Thu Jan 17, 2013 1:41 am by Raksha Dhawan
Khagarban City residential sector
*Once she had made her way down from the mountain outside the city Raksha, a former Corellian Defense Force XJ7 X-wing pilot in the City of Khagabhan visiting an old friend from her days at the University of Coruscant, had not been able to get a clear view of what was happening in the city until she had traversed some of the distance she had needed to cover to reach the mountain she had been free solo climbing when the turbolaser fire had begun to rain down upon the city. What Raksha had seen when reaching a vantage point that afforded her a relatively unobstructed view of the city had not been promising; drop pods pouring down in, as near as she was able to determine, all areas of the city, LAAT/i's she was able to determine were defending the besieged and battered city from the fact that they were firing on the pods and the hostile forces that emerged from them.
Hesitating for a handful of moments, Raksha had been torn between endeavoring to ascertain where the civilian evacuation she assumes must be going on is taking place to try and find her friend, Kashi, and her friend's husband and seven year old daughter or attempting to reach the residential sector in case they were unable to evacuate or, worse for Raksha to contemplate, injured and in need of help. Concluding that trying to find Kashi and her family at the evacuation point, assuming she would be able to find and reach it in the first place, would be difficult at best, Raksha had begun moving for the residential sector, thinking that she would be of more use to her friend if she or her family were trapped or injured. Raksha knew that there was a possibility that Kashi, her husband or daughter might have been killed when the turbolaser fire poured down on the city, she had seen the extent of the devastation and the way it had not been confined to any one area, but Raksha had chosen not to dwell on it.
Knowing that the invading forces and friendlies alike would probably make one of their first objectives establishing forward observers and snipers, Raksha, upon reaching the city, had avoided open streets and areas, sticking to those that afforded her the greatest chance of moving unseen; her attire - a lightweight, olive hued windbreaker worn over a black sleeveless tee and loose fitting khaki cargo pants and hiking boots - should, she had assumed, give any of the defending forces pause as it suggests she is a civilian and noncombatant, but the indiscriminate nature of the opening attack and the fact that the civilian sector had been hit just as hard as other areas of the city had made her aware of the high likelihood that the hostile forces would not think twice before targeting her if spotted.*
*As she nears the neighborhood Kashi and her family's home is located in, Raksha relaxes slightly when she sees the number of hostile casualties, determining that the defending LAAT's must have hit them hard enough that the hostile's were unable to form up into their elements in the vicinity and can see or hear no signs of fighting near enough that moving on into the neighborhood seems any more dangerous than her journey through the war torn city to reach it. Continuing to advance cautiously, Raksha eventually reaches Kashi's home, which had been left untouched in the turbolaser assault and enters it to find it empty. Moving through the rooms of the home, Raksha feels immensely relieved when she can see evidence of the family have made an effort to pack and assumes that they attempted to evacuate. Going to the guest room, her next objective being to try and reach an evacuation point herself, Raksha straps on her thigh holster, checks her DL-44 heavy blaster and drops it into the holster on her right thigh, leaving the clasp undone in case she has a need to draw it.
Carefully checking out the windows on all sides of the house's top floor to see if there are any hostiles approaching, Raksha leaves the home's back door and, avoiding the main streets, begins making her way towards the city proper to try reach an elevated position from which she can ascertain where the nearest evacuation center or defending position might be. As she reaches the outskirts of the city, Raksha finds out that she had been wrong about the hostile's presence in the area, coming across the first of the civilians that must have been cut down while attempting to evacuate and feeling a sinking feeling in her stomach as she recognizes some of them as neighbors of Kashi's family. Raksha tells herself not to waste time examining all of the bodies, tells herself that doing so requires her to be stationary and exposed for too long, but slows down and begins examining the bodies all the same. Kashi, when Raksha finds her body, is laying over her daughter, having obviously tried to protect her, and her husband's body is not far away. Raksha, on a knee beside her friend's body, lowers her head, her dark hair falling to curtain her face as she feels a sense of numbness and unreality wash over her, does not have long to mourn her friend; a blaster bolt splashing against the wall beside her head.
Rising into a crouch, Raksha sprints for the cover of a building with a heavily damaged entrance across from where the civilians had been slaughtered, hearing the sound of two more shots that impact the street behind her before she reaches the interior of the building, a hotel who's upper floors had been hit in the turbolaser assault on the city. Breathing heavily, willing herself to not panic, Raksha moves further into the rubble and corpse strewn lobby, drawing her DL-44 from its holster and trying to think strategically. It was almost certainly a sniper that fired on her, possibly a forward observer or scout for a hostile unit, and almost certainly a sign that the area she has reached is about to be occupied or searched. The lobby is too exposed and so Raksha enters a stairwell, heading up to the building's fifth floor, which seems relatively undamaged. Reaching a window on the opposite side of the building from that which the sniper must be facing given the direction of the shots, Raksha looks out, hoping to see LAAT's approaching or flying nearby, which would signal that the defending forces are nearby, but frowns when she does not. Staying in the building seems unwise; a lone civilian is probably not going to concern the hostiles enough to search for her, but Raksha's gut tells her to move and so, making her way to a window on the opposite side of the building and cautiously looking out to verify her assumptions, Raksha ducks back down when she sees what looks like a platoon sized force advancing towards the area the hotel is located in.
Returning to the stairwell, Raksha exits the rear of the hotel and, keeping to side streets and areas that offer her cover from the hostile force advancing from behind her, begins making her way east to move out of their path and keep ahead of them.*