Bound

The cords bite into his arms and legs, tight and chafing, binding him to the chair. The manacles around his wrists are worse. Torian concentrates on the pain to stay conscious, following it like a bright thread; his thoughts are a grey blur inside his skull. The GenoHaradan put something in his arm to take the fight out of him, to prevent him from killing any more of them. There had been more of them, he remembers. He wiggles his toes, his fingers, keeping blood circulating through his extremities. It's so cold. His left eye won't open anymore.

He can hear his captors beginning to stir, voices rising in frantic whispers, reminding him of angry wasps in a nest.

When he focuses he sees that she's come alone. He knows the GenoHaradan are counting on it. She stands tall, unbowed, her armor the color of shadows and smoke. Ner riduur. The thought is so new it floats, buoyant. The crystalline light of the ice chamber glints off her faceplate, sharp and bright. He can't see her face, but he knows her gaze is on him, and only him; he can feel it, like sunlight.

Their leader – Chask, a name Torian sees when he closes his eyes – preens, taunts, tells her to come closer. She does, without hesitation.

Torian raises his voice to warn her. "Ambush." The word tears at his dry throat like a caltrop.

She knows. He can tell by the way her focus doesn't waver, doesn't shift away from him: steady, warm, determined. Morro. She doesn't say anything, only raises her chin the smallest amount, holding his gaze; he feels it – feels her – as clearly as if she's reached across the chamber and touched his face. He knows she's not leaving without him.

He can see the shimmer then with his good eye, behind her, another to her left, the telltale distortion and gleam: stealth generators.

When she makes a fist with her left hand against her thigh, he knows what it means, as loud as a shout. Down. Torian throws the full weight of his body sideways, feels the legs of the chair teeter and then slip on the ice. He lands prone with a bone-rattling thunk, chair, manacles, cords and all. The icy floor smacks into his bruised face like a slap.

The Genoharadan closest to him pivots, blasters drawn, then the man's head explodes in a shower of sparks and smoke. Gault's work, distinctive. Torian whips his head to the right, back-tracking the shot, his stomach lurching when his vision reels and then abruptly darkens.

Everything is grey. He can feel the familiar report of Morro's blasters like thunder in his head. Beneath the din he can hear the pop of sniper fire, screaming, bodies hitting the cold hard ground, the whoosh-boom and high-pitched yips that can only be a Jawa with a rocket launcher.

He feels a hand on his shin. He makes himself focus through the grey haze and Mako is there, kneeling beside him on her cybernetic knees, thermal goggles obscuring her eyes, sideways in his view; the distortion around her glistens like a veil of light. She says his name, braces him. The quick, precise jab of a dart pierces what's left of his armor between the plates on his thigh, followed by the familiar warmth and tingle of kolto rushing through him.

Mako touches his temple and says his name again like a question. He blinks, tries to think of an answer. There is none. She holds a finger up to her lips and disappears just as suddenly, another blink and she's gone. Then there's a violent oinking screech, too close to him. When he wrenches his head towards the sound Mako shimmers into view like an apparition, caught in the act of twisting her vibroknife into a Gamorrean's kidneys. When the boar turns towards the medic, one hand reaching for the knife sticking out of his lower back, the other raising his axe, Morro blows his face off. It lands on the ice with a sick wet plop.

His captors close in; Torian can hear them, the sounds of shouting and blaster fire loud and then soft, oscillating, off sync with the pulse of pain in his head. Morro throws up her shield, sets her feet, sets fire to a Houk who's stupid enough to get in her face with a techblade, becoming a wall between him and harm. Even through the haze it bothers him; she shouldn't be that close to the melee fighters, that's his job. The Houk burns, shrieks, runs, falls, burns more in a heap on the ice. The smell of broiled Houk is meaty and revolting.

Morro lifts off, a burst from her jetpack giving her the advantage of higher ground, and lays waste to the incoming Genoharadan from above. There's more screaming, more burning. Mako is yelling something behind him; when he struggles towards her he sees that she's covering their flank, a pair of inbound melee fighters caught in an electric net that streams out of her bracer. Another sharp report and Gault picks off one of them, then the other, a matched pair of headshots.

The Genoharadan are onto the artillery. Torian hears Gault curse, loud even over the mayhem. There's heavy firepower coming from above and to the south, targeting the Devaronian, splinters of ice and fire ricocheting off the chamber walls and floor, raining down on them all. Torian struggles against his bonds, hampered by the weight of the chair, the weight in his head. Then Morro's shield is over him, guarding him; he can look up into the blue curve of it, watch the embers impact and fall away like burning leaves.

"Tracey!" He can't see Gault, but Torian can picture him, pinned down behind portable cover. "Now would be good!"

Morro does something, Torian's not sure what; the movement is slight, precise. Then there's another explosion, farther away. Blizz yips triumphantly. Torian becomes aware that Mako is cutting through the cords binding him to the chair; the sound her blood-soaked vibroknife makes against the laminoid ties is strangely specific and settles into his teeth like an ache.

His captors are aflame; Torian can feel the flames, but can't smell the smoke. The haze lifts and descends, lifts and descends.

When it lifts again Morro's hand is against his cheek, her touch as distinctive as a fingerprint. He focuses and finds she's kneeling over him, head bare, her eyes so full of concern they remind him of green wells that he could drown in. He realizes his lips are lacerated when she kisses him, the jolt and relief of it tinged with pain; he can taste the imprint his blood leaves on her mouth.

Torian. She doesn't say it. He hears it anyway in the touch of her lips to his, that soul-deep echo reverberating in his bones.

He tries to touch her back but his hands won't work. He leans into her, drinks in the comfort and relief of her warmth, of her scent, of her.

"That's my girl."