Fezy's idiot box

Malgus had escaped yet again. Xaja felt the bite of failure in her objective to stop the rogue Sith, as much as she felt the pressure of stone blocks pinning her to the ground. The bombardment of Naga Sadow's fortress had been an unwelcome addition to her efforts to stop Malgus, Jadus, and the Hidden Chain.

Malgus was gone. Jadus had escaped. And the Hidden Chain… well, at least one objective had been accomplished, even if at the cost of Shae's life. Heta Kol would never be a problem again.

Swearing under her breath, Xaja tried to use the Force to lift the stone block she was trapped under. She was lucky that she hadn't been crushed; the ceiling block was held up by other rubble, trapping the Jedi in a space small enough that she couldn't move more than a few inches. She bit back her panic at being in a tight, dark, enclosed space, and struggled to lift the block over her again.

But even with the Force, it was too heavy, and she couldn't budge it a centimetre. Trying to not think about how much air she had left in her little tomb, Xaja slumped back on the ground and reached out with the Force. Her mind cast out, looking for friendly signatures. Jekiah and Rass must have escaped, potentially with Shae's body – she couldn't sense either Mandalorian nearby, and didn't want to entertain the thought of either man dying. For a moment, she couldn't sense her brothers, or Theron, or Lana, and that made the panic come back in force. If they'd been killed by the Republic's bombardment of the site –

No, wait. She could feel familiar presences approaching, and recognised the grey bond in her mind that connected her to Lana. Her Sith advisor had survived and was on her way – she must have received the distress signal Xaja had sent over comms. The Jedi relaxed slightly, looking up in the pitch-black darkness of her rubble pile. Help was coming.

Dust suddenly fell onto her face, making her nose twitch. She grimaced, then suddenly felt fresh air on her face as one of the blocks on top of her was removed. “Xaja!” she heard Theron's frantic voice shout. “Come on, don't do this to me…”

“I'm here!” Xaja shouted back, coughing as she inhaled a lungful of dust. She started squirming, trying to get free of the rubble.

Another block was lifted away with the Force; footsteps approached at a run; and Theron appeared in Xaja's line of vision. He looked dusty and weary, with a new blaster burn in his jacket and a nasty scrape under his right eye. But he seemed hale as he dropped to his knees beside Xaja and all but hauled her upright. “I've got you,” he whispered as he held her closely. “You're safe now. Force, how bad are you hurt?”

Xaja managed to throw her arm around Theron's neck, her other hand reaching to grab his jacket. “Bruises and a headache,” she answered. Jadus’ mind trap had been migraine-inducing. “And I just hurt everywhere. Are you okay?”

“Fine. I'm fine.” Theron squeezed Xaja a little tighter, loosening his grip only when she hissed in discomfort. “Think you've got more than ‘bruises and a headache’ going on... Lana!”

Another piece of rubble was picked up and set away. “One moment,” Lana answered as she picked her way up to the newly-freed Jedi. Molten gold eyes scanned the smaller woman's body as their owner frowned. “You're lucky you're not dead, Xaja,” she said as she reached out with the Force. “Cracked ribs, fractured shin, concussion…”

“Oh.” Xaja made a face as she felt Lana healing her. “We've got bigger problems than my non-lethal injuries. Jadus and Malgus both escaped, Malgus was able to activate Nul's machine, and Shae… she's dead. So is Heta Kol.”

“We knew about Shae,” Lana quietly said as she and Theron helped Xaja to her feet. “Rass reached us on the comms.”

“And Rava is a dead man for bombarding us,” Theron muttered. He pulled Xaja's arm over his shoulders and wrapped his own arm around her waist. “Can you walk if I help you?”

Xaja nodded and let Theron help her out of the rubble. “When we find Malgus,” she muttered, “I'm going to–” She hissed as she put her weight on her right leg. Apparently that was the leg she'd broken, and was still tender from Lana's healing. “I'm going to make him wish he'd been eaten by something big and scary. And when we find Jadus, I'm going to let my dad skin him alive.”