A Young Girl’s War Between the Stars

  34

  Hyperspace, 39 BBY/961 GSC. En-route from Coruscant to Simpla-12.

  I looked up from my study of the green Tund holocron as my ship’s holocom rang. Standing, I put it out of sight of the video pickup and accepted the call. Taria appeared on the other side, standing in what appeared to be the little secure storage unit used as a drop point where I’d left the holocrons I’d gotten from Tython.

  “Good job on finding these,” she said, tossing one in the air and catching it—what I believed to be the one from Mahara Kesh. “Given Tython’s history, I’m sure they’re just scratching the surface of the artifacts and holocrons just laying around waiting for someone to pick them up.”

  I nodded. “As I said in the report I left, I felt the pull of several other objects or locations in the Force. I wouldn’t send down settlers without sending in a team first to clear them.”

  The aqua haired girl shook her head. “I think the High Council is going to pass on Tython. They’re considering Jedha. It’s a little cold desert moon with breathable atmosphere and a small local population of only about ten or eleven million. It’s directly galactic west of Coruscant, close enough to reach within a few days by way of Ord Mantell and Burke’s Trailing, and is of significant historical importance. It helps that there are huge, easily accessed Kyber crystal deposits and existing artifacts that couldn’t be moved when the Jedi last left it. Also…”

  She paused, her voice going quiet, “You gave a report on the nexus under the Coruscant Temple screwing with your senses. We’ve confirmed it. We’ve also confirmed that there is lasting damage to everyone who has been there long enough—which means basically all of the Masters. The thought among the Masters of the various Councils is that the Kyber Mirrors on Jedha can burn away the dark side energy clouding our senses, but it may take time. The light side Force nexus under the Kyber Temple there should be enough for the younger students, with time.”

  “I see,” I murmured. “After my last visit, spending time on top of one of the nexuses on Tython fixed the issue for me. It didn’t take long.”

  “Yes, but you notoriously didn’t spend much time in the Temple,” Taria pointed out, to which I nodded. “About that favor you asked for.”

  I perked up at the change in topic. “Yes?”

  “No one has been in contact with Master Qui-Gon or Obi-Wan recently. I think you were the last to speak with them, actually. They had taken an assignment on Duneeden but haven’t made contact since they reached the planet. When you’re done with Simpla-12, if we haven’t heard from them since, I’ll need you to go check up on them. It’s not like Master Qui-Gon to go this long incommunicado unless he’s on a mission that requires a communication blackout.”

  “What was their mission?”

  Taria eyed me for a moment before answering, “Remember I said some things fell by the wayside a few years back?” When I nodded, she continued, “A former senator’s son disappeared around that time. Uta S’orn’s son Ren. Master Mundi dismissed it as a runaway. Ren was Force-sensitive, but his mother refused to allow him into the Order. Mundi was the one who went to recruit the boy originally some years ago, but for whatever reason, he decided to leave the child with his mother.”

  “And I’m going to guess that he and Senator S’orn had a close working relationship afterwards?” I asked, and Taria nodded, as she frowned.

  “Very. Her voting record shows she was very favorable towards any issues involving Cerea. But that’s an entirely separate investigation. The senator herself retired to Belasco not long ago, citing grief over the loss and presumed death of her son. Master Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan went there to follow up on her son’s disappearance and a whole mess was exposed with some kind of plot to unleash a bacterial bio-plague into the planet’s water supply. The former senator was arrested.”

  I nodded. I remembered hearing about the near release of some bio-weapon on Belasco and the arrest of a former senator, some time ago from the regular reports sent to my holocom. “So why were they on Duneeden?”

  “Following the boy’s trail. Master Qui-Gon didn’t want to let it go. He felt like it was part of something larger. I suspect he may be right and that he and Obi-Wan may have run into trouble.”

  Frowning, I stepped into the cockpit and checked my nav computer, before coming back. “I could reroute—”

  Taria shook her head. “No, I need you on-mission for Simpla.” Considering for a moment, she said, “Fine. You’ve got that look on your face like you’re trying to decide how to creatively misinterpret orders to justify turning around. I’ll send Master Adi Gallia and her Padawan, Siri Tachi. I believe you’re acquainted.” When I nodded, Taria continued, “I’ll shoot you an update once they report in.”

  “Thank you.”

  “Uh huh. You can go back to studying your copied holocrons now.” When I raised an eyebrow and said nothing, she laughed. “Come on, we’re not stupid. You’re a Shadow now. You’re allowed to study that sort of thing, as long as you’re careful about it. The general idea is that by studying the dark side, you’ll be better prepared to deal with it in the future. Making personal copies is fine. Just make sure it doesn’t make it into the general population of Jedi, and destroy it if you think it could fall into the wrong hands.”

  I stared at her for a moment, trying to decide if this was some sort of trick to get me to admit guilt. Finally, I said, “I will neither confirm nor deny the existence of any such copies—”

  The girl rolled her eyes. “Fine, fine. I get it. You’re secretive and paranoid even for a Shadow. My Master will probably be moving us to Jedha soon. When you get some time, why don’t you swing by and we can meet up. I’ll show you my private collection.”

  “Maybe,” I murmured, and she shook her head.

  “Learn to loosen up a bit, Tanya.”

  We said our goodbyes and the call disconnected. Pulling the Tund holocron back to me, I refocused on delving into its secrets. Unlike the holocrons on Tython, this one was not meant for ease of access and sharing knowledge. It appeared to be a test. First, a test to see if the one wielding it was too dark in the Force.

  It had apparently accepted me because I’d moved on to the second test—a sort of puzzle that involved patching the holes in a very intricate weave of the Force that I had never seen before, outside of one place, that being my computation orb. It was very complicated, but as I worked on it, I was beginning to see the bigger picture—that whatever this was was meant to do things you couldn’t normally do with raw Force manipulation. It appeared to be the building blocks of a Force technique that required much more complexity than something like Telekinesis, Tutaminis, or other techniques—in fact, it reminded me more of my own formulas than pure Force manipulation, given just how precise and complex it was.

  I was beginning to suspect that the puzzle itself was a lesson, teaching the person attempting it how to do something in the Force required to learn the contents of the holocron. Which would make sense, really. You could tell someone how to paint and they wouldn’t necessarily get it until they picked up a brush and started applying paint to canvas. Sometimes, the best way to learn was to do, and the best way to teach was to do so by example.

  Interesting though. Given how similar it is to the patterns in my computation orb, maybe I can use this to improve it?

  Simpla-12, 39 BBY/961 GSC.

  The sound of a metal-clad fist hammering on my ship’s hatch roused me from my meditation. Checking the external cameras, I saw who I was expecting and quickly triggered the hatch release. The door actioned open and I waved the Mando standing outside carrying a crate in. He hurried inside and dropped the metal crate on the deck.

  “Jaster sends his regards,” he nodded.

  “Thank you for the speedy delivery.”

  The man chuckled. “Sure thing. Need a hand with the vambraces?”

  “Targeting is in the helmet HUD and it responds to gestures, right?” I asked to confirm and he nodded. “I should be fine. I’ll make sure to test it before I use it.”

  With that, he left the ship and I closed it back up. Opening the box, I found exactly what I’d been expecting—and a little something extra that brought a smile to my face.

  Reaching in, I ran my hand over the smooth, matte black chest piece. It was cool to the touch and experimentally lifting it showed it was very light. There was a note taped to it, written in Mandalorian—a simple explanation that since it was only Beskar plated, it had been made with my current Beskar light armor chest piece in mind and would just fit over the top of it directly as an extra layer of armor.

  As for the rest, it was pretty standard fare. Boot covers to go over the tops of my boots. Shin guards. Pieces to cover the knees and thighs. Pauldrons for the shoulders with the same Mythosaur/Tirra’Taka skull insignia as my normal ones. Plates to go over the back of my wrists. Vambraces with the tools I wanted on them. And finally, a helmet.

  Stripping out of my robes, I made my way back to the locker with my clothes and folded them up, before taking out a new set of clothes. Before I’d stopped by Coruscant, I had put in a call to a place I’d done some research on who produced custom clothes. I’d shot off my measurements and the required credits when they quoted me a price and collected my order when I arrived.

  What I’d had commissioned was a multi-piece vac suit made for combat and extended use in the field, and for getting into and out of as quickly and easily as normal clothes. It separated down into six different pieces—two boots, two gloves, bottom, and top—which all came together seamlessly. Once everything was on and the suit sealed, I’d have to either cut it or use the under-wrist mounted hidden control panel to disengage individual parts or the whole thing at once.

  The interior was lined with something that felt silky smooth on my skin as I pulled it on, but which would wick away sweat like my body stockings. It could be fully environmentally sealed and was climate controlled, so long as the power cell maintained a charge. It had its own air reserve and recycler built into a small panel on the back of the suit, which would go under my armor, and could connect to any standard helmet connection. Like the armor, it was flat black and clung to my body like a second skin, and stretched with my movements in a way that wouldn’t impede my ability to fight.

  With the under layer on, I pulled my chest piece on over it and began attaching armor. Mandalorian armor was made with the ability to attach to almost any material with little to no support, from mundane clothing to other pieces of armor, and the plugsuit style vac suit was pretty much the perfect base layer for it.

  The armor was thin and light—much lighter than I had been expecting, really. Even with the full set on, it didn’t feel like much weight at all. I was pretty sure the jetpack would weigh more than the whole set of armor. I’d said I wanted something lightweight and sleek and Jaster’s people had delivered marvelously.

  Finally, I strapped on the new belt with its nice new pouches and holsters—one for my A-180, the other containing a new, chrome hand cannon. Pulling the BlasTech RSKF-44 heavy blaster from my holster, I gave it a spin around my finger and whistled quietly as it settled back in my palm naturally.

  The RSKF-44 was a big gun, easily as large as the WESTAR-35, but with a more ergonomic handle. It looked very much like a very big Wild West style six shooter, with a few modern touches to make it more modifiable than the WESTAR-35. It was a double barreled heavy blaster pistol, meant to be very punchy and very fast at close to mid range, with no thought to ammunition conservation—it was supposed to punch through most armor or cover and put whatever you pointed it at down on the first shot, not the tenth.

  Slipping the RSKF-44 back into place, I checked the pouches directly behind them and found they were empty, but perfectly sized to conceal a lightsaber—the design lending itself more to pouches meant to contain ammunition. Behind them were another two pouches for carrying miscellaneous objects. I slipped my sabers into the pouches for them and attached my staff to the back. The belt buckle looked like it was meant to attach to something and I quickly found that it mated up with the full body shield I’d requested.

  I pulled my jetpack out of the storage locker and detached the harness carrying it and several grenades. The harness went on over the armor and attached to my belt, followed by attaching my DC-15A to the front of my chest piece so it could hang down the front of my body in its usual position. Then I pulled the cloak on and secured it. The jetpack clicked into place against the armor through the cloak and I took a few moments walking around the inside of the cabin and testing how the weight settled. Deciding it was still too awkward and heavy, I removed the jetpack and stowed it in the locker.

  Finally I pulled the helmet out of the crate and had a good look at it. The shape of the eyes and cheeks reminded me of Bo-Katan’s helmet, but without the antennae/rangefinder combo—likely because Jaster knew I didn’t need a range finder and had my own improved comms gear. Pulling it on, I blinked and the HUD activated, overlaying my vision. It had a current count of the electro-darts loaded on my right wrist launcher, and a combined power meter for the helmet, suit, and shields on my wrist and waist.

  After only a second, other systems turned on and I had a light breeze keeping the inside from getting stuffy, or feeling claustrophobic. A test of the ability to seal itself and connect to the suit’s atmosphere reserve and filter system showed that the climate and comfort control persisted, and I unsealed it.

  Looking over at my droid, I asked, “How’s it look, Arthree?”

  I hummed at the sound of my modulated voice coming from the helmet as Arthree beeped, a low-to-high affirmative sound. A bit of playing with the settings later and I found the controls for the voice modulator and began adjusting the pitch. “Test, test, test, test, test. Oh, that’s nice,” I murmured, nodding at the slightly deeper, older sound to my voice coming out of the helmet.

  Heading into the fresher, I checked the mirror and decided I liked what I saw. I didn’t look like a Jedi at all. If I pulled one of my sabers, most people would probably think I just stole it from a Jedi unless I started doing things with the Force.

  Pulling off the helmet and cloak, I sat down at my work bench and got to work on the RSKF-44, upgrading it the same way I had my rifle and other pistol and replacing the crystal. Brand recognition was important! Besides that, if I had to fire this hand cannon, I wanted whatever I shot to explode.

  When that was done, I took off the personal shield from my belt and opened it up. Connecting it to my computer, I found the settings for the shield’s size and shape. A bit of playing with it had it changed from spherical to closer to a teardrop shape—coming to a point over my head and a more tapered round beneath my feet if the ground wasn’t there, with the edges of the shield just tight enough that I could hold my carbine up and point it without it poking through the shield.

  I’d need to test it, but the logic was sound. That is, sharships used deflector shields to achieve hypersonic flight in atmosphere. If I used one to reduce my own drag and improve aerodynamics, I should get much more out of a flight formula for cheaper, theoretically even enough to allow me to run down a fighter going hypersonic to try to escape—hopefully before I ran out of juice.

  Eventually, I finished up and moved the Rusted Silver out of the mountains where I’d hidden to avoid attention. As I flew into the capital city of Sim-First, I made a face at the emotions welling up from below. Anger, frustration, hate, despair, addiction—a noxious cocktail of all the worst stuff. I focused and shut myself off from it—not closing my senses to it as I would have, but rather pushing aside the effects, so I could listen for anything out of place.

  I reached out with my Force senses as well, trying to feel out any potential Jedi in distress. I didn’t sense anything active, but I did faintly sense lingering echoes—as if a fairly strong Master had endured great pain and suffering here over a long period of time. That didn’t bode well for my search, or the survival of Master R’aya.

  “Arthree, I’m going to circle the city. Run a scan for me. Look for anything that stands out.”

  The droid whistled a confirmation just as I received a transmission. “Rusted Silver, this is ground control. When you’re finished with your flyover of our little shitheap and ready to put down, just find an open spot on the field. The droids will get you topped off and we’ll send a bill.”

  I pulled on my helmet and made sure the voice modulator was running. “Roger that, Control.”

  As soon as I’d completed a pass of the city, I turned for what was marked on my computer’s display as an airfield. And it was a field—just a strip of leveled off muddy dirt and gravel, with fuel and other hoses criss-crossing the field and a few older looking service droids and astromechs walking or rolling around. I set down in the gravel and winced as the ship sank a bit upon landing.

  Sliding my seat back, I left the cockpit and took a few moments to relieve myself. Grabbing the bounty puck out of the crate, I checked it to make sure it had what I wanted. Bo-Katan’s face popped up in a hologram, followed by a full body shot of her, then one in her Mando armor. Tucking that away into my pouch along with some physical credits, I grabbed a small bag with my slicing kit and slung it on under my cloak, then made my way to the hatch.

  “Make sure no one tries to enter, Arthree,” I instructed, and the droid whistled.

  Stepping out onto the gravel airfield, I made a face as the thin layer of gravel gave way to reveal a thick layer of mud. “Just great,” I muttered as the ship’s hatch closed behind me and a pair of droids approached to connect up fuel, water, and septic lines.

  If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

  I projected a hologram of the local map into my palm briefly, then made my way towards the spaceport. Soon enough, I spotted signage posted just outside of the building. Two of those were of interest to me. The first, the local constabulary office. The second, the local watering hole—a place called ‘12 Tavern.’

  Deciding to head to the police first, I followed the signage to a small but secure looking building nearby. Unlike most of the surrounding buildings, this one appeared to have a solid, level foundation and hadn’t simply been built directly on top of the mud—which made sense, for a law enforcement office where prisoners would hypothetically be kept.

  Opening the door, I stepped inside and looked around, finding it unoccupied save for one man sitting in an office in the back with his legs kicked up on the desk. “In here,” he called, and I strode over to the office.

  Upon spotting him, I froze briefly, my hand reflexively twitching towards my blaster only to still a moment later. He was a red Zabrak male—but red and almost human white, as opposed to the red and black I remembered from a nightmare… or perhaps a Force vision, I’d had more than once now.

  “Help you, Mando?” he drawled, hands crossed over his chest.

  I glanced around the room and made sure there were no cameras, before stepping closer. I didn’t gesture as I hit him with the full force of a Mind Trick. “Are there any recording devices in the room?”

  His eyes went a bit glazed and he nodded. “Yeah. On the shelf,” he turned his head that way and I followed his gaze, to a shelf containing what looked like basic police equipment—armor, weapons, restraints, that sort of thing. I eventually spotted the camera.

  “Shut it off for me, please. Then delete the recording of me entering.”

  He nodded and stood, doing as I instructed. It was only after he shut it off and sat back down that I asked, “Did a Jedi come through here? Or any female mirialan?”

  “Oh yeah. She was here a while ago.”

  “What happened to her?”

  He shrugged. “Same thing happens to all of Jenna’s experiments, I guess.”

  Frowning, I shook my head. “Start at the beginning. Walk me through what happened as you know it.”

  “Sure,” he nodded absently. “A mirialan Jedi showed up with a small ship and came here looking for someone, just like you. As soon as she left, I called Jenna. The Jedi went to the tavern, then left. Jenna’s boys jumped her and took her out with tranq gas. They took her back to the lab. I called the scavs and sold her ship for a nice little profit.”

  “I see. And Jenna is…?”

  The zabrak man spat off to the side. “A fucking crazy bitch. Jenna Zan Arbor. She’s some kind of big brain scientist. She’s studying Jedi and others with the Force. She paid me good money for the intel on that mirialan.”

  “Describe her,” I ordered.

  “Human female. Blonde. Gray eyes. Maybe thirty, but a Core World thirty, not an Outer Rim thirty.” In other words, she looked at least ten years younger and would remain that way for a long time. One of the benefits of advanced medical technology. Though not necessarily found exclusively in the Core. If she was some kind of scientist, then it was possible that she had worked for some corporation or other entity who would have provided medical treatments as part of its signing bonus. The zabrak man continued with a chuckle, holding his hands out and outlining the image of a womanly figure. “Hot as fuck, but she’s got that crazy look, you know?”

  “Where’s her lab?”

  The man shrugged. “It was in the middle of town. She bought the old hospital.”

  “And that’s where she is now?” I asked, getting ready to leave and go investigate the hospital.

  “Nope,” the zabrak shook his head. When I made a ‘go on’ gesture, he continued, “She packed up her shit and booked it after two more Jedi were brought in. Said it was getting too hot and she needed to move. They left planet yesterday.”

  I frowned, asking, “Where did they go?”

  “How the fuck should I know?” the man shook his head.

  “Then tell me who does.”

  “She hired a bounty hunter to catch Jedi for her. Ona Nobis. Sorrusian—basically human. Female. Shaved head. Bad attitude. A real bitch. She’s got some kind of laser whip. Wanted for crimes across a dozen worlds. Nobis stayed behind when Arbor left. Pretty sure she’s waiting to catch any Jedi following and bring them to wherever Arbor relocated to.”

  They set a trap, knowing the Temple would probably not send Jedi in force yet. This Nobis bounty hunter will be expecting Jedi, not another bounty hunter. So… Follow up on the fake job looking for Bo-Katan. Ask around to see if anyone has seen her. Be obvious about it. Draw Nobis’s attention. If she offers to join the hunt, reluctantly accept—haggle splitting the credits when we catch Bo. Get her alone somewhere, then take her down and interrogate her.

  …I don’t like it. It relies too much on a criminal being predictable. But I don’t exactly have another option available at the moment, where it comes to Nobis. Unless I want to abandon subtlety entirely, smash her face in, and demand answers. No. Better to check this lab Ms. Arbor left behind for clues.

  “Where can I find Ona Nobis?” I finally asked.

  “The local watering hole, 12 Tavern. She spends most of her time there, drinking her credits.”

  Nodding, I continued, “And the local Bounty Hunter’s Guild office?”

  The zabrak man snorted. “Head of the guild’s office is a booth in the tavern. He’s an old twi’lek, one of the yellow ones.”

  “Thank you. Now, why don’t you take a nap and forget that you ever saw me?” I asked, pushing hard on the mental suggestion.

  The man was sprawled across his desk and snoring before I made it out the door to his office. I opened a comm link to Arthree as I left the building. “Arthree, when we took the scans of the city, which of those buildings looked like it would have been an old hospital?”

  The droid beeped and my holocom pinged. Pulling it from my pouch, I looked over the map of the city it displayed, one building highlighted in red. “Thank you, Arthree. I need you to listen for comms chatter and scan for ships coming in and anyone leaving them. If you see or hear any Jedi landing, let me know.”

  There was an affirmative beep and I shut off the comm. Pulling my hood up, I slipped into an alley and made my way across town, keeping my senses open while at the same time reaching out with my empathy projection and making myself as disinteresting and boring as possible to anyone I happened to pass by.

  It was nearly dark when I reached the old hospital. Scanning the place with my senses, I fought the impulse to curl my lip in disgust at the feelings left over—soaked into the land and the structure itself. I made my way inside, turning on my helmet’s low light mode and scanning the interior as I went.

  For an abandoned building, it was remarkably clean. Recently renovated, even—within the last few years. I supposed I shouldn’t be terribly surprised, considering it was being used as an illicit scientific research lab until just recently—it would make sense that it would be a bit decrepit on the outside but up to a certain standard on the inside.

  Following my senses deeper into the building, I eventually found a large room that reeked of misery soaked into the walls—and Force. As though more than one Jedi or Force sensitive had suffered and died here. Unfortunately, what I did not find was any sort of evidence, no clue as to where Ms. Arbor had fled to, no electronics left over to see if she had been sloppy about hiding her plans or even to tell me what sort of research she was doing here beyond studying the Force in living beings.

  Annoyed, I left the building and slipped back through the city, towards the tavern the local constabulary had indicated as it began to pour down rain, lightning popping overhead. Stepping indoors out of the rain, I pulled my hood back, making my way into the tavern and looking around. I took in the tavern and its patrons.

  The place was busy, but not full. Most of the clientele looked to be on the shady side—even more so than your usual cantina patrons. Everyone had a kind of dusty, grungy look to them, probably caused by the dust in the atmosphere from the mines I’d read about when researching the planet on the flight over. Stuff that got kicked up every time the wind blew and seemed to coat everything around here.

  True to the constable’s words, I spotted an older yellow male twi’lek in the back corner, doing business over drinks. He looked up as I entered and briefly nodded my way before turning back to his conversation. Not too far away from him was a bald human-looking woman wearing armor, sipping at something that looked like beer.

  Making my way over to a table with a view of the twi’lek’s booth, and coincidentally the woman who had the information I needed, I settled in and waited. A few moments later, a modified protocol droid walked over, its feet clanking against the wooden floor. “How can I serve you, madame?”

  “What do you have to eat?” I asked, before correcting myself, “Something a human would find palatable.”

  The droid rattled off a very short list of selections that sounded mostly like exactly the kind of bar food I’d expect to find—meat and cheese on a bun with sauce, or meat, cheese, and vegetables either with a grain, noodles, or wrapped in something like a tortilla. In other words: Space American, Space Mexican, or Space Asian. In between my experiences on Coruscant, Mandalore, and Serenno and talking with the Mandalorians, I’d come to a few conclusions on those options.

  Space Asian tended to be hit or miss. Either it was fantastic or it was awful, and whether it was one or the other tended to directly correlate to how close one was either to the Core, or to largely aquatic worlds with aquatic-type sentient races. Mon Calamari, for instance, knew their seafood and their tastes where seafood was concerned largely overlapped with those of humans and near-humans. Simpla-12 was not an aquatic world, near to one, nor did it get enough imports to guarantee good seafood. Which meant it was likely to be slop. I gave it a hard pass.

  Space Mexican tended to be pretty consistent throughout the galaxy, as long as the planet it was on had some decent local agriculture infrastructure or got imports. It was easy to get right and hard to mess up so badly that what you were left with was inedible. The biggest risk was in whatever they were using for cheese and meat, and outside of agri-worlds, well-developed worlds, or the Core, you either didn’t ask or you avoided it. Given that this place was a mudball and that lack of good imports, I was iffy on it.

  Space American was the simplest, and conversely actually easier to fuck up than Space Mexican. Salt, grease, butter, meat, bread, and maybe some vegetables. You’d think that would be easy to get right, but you’d be wrong. But in backwater places like this, it was the surest bet—and a look at the tables around me showed most of the people eating were partaking of something like a hamburger made from nerf meat, which was one of the things shipped practically everywhere, including pit stops like Simpla-12.

  Why were the burgers okay but not the Space Mexican? Simple. Droids, such as the one working the kitchen, weren’t known for their creativity or ability to improvise when it came to food they couldn’t taste, smell, or digest. Most of them would look at a brick of pre-formed meat patties and not be able to make the intuitive leap that they could break that down into ingredients for something else. But they could cook a burger with a minimum standard of accuracy and edibility every time, with the proper ingredients already laid out for them.

  I put in my order and the droid left to go relay it to the kitchen. Nearby, the yellow twi’lek’s client stood and left. He looked my direction and waved me over. I moved across the floor and took a seat.

  “Mando. Not often we get one of your kind out this way. What can I do for you?” he asked, radiating curiosity.

  Pulling out the bounty puck, I dropped it on the table between us. I could feel Nobis’s attention on me and didn’t bother looking to see if she was watching. “I’m hunting a fugitive Mandalorian wanted for crimes against the Mandalorian people and their leader. Any information you have on her would be appreciated.”

  The twi’lek man nodded, activating the puck and reading over the details as Bo-Katan’s image hovered in the air between us. Looking at the sum, he whistled. “That’s a lot of credits.” After a moment, he murmured, “Ah. I see why. The job was commissioned by the ruler herself, and this is her sister. Must have tried a coup.”

  I nodded. “Something like that. She chose the wrong side, and that side attempted a coup. It failed. Regardless, any information you have or help you can offer would be appreciated.”

  The man grinned and slid the puck back to me. “How much appreciation, though? Could you perhaps put a numerical value on just how appreciative this queen or whatever she’s calling herself will be?”

  I stared at him, tilting my head slightly to the side to emphasize just how stupid that sounded to my ears. “You’re not dealing with the ruler of Mandalore.” Reaching into my pocket, I pulled out a few credits and dropped them on the table. The man curled his lip in disgust at what he must have thought was a paltry offering.

  “That is barely worth my time—”

  “I’m one bounty hunter, and I have other expenses to take care of that don’t involve bribing you to do your job. This is more than fair. Now, are you going to give me the information I’m purchasing, or do we need to go outside and have a friendly talk?” The man held up his hand in a signal and from across the bar, people at three different tables stood up, pulling blasters but not pointing them at me. The threat was clear.

  “I think you should leave now,” the man smirked, grabbing the credits.

  I slammed my hand down on top of his and jerked him across the table until his face was mere inches from mine. The thugs’ weapons came up, but the thrum of an active lightsaber made the entire bar go silent. I didn’t take my gaze off of him as I spoke. “Gentlemen, you’ll want to holster those weapons and leave. You know what this is and what I had to do to get it. Whatever this man is paying you is not enough to deal with me. Unless, that is, you feel that your lives are worth only a few credits?”

  “Shoot her! Shoot her—urk!” the twi’lek squealed, only to shut up as I brushed the edge of the saber against his skin and let it burn for a few seconds. “Don’t shoot! Don’t shoot!”

  The thugs looked between themselves and their boss, before tucking away their weapons and leaving the tavern. Nodding, I said, “If she passed through here, you would know about it. Did she?”

  “Y-yes!” he nodded, and I blinked as my senses registered that as the truth. “About ten months ago, with a bunch of other Mandos! Nine or ten of them! They were here for about a week before they left!”

  That was… unexpected. Very unexpected, really. Sure, we weren’t that far from Mandalore, but it was still odd. “What were they doing here?”

  “I, I don’t know! They just hung around for a bit, took some trips out of the city, then left!”

  So, scouting. Possibly for a place to relocate, regroup, and lick their wounds while they wait for a chance to attack Satine’s government? I wondered, frowning. “Any idea where they went?”

  “No! They just fucked off in the middle of the night!”

  I nodded, before letting go of his hand. Grabbing my puck, I shut off my lightsaber and stood, slipping it back under my cloak and into its holster. “Thank you for the information.”

  Moving back to my table, the droid brought my food a few moments later. Quickly casting a static illusion of myself sitting there, I pulled off my helmet and began eating. It was bar food, but decent enough.

  I had just finished eating when my ear bud beeped. Touching my ear, I wiped my hands and face clean on a napkin and pulled my helmet back on, letting the illusion drop. “Arthree,” I murmured quietly, “did something happen?”

  The droid chirped and my holocom chimed. Checking it, I found a text transcription of comms chatter as a Jedi ship arrived and negotiated use of the landing field. I shut off my holocom and quietly thanked the droid. I flagged down the server droid and ordered another drink while I waited, extending my senses and feeling the two Jedi nearby.

  To my surprise, when the drink arrived, Nobis stood and joined my table. “So,” the woman smirked, “you took out a Jedi.”

  “There are really only two ways to acquire a lightsaber, and the other one is to make it yourself,” I pointed out, and she chuckled.

  “Not bad. Sounds like the trail’s gone cold on your bounty.”

  I shook my head. “Just getting started. Even a dump like this has to have sensor logs of what vessels they flew in on and which way they went when they left, maybe even a hyperspace solution.” It was possible, when someone jumped to hyperspace, to calculate their most likely destination if it was close—or at least, the direction they were going if it wasn’t and they were sticking to a major hyperspace lane, like the Hydian Way. Given the dangers of going off the hyperspace lanes, most people tended to stick to them unless they were desperate or trying to be sneaky.

  “You know, if you find ‘em, one Mando is going to have a hell of a time taking on three or four of your own people who don’t want to be brought in, let alone ten,” she continued, sipping at her drink. “I could help with that. For a cut of the take. Call it… fifty percent.”

  Pulling a metal straw from my pouch, I slipped it into my drink so I could keep my helmet on. “There were about nine in her group, not counting the target. I can handle six of them. Thirty percent.”

  “You look kind of scrawny for that,” the woman chuckled. “Forty, but you’re doing all of the legwork and investigative crap.”

  I pretended to consider for a few moments, sipping my drink. Eventually, I nodded. “Deal.”

  I heard the door to the tavern open, the two Jedi entering. Looking up, I saw it was Master Gallia and Siri Tachi. “Jedi,” I murmured, and the woman across from me clicked her tongue.

  The pair stopped in the middle of the room, Master Gallia looking around as Siri stood ready beside her. “I’m looking for a group of Jedi. One mirialan woman, a bearded human man, and a young human girl. Jedi Knight Luminara Unduli, Master Qui-Gon Jinn, and Master Qui-Gon’s Padawan, Obi-Wan Kenobi. The humans would have been traveling together. If anyone has seen them, the Jedi Temple would be most grateful.”

  “Hey Mando, want to make a few extra credits?” Nobis quietly asked with a grin, and I shrugged.

  “I suppose that depends on the job,” I answered back, just as quiet.

  “Someone here has to have seen them!” Master Gallia spoke up a bit louder. “This is the closest drinking establishment to the air field. We believe they were here not long ago. Please speak up now. If it is reward you seek, the Temple can be very generous to those who aid its cause.”

  “How generous?” a familiar, weasly voice asked from nearby, and I turned to look directly at the yellow twi’lek, nursing the burn on his neck.

  “Quite generous,” Master Gallia smiled. “What happened to your neck, friend?”

  The little weasel turned a grin on me. “Why don’t you ask the Mando there? She’s got a lightsaber.”

  “In or out?” Nobis asked.

  “In,” I decided, and she grinned, throwing back her mug of beer as Master Gallia made her way over, hand slipping beneath her robe, where I knew her own lightsaber likely sat.

  “Excuse me—” Master Gallia began, only to jump back as a pink whip of energy slid through the space she had just been standing with a high pitched hum—entirely different from the lower thrum of a lightsaber.

  There were shouts as the patrons began to clear out. Ona Nobis stood up, pulling her light whip back in towards her body, the whip curling at her feet where the wooden floor began to blacken and smoke where it lay. I stood as well and the bounty hunter grinned. “I’ll take the Master, you deal with the apprentice. We can split the creds sixty/forty.”

  “Fine,” I agreed, drawing my lightsaber as the two other Jedi drew theirs, filling the room with the hum of three lightsabers and the accompanying light show of blue, purple, and white-silver.

  Siri’s eyes locked onto my blade as Master Gallia slowly inched towards Nobis, lifting her blade into a Form V Djem So stance. “Master! That blade—”

  I drew my A-180 left-handed and fired at her head—close enough to the side that she could dodge to her right, putting her more in line with the door. The shot shut the girl up as she reflexively parried and I dashed towards her. And while I expected the bolt to come flying straight back, I highly doubted Siri expected me to swat it back at her given the shocked look on her face as she was forced to parry again.

  The air between us strobed as Nobis engaged Master Gallia and led her deeper into the room and out of sight of Siri, while I slowly forced Siri back, advancing on her and closing the distance in the deadly blaster tennis match we were playing as her incredulity grew with every exchange. Finally, I missed a parry, tilting my head to the side to let the bolt slip past as I holstered my sidearm now that it’d served its purpose of distracting her.

  For just a moment, Siri looked relieved, slipping into a Form VI Niman stance, apparently thinking she would have the upper hand in a lightsaber duel against someone who was, as far as she knew, not a Jedi. A straight up lightsaber fight between a Jedi and a non-Jedi should be almost entirely lopsided, after all.

  I disabused her of that notion as I closed the rest of the short distance between us and tackled her, shutting off my saber to prevent an accident and grabbing her wrist holding her own saber as I rushed towards the wall. A subtle push with Force Telekinesis at the same time her back hit the wall blew the wall out behind her, as though the wall had rotted away and her slamming into it was all it took to destroy it. The girl landed on her back and slid through the mud.

  A Force Push caught me in the stomach as I jumped, but I countered with a yank on the ground, negating the energy Siri used as I fell on top of her. “Where did you get that lightsaber?! What did you do with my friends?!”

  She tried for a swing with the saber, but I caught her wrist again. Reaching out, I felt the bounty hunter and Master Gallia still fighting, but it felt like it would be over soon—and not in Master Gallia’s favor. Bringing my wrist up, I shot the girl in the chest with an electro dart.

  Siri went stiff as her muscles locked up, glaring up at me. It took another two before she lost consciousness, going limp beneath me.

  I sighed and hooked her saber onto my belt. I cuffed her hands together with a set of manacles that had been included in the kit Jaster had sent, then hauled her up and onto my shoulder.

  Carrying Siri back into the tavern, I found Nobis standing over Master Gallia’s prone form—the Master looking much worse for wear. The bounty hunter looked up as I entered and nodded. “Nice work.”

  Bending over, Nobis picked up Master Gallia. “Come on, let’s head to the air field. We need to get out of here. More Jedi will be coming with these two going missing.”

  “Mm,” I nodded. “And about those credits?”

  Nobis laughed, nodding. “I know someone who will pay good money to get fresh test subjects, especially Jedi. We’ll take my ship—”

  “Oh no. There won’t be any airlock incidents,” I shook my head. “You can take yours, I’ll take mine.”

  The bald woman turned an appraising look on me before chuckling. “Not as dumb as I thought. Fine, I’ll take the prisoners—”

  “I’ll be keeping my prisoner with me.”

  Narrowing her eyes, Nobis’s laid back attitude shifted to suspicion as she asked, “Really? Why’s that?”

  She’s starting to suspect something’s up. I need to reassure her. Convince her I’m exactly the sort of person she would get along with—a degenerate scumbag mercenary. No, go a level further.

  Reaching up, I smacked Siri’s ass, groping the unconscious girl’s firm posterior. “Why do you think?” I asked, the implication that the answer should be blatantly obvious hanging heavy in the air.

  She studied me for a few moments before the suspicion faded into amusement. “Just don’t damage the goods.”

  “Please, I’m not a savage,” I tried to verbally project my eye roll. “Besides, even if I didn’t have plans for her… It’s not that I don’t trust you not to feed me incorrect hyperspace coordinates and turn them both in to collect the credits for yourself while you send me halfway across the universe in the opposite direction, but I don’t trust you not to do exactly that.”

  “I might have considered it,” the woman admitted—though the feeling I got from her was more along the lines of that having been the plan from the moment we captured the Jedi and I denied her the opportunity to shove me out an airlock.

  Soon enough, we were on the airfield. I made my way to the Rusted Silver and stowed Siri in the fresher, turning on the sonic shower and setting it to high intensity to clean off the mud, before making my way to the cockpit. It wasn’t long after that, I was in the air following Nobis’s ship. The woman sent me a set of coordinates and I fed them into my navigational computer.

  Vanqor? I frowned, pulling it up in the computer as we jumped to hyperspace. Looks like… a desert and rocky crystalline planet in the Sertar sector, mostly populated by humans.

  I had a few days to come up with a plan for dealing with Nobis and Arbor. I’d have to trust that Master Gallia wasn’t an idiot and could intuit what was going on. In the meantime, I’d need to convince Siri to go along with the plan I’d been forced to improvise the moment she and her Master engaged us.

  Defeat and capture the Jedi. Follow the bounty hunter back to her boss. Free the captives and eliminate the hostile forces.

  My only regret was that I hadn’t found a moment to break off and contact them and inform them of the plan beforehand, but their reactions had been good enough to convince Nobis, so I’d consider it worth it.

  I’ll apologize to Siri when this is finished. Find some way to make it up to her. …Hopefully, she doesn’t sulk. One Obi is enough.