Lieutenant Commander Talin Andronicus opened his eyes slowly, gazing at the wrecked trees around him.  Damn, he thought, my Krath

paint job is screwed.  But what about my AI module?

"Eljay?" he said.

"Commander?" the droid pilot module replied.  "Are you hurt?"

"Nothing more than my pride, Eljay.  What's our status?"

"The crash landing has wrecked most of my systems," Eljay said matter-of-factly.  "My hull is relatively intact, so with extensive spare parts and repair facilities, I could fly again."

"Well, my droid friend, parts and facilities is something we don't have." Talin said caustically.

"Why?  Where are we?"

Talin sighed.  "Ssh'Peka's surface, wedged between two big trees."

"Oh," the droid said.

"What about my equipment?  Can I still reach the fighter's cargo bay?"

"Why yes, Commander.  The rear access port is free from the ground."

"Excellent," Talin said, unstrapping himself and opening the canopy, "I'll be back in a bit."

Talin exited the fighter, walked to its rear, crouched and opened a hatch at the rear of the fighter.  Inside were several bags and hard cases, all of which seemed intact.  The young pilot smiled grimly.  "Stormtrooper armour, never leave home without it."

Talin pulled out the case of armour and popped it open, revealing the white carpace worn by the Empire's elite troops.  Taking another look inside the fighter, he pulled out some other items; a survival kit, his blaster rifle, his DL-44 blaster pistol, the beckon call for the Optimus, his Luxury Yacht (currently on Aurora Prime, but he didn't want to leave his beckon call behind.) and several other gadgets supplied to him by Intel for his work as an agent.

And peering back at him from the very rear of the hold was one last set of items.  Talin smiled grimly again.  "Eljay," he said.  "get ready to move."

Talin pressed the last buttons on the outer shell and stepped back from his handiwork.  "Okay, Eljay," he said, "Give it a shot."

The Imperial Patrol Droid, controlled by Eljay's logic units, rose from the ground on its small repulsorlifts.  "Why, Commander," Eljay's voice said from the droid's tinny vocoders, "This is very...liberating.  I can go places I couldn't when I was a starfighter."

"Yeah, whatever, pal," Talin said semi-dismissively.  "The rest of the squad will have probably followed me down.  You got the sensor logs of everything that happened up there?"

"Affirmative, Commander.  Fire Dragon's sensor logs are in my RAM.  I have to say though, Fire Dragon was somewhat recalcitrant to relinquish the data."

"You're still fighting with Dragon?"

"I believe some of the personality of Commander Laerox has, ah, rubbed off on him."

"I can believe that.  I've heard some intersting stories about Laerox from the others in Typhoon..."

"There, finished," Blackbird said as the last of the camo-net settled over his TIE Defender.  Picking up the bag containing his survival gear, he walked over to Jennifer's Missile Boat.  "Jenn?  You ready to go?"

"Yup," Jen called, stepping into view.  Her voice betrayed some of the nervousness and concern she was feeling.  "I just hope Andron and any of the others that hit the deck are okay."

"Well, we're looking for Calli, Andron, Talon and Brandon at least, so we have our work cut out.  I'm not sure about Nightwolf, Domi, et cetera, so I guess we've just got to take our chances." 

Blackbird pulled a hand scanner from his bag.  "I've got a faint signal lock on Andronicus' fighter," he said, pointing to his left.  "Thataway."

"You sure it's Andron's ship?"

Blackbird shrugged.  "Pretty sure.  There seems to be nothing in the trees, ground or air that could cause a sensor echo, no EM dispolarities, no Theta radiation, no Chronoton pulses.  Everything seems fine."

"And besides, Andron's a Jedi," Jenn said.  "When sensors fail, the Force prevails."

"Amen, Jennie."  Blackbird replied.  "Shall we?"

FM/LCM Andronicus/Typhoon 2-4/Wing X/ISD Challenge