Republic Reckoning 5.15.87 (night)

When last we left our intrepid adventurers: Quindo was holding a hapless Faux Imperial Guard as a shield against numerous opponents carrying blasters and slugthrowers, stationed on the walls of the inner city and flanking him on either side on the ground. Igashu had dissapeared, presumably against his wishes and in the company of the mysterious Miramoto clan. Christina, Elbram, and Aegon had just witnessed the death of the Emperor (at the hands of the Bayushi clan) and were attempting to fight free and protect non-Bayushi caught in the crossfire including the Princess. Brojen was probably sleeping.

Elbram attacks the two Bayushi who grabbed the Princess and just narrowly escaps impaling the princess on his lightsaber. To his relief, he manages to incapacitate one of the two guards. Christina is grabbed from behind by her right arm, preventing her from drawing her lightsaber.

Quindo (OOC) - "Knee him in the balls... with the Force!"

As Aegon moves to intercept, Chris waves her free hand in the air and makes a subtle suggestion with the Force "I'm not the enemy you're looking for". The guard drops Chris' arm in confusion just in time to get a face full of Aegon's fist. Aegon starts yelling orders for the party to secure the Princess and the door, though it's rather pointless since that's what they were doing anyway. Bayushi Shoju, surrounded by guards, escapes through a secret passage in the initial confusion.

Elbram quickly dispatches the Princess' second attacker. His attempt at non-lethality fails when he accidentally cuts the man's head completely off. The Princess quickly grabs Elbram and heads into the secret passage which appears to be a dead end. Elbram cuts through the wall with his lightsaber rather than waste time looking for a secret door. Te rest of the party follows through, along with some refugees, with Aegon bringing up the rear.

The secret passage decants the fleeing Jedi and refugees into someone's bedroom closet and Aegon uses the Force to stop a glop grenade from hitting the party. As Bayushi troops follow through the passage, Aegon disarms the first guy through, takes his grenade launcher, rifle-whips him with the butt of the weapon and glops the entire hallway behind them to slow pursuit.

The Princess tries to lead the refugees out of the Palace, toward the Helipad. Elbram leads around a corner and gets shot with a glop grenade. He uses the Force to contain most of the blast from the exploding grenade and glop oozes out onto the floor instead of bursting all over him. Unfortunately, the group is pinned down from both sides of the corridor. What does a Jedi do in such circumstances? He cuts through the wall with his lightsaber and into an adjacent room. The refugees pass through into that room and into the next corridor while Christina and Aegon cover their retreat. The final corridor leads to an outer wall, which Elbram cuts through to exit into the Palace gardens.

Meanwhile, Quindo is holding a struggling guard with one arm and his lightsaber with the other while backing toward the cover of some nearby trees. The "Imperial" guards yell for him to surrender, then a sniper takes a shot. Quindo easily blocks the single bullet and tells his prisoner to tell his allies not to shoot. The prisoner yells for them to stop shooting. The Captain of the Guard sneers at that and upbraids the captured guard for forgetting his duty, then unloads a full clip at his erstwhile companion. Quindo tries but fails to stop all the incoming bullets and the poor Bayushi is killed. Quindo drops the body and dives behind cover. Bullets rain into the trees around him. Under cover of the full barrage, the sniper takes a clean shot at Quindo's head. Warned by the Force, Quindo is able to block the bullet, but his lightsaber overloads and dies. Cortosis bullets. He takes out his spare lightsaber and runs deeper into the palace gardens, away from a hail of gunfire. When he's deep enough under cover, he quenches his lightsaber and sneaks through the night. He senses for Elbram's location and circles around the palace toward him. Quindo arrives to see the tip of a lightsaber stab trough the outer wall of the palace. Unfortunately, there are guards nearby and they see it too. Before they can call for help, Quindo uses Projected Fighting to subdue them both. From a distance of 20 feet, he roundhouse kicks the two closest opponents and throws one into the other. One manages to fire a wild burst before falling. Another guard comes running around the corner and is tripped by Quindo who puts him in a virtual headlock until he passes out.

Elbram is the first through the wall and notices the unconscious guards. Chris comes out soon after, just in time to see the third guard choked into unconsciousness. She suspects Quindo of using the cool Darth Vader Force Choke thingie, but doesn't say anything.

We crash the front gates in force and head for the Imperial Landing Pad. There are sentries, we sneak up on them. Quindo and Aegon fail to sneak. That's okay. As the guards turn, Quindo TK's the guard's gun away and breaks for the shuttle. Aegon leaps onto the pad, blocks a full auto burst point blank from one of the guards, grabs his gun and Force Pushes him away. The pilot on the shuttle is caught trying to disable the controls but Quindo grapples him. Chris uses the Force to convince him that he's actually succeeded in disabling the ship. Quindo checks the controls while Elbram and Aegon guard the rear. Chris jumps in the co-pilot seat.

We manage to get the ship off the ground (barely) and are immediately surrounded by an escort that orders us to land by the order of Emperor Bayushi.

This is the wrong answer, they fire missiles. We open comms and let the Empress speak for herself. She proclaims herself the rightful heir and asks for help from all loyal Clans. Chris sucks at flying so Quindo takes the controls. We dodge a couple missles while wrestling for control of the ship. Now Chris seems to be getting the hang of it, so Quindo gives her back control. Finally, the Shinjo show up to shoot some badguys off our tail. Raiders suddenly jump in system and begin attacking the planet while we break for high orbit.

We make our escape.

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