I Surrender

His weapon was a bowcaster.

Where: Dee’ja Peak, Naboo.

Feeling: This is not going well.

Listening to: I can't hear anything.

Continued from here.

Then we were grappling and rolling away from the tree and out into the snow. If he wanted those Jagannath points, he was going to have to earn them the hard way.

We had rolled down a little slope away from the tree. He came to a stop in the prone position and instantly tried to bring that weapon around again, but I was too close. Being a Trandoshan, the bounty hunter’s arms were longer than a human’s and I had to neutralize his superior reach by tying him up, sticking close the way a brawler would to prevent him from using the bowcaster.

It was a good idea in theory. In reality, since the Trandoshan was taller than me and outweighed me, it was nearly impossible to accomplish this goal. I couldn’t move as fast as I would’ve liked. The snow was my enemy and even if I hadn’t blown out my knee somehow in the explosion, the Trandoshan still would’ve had a physical advantage on me. So I reverted to what I know best, using my environment to my advantage.

The bounty hunter’s mouth was moving. He was saying something, but who knows what it was? The ringing in my ears masked nearly everything. Whatever he was saying, it certainly wasn’t “I surrender,” that was certain.

Everything happened quickly. Fights are always like that in retrospect, but when you’re in the moment, time stretches. I couldn’t let him use his height and weight against me. He tried to get up, I brought him down. He tried to regain his balance, I kept him off balance. He tried to shoot me again, and at some cost to myself (I think my head is bleeding), I trapped his arm, forced his weapon down, and when the weapon discharged, he’d shot himself. That made him drop the weapon, finally.

He wasn’t done yet, however. He was stronger, and the burst of energy I’d had at the start of the fight was rapidly ebbing, sapped by the cold and a battle with a physically superior opponent. A glancing blow stunned me, and he now had the upper hand. Having lost the bowcaster, and still in a crouch, he produced a blaster in one hand and palmed my head with the other, and I knew this was it. I was done. A flick of the wrist would break my neck.

But he neither fired at me, nor broke my neck. Instead a shot was fired back behind him, and that’s when I knew Jardena was alive. I saw my chance. My hand reached out, blindly searching for something, anything to use as a weapon. It found, of all things, a handle. The shovel had shattered and the pieces had flown far and wide. What was left of it was a handle and a 15cm shaft of wood. Practically a stake. Unhesitatingly, I grabbed it and shoved it up and under his rib cage. I don’t know Trandoshan physiology, but I daresay I hit some vital organs.

He lurched back, but tried to pull me in front to use as a shield to foil any shot Jardena could take. I silently willed her to take the shot anyway, regardless of the risk.

To be continued...

See Jardena’s blog for her point of view.

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