The horde of Ewoks surged, their ululations echoing through the forest. Chikma reached over his shoulder to draw his spear, which had been carved from a redwood just a few miles away. It had barely cleared the sling when the shaft flew out of his grasp and away into the night. He scowled. Another reason to dislike the jetii.
Now rid of his visor, Chikma finally beheld his opponent. He could only note Tasha’Vel’s blue skin and tattooed lekku before his compatriots swarmed her. She flailed her body, flinging brave Ewoks this way and that as she managed to draw Vilruna from her belt and summon its blue blade.
“Oh, you want to do this?” the Twi’lek yelled, slashing at three Ewoks attempting to crawl up her legs in one flourish. The diminutive beings yowled for but a moment before they were sliced in half at the atomic level and fell to the wooden planks below in a furry pile of legs and torsos. “Let’s do this, then!”
It only took a few seconds for Chikma to pull the amethyst kukri from its sheath and join the fray with a charge. He ducked under an arcing swipe of Tasha’Vel’s lightsaber and popped up with the purple blade held high.
The two blades met for a heartbeat, but the collision proved enough to shatter the amethyst. A hundred tiny shards burst through the air like a swarm of angry insects, stinging Chikma’s cheeks and peppering Tasha’Vel’s exposed hands. Every Ewok within several feet yelped and clutched at their faces as the glittering spray buried itself into their skin.
The Twi’lek’s boot caught Chikma in the chest. His armor’s plasma shield absorbed most of the impact, though he did stumble backward. Then an unrelenting pressure began to close in around his throat as some invisible force lifted him off the ground. His eyes shot to Tasha’Vel, whose face sported an evil grin during the momentary reprieve. The Mandalorian kicked and clawed at his collar. The edges of his sight began to blur.
Then, suddenly, Chikma dropped to the ground. Not so much breathing as desperately grasping for air, he raised his head just in time to see Kazzik’s jaws latched into Tasha’s thigh. Coughing, he grabbed the fibercord whip from his belt as the Sadowan wiggled her leg in an attempt to fling his cousin off. With a flick of his wrist Chikma coiled the whip around her left forearm, then heaved with everything he had left. The quantum blade skewed wide as she dropped it, carving a furrow in the wooden planks.
Behind them, Varashi roared.
A dozen Ewoks had overtaken the varactyl. Armed with ropes and nets, they tried to subdue the creature as it bucked and snapped.
Perhaps due to the ridiculousness of the situation, perhaps out of concern for her companion, something snapped beneath Tasha’Vel’s already exasperated expression. “I will not,” she snarled, “be eaten by teddy bears!”
The air itself seemed to snap taut as she planted her feet and threw out a hand. Everything after happened in rapid succession in a way Chikma had never seen before, despite all his exposure to Force users. First Tasha’Vel telekinetically plucked an Ewok off Varashi’s back and dangled him in the air like a marionette. Then, as that Ewok squeaked in protest, violet bolts of lightning arced from her outstretched hand to his suspended form, illuminating him and singing his fur before he exploded into a gout of orange flame that rolled across the walkway until a solid chunk of the Ewok masses glowed like festival lanterns, burning alive.
Freed from his captors, Varashi snatched a charred Ewok in his jaws and bounded away.
Scorched fur drifted in the air like ash after a volcanic explosion. Tasha’Vel’s blast had put a dent in the horde’s numbers, but the walkways above were still thick with glinting eyes. More horns sounded in the distance, presumably calling other tribes to their aid. Having finally loosed Kazzik from her thigh, the Elder dropped her free hand to her belt. Varctas came out in a smooth draw. She snapped the blue blade to life, the whip still biting into her other forearm. Then she lunged at Chikma.
Chikma saw the blade coming his way, but he did not have enough time to evade the incoming blow. The plasma blade stabbed through his chestplate. His breathing became strained and laborious as the lightsaber pierced his body, but he didn’t fall. Instead he grabbed Tasha’Vel’s wrist and, summoning all his might, kicked.
The built-in boot blade snapped out from his toe with a sharp snick, driving up into the meat of her already bleeding thigh.
“Kazzik,” Chikma wheezed to his cousin in Ewokese, standing directly behind his opponent. “Spear.”
His cousin had already found a dropped spear much like the one Chikma had carved in his coming-of-age ritual. He clutched it firmly with both paws as he charged at Tasha’Vel, tears streaming down his face.
The point went in just under her ribs. She stiffened, mouth falling agape in disbelief.
“Yub nub,” Kazzik whispered as the remaining horde approached in a frenzy, stabbing her with their own spears and crude blades.
Meanwhile, Chikma slid to the blanks, gazing up at the canopy he’d so missed during his service to Venn-Voss Colonial Supply Solutions. As his vision once again faded to darkness, horns bellowed among the redwoods again in a lament to the Sky Warrior.
