Chapter Two – Warped

Unfortunately it wasn't 'hats off' for me. As the last of the blaster bolts hit the durasteel door, I whirled around, blaster still in hand, and walked towards the doors leading out of the Academy; the doors to my freedom. I'd hardly gone two paces when I heard the door I'd shot as release.

As it slid back, I looked over my shoulder to see the General and the Colonel standing there, General Tallon in front. The cadet line straightened under his gaze, but I could see him only watching me. For it was me, 'his' child, who held the hand blaster.

I turned again, continuing on out of the room. The grip I had on my blaster tightened ever-so-slightly as I headed the door. A hand rose to hit the pressure release, but orders were orders.

And orders had come.

"Cadet Tallon," began Colonel Naam. The General stopped him, instead speaking himself.

"Explain yourself, Cadet," the voice I'd known for as long as I can remember came across the now-silence between us.

I stayed in my place, glaring the daggers I'd like to be glaring at him into the wall instead. Then the order came for me to turn around and face the rest of the room. I did as much, all the while glowering at whatever my eyes touched.

The General nearly took a step back when he saw my face but instead repeated the earlier order to explain myself.

"No, I'm good. Though thank you for offering, Sir," the reply I gave was most definitely insubordinate; something I'm sure I could get a court martial over.
Something flickered behind the General's military gaze. He opened his mouth to reply, but then the jaw stayed dropped, his eyes widening, as I raised the blaster I was still holding and put it to my head.

At once my world seemed to jump into frame-by-frame slow motion. The group of cadets all moved out of their line, the commanding officers of the Academy all lunging forward. Colonel Naam's eyes seemed to bulge out of his head and he stretched out a hand, as if he could call the blaster from my hand. General Tallon was the only person who seemed to be doing much to stop me. I saw the word 'no' on his lips, heard it's echoes, as my finger began to tighten around the trigger.

You know how people say that right before you die your whole life flashes in front of you? Well, mine did. But somehow it seemed to go beyond my nine years in life. A woman- 19 maybe?- was holding a man in an orange flightsuit to a wall and something about the woman's face made me wonder who the Sith she was. The image faded abruptly as a very large something plowed into me.

My finger closed on the trigger just as I felt it my arm being wrenched out of position next to my temple. The blaster bolt careened into the ceiling. It took me a minute to realize that I was still alive, and somehow I was a bit glad. I'd take death over living as an Imperial any day...but I didn't really want to die. But it's better to die a martyr to your cause then to live for the traitorous one. General Tallon's head swam in and out of my focus and my eyes fixed on some point above him in the ceiling. Vaguely I heard what sounding like a very distorted version of Colonel Naam's voice telling someone to get a medic. Then the world began to swim again and I found it easier to surrender into unconsciousness.

***

Although I could tell you little details about what happened in the days that followed, the details I might be able to make get you to comprehend would be so blurred and misshapen, they wouldn't make sense anyway. All I know is that I was unconscious for a week after I hit my head on the durasteel floor at the Academy. After I woke and learned how long I'd been knocked out, I also learned that General Tallon had ordered that I not be allowed to touch a blaster. He'd even gone so far as to strip my room of what he thought were all the guns in it. Namely three visible blasters. Of course, he didn't realize that I had far more stashed away in secret little hidey-holes in case he made such an order.

Three days after I woke up, my mother decided I looked well enough to get out of my bed and come to breakfast. This I did obligingly, not so much because I wanted to eat with them, but because I was getting very bored with staring at my closet door.

I picked up a piece of soft fruit and rubbed it on my shirt, just to be sure it was cleaned off. And it was then, at this breakfast, that I heard the greatest of news. My mother came rushing into the room, a slightly sad, slightly angry expression on her face. She waved a datapad around wildly, the R4 unit- Bolt- beeping out of sight behind her.
General Tallon looked up quickly to his wife, and I could tell he was a bit worried about her wild antics. It was probably something stupid, like they decided not to let Garik Loran star in some new holovid or another. Well, I was half right. It was about The Face.

"Trude, you will not believe this!" my mother's expression got a bit angrier as she spoke. "Garik Loran has up and deserted! Rebel extremists attempted to kill him, then a whole squadron of stormtroopers came in to save him- which they did, I might add- and then he up and walked off to the Rebel Alliance! Can you believe the nerve of that..."

But I didn't even listen to the rest of her words. I took a bite of the fruit I'd been holding as calm as you please, but inside I was shouting with glee. He deserted, he deserted! Face Loran deserted! Praise whatever power's out there, Garik Loran's a rebel!

My mother didn't appear to be very pleased with my uncaring expression. She quickly turned her own into a heavy glower as I continued eating. The General looked over at me, his eyes calculating. My mother opened her mouth to start yelling again, only this time at me, but General Tallon interrupted her not-yet-started bawling out.

"Lina, dear, leave Adra alone. She's just recovered enough to come to a family gathering of some sort, even if it is only breakfast, and you do not need to be yelling at her."

Family gathering? Ahem, excuse me, did he just say 'family gathering'? Family gathering my afterburners! More like necessary torture! However, I was pleased to get out of the verbal thrashing I was sure my mother was going to instill if the General hadn't stepping in.

Still, she persisted in one thing, "Fine, I won't say anything. However Adra, I want all those holovids that he's in. I'm going to get rid of them."

Like Corellia's nine hells she was! Absolutely, positively, no way. I'd go to each of the Corellian hells five times and back before giving her those. So I improvised.

"Mother, I don't even like Garik Loran or any of his holovids. I don't have any of them in my room and I don't see why you'd think I had," the lie came out flawlessly and effortlessly. Besides, I knew she'd buy it.

***

That evening I slipped out of the house after assuring both Bolt and General Tallon that I was just going to go for a walk. Bolt was a bit more persistent about my not going, but in the end the little droid gave in. In each of my boots was a single blaster then around my waist was a utility belt that held a blaster of its own. Getting said blasters out of the house had been, for the most part, quite simple. The General hadn't inquired as to when I'd be back, but I knew he expected me in before oh-twenty four-hundred. That was fine by me.

My feet carried me towards the local 'hot spot', a bar called Warped. Originally it was some sort of club, but as it had changed owners so many times in the last two years, it had lost it's reputation as such and had instead become known as a place where underage citizens, like myself, could come to get drunk. Fighting was another thing that was commonplace there, and the owner didn't give a Sith if you fought, just so long as officers didn't show up. So when there were fights, nobody even bothered to report them. They just picked up their drink and moved out of the way of the fighters and their dispute.

I opened the door to Warped, the smell that always seemed to linger about- sweaty shirts and too much liquor- hit me square in the face, though I'd expected it. After a minute I got used to it and walked over to the group of Academy cadets I saw huddled at the bar. A girl I knew, Andora, waved over at me and I waved back, walking over.

"Hey there, Tallon," Andora said to me, her voice rather slurred, easily signifying she was drunk- or at least getting there very rapidly.

Everyone around the circular table looked up at me as Andora spoke, obviously not noticing me before she had. They each nodded once, then all of them raised their glasses to me as if in a toast.

"You did an awesome job at the Academy the other day," Reggie added in after he took another swig of whatever was in his glass.

I nodded, a grin coming to my face. "Thanks Reg. I always enjoy disobeying a commanding officer."

The table's occupants all laughed at my comment for it was a well-known fact at the Academy that Adra Tallon, despite being General Tallon's daughter and only child, was sent to Colonel Naam's office more times than most other people in the Academy. And it was all for one simple reason: I didn't follow orders if I didn't want to. That's just the way I am.

A few other unintelligible remarks were passed around the table then I departed. My strides were hindered once more though as a small, green, three-fingered hand came out in front of me. I looked over at it's owner, waiting for the punch that such a hindrance usually brought with it. However, no punching attempt was made. The creature the hand belonged to was an alien species I'd never seen before. She- I could only assume it was a she- was roughly three feet tall and had large, gungan-like ears, only hers stood up.

I was about to cast a remark something to the effect of 'What the sith do you want?' when I recognized the weapon on her utility belt. It was a lightsaber. Only three kinds of people had lightsabers in the galaxy that were trained enough to make me afraid: the Sith Lords and apprentices, the Jedi and the Imperial Royal Guards. She was obviously neither the former or the latter meaning she must be a Jedi. A Jedi on an Imperial world? Plainly showing her face? She must've been insane. However, as she beckoned me to follow her out a side door, I found my mind offering no reason why I shouldn't.