Over the River and Through the Woods (Adventures!AU Book 2)

Ch. 59 Battlestations!

I RETURN. With a massive (6400+ words) chapter full of action! Great way to get back into things! This WAS two chapters, but developments in later chapters caused me to shift things around so this is now one massive chapter XD

BIG thanks to everyone who was patient with me as I took a break to finish my last semester! Excluding any future weird complications, we should be back on a weekly upload schedule! After this story (only five chapters left!) and "Commander, Meet the Cat" I'll be posting book three "To the Far Reaches" AND book five "Fallen Not Forgotten" simultaneously! Fallen Not Forgotten will be the main story, with uploads three times a month, and To the Far Reaches being uploaded once a month. Depending on the interest for the pair, I may do alternating weeks but we'll see how it goes XD I'm figuring that since Fallen Not Forgotten brings in Rex, Domino, and the Jedi it will be the more popular but y'all never fail to surprise me XD

As always, feedback is very much appreciated! Even if its just a keyboard smash XD I do read all the comments, and from this point forward will hopefully be able to respond to them all again!

Really hope you enjoyed the battle scenes, and the little milestone at the end! ;)

CW: Canon typical violence, callbacks to Trust Shattered, Twiggy therapy, self doubt, regrets.

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"Done this before?"

My ear twitched at the crackle from the helmet's speaker. "No this... this is a first for me."

Creeping through the trees at the edge of the field in Kelusine form, soft paw pads muffling my steps, I kept my eyes on the advancing battalion of droids as Trevor walked out to meet them. Tech hid in the barn with Crosshair's Night Hunter gremlin, no doubt ready to record the battlefield from afar, while Wrecker and Hunter lurked at the treeline further back with Sarah.

Crosshair, meanwhile, laid flat against my back, tightly gripping my mane.

The arrangement was... odd to say the least. The only Kelusine saddle Sarah had was outfitted for a Forester Kelusine, not an Mountaineer one, so the sniper rode bareback. I didn't really care too much for hard plastoid rubbing against my spine, especially when he shifted side to side to find the best spot, but he had to be on my back or he'd never keep up.

The plan was simple; once Trevor gave the signal, Crosshair and I would run full speed to the jammer as Wrecker, Hunter, and Sarah kept the clankers busy.

The only issue? Trevor hadn't said exactly what the signal would be.

"How fast can you run in this form?" Crosshair whispered, shifting up on my neck.

"'Round forty to forty five mph, slower if I want to keep the pace uphill but faster if I'm going downhill," I replied, the pervasive roughness from my new vocal cords made worse by my hushed tone. "How 'bout those rollies?"

I counted at least ten, but hopefully a few would stay behind and not follow Crosshair and me. Then again, I didn't want Hunter and the others to face all those droids.

"Roughly seventy klicks an hour."

Yeah, my American ass has no idea how fast that is compared to me.

I looked across the field, eyeing the rocky gorges splitting open the mountainside, the mottled gray rock leaving a bald spot on the otherwise lush mountainside. How about a little theft from the Spirit movie? "Can you hold on if I get us in those narrow gorges?"

"Hmm." He remained silent for a moment, no doubt scanning the obstacle course. "Yeah."

"Good. Mountaineers are perfectly at home in rocky terrain." I settled into a crouch. "Hold on as tight as you can, I got mane to spare."