— Atom —
Circumtore was a strange place, owing to its unique shape and artificial creation. 'Donut-shaped' torus planets were theoretically possible in physics, but at the same time, they were also so improbably contrived that that theoretical possibility was rendered moot. Without outside interference, one wouldn't come to be. But I'd personally seen how this one came to be, and now, I was personally experiencing the effects of its nature.
Standing on Circumtore's surface felt normal. Down was down, as could be expected anywhere else, and the world spun around a not-so-imaginary, not-so-empty centerpoint that I knew was occupied by Loathsome Malik's corpse. The world's total mass in play needed to be several times greater than a planet of equal gravity to reach a similar gravitational pull.
Gravity tried to pull it into a good and proper spheroid shape. Centrifugal forces tried to flatten the world into a disk, stretching it into a thick hoop around the central point of potential, while centripetal forces kept everything spinning together.
Perfectly balanced against each other, the torus planet came to be. While the potential center of gravity lay at the not-so-empty center of the hoop, with Loathsome Malik's corpse, the true mass was still where the actual matter was. Thus, gravity across its surface was equipotent, still pulling toward the closest actual mass.
Or put simply, no matter the overall potential center of gravity, down was still down across the torus, perpendicular to the world's surface. It was slightly weaker along the outer equatorial band and strongest at the circular poles at the hoop's highest and lowest points.
From the perspective of a person on the ground, Circumtore — in all its donut-shaped glory — could've been mistaken for any other world. It maintained a perfectly habitable biosphere — bio-torus, that is — and a strong magnetic field to keep that bio-torus thriving. But stand on it too long, and the differences quickly become apparent.
To flatten the world into a pseudo-disk — more flat than it was round — Circumtore rotated at a truly impressive rate. And as a result, Circumtore's days and nights were just five hours each. A Circumtore year had almost a thousand of these days — 876 — to stay consistent with the timekeeping of the rest of the galaxy.
That impressive rotation had more effects than just the obvious day-night cycle. It, along with the differentials in gravity — and thus, air pressure — between both equators and both poles, also drove the weather of the world.
Circumtore, for all its nature as a paradise world, had weather to rival any death world. The worst of its jet streams could tear a starship to pieces. The storms of Circumtore were legendary when they struck — quick to come, but thankfully just as quick to pass. And even at its most habitable, the temperature differences across relatively short distances could be intense.
The exterior band of the world was where all the living happened, with the interior band receiving almost no light from the system's star and being a sub-arctic hellscape as a result. The circular poles were cold but still possibly livable. And the outer equator received the most consistent light and energy from the system's star.
Circumtore had three supercontinents, but only two mattered. The third was the barren, uninhabitable stretch of land, ice, and dead dust that consumed the whole interior band of the world, simply known, even to the Hutts, as Desolate. No fancy name, just the abject truth of the land.
The other two, Bootana — 'Garden' — and Azalus — 'Hazard' —, were both technically connected to Desolate, but obviously, the lines were drawn just past the northern and southern circular poles where the land stopped being livable. Bootana stretched north and east; Azalus stretched south and west. They were separated from each other by a continuous, winding, and still vast diagonally oriented ocean that looked like a river around the whole world from orbit.
Both continents had stories to tell. Bootana was where most of the world's population resided, while Azalus was the adventuring ground of the young, bold, or exiled. The latter boasted the worst of the world's already extreme weather, along with all the extreme wildlife the Hutts could import, throwing everything at the world to see what survived. Meanwhile, the former was almost entirely colonized and pacified, boasting just one massive major city that could be seen cutting starkly into the world's paradisical nature as a sprawling gray and brown stain from orbit.
The biomes of Circumtore took shape in latitudinal bands due to the unique nature and climate of the bio-torus. At the outer equator, dense jungles encircled the torus. On Bootana, those jungles were bordered by temperate mountain ranges to the north and the splitting sea to the south. On Azalus, the southern edge of the jungles abruptly, over the span of mere miles, transitioned into deserts to rival Tatooine.
With not much to fight for on Azalus, we'd made our landing on Bootana in its more temperate northern reaches. The world's only city, massive as it may be, lay directly to our south over the mountains, a wound in the thick equatorial jungles.
Hidden recon — David's cloak-capable SPECTRE coming in clutch there — had pinpointed a good spot for our beachhead on the world. Remote enough to get our feet under us; close enough to strike and threaten as needed.
The fortress that'd been here when we arrived had already been blasted into the dirt. Without having to worry about collateral, we went the way of overkill. Artillery to shake the world and make us surely known to the capital to our south. Once it was zeroed, we began setting up shop.
A base camp was springing up with surprising speed. Pre-fab buildings and all the materials we needed were dropped in from orbit, hanging from the undercarriages of Gonk ships. Converted tug-freighters did the heavy lifting. The LZ was bustling with Gonk and Freed in not-so-equal measure — much more Freed than Gonk, fitting for the crusade.
I'd been right about our invading force composition there. The Gonk forces we'd used for the Freeing of Nar Shaddaa were still anchored on home turf. Gonk gangers weren't about to pick up and stop everything they'd rightfully won. Neither were most corpos. But that didn't mean the Gonks were absent.
Instead of all the fodder, everyone willing to fight for their home, we'd rallied elite fodder, adventurous fodder, and unanchored fodder. Those that could and would come along for the ride, any ride. Edgerunners — both solo and crew —, corpo samurai squads, and every Gonk with something to prove and nothing to lose. As well, most of the Nomads had signed on with the Gonk Fleet, here as ship and vic support. Compared to everyone, fighting for the Freedom of Nar Shaddaa, about 20% of Gonk fighting fit forces had joined us for this invasion and crusade.
At the same time, our handpicked fodder made up around 20% of the crusade's forces. The rest were Freed — either Freest Legion for the fighting or non-fighting Freed for logistical and medical support. They'd signed up in droves once news of Mighty Leia's Crusade spread. Every one of them was here to fight and die for their Starry Sister, or support the brave souls who would.
The whole crusade had been outfitted as best the Cartel could manage, sparing no expense. Scratch, both from the Cartel's majority hold on Free Nar Shaddaa and still more stolen directly from the Hutts, was put to best use.
In a way, the Hutts were still funding their own demise. Kiwi and Lucy's netrunning squads had never stopped robbing Hutts blind in the net. They brought in hundreds of millions of creddies by the day, which were almost always funneled right back into the running and development of Gonk Free Nar Shaddaa.
Everyone who needed a blaster had one. Hell, they had two. Armor and chrome as well, whatever they needed. If a Gonk signed up for the crusade, the Cartel would sponsor one chrome upgrade for them with only a few questions asked. The chrome came from Gonk-affiliated corps; all that business kept them rather happy with me.
And for the real elite fodder, a decent few more Meks were made available. Nothing on the Core 9 Meks, the original Gen2 production run. Those were custom-made for the Core Crew — Me, Sasha, Lucy, Becca, Shaitan, Podry, Isla, V, and Smasher — and kept as the best of the best.
The Gen3s were made as trooper Meks. Solid, reliable, and still very much revolutionary. A Gen3 Mek was around 5 meters tall instead of almost 10 at the high end with Smasher and Shaitan, with about 15 tons of customizable loadout carrying capacity compared, again, to Smasher and Shaitan's 40.
The standard Gen3 loadout boasted a Mek-scale blaster rifle, along with a shoulder-mount choice of twinned heavy repeaters, concussion missiles/launcher, or an ion/disruptor/gauss cannon. The ammo independent options allowed for Mek-scale grenades to be carried, and every Gen3 had a melee option available to them — either a Mek-scale vibrobayonet or just their steel fists.
They were uniform and semi-mass-produced, while the Core 9 Meks were almost artisanal. The Gen3s were something those Womp-Rat mad scientists had thrown together 'cause they were ordered to; the Gen2s were still their babies.
That said, every Mek was still a machine of war as the galaxy had never seen it, and each of the new pilots had been handpicked from the elite of the elite.
They were given to cutting-edge corpo samurais and edgerunners with nigh-Legendary rep. They were also given to some of Night City's original boogiemen: MaxTac.
MaxTac employed monsters, one and all. But they were all monsters who could and had been tamed. They were often just as chromed-out as the cyberpsychos they hunted, with better training and coordination beyond. With all of Night City having long-since fallen in line behind the Gonks, those cyberpsycho hunting monsters were at our disposal.
Of the 120 Gen3 Meks we were fielding for the crusade, 60 of them were wielded by MaxTac pilots. Then, 20 samurai from various corps (mostly Arasaka as our closest corpo partner) and 20 edgerunners who just needed one more push to make themselves proper Night City Legends.
The last 20 were given over to Freest Legion pilots. I wasn't about to leave them out in the rain without steel, but worthy pilots for them had been harder to find. Raising former slaves to the level of nigh-Legendary edgerunners, corpos, or MaxTac monsters was a tough ask. Not that the Freed didn't have Legends in their own right — Podry was proof — but slaves hadn't often been given the level of equipment they deserved when being forced to fight. The rise from fighting pit to Mek pilot was a bit of a leap as a result.
To keep our Mek regiment from running off to test out their new toys, I'd assigned them to help build the base camp. They, along with the logistical vics, were making quick work of it. Now, Big Red was sitting on the rubble where the fortress had stood, and I was sitting on his shoulder, watching the steel at work.
We had a few moments of security to work with here. But the Hutts of the world had to know their world was being invaded. We hadn't been subtle, not in orbit and certainly not on the ground.
Our obliterating siege would've been heard from orbit, and from the ground, I could see that same orbit being secured by the Gonk Fleet. There was a Hutt fleet guarding Circumtore, but it was weaker than the one we'd smashed around Nal Hutta. David's battle plan had punched a hole straight through their screen around the world, allowing the Gonk ground forces to land while he cleaned up the rest.
Naval action against the Hutts was a frustrating and tragic thing. They absolutely had slaves manning their ships, and we couldn't reasonably do anything about those collateral casualties. The Hutt ships needed to be zeroed. Thousands of Mighty Leia's chained siblings would be rejoining her Sky as a result.
Knowing that we were forced to flatline slaves burned. But even if we used ion weapons to disable the Hutt ships, any boarding action likely wouldn't get to all of the slaves aboard before the slugs got… petty. By no fault of their own, slaves — siblings — were dying up there.
At the very least, I could feel Mighty Leia accepting each of her siblings lost to collateral as they passed, and Fay reported the same. We couldn't do anything for them, but the Starry Sister could welcome them with open arms, hold them tightly, and apologize for the futility of it all.
It was the most we could do for them… and that burned.
I'd already vowed to myself that the sitch wouldn't be the same down here. With boots on the ground, we had more options. And as soon as the base camp was up and fortified, I'd be sending strike squads to free the infamous slave legions of Circumtore.
The Shell Hutts of Circumtore were a special breed, even for the Hutts. They interacted with the world through suits of advanced, slug-shaped power armor, never leaving their titular 'shells'. And that was just the most obvious quality that set them apart.
Culturally, they saw themselves as the epitome of the Hutt species. That alone wasn't anything special. Every Hutt saw themselves as the peak of 'noble civilization'.
But the Shell Hutts might just have more of a claim to that than the rest.
They took everything that made a Hutt — cruelty, depravity, superiority, excess, and slime — and made a religion out of it — likely, as I now knew, influenced by Loathsome Malik's corpse in that cruel, depraved, superior, excessive, and slimy pride.
While the Snails embraced the modern Hutt way of life, they also maintained the old way. The warrior way, from when the Hutts conquered their significant slice of the galaxy. Their power-armored shells were meant for war. They still practiced ancient Hutt warrior arts. And with their homeworld's position as a gateway into Hutt Space, they saw themselves as Guardians. Not just Guardians of physical territory, but also, with their religious fervor, guardians of Hutt culture as a whole, protecting it from weak and pathetic outside influences.
They were Templars of everything Hutt; Templars considered extreme even by other Hutts; Templars leading infamous legions of slaves.
Templars evolved from the still-dreaming corpse of the First Slaver…
In a fitting way, this crusade was the only way to deal with the Shell Hutts — religious fervor to match religious fervor. Anything else would inevitably fall short of the task. But here we were. Here… we crusaded in Mighty Leia's name.
I watched the beachhead of that crusade take shape from atop my Mek, atop rubble we'd already made. One Shell Hutt down, obliterated with their fortress. More would come, dragging chained siblings behind them. We'd be ready. And these siblings, we'd save from their chained fates.
We landed at dawn, broke the fortress at noon, and now, night was already beginning to fall on this part of Circumtore. It was slightly jarring, but we'd adjust. Sunset lasted all of 30 seconds. It was a beautiful one, though. A veritable flash of pink turning a deep blood red like a signal for bloodshed to begin. Then, the stars came out — both those distant and the closer ones of the Gonk Fleet, gaining orbital superiority.
Smasher came up to me in the night, tons of steel moving with eerie silence, "READY TO LET THE V-BRAT LOOSEN MY LEASH, CLONE-MEAT?"
"Maybe. Or maybe not," I glared at him. "Since someone didn't feel like putting 10 meters of steel to work building the beachhead with everyone else."
Smasher chuckled, "THIS FRAME IS MADE FOR VIOLENCE, NOT GRUNT WORK. I'LL OFFLINE MYSELF BEFORE GETTING THESE PERFECT HANDS DIRTY WITH ANYTHING BUT BLOOD."
"Petty fucking 'Borg," I grumbled. "Whatever. I've got a mission for you. A mission for everyone. Nova, I know you're listening through Smasher's systems. Gather the crew and our elite unit leaders, will you?"
"… Message sent, Father," Nova's voice came from Smasher's speakers.
Smasher grumbled at that, "DON'T GO MAKING A HABIT OF PIGGYBACKING ON ME, LITTLE ONE."
"… Request denied, Grandpapa Smasher."
I laughed to myself as we waited for everyone to gather. Those two together were too cute for their own good. Nova made even Smasher seem like less of a monster, and she'd obviously won him over completely, despite his grumbles. Never thought I'd hear Adam Fucking Smasher call anyone 'little one'…
It took a bit, but everyone I deemed up to the task I had in mind gathered in the rubble of the fortress. There was the Core Crew, of course, but also our leading Mek pilots and a good representation of our elite PBI. The best of the best, be they Gonk or Freed. MaxTac squadron leaders, nigh-Legendary edgerunning leaders, Freest Legion leaders who'd survived all the worst fighting that could be thrown at a slave, and corpo samurai equipped with the best and trained even better.
"What's the gig, Atom?" Maine asked.
"Something to give you all the action you could ask for," I answered. "I need strike teams comfortable with acting independently behind enemy lines. I need bad motherfuckers who won't back down until the contract is closed. I need each and every one of you to pull your weight. 'Cause this crusade's gonna be relying on you. If you don't think you can hang, say something now."
Of course, no one backed down from the challenge. The idea was unthinkable. An electric sort of eagerness settled over everyone there. They were ready for anything I could throw at them. Circumtore would weep when I set them loose.
"Good," I nodded at the commitment I was seeing. "I'm putting all of your units to the task of freeing the slave legions of Circumtore. Anything goes. Whatever you need to do, don't hesitate. Those legions are going to be sent our way. And I have no intention of flatlining any of them. They're not our enemies; they're victims. I don't think I have to tell you that they don't deserve to die for their cruel sluggin' masters."
"No blood of Mighty Leia's still-chained kin shall be forcefully shed today, none more than necessary," A Freest Legion Mek pilot said solemnly.
He was Grunt, renamed in chains to fit his role in a similar slave legion to the ones we were now forced to face. Better than most, he knew and appreciated the reasons for this gig. The Freest Legion portion of this gig would undoubtedly stop at nothing to see it through.
"We can pick our targets?" A Kiroshi Opticals corpo samurai — a subtly chromed-out woman named Shirasa — asked.
"Once you're in the thick of it, you'll be acting and reacting on your own," I confirmed. "I won't micromanage. Just make sure the contract is good and closed. Flatline the Hutt masters, shatter their slave controllers, and break some damn chains, neh?"
"And you, Atom?" Aayla asked, just as invested in this gig as those from the Freest Legion.
"Unfortunately, I think I'll have to stick around here and hold down the fort," I grunted unhappily. "I'll be dealing with the welcome we're sure to receive; we might be guests, but I doubt it'll be a gentle one. So this is your time to shine, not mine."
"I shall join you in this defense, Atom," Fay said. "The beachhead will not fall; the crusade will not fail."
"Not a chance," I agreed. "But without being able to flatline the enslaved legions the Shell Hutts will be sending our way, it'll be an… interesting fight."
"Fun challenge," V teased.
"Not nearly as fun as going on the offensive," I shot back.
"Nope~…" V smirked. "Guess it sucks to suck. Sit pretty and keep all this up and running, Atom. The rest of us will get busy with the ninjutsu."
"FUCK NINJUTSU; I DON'T DO QUIET," Smasher chuffed.
"You really fraggin' don't," I agreed, my tone deceptively casual. "That's why I'm assigning a special squad for you. MaxTac? Up for keeping a steel psycho in line?"
The leading MaxTac pilot answered instantly, "Sir! Fuck, yes, sir! That alone would pay for our presence here. We've been waiting for our chance to zero the chrome whale. This won't be that, but we'll take what we can get."
That MaxTac pilot bore the ominous handle 'John Doe'. Knowing MaxTac's recruitment strategies, that likely meant he was one. An unidentified cyberpsycho thought flatlined; brought into MaxTac's fold instead.
I'd seen it already, but MaxTac had a unique relationship with Smasher. Upon joining the unit, their sole purpose in life became zeroing cyberpsychos. And you didn't get more cyberpsycho than Smasher. But the Legend was protected and 'in control' of himself, off limits to MaxTac. They might've taken offense to that. So Smasher became their ideal, their greatest ambition, their 'chrome whale'.
Many of them, I'd bet, had been living for the day he finally stepped out of line, and they were called with him as the target. Getting to him first had earned me as much discontent as respect from them. The fact that he was back up and fighting fit was likely the reason so many of them had signed on for this crusade. Their chrome — now steel — whale was one hell of a carrot.
"That's my job…" V said before grinning. "But I suppose I could accept a bit of heavy backup there."
"I'LL MURDER ALL OF YOU," Smasher growled. "THINK YOU'RE TOUGH SHIT 'CAUSE YOU HAPPEN TO MURDER SHIT WORTH MURDERIN' FOR A LIVING?"
"Yes," John Doe simply said. "Yes, we do."
Smasher chuffed, "AT LEAST YOU'RE PROPERLY HONEST ABOUT IT. STILL, YOU FUCKERS HAVEN'T GOTTEN ME SO FAR. THAT'S NOT GONNA CHANGE TODAY. I'VE BEEN TEMPTED, THOUGH. PUSH THE OLD MAN'S BUTTONS A BIT TOO MUCH, AND HE'D HAVE TO GIVE ME A GOOD CHALLENGE… SHAME I LIKE THE MURDER HE PROVIDES ME MORE THAN I'D LIKE TO MURDER YOU SMALL FRIES."
"Careful, Smasher," V teased. "They might start to think you care~…"
"Weapons like him don't care for anything," John Doe solemnly stated. "That's why they send monsters like us to zero monsters like him."
"… HEH. STROKE MY SHIT SOME MORE, WHY DON'T YA?"
"We've always been ready to smash the Smasher."
"Eww," V deadpanned.
Quinlan nodded, just as flatly, "There's absolutely no reason a murder rivalry should feel this… almost sexual."
"NO SEX, JUST BLOOD AND MURDER AND DESTRUCTION," Smasher chuckled. "WE UNDERSTAND EACH OTHER, AT LEAST."
"We do," John Doe nodded. "One step out of line, Smasher, and MaxTac will put you down."
"THERE IS NO LINE FOR ADAM FUCKING SMASHER."
I rolled my eyes, "I see everyone's happy with that squad arrangement. The rest of you will be left to choose your own. I want Meks and groundpounders in each one, to cover each other's weaknesses. You'll all be… cavalry, in a way, since the groundpounders will be riding the Meks. Hit fast, hit hard, and get the job done."
The leaders there began to group together and coordinate. Sasha, Becca, and Lucy would be taking the rest of the Core Crew as their groundpounding support, along with a few more edgerunner Mek pilots that Maine seemed familiar with. Shaitan took the rest of the edgerunning Mek pilots and groundpounders. V, Isla, and Smasher had a double-squad of MaxTac Meks with them, along with corpo samurai groundpounders. Podry took half of the Freest Legion Mek pilots and a portion of their groundpounding elites; Aayla and Quinlan took the rest of the Freest Legion Meks while making up the groundpounding aspect of their squad by themselves.
Each elite unit had a Mek spine, groundpounding support, netrunning capabilities, and at least one Freed 'ambassador' with them. Everything they needed to break some damn chains. Even for a mission in purely enemy territory, this might've been a bit of overkill. But the crusade was counting on this mission, this contract being closed.
So long as slave legions existed on Circumtore, we were at a massive disadvantage. Our whole purpose here was to bring Mighty Leia's Freedom to the world. Being forced to flatline her siblings, chained to the fight, went directly against that purpose. They had to be freed and gotten out of the way first and foremost, or our crusade would be flatlined on arrival.
I sent the strike teams off with their mission, staying back to prepare for the inevitable countersiege. Fay stayed back with me, thankfully. I had a feeling she and her Force powers would be essential as we were forced to fight nonlethally. The walls of the base camp were fortified, shield generators were brought up and running, and until the strike teams had had their fun and done their jobs, we settled in to hurry up and wait.
I had good company for that, at least.
"-And then~!" Fay giggled, telling one of what must have been nigh-infinite stories from her long life. "Then, this prince goes so far as to propose! With his fiancée right beside him! And she was nodding in agreement! I couldn't believe it!"
"I can," I chuckled. "Opportunity like that — like you, Fay — doesn't even come around once in a lifetime. You're even more rare. Mythical, even. If they hadn't shot their shot while they could, they would've become vengeful Force spirits from just that one regret."
"Hyperbole, I'm sure," Fay politely denied. For all her lived experience, she was still surprisingly innocent when it came to matters of love and lust.
She hesitated for a moment as my specific wording hit her, "… They?"
"They," I confirmed, flatly amused. "With the fiancée nodding beside him, sounds to me like both genders of royalty were after some immortal elf booty that day."
Fay gasped, "Oh, but the scandal that would've caused on the world! Surely, they wouldn't have jeopardized their future role for just me…?"
"Game is game, and game respects game," I shrugged. "Sometimes, we've gotta sacrifice for the things that are truly important in life. Like immortal elf booty."
"More hyperbole, I'm sure!" Fay exclaimed, torn between shock and laughter. "They were of the responsible sort. Of course, that's what made their proposal so surprising! But I doubt they would've thrown their realm into chaos just for me."
"When the people they ruled saw you, they'd understand," I deadpanned.
Seeing how serious I was, Fay blinked, "And… would you, Atom…?"
"I would," I nodded. "That's a sacrifice I'd be fully willing to make."
"Ridiculous," Fay giggled even as she dismissed the prospect. "Perish the thought! I'm hardly worth a whole realm and its ruling. Especially after I helped secure it for the prince against his treasonous, Dark-Side-dabbling uncle."
I stopped and turned to stare at her. Both of us were sitting on Big Red's shoulder, hip to hip. I made a show of looking her up and down, and then raised a rhetorical eyebrow.
"Fay," I said seriously. "Even without all you did for that prince and his realm, you alone are worth all the stars in the sky."
Speechless, Fay stared back at me. She saw the certainty in my eyes, felt it in my words. Her perfect, unaging visage began to pinken. Her long ears fluttered, flustered. I sensed so much Force within her quiver, trying and failing to conceal her reaction to my earnest statement.
Shakily, she cleared her throat and tried to change the subject, "A-Ahem… Your turn, then. Tell… Tell me a story, Atom."
Amused, I told her, "I don't have many to tell, actually. You do realize you've been in my life since almost the very beginning, as I remember it, neh? For almost everything I've done, Fay, you've been there with me."
With that reminder, Fay's attempt at changing the subject and distracting from her fluster backfired completely. The pink on her cheeks began to practically glow, creeping up her long ears to their wiggling tips.
"A-Ah!" Fay squeaked. "I, uh… I suppose I have. It's a bit strange to remember how young you actually are, Atom… and how old I am… Why, you must see me as decrepit. Preying upon you with my experience, even-…"
"Not a chance," I shot her down immediately. "Past maturity, age is just a number. Especially for an unaging, perfect, nigh-immortal Force elf and a clone who was 'born' fully formed. Don't go thinking it applies to us in our equally unique situations. A thousand or ten, I'd still want you with me, Fay."
"Now, you're just being… ridiculous… Y-Yes, ridiculous…" Fay protested weakly, her ears all but flapping at this point.
"If I need to be ridiculous to get how valued, needed, and desired you are through your surprisingly thick skull, I won't hesitate," I replied.
"R-Ridiculous~…" Fay definitely didn't whimper. The 'not-whimper' just made me want to bully the immortal elf with compliments that much more.
Unfortunately, we were still in the middle of a warzone; it didn't seem like the galaxy would give me the time I wanted to bully Fay until her flapping ears made her take flight. Alarms sounded through the preparing, fortifying base camp. In the Force, I sensed masses of fear, resignation, and chains on the horizon, and sighed. It killed the mood rather effectively.
"That's our welcome party, then," I said, standing.
The sobering sense of the incoming slave legions in the Force immediately dispelled Fay's flush and fluster. Just another reason to hate the Hutts…
With a deep, centering breath, she stood beside me on Big Red's shoulder, "An unspeakably wicked thing, chains dragging them into war against their siblings. They suffer. But they are not yet broken, Atom. Will they live to know the freedom you bring them?"
"That's the plan," I confirmed. "Only the slave drivers behind them will die today. The legions might be forced to fight, but they won't be flatlined by our hands. We'll hold. That's the easy part. Not killing the chained siblings forced to fight us will be the struggle."
"Men and women on our side will die to spare our conscripted enemies," Fay warned.
"They will," I nodded. "The Freed know that already. Many of them have volunteered for it. They're willing to die so their siblings have the chance to know freedom."
It was a tragic certainty. Until control of the slave legions of Circumtore was broken by the strike teams, there was nothing else we could do but fight nonlethally. Blasters set to stun, crippling our own effectiveness for the sake of siblings forced to be our enemies.
There was a cruel competence in the Shell Hutts sending their slaves to bloody us first. Against other invaders — rival Hutts or other enemies that didn't care about butchering their way through enslaved chaff and fodder — the Shell Hutts likely would've rode out to battle themselves in their warrior ways. Against us, though, they had to know the trap they were setting, had to know we'd be forced to fight at half-strength or decimate our own morale.
"I can pacify many without harm, Atom," Fay told me. "But even I can only do so much."
"I know. We know. The Freest Legion is committed to this sacrifice. I'm holding the rest of the Gonk forces back at their request. This is their fight. All we can do now is hold the line against tragedy until the tides can be turned," I said.
"The tides will turn, Atom," Fay assured me. "Until they do… I believe now is the best possible time to teach you Force Sleep."
"Every little bit helps," I agreed. "Let's give these chained siblings a peaceful rest. When they wake up, they'll be Freed."