Chapter Text
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Every last tent— empty .
That’s what you and the rest of your squad of death troopers find, all the while buffeted by unforgiving mountain winds. With each passing second, this mission turns out to be a colossal waste of time… And you can feel the tension brewing like a savage storm.
This expedition to Karthrexia was meant to be huge for Imperial intelligence—not to mention your team itself. The Empire had hard evidence that a rebel outpost was being established here, on this near-uninhabitable glacial planet, so sending your squad out to tear the place apart must have been a no-brainer for the desk jockeys at HQ.
It was supposed to be simple—violent, yes, but simple.
And yet here you all stand: in the midst of what looks to be a freshly-abandoned camp.
Your ship was forced to land on the mountaintop for lack of better options, and it had taken the 16 of you half a day to stealthily hike down to this ledge. Now, in the midst of the eerily abandoned weatherproof tents that freckle the wooded hillside, you internally curse every frozen step that led you to this place.
“Search everything,” Commander CT-9904 hisses through his modulator. You’ve been working under him long enough by now to detect the telltale embers of rage glowing in his harshly controlled tone; it sends a shiver down your spine that has nothing to do with the subzero temps.
“What else are we going to do?” DT-3323 grumbles beside you as you exit yet another structure. Crunching thick layers of snow underfoot, you cross the clearing beside your colleague, heading towards another small tent. Its thick fabric exterior appears an unassuming light grey beneath the cloudy afternoon sky.
Blasters raised, you nod to 3323 before bypassing the zippered entryway in tandem.
Like all the other tents, this one is… Vacant. Your shoulders relax as you and 3323 begin pacing the interior, just to be sure.
This one looks like it might have been some sort of larder—unfamiliar vegetable scraps and a few scattered cans line the dirty surfaces of durasteel tables. A camping stove sits cold and unused in the center of the space.
“Not gonna find anything in here but mold,” you shrug to your squadmate…
But just as soon as the words leave the modulation of your helmet, a rustling sound picks up from beneath one of the counters. You and 3323 instantly raise your blasters in its direction.
“ Come out ,” you bark, eyes struggling to take in readings through the night-vision of your helmet.
The crunching of snow, the shuffling of limbs—
And something crawls out from under the table.
Coarse white fur culminates in brutal black claws, and the dark vertical slits of four eyes blink back at you frantically. The creature is ursine in shape, but judging by its proportions, it might very well be a youngling of its species.
Even still—it’s easily almost as large as you.
The frozen remnants of some sort of tuber fall from its paw as it licks its lips… It would seem that you’ve interrupted its lunch.
“Easy,” your squadmate murmurs, making shushing noises through his vocoder—all the while keeping his sights firmly trained on the creature, unwilling to stand down.
“ 3323 ,” you hiss, glaring at him from behind your visor. “Just back out the way we came.”
You move slowly, barely making any noise on the frostbitten ground as you slide your feet in the direction of the exit. At last, as though your very gaze has burned a hole through his armor, 3323 begins backing off as well—
But in his efforts to keep all attention focused on the unknown threat at hand, your squadmate bumps one of the durasteel tables—and swears, loudly .
It’s just enough to startle the strange animal.
In a blur of white movement, the creature comes barreling toward you both… Aiming to pass between you and toward the tent’s only exit. In the haste of its retreat, it shoves 3323 to the side with one vicious paw, and you wince at the sound of claws cutting through duraplast greaves.
“ Dank farrik —” your colleague yelps in pain, stumbling out the doorway after the animal in a mess of fury.
“3323, wait —”
You reach out a gloved hand but it barely misses his shoulder, and you swear under your breath as you dash out after your hotheaded squadmate.
You hear the commotion being raised before you’re even back outside.
“What the hell—?” The Commander quickly sidesteps the fleeing animal as it heads up the mountainside toward the treeline…
And later, perhaps when you’re trying to recall all the events that ensued, you’ll wonder what might’ve happened if you had managed to stop DT-3323.
Because, in a trigger-happy burst of anger, he raises his blaster to aim at the ursine being running into the woods—and fires . The blaster bolt misses its target, but instead plows into the frostbitten hillside in a burst of sparks.
The Commander is on him in an instant.
“ 3323! ” CT-9904 smacks the blaster out of your teammate’s grip, sending it tumbling into the snow with a pathetic thud . “If you needed target practice , you should have stayed at the base.”
As ever, the clone’s tone is positively venomous—but in this instance, you can hardly blame him.
“Commander, I—” DT-3323 begins his defense…
But quickly falls just as silent as the rest of the squad, as a low and rumbling tremor begins to vibrate underfoot.
Your eyes widen as your gaze is pulled upward, toward the glaciers and the snow and—
“ Avalanche! ” 4663 shouts, voice hoarse in the thin air as the rumbling grows exponentially stronger.
The Commander’s helmet snaps toward the direction of the mountain peak above, and takes in the sight that leaves you immobilized—
A great, rolling wave of frost .
“To the tents!” The Commander yells at all 15 of you. “ Now —”
But for some, the order comes a fraction of a second too late.
As you trip over your own feet in an attempt to dive back towards the pantry tent you just came from, you witness those of your teammates further uphill get buried first—boundless snow and glacial chunks of ice knocking them over like flimsiplast dolls.
You fall flat on your stomach, wind sweeping you off your feet before you can make it to shelter—
And you can barely hear the screams of your fellow death troopers as the unrelenting cold swallows you whole.