"What are you doing?"

For the most part, Izan had been left alone in his cell. A small medical droid had come by under guard to tend to his wounds, and then left without a word. Hours had passed before Maarani was dragged back through and shoved into her cell, at which point she had gone to hide in one of the corners, and he had grown bored enough to attempt sleep.

He had no idea of how much time had passed, only that Maarani had left the corner to sit in the middle of her cell facing away from him. After looking from a few different angles, he finally came to notice she was in a meditative position, prompting his question at last.

"I'm going to mind trick one of the guards into opening the cell and dropping his weapon. It's not like you need years of training to do that."

Izan shook his head, making back for the bed. "Wake me when you've actually got something of worth to say."

"Fine, I'll say something you actually need to hear."

Maarani worked her legs out of the meditative pose, gripping onto the edge of the bunk for support as she moved to stand, tugging on some hems and straightening out her lekku before turning around. She looked Izan right in the eye, trying very hard to keep her lip from quivering.

"I'm sorry. For everything. For leading you on, for hitting you, for being abusive, for being dismissive, for being such an ungrateful little wretch. I am sorry for all of that, and I'm sorry that I couldn't get us both out of this mess. It might have been boring on Citadel Station, but at least if I hadn't walked into that cantina on a nostalgic whim, you wouldn't have had the utter displeasure of having met me."

For once, Izan had no doubts about Maarani's intent. It sounded like a genuine apology, and felt like one. And from the clear impact it was having on her below the surface, something he could already feel despite her efforts to conceal it all, there was no possible way to dismiss the intensity behind it.

"I'm sorry too. Whenever there was a problem, I shrugged it off and let the Jedi handle it. And when it was my problem, I left you alone, and you got a broken leg for it. You've done some awful things, but I never accept an apology without cleaning my own slate."

Eyes watering, Maarani nodded, trying so very hard to keep from crying. "You don't owe me that Izan. You don't owe me anything. Please, remember that. I'm so sorry."

The doors of the cell block slid open at that moment.

Izan craned his neck around to try and get a glimpse, without success, before stepping back. Her earlier words were beginning to resonate back.

I couldn't get us both out of this mess.

"You bitch! You're just making yourself feel better after screwing me over!"

"Please, don't try to fight back."

Sloane and her four guards walked into view, another two right following some distance behind, escorting a woman in a black officer's uniform.

"Open the cell."

The rightmost guard opened up the field to Izan's cell, leaving a deliberate space open between him and Maarani. Enough for him to see her rubbing her eyes clean as she tried to tackle with her overflowing emotional state.

"Whatever deal she made, I-"

The officer moved up to the cell and turned directly to Izan. She was carrying the clothes he had been wearing at the time of their capture, all cleaned, ironed, and even folded.

Sloane smiled. "I'd think twice about backing out when you've just been handed freedom, Zeltron. Dearest Tegama will explain."

The shock of the reversal left Izan speechless, only able to watch with jaw agape as Maarani sucked in a harsh breath.

"I'm staying here Izan. Sloane is going to give me the answers I've wanted, going back eight years at least, in return for all I know about the Lady of Balance. The Distant Star, Cecile, everything in it is yours now. When you go back for Dana and Jayden, tell them not to come for me. Sloane's moving the vessel to uncharted space to avoid being followed, you'll never find me again. Just…"

She stopped to choke back an outbreak of sobbing.

"Make them go back to Coruscant, to Mandalore, wherever. I'm not worth trying to rescue."

Izan continued to stare for a long while, almost choking up himself in disbelief. "You can't be serious. Look me in the eye and tell me that you're not-"

He looked up at Sloane, who smiled more, the veil across her eyeless face glittering more for it.

"No mind trickery at work here. She proposed this deal herself." She tilted her head to one of the guards before turning back to Izan. "Bring the droid. I suggest you get dressed now, you'll want to ensure everything is as it was on the ship before you leave after all."

After awkwardly taking hold of his clothes, he shuffled into the small cover provided to begin putting them on, trying to save what little decency was left. It all seemed so unbelievably good natured for a Sith especially to do. But, she also clearly had a large stake in what Maarani had to offer, and that was both a saving grace and a fact that made him fear for her safety all the more.

"And now…" Sloane motioned for the guards and officer to give Izan a bit more privacy, lightly turning on the ball of one foot with practised grace to look at Maarani. "Provided your cooperation continues, I'm willing to make some allowances until I'm ready to release you back to Republic space, if you still decide not to join us when that time comes."

Maarani remained cold in expression. "Kiarna will kill me before then. Unless you think you can protect me from her, I wouldn't count on anything."

At that, Sloane smiled, before breaking into a full laugh. "Nice try. I'm not about to divulge any secrets."

The doors opened to two more guards, Cecile trudging along between them. When they moved away to either side, she moved a little more quickly to Cecile's cell.

"My deepest apologies Mistress, I do hope you have been treated well."

"Oh yeah, just a few punches to the gut, the head, and other places…"

Cecile's eyes flickered. After a cautionary glance at the guards, she looked right up to Sloane. "I have behaved just as any respectable droid would, and I am quite sure the Mistress will behave as well as any Twi'lek woman possibly can, however difficult that is for her."

Maarani aimed a death glare right at the droid. "Call me a slut and I'll…"

"That's up to her. I do find the idea of a droid showing concern and contempt for her Mistress at the same time to be quite amusing. You must have known her a long while."

"I have been in her service for a few months."

"Oh? Well, that's good to hear…"

Izan emerged from his cell at that moment, now fully dressed again, and looking a lot better for it. "You at least going to give her a beacon I can track when you do drop her off in however many weeks? Or am I gonna have to search?"

"We'll find a neutral ship to take her back to a suitable world." Sloane stepped back, nodding to the various guards to clear the way. "Now, I suggest you return to your vessel and do your check over. You don't want to keep us waiting."

"No, I don't." Izan made one last look at Maarani before starting to make his way to the exit. It still felt worryingly easy. At the doorway itself, he stopped and looked back to Cecile, who was following behind a little slower. "Come, we don't want any trouble."

"Yes, I was about to say…" Right as Cecile reached the two guards, Sloane nodded to them, causing both to rush in and grab all four of her arms forcibly.

Izan quickly turned around, ready to argue, but Maarani got there first.

"What are you doing!? We had a deal!"

"I'm sorry, do you really think I'm so stupid that I didn't notice you had ordered your droid to make a recording of her movements, thereby mapping out the entire ship?" Sloane turned back again, her smile breaking into a wicked grin. "It's a shame, you almost got away with that little diversion, making it seem as if you actually despised her, only for her to provide the key for a little rescue mission down the line. Sorry, but I won't be taking that chance."

Despite the searing pain it caused, Maarani slammed both fists against the cell field. "Cecile! Cecile!"

"Wipe the droid's memory, thoroughly. Perhaps a waste of a well developed personality, but I won't take the chance."

"Cecile! Cecile I'm sorry!"

Izan was shoved out of the way by the guards as they dragged Cecile past in the direction of the droid workshop, another pair of guards moving in to ensure he didn't try anything.

The officer soon departed after, leaving Sloane and her four personal guards standing outside Maarani's cell while she broke down in tears.

"And now we see the real relation between an owner and her droid. You have only yourself to blame Tegama. Your final words to her before falling unconscious should have been orders for her to remain complacent, not to try spying on your captors."

Once she was on the floor in a sobbing heap, Sloane motioned for the guards to follow her back out. "Have Night and Bitter bring her to the chamber when she's stopped crying. And inform Lord Rak'Sakar that my plan for interrogation is going smoothly, that I am releasing a Zeltron for lack of use, and that my scrying has yet to determine the outcome of the impending battle on Katarr. But I will inform him the moment an answer is clear."

"Yes my Lady."


It was a very strange experience moving amongst junior Imperial officers, as well as technicians, a few mechanics, and the quartermaster at one point. None paid him more heed than they had to.

The weapons were all presented to his viewing, and then sealed in a time locked box that was put on the ship so that he would be long gone before having access to them. All of the food, medical and repair supplies that they had gathered up over the past few months had been left alone. Even some of the more messy junk piles that had been there since he first set foot on the Distant Star back at Telos had been organized out properly, presumably thanks to a particularly compulsive private looking for something to keep busy with.

The only weapon not returned was Maarani's lightsaber, a given expectation in the end. If there were any who had particularly demeaning views of him because he was coloured bright pink instead of a more typical skin colour, they kept it to themselves.

He was left standing by the boarding ramp when Cecile finally showed up, escorted by a deep red-headed woman who looked a little too pretty for the black uniform that seemed to match the tone of her perpetually bothered expression. Cecile herself was sickeningly blank. Her usual swagger of walking, holding her arms as if she always had a haughty opinion to give, all gone.

"Couldn't just settle for a two day history wipe, could you? Just had to go and take away every scrap of her!"

The officer glared back at him, nearly shoving the droid right into his arms. "It's a droid. Get over it pinkskin."

Izan glared back, not taking it lying down for once, something he didn't realize was attributed to Maarani's confrontational attitude. "She was a friend. I bet you shot all yours getting to where you're at."

"Captain Caura." Another officer strode over, glancing between Izan and Caura. "Is there a problem? None of us want this to take longer than it has to."

Caura glared at Izan, who glared back.

"No sir, just returning the droid to the ship."

"Good. You don't want to leave Zeltrons in a bad mood. They tend to mouth off to others of their kind, and that would hardly make future shore leave easier for you, now would it?"

That time, Izan took the slight against him with a little more dignity, even if it did strike him as an odd realization that Imperials probably did get vacations as well.

"Oh yes, I'll be calling all my friends in the next few sectors, telling them about this charming looking Imperial woman." He chewed his tongue to keep from following up with another slur, instead directing his efforts towards guiding the soulless Cecile onto the ship.

As soon as Caura had left, not even trying to hide the look of murder on her face, Merik scoffed a little, taking a step closer to Izan. "She's a human Wookiee you know, born to a Republic ambassador right in the trees of Kashyyyk."

Izan didn't acknowledge his continued presence with much more than a slight hesitation.

That didn't faze Merik. "For what its worth, it's a shame you got led on by that Republic pilot. Zeltron youth aside, you're quite the looker."

It took all of a few seconds for Izan to notice his hand was growing pale from how firmly it was gripping the ramp strut. Of all times and places, now was when he was actually being hit on, and by yet another Imperial officer who seemed a little too happy with his position, a little too out of place.

"She never led me on. Even when she was going at me, I could tell."

He released the strut to make his way up at last, closing the ramp behind him.

Without Maarani, Dana or Jayden on board, it felt truly desolate. He was quite literally the only living being left. And unlike the Citadel Station Cantina, being alone now was truly being alone.

"CC-13, might as well wait in the cockpit with me. Nothing needs repairing.

"Order acknowledged, reporting to Distant Star cockpit."

After one last tour of the ship, he made his way there as well, settling into the pilot's seat and going through the pre-launch procedure.

When it was done, he sighed to himself, took another look at Cecile's empty demeanour, then switched to comms.

"Distant Star ready to launch on permission. And please, treat Maarani well."

"Permission granted. Not my place to say, but she could be in worse hands."

He shut off his side of the transmission to ensure he wasn't overheard. "Yeah, she could be in the hands of a woman who isn't fifty years old, wearing tassels, and actually has something she finds remotely attractive. Never hear from her again."

Cecile's eyes flickered, though he was too busy keeping an eye on the controls as he brought the ship to a hover above the deck

"Low throttle until you have cleared the ship. Power dampeners are at the ready if you try anything."

"Not to worry, I've had three days of flight practise."

The deck itself opened up beneath the ship, sending an all-clear signal once it was safe to begin the descent.

All so routine, and yet the only thing that kept him from defining the people he was now so casually talking with as the enemy was the fact that he had never actually declared loyalty to the Republic. Zeltros, while technically part of the Republic, was considered neutral ground for the sake of maintaining some semblance of leisure for all sides. Czerka, now a lot less prone to illegal activities, was considered a properly neutral organization.

For all of Maarani's insistence on making that sacrifice for his behalf, for all the grief, pain and other ugly messes she had caused him, he still felt guilty for leaving her behind in the hands of her enemies.

Their enemies.

"Distant Star is clear of the vessel, travel on pre-assigned heading for two thousand kilometres. Do not attempt any scans or hypervector triangulation, or we will open fire."

He didn't even bother with a verbal acknowledgement, bringing the ship around to that heading and setting off, no longer having to look at the destroyer, and remind himself of the guilt.

"Just my luck. The only man on a ship with three women. One of them is a raging lesbian in so many meanings of the word, another is a cold hearted asexual mind construct thing with weird parental desires, and the third is a giant Mandalorian with a husband. And then there's the droid with metal tits, and nothing left of a personality."

Cecile's eyes flickered again.

He reclined down into his seat, leaving the ship to run its course. "Is this the Force toying with me again? I complain about being the only man, and then it takes away all the women and the female personality so that I can be the only man and not feel out of place for it? What have I even done to upset the Force like that? I'm not doubting it exists, I'm not cracking jokes about magical hand waving."

A sigh came as the sensors alerted that the Imperial destroyer had just gone to hyperspace. He glanced back at the droid briefly before returning to his idle musing, conveniently not noticing as she began to convulse quietly.

"You can't even appreciate a word I'm saying. You're just an empty shell waiting for new programming, and a few decades at least to develop a personality again. There's no telling what kind of droid you'll end up becoming now. Could actually turn out polite, or not like playing cards at all and leave me bored stiff. Hell, could end up developing a masculine personality this time instead, that'd be something."

Another, longer flicker overtook Cecile's eyes.

"Oh right, that wouldn't last long. You'd probably end up having the droid equivalent of a mental breakdown because you're in a female-shaped body. And since droids don't get self-determination rights, and I can't afford to buy a new droid body for your new male persona to get shoved into, they'd just wipe you for me to start over with again."

By then, he was so lost in his thoughts that he didn't notice her placing her lower hands on her hips, while the upper arms folded across her chest.

"What the hell am I even saying? Droids don't have genders, they can't have identification issues! Not five minutes into this solo voyage and I'm going nuts! Soon I'll be ranting how everything is racist and offensive, while being equally racist and offensive myself to other people, and then I'll start drinking again, and because I've picked up so much from Maarani I'll turn suicidal as well. And then you'll be left here as a blank droid in the middle of nowhere-"

"Could the Pinkskin kindly consider shutting his trap?"

Izan blinked. He continued staring out at the starry void for a very long time before slowly turning around, only to sigh in realization.

"Caura called me pinkskin. Look, CC-13, the name's Izan, not Pinkskin. It was bothersome enough being called that before, but I'm not going to let it continue when-"

"What exactly has changed? You are still a depressing drunk, the Mistress is still in distress, and until the Jedi return to the ship I am clearly the most capable crewmember."

Izan blinked again. "Cecile?"

"Yes?"

He thought about it again, then slowly stood up, clenching his fingers in and out a few times before looking right at the droid. "First question, and a very important one, what the hell is going on?"

"We are on a course towards nowhere at approximately-"

"Cecile, you know what I mean!"

"Droids do not have the capability to read organic minds, not yet anyway, so I do not in fact know what you mean."

"I mean-"

The proximity alarm blared out, drawing his attention right back to the controls before he could clarify. From seemingly out of nowhere came a full squadron of heavy attack fighters. A quick look over the scanners brought up no matches in the ship's computer.

"Great! Just great! Now we're being raided by pirates!"

The intercom began to pick up a slightly garbled signal.

"No Twi'lek lifesigns detected... Do we make contact?"

"Give it a minute. She might have a discreet jammer in place."

Izan went deathly cold, leaning forward in the seat and twisting his head up to get a look at one of the fighters. Completely unmarked, it was a very dark green, and had three 'wings' that bore several armaments. Too advanced for standard pirates.

"Still reading nothing. No high power signals either. Must've jumped ship."

"Or she was jettisoned. Continue the search, we'll find her."

Just as abruptly as they had appeared, the squadron formed back up and made a swift departure, leaving Izan trying to recover from the near heart attack at how closely he had avoided death.

"How the hell did the Hidden Hand find us out here?"

"Is that the clarification to the earlier question Pinkskin?"

"No! No no no! What I want to know is-"

Another arrival from hyperspace distracted him yet again. The timing of it worried him greatly, any follow up to a Hidden Hand appearance had to be bad news.

"Cecile, just get ready for a hyperspace jump. We need to go get Dana and Jayden quickly before they-"

The intercom crackled again.

"Teegs! Teegs don't leave!"

His hand leapt to the transmitter that time. "Dana! Dana! How are you even-"

"Hidden Hand scanned us, didn't think twice about helping, then moved on. We realized what they were looking for and followed them here. Listen, Izan, where's Teegs?"

Izan looked back at Cecile, who shrugged in her own way. "The Sith have her. Dana, I'm sorry."

There was a brief silence on the other end, though while listening closer he could hear her talking with Jayden. Both of them sounded short of breath. "How did you get away then?"

"She…" He chewed his tongue. "Maarani gave herself up to Sloane, the sorcerer running the ship. Look I can explain more, but what I'm seeing on sensors says that ship is a real bucket of junk, and I don't want to imagine how much air you've got left. And how am I going to even dock with it without fracturing the hull?"

"We've thought of that. Bring the ship to a complete standstill, no rotational forces at all. Is Cecile with you?"

He looked back again, still pondering that question. "Yeah, they let her go as well."

"Cecile, we need you to stand on the outer hull beside the airlock, but don't block the way. This ship doesn't have an airlock, only the one hatch. There's no going one at a time or getting spacesuits on first."

"Freespace jumping? Are you serious? You've got cloth robes last I noticed!"

"Now is exactly the time where 'the Force will protect us' comes into play. Just be ready at the airlock so you can close it behind us. Got that?"

"Yes, alright, I got it." He decelerated the ship until it reached a standstill, timidly firing the thrusters until it had achieved full motionlessness. There he waited while Cecile made her way out the airlock, keeping an eye on the sensors until the other ship had come up alongside. It was dwarfed considerably by the Distant Star, looking as if even a slight nudge would cause irreparable damage, and worse to those inside.

"Alright, we're in position and waiting."

"I'm coming now. Give it fifteen and blow the hatch, I'll be ready."

He was gone from his chair as soon as that was said, quietly counting under his breath while he sprinted from the cockpit through the corridors to the airlock, with just under ten seconds seconds left. Through the small window, he could see the hatch of the other ship, and Cecile's arms stretched out in readiness to catch the pair when it opened up.

"Three, two, one."

He winced when the hatch opened up at last, watching the air silently rush out of the vessel, pushing it away as Dana and Jayden leapt for the open airlock, arms wrapped tightly around each other to minimize the space they took up.

Every second was tense as they drifted closer and closer. He began counting upward, waiting for the moment that they landed in the airlock, his finger twitching over the controls.

Cecile caught hold of Dana's robes and used that grip to push her down. When he heard the thud of Mandalorian armor against metal, he shoved his finger right into the button, gritting his teeth hard.

Never was there a more relieving sound than the airlock pressurizing, and the inner door opening to the two as they gasped for air at last.

"Hey, breathe easy."

Dana was already red in the face, weakly untangling herself from Jayden while she clutched at her quivering fingers. It took a bit longer for Jayden herself to get her helmet off, also looking red from forcibly hyperventilating back on the other ship.

"Alright. Dana, I'll carry you to the medlab, and come back with another oxygen mask. Hang tight Jayden."

After awkwardly pulling them free of the airlock, Izan hoisted Dana up into his arms and began the awkward sideways shuffle through the corridor directly across the ship to the port side. Once she was lying on the single bed, breathing easier with the mask on, he rushed back to Jayden with hers. Cecile had returned inside by then, and was helping her to sit upright.

"Just relax, we'll all talk later. I got this under control."

Jayden's face had puffed up so much that she could barely see him by then, but she heard enough to weakly nod.

"Thank you, Izan."

"We'll find her. Somehow."


When Maarani looked up, two men were standing outside her cell. The black tattooing on their faces made it rather obvious they were Sith, which didn't bode well for her at all.

"Get up. Sloane's ready for you."

After the bitterness of losing Cecile, Maarani was feeling ready to be defiant until the end, bringing out her finger yet again.

Bitter clenched his teeth, starting to reach for his lightsaber. "Do that again and you lose the finger. Get. Up."

Before the tension grew worse, Night waved his hand at the controls, and then at Maarani, forcing her to stand in an unnatural way that made her wince at how contorted her muscles felt.

She still remained defiant.

"Go ahead, mutilate me. I'm not taking orders."

Night looked to Bitter, then back to her. "Mutilation isn't the way to get to you, is it? Perhaps we should tell Sloane we're taking a bit of time to persuade you…"

That made her glare back darkly, and with a growing fear. The tone in which he said that was very sinister, not just the typical dark threat of a Sith apprentice of pain and torment. There were emotions restrained behind it, most notably the way they both looked at her. Eyeing her up.

With that threat in mind, she clenched both hands and stepped out of the cell obediently. Night seemed to be satisfied at her co-operation, and much to her disgust, Bitter a little disappointed. At least she knew which of the two was technically more trustworthy.

Her hands remained clenched on the walk through the ship to the chamber. There was something more humiliating about it now that she was actually wide awake during, noticing every single head turn and glance from the officers and troopers they passed by alike. All human. The only time she even noticed non-humans was amongst the few Sith novices they passed; they at least ignored her altogether.

Disturbing as it was, the sight of the door to Sloane's chamber brought its own kind of relief, as it meant being free from Bitter's presence. Discreetly observing how the pair interacted with others of the crew told her enough. True to his name, and reinforcing her earlier assumption, Bitter was rather unlikeable compared Night, who on quite a few occasions had a smile for those they passed. And yet that also brought the sinking realization that Night was merely the more manipulative one, and her hopes of finding reason amongst Sloane's underlings were sorely misplaced.

As soon as the door was open, she stepped through, trying to appear reluctant still.

"Done shedding tears for circuitry and sheet metal? You should be more considerate of others as a projective empath."

Her fist remained tightly clenched as Sloane approached, looking just the same as she always did.

"Better to not get overly attached to anything, you're just going to keep crying about every new loss if you do."

When she drew closer still, Maarani clenched her teeth, remaining very quiet.

"Fine, if you're not going to speak, I suggest you make your way over to-"

In a flash, her fist rocketed up, striking Sloane right in the left jaw. While she recoiled from the momentary shock, Maarani grabbed for the left spiralling horn of her headdress, planning to yank it away so she could attack more of her face in the seething rage taking over once again.

As soon as it came off, the veil included, she was instead left stunned herself.

Rather than the expected stretches of flat skin covering the eye sockets, two perfectly normal looking eyes were fixated ahead. The irises were a touch grey, enough to make them out from the near veinless whites, but they were far from the ugly blank look she had heard described about atrophied eyes.

The surprise was more than enough time for Sloane to recover, practically launching Maarani overhead and slamming her onto the table, a sharp flick of her fingers bringing out the restraints, and tightening down further.

"And here I was trying to be a little more considerate!"

A spray of lightning leapt from her fingertips, surging right into the table to shock Maarani throughout her entire body while she screamed.

"You could have simply asked to look beneath the veil! Were you just curious? Or did you intend to mock me over a congenital defect!"

She fired another spray of lightning. Her creepily amused demeanour was entirely gone by then, replaced by her own form of cold rage, completely unfazed by the writhing and the wailing that Maarani was going through.

"Apologize and this stops!"

Through the agonizing pain, Maarani coughed back enough of the saliva buildup to swear at Sloane, earning another shock.

"I can keep this up for far longer than you can endure! I can keep your mind from letting your body fall unconscious! I can restart your bleeding heart when it gives out from the pain! Apologize!"

"No!"

"This stops when you apologize! Remember that!"

Outside in the hall, Night and Bitter remained in guarding positions either side of the door. The yelp from Sloane had caused them to turn towards it at first, ready to move to her aid, but the sounds of Maarani's screams shortly after reassured both that all was in hand.

"Mother dearest doesn't like it when we do that with the prisoners you know."

Night smirked. "It's called a bluff, Bitter. Just the threat is enough with her type. They really don't want anything to do with us."

"Since when have any of our prisoners taken an interest in Sith?"

"Psh, you're thicker than usual if you haven't figured her yet."

"Yeah yeah, you're the smart one around. Done reminding everyone of it for the day?"

Sloane's shouting grew louder still, followed by another crackle of lightning. This time, it was followed by another bout of sobbing instead of screaming.

"And she's broken. I don't think she'll try putting up a fight any more."

"Oh yes, because you prefer they just give in when there's no fight left anyway."

"It makes things cleaner." Night scoffed again as an amusing thought came to mind. "Hey, did you hear? Some dumb schluck walked right into a hazardous materials storage room, looks like he'll lose limbs for it. Someone tore off the warning label left on the door. Idiots didn't think to lock it as well."

"Why do they even use sheet labels attached to doors? What happened to holo-screens?"

"Would you want to be stumbling about in a power outage and not have a physical warning on the door?"

For once, Bitter accepted the point made without question. It left a pause in the conversation that let Sloane's softer, but still threatening voice through again.

"She could at least let us have a go at extracting information. We know how to be restrained."

"You know mother dearest, Bitter. She-"

They both quietly stood up a little straighter when Major Karren strode up the hall with some of her company of troopers in stride behind. She glanced at the door, then to both Sith with a discerning gaze.

"Is there a reason the two of you are here? Or are you merely done harassing my female troopers for the day?"

Night's smirk returned ever so slightly when he glanced at Bitter. "We felt like staying closer with mother this time while she works over the Twi'lek rat."

Karren took a sharp breath. "Consider watching your tone, Sith. Neither of you are Lady Sloane's blood; she will only tolerate so much in the end. I'll keep reminding you both of that fact until it sets in."

While she returned to the march, some of her troopers turned to glare at the pair of Sith on their way past, a few even tightening the grip on their blasters.

Both relaxed once the company was gone, Bitter taking the opportunity to scoff.

"'Consider watching your tone.' How dare she talk to you like that."

"Thank Darth Lasidia for punishing the discipline of mundanes with extreme prejudice. The amount of times I would have liked to wring Lise's neck, even just a little…"

"How's Darth Lasidia going to find out? She's still not back with the fleet."

"Mother will find out. She always does after all."


"So, you got the ship's access codes in addition to mapping out a fair portion of it, and you don't have a clue how?"

Cecile gave another little shrug while downloading the last of her recordings into the projector table. "I underwent standard diagnostics, part of which included a computer analysis, and only realized that data had been downloaded after the link was severed. I highly doubt the computer itself gave me such information, but I have no other explanation."

It only left Izan confused as ever. To save himself the further headache, he left the droid at the table and instead made his way over to Dana, who was still attending to an infected gash on her foot with some difficulty.

"I'm not getting anything out of Cecile, anything else I can do to help?"

Dana winced as she cleaned enough out to apply the kolto patch, the cold gel stinging on prolonged contact. "Nothing comes to mind." Once the pain had subsided enough, she carefully secured the patch down, keeping her foot resting over her knee in the meantime. "To think, two days of trudging through mud and muck, and it's right before we leave that wretched planet that I cut my foot open on a stick."

Izan did his best to smile along with her, though it still left him feeling gutted inside. Rescuing them had been far easier than expected, and that only made the concept of rescuing Maarani feel much harder by comparison, if at all possible.

And he still couldn't get the question out of his mind.

"Look, I'm no droid expert, but childcare models don't just have wipe-proof backups of their memory core and programming. Did Maarani mention anything?"

Dana gave a bemused smile and accompanying shrug. "Back on Coruscant when I first met up with her, we found Cecile in the company of a Khramboan, that was while we were scouring grey market shipyards for something suitable and untraceable. Anyway, Cecile had this big clamp on her head that apparently kept her programming and memory core locked down. Guess she was modified at some point, and they couldn't be bothered undoing it permanently so went for the clamp instead."

"Modified? Dana, if they didn't want her getting wiped, why wouldn't they just avoid having her wiped. That makes no sense…"

He looked over at Cecile again, who was still fully occupied with her holographic reconstruction of the ship. It was a day of realizations it seemed.

"Oh, it wasn't the host family that modified her. But that means..."

His head whipped back to Dana out of growing fear, only to see she was content as ever, if not outright unfazed.

"Maarani mentioned that some of the parts Carmen found in her were sixty years out of date. Whatever she was back then, she just saved both you and Maarani by taking the initiative. I'd say that's all you need to know about her loyalties, so what's there to worry about?"

Jayden's arrival in the common room at last brought that line of conversation to a halt. The chance to clean up had lifted her spirits considerably.

"Alright, assuming I don't keel over and start emptying my stomach repeatedly because of that planet's water, do we have a plan yet?"

Both Izan and Dana got up to approach the table, the latter keeping her foot up and hopping over in what would be a comical way if Jayden wasn't suddenly feeling so self-conscious about her artificial leg for it.

With a glance to the others, Izan decided to take the lead. "As far as I see it, we've got three main obstacles; the gun arrays, the energy dampeners, and the landing bay doors. That's just for getting on board at all, there are a lot of troopers and several Sith on board."

He gestured to points on the hologram for vague examples of his point. "We can't get back in through the lower bay. If we blast our way through, there'll be nothing to land on, and they certainly won't close it for us, so it'll have to be a side bay."

Jayden hummed in thought, looking over it herself a little while, then pointed to some of the sections right along the edge. "Here, there are smaller bays in these sections. Each ship has certain corridors locked down in different patterns from the others, made rescuing Omena difficult when we didn't have the plans for that exact ship, but the landing bays have always been in the same spot. They don't typically close them unless there's a reason to, because of how long it takes to open them back up. We can just blast or force our way back out once we're in the door."

"Fine, but that's still the last problem to get past. Even with the access codes Cecile somehow sliced from the computer, how do we put them to use before they hit us with the dampening field and finish with blaster cannons?"

Dana leaned her weight onto the table while getting a look at it herself. The mapping was definitely incomplete, but it was still far more extensive than she had expected Cecile to be able to cover discreetly. At the very least, they could memorize most of the corridors and labelled rooms, and guess their way through the rest. While looking it over, she was simultaneously thinking over the other problem, and soon reached a conclusion of her own.

"Many of the Imperial communication codes are deeply encrypted, but we might just be able to sneak a shutdown command through if we use one that the Jedi have cracked. Jayden, I think you'd have a better time convincing them, especially if you make it clear what the stakes are. They'll change it when we're gone after all."

"Maybe. We'd still have to get inside before they override the shutdown, and they'd pick us up on sensors well before. And there's also the issue of not knowing where the ship is now."

Cecile mimicked the sound of clearing a throat at that, getting the attention of the other three.

"While there, I removed a sign for hazardous materials storage."

All three sighed a little, Izan in particular failing to see the point. "And? How does that help us?"

Cecile's eyes flickered. "Sooner or later, someone will have an accident in there."

Jayden looked to Dana, who looked to Izan, who looked to Jayden. All were starting to come to the same idea.

"We scan for a departing shuttle, get on board for the navigation log and disable the long range comms, send them on their way and go back for the main ship before they leave. Might even get a clearance code while we're at it, make up some story about raiders while transmitting the shutdown command, and barrel in before they know what hit us."

Dana nodded, a full smile staring to form at last. "We'll still need the code from the Jedi temple, it'd take too long to decipher the one on the shuttle. But, assuming all off that works, we brute force our way through, blow the dampening field generator, break Maarani out and avoid as much weapons fire as we can on the escape. They'll have a harder time hitting a target moving away instead of towards them."

They all looked at each other again until Izan exhaled in a bit of a bewildered way.

"It's an absurd plan, relies so heavily on things working exactly how we need them to. What was it you said about 'the Force will protect us'? I think we're going to need every big of guidance and luck it has to spare on this one."

"We're doing this for Teegs, our friend. She's done a lot of crazy, questionable, and outright horrible things, but she's also done her best to make up for those things, and do right by so many others as well. I think that's reason enough to count on the Force protecting us on this endeavour."

Jayden tilted her head before nodding in agreement. "I wouldn't mind having a few extra Jedi, or a company of Mandalorians, but the heroes of old didn't have armies at their backs when one of them was in danger."

That made Izan pause. "My Jedi history isn't that strong, but didn't that end with Bastila getting turned to the dark side? What if…"

Dana reached across to him as best she could, moving to a reassuring expression. "Sloane won't break her that quickly. The Night's Bitterkiss cult was formed by Revan from Sith acolytes, all the techniques he used and passed on were meant to work on vulnerable, unhardened minds. I think it's safe to say Teegs is a lot stronger than that. We'll break her out well before then I'm sure." She glanced down at the projection again. "Imperials are accident prone after all, not properly looking where they're going."

"Yeah, they're only human after all."