Part Three – Flashback

I half stumbled into the lounge the next morning around 0600, tying my long blonde hair into an extremely messy ponytail, trying to clear my thoughts into something coherent. Kell pushed a cup of caf into my hands. Gratefully, I downed half of it, and stumbled towards a chair, smiling slightly at Cloud. As Kell turned away to fill a cup for himself, Cloud opened his mouth to speak but I shook my head slightly and mouthed 'not now' exaggeratedly at him. Getting the message, he nodded and went back to the way he had been before.

As Kell came to take a seat next to me, a cup of caf in his own large hands, he frowned slightly at Cloud.

"Hey Cloud," Cloud's head jerked sharply upwards, "I've got a bone to pick with you."

Oh no! I'd heard those words before, three years ago when Kell had found out about my last boyfriend. And then again last week.

10 days earlier

I sat quietly, fiddling with several listening devices, totally ignoring the rest of the Wraiths, my mind on my work. Frowning slightly, I once again dissembled one of the less high-tech devices and went back to trying to make it better.

I lifted my eyes up slightly as Adra and Nicola walked in. Nicola, looking much better than she had been earlier, went to go sit by Bror and Adra dragged Face back out of the lounge. Face tossed a datacard at me which I caught, put in my datapad, skimmed, and then went back to my work.

Frowning slightly, I started to reassemble the listening device. It wasn't my best work by far, but it was the best I could do with older than space dust parts. Leaning back in my chair, I finally took a break from my work, just in time to see Kell looking over at Nicola.

"What's this all about, Nicola?" Kell asked suspiciously. Nicola merely smiled and shook her head. Kell glared at her and turned towards me.

"Could I borrow one of those, 'Ria?" he asked, his blue eyes begging. Rolling my own blue eyes, I tossed one to him, the one I'd just fixed in fact.

Grinning insanely, Kell caught it and began to turn it on. Gaeriel looked sharply over at Nicola, most likely expecting her to grab the device away from Kell with the Force. But instead, Nicola merely raised an eyebrow at Gaeriel, acting like she had no clue what Gaeriel expected. I had to stifle a laugh at the fake innocent look on Nicola's face. Even though Nicola was sitting there, pretending to clueless as the rest of us about what Kell wanted to know and Gaeriel expected her to know, I was pretty sure she did and knew exactly what Adra was telling Face.

But then again, it really wasn't my problem. Taking a long sip of my water, I watched Gaeriel summon my device to her with the Force and Nicola sent it zooming back to Kell. The look on Gaeriel's face was priceless, her shock was more that clearly evident.

Ignoring Gaeriel and Nicola's one-sided conversation about whether or not that had been the right thing to do, I watched Kell set up my little device, Ryok and Cloud watching him impatiently on either side. Laughing inwardly at the three men, I went back to my work.

I didn't look up until about ten minutes later when I heard Adra and Face come back in and Kell speaking disapprovingly to Adra.

"Alright Adra, I've got a bone to pick with you. Care to enlighten us? I'm sure the rest of the squadron would love to know whatever Imperial secrets you told Face."

Sighing inwardly, I realized that there was little hope for my brother as Adra used some rough hand to hand moves on him, leaving him gasping for air. Turning back to my work once more, I managed to ignore the rest of the 'conversation' until my glorious sibling tried to tackle Adra. I looked up just in time to see Kell go crashing to the floor.

"Was that really necessary?" I asked my hacking partner. I mean really! Couldn't a woman have a few moments of peace without datacards being chucked at you and your friend beating up your brother?

Adra raised an eyebrow at me, her temper rapidly heating. "It was just as necessary as his assumptions of my withholding Imperial information and accusing me of it. I'll leave you to weigh the evidence."

Now a bit annoyed, I gathered up my 'gear' and headed off towards my lad, mumbling about how a woman couldn't get a second's peace here. I opened the lounge door...

And with I jolt, I was back in the present again, but not for long as another memory came up...

I was twenty-one again, still in Wraith Squadron, still Circuitry Girl, but currently seeing a Reg Davund. Reg grinned at me as I opened my room door. Grinning back at him, I grabbed my purse and shut the door behind me, my fingers quickly keying in the lock combination.

We'd almost made it out of the Wraith Headquarters when an all too familiar voice came from slightly behind us.

"Hey Davund!" We came to a halt and slowly turned around. Surprise, surprise; it was Kell.

"Hello Kell," Reg greeted the fellow pilot.

"I've got a bone to pick with you," Reg raised an eyebrow. Both of Kell's strong hands came up and pinned Reg against the wall. "What the hell are you doing with my sister, Reg?"

Shocked, Reg managed to gasp out, "Dating her,"

Kell's expression grew stormy and I immediately wished that I had on my comfortable old flightsuit and I could suitably deal with my idiot of a relation. Managing to get Kell away from Reg, I grabbed my comlink from my belt.

"Face Loran, wherever the Sith you are, get the hell back to base and to the lounge entrance. Do me a favor; get Kell very, very drunk."

A chuckle emerged from the other end. "Yub yub, Circuitry Girl! Poster Boy over, out, and on his way," Sighing with relief, I thumbed my comlink back off and shoved Kell into the lounge.

"If he hurts you 'Ria, I'll kill him," Kell said fiercely, digging into his pockets and coming back out with a detonator. I grabbed it from him, broke the firing pin, and then proceeded to completely dissemble the detonator, only handing it back to him when there would be no chance of him completely fixing it within the next 5 hours.

Grinning at him, I closed the door on his face and set off at almost a dead run with Reg towards the exit of Wraith HQ, leaving a furious and worried Kell behind. We'd gotten lucky, Kell hadn't blow Reg up this time, but next time, we might not be so lucky...

And I was back in the present again, looking worriedly back and forth between Kell and Cloud.

"What might that be, Kell?" Cloud asked tentatively.

"How come you never told me how you made old Windu's lightsaber into a bomb?"

I almost laughed with relief, I'd thought for 5 very long seconds that Kell had found out about me and Cloud. Also rather relieved, Cloud launched into a full blown, half an hour-long description about how exactly he had done so. About how exactly he had done so. I sat there quietly, downing the rest of my caf and got another as various other Wraiths filed in. Ryok joined Cloud and Kell's discussion, Face and Bror entered together, worried expressions on their faces. I could just make out the words "up all night," from Bror and Face replying "Adra too," before they moved out of my range of hearing. I nodded in greeting to both Asyr and Elix as they entered, still a bit sleepy eyed.

And then Adra and Nicola entered faces gaunt and tired, but identical grins on. And they were headed straight towards me.

"So Tyria," Adra began, glancing at Nicola. "Can we, say..."

As Adra trailed off, Nicola picked up her sentence. "Ask you about last night?"

Keeping my face perfectly straight, inwardly I cursed violently, glad that Face had taught me how to do so 5 years ago. Raising an eyebrow, I replied, a large grin on my face,

"Sure Adra, but only if I get to tell everyone about your little 'dilemma'."

That shut her up. Adra paled rapidly as I opened my mouth to speak again when Kell cut me off.

"Wait, what's this about Adra having a little 'dilemma,' Tyria?" Kell asked me, obviously clueless.

Winking at Nicola and Adra, I replied, "If you really want to know Kell, I'd suggest getting Face really really drunk."

Kell looked between Adra and me once more before grinning and saying to Face, "Hey Face! Ho-"

He didn't even get past the third word before Face shook his head exuberantly and replied, "Absolutely not. I'm good Kell, quite fine. I just got over my last hangover three days ago and after what Adra did to make it worse, I don't feel like giving her the opportunity to be that mad again and repeat the torture."

Grinning, I went back to sipping my second cup of caf, trying to wake up. And life went on in Wraith HQ, though some secrets were known, and the life of one depended on my brother not finding out about one of them.