Title: A New Path
Summary: Tycho Celchu's journey from the Empire to the Alliance.
Disclaimer: Star Wars is, quite clearly, not mine, and no copyright infringement is intended. This story is not written for profit.
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Chapter 19: The Easy Part
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Jesina leaned against her desk. She and Trae had come in early to get ready, under the pretense of getting things in order to make up for her extended absence. Now, though, they had nothing left to do but wait for Kalix to arrive.
She bit her lip thoughtfully, unsure of whether to ask what was on her mind. She desperately wanted to know what had nearly gotten Wes kicked out of the Alliance, and she was standing only a meter from a man who'd been there to witness it. Ah, what the hell? It's worth a shot. "Trae, could you tell me anything about what happened at Kien'tol? I know that it's classified, but it doesn't say why."
He shook his head slowly, looking a little sad. "I can't tell you. I'm sorry, but it's classified for a reason, though your Lieutenant Janson is one of the few allowed to talk about it."
She started. "How did you—?"
He smiled. "I do my homework." Then he glanced at his chrono. "I'd better wait outside for her. She'll be here soon."
Jesina nodded but scowled at his back as he left. Force but she hated intelligence types.
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Tycho was surprised to see Janson standing outside his door. Before he had a chance to say so much as a word, the other pilot spoke. "You had no business talking to Narra about me."
The Alderaanian sighed and shook his head. "First of all, yeah, I did. In case you've forgotten, I'm the one you damn near abandoned out there, Janson. And, in case you're interested, I didn't go to try to get you in trouble. Everyone seemed to think that you were in for it and I didn't think that was right. I figured that since I was the one who nearly got killed because of your stupid stunt, he might listen to me."
"I don't need you to defend me, Celchu."
Tycho rolled his eyes. "No kidding. Consider it payback. You saved my life; I thought it was the least I could do."
"Look, Celchu, I don't like you. I'll fly with you, I'll fight with you, and I'll watch your back. And I'll expect the same from you. But I don't like you, and I'm not going to. So you may as well forget about it."
"Janson, I'm not asking you to like me. I'm not asking any of you to like me. Frankly, I don't care if any of you do or not." It wasn't entirely true – he was holding out a slim hope that he might eventually find friendship with at least one of these men. "That's not why I'm here," he went on. That part was true. He was here to avenge his family, and make sure no one else suffered the loss he had.
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Jesina surveyed her handiwork. Kalix Teshi had come in with vibrant red hair and bright green eyes. Her hair was now an inconspicuous brown, tucked up under a cap, and her eyes were a matching dull color. Dressed in a plain gray jumpsuit, she was perhaps the most inconspicuous 'pilot' to ever set foot on Rothana. Jesina handed her a belt with a holster, and then a blaster to complete the image.
The young woman looked at her, uncertainty in her eyes. "Are you sure this is necessary?"
She nodded and sighed. Kalix was significantly younger than she'd expected – she was only in her early twenties. And she seemed at once naïve and jaded. It was a strange combination, one that Jesina had only rarely seen in her time. "Yes, it's necessary. At this point, with the war going the way it is, no pilot will fly unarmed. A simple blaster won't do much, but every pilot I know feels a little more secure having one within reach. You won't have to wear it once we get on board."
"All right." She hesitantly strapped it around her waist and took a few awkward steps, trying to adjust to the uneven weight. "It feels…strange."
"It will, for a while. Practice walking like this." She put on a stereotypical pilot's swagger and walked across the room.
Kalix laughed. "It seems so…arrogant."
"That's the idea. You walk like you're from Coruscant," she began, and Kalix cut her off.
"I am from Coruscant."
"I know. But Coruscant isn't known for its pilots. Bureaucrats, politicians, businessmen, yes. But pilots…." She shook her head. "I want you to walk like a Corellian."
Kalix frowned but nodded and made her way across the room. She stopped when she reached the other wall and turned. "How's that?"
"Um, well, you could pass for a Corellian who's been off Corellia for a few years, I suppose." She glanced at her chrono and shrugged. "We'll have to settle for that, because we've just run out of time." As if on cue, her comlink buzzed. "Sounds like our transportation's ready."
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Glancing across the mostly empty hangar bay, she saw Daxon at the foot of the boarding ramp of a refitted yacht. "This way," she said, quickening her pace and heading in his direction. Kalix clutched her satchel tighter and followed.
They were ten meters from the ship when Jesina heard a shout from the entrance they'd just come in. Whirling around, she grabbed Kalix's hand in her left hand and pulled her forward, almost knocking her off her feet. "Get behind me!" she yelled, drawing her blaster with her right hand.
Running backwards, she fired a few shots in the general direction of the door and the planetary officials – and Rothana Engineering Security officers – who were heading toward them. Several fell to her lethal aim, and several more to blaster fire coming from behind them thanks to Daxon. "Keep going!" she yelled, nearly stepping on Kalix's feet as she ran backward.
As she continued firing, she realized that she and Daxon weren't the only ones fending off the security officials. Additional blaster fire was coming from a side door. A quick glance told her that Trae and Lanara had joined the fight. She wondered idly where they'd come from but didn't have time for any real thought. As more troopers – how in the galaxy were so many of them there? – came in and sought cover behind anything and everything they could find, she felt a blaster bolt whiz past her ear. She didn't have to turn to realize that Kalix had drawn the blaster that only half an hour earlier she hadn't wanted to touch.
"Run!" she yelled at Kalix. "Go! Don't look. Just run!"
Something made her look over toward Trae and Lanara just as Kalix took off toward Daxon, though she kept firing at the security officers. Her eyes widened as Lanara stopped shooting for just a moment – just long enough to shift her aim to Trae. Realization hit him a second too late and as he moved to dodge and raised his blaster to fire at her, her next shot caught him in the chest, sending him backward into the wall. It didn't take much though to realize that he wouldn't be getting up again.
She felt a sharp pang of loss at his death, though she hadn't known him long. But she didn't have time to grieve now. If she didn't pay attention, she'd be joining him.
From somewhere in the back she heard Kalix scream and offered up a silent prayer that it was at because of the shock of seeing Lanara turn on Trae and not because she herself had been hit. A moment later she heard a cry from Lanara as a blaster bolt hit her in the shoulder, spinning her around. She didn't even try to figure out who that shot had come from.
Jesina pulled the trigger of her blaster once more and, when it didn't fire, hurled the now-useless weapon in the direction of their attackers. Springing up from where she was crouching, she sprinted for the yacht and waved her arms. "Go!" she yelled for what felt like the hundredth time in the last five minutes.
The ramp rose under her feet as she ran up. But it wasn't fast enough. She cried out and stumbled as a blaster bolt grazed her thigh but, with Kalix's help, made it up and in without being hit again. "Help me to the cockpit," she said through gritted teeth.
Daxon saw them come into the cockpit and moved from the pilot's seat to the copilot's seat. "You all right?"
"I'll live," she muttered. "As long as we get out of here, say, ten minutes ago." She surveyed the controls, glad that Daxon had had the foresight to run start up. Looking straight ahead and up at the large transparisteel windows, she glanced back at her passengers. "Hang on."
Kalix's eyes widened. "You're not—" When Jesina gave no indication that she planned on answering, Kalix turned her attention to Daxon. "She's not—"
"Well, I don't know her that well, but, yeah, I think so. We don't have any other way out right now. They're not about to open the hangar for us. Strap in. And secure that bag."
The physicist shoved the case under her seat and sat down, falling as Jesina pulled down on the yoke. She turned white as she fastened the belt across her lap and chest. "Gods!"
"Yeah, that might be a good idea," Jesina said, teeth clenched as she throttled forward, accelerating faster than was probably safe. "Hang on." It took every bit of self-control she possessed – and quite a bit she hadn't known she possessed – to not duck as she guided the craft through the transparisteel panels, shattering them and sending shards everywhere. The second she knew she was clear of the building's frame, she brought the nose of the yacht up in a more abbreviated liftoff than she would have liked.
Once they were actually in flight and leveled out, she checked the monitors. Sure enough, fighters were already launching in pursuit. "That, my friends, was the easy part."