Part of the effect was due to my dazed, calorie-deprived (but cleansed!) state of being, but also due to the efforts of the stage-droid discretely parked in the corner, looking so much like a blinking trash can as it skillfully adjusted the lighting and sound effects. Whatever the cause, Louke's talk was an impressive performance that had everything from excitement, love, danger, pathos, and even more excitement:
“...We were facing the galaxy's most fearsome weapon, and we were only a few squadrons of fighters and ships. Were we going to be crushed? Were we going to be like little waves crashing against a massive cliff? Was it crazy to attack a battlestation the size of a moon that had ten times more fire-power in one shot than all of the Rebel fleet combined? NO!”
Louke speechified with much verve and intense hypnotic eye action, as the stage-droid helpfully projected holos of ships and waves at the appropriately emotion-resonating moments. “I could tell you that as we sat there radioing amongst our teams, we felt no fear at all. We had the Powaah with us! We felt it!”
There was a significant brightening of the spotlight on Louke, followed by the crowd's, “Ahhhhh.... Ooooo....”
The room was stuffed with virtually everyone from the Center (except the Tuskans, who were busy working). We'd thought we had come early enough to get good seats, but, even though we arrived a good half-hour earlier, Mike and I only managed to squeeze our way in the back – and even then I had stand on my toes and crank my head at a funny angle to see above the heads and around a pillar. The effort was worth it though, as I was finally able to catch my solid looks of my lovely Leah and her pastry-hairdo sitting next to Louke, as she smiled in her intoxicating way that brought fire to my crotch. Mike was also craning his neck, as on the other side of Louke was Haan and his black vest smirking and winking at pretty much everybody.
“With the Powaah giving us strength, we went for it! Wooosh, wooosh, wooosh!” Louke mimed flying squadrons with his hands, complete with an impressive reverb provided by the stage-droid. “Gold team went in first, but they were getting mauled, so Red and Blue team went in to give them cover. Boom boom boom! It was too much! It was too much! We were losing fighters left right and center!”
“Ooooo...” the crowd oooed and sucked in a collective breath of nervous anticipation.
The lights dimmed ominously, as Louke took a heavy pause, confiding in a loud whisper, “You know, they said that Dorth Vadah himself was out there picking us off. We were getting close to having no hope.”
“Nooooo....” the crowd gasped, fearing now that Louke may ever survive the tale as he told the tale. Louke was putting on a great show, and I was lapping it up as much as anybody in the room. I've always been a sucker for the whole underdog beats the evil whatever against crazy impossible odds. This moment of the story coming up, obviously, was the requisite low moment when we were supposed to doubt that they'd even survive, but then, at the last minute, when all seemed lost,
“Then, I heard Ben's words in my head, saying 'Louke, remember the Powaah. Let the Powaah be with you!' Yes! I put my faith in the Powaah and went in for another run at that monster of a battlestation.”
And yet Louke frowned, sank his head, and construed a pause that was palpably unbearable for the crowd. “No... no... I couldn't! I still couldn't! There were too many of them shooting at me! The shot I had to take was so small! Even with EssTwo in the cockpit behind me and helping me dodge the enemy fighters, I still couldn't do it! We did our best though, didn't we, buddy?” There was an appreciative bleep-bloop-bloop from the stage-droid in the corner.
Suddenly though, Louke switched his frown into a bright smile, and turning to Haan, he slapped him on the back, “And then Haan came back to shoot all the attackers down!”
“Ahhhhh....” there was relieved clapping and cheering, as Louke continued,
“And I was free to make my run! It wasn't easy, you know. It was one tiny little hole that I had to drop a torpedo in. But I had the Powaah with me! The Powaah be with us all! I took a deep breath and... I fired! It went straight in! And BOOM went the Deeeeath Star!”
Yeah, whatever. Boom also went everyone in the Deeeeath Star working away minding their own business. Boom went all my shit now floating in space. Boom went my kitchen peeps and poor Joe. Well, at least it did destroy our annoying droid chef. I squirmed as EssTwo's exploding Deeeeath Star holo brought back some fairly unpleasant memories I had hoped never to revisit.
I looked over to Mike to see how he was doing, and could see that he too was a bit on the tense side. He seemed to be staring not at Louke or Haan, but at the guy sitting suspiciously close enough to Haan for their legs to be touching (!), and who was the hairiest dude I'd ever seen with a massive carpet of hair covering his face, arms and chest. Honestly, if it weren't for the eyes and the utility belt slung across his chest, I would have sworn he was some piece of plush furniture.
The room filled with wild clapping and cheering, as Louke, Leah and Haan beamed at the crowd with heroic pride. I did have my doubts about the details of Louke's story, but it made for a great yarn, and that was apparently the important thing. It brought up an awkward thought though: was this the kind of “business” that Leah and Haan had been disappearing to do? Could this Rebel thing really be what they've been involved with? But if Louke was part of the Rebellion and Leah was her brother, did that mean that she was also a... a... I tried not to think about it too much, lest it slacken my erection when I next hooked up with Leah.
Well, all is forgiven in the Powaah, right? The Powaah loves all, right? Let bygones be bygones, I suppose. Just wipe your mind clean, and put on that winning Powaah smile.
“Yes! We'll beat the Empire! We'll break their power!” cried out Louke, his fist shuddering in the air, as the crowd leapt to their feet and hooted.
Meh. They can do whatever they wanted, so long as it didn't involve me. I knew very well what the near-omnipotent power the Empire had, and I had no interest at all in throwing myself in front of all-consuming galactic garburator that it was. I get the whole injustice and cruelty thing, really I do, and I'm shocked, shocked I say, by the horror and awfulness of it all. But, fight against it? There was no sense in fighting the inevitable and what's always been in one way or another. We were such little specks of nothingness that what hope could we possibly have in front of the incontrovertible monolith that was the Empire? What point was there really? To make a point? Waste a life that no one would even notice getting flicked away? It was best to ignore it all, check out, and live happily out of the system, preferably working very minimally and having lots of sex.
“Down with the Empire! Down with the Emperor's tyranny!” Louke continued, starting to lead the ecstatic crowd in some fairly typical anti-establishment chanting.
Yeah, yeah. Rah, rah, rah. I'd been to my fair share of rallies in my wide-eyed innocent youth, and I was well familiar with the hysterical fervor that rose and rose during the rally itself, but that ended in an embarrassed, directionless fizzle once people started asking who was actually going to do what of the galaxy-changing they'd been chanting about. In the moment, however, all that cheering was giving a satisfyingly good warming to the collective mob and herd instincts that hungered for solidarity and belonging. Not wanting to get lynched, I joined in, and nudged Mike to do the same. So long as it was harmless venting, it didn't hurt to yell out a little and feel bigger in our britches that we really were.
“Join us! Join us against the Empire! Together, we'll beat them and take them down! The Powaah be with US!” Louke yelled at the peak of the chanting – to which he was rejoined with some intoxicated, joyous cries of assent.
Whoaaaaa there, buddy. Like I said, I feel you and agree with you (to some extent), but I'm not about to stick my neck out and do anything about it. What business was it of mine if the Empire was being unjust or unfair or brutal or genocidal, when it didn't bother me? So long as I wasn't on the wrong side and paid my dues, I'd see nothing of “bad” side of Empire – which incid
entally was pretty much a necessary fact of life. How do you think the Empire provided the services that kept the galaxy-ways free of debris? The money to do it all had to come from somewhere. So what if it came from some ass-wipe planet populated by primitives who were too stupid to set up a proper trade agreement to exploit their natural resources? Someone had to do it.
One way or the other, there was no chance I was about to be recruited into some risky, brainless movement/cause/thingamajigger, no matter how many inspirational stories I was told. Abandon this comfy place for the unknown and near certain death? You got to be kidding. In fact, I'd be willing to wager that all of the people in the crowd yelling so passionately with such deep conviction about the o-so-romantic prospect of being a Rebel would be quickly backing out once they realized that they weren't going to be living in another idealistic retreat center, but entering an actual war.
Mike and I looked at each other, having reached our tolerance limits with the crowd. This was far far removed from what we had come for. With some difficulty, we started wading through the roiling mass of people, making our way towards the exit. I wasn't sure what Mike was thinking right now, but I could imagine he was feeling something not dissimilar to my mood of depression and more than a little disgust. I just couldn't see myself staying at the Center any longer – but that meant no more Leah (and no Haan for Mike), and that was a damned painful thought to accept. Could I still stay and ignore the rest of the stupidity? It was possible, I guess, and I'd lived in much worse, but somehow there was deeper vein of disappointment that I was having trouble getting a grasp on.
We'd crawled our way out of the room and were getting our first gasps of cool, sane air, when a large, shuddering BANG made us jolt around. It was probably another of EssTwo's sound effects – though this one sounded strangely sharp and jarring, not at all like the pleasantly modulated tones that it had used before. The crowd seemed to be reacting differently too, no longer sounding like a chorus of animated cheering, but began to be mingled with confused yelps and the odd scream. And then, there was another,
BANG!
“Frag grenade!” Mike cried out in shock as he pulled me to the ground. Before I could ask Mike what the hell he meant, we were suddenly surrounded by screaming, fleeing people, as they tore their way out of the room. Mike dragged me up against the wall, screaming in my ear, “Stay down! Those are stormtroopers!”
“What? What? Stormtroopers?” I answered half-understanding, my senses completely overloaded with a blur of noises, people, and sheer terror. “We have to get Leah out!”
“Stay down, you idiot! We have to stay down. You'll get us both killed if we go anywhere,” Mike barked at me, firmly pressing me against the wall in spite of my struggling. “You hear that? Those are plasma rifles. They're picking the runners off.”
Sure enough, the screams were punctuated by the characteristic hypersonic zip-zip of plasma shots searing the air. I sank to the ground in a daze, and felt something wet and slippery slap against my face. Looking down, I had to keep myself from freaking out as I saw my chest splattered in blood, but somewhat calmed down as I realized it wasn't my own. The people running out of the room were coming out with heavy lacerations over their bodies that were bleeding profusely. Behind them came others that were hobbling as they dragged a twisted leg, or shuffled under the weight of a maimed or limp body.
Holy fuck. This was insane. I'm no Rebel! I desperately wanted to get out of there and run with the others, but Mike held on to me, looking on grimly as he pointed to the fleeing people getting cut down with systematic efficiency. Another explosion shook us, but this time much closer.
“Shit. They're coming in,” Mike cursed. He looked down at me and gave me a thin smile, “Well, Tim. We're going to have to take our chances and make a run for it. Follow me as best you can, alright?”
There wasn't much I could do except nod mechanically and wait for Mike to start running. Two more grenades landed, each one getting closer, but Mike motioned for me to stay still. The plasma shots began to get closer and louder too, as the stormtroopers gradually closed in on the building. I was pretty much ready to run on my own, when the first plasma shot burned from within the room, and Mike yelled,
“Come on!”
And we took off running! I pumped my legs and arms as hard as I could, trying desperately to keep up with Mike's much larger strides. Curiously, it was then that I realized that perhaps all those cleanses weren't the best idea or the most sustainable in the long run, as I rapidly felt my already depleted energy reserves peter out. Still, I struggled as best I could, straining with all my might to summon more adrenaline.
A burning pain flashed in my shoulder, and everything went dark.
CHAPTER 8