This chapter contains no spoilers for the Force Awakens. TW: Suicide mention.
Chunks of metal clinked against each other as an eager hand searched amongst their midst for anything that looked of value. The dusty interior of the sinking hut was littered with so many trinkets and belongings that it would take another twenty people to go through all of it before nightfall. There was neither the time nor the men to accomplish that, however, so one anxious individual was sanctioned per household to empty out the valuables to the best of their abilities.
A shrimpy, disenchanted woman that was searching the aforementioned hut whistled a jolly tune, stuffing shiny objects into a burlap sack with the vigor of a toddler and the carelessness of a corpse. Distantly, she could hear the hushed, though excited, voices of younger ones, exuberant to be partaking in their first pillage. This was far from the female's first raid, though she'd been sanctioned to corral the young ones when it was time to run like mad. It wasn't a responsibility that she begrudged, however, and thusly the woman was content to stroll about the township and get her greedy hands on anything that called her name.
As the woman was finishing her sweep of the home, a shrill tone broke the comfortable atmosphere that she'd easily grown accustomed to. Flinching inwardly at the noise, she turned towards the door, her gaze meeting the small stature of a boy about nine years old. Her initial negative reaction to the interruption was quickly broken apart by the jovial nature she'd been gifted with, and a crooked smile cracked across her face. She spoke low, her own voice croaky and rolling like the rivers on Belkadan, as she asked, "What was that, kiddo?"
The toothy young male scowled at the endearment she'd tagged him with, clearly disgruntled at having been referred to as anything but a full-grown male. "Don't call me kiddo, Gin, I'm old now - I'm allowed on raids!" He asserted, his small bag of newly-obtained belongings swishing with the intensity that he spoke with.
Gin rolled her eyes, sighing heavily at his energy. It was an absolute marvel that the general population wasn't trying to siphon the enthusiasm out of the younglings - they were practically a renewable resource at this point, given that they've had enough glucose. "If you're old - I must be the most ancient person you've ever met!" She challenged, tying off the sack of stolen items she herself had collected before meandering out of the hut with the boy in tow.
"You are the most ancient person I've ever met," He snorted, angling himself away from Gin to show his disgust.
She ignored his retort, knowing full well that there were countless numbers of people older than her that the both of them were more than well-acquainted with. The young woman also knew that silence was much more bothersome to children that insults and threats were. The boy was quietly boiling at the unspoken battle between them.
The pair's feet crunched against the damp leaves beneath them, the soil seeming to give way with every step. It had been a very rainy on this planet as of recent, if the mud was any indication of that, and the already uncoordinated younger male was having trouble keeping his footing. Gin would grab a hold of his jacket whenever he seemed close to falling, which was often. After several instances of this, the boy grabbed a hold of her jacket, deciding that it was easier for the both of them if he simply complied. The woman snickered at his sullen expression as they traipsed around the village together.
"What have you found so far, Nate?" She inquired, haphazardly shoving bushels of fruit into an extra sack she'd brought with her in case she found anything she'd like to keep - and of course, food was her main priority in any given situation. It wasn't that they were starving, however. Gin just liked to eat. It was less of a need and more of a hobby for her, and she'd likely do enough pillaging in a day to make up for whatever weight she'd otherwise gain. That didn't mean she lacked any real body fat - it just meant she wasn't six-hundred pounds. The young woman began munching with gusto on foreign fruit that she didn't have the patience to examine before consuming.
Nathan, mimicking his elder, and much more aloof, conversation partner, grabbed a smooth-looking vegetable from a different food stand and chewed idly on it between the words of his next reply, "I don't know, but it all looks really cool!" The vegetable being forgotten as soon as it was found, he started yanking objects out of his pack to show to Gin, a look of pride on his face.
The woman listened amicably to his rather boring tales of his first raid, and looked with feigned interest on the items he proffered to her, but was inwardly aching to return to their ship and take a well-deserved nap for the next several hours.
"- And I found this blaster! I don't know if it works, but it's awesome!" Nate pulled a decent-sized, black-colored blaster out of nowhere, pointing it excitedly in every direction he could possibly manage.
Gin choked at the sight of the gun, quickly snatching it from the boy's inexperienced and potentially volatile fingers. She scanned the weapon with a frantic gaze, her forehead wrinkling with concern as the young boy shrieked at his new find being stolen from him. The protests of her juvenile friend were completely blocked out as an unconsolable stream of anxious thoughts spewed from the crevices of her head.
Eyes wide and mouth dry, she grasped Nate's shoulders firmly, looking him directly in the eyes. "Where the hell did you find this, Nathan?" She asked, her voice becoming a hiss with the tension in her jaw.
His superior's sudden seriousness frightened the boy a little, and he shrunk backwards, not wanting to meet her gaze. He didn't answer.
"Nathan, it's not your fault. You aren't in trouble - but," Gin stopped, showing the male the gun that he'd obtained, "This blaster is not old. It is not broken, and it does not belong to anyone that lives on this planet." She perspired against her own worry, her fingers beginning to tremble.
This was meant to be a simple little raid - something for the younger generation to take on that would earn them some experience and make them feel more capable. The inhabitants of the village weren't even around. They'd all taken a trip to a distant shrine for the annual worship of whatever deity they subscribed to. The calculating gaggle of thieves had made sure of that, and had searched the area beforehand to be absolutely sure of the children's safety. This blaster was not from this planet, and was recently used, if the smell of smoke from the barrel was any evidence to that fact.
Just when she thought he would never speak up, Nate pointed off into the distance where he'd originally came from, and Gin grabbed his hand tightly as they made their way to the blaster's point of origin.
They wouldn't get very far before realizing that it was a little late to be investigating the strange occurrences around the thickly wooded area.
A nearby explosion caused the pair to be knocked to the side, Gin instinctively wrapping herself around her young friend to protect him from harm. The back of her skull connected with the tabletop of a nearby trading post, effectively knocking her out for the next several moments. Nathan's hysterical screaming was the thing that brought her back to consciousness, like a strange, personal blend of smelling salts that awakened in her a need to protect and serve those who needed her most. She ground her teeth at the pain her maternal instincts were giving her, her legs swaying beneath her body and her head swimming as she tried to stand and take stock of the situation.
Her eyes focused on the boy's face first, her clammy hands cupping his cheeks as she tried to stabilize herself. His eyes were wide, urgent, terrified. She noticed his lip was split and his temples appeared to be bleeding. Upon further investigation, it was her palms that had were bleeding - skinned and torn from the impact of fall. Upon further investigation, Gin realized that Nathan was screaming words at her that sounded like nothing but sirens in her concussed eardrums.
The blaster he'd found was clutched in his hands. He pressed it to her chest with desperate need - a desperate need for her to be the hero that he so desired. She was no such hero, however, and ignored his frantic attempts to communicate with her, dragging him hastily along the sidelines of the attack, simply sticking the now-damaged gun into her jacket pocket.
The horrifically familiar sight of a white bucket helmet was what jarred her back into functionality, stopping her feet from moving forward. Her hazy vision cleared, and the adrenaline pushed past the ringing in her ears. The woman swallowed the bile that had begun to build in her throat, turning to her young friend with a look of determination, of necessitation. There were children in this village. Her children - regardless of the lack of biological affiliation. She was going to get every last one of them home.
"Stay calm, Nate," Gin ordered, clasping his hand firmly. She gazed deep into his troubled expression, trying her best not to burst into hysterics. This was never what she wanted for herself, for the people around her. "You're my second in command now. I need you to help me get the rest of the kids to safety. Can you do that?" Screams echoed all around her. She couldn't be wasting time trying to keep Nathan from a panic attack, but he'd only endanger himself and his friends if he didn't keep himself marginally centered.
The boy, clearly not understanding the real danger in the situation, just nodded frantically at her command, and took a deep breath inwards.
Gin answered the first cry for help that reached her, diving into a crumbling hut to pull a panicking child from under a dinner table. Nate grasped the hand of the other child, taking his superior's order straight to heart. They ran across the village, avoiding the sights of their attackers to the best of their abilities. Three other adults among the thieves gathered what children they could find as well, bringing them to a cavity deep in the forest where they awaited rescue.
A quick head count revealed that they had only retrieved seventeen of the thirty-two children who had been brought to the village to take part in their first raid. The four adults looked at eachother with grave expressions on their faces - eyes hollow, lips flat. They'd seen the carnage. They'd seen the explosions, the laser-fire, the blood. Gin herself had found several dead bodies, missing limbs, heads - things that she could barely hide from the children that were still intact. The emotions within her were so intense that she even couldn't register anything but the shaking in her hands. She couldn't register details. She couldn't register sounds, sights, situations.
The only thing she knew was that her charges - her children - had been killed. Some of her peers were killed, some of her favorite people were killed, some of her loved ones. Some were still in the process of dying, too - and if she didn't go back in, they'd die with everyone else.
"The rescue ship is on its way. You all stay here," Gin spouted, her head so full of pain and confusion that she couldn't even find her own common sense, "I'm going back in."
Immediately, another woman just breaths younger than her cut in, "You absolutely cannot go in there. You will not come back out." This assertive female spoke firmly, astutely - prophetically. There was really no arguing with her, that is, unless you were Ginovae.
Gin's voice trembled with rage, with fear as she hissed out her next words, "If I don't go back in there, no one else will come out." She didn't wait to hear more protests, more opinions, more orders. The faces of subordinates - of friends - flashed through her head, some living, some dead. Fifteen lost children. Fifteen lost children. Fifteen lost children. Fifteen.
As she stumbled back into the chaos, her eyes boiled over with tears. Gin had returned just in time to watch six kids - barely ten years old - get pushed to their knees and ruthlessly shot from behind. She puked onto the dirt below as she searched for anyone, anyone left to save. Bile dribbled down her chin, mixing with tears and saliva that seemed to be continually leaking from her extremities.
She would only find one more child. Just one. A young girl stuck knee-deep in a thick layer of unrelenting, sticky mud. The elder female wasted no time in going to her side, trying in vain to tug her from the ground. Muffled, electronic-sounding voices grew closer and closer to the pair.
"Please, please, please save me," The girl whimpered hysterically, trying to keep her voice as low as possible. Sobs wracked silently through her small body as her struggles only got her more encased in the muck. Gin pulled and pulled on the girl's torso, on her arms, her own hysteria growing with every second.
It was like she was the only one there - the young girl completely ignored, despite being the sole focus of the situation at hand. Only Ginovae's own thoughts were heard, were valued. She cursed to herself repeatedly, wildly, losing whatever semblance of sanity she had left to spare. There was simply no leverage in trying to save the girl from the dry, stable ground that she herself was standing on.
Footsteps crept closer to the two, and Gin's urgency increased ten-fold. She stepped directly into the mud pit, using her last bout of adrenaline, of energy, to drag the child from the murky depths. Joints creaked beneath the skin with the effort used to save her, the woman's muscles screaming in protest. The legs of the larger female sank in the process, the youngling only adding to the weight on her own end. Soon she herself was thigh-deep in mud, and shiny white suits could be seen just yards away from them, hidden only slightly by the densely-packed trees.
"Get the hell out of here," Gin whispered forcefully to the girl, her voice seeming too loud for the tone she was really trying to use. Her voice broke at the end of her sentence, more tears welling up in her eye sockets. They boiled deep beneath her skin, up her cheeks and into her sinuses. The young girl choked back another sob as she took one last, mournful look at her superior and dove into the forest, where she hoped to find safety.
And the young woman was alone again, this time for good. At least, that's what she felt inside. However, a large group of stormtroopers had advanced upon her location from behind, and she could only anticipate their actions. She held her hands at her side, just slightly elevated with the tension in her arms. Gin waited for death. She waited for it with a deranged sort-of peace, her eyelids shut softly and her prayers said silently.
The static mumbles of transmitters could be heard from the helmets of the monsters that lay South of her, a conversation occurring that she couldn't quite make out, as if she was even trying. She did, however, hear the outcome.
"We are taking the woman into custody," One of the stormtroopers announced, relaying the orders he'd been given from his commander. Two of the masked individuals flanked Gin from the sides, moving to pull her from the ground and take her to God-knows-where.
In a last-ditch effort to survive, however, Gin shouted with urgency, "Wait!"
And in their shock, the murderous soldiers stopped in their tracks, all waiting to see what had caused the insipid woman to think that she could tell them what to do. Slowly, steadily, she pulled the stolen blaster from her jacket pocket, eliciting violence from the troopers. They trained their guns on her, not afraid of her tiny weapon in comparison to their more powerful, ranged blasters.
"Where did you get that, woman? That blaster is issued only the First Order," One of the soldiers questioned, his metallic voice severe with an over-inflated sense of duty to an organization that meant nothing good to the world. At least, that's what Gin believed.
She did not reply to the question, eliciting further threats from the enemies, as she slowed raised the blaster further and further upwards. Her tongue flicked anxiously over her chapped lips as she held an internal debate with herself, an existential struggle - her final decision.
And without any further deliberation, she pressed the blaster to her temple, and pulled the trigger.
The gun would not fire, and Gin would not die in that mud pit, much to her horror. She screeched and fought all the way to the enemies' ships, her protests and wild, unrelenting grief being completely ignored by the figures around her. She would scream on the way into the ship, she would scream down the length of the sinister carrier, and would continue to scream when she was locked in a holding cell, until they held her down, and quietly sedated her.
Gin would remember few details of what happened that day, and remains content that she never recall the faces of her dead and dying children.
"You swear to build, we swear to come and burn it down, burn it down." - Brand New
Please leave a review if you enjoyed the story. I'm looking forward to writing this one. - Marina