The Time Between
Chapter One
Vector watched the rear view of the ship on the monitor and witnessed everything he held most dear explode in blinding white light. Her song crescendoed into a deafening shriek before going silent and the weight of despair and disbelief drove him to his knees. His arms hung limply at his sides and his chin sank to his chest as he felt the Phantom jump to hyperspace.
She had been cruelly ripped from his life for the second time but this was different. Before, when Serevin had taken her, hope had clung to him like a protective cloak. But now, he was a lost child, groping in the dark, seeking the light of her aura and being answered by a void that gripped his heart. Not even the nest could reach him through the desolation.
His blood thundered in his ears, he couldn't breathe and there was no spit in his mouth, he could not swallow. He was so very cold, his muscles contracted as he shivered and then he heard a voice, from far away, "Come on, Vector." His face stung from the slap.
Reality tilted and suddenly snapped back into clarity, like something elastic stretched to the limit and then lot go. He saw the hand come at his face again and caught it in mid swing, giving the arm a painful twist as he looked up into the face of Kaliyo.
"Never strike us again."
Frowning and rubbing her arm, Kaliyo responded. "Like I care, snap the hell out of it, Vector, we need you right now, we can mourn later."
Mourn, death, finality, alone, the words assaulted his mind like a cudgel, blow after blow and he could not silence them, he could find no peace. "Leave us be, you will find no aid here."
Vector struggled to his feet, teetering on legs that shook. Dr. Lokin reached out to steady him as he took the few steps to the co-pilot seat and sank into the cushions. He leaned back against the headrest and closed his eyes, seeing nothing but her face and the white light that engulfed it.
"Pull yourself together, man," entreated Lokin.
"We are empty, doctor, there are no pieces to reassemble."
Kaliyo snorted, "That's bullshit and you know it, Vector. She wanted us to go back to Imperial space and tell them what was coming. I personally don't give a crap, but she would expect it of you. Don't you dare let her down."
"Give him some space, Kaliyo," said Lokin. "He will eventually do the right thing, he always does."
'He always does, he always does' the words rotated round and round his brain, 'the right thing, the right thing', he could no longer grasp the meaning, he inhaled deeply and smelled her scent on his clothes as his mind wandered back to the last time he saw her.
Darth Marr had summoned all of his allies, both Republic and Imperial, to hunt down a new force that was decimating remote colonies and outposts along the border of wild space. The attack on Korriban was the last goading factor that forced Darth Marr into action.
The emperor had already fled after consuming every living thing on Ziost and now there was this new threat to both factions and Marr sensed the involvement of the emperor at the center of it all.
Rey'elle was a ghost as far as sith intelligence was concerned, a blip, answering solely to her own sense of priorities. However, after Yavin 4, her presence carried more weight and her loyalty to the empire dictated that she assist Darth Marr with his hunt.
They had docked with Marr's Terminus class destroyer, the Agrona, just inside wild space and Vector had accompanied her through the airlock before she sent him back to the ship to assist Kaliyo with refueling and resupply.
They had stopped just outside the entrance and he had pulled her close, "please, love, let us stay at our rightful place by your side. There is something here that bothers us."
She had hooked her arms around his neck, "nonsense, Vector, what safer place than Marr's flagship. I will be fine and I won't be long, I need you to assist Kaliyo and make sure the ship is ready when I return."
He had kissed her, holding his lips to hers as long as he could until the door slid open and he was forced to let her go. He stood watching her retreating back until the door closed and he headed back to the Phantom as she had instructed.
The Eternal Fleet had come out of hyperspace soon after that with so many ships, they filled the cockpit window. The airlock had been damaged in the initial attack and he could not get to her without breaking the safety seals on the Phantom's hatch which would have killed everyone on board. The docking clamps had been damaged as well and Kaliyo could not release them from the Phantom's controls.
He recalled their last conversation as Rey'elle had released the docking clamps from inside Marr's ship. "If you see an opening, take it. Someone has to make it back to the empire."
Kaliyo had replied, "are you joking? You want us to ditch you?"
"I won't be far behind."
Vector's last words to her were, "We will hold you to that, my love." and then the comms went dead.
He replayed it all again, in his mind, slowing everything down to a crawl. There had been escape pods, perhaps she had managed to escape after all, but he had not detected her aura.
He had watched Marr's flagship split in two, bodies had been flushed out into space, he had seen the miniscule forms floating in the vacuum. Then the reactors had exploded, the flash was blinding, the colors changing from red to yellow to purest white. A corona of energy pulsed from the ship like ripples in a pond and then Kaliyo had made the jump. He rewound the scene again and again, replaying it over and over and coming to the same conclusion, she was gone, his truest and only love was gone.
He opened himself at last to the nest and they gave him strength and courage but he found no solace. They understood the loss but not the profound pain and suffering he endured over one individual life. They could not heal the gaping wound at the center of his existence.
Vector struggled out of the chair and prepared to leave the cockpit. "Let us know when we are within communications range to send a message to Minister Beniko. We will be in our quarters."
The ship was so cold now without her warmth and light. Vector hardly remembered walking to their cabin until he shut the door. Her scent permeated the room and he half expected to see her lying in their bed waiting for him, but it was as empty as he felt.
He sat down on the edge of the bed to take his boots off and noticed her datapad lying at the foot on her side. He picked it up, took it out of sleep mode and it opened to page 164 of one of those cheap romance novels she had become addicted to after Illum.
He glanced at the top and saw the title: 'Secrets of the Rose'. He rolled his eyes as a rueful smile played along his lips. The books seemed to offer her an escape from her everyday life and even initiated some very unexpected and enjoyable romantic interludes.
He recalled one time when she wanted him to try some impossible position that threw his back into such terrible muscle spasms he thought he would never walk again. Her laughter was infectious as she massaged the pain away, he remembered the sound and the softness of her hands.
He could feel the anger of her loss rise like molten lava and laid the datapad back down before he threw the damnable thing against the wall, he simply could not stand losing one more thing that was a link to her.
His love for Rey'elle had restored more and more of his humanity, he had become less joiner and more man which returned emotions he had thought long lost. He felt anger, jealousy, heartbreak, fear and he had learned, on Voss, that he was no longer beyond tears. He finished removing his armor, crawled into bed, pulled her pillow to his chest and quietly wept while the nest sang him to sleep with sad, sweet songs.
He did not know how long he slept since the nest kept away any nightmares or dreams that may have interrupted the welcome oblivion that engulfed him. Only the hateful sound of someone pounding on his door pulled him from that well of forgetfulness he never wanted to leave.
He was stiff as he moved her pillow aside and struggled to sit up. His mouth was dry and his bladder full, he ran his hand over his face, stubble scraped his fingertips.
The pounding continued. "Yes?" he growled.
"We just dropped out of hyperspace near Bakura, Vector. We will require refueling and you can contact the Minister now."
"Give us a few minutes, Dr. Lokin."
"Of course, my boy, but don't take too long."
The refresher offered no respite from the memories. He could almost see her naked form through the shower glass, or standing in front of the mirror putting finishing touches on her makeup. The whole ship was like a vault of her ghost peeking out from every nook and cranny.
His reflection peered back at him, gaunt, strained, broken and accusatory. She would want him to go on but left him ill equipped to do so. On Hoth he had learned how to die for her, every day he learned how to live for her, but nothing had taught him how to live without her.
He raised his fist and slammed it against the mirror, creating tiny fissures that spread from the point of impact. Blood dripped from his knuckles into the sink and the remote, burning pain in his hand dropped him back into this hell that he must now face alone.
He washed the blood away, cleaned his teeth, ran a comb through his hair and went back into the bedroom to get dressed. He would endure but he would never be the same.
"About damned time," Kaliyo chided as Vector walked into the common room.
Vector didn't even grace her with a look as he went to the holo terminal and activated the code for Sith Intelligence. He buried his emotions, became Dawn Herald because he knew he would break just mentioning her and he could not afford the luxury of grief right now.
It took a few minutes for the connection to go through and the image of a young man in imperial uniform to appear.
Vector did not wait for a greeting. "This is Vector Hyluss calling for Minister Lana Beniko. We have vital information that she will want to hear regarding Darth Marr and the former agent known as Cipher 9. Do not keep us waiting."
"Minister Beniko is currently in a meeting, perhaps I can….."
"No, you cannot. Interrupt her meeting or she will have your head. We doubt she will have much patience once she hears what we have to say."
"Y-yes sir. She will be with you shortly."
Vector began to pace, he was impatient to get back to their previous position to search for Rey'elle. That objective alone was paramount in his mind and nothing else mattered.
Raina Temple's voice came from the cockpit. "Vector, I am going to take us in to Salis D'aar spaceport for refueling. There was no time at Darth Marr's destroyer."
"We refuel, then we leave. How are supplies?"
"Sufficient for a while, perhaps six weeks or so."
"You know what to do, Temple."
At last, the image of a woman with shoulder length blond hair wearing a uniform of sorts but with a cape appeared. Vector stopped pacing and stood in front of the image, with his hands locked behind his back. His face was unreadable.
"Ambassador Hyluss, I understand you have some data for me? Important enough to pull me out of a meeting, no less. Well, let's have it."
"Just Vector will do, Minister. We have come to tell you of the destruction of Darth Marr's flagship and we presume all are dead except those that could get away in escape pods. We also assume the worst, that Darth Marr and the previous agent known as Cipher 9 are among the dead."
"And when did this happen, exactly?"
"A little over two days ago. We can send the coordinates if you like."
Beniko turned her head to give an order, presumably to an underling, before addressing Vector again.
"I felt nothing to substantiate this, Vector. The death of such a powerful sith as Darth Marr would surely have made an announcement through the force, and no one on the council has reported any such ripple either. Are you quite sure of your facts?"
He narrowed his eyes as he responded. "Minister Beniko, we do not entertain falsehoods nor fabrications. We, as well as the remainder of this crew, witnessed this first hand. A fleet of hundreds, perhaps thousands of ships came out of hyperspace almost on top of us.
"They opened fire immediately, not even giving the courtesy of a hail. The configuration of the ships matches those reported bombarding the empire's remote outposts and then Korriban. Whoever they are, Minister, they are coming, and hell is coming with them."
The minister turned her head again, then back to Vector. "We are unable to raise the Agrona so this may bear looking into. Darth Marr was traveling with a small group of ships to the rendezvous point in wild space, do you think any of them made it?"
"When we arrived, we saw perhaps eight ships, including Darth Marr's. There were a couple of Republic Thrantas, a couple of Imperial Gages and maybe three assault transports. We doubt any survived, and since you have not received word from anyone but us, that would prove our analysis correct."
"You and the remainder of your crew will return to Dromund Kaas, of course, for debrief and reassignment. You have a varied crew of useful skills and we may have need of your ambassadorial talents if what you say is true."
"We have not worn the mantle of ambassador for a very long time and we doubt that we still have the finesse required, therefore, we will return to the sight of the explosion and continue our search."
Benikos voice hardened as she spoke. "Your first priority is the empire."
Vector's voice left nothing to misinterpretation. "With all due respect, minister, our first priority is Rey'elle."
"You will comply with the empire's wishes and best interests, Vector."
"Again we decline, but do feel free to try and hunt us down, if you have the time and the resources. We highly doubt you will have either to squander. And, if we were you, we would put any nearby transports on alert to monitor for homing beacons from those escape pod death traps. We will send the coordinates. Vector out."