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It wasn't supposed to be like this. They were to find Saw Gerrera's men, inform them of the need for a meeting, they would be escorted with urgent haste to the man himself and give him the message. Bodhi was not to be left with his ears ringing from a sudden sharp blow to the head, his hands were not to be tied, they were not to be dragged in the frigid desert forced at a pace they couldn't match surrounded on all sides by silent foreboding men with cruel hands pulling them along. From what Bodhi had told her, from the way his continued pleading fell on deaf ears, Eris didn't think this was the plan.
But what did she know, she'd never really had a plan before.
Whether it be the pitiful state the Empire had left her, or the revealing tattered labor clothes, a blanket had been wrapped around her and a firm hand had latched onto her arm pulling her alongside the bound pilot. Their gentleness to her was seen only by their unwillingness to tie her already cuff-bruised wrists, she was just as much a captive propelled at a pace she couldn't keep.
Her breathing was ragged, for some all they could hear was her wheezing as even her lungs fell behind. Every so often her quivering legs would give out and her knees would scrape the sand as she was literally dragged along. Compassion was shown in the uncaring fingers that fisted her hair pulling her back to her aching feet, where she would walk several steps and stumble again. Eris wondered, scalp burning, if by the end of this she'd have any hair left to pull.
After another useless attempt at an appeal Bodhi craned his neck to look over his shoulder at where Eris was marched behind him, the hooded man holding her had slowed only slightly to give her a reprieve. She looked worse than before, her skin taking on a sallow sickly shade as she shivered beneath a thin blanket, unable to tell if she was breathing or whining as she lost her footing. "Hey," he called seeing the scarved figure beside her grab her by the hair and hoist her back up. He lost his own ground when the men on either side of him gave a harsh jerk and he was thrown forward no longer able to see her.
After an interminable time their small unit slowed converging with another group of revolutionaries, these were soldiers with their cannons or bandoliers and detonator belts. And at the forefront darkly dressed was a Tognath; skull-like head, respirator fitted over half his face, and eyes that looked like empty sockets. "So you're-you're Saw Gerrera?" Bodhi asked. There was a snicker.
Eris sank to her knees at the long needed pause, her shoulder straining as her arm was held letting her rest for the moment being. Her head drooped low over her heaving chest, messy hair falling over her eyes. Bodhi was pleading again, worried and irritable, but still none listened. "Hey!" he cried as a hood was pulled over his head, catching on the goggles perched on his forehead, and then down over his mouth. "Hey-we're all on the same side, if you just see past the uniform for a minute."
Behind his panicked ramblings the Tognath nodded to the slumped small figure on the ground. "Is she with him?"
The man holding her arm shrugged yanking her up. The sharp movement had her heavy head falling back showing she'd fallen unconscious several moments before. Her face was made innocent by sleep, her perpetual scowl smoothed showing beneath her prematurely lined face her youth.
Rough hands lifted her from the ground, an arm cradled behind her knees, generosity shown by the blanket pulled over her face protecting her vulnerable skin from the harsh sun. Time passed unknown to her, long were the minutes she knew nothing, but the seconds were fleeting that her lashes dragged against the thin fabric as she blinked wondering where she was – wondering where Bodhi was, she couldn't hear his voice. But those moments left her as quickly as they'd come.
…
Awareness was forced on her as she was carelessly dropped to the hard dirt-packed ground, her knees striking the stone as a rude hand encircled her arm keeping her upright. The blanket was torn away and she looked from the orange sun baked clay to the dark clothed battle scarred soldiers and to the barren walls around them. Until her gaze fell upon a thin trembling figure to her right with a hood still pulled tight over his head. The small passing of air through her chapped lips at the sight of him was unknown to her, as was the rush of relief – she thought it was the warmth of the enclosed walls.
A rhythmic metal clanking echoed through the chamber, like a fired piston, like a heavy metal step. "Lies!" a hoarse, ghostly, voice bellowed. "Deceptions!" She ducked slightly as if to protect against the reverberation of fury in that terrible rasping voice. She saw first the crudely made leg and cane that scraped along the ground, then the tattered cloak dusting the dirt, looking up she recoiled at the sight of the dark armor over broad shoulders – at the familiarity of it though it was dusty and aged. This couldn't be the Republic, this man couldn't be on the side of good not when he looked so much the opposite. A half man. "Bodhi Rook. The cargo pilot. Local boy," he scoffed stepping closer. "Anything else?"
Eris realized something, as the Tognath relinquished the holochip taken from Bodhi: she had let herself be dragged across an endless desert to face a sight that would surely be her last for a boy she whose last name she hadn't known, whose home she hadn't realized they'd come to. He was a stranger to her. And yet, hunched and shaking beside her, she wanted to tuck him away and run from all this.
"I can hear you." His exclamation burst forth demanding attention. "You made your point. I'm scared, you made me scared, but he didn't capture me – I came here myself. I defected."
Under different circumstances his words might've made her smile, that regardless of the persistent nervousness in his tone he meant every word – his fear, his choice. He had such fragile bravery, she wanted to harbor it.
The half man didn't agree, couldn't see past the tell tale symbol on the boy's shirt. "Lies," he proclaimed again. "Every day, more lies."
"Lies?" Bodhi repeat, his voice raised nearly to a scream. It drew Eris' surprised gaze at the strength his meek voice was capable. "Would I risk everything for a lie? We don't have time for this. I have to speak to Saw Gerrera before it's too-"
Eris watched as the sack was yanked from his head wondering if his once sweet fearful eyes would be steeled to match the spit-fury of his voice, his mouth pulled tight, his teeth bared: if he'd look like every other man consumed by anger and self righteousness. But his eyes were wide, red rimmed and glistening. Even in strength he was still small.
"That's for you," Bodhi said nodding to the holochip pinched between Saw's fingers. "And I gave it to them, they did not find it. I gave it to them." That had to mean something, his words, this choice it was right. He'd done the right thing. The girl, Eris, she was his affirmation; she believed him. "Galen Erso. He told me to find you." Please believe me, he urged.
There was a long harsh drag of artificial breathing, a familiar terror often accompanied by pain. The two with the spoked crests adorning their uniforms flinched at the horror they were suddenly struck. "Bor Gullet," Saw Gerrera rasped. He watched the young man, the pilot, be lifted from the ground muttering uselessly for mercy the men holding him no longer had. And then, as the hood was forced back over his head as he was dragged away, he yelled and begged. And it didn't do him any good.
The boy's hand was shown, a holochip, his quivering fear and self doubt. The girl, she wasn't so easy. Her displeasure at the boy being taken was clear in her cold shifting eyes, but her face was stone. She was still, measured, calculating – she showed nothing. Her having been a slave to the Empire did not excuse her, Saw Gerrera had no compassion to offer. "Show me your hands," he commanded, his voice quiet from the airlessness of it.
Obediently she held her hands out to him; to show she had nothing in them, to prove in her steady palms she would not be shaken. Eris didn't know. Steadfast she remained as he took a clanking step forward, the end of his metal staff grazing her bended knee, and pulled the sleeves down on her arms revealing the slender purpled wrists. It was easier to see, looking upon her from above, the dark tired circles around her eyes, the sunken-ness of her cheeks.
His resolve did not waver. "Did Galen Erso give you a message as well?" The softness of his voice was an illusion, there was no softness left in him.
"The man did not give me his name," she admitted, calling to mind an aged man's patient and stern face as he silently lead her to the cargo bay. "Only his word."
"And what did he promise you?"
"Freedom," was her simple answer.
Saw's head tilted just slightly as he appraised this curious young woman. There was her fire, burning in the pale blue of her eyes. She would not be moved, not for any man – never again. "Tell me, child," he bid her more gently, releasing her hands where she folded them over her lap, "are you willing to fight for your freedom?"
There were many things she didn't know, that she hadn't the privilege or means to learn, but she knew this: he wanted her to join him. To fight. What a thought that was, her hands on those weapons, her festering rage finally unleashed. But her eyes drifted to the hall Bodhi had been taken down, his echoing pleas long since silenced, and the fire in her didn't feel so much like righteous anger but of mourning. For the first time in her life, as far as she could remember, she'd had every choice to make and no one to stop her. But there'd been something in his ever-worried face, his narrow hunched shoulders – and she'd chosen him.
"I'll fight for his."
Saw Gerrera laughed darkly, a dry wheezing chuckle. Pulling at the mask hung on his breastplate he inhaled sharply, watching her unchanging face. "Stick with that boy and you'll never be free," he told her. A promise.
"Is there not a certain freedom in knowing that?"
Another breath he took, giving her those few measured seconds to decide if that was truly what she wanted. Her heavy stare was unwavering, she'd come to him already firmly decided.
