"Look, if it isn't me, it'll just be someone else."

"Oh yeah, yeah, 'nothing personal,' right?"

"Don't flatter yourself, Okami. I never do personal."

"But I do."

Ahsoka waited till he'd spied her in the rafters before dropping down onto the table. No point startling him into a shootout. "And I'd really rather this not be you."

Boba Fett had gone from bored to cagey to outraged in the span of three seconds, but only someone who knew his face as well as she did would've noticed. He'd removed his helmet early in the proceedings, unmasking around this mechanic with a nonchalance Ahsoka found … interesting.

When he finally dropped the blaster from Nyx's chest, he wouldn't even huff in her general direction, scowling at a distant corner of the garage.

"And what's it to you? They kick you down here to become some kind of anti-bounty vigilante?"

"No," she said, crossing her arms, "this is just a coincidence of galactic proportions—but I never have liked you in this line of work."

"What, trying to make a living?"

"Profiting off the misfortune of others."

Constitutionally unable to keep his trap shut for one karkin' minute, Nyx ventured to butt in. "Profit? He rarely breaks even. You wanna know why that couch smells? Well, you're looking at him."

At that, Boba retrained the blaster on Nyx and Ahsoka rolled her eyes. She toyed briefly with the idea of relinquishing the idiot and appropriating this poorly-run establishment. "Teenaged cockiness" had a distinctive vibe in the Force and as two male brands of it harassed her senses, she was reminded of Lux—and why she always regretted "taking a break" with Rex.

Was this a hiatus? Or mutual desertion? She was doing her level best not to think about it by making one reckless—kriff, she couldn't hear that word in any voice but Obi-Wan's—decision after another.

"Stow it, Nyx," she said, dropping her eyes from Boba, finding she didn't really want to meet his gaze either. He'd buzzed off the long, non-regulation mop, and now all her homesickness saw was a grumpy cadet Rex. She fished in her pockets for the remainder of the stipend Obi-Wan had pooled together. "What's the price on his head?"

"More than you can pay, Jedi."

"I'm not a Jedi anymore," Ahsoka replied with more conviction than she really felt, fingers brushing against all of four, maybe five, credit chips. New clothes were expensive, and that used speeder even more so. She had no sabers nor blasters and was reluctant to use the Force … extracurricularly. And being half-sloshed never helped.

It was looking like she really would have to surrender Nyx. This kid wasn't just Mando, he was pure Fett, well-armed and with a disposition like a crabbed, half-starved anooba—his sunken cheeks said he probably was half-starved, and that meant money talked a little louder than usual.

She was hungry, too. And curious. She wanted to know how this would sit with her.

"I'm … uh, more of a freelancer these days. Need a second for a job?"

Boba gawped at her like she'd just proposed a date, a snog, marriage, or all three—and maybe in whatever mercenary subculture he operated in, she had. It wouldn't be the first social blunder of her week down under.

"What would I do with a Jed—" he spat, before he stopped short and gave a few vacant blinks that deepened into contemplation of something unsaid.

Quelling whatever objections he had to a partner—let alone a Temple brat—seemed the matter of a moment. Boba holstered his blaster and reached around Nyx to grab his helmet. "It's your lucky day, Okami—well, hour maybe. Pintu's price will make you popular."

Now it was Nyx's turn to look offended. At whom, it was initially hard to say.

"You're just going to leave?" he scoffed, the incredulous rise of his brow exaggerated as he craned his head up at her. "With this kid?"

Ahsoka tried never to be cruel, but she found presumption, however cute, particularly irksome. That couch did smell, but he'd been awfully slow to shove off it the past couple nights.

"Uh, yeah." She hopped off the table and strolled over to her speeder, the repairs for which were now arguably settled, and more conveniently than she might've imagined. "It's been fun, Nyx. Thanks for all your help. And best of luck with the dianoga larvae—I will literally never unsee that."

She slung a leg over her bike, revved the engine, gave a two-fingered salute, and made to zoom off into the sunset—only Boba was suddenly in her path, grabbing the handlebar and motioning contemptuously for her to scoot back.

"Not so fast, Tano."

"Ugh, really?"

"Thought you volunteered for a job—or do you want to do us both a favor, mindfuck Okami for me and we split the bounty?"

"No. But can't I drive my own speeder?"

"You're working for me. I drive."

Ahsoka suddenly recalled the murderous baby face that was frogmarched into Coruscant's maximum security prison. "Wait. Are you even legal?"

There were a hundred and one things about Boba Fett that almost certainly were not legal—his very creation had been proscribed under Republic law and she didn't remember him being released from said prison—but somehow he could in fact produce a valid Republic Class-3 speeder permit. The existence of "Jeks Froxum" was probably a forgery, but that permit was not, and any fight she had left was melting under the lingering influence of whatever Nyx had distilled in that repurposed fuel pod.

Actually, letting the thirteen-year-old drive was probably for the best.

"Fine." She shoved back from the pedals and allowed him to swing up in front.

Something about the movement swept his signature like a wave across her mind. While none of the men had ever felt the same to her, she was suddenly face first in Rex's shadow, but gripping someone half his size, shooting out of a stale garage and up the vertical portal at a hundred klicks an hour.

And it was disorienting as hell.

Once they levelled off in some surface channel, Ashoka dropped her forehead against the hard nape of Boba's neck. She willed the air roaring over her montrals to drown her restless mind in a way that shitty alcohol clearly couldn't. Turning off the Force was impossible—fuck how she'd tried this past week—but she'd settle for tuning out her inner turmoil, until the tide of her new unanchored life threw her up against the next fresh distraction.

Which, apparently, was bounty hunting with a known Republic outlaw?

With a start, she realized just what she might have committed herself to. "Hey. Hey!" she shouted over the passing wind as she gave Boba's helmet a few thumps. "Pull over!"

He surprised her by complying, drifting below three opposing lanes of vehicular madness with a skill that said even if he hadn't had a permit, she shouldn't have doubted his driving. As he brought them to hover against a building, he inclined his helmet over his shoulder in irritated silence.

"This job—I won't … hurt anyone. Or use the Force. I'm just a second set of clean hands, okay?"

She held them up at her sides as if to demonstrate the limited extent of what she brought to the table. More than he'd ever get for free, less than he'd probably need.

"Relax. You might actually enjoy it," he said, before slipping back back into the ineffable stream of Coruscant's traffic.

He seemed confident in his brevity—and he didn't try to dump her off the back of the speeder. So Ahsoka relaxed. Rex's shadow was still there and, Force help her, she sank into it.

She shouldn't have allowed herself the lapse.

Wallowing in even the shade of him was enough to recall the events of last week. They ascended in her mind like those ominous larties in the rain, frightening a hundred blissful memories into the shadows and illuminating, in sharp relief, the agonizing truth she couldn't quite square.

Her Captain had chased her, pistols in hand, just like the rest of 'em.

She'd jumped. He'd watched.

And when she'd come to in that cold red cell, alone and miserable, the redolence of him clung to her shoulders. Like he'd carried and abandoned her there himself.

A sickening cocktail of fury, dread, and deserter's guilt congealed in her stomach, compounding the offence of day drinking, and she had to turn her face into the wind, inhaling deeply, willing herself not to vomit.

And trying not to wonder what Rex would say if he saw her now, zipping around town tailgun with Boba fucking Fett.

("That brat? Look, we're all fond of Jango, naturally, with his karked-up sense of honor and gett'se. And yeah, descending among the cadets now and then like some kind of little god wouldn't have been so insulting if he had one honorable bone in his unaccelerated body. Vod'kyramud."

"He didn't want to kill any of them. That was all Sing."

"Doesn't matter. Vod'kyramud.")

Ahsoka blinked her eyes open, mindlessly absorbing the collective blur of speeders and skyscrapers in the hazy dusk. A vista opened up, and in the distance she saw a column of cruisers and carriers, ascending and descending, as if on strings tied to the twin spires of Republic HQ, sitting squat and immutable below.

She might not have to wonder what Rex would think. She knew this quarter.

Clone Zone.

In fact, it looked like they were making a beeline for a certain club. She lifted her head to glance over Boba's other shoulder. Once she could make out unit distinctions among the troopers milling about on the landing pad, she really panicked.

"No no no—turn around! We can't go to 79's!" Ahsoka squealed, furiously smacking Boba's hand and throwing her weight backwards, as if to physically halt the speeder, and on the verge of using the Force itself.

"Wayii! Chill out! We're not going to 79's."

"Then pick some other route!"

Whether he was complying again, or simply continuing his original trajectory, she didn't know, but Boba angled the speeder sharply down. He brought them to land in a snub little alleyway some levels below 79's. It was grody, dimly lit, and decorated with the usual detritus of an overlooked stratum. Boba walked a little ways ahead and paused next to a nondescript door beneath a dead neon sign. Ahsoka couldn't see a handle. Wherever they were going, it wasn't through front door. She supposed Boba wasn't really a front-door kind of person and wondered if that was now her fate, too. While he murmured into a comm unit on the wall, her montrals picked up the the low, rhythmic reverberation of house music. There was a barely audible click and Boba pushed the door open, the vibrations inside temporarily deafening her as she acclimated to the club thrum.

Immediately before them, bathed in magenta light, was a long elliptical bar. At first, it seemed that was all there was—a bar, devoid of patrons at this relatively early hour. But it became clear that the club extended beyond the other side, opening up into a interior pulsing with colored lights and unclothed limbs.

A Zeltron may have intercepted them, beckoning Boba to follow her, but Ahsoka was really too distracted to notice.

Establishments like this, she well knew, were interwoven into the galaxy's infrastructure—Coruscant's upper levels were literally and figuratively speaking, underpinned by what went on here. She'd caught glimpses of shielded holos. Hells, she possessed a few of her own, more compact, and therefore more easily concealed, than the naughty holonovels her Ma— … Anakin had once been in the habit of confiscating. And she suspected nothing occurred here that she and Rex (and some other guys … once or twice) hadn't tried in the receptive headspace of a post-battle comedown.

But something about … the audience. The shameless display with strangers. It was if all the lust generated in 79's dripped down here and was shaken, not stirred, with a measure of abandoned hedonism and poured into a synth-crystal glass. She didn't know if Rex would have loved it, or if the silly pleasure he took in a public polish was limited to his brothers.

Speaking of, that dude they just passed with his face buried in a Mikkian's breasts was definitely a clone. Boba took the opportunity to swipe his bowl of nuts and his neglected drink, something dark and neat and definitely overproof by the smell of it.

The Zeltron opened a door and gestured them into a small room. It had sheet of one-way permaglass that looked out into the club, perhaps catering to those who were particular in their voyeurism, or those who preferred a clandestine business meeting with a view. Ahsoka recalled all the times she'd crashed shady tête-a-têtes like the one they were having now. Boba collapsed onto the black lethris sofa, removing his helmet and casually resting his boot on his knee, looking very much at home, while she perched herself on the opposite end and tried not to stare at the denizens and dancers.

"Umm," she began, slowly tearing her eyes away from a topless Togruta she'd spotted. "What were you doing here?"

Boba shrugged. "I didn't know it was a sex club. I just thought they served mussels." He mumbled something into his drink about "a misunderstanding."

She didn't get the chance to press the matter before the door cracked open and the Misunderstanding craned her head inside, dangling a fiery red lek that was probably as long as Ahsoka was tall.

The Twi'lek was familiar in a way Ahsoka couldn't quite place until she opened her mouth, greeting Boba with a skeptical "You're back." It was just enough for her to glimpse two rows of filed teeth, and Ahsoka realized she was looking upon a minor 501st celebrity.

The Ruby Rancor. Ahsoka had seen her baring her thighs in homemade pin-up posters around the barracks, and baring her fangs on the nose of one or two gunships in various companies. She was imposing and maybe a little scary, if Ahsoka was in the habit of being intimidated by anybody. Her long face was tempered by delicately set grey eyes and a nicely proportioned mouth, and she was actually very pretty, though she probably didn't stare at many ceilings.

"If that job's still free, we'll take it," Boba began. "You'll have to run it by her first. And I take half upfront."

Ruby eased into the room, keeping her head dipped beneath the frame and only straightening up to her immense height once inside. She hung back by the door, worrying her sharp nails together as she glanced between the two teenagers.

Boba elaborated, indicating to Ahsoka with his empty glass. "She's ex-Jedi. Demobbed five-oh-first."

"Karkin' hell, Fett, can you not—"

Ruby's grey eyes grew the size of remote droids, and she was on Ahsoka like a bolt, planting herself on the sofa between them. "You're the fugitive. You broke out of the Republic prison."

Honestly, did no one get the news down here? Sure, she and Nyx had spent the better part of Day Two deactivating (vandalizing) her obsolete wanted holos across a ten-klick radius, but she was cleared and could've sworn that trial had been broadcast.

It was now Day Seven and Ahsoka Tano was done explaining herself.

"What's it to you, Ruby?"

Ahsoka hadn't meant to let the moniker slip out—was that a name she'd chosen? She felt her lekku darken with shame as Ruby arched her severe brow.

After a tense moment, Ruby simply replied, "It's relevant," not bothering, or perhaps not deigning, to correct her.

Ahsoka crossed her arms and dropped back into the sofa, trying to address the suspiciously silent Boba past the broad Twi'lek in the way. "What kind of gig is this? And why does it require a job interview?"

Ruby answered for him. "You're not collecting a head on a plate, you're rescuing an inmate."

Rescuing an inmate. That was a nice euphemism for something that could stain Ahsoka's cleared record like a gutted Quarren.

"What?!"

Ruby sighed and jerked her thumb over her shoulder. "Did he just drag you in off the block?" she asked, her eyes narrowing. "You weren't down here looking for a different kind of job, were you?"

It was all Ahsoka could do not to laugh. But … she was technically homeless and no stranger to exploiting base desires for strategic, if not for monetary, gain. Ruby could be forgiven for the assumption, especially in this economy.

"No," said Ahsoka, firmly.

"Good, because they have a shitty ex-offender policy here, fresh little Tog or no."

Boba leaned forward "The only job she's after is the one she owes me. So I'd appreciate it if you cut the phobium and briefed her."

Ruby twisted in her seat to look at Boba, one of her absurdly long lekku smacking Ahsoka's shoulder. "And why are you suddenly so keen, dollface?"

Boba tumbled his glass in his hands with that same fidgety dexterity many clones shared. "Found a Jedi jailbird," he mumbled without looking up.

Ruby eyed Ahsoka again. "Seems strangely convenient." After a further pause, she shoved a hand down her brassiere and pulled out three identical keycards, each subtly stamped with the insignia of the Coruscant Guard. "But as your people say, the Force works in mysterious ways."

She held them out before Ahsoka like they were a hand she definitely wanted to play. "A trooper from the five-oh-first is being held in the Republic Military Detention Center. I'll pay you handsomely to extract him."

The galaxy suddenly felt ten sizes too small. Not just any prison then, but the very durasteel dungeon where her life had gone sideways—worse than sideways. Where it fucking imploded. That was the most distressing part of Ruby's statement, but Ahsoka's first voiced thought was, "Who?"

The frost in Ruby's grey eyes had long since chilled her pretty features into something wholly unforgiving. "And what's it to you, deserter?"

If the Twi'lek had actually bitten her, it would've hurt less. As it was, her words dripped with contempt, and Ahsoka's spirit was threadbare enough that the sting soaked straight through. She was too stunned to be angry, but it was Fett who mediated. In his own way.

"His pet name is meaningless in prison," he said decidedly. "It's the designation—the number—that counts. You have that, right?"

Ruby settled back into the sofa, draping her thick lekku across the top. She nodded, her gaze somewhere beyond the piece of bland cityscape art tacked to the opposite wall. "CT-5383."

She glanced at Ahsoka, as if to gauge her reaction.

"I don't deal in numbers," Ahsoka bit back. "Just names."

"Dogma."