"Gar lahm par ibic hibir, gar aalar pel," ( Are you ready pup, you seem soft)
Soft?! Ati bristled, setting her shoulders at the taller Mando with an invisible glare of challenge. Calling someone 'soft' was a good way to get in a quick fight on Mandalore. In a few years, with thicker skin and a more mature head, Ati may have brushed off the remark. But on her first round of galactic travel and with a mind to prove herself, the words stung her pride.
She may even have answered him in kind, regardless of her broken arm, if it weren't for the clipped electronic voice of the droid saying something that demanded an even more immediate portion of her attention.
"Statement: Well that's annoying..... I seam to be having an error. Clarification: All comms signal in this region has gone dead, rendering all guidance systems inoperable."
The female regarded 'Smiley' flatly for a long moment, "That could be a problem, droid. Does your master have enemies that could've followed you out here?"
As soon as the words are out, she considered a second, more likely, and less appealing scenario.
"Haar'chak." She growls the curse, "I only thought my headset was damaged in the crash. It's all too neat, isn't it? The ship suffers a power failure when there was no trouble anywhere else on the flight, bringing us down into an area that is now being jammed... I don't like what that means. Someone either anticipated survivors, or only just realized there -are- survivors, and we're being watched. Either way, they don't want us calling for help."
It sounded paranoid to her own ears, but it made too much sense; fitting the pieces of their circumstances together into a more complete whole.
"Take it off her shoulders, I can fight and haul this with ease, she on the other hand, she is still far to young for such impressive strength or finesse."
"Yeah, your not compensating for anything. No, I can go fine on my own. Unless you need to be guarded by the big, strong chick......"
The Trandoshan saves her from outright challenging Davern, and finally she shrugs her half of the harness off of her shoulder, allowing Zekk to do just as he said he'd do. His size really did make him the best suited to pull the tank, and she was mildly impressed that he'd volunteered to do it. Trandoshans usually weren't that level-headed when it came to demeaning themselves in front of 'lesser' mammalian species.
----
The night was bitterly cold, and the desert stretched forever in any direction they cared to look. Ati's Beskar'gam protected her better than those with any skin exposed to the biting sand, and most of her visor's visual components still functioned despite the minute cracks that'd starred the transparasteel. Because of that, she was usually the first to climb the next dune, watching for threats ahead of them on their trek across the dunes.
It hadn't left her mind that their circumstances might be fitting all too neatly into someone else's plan for them, and she didn't like being played from afar. So she kept her mouth shut and her thoughts to herself, even when Zekk lost his footing and sent the sled screaming down the slope of a dune, nearly colliding with several of the others.
The argument broke up quickly enough, and they didn't loose too much time, but eventually the wind and cold became too much, and in the relative shelter of a dune's valley, they all huddled around the tank for what shelter they could find. Ati declined the scraps that Rift handed around; it wouldn't add anything that her armor didn't already provide.
The next day was Hell. While her sealed armor had been fantastic in the night, during the day her lack of an environmental suite left her cooking right along with the rest of them. To remove her helmet would just expose her head to the sun, so she grunted and cursed and suffered in relative silence while the heat rolled off of the iron plates with enough heat to scorch, should she have been stupid enough to touch them with naked flesh.
She was going to smell -fantastic- after all of this, and made a mental note several times over to spend her next set of credits on any kind of in-armor atmosphere uprgrade.
And then Hell gets... Hell-ier? Ati had stayed back as Rift and Davern had gone up the next dune, arguing like children. The Deathwatch grated on her nerves at every turn, and she was itching for her arm to mend. Stars willing, she could find a medical droid in whatever settlement they hit first. Then she and that old man were going to have a prolonged talk.
But there are shouts, and blasterfire. Tusken. They must've come upon the wreck and seen their tracks. Her pistol wouldn't cut it. Reaching back, the rifle is heavy in her one-handed grip, and she steadies it against her hip. The assault weapon snaps, and heavy red bolts drill into the waves of roaring, savage scavengers.
The numbers press ever-closer, despite the casualties they absorb. A Raider falls to her shots, only to have its comrade leap over the body, too close to shoot again. Its Gaffi stick comes down hard onto her gun arm, but skips loudly, harmlessly, across the gray Mandalorian Iron. His momentum dedicated forward, Ati meets his wrapped forehead with the crown of her helmet, and the crack is even louder. The Tusken joins its fellows in the dirt.
With a screech, the assault is halted by whatever threat had spooked the Tusken Raiders sent crimson energy staining the sky.
"...I have a bad feeling about this."
And then they're all running, choosing to take their chances in the canyon rather than find out what was slaughtering the Tusken. As she clears her boots from desert dunes to hard-packed grit, Ati briefly regrets that she doesn't have the time to enjoy the few degrees difference in the shade. The twin paths look identical.
"Split up and double our chances to get away, or stay together and keep our firepower concentrated?"
Time was running out to decide, and Ati is already taking a few steps towards the left-hand path.