Log:New Republic: Bunker Buster

New Republic: Bunker Buster

OOC Date: May 18, 2021
Location: Corellia
Participants: Ambrosia Greystorm(GM, NPC Lt Quish), Wrrlryyhn, Chani Tahn, Rune, Jax Greystorm, B'haav Adasta(NPC Pvt Soolark Ardinn), Mortie(NPC Pvt Noobara Irwirney)

The race is on.

The surviving element of Razocat Platoon - 1.5 A-A5 Speeder Truck's worth - went leaping from their momentarily stalled transports while the Firehawke and remaining ULAV hammered down a line of cover fire at what was left of the opposition's vehicles. The First Order's A-A5 was by now /mostly/ engulfed in flames, courtesy of one of their own straffed ULAVs, but a decent number of those packed within made it out alive. The reformed squad of bucketheads is now in hot pursuit, on foot. Overhead, the roars of chaos are fading in the skies, further and further away as the Republic's Air Support nips at the heels of the Order's own. Or vice versa. It's hard to tell from down here and /right now/ it's not their immediate concern.

The Nomad's foothills have risen up around them, the last half klick through the Denendre Valley, and increasingly steep terrain is what now stands between them and target coordinates 31.26N 98.57W. The bunker. It shouldn't be far, according to their HUD, which means that somewhere up ahead is likely to be an entrance....and some heavy artillery. Could explain the persistance of the Stormtroopers, hounding at their tail. If they aren't careful, this could become a death sandwich. At least it's lovely this time of year.

"Alpha, RUN, Beta, FIRE!" Lt Quish bellows the marching orders from behind the charred remains of her visor. Her own HUD is spitting useless pixels of information at this point and she's about three sparks-to-the-eye from ditching her helmet entirely. The right side of her neck is numb, courtesy of Wrrlryyhn's tending, but she can still smell the stench of cooked flesh mingling with pungent bacta. It blocks the pleasing waft of wildflowers as she goes barreling through them, crushing greenery under heel, driving a relentless push up the hill, over and around rocks, between scraggly trees. Having finished her stretch of sprint, the burned LT drops to a knee behind a rotting tilt of fallen tree. It's not the lichen armor she's ocunting on for cover, but rather the pint-sized boulder that trunk has bent over. Her rifle comes up, takes aim, and does her part to enable the next group to advance.

Private Noobara Irwirney quickly jumps from her vehicle - the moment it comes to a halt - and runs along with the rest of her unit up the hill, a visor over her eyes protecting them from the damage of the bright sun overhead. As she spots members of her squad dropping down into position to start providing covering fire for Besh, she follows suit - dropping behind a rock. She even choses a smaller one, leaving the larger stones for the less diminuative in her squad. The blaster rifle which was already in her hands is brought to bear down on the troopers in their white armor - and after a moment she squeezes of a shot, hitting one squarely into the shoulder and burning through the seam under the stormtrooper's arm. One hit. Good. It's a start.

Private Soolark Ardinn, Slicer, Breaching Specialist. She is, for the fourth time this day, checking the items in her toolbelt and the small pack strapped to her hip - the tools of her trade and handed off by the quartermaster at dawn. Knelt behind a boulder, there's little else to do as she waits for the order to move again. If the platoon needs to get into or something, be it door, wall, or computer system, she has something for it in her bag of tricks. The pistol in her holster is an afterthought, even as others around her return fire to the advancing troopers. Sure, she can shoot - it was part of her training - but it's not her specialty. Her job is to get the the Platoon in, one way or the other.

'Alpha, RUN...'

is all she needs to hear from command, the long powerful legs that helped make her tall for a Falleen doing their best to push her out in front of the rest as she sprints - as much as you can in this terrain. As she weaves around boulders, bursting through scraggly trees and shrubbery that sting at her face, she keeps her eyes ahead. It's not far now.

Wrr sticks to her patient's flank as she follows Lt Quish and runs for the hills. It almost feels wrong, running from a fight. Against her very nature, though she knew logically this was tactics, and they were running into a fight as much as retreating. The Wookiee didn't bother with cover as she drew up her bowcaster. Dressed in her talon decorated, refurbished armor, and brandishing the famed weapon of her species there was little doubting the Wookiee taking up position to offer covering fire. Just to reinforce herself, Wrr loosened a terrible roar, a battle cry curling up from the pit of her very being to tear from shaggy maw. She followed that up, with a bolt from bowcaster, which sadly went wide of her mark. At least she was scary when she missed.

The novice Jedi pursues the rest of the group up the hill, dodging behind trees and darting to the safety of rocks as blaster fire dots the landscape around them. Dark brown robes billow about his form while he moves, his boots finding foothold after foothold as he sprints after the lot of them. Rune pauses his advance for a moment to turn and confront their attackers, summoning the Force to toss the offending white armored foes back down the hill from whence they came. Unfortunately, all he can manage is a few pebbles that lift around their feet, the hovering stones clattering to the ground after a short lived flight. If the stones had thoughts, they may have just had the time of their lives, however for the rather untrained Force user things had not gone to plan. "That did not work as I had intended." He comments to really no one as a searing red bolt scorches the boulder he was standing next to. This prompts the young man to flee once more, an ugly black cylinder, that seems to be held together by sheer will, clutched in his hand as he scales the sharply rising terrain.

Emerging from one of the ULAVs that had been providing escort was another hooded figure of the jedi. This one dressed in grays and blues. His hood falling back to expose his face and his longish brown hair pulled back in a pony tail as he runs to join the others. His hands have yet to go to a lightsaber or any other weapons. He draws up on Rune's left side. "On your left. " He calls out, "It rarely does for me either. It's usually awkward to use the force as a weapon directly. " Though there's a brief moment of concentration and he sidesteps the scorching bolt. Then he takes off following his fellow jedi. A silver cylinder of his own in his right hand.

As soon as she disembarks from their transport and puts boots on the ground, Chani's right hand crosses into the feyd-cloth robe draped from her shoulders to grasp the cylindrical hilt of her lightsaber. The distance to cross before it becomes effective is not insignificant, and Chani's deep breath in through her nose and exhaled through her mouth so loud she can hear it coincides with her own concentration on the mystical energy that she can feel inside the bubble of her perception. She utilizes that to aid her movement across the treacherous terrain, and faster than perhaps a normal person might move, she begins to close the distance to the white-armored troopers that have been deployed to stop their advance up the hill.

It's not graceful. Between the eruption of blaster fire between both sides and the rocks littering the ground, it's no such thing as a straight shot as the brown robe whips about her torso and body amid the preternatural movements she takes while moving. There's no stopping her from getting close to the stormtroopers, though. Nor is there anything stopping the violent snap-hiss of the lightsaber activating and suddenly casting a luminous, deep blue glow against the ground and her own body. It's pale core is distinct in the reflective black eyes of each of the trooper's helmets.

The sound of repulsortank turrets going to war is becoming more sporadic but still a soundtrack to power the Razorcats up the slopes! Additional volleys of carbine, rifle, and pistol fire coupled with a warbling ROOOAAAR of irritated Wookiee medic make the Nomad's otherwise tranquil landscape a very loud place. The first few stormtroopers to begin the climb are given a moment's pause by the blaze of bowcaster bolt that streaks on between them, but more join the party. Two of them find themselves confronted by a lady in feyd cloth and that lethal luminescence casts an eerie shade across their visors.

"Keep moving! ONE TWO ONE TWO!" Lt Quish shouts, voice more hoarse and less intimidating that her Wookiee compatriot's, even as she blasts a solid hole through the shoulder ofa trooper whose shot consequently goes wild, missing her. Fair. Another stumbles to a knee, wounded by Noobara and has a time bringing their weapon to bear afterwards.

Private Irwirney regrets her choice of cover as a searing blaster bolt burns into her shoulder and chest - instantly making breathing more difficult to the Sullustan woman. She crouches down lower, her grip tightening reflexively around her weapon as she tries to ignore the waves of pain coming from the wound by sheer force of will. She can't take another like that. She needs to return fire - take out some more of those troopers, and retreat with the rest of unit. Focus on the task at hand, if she wants to get out of here alive and return to her warren. "I'm hit," she hisses into her comm, willing herself to disappear behind the backdrop of vegetation that surrounds her.

Lifting her rifle once more - she squeezes off another shot, but doesn't aim true this time. Is it because of the cover the Stormtroopers have achieved? Or the distraction provided by her injury? It's hard to tell.

Private Ardinn continues to drive up the slope at full speed, slowing a little as a particularly inopportune placement of boulders threatens to end her momentum. Sidestepping quickly, the Falleen continues to push, her plastoid armor bolted snug to come as close to natural movement as a protected soldier can get. A look back is spared at the sound of one of theirs taking fire - someone in her own fire team, no less. She gets on the comms herself within her open-faced helmet. <<"Bara, hang in there. Medics, can you get to her? We're going to need her when we get to the bunker!">> Soolark can't carry someone, and she's lost sight of her fire-team member even if she did have that kind of strength. All she can do is keep pushing up the hill.

Wrr hears the Private announce her injury over comms. Lowering her bow caster she instead starts to unfasten the med kit worn at her waist. She heads towards the private's last location. Even though her intent was to be quiet, the fumbling at her utility belt distracts her. A dead twig crunches loudly under Wookiee feet. She finally finds the wounded Private Irwirney and kneels beside her, hopefully not giving away their position. "Hi," She warbles softly with her translator droid doing it's mechanical duty. "I'm a medic, I can help you."

However, exposed as they were, it was just not going to do. With a quick look at the injury, and assuming the Private allowed it, the Wookiee delicately scooped her up. Then in a show of her athleticism and strength, ran quickly further up the hill towards the summit.

Rune nods to Jax as they continue up the hill, sparing a few glances behind them to see how the rest of the group fares while they move up. "It does not feel right, though I still have trouble commanding the Force at will in any respect." One of the privates goes down with what looks to be a nasty shot, the Stormtroopers having particularly good aim in this instance. He pauses his upward climb and begins to turn to help when he spies the Wookie rushing to her aid. A grim smile and a nod of thanks is given, both of which not likely to be seen, before he turns to head upward again. As his fellow Jedi brandish their weapons so does he, the non-descript button depressed on the ugly black cylinder prompting a column of green to leap from the emitter. "I will meet you at the top!" He states before parting ways with Jax, determined to reach the apex of their climb and provide a safe retreat for their companions. Rune depresses the uncolored button on his cylindrical uncolored lightsaber hilt and with an electric snap-hiss a brilliant green energy beam bursts from the hilt!

Jax chuckles in the middle of battle, "Give it time and practice, Rune. You will get there." Then as the younger jedi calls out about meeting him at the top. There's a nod, "I will see you there." Then with a slight turn of his head almost like a bearded jax cat hearing something just beyond the range of human ears, the jedi knight takes off at a run. He though doesn't head up but across and towards a junior officer. Jax makes his way through the hill side and the chaos to Lt. Quish's side. His lightsaber ignites a blue blade and there is a purr escaping the hum of the blade. There's a quick slash of his blade laying a stormtrooper low before they can fire on the officer. "Lieutenant." Jax greets Quish with a wry grin. Somebody is disobeying orders. It was a guilty pleasure of his. He says as he comes to stand between her and the troopers his saber held ready.

Tuning out the cacophony of repulsorlift engines whining and straining as the craft they're attached to begin to angle up the hill and climb more difficult terrain, Chani focuses only on the white-clad stormtroopers ahead of her. Both are unhappy to be in close proximity with her. Luckily for the pair of troopers, death by lightsaber is not their fate today. Not by her hand, anyway. The bisecting, angular sweep of Chani's blade cutting from the direction of her left shoulder towards her right hip misses the stormtrooper's weapon as the soldier twists out of the way in fear. A rapid cleave upwards makes the lightsaber's thrum quick and almost electric. The forward tip of the blade separates the weapon just past the power pack and right before the stormtrooper's hand at the very level of the molecules that hold it together.

With the weapon no longer able to fire, Chani immediately turns towards the other stormtrooper by pivoting on her left foot and chopping down. The hem of her robe sweeps around the brown leather boots that scatter sediment and loose rocks away from her steps and her sleeves crumple, pulled back as they are to halfway up her forearms to expose the cream sleeves of the layered tunic beneath them. The chop of the lightsaber blade makes a distinct *whm* through the air, but her caution in wanting to avoid maiming or killing the trooper means she keeps the strike short. Better that than overcommitting and accidentally cutting through the trooper's torso through the cardiac box hidden beneath the plasteel chestpiece.

Advancement! The platoon is making good time up the hill, converging upon the area of interest. The Stormtrooper squad is thinning rapidly, picked apart from above and below but it doesn't seem that 'retreat' is in their vocabulary. It is clearly a suicide mission, some forty Republic troops versus the remaining handful of theirs still mobile, but they are good soldiers, trained up from youth, and the /will/ do as their told.

Even blast at a Jedi - albeit eyes closed maybe behind that mask - who's got her saber poised to kill! The trooper who's been disarmed is still frozen in place though, confused by the fact that they are still breathing and unsure of how to procede from there.

"You're a Greystorm, aren't you?" Lt Quish eyes Jax's emboldened little grin and enthusiasm, circumstances considered. She smirks, nods, then pivots on heel to take her turn powering up the escarpment while those above lay down coverfire. This is leg day, everyone.

Lt Quish doesn't quite make it as far as she'd hoped, just a lunge, before the bone-splintering punch of plasma bursts through her left knee from behind. She does down. HARD. Delivers one last punishing smack to that faceshield of hers, too, as it bounces off a knobby root.

"Thank you," the sullustan manages as the wookiee scoops her up, and she's carried bodily up the hill. Each step of Wrrlryyhn's loping gait sends a jolt of pain through her, but Noobara grits her teeth and does her best to ignore it. The wookiee was a medic - right? She'll get patched up, and back in the fight. <<"I'm good, Lark,">> she manages to say into the comm. <<"The wookiee's got me.">> What was the wookiee's name? Was she told the wookiee's name? She's not entirely sure. It was //rude// to just call her the wookiee, tho- "What's that?" she adds abruptly, the sight of something black and metalic above them on an outcropping catching her eyes, as she points at it with one hand.

Further up the slope, beginning to leave the immediacy of the battle behind, Private Ardinn sees something very-much not in keeping with the natural rising terrain. While there is some sort of black metallic... Something at about five hundred meters that pulls the eyes with the sheen of light reflected, the slicer's eyes are drawn past it to something weaving in and out of the rocks. Something white, and covered in armor. With an E-Web. <<"Lieutenant, I'm seeing something artificial, five-hundred meters, could be an entrance! Also, AT-ST Scout Walker, up ahead, and an E-web to boot. This could turn into a crossfire REALLY fast, over!">> The Falleen's breath is ragged over the comms as she continues to speed up the slope, hoping as hard as she can that the crew of that walker don't notice her plastoid-covered approach.

Once sufficiently up the hill, the Wookiee hunkered down with her charge. It was only by the private pointing it out, that Wrr thought to look further ahead. Her soft shirr deepened into a rumble. As the Falleen confirmed what the Wookiee saw, she could only nod. "E-web" She warbled softly at Sullustan. "I am going to take a look at your injuries and see what I can do to get you up and walking." She chirred in gentle, war purrs. However, her attempts at a soothing bed side manner were destroyed by the mechanical drone of Waska's translation. Wrr got out her med scanner, and then be to apply the hype spray filled with the topical numbing agent. The bacta patch was soon applied as well, trying to work quickly and efficiently.

‘'Just make it to the bunker, to the bunker... you can do it!' Rune recites his own little mantra of 'The Hoverlift That Could' while he makes his way up the hill. The youthful Jedi leaps from cover to cover, pock marks from the blaster fire appearing along his path, as he dodges and continues his climb. Suddenly a warning from the Force, something he's quite familiar with in his time alone on Ossus, catches his attention... there's something nasty waiting just ahead. Such is the call of alarm that it causes him to stumble in his traversal of the hill, the Ysannan tripping over his own feet and crashing to the ground behind some cover. This served two points, one as a cover for his lack in graceful athleticism and secondly as a way to be in some manner of protection from the trap that lays beyond. He presses down on the comm device in his ear, activating a line of communication to those below. <<"There is something up here, something that means us great harm...">> Once situated in a manner of cover to his liking, Rune peers over his rock shield to the sense of danger above.

Jax gives a reassuring nods, "I am but ain't half the planet a Greystorm?" Then he goes to backing up the hill providing cover for the Lieutenant. His saber swirling and flicking back and forth to deflect blasts. Though barely makes it through, Jax's saber is just a bit too slow. A stormtroopers shot makes it through as word of the E-web and the AT-ST come through. "Where's Rogue Squadron when I could use them." He looks back, "Sithspawn. Here let me help you."

There are a combination of factors at play that prevent Chani from taking a blaster rifle bolt to the chest point blank. The first is the stormtrooper's fear. The second is the inexplicable premonition that doesn't just tickle at her, but makes every pore of her body tighten at the same moment. Chani rotates out of the blender by flanking to the stormtrooper's left side, meaning the discharge of their weapon sends the blaster bolt hammering into the ground and kicking up burnt dirt and dust. The smell of singed ozone is acrid her nose, and but the flanking position gives Chani the opportunity she needs to deftly bisect the trooper's weapon without any harm to the soldier. "Leave this place." It's a sentiment she expresses to both troopers.

Then she's gone, moving up the hill with her lightsaber angled up and away from the dirt, but also out and away from her. The breeze cascading down the hill side from on high kicks the hem of her robe out so far that the loose cream trousers tucked into her dark leather boots are visible for brief moments at a time. She's unaware of the presence of the all-terrain scout vehicle or the enemy nest up ahead, but she's also at the tail end of the New Republic forces headed that way. The fighting is far from over and even as she ascends, Chani attempts to control her breathing to not overtax her muscles. She's learned from past excursions with the military that there's no telling how long a day will last.

The warnings were given.

Lt Quish's ears grew hot to hear it - or maybe that was the adrenaline rush of her body trying not to die as she lays there, staring at the lower half of her leg that somehow flopped over at /that/ angle. <<D..>> A raggedy gasp is drawn in through her lungs <<COPY! COPY, ADRINN! TAKE IT OUT! DEMO! GRENAAUUUGH>> She tried to sit up, hence the 'grenade' becomimg jumblygook. "Frakkin....bloody..." The woman struggles into a 'sit' and immediately fumbles with unstrapping a stimpak from her thigh. Not so much for the stim, but for the strap. Tourniquet! "Help me," she rasps to Jax, staring at what would've been a pretty clean amputation, had slivers of suit not held the disarticulated flesh captive and kept it 'attached' to her person. It's dead weight. She's tempted to cut it loose.

Behind her, the remaining stormtroopers have fallen or simply been detained, while the rest of the force moves up the slope.

500 meters above their position, an ominous whrrrrrrrrr turns into a whine which evolves into a roar. The E-Web rapidfires lancets of death in an indiscriminate spray across the advancing enemy front. Several troopers are mowed down in an instant, while a white-armored devil perches upon a different rock and snipes at those still standing.

Whatever is in that bunker had BETTER be worth the trouble.

Noobara lets out a sigh of relief as the painkillers are injected - and her dewflaps shift as she offers the wookiee a grateful smile. "I feel much better already. Thanks," she offers. The relief is short lived, however, as the sound of the e-web begins booming out. "Oh no... That's not a //good// sound," she murmurs, as she starts to leverage herself up. She has to silence the E-Web. They have to take it out - or they're all dead. She pushes herself up into a crouch - regardless of whether or not Wrrlryyhn has finished her ministrations - so she can bring her rifle up to bear on the weapon, taking a deep breath in (or at least, trying to with a damaged lung), and letting it out again as she squeezes the trigger. She grits her teeth with frustration as her bolt splashes harmlessly on the rock where the eweb currently stands, and she tries to adjust her aim for her next shot.

Just a little further. The bunker - maybe - is close. So close that the Private starts going through her checklist. Check for computer panels. Gauge interface. Debate slicing versus standard breach. Slicing is slicker, but can be slow. Breaching charges, thermo charges in the pack, detonators. Prioritizing, and shifting order, she somehow... Loses track of the E-Web. One shot down the hill zips by and it reminds her that she's in the wide open. The next shot, however, does not go downhill. Well, not very far. Instead, it strikes Private Soolark Ardinn right in the chest, upper torso, neck and face bursting into fire from the angry plasma collision as she flies backwards, perhaps twenty meters down the side of the mountain before a boulder arrests her tumble. By some fortune, the shot had not struck her bag of tricks, and the breaching charges, as well as the slicing tools at her belt, are somehow intact and able to be used, if someone relieves the former owner of them. Unmoving, it's uncertain if the Falleen is alive as the fire burns.

Noobara lets out a sigh of relief as the painkillers are injected - and her dewflaps shift as she offers the wookiee a grateful smile. "I feel much better already. Thanks," she offers. The relief is short lived, however, as the sound of the e-web begins booming out. "Oh no... That's not a //good// sound," she murmurs, as she starts to leverage herself up. She has to silence the E-Web. They have to take it out - or they're all dead. She pushes herself up into a crouch - regardless of whether or not Wrrlryyhn has finished her ministrations - so she can bring her rifle up to bear on the weapon, taking a deep breath in (or at least, trying to with a damaged lung), and letting it out again as she squeezes the trigger. The shot strikes true, and she lets out a quiet, satisfied, "Yesssss." That's what he gets for shooting at the rest of her team. <<"I winged the E-Web. Can I get a confirmation? Is he down?">> she calls into her comm. Please be down.

Wrr nods at Irwirney and gives an affirmative chirr. She is then off and moving to her next patient. She has no time. No time to notice the destructive weapons firing down on them. With the the numbers of wounded increasing, the Wookiee has to perform a quick mental triage. The unresponsive, burning form of the Falleen woman. Perhaps it is the unfamiliar biology of the reptilian species, or perhaps the gravity of the injury is just beyond the Wookiee medic. Despite her attempts to stabilized her very faint life signs, she just can't seem to reliably stabilize her. The least the Wookiee can do however is shroud her patient bodily and provide a furry meat shield.

It appears that the group below did not heed the warning of the trap as the volley of fire peppers his companions, dropping one and seriously injuring another. With grim determination he looks back uphill and grips his lightsaber, preparing to carve a path of safety for the folk arriving after. There's no way he'll be able to close the gap without being seen, that glowing green column of his a bit of an easy target. With a sigh, he depresses the button on the cylinder and deactivates his saber, the blade squealing into nothingness as he pushes out from behind his cover, moving low to the ground to be unseen.

Jax's away for a moment, "I'm sorry. I'm not a gifted healer, Aryn should be here. I can help and I will again later. I know a specalist that does good work. " He reaches down and knocks against his right leg, it doesn't make a clanging noise. Then with a heavy sigh and quick slash, Jax severs Quish's bum leg and cauterizes it at the same time. Then with a spin as the sniper takes a shot at him, he bounces the blaster bolt away deftly. Then reaching out with the force, He goes to knock sniper rifle out of the snipers hands but there's just a bit more umph than what he realizes. "Enough of that."

Chani grunts from the impact of throwing herself onto the inclinde ground in front of her. Her right hand angles out to point the blade of her lightsaber away from being plunged into the dirt and she rolls from prone to supine. Her feyd-cloth robe becomes covered in loose pebbles and bits of dirt, but Chani doesn't care. Better that than getting mowed down by the rapid bolts spewed from the weapon emplacement farther up the hill. Coughing thanks to the cloud of dust she'd kicked up following her impact and had inhaled after the harsh exhale of hitting the ground, Chani nonetheless fixates her gaze farther up the hill to where the nest and the stormtrooper operating it is positioned to rain death down on the advancing ground forces.

"Shiraya protect us," Chani mutters to herself in exasperation and out of habit. The Naboo moon deity is doubtful to do them any favors on the side of a Corellian hill in the middle of a Corellian day, but the young Jedi's mind fixates on something other than the eminent threat of death the heavy blaster repeater represents. Almost as soon as the E-Web begins its volley of death, it's forced to go silent by return fire from one of the troopers. Chani's oblivious to the sniper and instead focused on the path ahead. With the weapon nest silent, Chani chooses the opening to sprint up the hill. Again, she opens herself up to the binding energy of not just the world around her, but of everything. Through the Force, Chani manipulates the very cells in her body. She decreases the amount of lactic buildup in her muscles while also increasing the oxygenation in her blood and the pacing of her heart. The speed at which she moves up the hill is not something natural, especially given the incline.

A sickly haze settles over the rugged hillside when at last the E-Web is made silent. Dust - organic and mineral particulate - hangs in the air in its thunderous wake and the screams of the not-quite dead call out for their gods, their medics, their mothers, brothers...anyone.

Both sides have paid the price in this brief but violent clash.

Lt Quish is among the voices echoing over the hillside, if only briefly, when Jax frees her of the dead weight. It takes a serious mental kick in the pants to get going after that, but she tries. A three-legged crawl. Slowly. For about ten seconds. A pair of fellow troopers descend upon her and pick her up, carrying her into better cover until the bunker is officially cleared.

Another trooper makes a pass by Wrrlryyhn and Pvt Soolark, stopping to rest a hand on the WOokiee's shoulder and bow over their fallen teammember. And take her stuff. The breaching charges, the dataport coupler, anything that appears to be of use. Pragmatism, not sentimentalism, wins wars.

In the rocky alcove that the Republic troops have effectively secured - however momentary it may be - there IS a blastdoor set into the hillside. A control panel to the left is currently illuminated in RED. Locked. Several meters away, the Stormtrooper Lieutenant is coming-to after a long drop knocked the wind out of them. And rifle from their hands. They start to roll over, head on the swivel, trying to make sense of their relocation.

Private Irwirney pushes herself to her feet, and starts running up the hill. The E-Web stays silent - so perhaps that means she got the job done? Good. That at least was good. She struggles to catch her breath as she jogs up the hill, but the sight of the wookiee's fur still manages to catch her eye. "Thanks agai-" she starts, before she spots the figure Wrrlryyhn is crouched over. Oh, Triakk, why? Why'd it have to be Lark? "...help her," she urges the wookiee, as she crouches down beside her friend. It's not until the trooper comes to take Soolark's things that she jolts back to herself. After all - there's still work to be done. "I've got this Lark. Okay?" She doubts her friend can hear her, but... "I've got this. I'll be back. I'll visit you at the hospital."

She pushes herself to her feet - hurrying up the hill, and towards their destination. "I've got explosives," she announces - as she's directed towards the door. She starts placing the charges, focusing her attention on the task in front of her. Durasteel door - standard thickness, most likely? If she places the charges along the seam-

It takes a minute or two. Do you really want to rush an explosion? But she has everything in place, and she takes cover from the explosion. "Fire in the hole!" she calls out. "Five, Four, Three, Two, One..."

BOOM.

Wrrlryyhn warbled as she applied another stim filled hypo spray to Lark. "Come on!" Absently she notes the encouragement of Irwirney. She urged desperately her warble growing to a fevered pitch. "Keep fighting! Breathe, please breathe!" She applied one more hypo spray, then lowered her furry face to that of the Falleen and began to manually breath for her. If the manual resuscitation didn't work she feared there wasn't much else that could be done. The gaping plasma burn through Lark's torso made chest compression iffy. Non the less. Leaning in the Wookiee gave one last rumbling warble, and commanded "Breathe!"

After moving ahead to secure the way for his trailing team, and sneaking up to the E-web to silence it before it can do more damage, Rune finds his tasks done before he arrives. The lone Jedi stands there for a moment, peering back and forth between the downed Stormtrooper with the huge gun and the Lieutenant who is coming to, before he turns back to watch the rest of his group climb the hill. A short wait later one of the Privates is wiring the door to explode, the Ysannan turning his head away and bracing with one arm over his face while the door is breached.

Jax watches the El-Tee get evacuated. He frowns lost in his thoughts for the moment. Then turns to the building before he drops to his knees for a moment as the demo team preps the door. His eyes close for a moment and he focus on his breathing. It's a moment of silent meditation as the jedi centers himself for what must come next. When the sound of the explosion has came and left he rises to his feet. He begins to approach the others examining them.

Chani reaches the top of the hill in a solemn mood. Their dead lay strewn on the slope. If she were to turn around and gaze back onto the valley, she might just be able to see the twisted wreckage of some of the vehicles they'd lost along the way, too. Panting through her mouth, the young Naboo woman lowers her lightsaber so that it is canted at a forty-five degree angle towards the ground. It's quiet hum plays back as a gentle vibration through her right hand and clenching fingers. She keeps her wrist locked, though, lest the minute gyroscopic motions of the weapon's internal components lead the luminous, lethal blade of light into straying where it's not wanted. Dirt and grime coat her face and her robe, but she doesn't try to wipe it away.

When the door is breached, Chani ensures that her mouth is open and that all the breath is out of her lungs. It lessens the pain of the decompressive force of cavitation that spreads away from the point of the explosion before rushing back in. The terrific bang of the bunker being breached is enough to make her wince. Smoke curls and wafts just inside the entryway, where the outside air meets the air from inside. It almost dances before being pulled up and out to vanish into the sky. Her nostrils flare. The scent of duracrete dust is stale and strong. With loose rocks crunching into the ground beneath her boots, Chani begins to approach the door to head into the bunker. The cloudy illumination cast against the ground and her own clothing by her lightsaber begins to gently bob and weave with her steps.

The blast echoes endlessly throughout the Nomad's foothills and the blastdoor is effectively separated from its frame. It tilts inward with a precarious lean, creaking and groaning against gravity. Futile complaints.

Moments later, a resonating thud sees it landing on the floor.

When the smoke clears, very dim lights are visible within. The main power has been cut, leaving just the emergency strip lighting above and below along the seams of wall-floor/ceiling to illuminated the way. Two by two, Republic troopers begin filing in after confirming via comm with their still-conscious Lieutenant. Two rooms are cleared...then another two...

<<Doesn't seem like anyone's...>> Corporal Zuroch spoke prematurely and his breath catches in his throat to see a shadow moving in what must be some command center. <<HOLD IT!>> He barks, rifle bedazzling the bent FO Officer's spine with a little beam of red. <<One Operative present.>>

Said 'operative' was in the process of fidding with a rear panel of a computer terminal. It's one of three terminals in the room. They halt as ordered and turn a sloooow smirk around to land upon the arriving intruders. Both hands held mockingly in the air.

"Another win for the Republic...I should congratulate you, yes?"

Private Irwirney tilts her head briefly into the doorway - checking to make sure the demo did its job. It did, thankfully, and she allows herself a brief smile of satisfaction. <<"We're good,">> she says into the comm. <<"Door's wide open.">> She lets the more combat-experienced troops go first - before she follows after, with her explosives still in hand. After all, they may yet some across another door in need of her special touch. She keeps her rifle up and at the ready, however, the Sullustan woman peering cautiously down hallways, and into any open doors.

Rune steps through the breach in the door, the remaining smoke swirling around his body as he passes into the corridor beyond. Following the troops down the hall, he too spies the smug officer with the smirk of a Loth-cat about to pounce on prey. He shakes his head and moves over to the fellow, looking around the area as if there was something he'd be able to determine. Silly Rune, these are electronics... there's no way you'd be able to tell anything about anything.

The Republic troopers go first. Chani follows behind a crowd of them after they enter. Her steps over the blown-over door are careful. The explosion's force and the massive amount of heat it generated have deformed the thing so that her first step on it triggers a shift of the entire object towards one curled up edge. It flattens out when she gets to the middle, only to thunk against the floor against as her weight shifts it yet towards another deformed corner. The hum of her lightsaber grows louder in the confines. She doesn't deactivate it in this space. The illumination it provides is better than the emergency strips along the ceiling and walls. Once they find the nerve center of the bunker and the waiting officer, Chani's gaze fixates on him.

She exhales slowly and stretches out her own bubble of perception. She wants him to tell the truth. She wants him to tell them if he's done something to the terminal they caught him standing up from when they'd arrived. The look on his face certainly makes her want to distrust him. Reaching out through the Force, Chani attempts to impress that desire on the mind of the officer. It's a compulsion she tries to implant. A desire that will provide them the information they need in the moment. "You want to tell us what you did to the terminals." She tries to use that symbiotic energy surrounding them to give her voice and her will weight in his mind.

Jax steps across the room turning off his saber and hanging it from his belt. "Why don't you look the spukamas that ate the cream." Jax says as he approaches the terminal on the left. He starts to trying to access it. THe works a few moments before his foot steps on a pressure plate and there's a click. A jolt of electricty goes through him and the terminal and Jax. The jedi knight looks at the intel officer. "That wasn't nice. Check for a pressure plate on the others. Though I doubt he the type to repeat traps."

Jax's hack into the computer terminal was a success! The uploading of data began...

And then he stepped in it. ON it, rather. The pressure sensor triggered and the enter terminal went up in a show of sparks and ozone, cooking from within. Whatever files /had/ been theirs for the taking are toast - the comm log data on datachit, too, if he's too slow in yanking it free.

Seemingly unfazed by the briefly illuminating light show, the Officer smiles tersely and is forthcoming with answers to Chani's query. "I had to safeguard our data against tampering. It is better that sensitive materials be lost than fall into the wrong hands. A simple pressure sensor --- as your friend has demonstrated" One hand gestures openly to Jax's predicament "can do the job effectively, when set with a charge to overwhelm the power regulator to internal drives. It's a very simple trick, any entry-level analyst should be aware." His simple smile is as placid and honest as it is condescending - but maybe it's just the posh Coruscanti accent that's responsible for giving that air of superiority. Regardless of just how genuine his smile might be, the troopers are having none of it.

"KNEES" the Corporal orders and takes a half step closer while another moves around toward his back, pulling a pair of binders from all the gear equipped about her waist.

For all his troubles, Rune DOES come across a little multitool that's still sitting there on the floor, where it was dropped by the access panel.

With more capable hands taking care of the prisonner, and attempting to slice into the terminals, Private Irwirney takes up position near the door - covering the hallway with her blaster rifle. She continually scans up and down the hallway with her gaze - weapon held at the ready as she forces herself to remain focused on the task at hand. At the job in front of her - and not on the condition of her friend down on that hillside.

The only thing she can do for Lark right now is make sure that the job is done //right//.

Rune stands back to allow people with more technical minds access to the area and the terminals, a brief wince given when the sparks spew from the activation of the pressure plate. He watches the group move about, doing random things trying to suss out what this fellow was up to, when he decides just to search him straight away. "Arms out, do not move." The Ysannan commands, that black recognizable cylinder in his hand just in case. He pats down the officer and comes away with a datapad and a keyca...whoop! The keycard slips from his hands to land on the floor, sliding a little distance away. As he stoops to retrieve it, another piece of equipment grabs his notice. "Huh?" The luddite Jedi states as he picks up the mutlitool from the ground, holding it out to the rest of the group. "Is this important?" Rune asks, the multitool, datapad, and keycard held aloft for all to see.

Jax was searching the right terminal for traps carefully. As he slides back the mat that hid the pressure plate. He moves ever so carefully till he hears a click. Then a "Son of a..." Then there's another lighting bolt.

"I recommend we bring in an intelligence team to analyze the rest of the terminals and pull what data they can. We may be missing complex traps we are not equipped to handle if such simple implements like pressure plates are being used." It's something Chani announces to the group as a whole. It'll require them to occupy the bunker for awhile longer, but better to try to get all the data intact with a specialist team rather than risk destroying what archives exist here with a group that is, for the most part, made up of soldiers. Chani's thumb depresses the activation stud of her lightsaber and the blade itself vanishes in a motion not unlike the energy retracting back into the cylindrical hilt in her hand. Her right hand crosses her torso to reattach it on her belt at her left hip and Chani exhales another long, slow breath. "Especially since two of three terminals have now been destroyed."

Chani Tahn presses uncolored the button on her metalic lightsaber handle causing the shining blue energy beam to slide back into the None with an electric squeal.

"Indeed."

Somebody may want to muzzle the guy before this day, hour, minute is over. Or at least put a bag over that calm, smug looking fa---

Maybe not so calm. While attentions are turned to the second triggering of his hastily rigged security measures, the Officer has bit down upon his tongue. Or so it might appear, until the sputtering begins and body becomes rigid as the neurotoxin begins to take effect. He is a dead man, either way, so better to do it now before they can pry anything else from his brain in interrogation, no? The other officers fled via bike when the initial interception assault was launched.

"Aw, skrag..." the Corporal tries to keep the man's head on a tilt so he doesn't choke on his own bile while putting in an order for <<MEDIC>> over comm. It's a halfhearted order. Obligatory, nothing more.

Fortunately, more of the troopers have finished performing their initial sweep of bunker and more tech-savy types are soon swarming over the remaining LIVE terminal as well as the two toasty ones. Because y'never know when you'll get lucky. One of them takes the found items off Rune's hands with a "Yes" to confirm their importance. HOW important, they do not say, and seem too focused on the work at hand to feed him any juicy details or technobabble. Seconds later, another 'brain' (as General Greystorm calls them) chirps an appreciative "Thanks!" and "Good find!" The key card is held aloft, inspected with a light of rotating wavelengths, the multitool is tossed back to the Yssana. It's a pretty basic little thing, but it's his now, apparently.

The call of <<Bunker secure>> goes out over comms to the tank squad below, as well as Lt Quish, who's being hauled off to meet their ride, along with Pvt Ardinn and a number of other wounded.

<<Copy that>> Lt Quish sighs into comm, her painkiller taking effect. <<Gather up what you can, check the status of those shields. Wouldn't trust'em to stay away for long.>> With a groan, she leans her head back into the chest of the woman helping to load her up.