Author's Note: Thank you to everyone who has voted and commented on the story so far and read this story so far! If you have any writing tips, please feel free to comment. 

As always I hope that I am doing justice to the spirit of Star Wars as well the respective authors and characters from which I borrow, and I gratefully accept constructive criticism as a means to help me develop my skills further as a writer.

Mandalorian (Mando'a) words

Ner vod (nair-vohd): "my brother/sister"; colloquially also "my friend"

Di'kut (DEE-koot): fool, idiot, useless individual; context-dependent: can mean jerk, moron, etc.

Buy'ce (BOO-chay, BOO-shay): helmet; Colloquially: pint, bucket

Vode an: meaning "Brothers All", was an ancient Mandalorian war chant sung in Mando'a. During his training of Clone Troopers the of the Galactic Republic, Jango Fett revised a number of chants, including Vode An, replacing traditional Mandalorian keywords with more appropriate Republic ones. In this instance, it is presumable that he replaced "Mandalore" with "Coruscant". The chant was sung by the clone troopers with the accompaniment of drums and horns

Haran (HAH-rahn): hell; Literally: destruction, cosmic annihilation 

Fierfek: was a slang word that meant "hex" or "curse," but was commonly accepted to mean "poison" by non-Huttese-speaking races, most commonly. During the Clone Wars, it was adopted by clone commandos as a curse word. Boba Fett and Han Solo would later use it during the Second Galactic Civil War.  

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Chapter 8 

Since she was a child, I never stopped Arleese from viewing the galaxy with an innocent heart, and as many times as I wanted to expose her to the realistic and unpleasant side of politics, I just could never bring myself to destroy the safe fantasy I created for her to live within. I made the mistake of overprotecting her because she is all I have. I thought it was more important for me to be her loving father than to be a king who would teach her how to play the twisted games that take place in the royal court and in the rest of the galaxy.

King Vollan Psach admitting his faults to the Republic negotiator prior to Crimson's deployment on Tochin's Moon II

Onboard Fatal Bliss escape pod, 784 Days ABG  

In the tight proximity of the escape pod, Mouse realized that he had been forced closer to the princess than he felt comfortable ever being. However, curiosity got the better of him, and he felt his eyes scan over the female human form.

 Looking at the young woman, he didn't understand why there was such a fuss about her. Then again, Mouse chose to never understand politics anyway. 

In his opinion, if the Seps felt that the kidnapping a plain-looking woman would get them more control over the galaxy, then they were more cowardly than he first thought.

 And, if that was the case, he was more than happy to take out every last battle droid and every last being who was part of the separatist alliance.

The small pod shook and shuddered as it battled against the natural turbulence that came from atmospheric winds.

Mouse craned his neck toward the small canopy and saw that the sky had changed from the darkness of space and the frosty-red of the atmosphere into a darkened landscape that was shadowed in black and gray, indicating that night was still taking place on the moon.

Another wave of turbulence struck the craft, and Mouse suddenly spun back to the princess as she fell into him. He grasped her hands reluctantly and helped her straighten.

Mouse wasn't sure what to tell her. "Um, Ma'am..."

Gath didn't bother to turn around as he interrupted his brother's uncertain voice to give the princess instructions. He had to make sure he stooped Mouse before he said something that might insult her. "Get down, bring your legs to your chest, and tuck your head in. I can't make this ride any smoother."

Switching to private, Gath told Mouse, "Don't let her get too bumped around. Stabilize her and cover her if this landing goes sour."

Jas turned to watch that the princess did as instructed. Then, he saw Mouse kneel on the floor before her, prepared to do what he had to so that she would remain secure. Jas could tell by Mouse's hesitancy that he didn't like doing this at all, and Jas felt a brief but uncharacteristic flash of jealousy. 

Then, he pushed the strange emotion away. He had no reason to be envious of his brother, especially not when Mouse was doing something that he obviously didn't enjoy.

"Twenty seconds, and we'll know if our short lives are even more short-changed," Dusty offered.

"Still never got to read that novel," Mouse mumbled.

"Well at least we'll be together in the end," Gath said, with that sarcastic air of optimism he occasionally shared.

Jas kept his eyes on the princess, realizing that she was listening to a conversation that was probably bringing her further to the brink of frightening insanity. He and his brothers could deal with their own mortality, but she probably never thought about death or even had it be a consideration in her life.

The shaking and turbulence slowed down, and with a gentle bump, the repulsors had kicked in. The commandos all brought their attention to the canopy again, only to see the darkness of night greet them.

After a few moments, they heard a strange banging and scraping sound against the pod.

"Oh, no, no, no. Come on! No," Dusty complained when he realized that the sound was from a forest of treetops after a number of them grated loudly against the small window. "There has to be a perfectly good meadow around here somewhere."

"Hang on," Gath instructed. He tried to get some kind of control on the pod and redirect it, but the few buttons on the panel didn't offer much directional guidance. He knew he had to let the pod land blindly.

"Can you find us any kind of break in the forestry?" Dusty asked.

"Doing what I can," Gath responded as the pod's repulsors suddenly shut down.

Dusty laughed as though he was going to lose his mind. "Of course, this damn thing is out of fuel. Hazar was such a di'kut."

The free fall only lasted a couple of brief seconds, but everyone had been forced to cling to whatever they could to keep from losing their balance and being knocked around. 

Mouse locked his arms around the princess, pinning her into the corner with his body. He didn't move while the pod struck the ground, sliding on momentum to a horrible-sounding halt. Trees fell down around the craft causing banging and crashing outside the hull.

After a few moments, it had grown eerily quiet. The canopy showed nothing but darkness and the silhouette of what looked like a tree full of leaves.

Gath quickly turned around in the seat. He looked to Mouse and saw he was still kneeling before the curled up princess, following his directives to keep her secure.

"How is she?" Gath asked.

Mouse pulled back and tapped her shoulder gently. "Uh, Ma'am? You can get up now."

She brought her head up, and her eyes glance amongst the four blue visors. Her breathing was hurried, but she was obviously grateful that they made it to the ground in one piece.

"She's fine," Mouse said, quickly getting off the floor and opening the hatch to the pod. He set his visor to night vision and brought his Deece around. 

He held the weapon in a ready position as he stepped out of the craft. He decided to do a preliminary sweep of the area and get out of the confined pod. There were four too many people in it for his liking.

Dusty followed Mouse out of the pod, and Gath stood from the seat bringing his attention to the princess. He reached out his hand to help her to her feet. "Ma'am, give them a moment to secure the area."

She nodded her head silently and brought her hand to her side when Gath released his hold. Her eyes turned to Jas as though trying to figure out if he was the same soldier who had been with from the start.

 Jas wanted to give her some kind of reassurance that he hadn't left her, but he didn't know what to say. He hadn't even told her his name.

Dusty's voice came across the helmet communications, and it gave Jas the excuse he needed to break away from her. "All clear. Nothing around here but trees, animals, and insects."

Gath stepped forward, heading out of the pod with Jas and the princess following behind him. Gath and Jas flicked on the spot lamps on their buy'ce to get a better visual of what was actually around them, instead of just looking with the night vision.

 All they could see was a multitude of trees from different species and varying shades of earth tones. The shrubbery was mostly green, with many of the bushes spotted in colors that ranged in hues of orange and red. The forest floor was brown from dirt, dying leaves, and fallen branches, but the brown was broken up with spots of green wherever low-lying plants were striving.

Turning off the lamps, Gath looked up at the night sky and was disappointed that there wasn't even a pale glow in the distance. He thought for certain that dawn should be preparing to break soon.

 He wanted to see some kind of sign to give them hope that their mission wasn't another wasted attempt of their skills. He didn't like it when Mouse referred to them as the "Reject Squad," but Gath also knew that he was right more often than not about it.

Pulling out the long-range comlink that was stored away in his belt pouch, Gath opened it and waited for it to go through the initializing sequence. The device had been programmed to communicate only with their command ship, Integrity.

 It was a safeguard that if the comlink was found by the enemy, it would not be able to provide much information about Crimson and their contacts. Right now, Integrity was stationed in the orbit of the nearby planet Korriban, doing a routine patrol of the trade routes in that sector.

 All Gath wanted was for Integrity to relay a message that they had completed the mission and that they required transport to bring the princess back to her home.

"Crimson Squad to Integrity, do you read? Codephrase: Dancing nerf-pup."

There was a pause and some static. Gath knew it was not entirely uncommon to have intermittent communications. 

They were, after all, trying to raise their superiors on a warship that was in a neighboring system but it was still hundreds of light-years away. Calmly speaking into the device, Gath tied again. "Crimson to Integrity, I repeat. Do you copy? Codephrase: Dancing nerf-pup."

Static erupted on the small comlink and then the broken image of an admiral on a warship crackled in and out. His blue glowing holo waved and faded for a moment.

"Integrity, here. Crimson, we copy but..."

The sound of a distant explosion cut off the admiral's words, and the man brought his hands before him as though shielding himself from something.

"Sir?" Gath asked. "Do you copy?"

The admiral had a look of concern on his face as his arms came back to his sides.

"We have pressing matters, Crimson."

"Sir, extraction requested," Gath said quickly. "Moon III of Tochin."

Another explosion shook the holo, and the admiral was visibly thrown against one of the control boards.

"Shields down! Heavy casualties," the voice of a clone soldier cut in.

"Sir?" Gath asked again, knowing that something was happening to his distant brothers, and he didn't like being unable to assist. "What's happening?"

Suddenly, the holo filled with pained screams before going dead.

"What the haran happened?" Dusty asked. "Try to raise them again."

Gath put the transmitter away, and his voice was sober as though lost in thought. "I can't. Integrity was destroyed."

"Fierfek," Mouse said solemnly. "Kriffin' Seps."

"Can't you call another ship?" Dusty demanded. "We have to get out there and do something."

Gath brought his visor up quickly to his brother. "There is no other ship, ner vod. You know that our comlink was only allowed to contact Integrity, and even if there is another ship in the area, they're too busy with the Sep attack."

"Vode an," Jas said softly. His simple words broke the tension amongst them and remind them that they were missing the larger picture of what just happened.

Dusty took a heavy breath, as he knew Jas was right. They just lost brothers. It didn't matter if they were infantry, pilots, or commando. 

They were all from the same place, and for the most part, raised in the Mando way. They would not get left behind, at least not mentally.

"Vode an," Dusty repeated, his words sounding more like a vow than a remembrance.

Mouse turned to Gath. He would mourn privately like he always did when the time to do so didn't require them to be worrying about mission orders.

"Options, Gath. Spill it," Mouse said, his voice firm but direct.

Gath looked at his brothers and then behind him to the princess. Her blue eyes looked to them, and the hope she had placed there earlier seemed to have faded and dulled.

"An entire ship?" she asked sadly. "Why would they kill so many?"

"Ma'am," Jas answered as he stepped closer, "It is war."

Her arms folded around her, and she stared into nothing even though her eyes remained on Jas' visor. She looked like she was lost in a memory, something that had taken hold of her and grabbed her attention for the moment.

Gath could see that the princess was not accustomed to war or the cruelties of it, and he knew that the mission objective of getting her home was still their priority until other orders can across. 

Keeping her safe now would depend on what they encountered in the forests and amongst the life of Tochin Moon III. He knew that the mission wasn't going to be as easy as they originally had hoped or thought.

Looking up to the sky for a moment, Gath knew they didn't know exactly where they were in relation to her palace, and it was going to take some time to get a positional marker on their proximity.

 In the meantime, they had a long trek ahead of them, and above all, they had to keep her safe as possible. Gath feared that a lot could happen in such an amount of time, and he hoped that when daylight came, they would discover that they weren't far from her home.

"We're on our own," Gath explained tiredly. "We can't depend on anyone who finds the Fatal Bliss to know where to look for us. It probably burned up into a million pieces, and we could very well be a hundred miles or more away from the crash site of the ship. I doubt anyone knows there was an escape pod, and it's likely that they won't even know to come looking for us."

Jas did not move his visor from the princess, and as Gath spoke, he saw that her eyes had returned back to the present. She kept her gaze on him as though he could try to come up with some other kind of answer.

"I guess we'll find out if she can handle hiking," Dusty said as he took off his buy'ce to scratch the itch that had been in his hairline for the past few minutes. He looked over to the princess, doubtfully thinking she would survive walking for any length of time since he considered her dress a hindrance. 

He knew that it was made to be a pretty decoration to put over a woman, and he couldn't see any functionally of it that would give the princess any way to endure the forested landscape. He thought maybe this mission would have its moments of comedic relief after all.

"We need to get some rest and wait for the daylight," Gath instructed gently. "Let the young lady sleep in the escape pod. Jas and Mouse can rest first. Dusty and I will inventory our kits and supplies. After daylight breaks, we'll purge the ship of any additional supplies we can find."

"I guess she didn't think we were human," Dusty said shrugging off her reaction. He had seen some strange reactions from civvies before. 

It was pretty common that civvies were startled as soon as they realized that there were truly human men under the armor. Taking her reaction in his usual stride, Dusty continued to take his kit off his back and search for his water.

Mouse's voice was a quick response in a matter-of-fact tone. "No, she just realized how ugly you were."

"Your problem is that you spend so much time away from us that you forget what we really look like," Dusty retorted.

"Maybe, but I still had enough sense to keep my bucket on," Mouse shot back.

"He... I saw... You," the young woman breathed, unable to put together a full sentence The princess then fell to the ground, and the trembling that started in hands now moved over her entire body. 

Her eyes suddenly clouded over, lost again in some memory none of them could see. She started scrabbling backward on the ground as though trying to find someplace to hide within.

"Ma'am?" Jas asked as he looked between Dusty and the princess. "What's wrong?"

In the faded brightness of night, the commandos saw a thin line on her cheeks that glistened as she moved. Her breath came in a choked sob, and she suddenly became unresponsive while whatever memory had been left upon her had transported her back to some moment in her past. 

None of them seemed certain of exactly how to approach her or what to say, but they all knew that failure of the mission was not an option.

 No one told them that a simple rescue and extract would become so complicated. It was times like this that they wished they could have been given the privilege of having a Jedi assigned to them.

 At the very least, a Jedi would just wave his or her fingers and problems like a frightened young woman would simply go away. 

Then, Crimson could concentrate on the things that made sense and were concrete, like combat skills and stopping an enemy before the enemy even knew what hit them. 

Comforting a young woman was not part of their training program, and the thought of it frightened them in a way that suddenly made live-fire exercises soothing in comparison.

Gath sighed quietly. This was going to be a long couple of hours until dawn. He just knew it.

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