Meanwhile, on the lower decks of the starship, Zule and Fay pushed a grav cart that carried salvaged spare parts through the corridors. The overhead lights functioned, which provided illumination, but the red flashes from the emergency strobes occurred at intervals, and these flashes contributed to Zule's sense of unease.
Zule glanced around, the feelings not going away. Fay, who remained attuned to the emotions around her, detected Zule's discomfort through the Force. She placed her hand on Zule's shoulder. "Hey, it's okay," Fay said reassuringly, even though she harbored her own doubts. "We'll get these parts back to the shuttle, and then we'll leave this place soon. Everything's going to be fine."
However, as Fay uttered these words, she questioned their truth because the Force conveyed warnings to her, ones that she didn't quite understand. Something existed here that deviated from normal, something that felt wrong.
Zule nodded. "We need to get out of here fast," she muttered. "The turbo lift should work now that power has returned, we can use it to reach the hangar deck and load the parts."
They increased their pace after that, and they guided the cart forward through the corridors until they arrived at a T-junction. One end of the corridor led toward the turbo lift banks, while the other end extended into darkness that the red flashes interrupted only occasionally. A surge of alarm then passed through Fay via the Force, this warning felt stronger than before, which prompted her to direct her gaze toward the dark end of the corridor. Her eyes narrowed as she tried to discern what lay there.
Zule sensed the disturbance as well, and it caused her to draw her lightsaber from her belt in a single motion. The blue blade ignited with a snap-hiss. "What is that?" she whispered to Fay.
Fay shook her head, while she continued to strain her vision. "I'm not sure." Initially, they observed nothing, it seemed to just be an empty space. Then, as the flashes occurred, shapes started to appear. Figures emerged from the shadows, Dozens of them, possibly more. They didn't move they just stood there. More of them starting to pile until it looked packed.
Zule's temper rose at the sight, she stepped forward and she raised her voice. "Hey! If you don't back off and leave us alone, you're gonna regret it! I swear, I'll cut through every last one of you!"
Fay, who concentrated on the Force's guidance, delved deeper into the sensation, whatever these people were they weren't alive, they weren't normal, yet they stood there in front of her. Every instinct in her body told her to run, and that wasn't even including the force—which was practically screaming at her. Her eyes widened, and she seized Zule's arm. "No! Zule, we need to run. Right now!"
Zule paused briefly, but Fay had already climbed onto the grav cart, and she pulled Zule up alongside her. Fay adjusted the cart's throttle to its maximum setting, which caused the repulsors to produce a high-pitched whine as the cart moved forward at full speed. She extended her influence through the Force, and she directed their path with telekinetic adjustments that navigated around corners and maintained stability.
The figures started to run at them from behind, their footsteps created a loud noise that sounded like they were a horde. And despite the speed of the cart they still managed to keep up. "Who the kriff are they?" Zule yelled.
"I don't know!" Fay shouted in reply, and she divided her attention between controlling the cart and talking to Zule. "But there's something wrong with them—twisted, corrupted. I know we can't beat them alone!"
Zule looked over her shoulder, and she activated the blaster that her prosthetic arm contained. "What do you mean? They don't even have weapons!"
"I'm not sure," Fay admitted. "But there's something about them thats... dangerous."
The corridors passed by as they traveled at high speed on the grav cart, and the engines emitted sounds of strain, they wouldn't last for long at such a speed. The horde followed without pause, and it formed into a mass of bodies that surged after them climbing over each other and being thrown forward. All to get closer to them.
Zule turned her body, and she discharged shots from her arm blaster that struck the leading figures. However, the figures did not collapse, they continued their advance despite the impacts. "They're not dropping!" Zule exclaimed, and she fired additional rounds that filled the air with the scent of burnt glesh.
The turbo lift doors appeared ahead, and Fay brought the cart to a stop before they jumped off. Zule pressed the call button repeatedly, and the indicator activated, but the lift ascended from lower levels at a rate that seemed insufficient.
"It's not gonna make it in time!" Zule said with panic in her tone, and she retreated toward the doors with her lightsaber active as the horde approached from the previous turn.
"Be patient," Fay encouraged, maintaining her composure. "It'll be fine."
The situation got worse as the leading figures extended their reach, and their fingers aimed toward the pair while their expressions conveyed intent. Zule swung her blade at the nearest one wnd severed a limb, but the action only delayed the advance slightly. Fay used the Force to repel a group of them, which gained a few moments.
Luckily the doors opened, and they entered the lift before Fay activated the close mechanism as contact occurred on the outer surface. The doors secured themselves, and the horde collided with them, which produced thuds and bangs that resonated through the structure. Then, the noise ceased as the turbo lift began its ascent to the hangar bay.
Zule positioned herself against the wall, she breathed heavily, it felt like her chest was going to explode.
Fay remained in place. She felt equally as disturbed as Xule did, as she had managed to get a good look at the people who attacked them. It was the crew, the crew that should be dead. It disturbed her in a way she hadn't felt in decades.
As the turbo lift reached the hangar bay, Fay activated her commlink and attempted to contact Jaden and Aubrie, she needed to warn them about the threat that had emerged from below. If it happened to them it's possible it's happening all over the ship. "Jaden, Aubrie, do you read me? We ran into what's left of the crew... They're not normal. Something's wrong with them. They attacked us." No response came from the other end, only static that crackled through the speaker.
"Dammit," she muttered, lowering the device slightly.
Zule tried her own commlink next, and she repeated the call. "Jaden, this is Zule. You need to fall back. Now. Something's in the lower decks, and it's hostile. Get out of there and meet us at the hangar." Yet the silence persisted, which indicated that either interference blocked the signal or something had occurred to prevent them from answering.
Fay glanced at her. "Still nothing?"
Zule shook her head. "Nothing but static."
Fay exhaled slowly. "Either comms are down... or they can't answer."
Zule paced inside the cramped lift, as tension bled into every movement. "We shouldn't have let them go alone," she said sharply. "You saw what's down there, one of us needs to go after them. If anything happens—"
Fay reached out, her hand closing gently around Zule's arm, stopping her mid-step. "We don't have time to split up," she said firmly. "Scout needs those parts now. If the engines aren't repaired soon, we're all stuck here."
Zule didn't answer right away. Her jaw tightened, her eyes still fixed on the closed lift doors as if she could will them to open faster. Fay's voice softened. "Jaden can handle himself. He's trained for this. And he's not alone, Aubrie's with him. Trust them to get through it."
A long pause followed before Zule gave a slow nod, though the stiffness in her shoulders didn't ease. She reached down and adjusted her grip on the lightsaber clipped to her belt. When the lift doors finally slid open, the two of them moved together, guiding the grav cart across the hangar deck. Their ship stood near the far wall. From the left, another figure appeared. Vaylin, emerging from a side corridor with a large crate balanced against her hip. She adjusted its weight as she closed the distance between them.
"What's that?" Zule asked, as a frown formed on her face while she eyed the crate's contents that protruded slightly from the top.
Vaylin set the crate down near the shuttle's entrance, and smiled in response. "I went to the medical bay and collected some of the equipment," she said. "I thought it could help us."
Fay acknowledged the gesture with a nod. "That was very kind of you, Vaylin," Fay replied. "However we need to get these parts aboard the ship now, the crew... something is wrong with them and they've turned hostile. We need to leave as fast as possible."
At that moment, Scout appeared at the top of the shuttle ramp, stepping down as she wiped her hands on a rag tucked into her belt. "Took you long enough," she said, giving the group a brief look before heading straight for the grav cart. She didn't wait for an explanation. Kneeling beside the load, she began checking the parts Zule and Fay had brought, lifting each component and inspecting them. Her eyes scanned for damage, wear, or mismatched pieces. After a few moments of inspection, she set aside the components that didn't meet her standards and gathered the rest into her arms.
"These will work," she muttered, more to herself than anyone else.
Without another word, she turned and disappeared back inside the ship and got to work on fixing the engine.
The repairs had begun.
...
Back on the engineering deck of the starship, Jaden and Aubrie exited the engine room like they had a droid battalion at their back m. Jaden moved straight to the nearby wall panel and tapped in a manual code, forcing the bulkhead to seal behind them. The door slid shut with a deep clank, cutting off the presence they'd both sensed moments earlier. He exhaled sharply as the locks engaged. "That wasn't just the sound of the engines," he said. "Something was in there with us."
Aubrie nodded as she kept her saber hilt in hand. "I felt it too, just behind us, just out of view."
"Yeah," Jaden muttered, already leading the way down the corridor. "We'll call it a mystery for someone else to solve."
As they moved at a jog toward the hangar bay, the halls remained dimly lit and eerily silent. Then footsteps which were not their own sounded out. Ahead and to the left. They both stopped. A moment later, several figures came into view through the flickering emergency lights. They were crew members... or they looked like crew members. Same uniforms, same features, same insignias on the shoulders. For half a second, Jaden and Aubrie stared in silence. Their minds struggled to catch up with what they were seeing. "They're supposed to be dead," Aubrie whispered. "I remember passing him."
"I know," Jaden said, eyes narrowing.
But these crew members were strange.Their heads twitched with each step, their limbs were stiff and awkward, their faces blank, pale. As the group approached, Jaden raised a hand slowly, trying to signal them. "Hey! Hold up. Are you—?"
The first crewman let out a sudden, wet grunt and broke into a sprint. Then the rest followed.
Jaden's lightsaber snapped to life with a sharp crack-hiss. "Not friendly!" he shouted, and stepped forward in the same breath, cutting clean through the lead attacker's shoulder and down through the torso. The body fell hard, but the others didn't stop. Aubrie ignited her blade and intercepted two more. The group swarmed with no coordination. They just seemed to want to overrun both of them with sheer numbers.
"They're not thinking," Aubrie shouted as she swept low and took out another attacker's legs. "They're not even trying to defend themselves."
"They must not be alive," Jaden speculated. "Or if they are, something else is driving them."
They worked in tandem, each one covering the others blind spot and making up for any mistakes. But then something new happened. From the fallen bodies, thick gray sludge began to seep out, not like blood, but in long, moving strands. The substance slithered across the floor, flowing toward them like it had eyes of its own.
"Jaden!" Aubrie pointed down. "That sludge, it's moving!"
Jaden reacted fast, raising a hand and pushing out with the Force. The first wave of sludge lifted and hurled backward against the wall, splattering across panels. For a moment, it looked like that would be enough. But seconds later, the strands pulled back together and began creeping forward again, undeterred.
"This stuff is alive... it must be what's moving the bodies," he said in a grim tone.
"Then we need to move. Now." Aubrie didn't wait. She turned down the nearest hall, and Jaden fell in beside her. The path back to the hangar wasn't easy. More of the altered crew emerged from branching corridors. The further they moved, the worse it got. Whole groups now, shambling at first, then sprinting with sudden, explosive speed. Jaden's lightsaber flashed and twisted as he cut through another wave.
Though with every death the sludge emerged from the bodies and tried to reach them. It reached across the deck in streaks, searching for weak spots. At one point, a strand flicked up and grazed his boot, but he leapt back just in time. "It's going for gaps in the armor," he said tightly. "I think it's trying to get inside us."
"Like a parasite?" Aubrie asked, parrying a strike from a snarling crewman.
Jaden nodded grimly. "Don't let it touch you."
She adjusted her stance and lifted her free hand, forming a tight Force shield around her body. "No contact. Got it."
They pressed forward, reaching a long corridor that fed into the hangar lifts. Behind them, the noise escalated, they were pouring down the hallway now like a wave, both the slime and the crew. Aubrie turned to glance back and winced. "They're close. Really close."
"Then we close the door," Jaden said as he cracked his neck.
"What door!?" Aubrie said in a panic.
Jaden paused mid-run and slammed both palms against the wall, focusing his will. The Force surged. The entire hallway started to bend inwards before the metal snapped and the entire corridor collapsed. "That'll buy us some time," he said, pulling Aubrie into the lift chamber. They dove inside. Jaden slammed the panel. The lift hummed and jolted upward. Both of them relaxed slightly as they managed to get away, whatever this parasite was... it was dangerous and they couldn't risk.
"That was close," Jaden breathed heavily.
Aubrie only nodded. Both of them were shell shocked by what they just saw. Both of them were seasoned warriors and faced dozens of battles, but none of that prepared them for seeing dead men chase them.
"At least we got away," Jaden said as he stood up and the elevator came to a halt. Though when the doors opened he couldn't help but wonder why he had to go and open his big fat mouth.
The hangar was under assault. More of the altered crew were flooding through the far entrances, and in the center of it all, Fay, Zule, and Vaylin held the line. Fay was mid-swing, her lightsaber catching a lunging attacker across the side and spinning into the next with slash that bisected them. Zule stood beside her, her prosthetic arm extended and rapid-firing shots into clusters of targets while she decapitated one of them with her saber. Vaylin had a blaster rifle and was shooting at them from the ramp, though her aim wasn't good.
"Get into the ship quickly!" Fay shouted as she spotted Jaden and Aubrie. "We need to leave now!"
Without hesitation, Jaden and Aubrie charged into the open space, cutting a path with their lightsabers. The altered crew converged around them in a mad scramble. Both Fay and Jaden nodded, before they moved together and threw their hands up unleashing a devastating Force Push that sent them back and gave them the time they needed to get onto the ship.
"Scout, start the engines!" Jaden shouted as he reached the base of the ramp.
Already in the cockpit, Scout's voice crackled through the comms. "On it!"
Jaden and Aubrie sprinted up just as the floor trembled under the ship's engines. Fay, Zule, and Vaylin followed close behind. As the last of them cleared the threshold, the ship shuddered and the ramp sealed shut behind them with a final hiss.
The shuttle lifted off the deck. Through the small rear window, they could see the remaining crew swarm toward the rising vessel, shrieking with rage, but it was too late. The ship peeled away from the hangar and shot into space. Inside no one spoke at first. They stood where they were, breathing hard, eyes scanning the interior as if half-expecting something to have made it inside with them.
"We made it," Fay said quietly, lowering her weapon.
Jaden didn't respond. He kept his eyes on the shrinking shape of the starship behind them through the viewport. Its flickering lights disappeared one by one into the dark.
"Whatever that was..." Aubrie murmured. "It seems the captain knew of it and shut down the engines, and activated the quarantine procedures. "
Zule glanced at Jaden. "You think it's a disease?"
"I think we were lucky to get out when we did," Jaden said.
Vaylin stepped forward. "Let's just hope it stays sealed in that ship."
Jaden turned on his comms. "Scout do we have weapons?" He asked.
"Negative, we barely have engines, we need to get to a drydock," she replied through the comms.
"Kriff..." Jaden cursed to himself.
"Jaden I know you've been avoiding it but I believe it's time we returned back to known space..." Fay said softly as she put a hand on his shoulder.
Jaden sighed. "I know, I know I was just hoping to avoid it a bit longer, I've been having fun out here with you guys."
The girls smiled at him.
"Apart from the time we landed on that planet with the black hole at its centre," Aubrie said.
"Well... yeah apart from that," Jaden replied.
"And the time we found that sun station and nearly got caught in a supernova," Vaylin added.
"That wasn't too bad..." Jaden murmured.
"That time a star weird nearly killed all of us," Zule said, crossing her arms.
"We lived?" Jaden said sheepishly.
"The time where we got knocked out of warp by a star grazer and had to land in a ship that was filled with a parasitic crew that tried to infect us..." Scout said through the comms.
"Okay I get it! Scout set a course for Coruscant, maximum warp."
"Aye aye Captain!"
(AN: So a bit of an introduction chapter to this arc. We are now in the clone wars tv show era. Well by tv show I mean the clone wars movie. That's what we are starting with though I'll probably change some stuff as you know how much I hate following canon. Don't worry though I always include cool moments from canon or I try and make them better. Anyway hope you enjoyed it.)
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