A/N: This story is the long overdue sequel to "Lost Fortune", and is best read after having read the first, despite my efforts to make it stand alone. After over a year of working on this story, countless rewrites and a number of flat restarts, several revisions and a long hiatus, I can't say that I'm well pleased with this, the result of all that time and effort. But I can say for a fact that it was the best I could do.

As usual, I'm going to say this story is probably AU (more and more all the time). As always, this story is completely written. As per usual, I will upload one chapter per day (Barring anything out of the ordinary. I will attempt to give readers a head's up via A/N). This was written for my entertainment, and is being published for yours. If you find yourself not enjoying it, then you should feel perfectly free to stop reading. Heap praise or criticism upon it, whichever may suit you best. Or say nothing about it at all, if you would prefer. Do feel free to point out typos, I check my stories before publishing, but I admit my imperfection and would welcome the opportunity to correct any mistakes I may have made.

Enjoy.

"The only thing you can count on is that people will do anything to survive..."

Some people love their work. They wake up every day simply delighted to be alive and able to continue doing what they absolutely love to do. But some people are just very, very good at their work. Some might even say exceptionally gifted. But contrary to what the people who love their work will tell you, you don't have to enjoy your gift, or your work for that matter. In the end, all that anyone really cares about is that it gets done. And, in the case of troopers in the Grand Army of the Republic, that it gets done right. PFC Caden was one such trooper. Whether or not he loved his work wasn't particularly relevant. What mattered, what really mattered, was that he was damned good at what he did.

Easing slowly forward, a single carefully placed step at a time, trusting the gray-black night sky to hide him from sight, the knee deep mud to keep his sounds to a minimum, and the planet's prolific algae to conceal his scent, Caden was in the process of doing the work he'd been born to do.

The steady thrum of a thousand insectile wings didn't distract him, nor did the clouding of his visor as the tiny black, mosquito-like bugs pinged off his armor, which was coated in a slick brownish-green layer of algae that rendered him practically invisible even in broad daylight. It was there because, aside from its obvious benefits, he couldn't scrape it off long enough for it to be worth the effort.

Caden knew that, if he wasn't careful, each step could be his last. Even in daylight, the mud was covered in a layer of murky water, and it was impossible to determine safe ground from hazardous without first prodding it.

Lifting his right boot clear of the mud took effort, but Caden was patient about it. Far as he was concerned, he had all the time in the world. He kept his eyes looking ahead, searching the darkness for the target that he knew was there. He let his leg sink to the knee, finding a bit of solid under the muck before shifting his weight to that foot and repeating the process with his other foot.

Each time his lungs expanded, it felt more like he was drinking the air than breathing it, and he was uncomfortably aware of how much that limited his stamina. When even breathing felt like exercise, you knew you had to be not just good, but perfect at your work if you were going to survive.

Caden wasn't worried. He knew just how good he was. And he wasn't afraid to bet not only his life, but also his best friend's life, on his skill. Which is exactly what he was doing now.

A low, sort of coughing hiss followed by a tick-tick-tick sound told him he'd found what he was looking for. More importantly, it had noticed his presence. He didn't bother to ask how. The uncertain clicking that followed the threat sound indicated that it didn't know where he was, just that he was there. The problem was, he wasn't sure where it was either, which meant he had no advantage in that department. Now his target knew he was there, it was only a matter of who found whom first.

Caden wasn't hunting droids. Not here. Here, there was an even bigger threat. At first it had simply been called the Clone Killer or Slayer. But then the clones had discovered what it did after killing them. It then became the Trooper Eating Monster. In the interest of efficiency, that had been shortened to TEM. Familiarization had turned it into Temmie. In any case, it was big, it was fast, and it wanted Caden and his brothers for dinner. It was Caden's job to find it first. Find it, and kill it.

The threat sound repeated, louder this time.

Temmie's getting agitated, Caden thought.

He saw a flicker of movement in the stilt roots of the trees about a hundred and fifty yards to his right. That was his partner, moving in tandem with him. The objective was to come from two different sides. Caden was hearing the hissing ahead and slightly to his right, the second hiss had confirmed it. His partner would be going around to the other side of the sound. And then they would close in. Hopefully, this would be over before the Temmie got really angry.

Furious animals were so much more difficult to deal with than mildly irritated or alarmed animals. Caden wasn't even sure Temmie had an alarm call. If it did, Caden had never heard it.

When the Temmie had first come upon the base camp, there had been no warning. It had found the sentry on the Eastern side of the camp. There had been no body to find. Now they knew why. Doubling the security around the camp had been essential. This posting was meant to be a safe landing site for sending in more men and equipment. It was far back from where the lines were drawn in the mud, but sentries were still alert for any Separatists sneaking behind the lines to try and take down the outposts. But they hadn't been prepared for the wildlife to be trying to kill them.

Initially, Caden had theorized that they were in Temmie's territory and it merely wanted to drive them away. That was before they'd doubled the sentry teams and had witnesses saying that the Temmie was eating their brothers. Caden knew that animals fighting over territory seldom ate their adversaries, but rather left them for scavengers. Temmie wasn't being territorial, it wasn't defending young. It was hunting. And that was a whole other game. One few clones knew how to play. They weren't trained to deal with threats of that kind. Droids were their designed adversaries, and Temmie bore little to no resemblance to those.

But Caden, along with his fireteam and the squad it belonged to, had special experience in these matters. He'd convinced his lieutenant to let the squad (Fortune Actual) handle it.

They had already tried discouraging the Temmie through the use of trip wires and even flash-bangs. But it didn't write the post off as too dangerous to be worth the trouble. It seemed like all they'd done was make it angry, in addition to being its being hungry. It had been coming at them more and more frequently. But tonight, Caden intended to finally end it. If the creature wouldn't take a hint, he was willing to fight it on the terms it had set. To the death. Preferably its own.

This time, there would be no warning shots. No grenades thrown in the blind hope of hitting the animal in the dark. No missing, no hitting it where it must be shelled or otherwise armor plated; no previous hits had killed it. Tonight, Caden was going to get up close and personal, find its weak spot, and shoot it. Repeatedly if necessary. Temmie had killed its last trooper.

Something shot out of the darkness from above. Caden felt it more than saw it and rolled instinctively to the side. The mud slowed him down. An enormous barb punctured his armor at the thigh, its sharpened end cut into the skin of his leg. The barb was attached to a spidery leg, which began to withdraw, dragging Caden with it. He yelped as the barb dug its way into his flesh.

A high pitched roar answered him, and a dark shape came racing out of the dark. The onrushing creature ran on four legs at first, but once it hit its stride, it tucked its forelegs and skimmed along the ground on its hind legs. A long, stiff tail balanced the weight of its body. An S-shaped neck tucked to its shoulders carried an almost wolfish head equipped with a beak which was serrated at the edges. Instead of fur or scales, the animal had dark gray-black feathering, except on the leathery wings which it now spread to lend itself the illusion of size and increased its speed. It stood about three feet high bent over as it was, and weighed around a hundred pounds. Its wings weren't powerful enough to let it fly but when it leaped for its target, they gave it greater thrust.

This was Caden's partner, an Onitheran. Armor like that of a GAR trooper's, but reshaped to fit him, covered his skull, the back of his neck, and his back and sides around the wings, as well as his flanks. Theran was his name, and Caden had raised him from a chick. Theran had never forgotten. Even now, he was far from fully grown. An adult Onitheran could reach eight hundred pounds or more. However, what he lacked in size, Theran made up for in speed, agility and strength. He had twice the speed Caden could manage, three times the power, and the agility was so far above Caden it couldn't even be compared. When he jumped, he hit the target he aimed for.

Theran hit the Temmie in the head, his clawed fingers curling around the base of the creature's skull, pulling him in close under its jaw, his long claws sinking in deep. Those claws were strong and sharp enough to cut through bone. His hind claws raked down his adversary's exposed throat, his wings beat at its face, disorienting it.

The barbed leg ripped free of Caden and swung in the air. Caden looked up, seeing that the creature towered over him. Even as he moved, he estimated it was about ten feet high. The legs it stood on were absurdly short and squat, with wide webbed feet. The spidery legs were actually more like arms. Four of them flailed wildly in the air, trying to get hold of Theran, who hissed and snapped at them with his powerful jaws, finally catching one and holding it while violently shaking his head side to side, shredding and crunching the exoskeleton.

Caden knew it was time to make his own move. He slid in towards the body of the Temmie. It was insect-like in that it had its skeleton on the outside, which explained why no shots had killed it. Caden found a space between sections at the joint of one of the spider legs where they met the creature's chest.

Jamming the muzzle of his blaster into the space, Caden fired.

A shrieking roar said he'd finally found a soft spot.

The animal reeled backwards, one of its legs struck Caden hard, sending him spinning. Caden hit the mud just as Theran lunged clear, blood dripping from his jaws. Theran crouched between Caden and the behemoth, snarling in fury, prepared to go on the attack again if needed.

The Temmie shrieked, roared, stumbled into a tree. Branches snapped under its weight and it tumbled onto its side with a thud, hissing its last as its massive head began to sink into the swamp.

Caden got up, favoring his injured leg. He was cut, bruised, but otherwise unharmed.

At last, he got to get a close look at the creature that had been terrorizing his platoon for weeks.

It had been roughly ten feet high in life, standing on two large, flat, round, webbed feet. Two pairs of spidery legs with sharp barbs on the ends obviously served as its primary weapons. The lower jaw split and opened sideways and downward, revealing a mouth full of hundreds of yellowish spikes. Multifaceted black eyes stared vacantly at the gray night sky. The mouth hardware told Caden all he needed to know. This was either a fisher or worm eater. Either way, he couldn't see why it had suddenly decided that troopers were on the menu.

Theran parted his jaws and chirped one of the handful of words he knew, "Dead?"

"Very," Caden replied, kneeling beside the creature to examine its mouth more closely, appreciating the efficiency of the design and finally understanding how so many had been caught unaware.

You didn't see those legs until it was too late. The barbs prevented premature escape once you were speared, and then you were fed into a mouth designed to swallow things whole.

Theran twitched his head and pointed his muzzle slightly downward, "Hurt?"

Caden glanced at his leg wound, which Theran was studying intently through black, reptilian eyes.

"Not bad. Just a scratch."

Theran relaxed and rubbed his muzzle against Caden's right arm, making an affectionate cooing sound, which contrasted sharply with his earlier roar of fury. He then proceeded to nibble at the edges of the armor, which Caden understood to be a grooming gesture, intended to strengthen the bond between parent and offspring. Theran had eventually come to understand that Caden wasn't really his mother, but seemed to regard his adoptive parent with fierce adoration in spite of that. Or maybe because of it.

Caden keyed his radio and spoke into it, "This is Caden. Sentry Station Bravo has been secured."

"The Temmie?" came the stiff sounding reply.

"Threat is neutralized. No casualties on our end. Returning to post."

"Roger that. Good job, Bravo station."

Caden merely keyed his radio in response. Cautiously, he got to his feet. His leg was sore, but it supported his weight. He'd get it cleaned and bandaged when he came off duty.

Theran continued cooing and making little cricket chirps, rubbing his head against Caden and batting at him gently with one of his black wings.

"Yeah, yeah, you did good too," Caden muttered, shoving the muzzle away so it wouldn't throw him off balance, then he added more kindly, "Thanks. You saved my life, Theran."

"Fortune," Theran responded, the single word conveying everything.

Fortune goes with us. Actual survives.

Caden knew what it meant. Together, they had saved each other. Theran wasn't keeping score, and neither was he. Neither of them owed the other any special favors. But, because they were friends, family even, each would offer everything he had for the other. Together, they continued to survive. In Caden's mind, that was all that mattered.