"Those Khommites are looking for trouble again" Itket murmurs next to me, and I look up from my breakfast. I find Saelte 60 and Droees 49 insulting a big-mouthed Chandrilan politician two tables to my right, and I stand up to interfere without a second thought. I don't mind pathetic insults from a species that declared itself as perfect as to cease their own evolution while they cannot even digest raw food. We've been trained not to react to harmless provocation. Also, Master Kalibi has told us to stay out of trouble as much as possible, especially because Chersen is not a Republic planet and it hasn't been for the past five hundred years. Their world, their rules. But that guy is a representative in the Senate of the Republic, and that means we have to back him up if needed.

Of course, that doesn't necessarily mean walking up to the politician's table and beating them until they reconsider their mess-with list. There are always quiet, subtle ways, and our Jedi both seem to have a preference for those. I'm sure they would avoid direct contact in this situation.

So I stand up, wait for a nanosec for them to see me standing, and then I turn around and walk away in the opposite direction. I can't see them, but from the corner of my eye I can see my batch-brother, and he gives me a very reassuring nod. I walk to the fruit basket, and pick up the overripe muja Saelte 60 tried to convince me to eat only a few minutes ago. The two Khommites point at me and laughingly tell the Senator that I'm more eager to get myself some vitamins than to hurry to his help the way a Republic soldier would be expected to. I don't comment on their lack of vision.

"Maybe he is the wise one" the politician says behind my back, and I can hear it in his tone that he'd prefer to have this breakfast over with.

Without visible haste, I march back to our table with the muja and start peeling it with a knife. It's a sharp little tool, it could cut the Khommites' delicate skin with ease, but the local rules strictly forbid one patient (or his relatives) to harm another patient. And these Khommites are recovering from a food poisoning, while the two of us stayed behind with Roquewon. This setting allows for no direct fighting, conflicts are to be left to the local security. With a sigh, I continue peeling the muja.

I move the large fruit between my fingers, trying to find out why Saelte 60 suggested for me to eat it. The color is slightly off, the smell is a little unsettling. It feels like a ball of liquid under pressure.

"I think its contents liquefy with rotting" Itket whispers to me.

I nod, but he is the only one meant to see that. The two Khommites are under the impression that I will, in a matter of moments, cover my entire face with reeking muja juice, and thus, I anticipate their attention. Not that I would look in their direction, only '77 does. We work well as a team.

I cut into the thick peel carefully. Judging by the sudden silence around our table, the Khommites are watching tensed. I focus on the memory of where those two are standing, and try to estimate the ideal angle.

My marksmanship, my pride, please don't fail me!

I cut into the muja fruit, and squeeze it with my other hand at the same time.

Two-toned cursing from behind my back informs me I scored a direct hit.

I turn around with the most innocent face a trooper can manage. One Khommite is covered in rotten muja liquid from right ear to the middle of his neck, the other received most of the juice into his nose. The duo starts screaming about their destroyed clothes and ruined appearance, once they find their voice. Over their shoulders, I wink at the Chandrilan representative. Once the Khommites leave the room, he comes over to our table and congratulates.

"No trouble, Senator."

I get myself another muja, and suppress a sigh while I'm peeling it. This interlude was the most eventful thing that happened to us in the past two weeks, and the complete lack of action is starting to get on my nerves.

Master Kalibi has rushed us here to save Roquewon's life, but then she's left with the rest of the team and perhaps she won't be back until our brother can walk again. As I've heard her say several times, there are no 'good traits' or 'bad traits' and this time our accelerated aging provides for double-speed healing. The doctors say '80 will be released by the end of next week. Until then, the two of us has to sit here, and do nothing unless another idiot starts messing with the senator. Not that I could be blasting droids with the knowledge that my batch-brother is kept in artificial coma on a planet that the Republic's filthy upper-class uses as a money laundry.

I have no idea how Master Kalibi has the funds to get a no-ranking clonetrooper the type of medical service only the civilian elite can afford, but apparently this wasn't her first visit here. The origin of the healer staff might be of some clue, but neither of us are reconnaissance commandos to uncover why they're helping us. All we have found out so far is that the ancestors of the doctors were all cloned from a Lorrdian on Kamino.

Neelaer Pegquisse was a famed surgeon of his time, but he was overly irritable and could not get along with his co-workers whom he looked down and reportedly hated for 'holding him back'. Eventually, he invested into a private clinic on the politically independent Chersen, and turned to the Kaminoans to provide him with the only colleagues he was willing to work with: practically, himself. Our mutual creators had altered his source material to create doctors who have perfect vision, even greater capacity for logical thinking, and resistance to most inhalable anesthetics. They made sure to alter the original DNA so radically that the medical staff they created does not successfully reproduce with Lorrdians. By this, they had thought to have forced the Pegquisse clan to become their eternal client.

And this was where their Khommite colleagues entered the picture. For a considerable payment, they were willing to lend their own gene technology to the first generation of Pegquisse clones, who were, by their education, masters of medical science, theoretics of gene alteration included. They constructed a female version of the Pegquisse genome, and thus they created what we now know as the Chersani species. They have been breeding successfully for the past two centuries without any further assistance, much to the Kaminoans' dismay.

But that doesn't explain why the Chersani treat our brother almost as their own. Both '77 and I are certain that somewhere payment is included, but as I said: we're not recon troops. And our Jedi asked us to behave.

I spend a lot of time reading. Litne gave us a data ring with the novels of a Jedi author, Daris Owelh. In this voluntary exile I've already read Mist of Time, Lightwalk, Knights in the mirror, Crystal and Sabre, and After the Last One. Owelh gives a lot of insight to the lives and morals of the Jedi, their philosophy, their history... It's really interesting how their Order and the Republic are intertwined. Until now I believed that serving under them for five months had taught me something, but the depths of their motives are fazettes I'm starting to understand just now. It pains me we had to learn Contingency Orders at the age we all should have been reading these: Owelh's books teach everything what anyone serving the Republic needs to know. Especially Lightwalk.

I tried to persuade '77 to give at least that one a try, but he would rather just bask in the sun in the middle of a barren plain, or maybe watch some holo-series with some other patients in the main hall, by the fireplace. 'Riddance and Regale in Ridiculous Regulations' is his favorite show, it's centered around two clawdites who travel to various worlds and aquire the shape of native lifeforms just to break some local rules that appear pointless to them. Then they usually have to morph into something small or scary to get away with the mess they started. For some reason, Itket finds this to be amusing, and he often told me in the past two weeks that Riddance should be invited aboard our small old yacht and see how he would set right Master Kalibi's strict ban on trusting any transmitted information.

I have to admit, that is one rule that would match neatly with the holo-show's theme. It is completely pointless and it makes communication difficult, not to mention how confusing it was at the start. But she is the Jedi and we obey, because that's what we've been created to do. If we have to rely on lightsabre signals instead of the helmet's built-in radio, it is her choice. It's not like our first three deaths had anything to do with communication failure, to be honest. And if one looks closely, Kalibi's scar is still visible between her big purple eyes: that's what she got during her padawan years when she fell for a holo message that seemingly came from her master. She had been lured into a trap, she could not save her mentor, she calls it a miracle that she made it out alive. Ever after, she always double-checks anything that could have been altered, and since we cannot use the Force for the same purpose, she prohibited us from following any instruction we didn't receive in person.

I admit, the clawdites could make a lot of fun of us, if they ever managed to fake being a clonetrooper. At the same time, I believe Litne would not remain in their debt for long.

I switch my monitor to the medical data to check on my batch-brother's readouts. Intestinal motility slowly climbing back to normal, perfusion optimal, the Moreau-plates almost 48% fused with his shattered bones. Above 75% he will be released from the bacta tank.

I open up the last file on the data ring with ambiguous feelings. '...But we're trying to be' is Owelh's last, shortest, and least popular novel. As I've heard, he attempted to explain the Sith Wars from a Jedi point of view, but he had failed with the historical accuracy. After this book's horrible reception, he never published anything.

Perhaps due to the lack of my knowledge, it's easy to overlook minuscule faults in the plot. But our education included history of vessels and hand-held weapons, and he got those wrong on an irritating level. And what's worse, several of the antagonist characters are implausible, stereotypical evil-doers. And how could anyone grow so blind with power that he doesn't see the danger right in front of his eyes?

I find myself checking on Roquewon after every tenth page, although his readouts are safe and stabile. And when I get through the book, I stare at the blank monitor with my mind echoing one question. WHY?

Why did the Sith Wars truly end? Why did the Jedi try to alter the historical knowledge, why did Daris Owelh lie to his readers about fake heroism over demonified opponents? Did he intend to reflect on honor? How many of his other books were based on falsities?

Why did he make me question his former works?

Itket enters our room, and mockingly asks if I just read the death scene of my newest favorite character. I shake my head. How could I explain to someone who refuses to sit down and read anything he was not ordered to get himself through?

"The Retlays are leaving tomorrow" my brother announces. "They insist on throwing a blowfire party, to which you are also invited."

Honestly, I don't think I should be present for an elite Alderaanian family celebrating the results of their yearly checkup, but I'm aware they hate the two Khommite patients.

"I will drop by" I murmur, stretching my limbs one after the other. If I will spend the evening there, I might as well look around in that area.

The blowfire hole is in the back of the private hospital's park, usually a quiet and rarely visited place. Most of its plants are imported from Ylesia, but deep under the surface lies the wasteyard of the Chersen hospital. Various machines separate organic matter from metal, and the latter is smelted down in the fire of the former. The heat is partially recycled to the clinic's needs, but most of it is channeled to the far side of the Greater Echo Mountain Range, where tourists can bathe in warm artificial streams running through the alpine snow fields.

I turn around, staring up at the peaks. We had passed several mountainous terrain simulations back on Kamino, and we have been to five or six vertical worlds with our Jedi, but these peaks are the most impressive I have ever seen. They don't belong to the clinic, though, so we would need special permits to hike them, but their sheer sight moves something in me.

My name means "Stone Dragon". Skups called me so on a mission when I took a rear position and defended their colony while my brothers advanced. I didn't move from my place, not even under heavy fire. This had greatly impressed them, and my tenacity had triggered theirs, and in the end the Chattza Rodians were trapped in the very site they had chosen for capturing the Skups.

I see movement between the trees. It's too far to identify, and without my helmet I cannot take a recording of it. Now that I'm looking in that direction, the intruder remains motionless, and I know better than to directly walk there and give a closer look. I'm unarmed, alone, and that thing was almost twice my size. So I pretend I didn't notice him. I pretend not to hear the chersils chirping timidly instead of the loud yelling-like songs they engaged in a few moments before.

The intruder doesn't want to be seen, that's clear. If I had cameras or at least a probe with me, I would leave them around, but I have no equipment and my two hands would be miserable weapons against this creature. All I can do is to retreat quietly, and re-check the perimeter from a safer distance.

I sit down farther by the creek, facing the park's trees, ready to jump if I have to. Nothing moves. A black and white chersil flies by, then two others in the opposite direction. I'm trying to read their moves the way Master Kalibi had taught us, and apparently they have not seen a predator in the near proximity. Yet another lands on a nearby branch, and whistles a small melody to me.

Chersils are the most intelligent natives of this planet. They are believed to be non-sentient animals, flying around and building nests in the bushes, but in my opinion they are smart enough not to want more. They don't chase big dreams of power and affluence, they don't hoard treasures, they don't get caught up in other species' wars. Instead of all that, they enjoy a calm and free lifestyle. Either they are more intelligent than the so-called sentients I've met here, or I read far too many Jedi books.

Still, because of the chersils' refrained chirps, I'm sure I wasn't just imagining the intruder. But what could I do? I suppose he is waiting for me to leave, so that he can continue whatever he intended to do. At the moment he doesn't want me dead, or else he would have shown himself. That's one great advantage of the clinic's strict rules. If I would be found dead, my death would trigger a turmoil he obviously doesn't want. That's because, unlike the Republic at the moment, this place is not a war zone. Here, a clone's death would be noticed.

I leave, loudly, only to return quietlike a few minutes later. The trick doesn't fool him, whoever he might be. Or maybe he'd left already when I wasn't watching? I cannot tell.

On my return, I find '77 chatting with one of the Chersani, and of what I catch, the topic was the Khommite hauteur's incompatibility with overripe muja fruit. What could I say? Our aim is always true.

"It will be fun to attend to the Retlay party as scare-Khomms" I murmur. "How are the two perfect idiots doing?"

"They won't be insulting anyone in the near future" the doctor replies. "Though I can't say they didn't have this coming, but..."

"But?" Itket insists when Doctor Rael Pegquisse waves his hand. " Noone expects you to heal them from their stupidity, and their messing with '83 is their own fault."

"We were hoping to release them from the clinic in a few days. Now that Droees 49 inhaled the rotten muja and he appears to be developing a pneumonia, we are stuck with them for yet another week."

Ahm. I feel sorry for the doctor who had his hopes too high up until today morning.

"I really need to learn to be more careful with fragile things..."

Doctor Rael laughs and pats me on the shoulder like our drill sergeant used to.

"You're doing perfectly, KirretRor. By the time your brother will be up and running, you two will master being a civilian."

"I'm not sure that's what he wanted to hear" '77 snickers.

"I'd be much happier if this war were over" Doctor Rael replies. "As a neutral clinic, we constantly face the possibility of our patients being murdered by the opposing party. Don't get me wrong, I know you two are to be trusted, because Kalibi wouldn't have let you stay here otherwise. I trust her. Who I don't trust are the ten-fifteen patients leaving each day with the knowledge of who else are here in the clinic."

"You think they might send assassins on their enemies while they're still under your care?" I might as well mention the movement I've witnessed in the park above the hospital's incinerator.

"We can't keep our security up with a war of this scale."

I instinctively reach for my gun before realizing I don't have it with me. '77 sees the flinch of my hand and asks if I want to accompany him for his jogging.

We need to keep in shape anyway, and maybe the two of us would spot something I ignored before.

The clinic's main building consists of a central intensive care unit and the three surgery rooms, above which the medical staff's private levels had been built. Most Chersani live here: although some of them have left the clinic for famous hospitals all around the galaxy, sooner or later they tend to return home, and they bring their newly gained knowledge with themselves.

Four wings are arranged around the central structure: two for the clients, separated by the type of atmosphere they need; one for the staff, mostly mechanics and programmers; one for the laboratories. The landing platform is located between the methane wing and the oxygen wing, the two restaurants are next to each side of the patients' wings. They have a separate building for those allergic to bacta, hermetically closed to make sure they would not get into contact with the material.

We start our jogging around the oxygen-atmosphere wing, enjoying the fresh air and the afternoon sunshine. Back on Kamino we didn't even realize we missed these so much. We march up the slope to the terrace of the restaurant, and as usual, we grab two packs of food to use as dead weight during training. We would later destroy these when we're too exhausted, thirsty, and tired.

There's an old-looking (and as we both point out, severely modified) Corellian light freighter taking up most of the parking lot, and different size droids are unloading boxes of sterile medical tools and at least three tanks of Inhathin. My brother loudly comments on the soporific's intense smell.

"Do you now believe what Rael told us about it?" I mock him. "You said if the insulations are all tightened properly, nothing would seep out. You refused to believe Inhathin does seep regardless the storage method." At least it is non-explosive, or so the good doctor informed us.

"I take it back, OK? If the wind would be blowing in the other direction, we would now both be napping on the landing platform. I can't understand how the Chersani can stand it."

"They have been genetically modified to be resistant" I remind '77, but he seems incredulous. "Per Neelaer Pegquisse's order. He needed surgeons who would not fall asleep during a surgery. Not to be effected in any way, to be precise."

"Yes, but how could it be possible to achieve? This thing is reeking worse than nerf guts!"

"Ask the Kaminoans."

We leave it at that. The afternoon lights cover the entire building with bright golden gleam, so unlike the training grounds where we were brought up. We climb the outer structures of the methane wing, stare through the triple-layer windows, then descend on the other side.

I take the lead from here. We're not heading straight to the blowfire hole, I choose a longer route. The Greater Echo Mountains tower above us, colored golden by the play of lightwave frequencies. I check on the small service path that connects the clinic and the hiking hotel's territory. It has not been used for several years.

"What exactly are we looking for?"

"Traces of a large creature" I reply. "He might have been brown, I'm not sure. He was moving quite comfortably among the trees, if he managed to hide from me."

"And the chersils didn't mind his presence?"

"Not like they would react to a predator" I reply. "But it was an invader, I'm sure."

We reach the blowfire hole: an artistically created exhaust port where the incinerator's fire can be seen if the underground panels are retracted. As I've heard, these were constructed to allow baking, cooking, or just a general come-together when the nights turn colder.

"Well, '83, I think you're not yet an observation specialist" my brother suddenly stops at a line of bushes. "I hate to point out, but he's carnivorous, after all."

"What did you find?"

"Wookiee hair. Dark brown wookiee hair, and it's long enough to belong to an adult."

I scratch my head. And what was a wookiee doing out here? Kashyyyk is an inner rim world, allied to the Republic. This doesn't make sense to me.

"Maybe he's hired by the Republic to hunt down a Separatist patient?"

"If so, why wouldn't he come the legal way? It's not like he couldn't find some wounds for himself if he wanted to make his appearance realistic."

"Because that would not make him suspicious at all..."

"And what if he's hired by the Seps? His planet is allied to the Republic, but he may not be allied to his world."

"That makes even less sense."

As we're trudging through the park, '77 suddenly stops not far from me. "There's been some activity here... Look at all those broken branches."

No, I don't.

Instead, I'm looking at the well disguised trapdoor in front of my feet. Apparently, we found the back door of the clinic, and we're too late. There's a wookiee somewhere below us, and at this point I don't care which side he is working for.

"He could be undermining the Retlay's party."

"Or maybe he went the other way."

Itket takes the deadweight in his hands, and gently places it on a barbeque-table near the blowfire hole. "I didn't even get to see what has been packed for my dinner" he laments.

Wordlessly, we split up. He is faster than I am, so he runs back to the clinic to contact the security forces there. I, the unarmed Stone Dragon, am left alone to find and perhaps neutralize a fully grown wookiee.

I don't calculate the odds for long. I have a brother to rely on while the enemy is a loner. I sneak down the trapdoor into the unlit corridor.

Rails are the only thing I can see, running from the hospital to (I suppose) the incinerator. It must be for the automated transport of the to-be-destroyed waste, and in that case, I can only hope the drones have an automated braking mechanism that doesn't require visual contact to identify an obstackle. Not for the first time, I miss my pure white armor's visibility.

Running in a pitch black tunnel with only the walls and rails to guide me is not fun. I regret every moment we wasted with Itket, but I could not pull him aside while he was talking with Roquewon's physician. But the lack of incoming waste carriages suggests the wookiee had disabled transports for his own safety, which means he indeed came in this direction.

The wall turns away from under my palm, and as I kneel down, I find two pairs of rails that join at this point. I suppose I'm under the clinic somewhere, with the medical wings on my left side, and the utilities on my right. I can feel some type of tremor from above, but I can't tell what causes it.

All of a sudden, bright light blinds me after the darkness, and I have just enough time to jump into the right side corridor before the transport drones would rally down towards the fire-hole. One, two, then five large containers are carried away on clanky wheels. In a top-notch private clinic, I honestly expected more than such historical automatons. Two more carriages rush down into the darkness where I came from. Apparently something had thwarted them until now. As soon as I'm sure there's no more of these, I continue my pursuit in that direction.

I realize just now how useful the air filters on our helmets really are. Medical waste products, and other organic matter that might have came out from the patients, reek horribly. I recognize the smell of a neglected, infected wound. One more transport rushes after the others, and here I have nowhere to hide from, so I have to jump on the front of it and climb to the top as it rolls with me. By the time I can jump down on the back of the vessel, I'm back to the ramification. I wasted roughly five minutes.

I'm running in the maze of rubbish carriages, lit only by the drains above. My sole guide is the distant echo of something big marching in front of me.

I hear a cursing roar when a door would not open to the decoder he is carrying. The lock is, however, soon manually 'decoded' by the sentient beast's pure strength. Some very dim light comes in from above, and I can see his furry legs as he climbs up to the higher level. I carefully follow: we are in the service corridor system. By the smell, I suppose we're not far from the kitchen and my stomach churns as I remember the foodpacks we left at the entrance.

All of a sudden, the doors close around us. Either one of us triggered an alarm, or my brother did. The wookiee lets out a long, miserable howl, then tests his strength against one door after the other. I have to take cover in one of the empty waste carriages, and it turns out to be not quite as empty as I imagined it to be.

I, CT-4405/83 KirretRor, Stone Dragon, hero of the Skup Homeworlds and assistant to Master Jedi Kalibar Iz Rese'Dh, am hiding in a large bin halfway filled with used urine pads, shed skin layers, fallen scales and broken talons, various drains and canulae dripping various liquids, and several piles of pus-sodden bandages. The closeness of the kitchen makes me wonder what our meal might have been made of. On Kamino at least what has been made of what, even if the reasons were sometimes shady. This carriage is suitable for me sitting unnoticed, so while the wookiee is trying to break free, I have plenty time recall our two Jedi's comments on that.

As far as it has been uncovered, a senior member of the Jedi Council named Sifo- Dyas decided to put the order for us, on behalf of the Jedi –council, but actually behind their backs. Having served under Master Kalibi for almost half a year, I think I understand why he decided to do so. When did he intend to enlighten his people about an army at their disposal, we will never find out. By the time our original host Jango Fett had been contracted to provide Mandalorian genome and knowledge for us, he had already been killed.

I risk a sneak peak out from under the suppurate bandages, and find the wookiee to have halfway dislocated a doorwing. A blast door and its crosscut, the drill instructor's words come back to me, though this is much thinner than the ones we learnt to get past with some thermal tape and a detonator.

Before I would be noticed, I hide back into the carriage. Wookiees' smell is keen, and if he would notice me locked up with him, this mission would be so over for me. So I hide back and try to ignore what I'm hiding in. Let's just hope the Chersani are truly great doctors and no patient had died on them today.

My mind wanders back to my team. The mystery surrounding us is one of Konnek's favorite topics, the political aspects of the war being a close second. Where might he be now? Where is our squad, our Jedi and the four clones who departed Chersen as soon as Roquewon was out from his first surgery?

It is odd how little I remember the entire regiment I grew up and trained with. We were the most average rank-and-file soldiers Kamino ever produced. Even Itket. Back then, Itket was the most average of us, never exceeding in anything. I at least have good stamina, high endurance, and (huh!) good tolerance for distractive circumstances. Most of these attributes I share with Roquewon. I don't think my batchers would be different from us... there's just barely anything that could distinguish us from the others. Apart from a few unimportant digits in our designation, we were exactly the same.

I wonder how and why '77 could change this much in a matter of months. With his agility, he would have been made a commando, perhaps even a reconnaissance trooper. His tendency to follow his own head puts him on par with the ARCs. Our two Jedi are lucky to have earned Itket's loyalty before he developed his traits, and even more I am lucky to belong to this squad. Even if it means sitting in the rotting medical waste at the moment.

Still, I wonder where the rest of my batch might be at the moment. 1138 members of the regiment survived Geonosis, most of them wounded. I think the combat-fit were re-assigned together with another halved unit immediately, and the wounded ones when they reached that stage of recovery. Perhaps they don't even know we live. Perhaps they have forgotten us just like I forgot them. It might sound inhumane, but there's nothing about us to remember. When we will die, it will only be a loss to the Republic Treasury. The only one well and truly interested in a clone's survival is himself. And, of course, there needs to be someone to accomplish the mission, and dead troops are rarely able to do that.

At least, that had been our opinion before Geonosis. After? Master Kalibi treats us like we each were some unrepeatable phenomenon, valued and worthy, just like the monomers of her six-piece lightsabre. As I heard her explain it once, every little part of her weapon differs from the others in some way. And whenever one has to be replaced, the balance of the entire construct would change. Their weapon is the allegory of a Jedi's life, by the way: permanent damage to a lightsabre would always accompany and indicate some drastic change in their life.

The wookiee pushes himself through the hatch of the door, so I climb out and follow him. Most of the brown fur he left behind now sticks into the materials on my clothes, but it's my least concern at the moment.

The biggest problem is, we are now in the medicine storage room and the wookiee is climbing up the cables to the ICU. At least he has not yet noticed me, and if he would even pick up my scent, it is properly suppressed by the materials transported through the tunnel he came through. Not quite the disguise I have always been dreaming about, though.

Despite his uncivilized outlook (Am I the one talking?!) the beast seems to handle the clinic's database with ease. Maybe he is looking for the exact location of his target. I see two large Czerka riffles on his back, and I notice silver tufts in his hair. Odd, I've never heard of a multi-colored wookiee before.

I have no idea who his target is. Maybe if it's the Khommites, I should just show him the way... but with Separatist weapons he is more likely after a Republic target.

I am irritatingly unarmed, all I have is a titanium scalpel I found in the debris. Quite the mock of a weapon against a full-size wookiee, but I will keep it with me until I find something better. Why couldn't they discard a laser scalpel for me, at least? But I have never been the ungrateful one. I will fight with whatever I have, when it comes to fighting. With a miserable blade, if nothing else.

Too easy for him, I suddenly realize as the wookiee turns to the methane wing. He takes a small mask out from a small bag I didn't even notice under his fur, while I have to smuggle one from a medical assistant's locker. And too bad I have no time to change clothes. Armor can be removed and put back up in a matter of seconds, but civilian clothes are not nearly as convenient.

Too easy, my mind warns again. Trap-like. What did Itket and the clinic's security organize behind my back, and what plan do they have for me in it? Did they evacuate the methane wing? Of course not, where would they take the patients. Where? To the bacta-free building, I suddenly remember. It is empty for now, and hermetically separated. Ideal.

Just after cheering up at the hope of no civilians in the way, I catch voices from behind the wing's wall. Evacuation is still in progress. The security personnel, of course, is on the other side of the airlocks. I also don't like the locked doors all around us: it looks like a trap of a rather unprofessional kind.

But if so, then where is my wookiee? It's really embarrassing to have lost an entire wookiee.

I go back until I find an open service tunnel that would run under the methane wing. It has been built to accommodate smaller cargo droids, of course the silver-tufted furball could press himself into it. Faint smell of Inhathin tells me that the wing gets the medical supplies the same way ours does. On our first day here, w have tracked down the tubes that keep Roquewon oxigenated and sedated in his bacta tank. This corridor is built just the same way as the one in the oxygen wing, even the angle of the corridor's slope appears to be the same.

A few lines of brown fur assure me: this is the right direction.

The gravity of the situation hits me when I realize the goal of the hunter. Air and methane make an explosive mix, one well-placed explosive can blow up the entire hospital wing. What safer way to get rid of a target? Master Kalibi would chop us into luncheon meat if she would ever catch us doing it, but not because it weren't an effective method. I realize I need to stop the wookiee before he would get out from this service path, or else he would detonate the building.

From that moment of realization, it is a simple mission for me. I've been trained infantry, not commando, but having a clear objective makes all the difference. And we're based off a bounty hunter, maybe he would do faster than me, but I will succeed, that's a fact. I just need to find how.

No way back, no time to get better weapons. The evacuation is still on the way in there, and I swear I can hear the wookiee roaring contentedly. I grab the scalpel, take a deep breath, and cut into the Inhathin tube. Purplish brown liquid spurts out, and although most of it evaporates immediately, I see the pool forming on the floor of the service corridor. A small river starts from it, and I smile under a grimace. No matter his breathing mask, the wookiee will not pass here.

I start feeling the effects before I would take a breath from the soporific-filled air. Inhathin is safe and cannot be overdosed, I remind myself. I will have put the entire clinic to sleep, but I didn't kill anyone.

I hear a loud bang echoing in the tunnel, as a fur-covered body hits the ground. With my last breath I'm still holding, I let out a victorious dragon-roar.

The Chersani are genetically modified to not be affected by Inhathin, I tell myself. They will find me and wa-