Post by Logan Shivers on Jul 7, 2021 21:44:53 GMT
Logan was doing one of the things he hated most… sitting in an office in the Faceless Hunter Ascendancy training academy looking through training files. Of course he paid clerical staff, he paid office Managers, he had trusted and skilled instructors…. But none of them could give him the FEEL of picking out special individuals… So, once a year he forced himself to sit down, go through the files and select individuals that he will then meet in person and take through some rigorous testing of his own to see which of them, if any, will join his personal military unit.
But it was SUCH A TEDIOUS TASK…. There MUST be a better way…. Offices were just so…so… boring and he could not even drink too much as.. well, it made reading the damned files even harder. He was still lamenting his current self imposed discontent when the communication unit on his desk bleeped.
Dropping his bare feet to the bare wooden floor, which had been propped up on the vast desk he sat behind, Logan leant forward and hit the receive button. Not an encrypted message coming through, just a general use transmition from Proconsul Max Ameeno Bacca. Odd, he was not used to open communications coming from him…
A holo image of the Wookie appeared in miniature over his desk, the Proconsul as usual perfectly groomed and in a pretty sharp uniform – something he insisted in wearing despite his race’s odd predilection towards nudity. They were a strange race, and one he SHOULD find offensive and far beneath him in social standing, but, well, his time spent with the Wookies of the Alliance had somewhat changed his mind and he had grown really quite fond of them and their strange ways.
“General, how are you enjoying your clerical time?”
Max knew as well as anyone how much Logan detested this yearly task so this was clearly a goad to irk him. That was ok, it meant that whatever this call was about, it was not business.. not serious either… so…?
“Hey boss-Wookie furball, you calling to offer yourself up to do my dirty work?! This don’t seem to be a business call so I can only think you felt so sorry for me that you are heading over here to help me out right?”
Logan split his face into a huge toothy grin that he knew full well looked nothing like pleasant… but it was what was expected in so called civilised discourse. Max chuckled and shook his head.
“No my friend, that task is well and tryly yours to keep, I have more than enough of my own clerical work to do… unless of course you wish to swap?!”
Trying to keep the horror from his face, he continued grinning and kept his reply up-beat, perhaps a bit too much so,
“Aw, you honour me with such trust… but perhaps we are best suited to our own little tasks hey?!
Max laughed again before continuing,
“I had an invitation come through for the AMC to take part in a large scale competitive event they are calling a “Showdown”. Sounds like it will involve some form of combat….”
Max did not have the chance to finish he explanation, Logan had stood up, dumped his datapad on the table and was in the process of gathering his battle armour from its stand whilst shouting back at the holo..
“YES, I’M IN!, WHERE DO I NEED TO GO?!!”
“Logan… Logan… LOGAN… GENERAL!!!!!”
That final bellow finally caught his attention,
“You wont need your armour, just bring yourself, all other equipment is provided by the organisers. There is a shuttle waiting for us at our Trading Station in Comra, it is due to take us to the Showdown in five days time. I will meet you there with Pat and Ichiru. I had a feeling I could count on you. See you soon my friend, and travel light.. this is NOT a combat expedition, it is a tournament, understood?”
Logan looked upon his beloved battle armour and ran his thick digit down one of its many scars,
“Arer you sure Max?... Maybe just in case I should…”
“No Logan, competition rules, nobody will be allosed entry with any weapons or combat gear of any type, there is huge security arrangements in place as there will be some… interesting competitors taking part.”
Barely an hour after that call, Logan was in his YT-2000 “Firestone Heretic” and running through his preflight checklist. He muttered to himself as he ran down the list,
“Aurilian Beer – 2 crates, Corellian Brandy – 1 crate, Corellian Spice Run – 1 crate……”
He continued to mumble his way down the list, then re-read it…. Something was missing… He stomped out of the cockpit and was shouting at the top of his voice by the time his feet hit the ramp down to the landing pad,
“ARGOOOOOOON!!!!!.... ARGON, where are you you lumbering giant… ah, there you are, where is my crate of Mags Fire Whiskey?!”
The Gamorrean looked on impassively and just pointed a thick finger towards a box stacker that Logan had almost trampled as he charged out of the ship.
“There.”
Taking note of the human male with a large crate balanced on his shoulder, Logan smiled and relieved him of his load.
“Thanks, I’ll take that from here.”
He hefted the crate happily and returned to his ship, packing the container safely into the hold. He added the item to his inventory and did his preflight check one last time to make sure he was happy.. then he punched the engines to life, closed the ramp and trusting in his ground crew to have done the ACTUAL pre flight check before letting him onto the ship.. he sat himself down in the pilots seat and guided the nimble little freighter into the skies of Leafar.
++++++
The Comra Trading station was a busy place, but it did not take Logan long to get a couple of the docking bay crew along and got them busy unloading his cargo.
“You know where the shuttle for this Showdown event thing is?”
“Yes sir, landing pad 13A, big green thing over there.”
“Good, take the crates over and load them up into it, and be carefull, those crates are valuable.”
“yes sir.”
With that he left the workers and made his way towards the shuttle, having only just arrived in time for its departure, he assumed the others would already be onboard, or at least in its vicinity. Sure enough, as he approached the green showdown shuttle he spotted the trio standing by the entry ramp chatting amongst themselves.
“Not too late to join this party am I?”
“Ah, Logan, there you are.. not like you to be late for a potential party?”
Pat tipped his hat at Logan as he spoke, ever the polite one he was.
“Could not squeeze any more out of the engines… Did the Leafar to Comra trip in pretty good time, well, considering I made a slight error and went to Carlac first.. easy mistake to make when in a hurry right?!”
Ichiru raised his eyebrow, Pat smiled a knowing smile and Max shook his head. It was Max that spoke next,
“Logan… will you EVER change?!.. what the?”
Two sweating, grunting workers were making their way up the ramp to the shuttle with crate upon crate stacked on anti-grav sleds, with huge stickers bearing the FHA emblem on them.
The three all stared and then turned as one to look accusingly at Logan, once again, it was Max that spoke up first,
“Logan, I thought I made it clear.. no combat gear, no….”
Logan waved his hand in a dismissive manner,
“I heard ya! That’s not my war stuff… that is just some liveners to keep us going while the party is on!”
He produced a datapad and brought up the list of contents and proudly handed it to Max.
“I already checked it in with the Showdown Security grunt, he said he looked forward to finding me on his downtime!”
“Not surprised..”
Max replied in a sort of stunned manner, his eyes bulging a bit as he read down the list, then handed it to Ichiru and Pat to read,
“Logan… there is enough booze there to drown a battalion!”
It was Logans turn to look shocked,
“So you don’t think I brought enough?!”
++++++
The Showdown had been going very well, all competitors were in great spirits and some truly spectacular battles had been accomplished in the space combat simulation rounds. But where the real interest lay for Logan was the ground combat events, he really wanted to gt stuck into those and get his adrenaline rushing around. He had been told that all the combatant troops would be from Polus, a planet he was familiar with, having worked with the funny little bird-like aliens in the past.
But… the spirit of the Showdown had got hold of Logan a bit too much and he almost missed the first event AMC were scheduled to take part in. He stumbled into the waiting room to be greeted by a trio of not so impressed companions. Ichiru, used to this sort of behaviour just shook his head, Pat put his head in his hands and Max groaned..
“Logan!.... we are supposed to be going out to the arena and you can barely walk!!”
Logan stared at Max for a couple of seconds, or maybe a bit longer until comprehension dawned.
“OHHH!!... Ish ok… lemme get thish shorted…”
He rooted around his robes and finally found what he was looking for. He brought a stim pack up in front of him with a look of triumph.
“Shee?! I jusht take thish…”
Logan managed to jab himself on only the second attempt and plunged the content into his bloodstream. The contents were the highly toxic mixture his family had come up with some centruries past, and its effects were almost instant. Logan went rigid, his entire body tensed and his face contorted in a look of sheer pain, then he collapsed to the floor in violent convulsions. After a few minutes, this drew the attention of the event overseer who took one look at the shaking Trandoshan sprawled on the floor and raised an eyebrow at the remaining AMC team members.
“Does this mean you are not able to compete?”
Max smiled at the overseer.
“We will be fine sir.. he will be back up and ready in a few more minutes.”
The overseer did not seem convinced.
“Arena doors open in five minutes. Your troops are inside ready to accept your command. If he cant walk in unattended, you are out.”
With that he walked away, attending to his many other tasks. But just as Max had predicted, having seen Logan use that particular stim in the past, Logans body stopped convulsing and seconds before the arena doors were due to open he flipped open hes eyes and grinned his toothy, ugly grin.
“Ready for battle sir!”
His voice was raspy, full of supressed rage and pain, the last lingering affects of his drug intake. He got himself up and just as the doors swung open to the arena he raised himself to his full height. The four warriors made their way into the arena and greeted the waiting Penguani troops.
After briefing them on the tactics that the four had settled on, the squad leaders collected their weapons from the racks. Eager to inspect the provided vibroblades Logan rushed over and picked his allocated weapons up and then stared at them in confusion. He walked over to his squad and inspected their weapons and his facial expressions began to flip from confusion, to rage, and back again..
“HEY!, MAX, come look at this… we’ve been sabotaged!! These are all blunted!!”
Logan did not notice the looks his squad gave him upon making that statement, and when Max made his way over, followed by a curious Ichiru, he did not understand why the Wookie was laughing at him.
“Of course they are blunted you great big Nerf brained lump… this is not a real war… its not real battles, we are not intending to kill… accidents of course might happen, but the intent is to incapacitate, not kill, got it?”
Logan tried to hide his disappointment and shrugged,
“Sure, I guess… but… if I accidentally..”
“Logan, just try to knock out, not splatter, that make it a bit clearer?”
“I got it, I got it… I’ll be carefull…”
The horns blasted, announcing the start of their combat round. As planned, Ichiru headed out to a prime location with his sniper squad, finding a clear line of sight to where the enemy would be coming from. Max and Pat followed, arranging themselves to be able to provide covering arcs of fire, whilst also able to go on the offensive when the opportunity arose.
Logan, much to his dismay, was supposed to stay behind cover until he was called for and, as he knew he had already strained his friends patience this night, he did his best to sit tight where he was told and avoided his natural desire to just go and wreak havoc.
It was not long before the subdued sound of high powered blasters set to stun filled the air around him. Flashes of light reflected from the arena walls around him and as the air filled with more and more static charge from the heavy fire, Logan found himself getting more and more hyped up.
Eventually, the call came through for Logan to make his entrance and he almost missed it he was so agitated.
“Logan, come in and cover, take out their melee team”
Turning around to his troop of 12 Penguani, who looked almost as agitated as he did, he growled,
“Its our time birdies, lets go break some skulls!!”
In a somewhat unorganised manner, the 13 warriors ran into battle, spotting the enemy melee fighters and making a beeline towards them. With all the pent up aggression the clash was violent and fast, forcing their opponents to disengage from their attack on Pat and his squad and make an evasive run back towards their own riflemen to try and get some covering fire.
But Logan was past caring about avoiding blaster fire, his eyes were set onto a target and he was NOT letting go. He led his team in a charge across the arena, clashing with his opponents rear guard and slowly running them down until none were left standing. There was a trail behind them of penquani bodies in various states of unconsciousness and injury, none able to continue in the fight any longer.
Breathing heavily from his exertions, Logan looked around him, realising he was slap bang in the middle of the arena with the majority of his squad still around him. Scanning around he saw that bot hteams had lost their sniper squads and Max and Pat were currently pinned down by the enemy riflemen who outnumbered the remaining troops in his companions combined squads.
“Ok, we done good boys and girls, now we got to run the gauntlet, get your heads down and charge those rifles, don’t stop until you hit them you hear me?”
Riled up by their success, and by their leaders infectious battle lust the Penguani shouted and squaked their agreement and the charge began.
What followed was a bit of a blur for Logan, a chase across the arena, dodging shots and landing blows where they could catch their opponents out. Several violent clashes later and Logan found himself standing over a pair of avian bodies, with just 8 of his squad left, all looking like they were about to fall over. His breathing was ragged and deep, his lungs barely able to take in enough oxygen to keep him standing. He wiped his face to try and clear his vision and realised his hand came away slick with blood, but as the motion had also cleared his vision he ignored it and took a look around him.
To his amazement he realise that he and his diminished troop were the last ones standing!! What he thought was the sound of his blood rushing through his veins he now began to realise was the roar of the crown in the arena audience stands.
“We won?”