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marlynnofmany · 10 months

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A Worthy Sacrifice

Going on a food run for this spaceship usually didn’t end up in a debate over whose body parts are more expendable. Never, as a matter of fact. Today was the first. And it could have easily been our last.

The trip had such a peaceful start, too. Along with the usual supplies that we paid real money for, Captain Sunlight sent a handful of us to pick up a local delicacy: some plant. I honestly missed the name. I was more interested in the location — inside a vast cave complex with shafts of light filtering in from above, and multiple lakes of poison to make the perfect growing environment. Or maybe they were acid lakes. At any rate, extremely dangerous, and completely at odds with the lovely sun-dappled scenery and brightly colored plantlife.

I stood with some trepidation at the edge of the cave maze, holding an empty bag and wondering if there was maybe an entrance somewhere big enough for a hoverbike. Beside me, the hulking forms of the Frillian twins were similarly hesitant. You can’t punch an acid lake, after all, or lift weights at it.

Down closer to ground level, Mur just looked annoyed. “It’s fine,” he said, flipping a blue-black tentacle forward. “The locals pick these plants daily.” His own bag was on a dinky little hoversled that followed him like a flying puppy, leash and all. The sled also held a couple pairs of pruning shears in case the stems gave us trouble. Mur could have ridden on the sled himself, pushing off the ground like a squid-shaped kid on a snow disk, but that would have been undignified. Strongarms are proud of that tentacle-walking, after all.

And apparently they’re not phased by giant lakes of acid.

“If you say so,” I told him. “Lead the way.”

He did, grumbling. I followed, taking care not to trip over the sled, while Blip and Blop stood tall and brought up the rear.

The entrance tunnel was small, alongside many others, and a few turned out to lead to the same big cavern. My first impression was warmth. I regretted wearing a sweater, thin and utilitarian though it was. I took it off as we walked, tying it around my waist, glad that I at least had my hair tied back in its usual long braid. I didn’t need any extra sweat about my neck today.

Once the sweater was secure, I was free to appreciate the scenery. It really was pretty. The walls were a wash of reds and golds, with multiple types of greenery sprouting from every level surface and a few that weren’t. The lake far below was an evil purple, fading to the innocent blue of tropical seas at the edges. A solid fence lined the cliff edge, which I appreciated.

The wall behind us was awash in climbing vines with dangling blueberry-looking things that sure would be convenient if they were the plants we were here for.

No such luck. Those were on the far side. Lots of them. A vast jungle of treelike things, most of which were bent under the weight of head-sized yellow fruit. As I watched, one particularly spindly trunk lost its biggest fruit to gravity, and sprung upwards to fling the smaller ones away in a comical fashion. I could almost hear the splats against the cave wall.

“Well, they sure look ripe,” I said.

Mur wasn’t interested. “Where’s the— Oh, there it is. We took the wrong door. C’mon.” He slapped away along the path beside that fence, over to where a single large hover platform waited like a ferry.

We were just getting on, with me trying to hide my misgivings and the Frillians doing the same, when a chorus of more slapping tentacle-steps approached at speed.

“Wait!” commanded the large reddish Strongarm in the lead, who was colored much like the cavern walls. She was also shaped more like an octopus than a squid, as was the green one behind her. The beige-gray one had a pointy squid head like Mur.

Mur waited. He’d already figured out the controls for the platform, and he stood there in silence while I clutched the railing with the Frillians, and the newcomers climbed on.

With nods all around, Mur pressed a button to close the gate. Then he removed the lid of the fancy pottery jar big enough for a child to hide inside — I’d assumed somebody had left it behind — and he scooped out a bunch of those blueberry things. As I watched in curiosity, he opened a different lid, this one over a part of the control console that stuck out, baring a dark tunnel like an ominous toilet bowl.

He threw the berries in. The platform’s engine started.

Mur steered us out over the deadly lake, engines humming happily, throwing clusters of berries in every so often. I exchanged looks with the Frillians. The other Strongarms didn’t look impressed.

“Are those fuel berries?” I asked.

“Only for this engine,” Mur said, tapping a sign. “It takes anything organic. Nice of the locals to make sure there’s always a full pot here. There is a note here to refill what we use if possible, and I think we definitely should, but I’m sure that not everyone does.”

The red Strongarm made a flapping noise that I recognized as the equivalent of a snort. Yeah, she probably wouldn’t stick around to do her part.

(And remember that bit about “anything organic”? If you recall how I started this little anecdote, this is where you’ll start to get concerned.)

There was only a moderate level of worry in the air at that point, though. We hadn’t fallen in yet and the rails seemed sturdy, if sparse, and the jungle was approaching at a reasonable pace. The slight breeze even made the temperature pleasant.

When Mur docked the platform headfirst and opened a gate on the other side, I was the first one off among the trees. Picking the yellow fruits turned out to be a great time, especially the way they kept accidentally flying through the air. They were about as heavy as cantaloupes, but with such rubbery outsides that it was like they were made for high-impact comedy. I did my best to pick each tree thoroughly, hanging onto the bent trunk with one hand before letting go. I’d started by taking a single fruit from each tree, but that had not worked.

Blip and Blop had the most efficient strategy: one held a bag and the other shook a tree like they were taking its lunch money. Mur just climbed the lowest trunks and plucked everything he found. One way or another, we filled our bags quickly and met back at the platform.

The strangers were a little slower, but again, we waited politely. Soon enough, we were on the way across the lake that lurked distantly below like malevolent grape jam.

I was just thinking that it had been a while since I’d had a proper PB&J when the trouble happened.

The Strongarms, standing on one side of the platform with their sacks of fruit, produced blasters and demanded ours.

(Yes, Strongarms keep things hidden among their tentacles. Yes, it’s just as gross as it sounds.)

Anyway, they must have taken our politeness and healthy fear of death for the signs of a bunch of pushovers, and wow they were wrong about that.

Blip and Blop swung their sacks of fruit in unison while I dove to one side and Mur took the other. You’d think we did this sort of thing all the time. In reality, there were only so many directions to go in a fenced-in battleground like this.

The would-be bandits were too busy dodging the sacks to aim their blasters properly, though they tried. One shot Blip’s bag of fruit, making her even more angry as yellow globes bounced everywhere. One nearly singed my ear, but didn’t get a second shot when I roundhouse kicked him in the squiddy head.

The other one, the leader, was wrestling Mur, and her shot went right through the center of the berry pot, shattering it and sending the platform’s fuel in every direction.

I mentioned that the railings weren’t exactly close together. And that these looked like blueberries: the little round things. My point is, they rolled. With great talent and speed. Right off the sides and down into that terrifying lake, leaving only a few behind.

“Look what you did!” Mur yelled, wrestling harder.

Blop made an undignified squeak of concern, then tried to find an angle he could help from. He ended up stepping firmly on a red tentacle and pinning the blaster to the floor.

His sister, meanwhile, was slamming an alien cantaloupe against the green guy, whose own weapon was stuck inside a different fruit, making its leisurely way down towards the lake.

The gray dude was out cold, which was a surprise to me. I guess Strongarms are easy to concuss, I thought as I made sure his blaster was safe on our side of the platform. I’d considered throwing it over the side as well, but figured we might want it to keep them in line once they woke up. I sure wasn’t planning on giving it back, though.

Crunch went the third blaster, Ow went the Strongarm holding it, and “Stay down, you arm-dragging limp grub!” went Mur. The red Strongarm stayed down.

So. We won the fight. But we only had a scattered few berries left to fuel the platform, and it had coasted to a stop in what looked to me like the exact stinkin’ center of this terrible, poisonous lake.

Blop looked worried. “Now what?” he asked Mur.

“These?” Blip suggested, holding a yellow fruit out toward the intake.

“No!” Mur shouted, startling everyone. He blocked her path. “Those break the engine. Didn’t you read the sign?”

I glanced at the defeated Strongarms. “I think only you read the sign,” I told him.

“Well, it’s very clear!” he exclaimed, waving dark tentacles like he wanted to tear out hair that he didn’t have. “Only other organics!”

Blip set the fruit down. “What do we have?” she asked, checking her pockets. “I’ve got two shrimp sticks and one of those seednuts that Paint likes.”

We all took stock, coming up with a whole lot of nothing. The unconscious Strongarms woke, and submitted to sitting in the corner with their leader, injured and embarrassed and also not in possession of any spare fuel.

“Let’s at least see how far the berries take us,” Mur said grimly, picking up the nearest.

We gathered all that we could find, and it took us a little way. Pocket snacks and whatnot took us a bit farther. We considered clothes (most were artificial), the fruit-carrying bags (same), and even treating the toilet-looking thing in appropriate but mortifying ways.

As we got increasingly desperate, we were still far from shore.

“Pretty sure this is real leather,” Mur said as he dropped in the leash for his tiny hoversled. “That will take us … not far enough.”

We were sort of close, kind of. Relatively speaking.

“The captain will come looking if we’re gone long enough,” Blop said.

“She doesn’t know which tunnel we took,” Mur reminded him. “Searching could take days.”

“Won’t the locals find us?” Blip asked.

The red Strongarm sneered. “They just finished a work cycle, and it’s a regular holiday. You think we’d try to rob you if they could come in at any moment?”

Both Frillians groaned.

Mur scowled. “Yes, very smart. See where that got you!” Moving slowly for added drama, he picked up a pair of shears from his sled. “Who wants to volunteer something organic?”

There were desperate pleas at that, and stonefaced silence from Mur that I hoped was acting.

“What about them?” the leader said, pointing wildly at the Frillians. “Surely they don’t need all those frills!”

Blip and Blop regarded her with identical shocked expressions. “Yes we do!”

“Well, we need our arms! You think that wouldn’t hurt to cut off?”

The yelling escalated while something very obvious occurred to me. I stepped over to Mur and flopped the braid over my shoulder. “Do you think this would be enough?”

The Strongarms shut up immediately. And they stayed silent while Mur calculated, so silent that I started to wonder.

They answered my question before I could ask it.

“You would volunteer that?” asked the red one quietly.

Ohhh, they think it’s a tentacle covered in hair, I realized. Have they not met a human before? Never mind; let’s see if Mur plays along.

“Yes,” I said solemnly, instead of going “Yeah” like I usually would. “If this is the only way to save all of us, then I will gladly make that sacrifice.” I looked over at Blip and Blop, who were elbowing each other but keeping mum. Good.

Mur ushered me toward the intake with all the grandeur of a high-society attendant. “If you would permit me to do the honors,” he said, “I will be quick.”

So I stood in front of the thing with my back to it so the wide-eyed bandits couldn’t see, told Mur to cut just below the hair tie, and held up my sweater ready to wrap it around my head like a bandage.

Yes, I did feel silly. But the bandits deserved a bit of shame and secondhand anguish. Besides, I’d been wanting to try a short haircut for ages, but never found the right time to chop it all off.

This is definitely the right time, I thought. “Go ahead.”

Mur snipped through the braid with one clean cut — hooray for sharp shears — and I collapsed with an anguished expression and some artful whimpers. Blip helped tie the sweater “bandage,” while Blop shielded us from view and stared down the Strongarms. I didn’t see Mur drop the braid into the intake, since my view was somewhat limited, but I felt the engine kick on with a most welcome hum.

I really hope that was enough, I thought as I lay there with my arms about my head. It’ll suck if we have to snip this down to a buzz cut. That’ll be hard to keep up the act through. And I really don’t want hair THAT short.

But when the engine finally went quiet, it was to a cheer from the Frillians. We were close enough to jump.

Or, more accurately, close enough for Blip to fling Mur across the gap with one of my socks to gather berries in. Mur was a terrible shot when he threw it back, but enough berries reached us that we were able to close the distance.

I pulled the blaster from my waistband and nudged it over the side before I forgot. It was too small for the Frillians to use anyway.

Plus, we didn’t need it. By the sound of her voice, the lead Strongarm had been so humbled by my sacrifice that she might have been considering a career change.

She even offered their collections of fruit, and the other two didn’t object.

Mur accepted graciously. I managed to turn my chuckling into pained noises as strong Frillian arms lifted me. I didn’t uncover my head to look. By the sounds of it, the many fruits were being balanced on Mur’s sled and the shoulders of whichever Frillian wasn’t carrying me.

“Farewell,” Mur said haughtily. “Make better choices in the future.”

We left the cavern to the sound of the ex-bandits promising to do so.

I have no idea if they’ll really go straight, but wouldn’t it be hilarious if they did?

Once we were out of sight, Blip put me down and took her share of the fruit bags. I claimed one too. I felt much lighter without the braid. And the threat of impending death.

I looked at my crewmates cheerfully. “Let’s never do that again.”

“Not without significant backup,” Mur agreed.

“Or more spare headfur!” Blop said.

“I’ve definitely spared enough for one day.” I freed a hand to pull out the hair tie, marveling at how simple a process it was now.

My crewmates all told me I looked incredibly strange with short hair about my face like that.

I told them to wait until I picked a final hairstyle, and I described hair gel to them.

~~~

The ongoing backstory adventures of the main character from this book. More to come!

#my writing #the Token Human #writeblr #humans are weird #haso #hfy #eiad #humans are space orcs #and other such tags #science fiction #short stories #stories that are short but not as short as they were supposed to be #seriously why is it so long #anyways!#enjoy #the next one will probably be shorter

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dystopicjumpsuit · 4 months

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Stars Beyond Number - Chapter 19

The Way the World Ends, Part 3

Rating: T (rating varies by chapter; mature content will be tagged; regardless of rating, minors DNI)

Pairings: Echo x Riyo Chuchi; Gregor x OFC Cerra Kilian

Wordcount: 2.9k

Warnings and tags: angst; suspense; canon-typical violence; someone gets punched; blood and injury; language.

Suggested Listening:

Summary: Echo arrives in Pabu; the team disagrees about how to proceed.

A/N: This story shares continuity with Martyrs and Kings, "Double, Double Boil and Trouble" (part 2 here) and "Do It Again," but all the fics can be read as stand-alones.

…This is the way the world ends…

—T. S. Eliot, “The Hollow Men”

To say Pabu was beautiful would be grossly inadequate: it was the most idyllic place Echo had ever seen, and he’d seen a kriffing lot of the galaxy. He didn’t know if a worse hell existed than Skako Minor, but it was difficult to imagine a heaven that was lovelier than Pabu. He wished Riyo could have been there with him to see it.

It felt very strange to sit in the sunshine and enjoy Shep Hazard’s feast, to drink whatever fruity cocktail the mayor had made from the fermented tropical fruit that grew on their island—all while conscious that the rest of his team was either stuck in that dingy underworld garage or out on missions that were equally likely to end in gruesome disaster as success. He didn’t blame Hunter for wanting to keep the rest of the Batch—and particularly Omega—safe in this paradise.

Despite all that, Echo didn’t regret his decision to join Rex for even a second. The team’s success at Balmorra had only reaffirmed that he’d made the right call. But he couldn’t deny that it was very good to see his family again. Hunter made it more than clear that Echo would be welcome to join them, and if he were honest with himself, Echo admitted that it was a tempting prospect: a peaceful life in this beautiful place, surrounded by the people who were closest to him.

But what about the others? The ones who weren’t lucky enough to have found peace and safety?

“Echo, you've seen the power you're up against,” Hunter said. “You can't defeat them.”

“It's not about that,” Echo insisted. “It's about fighting for our brothers.”

“I understand why you're doing this,” Hunter sighed, “but when will it be enough?”

Echo didn’t reply immediately, but the unspoken words hovered between them nonetheless: Not yet.

“We have to tell him,” Fireball insisted.

“What good would it do?” Rex asked. “We need to get that data spike decrypted. If we tell Echo now, he’ll want to join in the search. We have to think about the bigger picture.”

“We could use some karking help with the search,” Nemec pointed out. “We still don’t know where Cerra is or even who took her.”

“My contact is looking into it,” Rex insisted. “If she’s in Imperial custody, we should know within a day or two.”

“And what if she isn’t?” Fireball asked. “How are we supposed to find her when we have no actionable intel?”

Riyo’s stomach churned. She couldn’t even believe they were having this conversation. Rex’s jaw was set firmly, but she could see the torment and self-doubt that swirled in his eyes.

“What if the situation were reversed?” she asked Rex. “If Echo knew something had happened to Cerra, and he decided to keep it from you?”

“I’d say he made the right decision,” Rex said. “The mission comes first.”

“That’s a kriffin’ lie,” Gregor said. “You’d burn the galaxy to the ground.”

“And what makes you say that?” Rex demanded harshly.

Gregor stared at Rex without flinching. “Because that’s what I’d do.”

“I have to agree,” Riyo said. “I’m sorry, Rex. If you don’t comm Echo, I will.”

Rex sighed and dropped his head into his hands. “Just… Give me a day. If I don’t hear back from my contact by then, I’ll comm Echo myself.”

“And what if you hear back?” Gregor asked.

Rex didn’t respond, and Riyo knew he was considering the possibility that his contact wouldn’t have any information.

“Then we’ll make a decision at that point,” she said decisively.

Rex met her eyes and nodded in acknowledgment. She wasn’t particularly thrilled, but she understood Rex’s reservations. There was really nothing Echo could do right now, and his mission was important. But the minute they had a shred of intel, she would comm him—Rex and his bigger picture be damned.

“Previous transfer records recovered from the ship's logs list other clone prisoners detained by the Advanced Science Division,” Tech said, “and Crosshair is one of them.”

Wrecker spoke the thought that sprang to all of their minds: “You mean Crosshair turned on the Empire?”

Echo stared at Tech. If this were true, it could change everything. Crosshair had chosen the Empire, and he’d claimed to have done it without the influence of his inhibitor chip. Echo harbored private doubts that Crosshair’s chip had truly been removed, even if he thought it had. Regardless, if Crosshair had a change of heart about the Empire, that meant that there was hope that he would be willing to come back to the squad. Echo had lost too many brothers already. If there was the slightest chance that he could save Crosshair, he had to do it.

Tech and Echo threw themselves into the task of combing through the data he’d recovered from the Gozanti, and then into hunting down any leads they could find on Hemlock and the Advanced Science Division in Republic and Imperial records. There was precious little, and after an exhaustive search, Echo sent a message to Rex asking for assistance.

Echo was surprised by how quickly Rex commed him back. He answered the call aboard the Remora; better for everyone involved if the Batch knew as little as possible about the details of Rex’s operations. The more they knew, the bigger the targets on their backs would grow.

“Echo,” Rex greeted him without preamble. “My contact came through with limited intel on your Dr. Hemlock, but we do know that he’s set to travel to Eriadu in two rotations.”

“That’s not much time,” Echo frowned. “What’s he doing there?”

“Attending some sort of summit at Tarkin’s compound with a bunch of Imperials. Not sure who else will be there, but given how classified it is, safe to say they’re all high-level officials.”

Echo grunted. “Tight security, then. Couldn’t take it with an army, but maybe a strike team could infil. Anything else?”

Rex shook his head, his expression troubled. “Someone has gone to a lot of trouble to make it seem like Hemlock doesn’t exist. They’re not going to be happy to see a squad of wanted fugitives tracking him down.”

“We don’t have a choice. If he has Crosshair, we have to get him back,” Echo said firmly. “He’s our brother. Besides, Hemlock is holding other clones, too.”

“I understand,” Rex replied, but doubt clouded his eyes.

“We could use some backup,” Echo observed.

“I wish I could send it,” Rex said. “Echo… there’s something you need to know.”

“What is it?” Echo asked. “Riyo—”

“She’s all right,” Rex said. “It’s about Cerra.”

Echo’s short-lived relief spiraled into a sense of foreboding. “What happened?”

“She went missing on an extraction mission. We still don’t know who took her.”

“I’m coming back,” Echo said flatly.

“Negative,” Rex replied, his voice stern. “The whole team on Coruscant is working on it. Your mission is too important; we have no idea if or when we’ll get another lead on Hemlock.”

“Kriff Hemlock—” Echo began.

“Cerra would want you to put the mission first,” Rex interrupted. “You know it’s true.”

“Cerra has a karkin’ death wish!” Echo snapped. “She’s been looking for an excuse to self-destruct since I met her.”

“We won’t let that happen. We will find her. I need you to stay focused on your mission. We can’t spare the men for Eriadu, and we couldn’t make it in time anyway. It has to be you, Echo. We’re counting on you.”

Echo sat alone in the Remora for a long moment after Rex ended the holocom. He knew Rex was right, but it didn’t ease the sick feeling of dread when he thought about Cerra. Dank farrik, he’d only just begun to get through to her, and now he might have lost her for good—his last link to Fives.

The mission comes first.

He’d get his brother back first, and if the team hadn’t found Cerra by then, he swore by the Force he’d get his sister back, too.

Cerra awoke to the familiar gray walls of a Venator brig. She’d never been held in one before, but she’d seen them plenty of times during her years of service. She had no idea how much time had passed or even which Venator she was on. Her body ached, and hunger gnawed at her stomach. She took a quick stock of her situation.

Naturally, she’d been stripped of her weapons and armor, which was karking annoying. It was just her luck to lose her armor on the very first mission after she finished the modifications she’d been working on with Echo. The loss of the blasters cut deeper. Jesse had customized them for her specially years before, and they were all she had left from him. Even if she managed to escape, the odds were spectacularly bad that she would be able to find them on the Venator, if they’d even made it aboard.

That was assuming she lived long enough to escape. She had no delusions about her chances: she was being kept alive long enough to interrogate. Once they’d ripped the answers out of her, she would be terminated and jettisoned with the rest of the trash. If she were lucky, it would happen in that order.

All of which meant that she needed to escape before they had a chance to extract her secrets. All she had to do was break out of a completely secure holding cell, make her way through an enormous and heavily guarded starship, steal a ride, and jump into hyperspace before the Venator could engage its tractor beam—all without getting captured again.

Easy peasy.

She scoffed and flopped back down on the kriffing pathetic excuse for a bed. Clearly, prisoner comfort was not high on the list of priorities for jail cells. Nor was entertainment, which she discovered over the course of the next several days. Had she been bored when she was alone in the garage? That had been a paradise compared to the endless, colorless monotony of a Venator cell.

She slept, she woke, she slept again. Nothing changed, and she was forced to confront the very real possibility that she was going to die in this cell. She didn’t know how many days passed before the heavy tread of a TK trooper sounded outside her cell door.

“On your feet,” he barked. “Hands behind your head.”

She complied, keeping a wary eye on his blaster. He shut down the ray shield and entered the cell, then shoved her against the wall as he secured her wrists in a set of binders behind her back.

“You know, I usually expect a man to at least tell me his name before I let him tie me up,” she said, hoping to catch him off-balance.

“Quiet, scum,” he snapped.

Ah, well. Worth a shot.

“Get moving,” he ordered, nudging her out of the cell and into the corridor with the muzzle of his blaster.

“Where we headed?” she asked conversationally.

“Interrogation,” he replied shortly.

“Any chance we can stop at the commissary?” she asked. “I wouldn’t mind a snack. The prisoner rations here are—”

“Shut up,” he snapped. “Eyes front.”

Unfortunately, he never let down his guard, and his blasters were properly secured. Trust her to encounter the only competent TK trooper in the entire kriffin’ army. He marched her to the interrogation room and thrust her through the doorway. She stumbled, but righted herself in time to see the door slide closed and the lock engage.

She took a quick inventory of the room. There was nothing inside except a table and two chairs; nothing she could use to escape or even loosen her binders. She paced around the room impatiently. After waiting a frankly impolite amount of time, at last she heard the door hiss open behind her.

“Cerra Kilian. I didn’t think I’d ever see you again.”

Oh kark.

She would recognize that voice anywhere, and she fought against a reflexive urge to snap to attention. Instead, she turned slowly around and inspected the man who’d entered the room.

“Admiral,” she drawled in greeting, hoping that he couldn’t hear the pounding of her heart or see the damp sheen of sweat that she suddenly felt on her forehead.

“It’s colonel, actually,” Wullf Yularen replied.

“Apologies, I didn’t realize you’d been demoted,” Cerra replied. From his narrowed eyes, she could tell the barb had struck home.

“It was a lateral move,” he replied. “An opportunity presented itself to be of greater service to the Empire.”

“Then I suppose congratulations are in order,” Cerra said.

“I can’t say the same for you,” Yularen said with a faint look of disgust as he surveyed her from her shaved head to her booted feet. “What on earth have you done to yourself? You used to be almost pretty.”

Always such a charmer.

“Well, new Empire, new me,” she said glibly. “I think the new look suits me.”

“I suppose I shouldn’t expect better from a deserter and a traitor,” he said.

Cerra smirked. “Deserter, I’ll give you. But I hardly think a few shady back-alley deals constitute treason. If they did, you’d have to arrest the entire senate.”

Yularen clenched his jaw, but he didn’t rise to her bait. “You saved my life once, Lieutenant—or rather—Miss Kilian, and out of respect for that, I am going to give you a chance to do this the easy way. Tell me where to find your companions, and I will let you go free.”

Kraytshit, scughole. The only way you’re letting me out is in a body bag.

“I don’t have any companions,” she said. “I’m a free agent.”

Yularen’s lips tightened. He began to circle her, slowly, his shoulders ramrod straight, and his hands clasped behind his back.

“What were you doing on Daiyu?”

“What does anyone do on Daiyu?” she asked. “I was picking up a shipment of glitterstim.”

“You expect me to believe you abandoned your highly decorated military career to become a spice runner?” Yularen’s voice dripped with skepticism.

She shrugged. “Girl’s gotta make a living.”

He narrowed his eyes. “We know you were involved with the insurrection on Raada.”

It was hardly an insurrection. I just blew up a speeder.

“What’s Raada?” she asked insouciantly.

“We have surveillance holos of you on the base. There’s no point in pretending ignorance.”

“Oh, you mean Raada, the moon,” Cerra said. “I was thinking about moving there, but I didn’t care much for the neighbors.”

“I see. I must admit, I was surprised to see a familiar face when we began to investigate the Raada incident. Careless. Almost as careless as trusting a spice runner not to give you up at the first hint of a reward.”

So that’s where the hole in our opsec was, Cerra thought grimly. Poor fucker.

“Hell of a reward,” she said. “Why do you care so much about a blown-up speeder, anyway?”

“Don’t pretend to be so innocent,” he gritted out. “Where is Ahsoka Tano?”

“Who?” Cerra didn’t need to fake her confusion this time; she was truly baffled.

What in the galaxy does Ahsoka Tano have to do with anything? Cerra had met the young Jedi several times before she was transferred to the Ro-Ti-Mundi, but didn’t know her particularly well. Certainly not as well as Rex did. As far as Cerra knew, the girl had died along with the rest of the Jedi Order, even if she was a lapsed member.

“We know an adolescent Togruta Jedi killed an inquisitor on Raada and escaped mere days after you were caught on holocam at that base. Where is she?” Yularen demanded in a harsh tone.

“I thought all the Jedi were dead. What’s an inquisitor?” Cerra asked curiously. She hadn’t heard of them before, and she figured she might as well try to get as much information as she could on the off chance that she walked away from this mess.

Yularen backhanded her, hard. He struck so fast she never saw his fist coming before it smashed into her face. Her head snapped to the side, and she stumbled, but righted herself quickly as agony exploded in her mouth.

“Rude,” she gasped painfully. “I thought we were having a conversation.”

She tasted the salty, metallic flavor of blood, and she spat it onto the floor in front of Yularen’s feet.

“I gave you your chance to cooperate,” he said. “But it seems you’ve chosen to do it the hard way.”

“You know,” Cerra said, “you were a decent commanding officer. Bit of a hardass, but I never took you for a stooge. I guess you can never really know someone.”

“Strong words for a woman who betrayed everything she ever stood for,” Yularen said.

“I didn’t betray shit,” Cerra snarled. “And my only regret is that I dragged your fascist ass into the escape pod instead of saving more clones.”

He glared at her. “You will tell me everything.”

“Don’t hold your breath,” she said.

“I won’t need to. Guard!” Yularen snapped. The TK trooper stationed outside the room entered immediately. “Escort the prisoner to the enhanced interrogation room, and notify Agent Daivik that his services are required.”

“Yes, sir,” the trooper said, taking aim at Cerra. “Move it, scum.”

Cerra shot Yularen an impudent, bloody grin. “Be seeing you.”

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