NOTHING STAYS THE SAME
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Mara had spent several minutes searching for her lightsaber, which had been flung from the gun turret she'd been in during the crash. After unsuccessfully looking for the weapon, she finally closed her eyes and pictured her saber in her hand, and used the Force to pull it to her from wherever it had been. It nearly tore a hole in the chunk of hull that it had been buried under.
"I thought you kept telling Luke not to use the Force for frivolous things," Corran reminded her. He had used his silver blade on the hull so that he could begin taking supplies from the ship. Mara had given herself ten minutes to get away from the ship. She still didn't hear a whine from any kind of transport, but she kept herself open to the Force so she would know as soon as someone, anyone entered the vicinity.
"This wasn't frivolous. I needed my saber, and we don't have all day. What do you have, so far?"
"Enough rationbars to make even you happy." The Corellian Jedi shook his head. "I don't know how you eat those things."
"You get used to it quickly." She walked past Talon, who was half-seated on a large rock. "Weapons?"
"I don't have room for them."
"Fine." She picked up the holsters and put them around her shoulders and across her chest; acting like it was something she did every day. She fitted the blasters into their holders and grabbed one of the backpacks that Corran had found. She stuffed blaster power packs into it, and finished off grabbing a medpack. Checking her chrono, which had somehow survived the crash, she realized that they'd been out at the crash site for five minutes longer than she'd wanted.
"We've got to get out of here," she said, walking over to Talon. Her employer had a sickly grey complexion, and Mara knew it was no doubt because of shock. She and Corran had to get him somewhere quickly where they could better bandage his leg. Their quick sprint was better than she expected, but Talon was still undoubtedly in extreme pain. Breaking two bones in the same leg was definitely excruciating, as Mara knew. Several of her missions as the Emperor's Hand had gone wrong, and she'd spent more time in the bacta tank than anyone she knew. Well, except for Luke. That farmboy sure knew how to get himself into troublesome situations.
She and Corran both helped Talon to his feet and they half-carried him away from the ship as quickly as they could.
Cara waited for the old woman to acknowledge her presence. It would be nothing new if her mistress made her wait two hours before coming out of her trance-like state. It had happened before. She stayed on one knee, head bowed.
Carefully shielding her mind, she fumed at the old woman. Why should one woman, not even a fully trained Force user, presume to have complete control over Cara and the others? There were two other women, all who were bodyguards for the same damned old woman. Who was this human, who assumed so much power?
Cara glanced up with only her eyes, not moving her head one centimeter. The old woman was watching her. Cara recognized the gleam of barely concealed anger in the old woman's eyes.
"You've shielded your mind against me? Do you honestly believe I can not read your mind easily enough?"
"I apologize, my lady," Cara told the woman. "I only shielded my mind so that my thought would not distract you from your meditation."
"Of course. I trust you have news?"
"The Retaliator sent a squad to check on the wreckage. It appears at least three were on board. One carried a lightsaber, or so the cuts indicate.
"They all survived?" Disgust was evident in the old woman's voice.
"It appears so. No bodies were discovered, and the scanning crew should be onplanet in a few minutes. The captain has explicit instructions to notify you immediately with the details."
"Good, Cara. You did this yourself?"
"Yes, my lady." You stupid old hag.
The old woman laughed. She had obviously missed Cara's mental addition. "You truly are the smartest of my daughters. Your sisters are failures."
"Thank you, my lady." Cara forced a light smile on her face. She hoped the old woman didn't take offense at her. She was offended by so much these days.
"Make certain, dear Cara, that Mara Jade will come here." The woman turned away. "Smartest or not, I will kill you with my own hands if you fail me."
Luke felt like he was floating in midair. He could feel Han's heartbeat, still not strong enough for his liking, but methodic. Luke had been able to locate the main source of the bleeding, and repaired it. Now Luke was weakening while his brother-in-law was strengthening. The Jedi debated whether or not to come out of the trance before he was too weak to.
He blinked his eyes a few times in the dark room before he realized the reason everything was fuzzy and shadowy was because the room was barely lit.
"Chewie?" he asked hoarsely. His throat and mouth was dry. Han looked the same as he had when Luke placed him in the trance, except that all the blood on the shirt, vest, and bed sheets was dark and old.
The door slid open with a shriek of badly oiled gears. Luke reminded himself to either oil the door or have Chewbacca take it off completely. That was, of course, after Luke felt he could walk again.
He saw the silhouette of three people in the doorway, and it wasn't until the door screeched closed that Luke realized Chewbacca had brought Talon in. Chewbacca gently put the smuggler chief on the other bed in the small room. Luke lurched to his feet and limped over to the other injured man.
"How is he?" Skywalker asked quietly. He didn't think he could speak above a whisper right now.
"Broken bone. Upper leg. At least that's what it looks like. Mara and I put a splint on it, but it needs to be looked at by a real doctor. Or a meddroid. There doesn't happen to be one here, is there?"
"No." The Jedi didn't elaborate on what else the aging home was lacking. "He's going into shock. Corran, grab some blankets, anything. We need to bring up his temperature before it drops too much. When did he lose consciousness?"
Corran glanced at Mara. "About five minutes before we arrived?"
"Yeah," she agreed. "Give or take a minute." She walked up to Skywalker. "Luke, go take a break. You're tired, and you need to sleep. Corran and I can take care of this."
"Mara—"
"Don't argue with me, farmboy, especially when you know I'm right. Now, get out of here. Corran, I don't see any blankets yet!"
Mara wasn't sure what time it was when she finally let herself go up to the second floor of the house. Luke had disappeared up here an hour or so before. It had taken that long to bring Talon back around, and to fit a new, better fitting splint on his leg. Even with that, he and Han would not be able to do much. Mara already figured that she and Luke would have to go find out who his captors were. This operation had to be shut down, but not without some questions answered first. Of course, Mara thought to herself, the assassin part of her mind coming to play, I wouldn't mind having to skip the interrogation and going straight to the fun.
She walked lightly up the stairs to the attic, but the top step creaked anyway. Luke glanced back at her and held his hand out towards her. She took it and sat down next to him, and he put his arm comfortably around her shoulders and kissed her. Both were careful not to let their Force senses mingle too much. Every time they did that, any Force-sensitive in the vicinity would suddenly become aware that something was happening. That was one way that Corran knew what had gone on between them, and they didn't want to give the former CorSec officer anything else to comment on. They'd have time to do more sometime else. It was a few minutes before she pulled away.
His eyes raked over her body. Her wet flightsuit clung to her curves more than usual.
"You've lost weight," he said, concerned. "Too much. Haven't you been eating?"
"Yes," she answered, but with none of her normal defensive tone. If he knew how little she'd eaten in prison, she'd be in for a lecture for him. He'd always worried more about her health than she did. "Why is it I'm always stuck coming out to the middle of nowhere to save your ass? Would it be all that difficult for you to nearly kill yourself on some nice planet, with actual hotels and everything?"
"What would be the fun in that, MJ?" he asked her. Mara couldn't remember when he had begun calling her MJ. He was the only one who called her that.
"I'm better than you at roughing it, farmboy, but I still wouldn't mind a nice place to make plans to attack bad guys in." She pulled away and looked at him carefully. "How are you?"
"Okay. Normal stuff. Captured, got the shit beaten out of me…nothing permanent. I doubt I'll even have scars."
"Scars? What did they use?" she asked suspiciously. Scars happened with beatings, but she had a feeling that they used weapons, instead. "Beaten" sounded much nicer than the alternatives.
"An old fashioned nerf-hide whip."
"They whipped you? What for? What did they want to know?" Mara tried hard to keep emotion from her voice. When Luke said that they had beaten him, she'd expected punches, kicks…they still hurt, but anyone with a whip could seriously hurt a captive, intentionally or not, especially if they were inexperienced with such weapons. She herself had rarely ever used a whip, and then it was a Force-whip, and a pain in the ass to control, even for the Emperor's Hand. For assassinations and such, a blaster worked just fine. And the occasional detonator.
"You know what's funny?" he asked her. "I don't remember what they wanted. I barely remember the whip." He pulled her close. "I just don't remember. I'm not even sure whether they asked me anything or not."
"Why would they kidnap you and not want any information? Were they Imperials?"
"Women. I didn't see any guys. Just two women."
"Descriptions?"
"One old, one young. I don't remember much about the old one…the imposter. The younger one was the imposter. She does look like you."
"How close?"
Luke was quiet for a few minutes. "She really looked like you. Her hair was all red, though. None of your highlights. But she was…mechanical. She didn't have the attitude you show in your walk."
Mara thought about this, and then finally said, "Here, let me have a look at those cuts."
"They're fine, Mara. None of them are deep."
"Shallow, for pain. The deeper you go, the better chance you have of seriously wounding the person, and without proper medical attention, bleed to death."
"You talk like you know about these things," he said.
"I do."
"I know." He stretched his arms a little, and hoped that Mara didn't see the grimace that crossed his face before he could control it. She could be so overprotective sometimes. "Do you have any idea how much I missed you?"
She looked up at him. "Do you have any idea how I felt when they told me you were killed?" She thought about letting him know about everything, but she'd tell him later. It wasn't necessary for him to know of her incarceration for this mission.
"I am so sorry, Mara."
"What for, Skywalker? You never intended to get yourself kidnapped and beaten. At least, I should hope not."
"I didn't. I've had enough of these nice little interrogation sessions. I don't like them, and I don't want them."
"Good. You had me worried there for a minute."
"Oh, come on, MJ. You know me better than that."
"True. Now, are we going to talk all night…morning, whatever, or are we going to get some sleep?"
Luke tried to stifle a yawn. "It has been a while since I've slept."
"How long?"
"Way too long." After a few minutes, she knew that he had fallen asleep, his arms still tightly around her. He didn't want to chance her leaving while he was still asleep. She turned in his arms so that she was facing him, and brushed a lock of blond hair from his face. He still needs a haircut, she thought to herself. Oh, what the hell. He looks better with this farmboy cut than he would military style. She wished that she had asked him more questions about where he'd been, and what he'd done since. But she had missed him, enough to where she put the mission behind her just to make sure that he was all right.
Sleep now, she thought to him. Because once all this is over, we are going for a very long, enjoyable vacation.
