In the thick of it 8

"They're what!?" Everyone shouted in unison, save Bly whose eyes widened an imperceptible amount.

"You heard me" I stated while rubbing my temples, suddenly wishing the Lurmen left some booze for me, "I just had a vision. That big ass tank's heading over to the village, along with an escort of droids. Three-maybe five hundred in total."

"Are you sure?" Aayla asked.

"Damn sure. Unless the force is just fucking with me. In Fact…" I said while glancing between the clones, "...Lucky let me borrow these for a second."

Pulling the binoculars off his utility belt, I held them tight before bending my legs and performing a giant force aided leap straight into the air. Reaching the apex at about twenty metres, I quickly put the binoculars to work and took a brief look around.

Managing to catch sight of several moving objects, I jumped back up to make sure it was the separatists. With confirmation that it was them, I gave everyone the bad news.

"About five klicks out in that direction" I said, pointing to the slightly hilly plains to the north, "We've got about half an hour before they're in firing distance. So… anyone got any ideas?"

The group quickly began to come up with a survival plan, while increasingly more incredulous idea's were being given by Anakin, Aayla reminded everyone about something they overlooked till now.

"We need to wake the Lurmen up and get them out of here." She said, reminding everyone here that at least half the village is comatose.

"I'll handle it" I told her. Bringing my finger's up to the corners of my mouth, I let loose a disturbingly loud whistle that clattered off the sleeping Lurmen's eardrums.

What followed was a symphony of grunts and cusses, the Lurmen clearly weren't happy with being woken up so early after a night of heavy drinking, but survival sadly takes priority over nursing a hangover.

Rounding the grumpy Lurmen up, I told them their current predicament, "Listen up ya thieving bastards. The Seperatist are on their way over here right now, and if you don't make a decision on what you're going to do very soon, you who be able to make a decision at all."

"So, are you going to run away and hide, or stay here and help up fight them?"

There was a brief period of silence as my words sank in, but breaking it was none other than the village elder, "What menace have you brought upon our village now Jedi?"

"Father, you can't blame them." Want Too contended, seeming fed up with his father's neutrality.

Pitching in, Anakin states, "He's right. The separatists don't know we're here, and if they're rushing over here with a battalion of droids, I doubt that they will come in peace."

Staying stubborn,the elder argues, "Your presence here endangers us. Leave before they arrive and we may still be able to enter talks with them."

This cunt's got a few screws loose. I can't claim to know what he's been through that made him his way, but can't he see that nothing they have is worth anything in the Separatists eyes.

How can you talk them out of whatever they're about to do, if you don't have anything to appease them?

Following in her Master's footsteps, Ahsoka refuted, "But they won't listen and you'll have no way to defend yourself. You'll need our help to fight back!"

"We won't fight at all." The elder stalwartly stated, "We would rather die than to kill others"

His word drew mixed reactions out of the other Lurmen, before our very eyes, two factions were forming. You had the pacifists that wanted to do anything else but fight, that was mostly made up of the older members of the tribe, from what I could gleam, most of them would've rather left the village than try to bargain with the Separatists, but never voiced it since the elder had already made his mind up.

Rallying behind Wang Too were those who wanted to aid us in defending the village against the Separatists. Those who followed Wang Too were mostly of the younger generation, who didn't want to risk losing the village they grew up in without a fight.

"You do realise that droids aren't alive" I said, pointing out a flaw in the elders argument, but it was easily ignored in favour of Ahsoka's passionate rambling.

"But how could you-" In the middle of another speech, Ahsoka was cut off by Aayla.

"Ahsoka, stop. If they want to remain neutral, we won't force them into war." She told the Padawan before shifting her gaze to the elder, "See to it that you're people temporarily leave the Village. I know the Separatists, and I can guarantee that their arrival won't end with a talk, all I'm asking you to do is to vacate the area so that we can handle this."

"We can't let you do this yourselves!" Turning to the elder, Wang Too passionately says, "Father even if we don't fight the Separatists, we must defend ourselves!"

Showing anger for the first time since we arrived the elder attested, "Mounting a defence is still engaging in battle! If we sacrifice our beliefs, we're no better than they are! Our philosophy has helped us survive for generations, why should we change it now!"

"Because times have changed! There's a war going on in the galaxy, how can we hope to live peacefully if we aren't willing to defend that peace! What will happen after we abandon this planet, will you continue to run away everytime trouble finds us?"

On an entirely different note. Captain Rex and Flash just arrived and told the generals, "The shield generator is ready sir/ma'am."

Quality, they must've brought it back from the ship wreckage. At least we won't be blown to smithereens by artillery fire now, nor will the Lurmen Village get torn asunder from the battle.

While walking away from the village with several other Lurmen, the Elder shouted, "You can still come with us! It's not too late Wang Too."

Aw aye, I might have used a mind trick of subtly convince the elder to fuck off. Can't be arse putting up with his peace rants while I'm chopping fuck out of battle droids.

With a complicated look in his eyes, Wang Too shook his head, turning away from his father. Bringing the Lurmen that decide to say over to us, he asked, "Please Jedi, give us something to do. We can't just stand by and watch while you risk your lives for us."

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