"They're coming this way," Hera whispered, nudging Eli with her toe.

Eli jarred awake, his entire body shaking as her touch tore him from sleep. He had thought he knew exhaustion – Thrawn had some wild ideas about how long his human aide could stay awake and pour over data – but this was exhaustion on a completely different level.

He pushed himself up quickly – a surge of adrenaline flooding his body and making his skin tingle. But at least it worked.

By the time the guard passed by, it seemed as though both the human and the Twi'lek prisoners were working as they were supposed to. The stormtrooper walked back to the other side of the warehouse – where it was warmer – and sat back down inside his watch booth.

"Do they have to keep brewing caf?" Eli mumbled, the smell of it wafting over as the booth's door closed.

Of course, drinking caf so openly was the least of their offenses. The guards seemed to have no idea what to do with the prisoners they were in charge of, but whatever menial tasks they came up with, they took special delight in making sure Eli did them. And Hera – either because she wanted to stay alongside the person she was plotting to escape with or because her heart was actually solid gold – found ways to end up doing those tasks with him.

Eli only hoped Hera assumed their interest in him was due to him being the only human at the prison. The explanation he'd offered was that his alien lover had proved to be too difficult to catch, which wasn't exactly a lie. He never brought up his Imperial connections, and neither did the guards. Something told Eli that his fragile cooperation with the Rebel pilot would break apart the moment she learned her fellow prisoner was a former Imperial officer.

Former Imperial officer. That was a thought he'd have to get used to. Then again, if he managed to find a way to escape, perhaps there was hope of somehow making contact with Thrawn again and…

Eli stopped that track of thought right there. Merely asking himself whether or not Thrawn would abandon his plans based on the Empire's immoral actions had… in the past proven to be a lesson in futility, to say the least.

Still, as far as prison life went, things could have been much worse. The guards generally didn't bother them at all, which is why Hera insisted Eli curl up in a corner and try to catch up on sleep.

"Should I ask if they could spare a cup?" Hera asked with a devious smile. Eli smirked in response. No matter what the situation, nothing seemed to ever get her spirits down. Then again, she was more certain than he was that they would escape.

"Yeah, could you?" Eli replied.

"On second thought, not sure that's a good idea," Hera said. "It'll make you stay up past your bedtime."

"I'm up now," Eli said. "You need a break?"

"The only break I need is to break out of here," Hera said.

"Suit yourself," Eli said. "So where were we again?"

Eli zoned out while Hera reminded him of the details. The disinterest of the guards could be used to their advantage. They only could see eight stormtroopers. The ISB agent who'd charged them was only rarely seen and each time he looked dispirited, as though this was not the assignment he'd thought it would be. The planet they were on, whose name still escaped Eli, was uninhabited so if they were to escape, it would have to be to space. There were two Lambda shuttles, either of which Hera could fly.

Though the most bizarre detail of all – the Imperials in charge clearly had no guidance on what they were supposed to do.

The prison was meant to be some kind of a labor camp. Their sentencing included punishment of "hard labor," yet it was obvious the warehouse they were housed in was only recently acquired. Eli could recognize some farming equipment, and from the black rocks and soil, figured the planet had at one time been extremely lucrative for food production. Yet there was no clear work plan other than clearing the warehouse of old storage containers. No deliveries of farming equipment were being made. No efforts to clear the local area of vegetation to prepare for crops.

All of which told Eli that this entire thing had been thrown together at the last minute.

Which made Eli think the law itself had been created to topple Thrawn, and their current location on an abandoned world was merely a way to prevent Thrawn from finding out where Eli had been taken.

"What?" Hera asked, drawing out her question.

Eli blushed. He had never quite found a way to keep his thoughts from showing on his face.

"I just now realized, everything about this prison is off the books," Eli answered.

Hera gave him a searching look. He'd spent nearly every hour of the last few days with her, so he explained himself without further prompting, "Okay, you see, there hasn't been any deliveries, right? Farming equipment's expensive and heavy but I've been here a week. If they'd planned on farming, they'd have something here by now."

"Maybe they want us to do it by hand," Hera said.

Eli winced again. He'd forgotten that the previous day they'd been made to unload old, animal-pull-style plows from a dusty storage room.

"That'd fit into the 'hard labor' line," Eli admitted, cringing at the thought. "Still…" How to convey his message without revealing his past? "There's nothing about our crimes that warrants this kind of secrecy. There's a thousand different Imperial prisons they could've shuffled us all off to. Plus, they obviously weren't planning this for a long time."

"I'll hand you that one," Hera said. "Any ideas why?"

Eli rubbed his eyes, the need for sleep creeping up on him again. "Remind me. You said they broadcasted the law over the Holonet?"

"That's why I let myself get caught."

"Right." Eli blew out a nervous breath. There was really no other way to go about this. "They published the crime, so it's not like it's a secret, but they didn't follow normal procedures after we were all apprehended. They should've sent us off to various, regular prisons or work camps or whatnot, right? But they didn't. If we were in regular prisons, our names would be entered into the Imperial database, making us too easy to find. But they open up a new prison, just for us? Well, that'd be too easy to find, too. If someone were to trying to track us down, and they couldn't find us in the database, the first thing they'd do is see if any new prisons were opened. Hence, this prison has got to be off the books."

"But why go through so much secrecy?" Hera asked. "Who would they be hiding us from?"

Thrawn, Eli thought bitterly.

"Your Jedi, maybe."

"If that were so, they would've recognize me when I got here."

Eli winced again. "Yeah, forgot about that."

Hera was piercing him with a searching look. "So you, then?"

"I was the first one here," Eli said, surrendering. He stalled, trying to think up of something that wasn't a lie, but wouldn't risk destroying all hopes of escape, either.

Hera glanced over Eli's shoulder.

"They're coming back," she whispered, then her expressions changed. She was wary. "They seem happy."

"Wonderful," Eli muttered, turning to see what was coming for them.

And felt his heart stop in his chest.

Happy wasn't the right term for it. They were exuberant. All eight stormtroopers were heading their way. The ISB agent was in front, his chest held high in a way Eli hadn't seen since he'd been arrested.

Not a single stormtrooper was carrying their standard blasters and in their place were slugthrowers. Why, Eli could only guess.

-SWR-

Hera lowered her eyes as the contingent approached, falling back into her role as the scared, mousy, clueless Twi'lek she was pretending to be. She hardly needed to. The group came to a halt in front of Eli, but as far as the Imperials were concerned, she may as well have been another storage container.

"Hello there, Vanto," the ISB agent said, grinning far too much. "You must be wondering why I'm so pleased."

Eli didn't react at all. Hera could tell he was nervous – his eyes darted down to the slugthrowers about half a dozen times – but he kept scowling to cover it up. She'd noticed the archaic weapons as well. Perhaps there were some local vermin they wanted him to climb up on the roof and shoot at?

"Ah, I see," the agent said after a lengthy, unanswered pause passed. "Too stoic to play? Very well. We're shutting down operations here, thanks to you. All the prisoners are going back to their home worlds and put into the local jail system. Curious yet?"

Eli's eyebrows knit closer together, "Let me guess. Senate didn't approve of this law?"

"And here your dear alien said you were so clever," the agent said, clucking his tongue in disapproval. "I just told you the other prisoners were to find their ways into their homeworld's prison system."

Eli looked down at the slugthrowers again, but didn't attempt another answer.

"Very well. Let's just say a surprising report ended up on my desk," the agent said, drawing out a datapad and skimming through it lazily. "It detailed a rather remarkable series of events, starting with the detonation of an electromagnetic device on board the Imperial Star Destroyer, Chimaera."

Hera's eyebrows lifted, the shock coming too suddenly to properly hide it. Eli attacked a star destroyer? She was impressed. He hadn't even bragged about it. Humble and crazy? Good mix for a rebel…

Eli, on the other hand, looked even angrier. "You…"

The agent smiled again. "The attack did a little bit more than anyone could have anticipated. The entire ship was nearly lost. The crew very well could have died. It still had the desired effect, though, didn't it? Wiping all the onboard computers clean so there would be no records of anything. No security cameras to show what happened. No reason to track us down."

The agent paused, looking down at his datapad. He obviously enjoyed a showman's flair.

"Oh, now you're beginning to worry," the agent said. "Well, I must say, your precious little Grand Admiral did far more than we could have ever asked. You see… he wrote the after-action report detailing the events… and… has named you as the sole and primary suspect of the crimes. You're a traitor to the Empire now, Commander Vanto. And that gives us the authority to execute you."

Hera's head snapped up, a gasp escaping her lips. Everything moved too fast. A stormtrooper had shoved the butt of his slugthrower into her chest before she realized she had lunged forward. A hand wrapped around one of her lekku, pulling hard, preventing her from getting back to her feet.

Her eyes watered at the searing pain and the indignation of it. The sound of scuffling brought her attention back to Eli…

"No…" she said, not expected to be heard. It was an involuntary exclamation.

The agent was laying a small holorecorder on the ground, and beyond him, Hera could make out the shuffling, struggling jumble of bodies. One of the stormtroopers threw a punch into Eli's stomach. Doubled over, the human was easy to snatch up, dragged over to one of the many support beams in the warehouse.

"You should be honored," the agent was saying. "I looked it up. You'll be the first Imperial officer executed by firing squad."

Hera's head spun. Imperial officer. But the way the ISB agent spoke… her friend hadn't been taking a bite out of the Empire. He'd been set up. Not like it mattered what side he was on anymore. He'd been a good friend… compassionate. Not like any other Imperial she'd ever met. He didn't see her as merely a nonhuman, an alien… but as another person.

She had to do something. Hera tried to stand, but the trooper holding her in place jerked back on her lek. She growled in pain.

They had Eli tied up against the support beam, hands secured behind his back. There was a cloth tied around his mouth, muffling the protests he was obviously trying to make. The stormtroopers stood off about twenty meters, pulling up their slugthrowers.

She had to do something… anything…

And as if the stormtrooper grabbing onto her could read her mind, she felt another tug on her lek, this time hard enough that it forced her back to her feet. An armored arm wrapped around her chest, pinning her arm to her side, and grabbed onto her face. Forcing her to not turn away.

"You liked this one, didn't you?" the stormtrooper said.

The ISB agent had initiated the recording sequence, and started rattling off some official sounding proclamation about how they'd captured Eli Vanto… traitor to the Empire, and his credentials allowing him to carry out the execution.

They had forgotten Eli was still wearing a prisoner's uniform.

Eli's face betrayed his feelings. He was panicking. He pulled fruitlessly at his binds, his jaw working against the gag in his mouth. There was no way he could say anything at the last minute, reveal any unwanted facts…

The stormtroopers were lifting their weapons.

And at that last moment, Eli accepted it. He stopped fighting, stopped resisting. He stood tall, chest lifted, shoulders square. Accepting that this was the end and-

The reports from the slugthrowers were far louder than what Hera expected. Her ears rang, momentarily deafening her. She couldn't hear herself scream out.

Eli's body slumped ungracefully to the ground. And remained there. Unmoving.

When her hearing returned, the agent was already scooping up his holorecorder.

"Gather up the prisoners," a stormtrooper, one with an orange shoulder board, said to the stormtrooper holding her. "And get them to the shuttles."

"Not yet," the agent said. He was crouching next to Eli's body. A wave of sickness swept over Hera as the man looked down at the other's form. As though he had plans for it.

"I'll be needing one of those Lambdas," the agent explained, motioning to two of the stormtroopers to come help him…carry the body.

"I thought we were getting off this rock," the sergeant said.

"Not yet," the agent answered. The two stormtroopers who had come over at the agent's beacon had hauled Eli up, and the agent reached over, touching his neck.

"There's a world in this system which has cropped up on the ISB radar for running a slaving operation," the agent said. "Mining, apparently. I'm going to go find out if they pay as handsomely as they're rumored to for fresh meat."

Hera snapped her head up. Meat? That was even more vile than-

"So that's why you had us use the training ammunition?" the sergeant of the stormtroopers asked. "So you'd look like you were carrying out the execution and instead-"

"Make a little money on the side?" the agent asked. "Exactly."

Hera's eyes darted to Eli again, examining him… and it was true. He wasn't bleeding. Slugthrowers were infamously gruesome weapons, tearing holes into its victims and causing them horrifically hemorrhaging wounds… and if he'd been shot by seven…. But there was no blood. It'd been a ruse.

Eli wasn't dead.