Chapter 5

Chapter 5

"Ground level."

The turbo lift whirred almost imperceptibly to the top of the shaft and Maija wondered at the courage and resourcefulness of the Chitipeks. They were now forced to labour in their own factory, but still found time to work for the Rebellion. She paused - forced was a little strong since neither Krupek nor Lhinda toiled deep below the surface, but if they'd refused they would have been quietly removed from their positions of power and probably never heard of again. This way, they could help the Rebellion and their home world. They were given a good offer for the factories. Not what they were worth, but enough to leave them with no money worries. A lot of their wealth had already found its way to the Rebellion by some means or other. Their former positions naturally put them under a lot of suspicion but Krupek and Lhinda refused to let that stop them. They'd explained to the Sector Moff that they would, if possible, like to continue running the plants. They argued that they knew the processes and the employees. The Empire had agreed. In the end, the transfer of power from family to Imperial ownership had been relatively smooth. Their son, Rorri, was trying so hard to wait and do what his parents wanted him to, but he also wanted to be a man and fight for the life of his world. He wanted to do more than hang around at the top of a mineshaft on the off chance that he might see some action. Disillusionment with his life had already set in, but his parents didn't want to see all the innocence stripped from his eyes.

Maija still had their warm wishes echoing in her ears. 'May the Force be with you.' She hoped it was and she hadn't imagined that minute flash of awareness and the hope that Page had heard her words in his head. She couldn't be sure. She stretched out tentatively and was met with a muffled silence. Somewhere in her own mind there was a barrier and she had to learn to break it down. But did she want that? On second thoughts, she'd existed without it for years and had managed fine. It just got people killed. 'But it's your gift, your destiny,' the insidious voice in her head whispered. 'Use it'. Maija stared hard at the blank turbolift walls and again stretched out to see what was out there. And once again she sensed nothing, just the muffled feeling as if she'd been wrapped in too many layers of clothing. So many, in fact, that she could neither see nor hear.

"Jamia!" A voice hissed through the corridor as she exited the lift. "There's someone here."

"What!" Maija pulled her black cloak over her shoulders and attached her breath mask about her neck.

Rorri, his boyish face clearly anxious, stood trembling before her. His weapon was out of its customary holster and shook in his tight grip. "There's someone here, Jamia."

"Sithspawn," she muttered. "I must have been followed."

"Followed!" His eyes widened. "How could you have been followed? Who could have followed you? Where…? Do we evacuate?" The sentences emerged in short staccato gasps as Rorri gulped the words out worriedly. Things had never been so close to him before.

"No, not yet. If you have to leave, I'll send you a signal. Think before you act; the worst thing you can do is panic," her voice gentled reassuringly. "You're doing fine, Rorri. Krupek and Lhinda must be so proud of you and I know I can rely on you too."

"You're not just saying that?"

Maija gave him a wry look. "I haven't time to patronise you." Time was not in their favour, but she reckoned it was more important to calm the boy down first. Then he would be less likely to make mistakes and in the long run that was definitely the better option.

"It's a man and he's on his own. At least he seems to be on his own." He peered through his night-vision goggles.

"Has he got through the gate system?" she questioned as she fitted her mask over her face and indicated to the younger man that it was time for him to do the same.

"No - he's prowling around outside." Rorri copied her and they edged carefully towards the door.

Maija grabbed her blaster and eased slowly from the building into the night, blending as much as she could into the shadows. 'Stay back,' she signalled Rorri, her hand movements clear and concise, her weapon set to stun.

With a muffled oath, the mysterious follower kicked part of the interlocking metal gates. They rattled but didn't give. Maija stiffened in recognition at the sound of the hastily stifled curse. She knew that figure and she should have guessed he'd be the one following her. It was, unsurprisingly enough, Nerano. She'd given herself away too many times over the past few hours and he was not the naïve young man he'd once been. He'd developed into a competent imperial officer, if not overly brilliant.

'Unfair, Maija,' she told herself. 'He's a good man and he worked hard for his position. But you don't have to be brilliant to second-guess my loyalties.'

She groaned inwardly at her own unwitting betrayal of her true allegiance. 'Some rebel agent you turned out to be, Maija Darklighter.' For the first time in ages, it was brought home to her that she was not invincible and was as capable as the next officer of making mistakes. The idea was a sobering experience and a wisp of fear curled into her stomach.

She couldn't risk compromising the Chitipeks' safety and there were a lot of people in the Rebellion depending on her to provide them with some raw materials to help with the war effort. How to do both was the problem.

Rorri watched mindfully as Maija became lost within the twisted metal graveyard. He suddenly felt very alone and frightened, but he knew he couldn't let anyone down and he wouldn't. All of a sudden he heard a slight rustle next to him and it was with surprise that he saw Maija crawl back to his hiding position. She pulled her breath mask down and gave a faint gasp as the tainted air hit her throat.

"I know him - it's a colleague from the base. I should have guessed he didn't trust me. He's on his own right enough and I don't think he's told anyone yet that he is suspicious. At least I hope he hasn't." Maija crossed her fingers and willed a silent plea out into the open air. 'Please, don't have told anyone yet.'

She quickly and deftly checked the power pack on her blaster and shook her head in frustration. She was low on power and hadn't time to take spares with her. Hopefully she wouldn't be required to use it. "I'd like you to cover me until I get to the speeder and then let me out the back way. It may give him a clear shot at me, but I think with the element of surprise I should have enough time to get out in front of him. He doesn't know for sure it's me." She gave a faint grin, barely discernible in the darkness. "Once you've let me out, lock up the gates and get your stuff out to the new place. I know it's early, but it's probably a wise move. The fact he's here at all is a security risk."

"Good idea, Jamia. I'll do that immediately." Rorri was serious in his effort to be of use.

"You're in charge here, Rorri. You know the co-ordinates of the new shaft. Get your parents there and get the transmitters set up again. How quickly can you do it?"

Rorri grinned, his confidence returning. They shifted the equipment on a regular basis to avoid detection and Rorri had proved to be very capable at getting people in and out of places. He'd been practically brought up in his parents' factories and mines and knew the layout of each tunnel, shaft and storage level. Useful when hiding places were needed. It was only in the past few months that they'd realised how useful Rorri could be, although he still wanted to be in the thick of things - fighting.

"I can get the entire com centre stripped down in less than an hour and set up in about two more."

Maija nodded approvingly. "When you decide that your parents can cope on their own, I'm certain that the Alliance technical division could use people with that level of expertise."

"My parents don't need me here, Jamia. I'm ready now."

"They do, for a little while longer. They are depending on you, because you're their son and someone they can trust totally. They need that security. Look, Rorri." She turned and placed her hands on his shoulders. "I'm not just saying this." She sighed deeply, the air of world-weariness sitting awkwardly on her slim shoulders. "Aren't you studying at the Triadii Imperial College?"

The young man gave an unwilling nod.

"Finish your studies first, learn all the new techniques and develop some of your own. Take what the Empire can give you and learn to use it against them as I have. Your mother says you have a real gift for that kind of thing. She told me you can already set up and dismantle com centres faster than any Imperial technician."

"But…"

"That way you will still be alive in two years and be better equipped to help us."

Rorri's face fell, but he knew Jamia was right. "Do you ever regret getting involved so early in your life?"

She made a little sound somewhere between a pained laugh and a sigh. "I regret it, more than you'll ever know, but I had no choice." She sat with her back against the wall and rechecked her blaster again. "Check, Rorri - where is he now?" The blaster slipped a little in her sweaty hands.

"He's still too close," the young man answered in a low voice. "No… he's moving away."

Maija took a couple of steadying breaths and decided a few moments trying to save Rorri from doing anything rash might not go amiss and would help her too. It was important that he understood that it was not his time to act. "I was living this kind of existence before I was even born. I've never known any other way and it's not something I wish on you. My parents were members of the Rebellion essentially from its infancy. We're practically the same age and yet I feel as old as your mother. Don't wish away your time. Besides…" She sighed again. "We need you to protect them." Maija watched as he aimed a scanning device out into the blackness of the murky night. "He's still out there. Nerano is nothing if not thorough."

Peering into the blackness, she assessed her chances. "Is he far enough away yet for me to get to the hover car?"

"Just about - he's over by the far set of gates."

That should do, she decided. "May the Force be with you, Rorri Chitipek. Look after your family." She pulled the breathing mask back over her face and made a run for her vehicle.

Rorri watched carefully until he heard the faint but unmistakable sound of the engine being fired up. Then he activated one of the gates. Not to open but to bang shut with an audible clang. The sound was shocking in the almost-still of the night. The imperial soldier whirled away from the speeder's location towards the sound and Rorri clicked on Maija's com. With a grinding sound from the engine, she shot away.

The Imperial swore loudly and ran to his own vehicle, but she would already have several minutes on him. Rorri thought it might just be enough.

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Nerano stared uneasily into the darkness. The speeder he'd followed had disappeared somewhere around here and he was unsure how to proceed. If it was Maija, then she had to be one of the Rebels. He found it worrisome that such a brilliant student had turned to the Rebellion and become a traitor to her people. He'd finally worked it all out, and he didn't like the fact he'd been played for a fool for so long. She must have been brainwashed by the Rebel terrorists from childhood. How could people be so unscrupulous? Perhaps she was just an innocent caught up in all of this. Her parents had worked on Alderaan - clue number one. Her use of illegal electronic gadgets and the cousin who had died in the Rebel assault on the Death Star. Had he really died? Had he ever existed at all or was he another fabrication? Then he recalled that he had seen Biggs at the Academy when he'd graduated as one of the top cadets in his year. No - Biggs Darklighter had definitely existed and he was probably dead.

The final key to the puzzle was her unguarded comments over their meal. She'd been bitter and her low voiced observations had coiled into his brain. She genuinely cared for the people here while their plight and the conditions they worked under had never crossed his consciousness before. Perhaps he hadn't allowed it to. He was accustomed to feeling safe and cosily accepting the superiority of the Empire. Perhaps he should just say nothing and let her continue what she was doing, but then that would make him a Rebel by association and he couldn't turn a blind eye if it meant that more Imperial citizens lost their lives. He was a loyal officer and working in the service of the Emperor had been his only goal ever since he'd known wrong from right.

He wondered now at his parents' ambivalence at his chosen career. They were proud of him and their lives had become so much easier since he'd been accepted to and graduated from Raithal. Sure, they accepted the perks, but it was the proud, yet fearful expressions on their faces every time he came home on leave that he remembered now. It was as if they thought they might never see him again. His father had been given a promotion at the firm in which he worked and his mother could choose from several of the more exclusive social clubs in the town where they lived. He was glad that he'd been able to do that much for them.

Maybe he was overreacting and Maija wasn't really a rebel spy after all but deep down Franjeer Nerano was sure he'd matched the sandperson with his bantha. He started running towards his own vehicle, dodging discarded piles of rusting metal and small acidic puddles of water. What a hellish position to be in. Betray the one person who'd believed in him all those years ago and helped him gain the place he'd wanted so badly, or murder his own ideals and betray his beliefs in the Empire he'd sworn to protect and give his life for if he could? It was no choice at all - not really.

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Maija gunned the speeder; emerging back at Rorek's used speeder lot. Thank the Force she'd signalled ahead. Rorek had her vehicle waiting. No time to change. She dived into the driver's seat and switched to autopilot. What Rorek couldn't do to an ordinary Imperial covered speeder wasn't worth bothering with. With any luck he'd added one or two extra bonuses for her. But now wasn't the time to ask and she hit the throttle and roared into the gradually recovering city. Having an ordinary speeder fitted with a guidance system might just save her hide - this time. Piling her hair on top of her head, she shoved her hat on top and wormed her way into her Imperial uniform jacket - just in time to take over manually as the vehicle approached the outer perimeter fence of the garrison compound.

Minutes later, Lieutenant M. Darklighter presented her late pass to the guard on duty at the entrance to the garrison compound. All he saw was another officer; hair scraped back and smartly attired. He filed the pass away, not realising that when verified, it had wiped itself clean of all information and checks would find no record of Lieutenant Darklighter leaving or entering the base that day.

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Maija's door chime rang loud and continuously, interrupting the almost frantic haste of the room's occupant.

Maija took a deep breath, pulled on her robe, and walked as slowly as she could to the door.

"Yes…" she croaked sleepily. "Who is it and what do you want - it's late!"

"Nerano." He barked his name gruffly.

"I'll see you tomorrow."

"No." He kept sounding the door chime. "Now!"

"Okay, okay." She made a great play of fumbling for the door controls.

"Open up or I'm going to security."

"Nerano, can't this wait?" she almost wailed and the door slid reluctantly aside.

Maija stood partly behind the door of her darkened room, her dilated in the dark and she blinked at the harsh glare of the corridor lighting.

Nerano's mouth opened in dumbfounded amazement. Maija's flushed sleepy face greeted him framed by tangled dark curls. Over her shoulder, he could see the neat room and the rumpled bed lit by a single small light. Hanging on a hook was her fresh uniform for the morning… and then there was Maija herself.

Her hair tumbled over her shoulders and drew his unwilling attention to the column of her throat accentuated by the collar of the floor length robe she clutched to herself. Her eyes drooped, heavy lidded, giving her an entirely different appearance. Nerano swallowed. This wasn't the little girl he'd known for all these years. This was a young woman… There was no way she could have been the person he'd followed, but he'd been so sure.

"What is it, Nerano?" Her voice was husky with sleep.

"I… I'm sorry to have woken you. It will keep. I'll see you in the morning," he stammered as he began to back away from the door. How could he have been so wrong? He was thoroughly perplexed.

"I really am sorry for disturbing you," he muttered and fled.

Maija closed the door and smiled with cold satisfaction as the aspects of sleep vanished from her eyes. The robe dropped from her shoulders to reveal part of the Triadi factory costume, her tunic trousers and two very muddy Imperial issue boots. She pursed her lips and shook her head. Good job he hadn't spotted those. It would have been a dead give-away. Even out on the rim, you didn't wear your boots to bed.

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Spaceport

The team of maintenance workers looked as if life barely registered in them as they waited for their next set of instructions. The seedy surroundings of the port left little desire in them to show much in the way of emotion. Luke Skywalker battled fatigue as he waited with them. With his hair dyed brown and with his face stained, the young man looked very different from the numerous holos flooding the galaxy in an attempt to capture him. Why he was exactly here, he had no idea, but Page had sent word that it was important and a request from Page was always treated with the seriousness it deserved. He was told he had to ensure homing devices got on to some cargo ships. So he'd left Hoth, where he really needed to be and travelled to this miserable place. At least it was warmer than Hoth - come to think of it, anywhere was warmer than Hoth. It reminded him of Mos Eisley except worse and a touch of homesickness and longing for his former life washed over him. A hint of decay hung over the whole planet - he could feel it through the Force.

A tall, black-clad Imperial officer strode over to the unkempt group and handed the foreman a data card. The man didn't acknowledge the Imperial, merely turned away and spat on the ground. Luke resisted the urge to grin. Somewhere, even in people totally under the Imperial yoke, there existed a bit of resistance - some tiny automatic sparks of rebellion. But Luke also got the feeling that they would behave in exactly the same fashion no matter who the masters were.

The Imperial officer sneered at the apparent crudeness of this lower being but for now he needed them and carefully stepped around the globule of spit mocking him from the ground. Luke slouched his slight frame and assumed the posture of the others.

"We hafta load."

That was all that was said but Luke knew this was his chance. He had to slip some marking tags in with the load. One to find out where it was really going and another to help the Alliance locate it if it should happen to land in their laps. Page had seemed to think it was a possibility. It would also give Luke a chance to find out how many ships there would be and what the guarding escort would be like. He moved off after the last man and joined the work party.

"You the contact?" The foreman shuffled next to him, showing the screen on his beat-up portable reader.

Luke gave a sideways glance and continued working. The correct pass codes had flashed onto the display before disappearing.

"I gotta send a signal. We have someone on the base." He pushed the datareader into his pocket and hefted a large crate into burly arms and shoved it at Luke.

"It's not safe to talk here." Luke muttered, appalled at the lack of security, while trying to adjust the weight in his arms. This life he was leading was dangerous, but the apparent carelessness of these contacts made it seem that they were just asking to be caught.

"Sure it's not. I'm not talking. Look," the man's voice rose a little in exasperation. "Will you be sending the signal or will I?"

Luke turned his back on him to place the crate on top of a repulsor sled. Digging his hand into his tunic he pulled out a silver cylinder and made a couple of adjustments to it. With a faint hiss which was covered by the many sounds of the spaceport, Luke's lightsaber sprang into careful blue life. He'd used one of its alternative settings and a thin sliver of light carved a slit in the side of the durasteel box.

The Imperial stormtrooper wandered over, his rifle displayed ready to instil fear in the workers. "You there. Quit wasting time."

Luke switched off his saber and replaced it before the trooper could see anything but still had time to slip a couple of markers into the crate.

"Who us?" the man muttered and waited till the trooper wandered over to the other working groups. Once his attention was away from his line, the contact gave Luke an irritated stare. "Well?"

Luke ducked his head down, annoyance clouding his blue eyes. "Who do I contact?" he hissed out of the corner of his mouth.

"Dunno! Some agent they got stashed in the garrison. We don't talk, we just signal. He, she or it just sends some numbers back and we send them on. Or you do. You new to this?"

"Okay," Luke sighed heavily, trying to keep his dwindling patience. Why on earth was he wasting time here when he could be back on Hoth with the rest of the group? "No, I'm not new to this."

A rather grubby data card transferred into Luke's possession along with the next box and Luke purposely staggered under its weight.

"The boy here," his companion yelled at the stormtrooper. "He needs five."

The white-armour-clad man moved alongside Luke and assessed his condition. Luke sat slumped in a heap, apparently too tired to move.

"I just need a breather," he panted, his eyes cast down. "I need this work. My mother's sick. I'll work extra hard. We need the money - medicine is expensive. Don't fire me."

"Five minutes," the disembodied voice echoed distantly from the helmet speaker and the black anonymous eyes gazed dispassionately at the pathetic human specimen before him. "Five minutes only and then you're back on. This is not a resort world. You're here to serve the glory of the Empire and the Emperor."

"Yeah, right." Luke drawled, his blue eyes cynical.

The Stormtrooper paused and Luke felt a little uneasy as he held the soldier's gaze, until the foreman bustled up with a data reader and a stack of cards. "Here, young one. While you rest you can read out the loading orders, then you're still being useful." He turned to the trooper and muttered in a loud stage whisper. "The kid here, father was killed by the rebels. His mother never really recovered. He provides the income for the family."

The trooper shook his head before walking away. The Empire was carrying many people but he supposed if they were desperate to work he would turn a blind eye for a short while.

Luke slid the card home and tapped in the commands it gave him and suddenly he felt a crack through the fabric of the Force. It was a strange sense of something unravelling. He shivered and caught an almost familiar presence. His first thought was 'Lord Vader', but no, this was a weak echo of something and then it was gone. He frowned, his blue eyes distant. He had the feeling his life was about to change and would never be the same again. He should have been with Commander Narra with the supply run to Derra Four, but the Force had willed that he be here instead. He turned his attention back to the datareader's display. A series of codes and positional vectors came back along with a short message.

"Good luck, Page. May the Force be with you."

"Well, I'm not Page, but I'm here on his behalf and I appreciate the sentiment - whoever you are." Luke murmured to himself. Page had been heading out towards the Outer Rim territories last time he'd heard. Something was brewing out there.

Still, his work here was over. He'd planted the markers; he now knew the size of the convoy and its likely escorts. A couple of capital cruisers for every ten ships, each equipped with a full compliment of TIE fighters. The data in the card had provided all the information he needed. Hopefully the spy in the garrison could provide the location. Concentrating as hard as he could, Luke spun a line in the Force and one of the boxes slid to the edge of the loaded repulsor sled. Sweat broke out on his brow and he lifted his hand a little. His shoulders slumped. Call himself a Jedi! He didn't know the first thing about using the Force properly and without training… The only man who could have trained him was dead. Squashing his moment of self-pity, he summoned up a last piece of desperate effort. Again Luke reached out and finally eased the box over the edge, where it toppled onto the ground with a resonant crash. In the resulting confusion, he slipped from the loading area and returned to the location of the shuttle he'd been using. Things were looking good so far. His shuttle was as he had left it. There had been word of a ship-to-ship search for security reasons but so far it hadn't materialised.

"Time to go," he murmured into his comlink. "Artoo! Fire up the converters."

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Imperial Garrison

Maija sat alone in her office dealing with the commander's correspondence when a light began to shine on her console. Incoming data and with a particular code added to it that made her heart beat a little faster, but as she reached out to transfer the data to her screen she was shot through with a frisson of awareness in the Force. It was as if all the lights had gone back on because she'd been in the dark for so long. As suddenly as it had appeared, the feeling left her but it had been so strong that instinctively she'd reached out to touch the feeling. Another Force user? She couldn't be sure. She rubbed her shaking hands over her face before transferring the data to a data card and sending the encrypted information back as required. She knew what this meant. The ships were being loaded on time and her period as an Imperial employee was probably up. A faint tinge of fear entered her mind. She would do what she had to. For now it was a waiting game.

And high in the ceiling a mechanical spying device watched unblinking.