to rip and tear through flesh wherever it found purchase. "Fight it! C'mon, Val, we're almost out!"

The thought alone was enough to make Amani wince, but she saw it through, not stopping for any outside distractions until the work was done. With her other hand, she made a steady effort to staunch the flow of blood as it continued to pump out. It could not all be kept in, but without her intervention, the Jedi master might as well have been bloodless by the time all was said and done.

Valery Noble​

 

[Valery Noble]

​

Location: Planetside
Appearance: Link
Outfit: Factory Link
Weapon: Double-Bladed Lightsaber
Tag: Amani Serys

Despite the pain, Valery snorted at the joke, "At least they can't blame me for walking around with my injuries and avoiding healers, if you tell them," she chuckled again but this time, it stopped very quickly as a jolt of pain went up her leg. She had been sitting until now, but with the pain growing worse and Amani preparing herself to remove the large piece of shrapnel, she decided to lay down on her back. She bit down on her belt and the second the metal piece shifted an inch, she bit down and screamed.

It hurting like hell had been an understatement.

A cold sweat struck the woman's body immediately, and Amani could see Valery getting a lot paler. She looked like she was incredibly ill, and her strength to bite down on her belt was fading rapidly, "I can't... it's..." her breathing was labored and her pain was an intense echo in the Force. Tears ran down her cheeks from it, and for just a few seconds, she felt like this was it.

Without Amani's healing, it definitely would have been the end, but her skills combined with her desire and stubbornness to return to her family kept her going.

"Hey... do you think..." she was breathing heavily through the pain, "...my pants are ruined?" she looked down at the bloody mess, regretted that instantly, but still smirked a little.

 

[Amani Serys]

With finality, the gnarly piece of shrapnel was freed from Valery’s leg. Without missing a beat, Amani tossed it aside and set to healing the wound itself. The flow of blood ceased, and flesh began to mend as if the initial injury was being played out in reverse.

“I’msorryI’msorryI’msorry-” Amani apologized profusely, as if it were all her fault. She scrambled over and raised the master's head, even giving her cheek a few gentle slaps to ensure she didn’t fall unconscious, “Hey, hey, you’re okay. We’re done, you’re okay now.” The healer used her own body to keep Valery propped up, waiting with bated breath for some kind of confirmation.

Thankfully her initial fears were put to rest, and after a few anxiety-inducing gasps from Valery, the question proved to Amani that the master was not, in fact, going to die here. “Your pants? What about mine?” She laughed, tired but relieved. Her own clothes were now sprayed with Val’s blood, giving the impression of a murder scene rather than a by-the-books surgical procedure.

“Ahhh... Please don’t do that again,” Amani’s chuckling trailed off shortly after, and she flopped against the tree behind them, unintentionally taking Valery back with her. Force healing was a draining endeavor, and after an injury like that, the wave of lethargy had her feeling ready for a nap.

Valery Noble​

 

[Valery Noble]

​

Location: Planetside
Appearance: Link
Outfit: Factory Link
Weapon: Double-Bladed Lightsaber
Tag: Amani Serys

"I don't feel okay..."

The dumb grin on her face made sure that it came across as a joke because her voice could no longer handle that for her. She was a complete mess — pale, exhausted, and covered in sweat and blood. If it wasn't for the way Amani adjusted her and slapped her face, Valery would have likely lost consciousness, but she pushed on for now.

"Fine... shopping for new clothing will be on me," Valery chuckled but the movement wasn't entirely comfortable, so a grimace briefly appeared and faded along with her laughing. Amani seemed completely exhausted as well, so she moved back to lean against a tree and pulled Valery along, who wasn't exactly cooperating, but at least she wasn't fighting it either.

She just... couldn't move or do anything, really.

"I'll try my best, but thank you, Amani," her voice was a little somber suddenly, and she fought against a tear or two she felt in her eyes, "For a moment there, I was worried I wouldn't ever see my family again. But... thank you."

 

[Amani Serys]

“I’m absolutely taking you up on that,” Clothing ruined by blood was a sacrifice Amani dealt with a bit more often than the average person. She calmed down with slow, deliberate breaths, and nestled in against the tree. For a moment she became so still that it seemed she may have fallen asleep right on the spot, but Val’s words stirred her from that moment of meditation.

“Don’t mention it,” Amani waved aside with a limp hand, “Just doing my job.” She opened her eyes and peeked down at the Jedi master. The betrayal of emotion was deeper than she had expected. Valery was never cold, but her vulnerability had never been this clear. “I…” Amani’s lip trembled into a weak smile, “It’ll take a lot more than that to bring you down. Your family’s real luck to have you.” She forced herself to look away and stifled an awkward laugh, “Look if you start crying, then I’m gonna start crying, and it’s gonna be a whole mess.” Already her eyes were filmed over with moisture.

Valery Noble​

 

[Valery Noble]

​

Location: Planetside
Appearance: Link
Outfit: Factory Link
Weapon: Double-Bladed Lightsaber
Tag: Amani Serys

"Don't fall asleep on the job, Amani," Valery continued with the same stupid grin, all in an attempt to keep the mood up despite the rather rough situation they were in. But whether she wanted it or not, the tears in her eyes didn't entirely leave, and she did feel emotional about what her fellow Jedi- no her friend was saying.

"Sorry," she awkwardly chuckled once and sniffed away some of the sadness that hit her, "But I do owe you one. Thank you," she was repeating herself a little, but finding the words to express her gratitude was difficult, so she hoped emotion and tone would help her out a little, "Now we just have to get off this rock somehow."

She sighed and tried to look up at the Mirialan.

"We can try to call in evac, or maybe I can alert my husband if it's too risky to send out transmissions." Kahlil Noble likely already knew that she had just nearly died — it was the strength of their bond. But he also trusted her to stay alive and fight herself back home one way or another, so he wasn't going to abandon everything to rush off to her side. Getting him to help her was still easy though, all she needed to do was ask.

She hummed in thought and looked around again, "Unless we can make it back through that warzone with all these people."

 

[Amani Serys]

“Well, you're a big part of the reason I can even do that in the first place, so consider it a debt paid.” Without Valery’s aid, Amani would likely still have not remastered her Force-sensitivity. It was not something she would easily forget.

But more pressingly, they were still stuck in the middle of a forest, possibly surrounded by enemies, “Don’t remind me,” She chuckled. For a brief moment there it was easy to forget this was a mission. “We can try for an evac, I think. Looks like people have things locked down here,"
Amani lolled her head to the side, noting the perimeter set up around the crash site, "Should still have an air presence in the area. If not, then surely your husband wouldn't be too inconvenienced to come rescue his lovely wife, and her illustrious savior?" Amani grew a dumb grin that matched Valery's own.

Valery Noble​

 

[Valery Noble]

​

Location: Planetside
Appearance: Link
Outfit: Factory Link
Weapon: Double-Bladed Lightsaber
Tag: Amani Serys

"Fair enough, but the shopping offer stands," she chuckled and took a brief moment to catch her breath as well. Some color was returning to her face now that the healing was kicking in, and she no longer felt like a sack of potatoes either. There was actual strength in her arms and legs again, and soon, she'd probably be able to walk properly.

"That sounds like a plan." Looking around, everything seemed locked down tightly, and she hadn't heard any explosions or attempts from the Maw to reach their position. So as far as she could tell, the fighting was over, and they just had to get themselves and the other survivors out of here, "Oh Nah, he wouldn't be inconvenienced. If he doesn't show when I really need his help, I'd make him sleep on the couch for a month, and I doubt he'd want that."

She looked at Amani with a grin and slowly began to adjust so she could sit up on her own. Small steps. "Let's get out of here."

 

[Amani Serys]

"Oh, you've already got me on board with that idea," Amani's grin widened at the thought of fresh, unbloodied clothes. They began to shift as the passage of time brought back a bit of strength in them both. She slowly stood up, wobbling a little before she found her footing. "Whew, that took even more out of me than I thought."

Amani proffered a hand to Valery, helping her up if she needed it. The comment on her husband garnered another laugh, "I'll try my best to save him from that fate." She took out a communicator, connecting with Alliance personnel, "This is Amani Serys. We've found the shuttle crash site. Survivors sustained heavy injuries, need medevac ASAP. Sending our coordinates now." The voice on the other end confirmed a ship en route, and signed off.

"Shouldn't be long." She smiled, and looked to the sky that broke through the wooded clearing. It was a bit too close for comfort, but all things considered… that could've gone a lot worse.

Valery Noble​