Weighting the odds
Summary: At one point, Shada has taken over completely. His bridge, his crew, his organization. His life. OneShot.
Warnings: none.
Set: fifteen years after "Specter of the Past/Vision of the Future" by Timothy Zahn, around the beginning of "Fate of the Jedi"
Disclaimer: I don't own Star Wars. I'd be fine with just owning Luke and Mara…
At one point, Shada has taken over.
Taken over completely.
Talon Karrde can't even say when it happened. That time when he took her on his search for Jori Car'das? When she became his self-proclaimed bodyguard? When she became his friend? When they officially started cooperating with the New Republic and the Imperial Remnant? After the Galactic Alliance had been formed?
He couldn't say.
The change almost has slipped by him unnoticed. But he's not the most powerful information broker of the Core Worlds and the Outer Rim for nothing.
He notices.
She is there whenever he steps onto the bridge of the Wild Karrde. Nobody wonders about it anymore. Neither Dankin nor H'shishi nor Odonnl say anything when she hovers in the background, commenting and advising carefully and sometimes sharply. At some point, she has begun to give out orders, just as he does. Seal the hatches and let's get going. Please do the sensor-check and report back. She asks the questions he's supposed to ask. Have you checked the sub-light engines? Anything suspicious? She knows the people by heart, just as he does, and she feels the mood shift on his bridge the way only a captain feels.
Not enough that she has taken over his bridge.
She is wherever he goes. She claims she's his bodyguard, even though he can't remember having her hired as one. Indeed, he hasn't, he has witnesses. But Shada ignores him. She walks through the doors first, she makes sure he always carries a blaster, she sends people into bars he's going to visit as a part of his business meetings to check out the place. She searches the landing gliders for hidden microphones and other threats. She continues to work in the background, making sure he is safe no matter where he goes, no matter what the threat is. She's always there.
She has taken over his schedule.
She never tries to tell him what to do. That would be too obvious, and Shada isn't an obvious person. She gives him hints, every now and then, and whenever she doesn't approve of an arrangement he has prepared she finds a way to show him. With her, loyalty and truthfulness suddenly don't seem like an all too ancient concept anymore. In her subtle ways, she interferes with his business contracts, his partners and his ways of information brokerage. It's almost scary, the way she has even taken over his beliefs.
Karrde watches her closely: her expressive face, her golden hair, her lean body. Her grey eyes never stand still. Her hands don't, either. She is always on guard, always watchful and prepared to kill whatever threat might jump out of the shadows, be it a cadre of Noghri or a mad Dark Jedi. She's shown him often enough she would die for him and he can't understand why. He never asked for her services as a Mistryl, he never promised her anything in exchange for her protection.
But he knows what she thinks, at least that much is sure.
He is just the person that was there when she needed to transfer her loyalty.
He was there when she was searching for some place to go, he was there when she wanted to help but was pushed aside roughly. He was there when she was hunted down, and for him, she was important. He had only wanted her to come along to find Jori Car'das, because Car'das most likely wouldn't have killed her if he decided to kill Karrde. Somehow, they both survived, and they survived the Camaas-affair and the attack of the Yuuzhan Vong and the rise of another Sith lord, and they're both still alive. His once grey-and-black hair is entirely white now and there are a few silver streaks in her blond locks but she still moves with the silent, deathly grace he has gotten to know so well.
Karrde watches her sleep and wonders why this woman is still at his side, even after so many years. He doesn't need a bodyguard anymore. He doesn't need protection, he doesn't need loyalty and she doesn't need to give her loyalty to anyone anymore. But still, both of them are here. And still, Shada occupies his mind entirely.
She has taken over his life.
"Talon?" A sleepy voice asks and Shada blinks at him. Her hair is messy and her face is tired, but she is alert. "Is everything okay?"
There she is, back in bodyguard mode.
"Everything is fine," he assures her and smiles. "I just can't sleep, that's all."
She sits up in the bed and blinks away the last remnants of sleep.
"We're leaving early tomorrow. You should get some sleep."
"I know." He sighs quietly. "I'm just thinking a few things over. Don't worry. Go back to sleep again."
Now she's fully awake. "What's on your mind?"
"Many things," he tells her truthfully. She grimaces.
"Trust to ask a smuggler a direct question and get such an answer."
He smiles at her.
"Old habits die hard."
"That's what I've heard."
She stands up and steps besides him. Since he's occupying the chair, she sits down on the window sill, declining his offer to get up so she can sit. For a while, they both just sit there.
"You know, you might as well just ask," she finally tells him. Karrde stares at her.
"What do you mean?"
"I mean the question that has been going around in your head since we returned from Belsavis."
"Was it so obvious?" He asks and it's his turn to grimace. Shada smiles, a genuine smile that lights up the dark room.
"I have gotten to know you quite well over the last fifteen years."
"Has it been such a long time?"
"Obviously, it has."
Again, he sighs.
"I guess. We don't grow younger."
"That's right. So you might as well ask."
"I don't know what you're going to answer."
"That's the risk you take when asking. I fear I can't promise I'll respond the way you expect me to do."
He looks at her sharply.
"That doesn't sound very promising."
Now, Shada sighs.
"Karrde. Get it out and just ask."
He probably should be more self-conscious about it, but he's sixty-five and as they've just said, nobody grows younger. He has had enough pomp and ceremony in his life.
"Shada D'ukal," he asks her, with something in between a sigh and a smile.
"Will you marry me?"
"Finally," she breathes. "Now why do you think I'm going to answer the way you expect me to?"
"Well, weighting the odds – and I've been doing so for quite a time – I'm pretty sure you're going to tell me I'm too old. Or at least that we're both too old to get married. And you'll probably remind me that the downfall of every good smuggler was the day when he settled down. And you could tell me that you've already spent enough of your lifetime with smugglers and you don't want to waste more time on me, since I'm not a respectable man and such…"
"Wait," she interrupts him. "Don't you think I'd have left long ago if I'd thought I was wasting my time?"
He merely shrugs.
"And about that downfall-thing – I think Solo and Calrissian have done quite well for themselves. And they were much younger than you are…"
"Ah," he says darkly. "There comes the age-issue."
"I'm not exactly twenty anymore, either. What makes you think I'll care about how old you are? I've spent fifteen years with you, seven of them as your… Call it whatever you like."
"Undoubtedly. But still…"
"But still you don't believe I'd answer the way you want me to."
"Well, in a way, you haven't."
"What do you want me to say?"
He shrugs.
"I think you know the answer well by yourself."
"You expect me to say no? Or do you want me to say no?"
"I expect… Damn, I don't know what I expect you to say. I just know I want you to say yes! I wouldn't have asked otherwise!"
"So you're not going to have a heart-attack if I do say yes?"
"Definitively not."
"So then, it should be safe to say yes. Yes, Talon Karrde, I, Shada D'ukal, will marry you. Happy?"
He takes her hand and kisses it, with the courteously polite style she loves so much.
"You can't imagine how happy, my love."
She slips from the window sill into his embrace, a smile on her face that is even more beautiful than the sight of the rising sun outside their window.
"Oh, I believe I can".