Back in the Saddle Again.

[Dire Wolf]

So there Marcus Davion was, much to his dismay, back in the saddle again. In a way. He hadn't stopped drinking since that night at the Anti-DLA rally he had been forced to go to. Memories of how Imperial troops rushed towards the children's section flooded his mind. Everything he did. Everything that could have happened. Everything he should have done. What would have happened if he wasn't drunk? Marc shook his head, but that only seemed to bring on more images. Death, destruction, war, and chaos.

If those bastard sith hadn't forced his hand, he could be getting completely hammered at that moment instead of only having a few (comparatively) drinks in his system. Regardless of thoughts or what-ifs, Marc walked up to a make shift shooting bench and allowed his hunk of a rifle to slip off of his shoulder. It was truly a marvel of death dealing technology. From all that he could tell the thing was a magnetic accelerator, yet it shot a burst of what could best be described as light. Its "bullets" seemed to be fairly heavy canisters that are warm to the touch, yet remarkably solid. Regardless of what was inside, he sat at the bench and flicked each arm of the bipod down before he assumed his position at the proper end of the buttstock.

He had taken this weapon off of the same Sith that he had stolen the pistol from before promptly turning his head into a canoe. The man was very thankful that this particular soldier was the kind of idiot to be focused on the stage rather than on the crowd around him.

Marc's off hand rested against the length of the buttstock and pressed down so that the weight of the rifle drove itself into his shoulder rather than off of it. It was a habit that wasn't necessary on this weapon system, but born of extensive use of a medium repeating blaster in the military years before. Both eyes remained open as he flicked the power switch to the 'on' position and gave the system a moment to charge up before sighting in on a target a little more than 100 yards off. It was the carcass of a pig that had been cleaned for all of its meat and guts some time before.

His finger caressed the trigger like a long lost lover before lightly pressing back until he felt a small click. This was completely different than handling a weapon that doled out a thousand bolts a minute. This weapon was precise, and the trigger couldn't simply be mashed like a button on a holo game controller. His rifle whirred to life for a moment before firing a small metallic disk out of its end which was followed by a single lance of brilliant yellowish orange light and a moderate amount of recoil. This burst of light seemed to instantly slammed into the pig with enough force to snap the rope that supported it and send the carrion tumbling to the ground.

Marcus Davion didn't know how this weapon worked. Marc didn't even know what it shot, but what he did know was that he liked it. A lot.

[Kella]

This was one of the more disheveled areas of the old temple, the stone reliefs having crumbled under the pressure of tree-roots, sub-terranian plants pushing their way up between the stones of the floor, rubble here and there. The ruins of a long atrium were well suited to their current purpose, as a make-shift firing range. Didn't matter if you broke the rubble into smaller pieces of rubble. She had a machine gun over one shoulder and a sniper rifle over the other, both in desperate need of calibration. Bringing the DLA's armory up to snuff had been a massive undertaking, but it was one Grizzelda was enjoying immensely, and she'd had the lovely opportunity to see the fruits of her labor at the rally.

Grizzelda stepped out of the side hall just in time to identify the scene before her, the man, the rifle, the pig, before a beam of light a hundred times more bright and intense than a blaster bolt tore through the air and snapped through the carcass.

She whistled as she stepped into the atrium.

"How come you get all the cool toys? It just isn't fair."

[Dire Wolf]

Marcus quirked a brow at the woman as she seemed to melt out of the shadows, though his degraded perception may have been because of his alcohol. He glanced between the olive skinned woman and his rifle for a few moments before responding, "because this thing's awesome. I'm awesome. It's perfect, really." He had barely finished speaking before he rose to his feet, flicked the bipod up towards the handguard, and slung the weapon around his shoulder.

"Care to see what this thing did to the pig," Marc rolled the shoulder that the rifle rested against before setting off towards the gutted pig carcass. "I would let'cha shoot it, but last time I handed something over to you I barely got it back. That was a bike. This is a death ray." A smile spread his lips thin as he finally reached the pig carcass, which had a fairly sizable hole punched through either side of it's rib cage. His weight dropped to one knee so that he could further inspect the target.

The entrance wound was only a few millimeters thick and moderately clean. That wasn't surprising, though. Entrance wounds generally weren't grizzly affairs, but the exit wounds would end up being at least two times their counterparts' size. With bullets anyways. Light was generally a clean, cauterized wound not unlike the one his rifle had made. Marc reached his hands down and flipped the oddly cold, sticky carcass over on it's other side to reveal another hole that was roughly the same size, though multiple splotches were peppered in close proximity to the hole, almost as if the ray of light splashed. The small exit wound wasn't so much of a surprise, as there wasn't much soft flesh on the creature to explode outwards with the projectile.

"What... is this thing," Marc looked up at Grizz with a rather befuddled look on his face as he knelt down beside the carcass. "It's like a sniper rifle... but the light isn't light. Look at the exit wound," he pointed towards the small wound, and the smaller wounds around it, "The light... splashed?"

[Kella]

Grizzelda laughed aloud at his self-aggrandizing.

"Hey, if I remember correctly, I was uncharacteristically courteous concerning your bike, you can trust me," she purred, following the man to the end of the range. She kneeled as well, taking a close look at the pig then giving the rifle an assessing gaze. She listened to his hypothesis.

"I'd say you might have better luck figuring it out sober, but this is actually one you have a right to be ignorant to." She ran her thumb around the edges of the exit wounds, feeling the texture. She dug her fingers into the largest, scraping the edge of the hole. When her fingers emerged, little beads of metal, irregularly shaped, clung to her fingertips, held there by the goo of rotten bodily fluid.

"It's not shooting light and it's not shooting bullets, it's shooting super-heated metal. It's literally white-hot when it comes out of the barrel, that's why the projectile glows. Doesn't go through clean, like a blaster, doesn't explode, like a bullet, just some parts get diverted as they move through the target."

She gestured with the beads of metal, then flicked them back onto the carcass and wiped the pig blood on her pants. "Mentra Corp was working on this tech a few years back, when I heard they'd gotten contracts with the Sith, I figured they'd just be working their stock stuff, not digging back through the experimentals... That's interesting..."

She looked back to Marcus. "I've got to see something." She gestured for him to hand the rifle over.

[Dire Wolf]

"Liquid Metal," Marc quickly replied with disbelief scrawled across his face. A weapon that propelled something other than than the ordinary was so foreign that it's mention was met with disbelief despite the fact that it was the most logical choice. After a few moments he gently brushed his index finger against the circumference of the wound. The cold fluid of a rotten body trapped some of the metallic flakes on his finger as he drew it away. After a few moments of rubbing the goo between his thumb and finger Marcus wiped the disgusting fluid off on the old stone floor.

This was all too strange. Why would some average grunt be issued such a rare weapon? He would expect the gun to be in the hands of a crack sniper, or at least someone above the average crowd control guard. Marc couldn't exactly blame the guy for focusing on Dutch, though. The man had been dead for some time by the time he decided to show up. Anyone could have made the mistake of focusing less on the people around you than a ghost on the stage. It probably would have happened to Marcus if the roles were reversed. "I think yer right, Grizz," he rose to his feet and smirked a bit at her second request. "Give this," he motioned towards Grizz with the rifle, "to you?

"An' I also r'emember wakin' up in a field an hour after I was suppos' to be at work, 'n with my power cells almos' dead, by the way." That smirk grew into a little smile as he readjusted the rifle's position on his shoulder before moving to check the opposite wall. Fortunately nothing important was behind the thick stone wall because the super-heated metal went straight through it, and almost through the opposing wall as well. Once Marcus was done inspecting the small hole he turned to face Grizzelda with a little grin. "Thanks fer lettin' me know that gettin' things back from you courteously is uncharacteristic, though."

[Kella]

"An' I also r'emember wakin' up in a field an hour after I was suppos' to be at work, 'n with my power cells almos' dead, by the way."

"Only an hour?" She returned his smug tone. Though, despite the way she'd casually reported the nature of the weapon, it was a remarkable piece of machinery. It certainly wasn't in mass-production, yet, she would have heard. Even underground on Dantooine she had her way of staying connected. That meant this weapon was rare, experimental, exotic -- Grizzelda's love for such weapons bordered on the obsessive. She eyed the barrel of the rifle, it had to use electromagnetic acceleration, that was sure, but how did the cylinder ammunition system operate? What was the loading mechanism? Was it the sort of weapon that needed consistent maintenance or cleaning, or would it be largely self-sufficient as she had seen in other electromagnetic systems?


"Aw, c'mon. You can trust me. This stuff's my bread and butter. She'll run better when I'm done, promise." Grizzelda's tone bordered on begging, her tone was placating. "'sides, you're one of the DLA now. Leaving you out in the middle of a field would disadvantage me, and I'm very reliably self-serving."

[Dire Wolf]

Marcus crossed his arms before leaning a shoulder against the wall, and that little smirk on his face grew to a small smile. "Yeah, 'only' an hour. I might be a sad drunk, b't I'm a punctu'l drunk." It was funny to him how he could go from self aggrandizing to self deprecating humor. The jovial tones riddled about his voice served to reflect that such love.

"You know" he tilted his head to either side with a series of loud cracks and pops, "this thing needs to kill at least one thing 'fore ya take 'er apart 'n she's ruined forever." That smirk slowly turned into a little grin at the jab, "shootin' somethin' dead isn't exactly good for seein' what this thing c'n do. Feel like takin' down a few kath hounds? We need the meat pretty bad, and somethin' tells me you ain't the best at cleaning a kill. After that... you can take her apart so we can figure out how she works."

"Deal?" Truth be told, he didn't particularly care if she wanted to learn how to cut up an animal, or where to shoot it so an animal went down clean. He just wanted an excuse to have someone else help him throw the fresh kill on the speeder. Marcus Davion may have been strong, but an adult kath hound got very big. Horned kath hounds even larger.

[Kella]

That sounded like a challenge, at which Grizzelda raised her eyebrows. She couldn't say no to that.

"She's far too pretty for me to even consider ruining, no matter how tempting the mischief," Grizzelda insisted, but then she relented.

"I suppose I could go for that, though, you show off your butchery skills and I show off my particular expertise. Deal." She nodded definitively. "Though I'll warn you, if you've got a competitive streak you'd best keep it neatly tucked away, lest it suffer grievous harm."

~~~

An hour later Grizzelda was walking in the warm Dantooine sun, coarse, tall grass crunching under her boots, the smell of rain and manure on the wind. She looked back over her shoulder at Marcus, slipping a thumb under the strap slung across her shoulder. She'd calibrated the sniper rifle, and it was ready for a proper field test. The fingers of her other hand brushed the grip of the heavy blaster pistol at her left thigh, the familiar weight of a slugthrower weighing down her right. It was always fun to have options.

"So when do I get to kill things?"

[Dire Wolf]

Marcus hated any speeder that wasn't his sporty speeder bike. It all felt as if it was slow, clunky, and generally handled like a wheel barrow without the wheels. At least that's how going from a speeder bike to a heavier transport speeder. He drove for a good hour before slowing to a stop in the plains. The further they went out from the base meant that they would draw less attention to the DLA, should they be captured.

"I dunno," Marcus glanced around the wide plains from behind his windshield. Nothing was in sight, "when you see something?" Marcus hadn't bothered to step out of his speeder, but what he had done was allowed his window to roll down so she could still hear him. He immediately regretted allowing all the cool air to rush out and be replaced by Dantooine's famous humidity.

"It shouldn't be too tough, though I don't really know what the range on that thing is," by then his buzz had been completely gone. Unfortunately he was replaced by the sarcastic, completely unjolly persona that was Marcus Davion. "There should be a den a few miles up. We could hump it up there, or we could take this thing and risk scaring them off. Or stirring them up. Either way's fine by me."

Should the former occur, he had a medium repeating blaster that he had relieved from another Sith soldier. It shot out enough rounds fast enough to keep anything short of a small army of Kath hounds at bay, and he knew exactly how to shoot it well. They were in particular trouble.

[Kella]

"I like the sound of the den," she said. "Feels right." Her tone was still light, though Marcus's was not. So surly, she mocked silently. He was a happy drunk, but that seemed to be the only time the mood graced him.

Grizzelda let Marcus lead the way, her step quiet and mind alert. The humidity was oppressive, but Grizzelda tucked away her complaints. Her usual haunts comprised durasteel and glass. These open spaces, the breeze, the variability of the landscape, the plant cover... it was different. Though Grizzelda felt no less comfortable, she was actually beginning to rather enjoy Dantooine.

What was most remarkable was the smell. One grew used to largely ignoring that sense in the smoggy streets of over-civilized words, so the fresh smell of dirt and grass was especially remarkable. A breeze stirred, and brought with it a sticky, sweet scent. Perhaps they'd come across the source at some point.

Preferably, they'd come across something large and hairy that Grizzelda could shoot. She slipped the rifle from her shoulder and raised the scope to her eye, scanning the grasses ahead as they walked forward.

"I do believe I see the mouth of the den," she said, searching for any hint of movement in the dark shadowy opening the crosshairs had settled on.

[Dire Wolf]

Marcus had hoped that she didn't decide to go after the Kath hounds on foot. Kath hounds were ferocious, and he knew that there was a horned bull in that den. Davion knew that he was no coward, he had proven himself in hopeless situations, but something had changed in him ever since he returned to his home world. Ever since he saw that medic kit roll across the doorway from behind the sights of his blaster pistol. The big man gave a heavy sigh as he stepped out of the speeder and allowed the over-sized rifle to rest on his shoulder.

"If they get a little rowdy, this'll get 'em to back off. " Shortly after speaking, his face turned from disinterested and stoic to one of intensity. The plains melted away and turned into that damned village for a few seconds, and the silhouette of a Mando'ade guerilla was lined in the second story window of a small house. He shrugged his shoulder, caught the hand grip with his free hand, and leveled his massive rifle on the silhouette. As soon as he did everything melted back into the plains of Dantooine. Confusion caused the man to blink for a few moments before he continued on, and hefted his rifle back to it's position on his shoulder.

The den itself wasn't a particularly large one, but the Kath hounds there were particularly ferocious. If they hadn't caught their scent already, they soon would. Fortunately the wind was blowing the right way, keeping the pair out of their senses for the moment. When they finally got about three hundred meters off he went down to a prone position and motioned for her to do the same. After a few moments the bipod on his medium repeating blaster was unfolded and resting against the soft grass of the plains. If they got too nasty he would have them gunned down before they got anywhere near them.

"Well, hot shot? Three hundred yards shouldn't be too tough. If you're as good as you think you are, anyways." His tone shifted from down and dour to slightly playful. Yes, it was a jab and a challenge. He hoped she'd rise to the occasion and, perhaps, not miss the first shot his rifle had ever taken towards a living thing.

[Kella]

"Easy as a hormonal Zeltron," Grizzelda crooned. As she lay down, the grass yielded only unwillingly, but Grizzelda was no stranger to uncomfortable places. Even as she sniper rifle's bipod in order, and rested it familiarly against her shoulder, she was taking deep, steadying breaths. Slowing her breathing, slowing her heart.

Gruzzelda had spent too many years with her finger on the trigger to be bothered by a sense of anticipation. She'd certainly been looking forward to putting the rifle through its paces, though the excitement was easy to push away. It was time to focus.

Which is exactly what Grizzelda did to the sight on the rifle, adjusting it to bring the mouth of the den into clarity. Hearing, smell, touch, taste, all those senses dulled as Grizzelda's mind prioritized sight and the sense of motion.

The swaying of the grass, the blurry twitch of an insect as it flicked across the scope's line of sight, and then finally a shadow moving in the den. A medium-sized female emerged, but something told Grizzelda to wait, to be patient. So she watched the female, analyzing the way in which she moved, the impact of her gait on the swing of her head. Grizzelda had done this so often for humanoids, it was a natural process even when applied to the Kath hounds.

Her instinct was rewarded as the bull appeared, sniffing the hindquarters of the female who swatted him away with her tail.

"I'll be generous and let you have the bigger target," she said quietly, then centered the crosshairs with the flow of the female's gait and pulled the trigger. This rifle's projectiles were well suited to its purpose, traveling much faster than traditional blaster bolts, striking nearly instantaneously.

She was rewarded with the sight of a charred black hole where the female's eye socket had been. Brains fried, instantly dead, the female crumpled to the ground. Grizzelda swept her scope to the side then, to see what had become of the bull.

[Dire Wolf]

Marc quirked his brow at her initial comment, though shook his head instead of giving a little chuckle as one might expect. The man looked down the scope of his crazy death ray as Grizzelda did the same with her sniper rifle. A few heartbeats later and he heard the screech of the rifle discharging into the female hound's skull. She dropped instantly.

"It would be pretty embarrassing to not kill. If you manage to kill yours. My six year old daughter could kill these things while laying down with a bipod, though." It was true. Grizz's sights likely didn't move at all while she had them trained on the kath hounds. No matter. He wasn't trying to stress test the weapon or the dark skinned woman's abilities. Just the lethality of his new toy.

A male took notice of one of his females falling to the ground, and while they were used to a random death in their pack they weren't entirely sure where the bolt came from. Marcus carefully moved the cross hairs to the 'sweet spot' to hit on most animals. It was just behind the shoulder. As he fired, the lance of super-heated metal should burst through the heart and bolt lungs, if he was hit in that area. Davion's finger pressed back against the trigger slowly until he felt a click and saw the little disk fly out from the barrel. Half a second later and he felt the slight push of his rifle's stock against his shoulder as the magnets launched the molten steel towards the male.

An intensely bright lance of steel screamed forward and slammed into the side of the Alpha. He charged towards nothing in particular after the molten steel passed through him with a concoction of surprise, rage, and pain surging through him. After a few meters before the internal blood loss and shock of the wound caused him to trip on his own legs, crash to the ground, and slide to a stop. He smirked from behind the scope as it heaved its last breath.

The funny thing about most creatures, sentient or no, is that they could rarely figure out where a shot came from if there was only one. When the second one was fired they could pin point it rather accurately. The other four hounds rushed forward at considerable speed.

His aim changed to one of the four others, this one another female. "Let's see if you're any good against a moving target," he said before he gently pressed the trigger back and unleashed another lance of molten steel.

It struck the female in the brisket and seared through most of the way before the projectile balled up within the beast and exploded out it's hind quarters. What resulted was a rather stunning display of gore as the beast was nearly ripped in half from the immense amount of shock. The beast's legs lost the power to keep it moving, or hold it up, and it crashed into the ground with a slide. There were still three more of the beasts rushing towards them, and only a few moments would pass by before they reached the aggressors.

[Kella]

Unless Kath hounds had some extra brain that Grizzelda had not been informed of, Marcus was just being classically male and insecure. The thing's brain was fried, of course it was dead. She just rolled her eyes. Easy shot or not, it'd been a damn good one.

She couldn't help but watch the white-hot projectile, which left behind a glowing green streak on her vision. She blinked it away and smiled as the shot tore all the way through the massive beast. She had to get her hands on that thing.

The Kath hounds started to charge then, and Grizzelda pulled her feet under her and stood just as Marcus was making his comments about moving targets. He'd see indeed.

Her stance was solid, core stabilizing, rifle resting comfortably against her shoulder. As she was choosing which hound to take first, one tossed its head and snarled, and with one smooth movement she centered the rifle and fired. The shot hit the back of the Kath's throat, tearing through its spine. The legs continued of their own accord for a moment or two, having not been informed that their master was gone, but their undead clumsiness sent the hound rolling across the dirt. It gave one final twitch and then was still.

Grizzelda had already centered on the second Kath, sparing only half a moment to be impressed by the utter destruction imparted by Marcus's new toy, before returning to her mark. Predicting the Kath's stride, she steadied the rifle and waited, at just the right moment sending a bolt searing through the Kath's chest, through the heart and out its spine. Sure enough, this Kath fell as the last had.

She noted that the fourth Kath had fallen, and though her eyes and ears were still alert for any further sign of movement, she lowered her rifle.

"That was fun. I like this hunting thing, not as many political complications as when killing people."

[Dire Wolf]

Marcus rose to his feet along with Grizzelda, and adopted a solid stance though one that was a bit more formal than hers. His feet were planted a shoulder width apart and faced the same way, his left elbow was tucked into his side and the hand attached held the foregrip in a quirky looking way. The man stretched his right hand out, which forced the rifle into the pocket of his shoulder, before he brought it back and allowed his hand to firmly grasp the pistol grip.

He had done this once or twice.

His finger caressed the trigger much as he had before, but this time he didn't quite take as much time. One's grip could only be solid for so long before it begins to waver while standing. No matter how powerful or weak a man was. This fact was especially true when dealing with a weapon that was as heavy as the liquid steel launcher. The little disk whirled out of the barrel shortly before the intense burst of slagged steel surged after it.

The final Kath hound wasn't quite as large as the Alpha he had taken down a few minutes prior, but it was still bigger than most of its peers. Marcus' lance of liquified metal burst through it's sternum as if it were paper, but due to the angle it missed most of the vital organs and seared out of the beast's rear leg. The male only took a few more paces before he crashed to the soft grass and slid to a stop.

A pang of regret struck his heart as he dropped from his stance, and threw his arm through the sling. He hated unclean kills. Regardless of their inherent nature, they were innocent creatures. They deserved a painless death from a sentient being. "Killing's always a messy business, if you ask me."

Killing was not a thing to take pleasure in. Killing was something that was necessary. The Dantooine Liberation Army needed food, and these Kath hounds would provide it to them. Well... lets get to it. One of his hands wrapped around the grip of his heavy blaster pistol and yanked it from it's holster on his thigh. A few moments later he stood over the wounded beast.

Impassive brown eyes watched as the beast tried to stand, but ultimately failed and fell to the ground. He lifted the pistol to the beast's head and watched as a red bolt leaped from the barrel. It was so easy to kill. So easy to watch as a bolt of ionized particles flew from one point of space to another, and tear apart everything in its path. He looked over to Grizzelda with a stoic, stony look scrawled across his face.

"Lets go check out the cave before we... get to business. Shall we?"

[Kella]

Grizzelda caught Marcus's expression of guilt. Being able to read people was a lot of the reason she was still alive. In other situations, it was a skill both convenient and amusing. At the current moment, it was a bit enlightening. This guy had a lot of baggage.

"Killing's always a messy business, if you ask me."

Grizzelda shrugged. "Maybe the way you do it," she said, looking down her nose at the struggling Kath. "I seem to have it down to an art." Grizzelda's lethality was more of a necessity than a charity, but she supposed it worked out. She was not entirely callous, however, and she wouldn't have denied that to see the Kath in such pain darkened her mood a few shades. Not to the point of being nearly as humorless as Marcus seemed to be, though.

The blaster rapport hung in the air, and as he gave her a significant look, she glanced at the fallen hound.

She nodded to his suggestion. "Much as I like surprises..."

Grizzelda walked with purpose towards the mouth of the den, slinging the rifle over her shoulder. She glanced at each carcass as she passed, as interested in the precision of her shots as the power of Marcus's. As the mouth of the den grew near, the quiet noises within grew clearer. Scuffing and scratching, footsteps...

There was a sudden movement, and Grizzelda had drawn her heavy blaster and centered it on the form before her mind had registered what it was. A Kath puppy was peeking out from the darkness, ears flopping ridiculously, horns barely noticeable, more a ball of fluff with large eyes and larger feet than anything else. Grizzelda slipped the pistol back into its holster as the puppy looked her up and down.

"Well now aren't you just adorable," she crooned, holding out a closed fist for it to sniff curiously. No use losing any fingers. The puppy scrabbled out of the darkness and trotted past Grizzelda. He gave Marcus an appraising look, a good sniff, then peed at his feet.

"I think he likes you."

There was another noise from inside the den, and another puppy cautiously emerged, growling at Grizzelda until she scratched it under the chin, at which point the puppy utterly melted. "That's a good girl..."

[Dire Wolf]

Marcus Davion may have been a dour, stoic, and all around negative person but that hardly stopped him from cracking a wide grin at the little pup. He knelt down and scratched behind the delicate little creature's ear. The little pup curled leaned into his finger at the touch, and made a satisfied groan. "Really? What makes you say that," he said with a smirk as he lifted the little pup up to his chest.

The kath hound wasn't too different from Danny when she was a pup, or even Mirri when she was a baby. It was amazing to him how such a delicate creature could grow into a beast that could kill a man with little effort. Brown eyes flicked up to the caramel woman beside him, that smile still pursing his lips. "My daughter will love him."

He had just began to turn back to the speeder when he heard a little whimper come from the cave. Marc's heavy brows furrowed as he took a edged closer to mouth of the cave. Moments later a few balls of fluff left the cave and sniffed at Grizzelda's shoes before darting over to Marcus. "What do you think? Can we keep them?"

[Kella]

One of the pups looked around and licked its muzzle, then sniffed the air and began to whine. "I think it's only right," she said, quieting the hound with a scratch to the belly as a fourth and fifth pup wandered out of the cave.

Two hours later the pups were hanging their heads over the speeder rail, tongues flapping in the wind, too simple to know that their parents lay lashed to the back of the speeder. One of the pups had settled in Grizzelda's lap, and she scratched it behind the ears. Such was life, sometimes.

Several sound meals and a solid addition to the DLA's bestiary, the hunt had been a great success.