The Things We Leave Behind 8

I swung the blaster I had a death grip on upwards but  before I could pull the trigger Ged grabbed a hold of the barrel with one hand and gently pushed it back down. “Oh no you don’t.” He said, “You’re not so skilled with that thing and I would hate to see you hurt someone who is actually on our side.”

The man who had been standing by the large row of databank and computer system stepped forward and saluted Ged smartly. “Sir, it is good to see you again.”

Ged returned the salute and nodded, “You too Morrish.”

“Morrish? The Virulent’s captain?”

The man stepped forward and shook my hand. “Yes, although I’m no longer the captain of the Virulent, she’s in Captain Wulfman’s capable hands now. It’s nice to see you again Miss Gabriel.” He politely ignored the blaster in my hand and the fact that I had just aimed it at him.

Ged turned to me and smiled slightly at my shock. “You see you should learn to trust me a little bit more.” He said then turned back to Morrish, “It’s Vander and he’s tracking us, how much time do we have?”

“About ten minutes unless they’ve changed how their tracking equipment works.”

“Right then let’s get started....” Ged began.

“Tracking? Tracking how?” I interrupted, feeling as though the world had just shifted sideways and I had been bounced into another universe with no road map.

“In the satchel you’re carrying.” Ged replied as he went to the computer consoles to study something Morrish was showing him. “You don’t think they’d really leave our things so easily accessible without a reason do you? They put a tracking device in your bag.”

I began a frantic search of my satchel but Ged’s sharp command to stop halted me in my tracks. “Leave it! I’ll need it to find Vander. They can’t locate us here it’s protected by a scrambling shield so they’ll think we’re in a service tunnel. We’ll have about ten minutes before they will get suspicious.”

“Your orders sir?” Morrish asked bringing us back to the problems at hand.

Ged didn’t answer him directly. “Is the Lightning in orbit?” He asked.

“Yes sir, cloaked and waiting.”

“Merlyn come here.” Ged said. I did as he commanded. He had become someone I didn’t recognise. Someone I didn’t argue with.

“Put your palm on this will you?” He gestured to a number pad. I looked at him and he made a face which said just do it we don’t have time for games.

I did as he asked and sucked in my breath. “Wow.”

“You know?” He asked.

I nodded. “I do.”

Ged sighed. “Damn it.” He swore and took a deep breath, “Morrish, change of plans. We’ll need a secure uplink to the Lightning and then I want the entire database uploaded as quickly as possible. Forget copying it. After that, wipe and destroy the mainframe completely and spider mine this place.”

“Yes Sir.” Morrish nodded as he started to work on the computer system, “Sir, if may ask did you find Behl?”

Ged glanced at me and then shook his head. “He is believed dead.”

“How sir?”

Ged glanced at me and then said, “Lee Vander executed him and should you or your men see Vander you are to use extreme prejudice. He must not escape.”

“Understood sir.” Morrish nodded but there was sadness in his eyes. “I’m sorry about Behl sir, he was a good man.”

“Yes, he was so do me a huge favour and get yourself and your team the hell off this planet in one piece on schedule. I do not want to lose any more of good people.”

Morrish grinned. “Yes sir,” he repeated, “The rendezvous point?”

“Remains as planned.”

“And you sir?”

“The Grand Admiral has ordered that I escort Miss Gabriel home safely back to the Virulent. We have an alternate way off the planet. We will meet with the fleet at the rendezvous as planned.”

I rolled my eyes.

Morrish gave me a grin this time. “Understood sir.”

Ged looked at his chrono, checking the time “Okay, we need to go now.” He said dragging me by the arm, across the floor to the wall opposite the turbo lift. He touched an invisible panel and a narrow opening appeared. “Come on.” And before I could protest he pulled me into the narrow, dimly lit passageway.

“What the hell was that all about?” I hissed wriggling my palm at him.

He sighed slightly, “I would like to assume that Vander doesn’t know what you can do, that he believes you’re this Amyshka Pavjaska, which was a nice touch by the way, and that he doesn’t know who you really are but I cannot take that risk. You saw the access code when you touched the panel right? You know how to get into the mainframe?”

“Yes.” I nodded.

“If he had known, if he thought for a second you could get him what he wanted this would be a very different scenario right now and if there are more people who can do what you can then I am not taking any risks. The information on that mainframe is far too important for that.”

“Why was it still here? I mean the rebels could have found it at any time.”

Ged shook his head. “No, that room is not in any blueprints or plans. Unless you know what to look for and have the right access codes it is virtually impossible to find. Vander knew of the mainframe’s existence but not its exact location or how to get there. This place is built like a maze for a reason. He was hoping I would lead him to it by letting us escape and tracking us.”

“He let us escape just so you would lead him to a computer?”

“Didn’t you think that our get away was just a little too easy?” Ged asked giving me a look.

“You had to kill two men and what was that whole suck face with Merly make out session all about if it was so easy?”

“Well if it had been too easy...” He started to explain but I flapped a hand at him shutting him up.

I glared at him. “I really hate all of this spy stuff.”

“You have so many wonderful talents Merly but being a covert agent is definitely not one of them.” His chuckle annoyed me even more.

I ignored his insult. “Did you plan for all of this?”

“Plan is not exactly the word I would use, but I worked around some of the given eventualities. No plan is set in stone but probabilities can be calculated when one knows all the players involved, unless of course you happen to be with the party. I would not have found out about Vander until it was perhaps too late had it not been for you. You, my dear, are a wild card.”

“You sound like Thrawn.” I grumbled.

“I’ll take that as a compliment, the man is a genius although how he manages to keep you in line is beyond me.”

I wanted to argue with him but thought the better of it; this wasn’t the right place or time, “So now what?” I asked with a sigh.

“Now I get you out of here and I go and wait for Vander to find me.”

“Not on your life!” I said standing still. I suddenly had a very bad feeling about all of this and knew that whatever was going to happen it did not involve leaving Ged on his own, that was not an option.

“Merlyn come on!” Ged hissed. But I didn’t budge.

I folded my arms across my chest and stared at him defiantly, “No, either I come with you or I stay right here take your pick but I’m not leaving you alone and nothing you do or say will make me. You brought me along for a reason and I don’t walk away in the middle of a job.”

Ged weighed his options and then shook his head. “Come on then but you have to do exactly what I tell you, no deviations. Are we clear?”

I nodded.

“No! I want to hear you say it. Our lives depend on it.”

“Okay.”

Ged made a face.

I narrowed my eyes at him. “Yes sir. I will do exactly as you tell me.”

“Alright then, now maybe we can get out of this alive. Let’s go.”

The small passage came out into a quiet hallway that looked as though it had not been used in some time. We walked quickly until we reached a set of stairs and another turbo lift. I didn’t argue with Ged when he chose the stairs. We moved up them quietly, leaving through the exit door like ghosts. He led me through a maze of hallways until he found a room he felt was suitable and once we were there he dug the tracking chip out of my satchel and tossed across the floor.

“If you have to you use this.” He said showing me again how to fire the blaster. “No messing around. Okay? Aim, pull the trigger just like I showed you just... try not to shoot me, okay?”

I held the weapon like he had shown me and nodded. I didn’t like how it felt in my hands but I wasn’t going to argue with him about it. I watched as he moved the table and chairs that were sitting in the middle of what appeared to be a small meeting room to one side. He picked up one of the chairs and placed in the corner on the same wall as the door. “Sit there and don’t move until you have to. Watch for my signal or use your head but wait until the right moment.” He instructed, setting the blaster he had carried on the floor beside my chair.

“How will I know?”

“You’ll know, you’ve been well trained but you need to trust that I also am very well trained. Do not give your position away too soon.”

“This is going to be messy right?”

“Hopefully not, I hate messy but it does feel that way.” He said cracking the first grin I had seen since we had entered the mainframe room. “I just need them to not see you when they enter the room. There’s a better chance of being noticed if you stand, when people scan a room they do so on a single plane first and they’ll be distracted by looking at me. I am hoping they won’t turn around to see you behind them.”

“How many do you think there will be?”

Ged thought about it for a moment, “If he followed training he’d have had a nine man team with himself included, we’ve taken out four so that leaves four more and Vander. They will come in first protecting him so that he gets a better idea of our defences and where the enemy fire is coming from. He must not know you are there, he will suspect but he won’t know for sure and I hope to keep him distracted enough that he’ll be too busy to wonder, so please trust me when I say I can handle this. I’m very good.”

I swallowed and took a deep breath. “Okay.”

“Now let’s make this place more comfy shall we?”

I nodded, sitting down on the chair in corner watching as he used the force to blow out all of the lights except the centre one leaving the corners of the room dimly lit. Once that was done he took out his lightsaber and stood in the middle of the room, directly in line with the door. I watched as he seemed to almost transform. He drew a deep breath and, just like I had been taught, he started the process of finding his centre. It seemed like a good idea so I did the same, tapping into the force which swirled around us like invisible fire. It made the waiting easier and it helped that we didn’t have to wait for long.

They came in hard. I suppose they thought rushing us would be better than being picked off one by one but they were wrong. Ged was right there were five of them in total. It was like watching a blurry dance on fast forward. As soon as the door opened Ged ignited his lightsaber and the brilliance lit up the room in a blaze of purple. The light from his weapon and the fact that he was right in front of them meant no one had time to look around, no one saw me at all as I sat in the darkened corner, my heart beating so fast I thought it would burst free from my chest and fly away.

Ged had not been joking when he had said he was good at what he did. He moved incredibly fast to deflect the blaster shots back against the first two shooters who went down very quickly creating obstacles right at the entrance. Two more armed men came into the room, shooting and managed to create a certain amount of chaos by ducking low and avoiding the initial reflected blaster bolts. I started to stand up but Ged, glancing my way, shook his head. ‘No, wait.’ I heard him push into my mind so I did the hardest thing in the universe to do, I waited.

He moved with a fluidity that was beautiful, reminding me of water in slow motion. The violet blade of his lightsaber and the brilliant white-blue of the blaster bolts mixed to create a stunning yet deadly dance of colourful fire that reflected all around the room. The air filled with the scent of burning ozone, dust and seared flesh. My stomach churned as I fought to get past the horror of it all. There were four armed men in total and when they were all dead Lee Vander stepped past the mess of bodies into the room to face Ged. He looked pissed.

“You always did like to show off.” He said as he walked up to where Ged stood calmly.

Ged, who did not even seem winded, just stood with his lightsaber at the ready looking strangely relaxed and calm but I knew that was not the case. Lee Vander had been his friend, a close ally and confident and I understood from personal experience what a betrayal on that level could feel like. This fight would be anything but easy no matter how it appeared.

“You should have walked away from this Lee.” Ged said breaking the silence between them.

“I can’t. The Empire is dead, it died with Palpatine. You and that alien purporting himself to be a Grand Admiral cannot save it; I don’t even know why you are trying, yet here you are, Ged Larsen the idealist.” Vander spat.

“I am here because the alternative is so much worse.” Ged replied softly sending a shudder down my spine.

“There is no phantom enemy coming to get us from far away!” Lee snarled, “That is a lie Palpatine fabricated to keep his power to himself and everyone else in the galaxy scared.”

“You are an idiot if you believe that.” Ged shook his head. “So now what, you want me dead? Will that make it all better? Will killing me help you find a place with your new friends?”

“You just don’t get it do you? After all this time how is it that you still do not understand?” There was such anguish in Lee Vander’s voice that it almost broke my heart to hear it.

“Then enlighten me.” Ged hissed through gritted teeth. I could feel his ire and anger rising, stirring the force around him and it made the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end.

“I should have been informed before you made the decision to slaughter hundreds of people. You should have given me access to the mainframe. I could have stopped them, I could have prevented their deaths. You should have trusted me to do what was right. You should have listened to me!” Lee yelled.

I saw sorrow flicker across Ged’s face. “Is that what all of this is about?” He shook his head in disbelief. “All this time and you still carry the weight of a command decision that was never yours to make.”

“I was right! You should have listened to me! Because of you hundreds of good men and women died. People I cared about, people who trusted you.”

“You think the rebels you now serve were any better? They blew up two manned space stations and killed thousands. For people trying to assassinate one person they went a bit overboard don’t you think?”

“They did what they had to do to get the job done. You had a choice, if you had only listened....”

“I did listen, Lee. I read the reports and I understood everything.” Ged replied softly “I had all the information I needed but it wouldn’t have mattered I could do nothing but let events take place as planned. And I’d do exactly the same thing again if I had to.”

“Which is why I can’t let you live or lead anymore.” Lee said as they began to circle each other, looking for weaknesses and mistakes. Jyrki and I had done exactly the same thing but we had both been force users this was very different.

I listened to the conversation without context or understanding, hearing the undertones of regret, sadness and hatred in the words of both men. Suddenly I understood what Ged had known all along, there was no going backwards and every moment led us closer to whatever it was that destiny had in mind for us. It was unavoidable and suddenly my heart ached for Thrawn.

“I suppose you tried to turn Jarack Behl into betraying me as well?”

“He was there! He barely made it out alive. He had every reason to hate you but instead he chose not to. He simply could not see reason. He was blinded by his loyalty to you.”

“So you executed him?” Ged said flatly.

Lee’s answer sent chills down my spine. “He made his choice. It was the wrong one.”

“So you decide who gets to live or die based on whether or not they agree with you? How does this make you any better than me?” Ged asked masking the sadness in his voice with anger.

Lee didn’t have an answer instead he went for his weapon and I saw the surprise in Ged’s eyes as Lee pulled out a lightsaber from an inside pocket of his long jacket and turned it on. It was a brilliant white-blue in colour and from the way he swung it around he had been well taught to use it. “You think just because you use the force you have exclusive right to this kind of weapon?” he asked. “You think you are special? You are nothing!”

Ged didn’t answer. He just took a breath, using his fury and anger, drawing the force and readying himself. He let the fight began as Lee Vander made the first move mistaking Ged’s calm for hesitation.




...

The Things We Leave Behind 7

I woke up slowly and wished I hadn’t. I was lying on my side, curled up on a memory-foam mattress. My head pounded, my body ached and my hands were tied together in imperial binders. I was grateful they had not tied them behind my back but my shoulders ached anyway.  I opened my eyes and blinked hard until the blurriness cleared. I was in a moderately sized, moderately lit room. Aside from the mattress the room was empty. I realised that there was no chem-toilet or wash-sink which meant whatever Vander had planned for us, it wasn’t long term. I sighed, struggled to sit up and swore as my head pounded viciously. I could not believe that I had once again been abducted and locked in a room somewhere, at least this time I wasn’t alone.

“Welcome back to the land of the living.” Ged said as he helped me to sit up beside him.

“What the hell..?” I asked trying to get past my throbbing head.

“Vander shot you.” He explained, “The stun’s effects should wear off soon.”

 “Lovely!” I rubbed my temples. “How the hell did he even find us?”

He shook his head. “I don’t know. But the datachip he gave to me might have been trackable.”

“Why did I not see that when I touched it?”

“Your little talent is not perfect?” He winced as he touched his head where he had been hit by the blaster butt. “And technology can be tracked easily enough.”

I nodded. “Are you alright?”

“You were not the only one on the wrong end of a blaster stun and my head isn’t immune to being smacked around either.” He said tartly. “And don’t ask me what time it is, they took my kit, chrono and your satchel.”

“So you have no idea how long we’ve been here for?” 

“No, but stun blasts tend towards short term not long term so I’m thinking only a few hours maybe, unless the stunned us more than once, then it’s anyone’s guess.” Ged replied.

“Why did not he just kill us?” My mouth was dry and my chest hurt where the stun blast had hit me. I closed my eyes and leaned my head against his shoulder.

Ged shrugged ever so slightly, “Oh I’m sure he has his reasons. He’s a black ops agent, Mer... Amyshka, nice name by the way.” He turned his head to look at me, “He was trained by the very best and he’s been in the field for twice as long as most of my agents. We’re alive for a reason and you can be sure it’s not a good one.”

“Fantastic.” I hissed. “What the hell does he want from us anyway?” I asked, “Because none of this makes sense.”

“He wants something from me. You are just collateral damage.”

I lifted my head up to look at him, made a face and a gesture of distance with my thumb and forefinger. “You know right now, I hate you... just a little bit.”

Ged grinned and stroked the side of my face with the backs of his fingers which was not so easy to do with his hands bound together. “I know and it’s really cute.”

I made a noise of disgust, “Why are you not more concerned about this situation we’re in?”

“Because nothing has happened yet that we need to be concerned about.” He answered.

I stared at him for what seemed like forever. “He shot me!”

“Only on stun.”

 “This day just keeps getting better and better. Seriously, if Lee Vander doesn’t kill you, I swear I will.”

He just chuckled. “Well, that will be a lot of fun but it will have to wait.” He said as he stood up. “Come on, you need to walk off the effects of the stun blast because I need you clear headed and focused, so get up.” And before I could tell him to go away he had pulled me to my feet and I found myself walking around the small room in circles until I felt dizzy while he kept studying the walls.

“Ged....what are you doing?”

“Shhhhhh.” He shushed me, leaned into me and whispered in my ear all the while slowly backing me into the corner furthest away from the door. “I’m getting us out of here so turn around, look at me and try to pretend you actually like me.”

I did as he asked and before I could stop him he looped his arms over my head and pulled me to him in an awkward and uncomfortable embrace, uncomfortable because my hands were still bound in front of me. I pulled them up to my chest with my hands under my chin because holding them straight down would have been even more awkward and embarrassing. He smirked.

“Here is what is going to happen.” He said in a hushed voice, glancing around, “I’m going to kiss you now, just so you know, and it would be a really good idea if you moved in tightly to me and didn’t touch the wall. I don’t want to hurt you.” he whispered, “And it would also be nice if you would try to make it look like you enjoy kissing me back because I want the guards to think this is just what it looks like and not something else.” and then before I could argue with him or ask what ‘something else’ meant he did exactly as he said he would except, instead of holding me tightly with his hands, he braced them on the flat of the wall behind us.

The last time Ged had kissed me he had taken me by surprise and the desire he had stirred up had been a shock. This time, even though I had been warned, the feelings that bubbled up inside of me still took me by surprise. I gasped at the rush of sensations that washed through me. Even with his warning I wasn’t ready for this.

Instead of just planning a big kiss on me, he teased me slowly, seductively with gentle lips, tasting mine with the tip of his tongue and it surprised me. I stared at him and a slight smile curved the corners of his mouth. For a split second the world stopped and then, seeing he had my interest he kissed me again but this time with heat and I gasped.  It was so deliciously easy to get lost in what he was doing because he was good at it and I enjoyed it even though I knew this wasn’t right. I could feel the force well up between us in a rush of lust that might have drowned me except that he suddenly nipped my neck painfully with his teeth bringing me back to my senses sharply.

“Stay focused.” He hissed in my ear.

“That would be easier to do if you weren’t shoving your tongue down my throat!” I growled back. “And I know I’m not the only one affected by this.” I glanced downward and he grinned at me some more.

“A pleasurable side effect is all.” He smirked, “And so much better than the alternative.”

I raised both eyebrows in question. “Oh really?”

“Sweetheart, if you still want to play with me later I’m all yours but right I need you to stay focused and I need your help with what I am about to do so stop messing about and help me here.” He smirked and before I could argue or retort he kissed me again but this time I mostly ignored the wash of sensations that were running rampant through me in favour of figuring out what it was he was actually doing.

I could feel my skin tingle but realised the sensation wasn’t because of Ged’s kisses but rather through his use of the force. He was drawing power around, through and from me.  Once I understood what he was doing I stopped fighting him and started to help him. I gathered the force through me and I fed it to him the only way I knew how and smiled inwardly when I heard him gasp. He wasn’t the only one who could create desire and I knew for a fact I could pull up a lot of power with it. That was what he wanted; power and I did my best to give it to him.

“Is that being helpful enough?” I growled as wild energy surged through us both.

He sucked in a breath, “Oh it will do.” His voice had taken on a warm husky tone, “Now shut up so I can concentrate.”

I could feel the sparkles of electricity run through him as he took all of the energy we were creating and focused it to flow through his palms which were flat on the wall behind me.  The hair on my arms and the back of my neck stood on end and everything prickled. Flickers of reflected pale blue light danced from his hands. I could sense the path of the force lighting flow through the wall and around the room as he directed it and one by one he blew out all the surveillance equipment. When he was satisfied the cameras were broken he let out the breath he had been holding, I could feel the power withdraw like a waning storm. It left me shaky and momentarily exhausted and I understood that what he had just done was very, very difficult.

“Wow.” I whispered in awe when he relaxed against me for a moment to catch his breath.

He drew back to look at me and smiled. “Oh you have no idea what you are missing. We could be amazing together.” Then he kissed me lightly on the forehead.

“I was talking about your little force trick!” I snapped tried to pull back from him but his cuffed hands were still looped around me trapping me in a tight circle. “Now what?” I asked trying to get myself back into some sort of normal. I did not like the conflicts he stirred up in me and I felt all kinds of guilty about what had just happened.

“Now we pretend to make out some more until the two thugs who are outside come in to see what happened to all their spy equipment. They’ll see us still making out as though nothing had happened and hopefully believe we had nothing to do with it. Then we make our move, do you think you can handle one of these jokers on your own if I can’t get a blaster in time?”

“I guess we’ll find out, won’t we?”

“Oh and I don’t suppose you can use that delicious little trick of yours to distract one of them could you?”

“You need to buy me a little time,” I told him, “That little trick also takes a bit of work and I’m a little out of breath.”

“Oh you really do know how to make a man feel good about himself.” Ged murmured in my ear then moved just enough to avoid the kick I aimed at his shin.

“Feisty!” He grinned.

I made a face and hoped that the guards he was expecting got here sooner rather than later because I was getting a cramp in my neck and my chest hurt where the edges of the binders around my hands dug into me. Luckily for me I got my wish.

I was already in a heightened state, tapped into the force along with Ged so when the two armed men came in to see what was going on with the security system I knew exactly where they both were in the room without looking. Ged nuzzled my neck using it as a pretence to see what was happening. He could feel me tense and his teeth grazed my skin, reminding me to wait. He shifted slightly lifting pulling his arms over my head so I was no longer trapped, “We’ll only get one chance to get a clean shot at this.” He whispered in my ear “After that it will be messy. I don’t like messy.”

I was about to give him a rude retort but he put stop to that with another passionate kiss. I felt as though I had suddenly been drafted into a very bad holo drama but it did its job. For a long moment no one moved or spoke and then one of the guards laughed in that slightly embarrassed manner people do when they walk in on a couple making out. He watched for a moment and then he started making jokes with his partner about taking turns with me next. This had been Ged’s plan all along, sex put people off balance and turned men into idiots which was exactly what Ged had wanted.

I reached out with the force and showered the closer of the two guards with a blast of lust. I knew it had worked because I heard him suck in his breath and let his gun clatter to the floor. The change in mood took his partner’s attention away from us for a moment, but a moment was all Ged needed.
He spun around, pushed me back, force pulled the gun to him and opened fire. The two men were dead before they even knew what had hit them. 

“Well, I’m glad one of us knows how to use that thing.” I told him.

For a second neither of us moved and then he was all business as he went through the pockets of the two dead men. He found what he was looking for, used it and the binders which cuffed our hands fell open with a soft snick.

“You really should learn, while they are not as elegant or beautiful as lightsabers they do come in handy sometimes.” Ged replied as he removed the ID tags and key-cards and then started stripping off the clothes of the guard closest to his size.

“Thrawn said the same thing once. I don’t like guns, they’re too loud.” I said taking one of the card-keys he held out to me.

“Too loud?” He just shook his head. “You never cease to surprise me, you know that?”

“Lucky me.” I replied dryly. “How long before what you did gets noticed?” I asked watching him strip off and change into the clothes from the man he had just shot.

“I don’t know but I don’t think we have time to dance if that’s what you are asking.” He said once he was dressed. “What do you think?” He asked modelling his new look as one of Lee Vander’s thugs.

“I think the colour is crap and that coat makes you look like a scoundrel from a Corellian smuggler bar.”

He grinned at me. “What’s the matter you don’t like scoundrels?”

“No.” I replied tartly. “I’m not a big fan of the scruffy and unpredictable.”

This made Ged grin even more. “So what you’re saying is I looked better with no clothes on?”

“You’re impossible!” I snapped.

“I get told that a lot.”

“So now what?” I asked picking up the second weapon, looking at it as though it might bite me.

“Here, that’s a modified carbine, it’s a good weapon. I guess Vander hasn’t completely gone rebel, this was an Imperial issued weapon.” Ged said and he showed me how to hold the blaster and where all the right switches were. “Safety, stun and kill. If you have this on kill try not to point it at me.”

“I’m not taking this!” I said trying to give it back to him.

“Yes, you are. This is not a good place for close hand to hand combat, no one else here will have a lightsaber so fighting with one, especially in a place like this, is like bringing a butter knife to a gunfight.”

I looked the weapon over. “Are you still taking the other one?” I asked hoping he wasn’t relying on me to be the shooter in this game because if he was we were lost.

He nodded. “It never hurts to have more weapons.”

“Me with a gun sounds like a really, really bad idea to me.” I grumbled. I turned the weapon over in my hands trying to decide where to put it.

 “It goes over your shoulder, like this.” He said showing me.

So I slung the carbine over my shoulder and scowled at it. It was extra weight and unfamiliar but he was right, you could never have enough weapons and this was a fight against unknown enemies.

“It could be worse.” He said, “We could be facing an army. So far the only people who seem to know we are here are Vander’s and I think he’s gone rogue, running his own mission off any official grid.”

“Okay, do you have more brilliant plans?”

 He grinned, “Do you want to pretend to have your hands tied behind your back or do I need to put the binders back on?” He asked as he dangled a pair of binders from a single finger.

“If you try to put those binder-cuffs on me I will kick your ass all the way to Tatooine.” I told him sweetly.

“So being tied up not your thing?”

“You’ll never know!”

“It could be fun!”

 “Keep that up and I’ll actually learn how to use this thing by using you as target practice.” I tapped the blaster in my hands.

He laughed. “Okay so pretending to transfer you as a prisoner is out but do keep it in mind because I’m not wearing these clothes for the fashion statement and we might need a ruse if there are people around.” Ged said with a grin. “Come on, we need to go.”

“You have a plan? A different plan? One that doesn’t involve me in hand-binders backed into a corner making out with you?”

 “As I said, doing that was better than the alternative.”

“Really?” I raised my eyebrows at him but he didn’t elaborate so I pressed the point. “So a plan? Do you have one?” I pressed.

“Yes, find that traitor Vander and kill him then get the off this planet before all hell breaks loose.”

“How do you even know where to go to find him?” I asked.

“Because I know exactly where we are and I know him. He will probably find me.” He replied as we walked out of the cell into the small detention processing area. He spent a few seconds at the computer then searched the small desk and smiled when he found my satchel along with his lightsaber and his chrono. He tucked his lightsaber into an inside pocket of the coat, put on his chrono and tossed the satchel to me. “This is yours I believe?”

I did a quick inventory and was relieved to see all my stuff was still there including my lightsaber. “Care to enlighten me?” I asked.

“This is the special operations command centre. It’s hidden deep under the palace. It was part of the Ubiqtorate.” He replied quietly as he checked to make sure the corridor outside of the room was empty. “I helped design this place when it was renovated.”

I glanced at him in surprise. “What? You what? How?”

He smiled gesturing for me to follow him. “Did you not ever think about why everything I did was cloaked in secrecy? When you lived here did you ever wonder why you so rarely ever saw me on Coruscant or why neither I nor my people have joined overtly with Thrawn’s fleet? Or did you really just think I was the Emperor’s pretty boy wonder?”

“Well, no, yes, maybe.” I shrugged, “It sometimes crossed my mind, especially when I was on board the Virulent, but I assumed Thrawn and you had your reasons and he gets testy when I bug him too much about all this secrety, cloak and sabre stuff.” I replied. “Mostly though I just thought you were another annoyingly, arrogant Imperial Navy guy with a nice ass and a cute smile.”

“You think I have a nice ass?” He shook his head at me in amusement then serious shifted in his features. “I ran a division of Imperial Intelligence that specialized in off the books black ops for the Empire when the Emperor was still alive.”

“The Bureau?” I whispered in awe. “You ran the Bureau?” The Bureau of Operations had been a very hush hush part of the Ubiqtorate that specialised in covert and black operations. No one spoke about the Bureau, the people who were in it or what they actually did openly or in any detail. They were like ghosts in the machine. Suddenly I looked at Ged through completely different eyes.

“Not the entire Bureau, no, I headed up the infiltration and counter intelligence divisions. I helped design this facility to augment our operations, with the Emperor’s approval.”

“Really for real?”

Ged nodded, “Really for real. Now I run the secret operations aspect of what is left of the Empire, what we’re now calling the Imperial Order. We had hoped to infiltrate the New Republic and deal with them on two fronts with Thrawn on the visible offensive and us behind the scenes” Ged explained while walking quickly with the security of a person who knew exactly where he wanted to go next.

“So what happened then, I mean you’re here and Jarack is dead.”

“Vital information started to get out from what should have been a closed system.” He replied, “Behl was the agent on lead, trying to ferret out the leak. We thought it was a rebel spy who had somehow managed to infiltrate us not the other way around.”

“So why did Vander turn against you?” I asked.

Ged’s jaw clenched tightly as he shook his head and I understood that whatever it was it was personal and I would not learn about it now.

“Okay then, I have another question.”

“Why am I not surprised.” He looked at me sideways and offered a slight smile. “Shoot.”

“Why didn’t you tell me any of this before?” trotting to keep up with him

“That’s easy, it was need to know only and you did not need to know.” He answered as we made our way quietly down the corridor.

“So if you’re really this all important super spy master why couldn’t you override the shuttle car controls?”

Ged just gave me a grin and waited for me to work it out.

I stopped dead in my tracks, “Oh I am so going kill you when this is all over! You let him capture us didn’t you? You knew at some point he’d figure out where we were and he’d find us. You knew that chip was trackable!”

“He is a traitor and he needs to be eliminated. He knows too much.” He said simply, his hand at the small of my back pushed me back into motion. “It was easier to allow him to take us than spending time to tracking him down.”

I gave him a look and decided to try again. “We have a deadline to keep to, remember?”

“I am well aware of that.”

“He should have killed you, killed us when he first had the chance but he didn’t so what does Lee Vander want from you?”

He looked at me for a moment and then said, “Codes.” He said, “He wants me and my command codes so that he can gain access to the mainframe. The mainframe contains all the information on everything we’ve ever done, all the missions, all the agents and double agents, everything. It would be invaluable to the New Republic and incredibly damaging to Thrawn and myself. He needs me and he won’t kill you because he thinks he can use you as blackmail to get what he wants from me.”

“Why doesn’t he just slice it? I mean I thought you trained your super sneaky spies to deal with that sort of thing?”

Ged laughed quietly, “You do have a way with words.” He said, “Because if he tries to do that the entire mainframe will self-destruct and he wants the information intact. When I designed the system I had the very best coders create it but the Emperor added something which no one else knew about to make sure it was virtually impossible to bypass the standard security.”

I suddenly remembered what the Emperor had done with the entrance to his secret museum room. “He added a force activation element didn’t he?”

Ged nodded, “Even the very best slicers in this galaxy would not be able to bypass the security. Only a force user can do that and only one with the right codes. And I am the only one left who fits these criteria. Vander is a brilliant agent but he is not force sensitive.”

We came to a turbo lift. Ged punched a long code into the keypad and the door opened. “Come on.”

I shook my head. “No way!” I hissed. “This is a trap waiting to happen, a trap, men with guns, a hoard of angry fuzzy things with sticks and stones and sarlacc knows what else could be waiting at the other end of where ever that thing stops!”

He shook his head in annoyance. “Oh, we do not have time for this!” he muttered and grasped my arm, yanking me into the waiting turbo lift. “Get in and shut up.” He said standing beside me in the lift, the door closed softly and before I could protest he punched in another lengthy code into the control panel and the lift jolted downward quickly.

“What the hell!” I snapped. “Did you not hear me mention all manner of nasty traps waiting for us?”

“I heard you.”

“So what you like getting hit in the face, tied up and stunned?”

“Not on my favourite things to do list.”

“Then why are you walking into a trap?”

“We’re not.”

“Are you sure?” I asked, “Because you didn’t know your best friend and super duper secret special ops guy had turned against you!”

He rolled his eyes and smiled, “Good point, but this time trust me it’s not a ....” He started but he didn’t have time to finish because the lift door opened and we stepped out into a dimly lit room full of computers and we were not alone.

I turned to Ged and punched him hard on the arm. “See? Trap!”


.

The Things We Leave Behind 6

The moment the turbo-lift door opened I ignited my lightsaber but the only things it destroyed were the speckles of dust floating in the air as we stepped out onto the platform. The area was empty and silent. The same shuttle I had used when I was last here was sitting, waiting as though we had been expected. I sighed and swore under my breath making Ged raise an eyebrow at me.

“Problems?”  He asked as he looked around.

“No, but the last time I used this thing it wasn’t exactly friendly to stopping when I wanted it to.” I replied. “It was the Emperor’s personal shuttle. He used it to traverse under the palace in secret. I don’t have the codes and I can’t slice it, I tried that once before.”

“Well that’s useful then isn’t it.” Ged muttered, stepping into the shuttle. I followed him, looking over my shoulder to make sure that no one was lurking somewhere behind us but there was nothing. As soon as I entered and sat down, the shuttle flickered to life, the door closed and it moved forward with a soft jerk.

“It appears to like you.” Ged said. He was staring at the control panel trying to figure out how it worked.

“The system is automated with motion sensors, nothing more.” I suddenly felt exhausted. “But unless you have magic codes or something to change how this thing works you might want to sit, it takes a while for it to get to the end destination.”

“Hmm.” He stared at the control panel until I thought he would burn holes in it and then he tried what I tried the last time I was here. He punched in various codes and he pushed all the buttons he could see. I just sat there watching him in sleepy amusement until he made a noise of disgust and hit the panel with his fist.

“Like I said...” I told him again, folding my arms across my chest and suddenly feeling exhausted. “You should just relax.”

He gave me a look which I interpreted to mean something rude and then paced the short length of the shuttle car and back. When he returned he sat down across from me and took out his data-pad. “I found the fresher.” He said without taking his eyes off the pad he was fiddling with.

“The Emperor spared no expense when it came to his comfort.” I replied with a shrug.

“So where exactly is it we are headed?”

I gestured for him to give me his data-pad and I called up the map of Coruscant. “This is the palace,” I said pointing at the dot on the map, “And this is the medical facility in the Works District.” He watched as my finger traced a straight line form one point to the next. “The shuttle stops here, right under this building. The whole trip takes just over an hour; this shuttle thingy is very fast. This was the Emperor’s private medical and research facility. It was here he saved Lord Vader’s life after he was almost killed on Mustafar by General Kenobi. It also housed his cloning facilities and other laboratories.” I explained.

“Why does it only go there?” Ged asked staring at the pad as it would suddenly give him better answers.

I shook my head. “I think that’s what the Emperor had programmed it to do, all I know is that’s where it took me when I was here last and there wasn’t much I could do about it.”

“I thought you said you could slice.”

“I have some skills but I’m not a genius. I learned how to bypass and slice ship systems but not this stuff.” I gestured in the direction of the control pad by the shuttle’s door. “This is all protected by codes only the Emperor understood, I tried and I am not that good. Even the codes I have from Lord Vader can’t bypass this stuff. The only reason I ended up here once before was because that was what the Emperor wished to happen.”

That piqued Ged’s interest so I told him what had taken place the last time I had come this way. I left out the whole conversation I had had with the ghost of my dead jedi mother because I didn’t think that Ged needed to know that but I told him everything else. When I was done there was a lengthy, heavy silence between us and then Ged shook his head.

“I don’t understand, he was already dead so why would he lead you here with these strange clues? I mean if he had wanted you he would have just taken you when he was alive, you obviously have skills he was intrigued by.”

“It’s complicated.” I growled.

He gave me a look which said ‘un-complicate it for me’.

I sighed heavily. This was a conversation I didn’t really want to have.

“Merly out with it, now!”

“He didn’t think he was going to die at Endor. He thought he was invincible. He had this whole plan laid out about how he was going to destroy the rebellion, kill Lord Vader and take Luke Skywalker to be his new apprentice. He totally miscalculated the love between a father and a son, he completely screwed up.” I retorted.

“Vader betrayed him.” Ged spat.

I closed my eyes and bit back on the sudden sorrow I felt. “No,” I said shaking my head, “Vader protected the last link he had to the woman he had loved more than anything else. Palpatine was the one who had betrayed Lord Vader.”

Ged took a deep breath not wanting to get into this with me. “We can debate this at another time. Just answer my question.”

“I think the Emperor waited before cornering me because it was more useful to have me where I was, doing what I was doing rather than trying to bend me to his will against my own. I would have fought him hard enough that he would not have been able to get what he wanted from me, the way he wanted it.”

Ged just sat back and watched my face, waiting for more.

“Don’t you see? He didn’t want to break me in the usual way because I would have been useless to him like that. He wanted bend me in such a way that I had no choice to do what he wanted; he wanted to use me, to twist me and warp everything I knew into something else and still have it feel as though  it had been my choice to go down that path. That was his power, he manipulated everything and it was all just a game to him. I think he enjoyed the fact that Lord Vader had taken some sort of liking to me, there was an attachment there the Emperor could use and then when Thrawn ....” I choked on his name, remembering the bitterness of Thrawn’s supposed disgrace and had to stop and take a deep breath. “Well he used that as well and it was all very public and messy.” I stopped before anger overrode my common sense. “The Emperor had learned about what I could do earlier but he left it alone. Let’s just say I was of more use to him as I was, at least until Endor and then things changed.”

“Changed? How?”

I heaved a very deep sigh and then told him what had happened to me on the second Death Star and when I was done he was silent for a very long time. When he finally spoke his voice was gentle and full of sorrow.

“No wonder you hate him so much.” He shook his head slightly, “I never understood why because to me he was like a father. He took great interest in my career from a very early age and he helped me often. He was my mentor in so many ways I can’t even count them. I knew that he could be ruthless but I never experienced his cruelty first hand.” He reached out and placed his hand over mine and I welcomed the warmth. “I’m sorry he did that to you but why at Endor, why wait so long to use a gift that would have been of great use to him?”

I shrugged, “I don’t know. I’m sure he had his reasons.” I said quietly. “It’s not a talent I enjoy having and for a very long time I managed to shut it out. It was something that I had little control over and it wasn’t a strong gift, or so I thought. Under the training I received that changed. As I learned more about how to control the force so this delightful little gift grew too.  It’s a trait found in the Kiffar people. My birth mother was from Kiffu and she was a powerful jedi. I inherited this from her. I kept it a secret for as long as I could and although Lord Vader and Thrawn eventually learned about it they did not tell the Emperor, he discovered it by himself. He set a trap for me and I fell right into it. I assume he was waiting until I was strong enough to control it properly before he decided to make use of it.”

“So exactly when did he find out about this gift of yours?”

“Shortly after the battle of Hoth.” I shuddered at that terrible memory and Ged didn’t press for more. “A secret such as this is almost impossible to keep secret for long, especially from someone like Palpatine. It was only a matter of time and he wanted that time to perfect.”

“Does the Grand Admiral find your talent of use?”

I made a noise of disgust, “Thrawn doesn’t need to use my force tricks Ged, he’s brilliant all on his own.” I snapped. “And besides he knows what it does to me, he doesn’t feel the need to put me through that just to find out information he can get from more reliable sources.”

“He certainly has a different way of doing things, I will give him that but none of this answers why you were led here after the Emperor’s death.”

“I don’t think he’s dead.” I said simply.

If I had ever hoped to see surprise on Ged’s face that was the moment I had been waiting for. “What?”

I opened my mouth to explain about my dreams and my theories about the Emperor’s cloning projects but before I could speak the shuttle car shuddered suddenly and began to slow down. Ged looked at me sharply. I just shook my head and shrugged.

“It didn’t do this the last time I was here.” I said.

“Hide.” He hissed at me readying the blaster.

“What? No! I can fight, there’s two of us and we can...”

He pulled me up from the seat and shoved me hard, “Go! Hide now. That is an order!”

He didn’t need to tell me again but looking for a place to hide wasn’t so simple. I ended up ducking behind one of the plush seats near the fresher, waiting what felt like forever for the shuttle car to finally screech to a violent stop. For the longest moment there was nothing then the shuttle doors opened. I heard blaster fire and shouting, the sounds of a fight and then silence.  My heart thudded so loudly in my chest I was certain the entire planet could hear it. I fought against the fear and calmed down as I had been taught but it wasn’t easy.

“Come on out.” An unfamiliar voice yelled. “I know there are two of you here so if you do not come out now I will kill this man and then I will kill you.”

I hesitated to see if this was some sort of a trick and a bolt from a blaster seared the air above me. I didn’t wait for the second one to maybe miss the air and hit me instead. I got up from my hiding place slowly with my hands up. There were two bodies on the floor, Ged was on his knees with two men flanking him, one held a blaster to his head, his hands had been bound in front of him and there was blood on his lip where someone had hit him. He stared at me without any emotion on his face and when I tried to reach him through the force I was met with resistance. I thought for a moment about fighting back, I had my lightsaber in my satchel but calculated that by the time I had fished it out Ged would already be dead and as much as he annoyed me I didn’t want to see him hurt.

The third man of the group stepped forward and smiled as he watched me.

“Well well, come here little bird, I won’t hurt you.” He said with a gentleness that didn’t fit the situation then he looked down at Ged. “You didn’t tell me you were bringing such lovely company.”

I made my way down the aisle to stand in front of him, “Lee Vander I presume?” I said staring into dark blue eyes and sounding calmer than I felt. He was tall and shockingly handsome, even with the vivid white scar than ran diagonally across his right cheek and I remembered that at one time in his life he had been the poster boy for the Imperial Navy although then his hair had been shorter and there hadn’t been any scars.

He smiled but it never reached his eyes, “You know of me? How delightful. I, however, do not know who you are. So why don’t we start with your name?”

I hesitated.

“Name. Now.” As he spoke I understood that behind the handsome face and beguilingly calm manner was a man who would give no mercy, take no crap from anyone and would kill without a moment’s thought. Something in his life had changed him from grinning Imperial pilot to a stone cold killer. It made me sad and I was glad that Jorae was not alive to see what his hero had become.

“I will not ask a third time.” He said softly.

“Amyshka.” I said defiantly, pronouncing it with galactic basic intonation instead of how it should have been spoken. “Amyshka Pavjaska.” Out of the corner of my eyes I saw a flicker of emotion on Ged’s face. He had not been expecting this but the name Merlyn Gabriel had been known so I decided to use my Dantassi name instead. I could have sworn I saw Ged smirk, just a little.

“Well Amyshka you made the right choice. It would have been a shame to kill something as pretty as you.”

I sighed and rolled my eyes. “Wow, you’ve been watching far too many Holloway holo-dramas.”

Ged laughed and it earned him a smack to the head with the butt of a blaster rifle.

“Pretty and mouthy. Ged you bring me all the fun toys.” Lee Vander replied.

“You bastard!” I swore at him.

 Lee Vander just gave me a mirthless smile and then pointed his blaster at my chest. Before I could say or do anything else he shot me. 

.

The Things We Leave Behind 5

The detention area was large and complex and, in theory, full of security but nothing showed up on the scanners to indicate where any of the guards were, just there were life forms in what appeared to be cell blocks. We were in one of the small maintenance tunnels that lead to the detention area but from where we were hiding it was impossible to see anything clearly.

“There should be a main control console near the entrance to the cell blocks.” Ged said quietly studying the layout from the datapad.

“It may be guarded.”

He nodded, “Yes, probably, but they don’t expect anyone to come barging in so we have an advantage. Looking at this there is probably only one life form guarding the area, though this won’t tell us how many sentry droids there are.”

“So what are you suggesting? We just storm the area like a couple of mad banthas?”  I said crossly.

Ged smiled. “You’re very cute when you’re annoyed, you know that?”

I made a face. “I get annoyed when there’s no solid plan with no solid backup. Look, something here feels off.”

“Can you be more specific because I don’t sense any danger and usually my instincts are spot on.”

“No, I can’t. It just doesn’t feel right.” I shook my head. Wondering, not for the first time, what the exact nature of Ged’s own force talents were, because while we both knew we were force users our exact abilities were something we had never directly discussed.

He sighed, “We’re breaking into a detention area so of course it doesn’t feel right. Look, I’m happy to listen to any suggestions you have but just having a bad feeling doesn’t count as a suggestion.”

“So then what, do you have a plan or are we just winging it?”

“If we can hone in on Behl’s tracking chip then we could bypass all need for logging in to the system. The less invasive we are the less likely we are to trip any alarms but you know the risks as well as I do.”

I waited with a nagging sense of annoyance and unease.

He fiddled with his datapad for far too long and then cursed softly.

“What.” I demanded.

“I can’t seem to find him. They must have disabled his tracking chip.”

I frowned at him. “Ged, did you not check that before we left?”

He just shrugged. “I was rather hoping it was a proximity issue. My contact assured me that Behl was being held here.”

“So we’re doing this the hard way.”  I made a face. I pulled off my satchel and gave it to him. “Take this, keep it safe.” It held my lightsaber and I didn’t want to run the risk of getting caught with it in case I was right and this mission went south.

“What the hell are you doing?”

“To find out where Jarack is. The main console should be here,” I said tapping the data-pad, “I think I can slice it, maybe, if they are using the existing mainframe or I can get into it through a backdoor using one of  Lord Vader’s codes. I’m happy to hang back here though if you think you can do this better. Can you do this?”

“Slice the data? No. I can do a great many things but slicing is not one of my big skill sets.” He replied. “How is it that you can?”

“Well I had some help and it’s a long story but let’s just say that working for Lord Vader had its advantages.” I nodded. “So I go, you stay.”

“Don’t get caught.” He chided.

“That’s not my plan but my plans don’t ever tend to go the way I hope they will so if I’m not back in about five minutes then it’s your turn. Just don’t leave me here because Thrawn will kill you if you do.”

Ged grinned.

“I’m not joking you know.”

“Merlyn....” Ged started but then stopped because I had already slipped away from him into the shadows.

 Isard’s palace detention complex, while not as huge as the Lusankya facility had been, was still big enough to get lost in if one wasn’t careful. Luckily for me the design had been based on the same sort of layout used on an ISD. One had to admire the Imperials for their streamlining of things. This meant a main room with a central computer to control all the cells, locks and live security camera feeds. 

I moved quietly, the way I had been taught by Master Kjestyll, stretching out with the force to feel for danger but there was nothing. Whatever was happening here it was being done on the quiet by a pretty nonexistent skeleton crew. I drew a deep breath, finding my center, and then stepped into the main room. I had a rough idea where the spy-cams were and tried to stay in the shadows. I was hoping that if I actually ran into a real person I could manipulate them with the force power Lord Vader had called mind trick. It wasn’t my best ability since I so rarely used it but it would do in a pinch. 

The entire detention area was shaped like a fan. The main processing area, a large semi circular room which housed the computers and the offices had three long corridors branching off it with detention cells, interrogation rooms and other facilities lining them. I stood for a moment in the shadows trying to sense if there was anyone around at all, it all felt strangely devoid of life and I began to wonder if Ged hadn’t made some huge miscalculation. Against my better judgment I stepped out into the main room and made my way to the central control panel. This was all way too easy.

I glanced around to make certain I was alone and started to tap into the computer system. The database was there but it was empty. There were no prisoners listed, in fact there was nothing listed at all. Puzzled I dug deeper using all of the tools I had been taught to slice.  The coding was clever and I wasn’t nearly good enough to wade through it all but what I did find was enough to know we had made a terrible mistake.  I swore under my breath as I backed away from the console. Alarms suddenly sounded loud enough to make me jump.  Two seconds later I stood face to face with a rather grim faced man holding a blaster aimed at my chest.

“This is a restricted area.” He said. “Who are you and what are you doing here?”

“I was looking for the fresher.” I said slowly, reaching out with the force, sensing his mind and giving it a shove.

He frowned slightly. “This is a restricted area.” He said again slowly, looking puzzled.

“I work here and I was looking for the ‘fresher.” I said again re-enforcing the force push.

The man shook his head ever so slightly as though he were fighting off a drug and I knew that he was fighting me so I did the next best thing I knew how and I kicked him as hard as I could in the groin. The blaster in his hand clattered to the floor as he sank to his knees in agony. I used the force to bring the blaster to my hand.

 “Are there more of you?” I hissed shakily pointing the blaster at him but the guard remained silent and grim faced. I should have been more concerned that he didn’t seem too worried.

“Ged! We’re going to have company!” I yelled.

“No need to shout, I’m right here.” Ged swore yanking the blaster out of my hand to shoot the man who was kneeling in pain on the floor in the chest. The blaster had not been set on stun.

“This is a trap.” I hissed as Ged did a quick search of the dead man’s pockets, pulling out a card key. “There’s no one here. No prisoners, no people, no one. Wherever Jarack is being held it’s not in this place.”

“Your ability to state the obvious is brilliant.” He snapped. He turned and blasted the lock at the main door. “That won’t hold for long. Can you get anything useful out of that?” He nodded at the console I had been using.

“The program is too sophisticated for me. Someone really good set that up. The minute I sliced into it they knew we were here.”

“So it’s useless then?”

I nodded. He shot it sending sparks showering everywhere. I glanced as the entrance to the detention center began to open.

 “Come on.” He tugged my hand to lead us back into the maintenance tunnels. “We need to get out of here  right now. And then we need to find a place to hide and rethink our strategy.”

I was about to argue when the sound of a blaster fired very close by. They had found the service tunnel entrance. Ged shoved me ahead of him and turned to fire back. The smell of scorched metal and flesh filled the small service tunnel making me sick. He was an extraordinarily good shot and when it seemed he had managed to kill everyone who had entered the tunnel to follow us he yelled at me to run.

“Go!” He yelled. “There will be more on the way and they will have better scanning equipment!”

I wasn’t going to disagree. Using my memories of being here before I led Ged through an impressive maze of small maintenance tunnels and secret passageways. It took longer than it should have. The entire palace was now on alert so there were many more open or easily accessed tunnels and areas we had to work hard to avoid. Eventually we found ourselves at a place I was all too familiar with. I pushed Ged through the force shielding and we slipped into the secret room which had once housed the Emperor’s treasures. No one had been here since my last visit, touching the door panel had told me that. Once the door had shut behind us I let out a sigh of relief and sank down to the floor.

“Well that didn’t go quite as planned did it?” I said trying to catch my breath. “What the hell happened?”

He looked at me angrily as he paced the room. “I do not know. This was not how things were supposed to go.”

I shook my head. “They knew we were coming. How is that possible? I didn’t tell anyone so who did you tell, who knew?”

Ged stopped and looked at me. “My informant was the only person apprised that I was here, who knew anything about this mission. No one else was told the exact nature of what I was planning. I didn’t trust anyone else.”

I nodded, sighing with heavy resignation, “And there’s your double agent. Did he know about me, did he know I was with you?”

“No. I never mentioned you but if they caught your face on the security holos they know you are here now. If there is any record of you at all, they'll know who you are.”

I didn't need him to tell me what that would mean if we were to get caught.

“Is Jarack even still alive?” I asked after a lengthy silence. “Or was that all a lie as well?”

Ged shook his head. “I don’t know.”

“This agent of yours, you trusted him?”

“Yes. Absolutely, I’ve known him for years, we were in the Academy together and, “He added angrily, “we were friends.”

“Who is he?”

“Lee Vander.”

“Admiral Kel Vander’s son?” I could not keep the astonishment out of my voice. “The ace pilot? I had heard that he had been killed at the Battle of Yavin.”  Jorae had talked about it a lot, Lee Vander had been one of his heroes.

He nodded. “Yes. That was the story fabricated so that he could move into the black ops service.”

I sighed and scrubbed at my face with my hands. I could still hear alarms wailing away in the distance. I really hoped this room was safe. Only a force user would ever be able to get past the Emperor’s strange force block and as far as I knew there were not so many of us around anymore but a lot of things had changed since I had last been here. I wasn’t that secure about how secret this room was any more but it had been the only place I could think of to go.  I looked at Ged and motioned for him to pass me my satchel.  I dug out the water bottle I had and took a sip then handed it to Ged who shook his head.

“No thanks.”

The silence in the room grew heavy so I broke it. “Forty eight hours you said.” I drew a deep breath. “What happens in forty eight hours?”

 “It was the amount of time I gave us to get in and out.” He said evasively.

“Why?”

He sighed. “Because in seventy two hours, give or take, this planet will be under attack if all goes according to the Grand Admiral’s plan. I wanted to be well away before that happened.”

“Well, this is just great.”  I said. “Can I say I told you this was a bad idea now?”

“If it will make you feel better.” He replied, “So where exactly are we now? I don’t recall this room at all and I thought I knew a great deal about the palace.”

“This is one of the Emperor’s secret collection rooms. His private treasury.”  I said and then before he could ask I told him the entire story of how I knew this place was here.

“Wow.” Ged breathed. “You do lead a charmed life. I thought you didn’t like the Emperor.”

“I didn’t. He scared the hell out of me.” I retorted, “But he seemed to like me.”

“He took you under his wing.” Ged said. “He must have seen something remarkable in you.”

I stared at Ged for a long while and then realised what I was hearing in his voice was sadness. “I’m sorry. You were close to him and I am being insensitive.”

“You didn’t answer the question.”

“I have some talents he felt would be of use to him. I was of the opinion that I did not want to be used. I was Lord Vader’s girl not the Emperor’s.”

“What sort of talents?”

I stared at him for a moment and then using the force I pushed at him, invading his mind, showering him with a taste of the anger I was feeling at him for getting me into this situation.

He stiffened and then in a move so fast I did not see it coming he whirled around to come at me, grabbed my arm and yanked me to my feet pulling me close to his body. “Get out of my head!” He snarled in my ear.

I just stared at him reinforcing the link until he slammed it shut with a brutality that reminded me of Lord Vader. It hurt.

“Ow!” I pushed him away from me and rubbed at my temples to try and ease the sharpness of the pain I had felt.

“Vader used to try that trick with me, trying to dig out information and while you have some talent you are nowhere near as good or as strong as he was!” Ged said angrily. “Palpatine taught me how to counter attacks like that easily. Do not ever do that again.”

“So you were his student?” I asked sliding back down the wall to sit on the floor again.

He glanced about the empty room as if trying to decide how much to tell me. “He felt there was some merit in teaching me to use my talents wisely.”

“You never speak of it in any great detail.” I said, "I mean I know we're chatted about this stuff but we always skirt around the details."

He shrugged slightly. “What is there to speak about? Palpatine is dead and the force has been usurped back into the domain of the jedi.” He spat that last word as though it burned his tongue just to utter it.

“So what can you do aside from shutting me out and hurting me?” I asked.

“The usual, move things, get a sense of feelings and so on.” He replied. “And this...” he smirked a little as he held up his hands and for a brief second blue electricity seemed to writhe and dance about his fingers.

I gasped. “Force lightening?”

He nodded.

“Why didn’t you use that in the tunnels?”

“It’s very draining and I need all my energy to keep you in line.”

“Ha very ha.”

He looked at me for a moment and then asked, “So aside from what you just showed me what was it that made Palpatine so intrigued by you because I know it wasn’t just the usual list of force powers that had you on his watch list.”

I studied my nails for a long moment listening as the klaxons continued. “I can tell when someone is lying to me.” I said.

“And?”

I sighed. “I can read the memories off objects.”

Ged regarded me for a very long moment. “Well that might have been useful to know a few hours ago.” He said digging into a pouch on his utility belt. He pulled out a small data chip and tossed it to me before I could say anything. I caught it out of reflex.

I sucked in my breath as I was bombarded with everything the datachip had to tell me. Once it was over I let out a gasp and swore in cheunh loudly.

“I take it that means you saw something interesting?”

I nodded trying to sort out everything I had been shown. “Jarack is dead.” I said not bothering to fight back the tears in my eyes. “Your friend killed him.”

Ged stared at me for a second and then his temper exploded as he hurled the data-pad he had been holding across the room where it shattered against the far wall.

“What else did you see?” He demanded.

I shook my head. “It’s too hard to try and put into words, it’s all images and a lot of them I don’t understand.”

He drew a deep breath. “Share them with me then, with your mind, through the force.”

“You told me not to ever do that again.”

“I’m making an exception. Just do it.” He said squatting down in front of me.

He opened his mind up to me and felt it as though the sun had suddenly come out from under a cloud. I gasped at the sensation and he hissed. “Hurry up.”

I reached out, cupped his face with both hands pressing the datachip against his cheek, and drew him to me so that our foreheads touched and did as he asked and while holding onto the small data-chip I flooded everything it showed me to him in real time. He grunted with the weight of it and this time when I was done he severed the connection between us far more gently. When I handed him the datachip back he just slipped it into his pocket without looking at it.

“Oh Merly,” He whispered, his voice husky with sorrow, “I do not envy you this talent.”

I looked up at Ged. “He set you up and you walked right into his trap.”

“He was my friend.” He said simply as if that explained it all. 

I just sighed, closed my eyes and leaned my head against the wall. “I know, I'm sorry.”

He nodded and stood up slowly. “Speaking of traps, Merly how do we get out of here? I get the impression that this place may not be as secure as it might have once been.”

I got up and pressed the panel on the wall which opened the secret entrance to a turbo lift. 

“I don’t have the codes to make the lift go anywhere but all the way down.” I said as we stepped into it. “At the bottom is a shuttle line that goes under much of the city. There are two stops still in the palace, one where Xizor’s palace used to be, one at the museum and the one at the end, in The Works district, is the medical facility that the Emperor once used to ...fix...Lord Vader.”

The door closed silently and we stood across from each other, leaning against the walls. He studied my face intently making me self conscious and shy all at the same time.

“Anything else at the bottom I should know about?” He asked eventually breaking the awkward silence.

I shrugged, “Last time I was here it was just the shuttle car and the tunnel.”

“So we could be headed down into another trap?”

“We could be, if anyone knows about this room and all its secrets, though I doubt it.”

“Are you certain of that?” He asked checking that the blaster he had taken off the guard still held a charge.

“No.” I fished my lightsaber out of my satchel. He looked at it with a smile.

“Do you actually know how to use that thing without hurting yourself?” He teased.

“I can hold my own.” I retorted crossly.

“Alright then, shall we see if there’s a party waiting for us?”

I sighed and brushed my fingers against the control panel and the turbo lift moved down with a soft jolt. 

“You know, I wasn’t joking.” I said, “If anything happens to me Thrawn will kill you.”

Ged gave me a look I couldn't read and reached out to stroke my face. “Then I shall not let anything happen to you, shall I.” His touch was oddly comforting but I moved away from his hand anyway.

He just grinned, “Once we get back to the Virulent, you and I are going to have a long discussion about your force talents and I want to see just how good you are with that thing.” He smirked as he showed me his own lightsaber that had been hidden beneath his jacket.

I just shook my head. “How can you be so calm after all that’s happened?”

“I’m not calm, Merly. I’m angry but I’m saving the fury up for when we find Vander so that I can kill him with a minimum of fuss.”

“Wait, we’re getting off this planet! We are not going after anyone.”

Ged’s only answer was a feral smile and then the lift stopped.








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