Broken Reflection

by Lady Dawson

Chapter Three: Shot of Trust

The captain was terrifying.

That being said, the rest of Solara's friends were nice enough—well, Seela was, anyway, Jacen corrected himself. Marak, he had barely gotten a civil word out of but judging from the way that he acted around the rest of the crew, this didn't seem out of the ordinary. Solara was quick to put him in his place, when he started causing trouble.

"Just ignore him," she'd advised when they were cleaning up dinner. "Marak tends to run his mouth and doesn't know when to shut up, so the best thing to do is ignore him. Or tease him relentlessly, which I do not advise unless you're good at avoiding items being chucked at your head," she added with a grin. "Did Alaric give you anything to do?"

"Cleaning the fuel tanks."

"Oh, that's easy," she said and for the next hour and a half, she helped him with the job that Alaric had given him, though for the most part, she just stayed there and watched him, because, she said, he wouldn't thank her for the additional work that Alaric would pile on if he didn't think he was doing the job.

Jacen believed her. The man wasn't unfair, but he did run a tight ship and worked Jacen hard for the lift they were giving him. He didn't mind, though. It was the least he could do after they'd helped him with little to no questions.

During the course of the next thirty-six hours or so, Jacen worked on every inch of the ship that Alaric told him to do, only stopping when Seela ordered him to go get some sleep, giving him a smile. "Don't worry about my husband; I'll deal with him," she told him, sending him down to the passenger's quarters.

Back on Coruscant, he had barely slept for fear that he would wake up to stormtroopers taking him into custody. The passengers' beds, though far less luxurious than he was used to, was a welcome sight; he all but dropped onto the mattress and was out like a light before his head hit the pillow.

The next morning (at least, he assumed it was morning, because it was hard to tell what time of day it was on a spaceship, especially traveling at lightspeed), Jacen woke to Solara shaking him gently.

"Hey, we're coming up on Nar Shaddaa."

Groggily, he rubbed his eyes tiredly, sluggishly climbing off the bed and picking up the jacket that he'd lain on the floor a few hours ago, following her through the Blue Siren. He had never been on a ship before, but he could tell that it had been well-kept; someone, Seela probably, had taken great care to make this ship not feel like a ship at all, but a home. Were he not trying to stay alive, Jacen thought he might like a place like this.

Back at the compound, he used to watch the ships that were passing from the window, think that he would like to live on one. They glided through the Coruscant skyline effortlessly, disappearing into the stars.

But he was the one that would have to disappear, he reminded himself, shivering and this was the planet that he would have to disappear into.

Nar Shaddaa was bright to say the least, even from space. The second that he stepped into the cockpit, with Alaric in the chair, they were leaving hyperspace and the large moon was there before his eyes, glowing so bright that he thought he could see the city lights even though they weren't even in the planet's atmosphere. The second that they entered it, Jacen was greeted to the sight of a sprawling cityscape, but unlike Coruscant, Nar Shaddaa was dominated by decaying urban landscapes and polluted cities.

It was the first planet that he had ever set foot on other than Coruscant and Kamino; it was so different than either of them that he couldn't tear his eyes away. Similar to Coruscant, yes, but with a grimier look to it.

"Kid, you want to try and land this thing?"

At first, Jacen thought Alaric was talking to him, but a split second later, he realized that the captain was looking to Solara. Her expression was one of pure joy mixed with disbelief as she asked, "Really?"

"Just don't crack my ship," he said dryly, climbing out of the chair. She didn't hesitate to dive into the pilot's seat, hands curling around the controls. "All right, just take her down slowly, easy now . . ."

Jacen watched her hands curling around the controls, taking them down into the planet, with Alaric right behind her to assist if need be. To Seela next to him, he whispered, "Has she done this before?"

"A few times," Seela replied, chuckling. "Ric's been teaching her how to fly for a few months now, but he doesn't let her land too often. She needs the practice if she's going to take over as pilot, though."

And as he watched her in the pilot's seat, Jacen realized just how much Solara looked like she belonged there. Her hands effortlessly moved back and forth, moving with the skylines with the traffic, her blue-green eyes bright with excitement with every movement, she sat in the seat with such ease that never in a million years would he be ever to do.

"Right, take her over there, on that landing," Alaric instructed smoothly, pointing a landing platform. "Take it easy . . . gently . . ." Solara carefully turned the ship, carefully hovering above the platform. "All right, good . . . now, gently put her down . . . good, just like that. There you go, kid."

He sounded please, Jacen noticed, but Marak ruined the moment by commenting, "Nice job, runt; you didn't put a dent into this time."

This time?

"Maybe next time, I'll chuck you out the airlock and have you giving directions while I'm doing it," Solara suggested, her tone making it calm, "and maybe I'll just end up missing and squish you."

"Then you'll be stuck fixing the Siren. No time for flying lessons if you're playing engineer."

Solara stuck her tongue out at him.

"All right, that's enough," Seela said, holding up her hands to dispel the argument. Jacen guessed that this was a usual occurrence between the two. "We should get the shipment to Zelada; he won't be happy waiting for us."

"When is he ever happy?" Solara quipped, but nevertheless was grinning happily at her smooth landing. "But I promised Jacen to take him to see Antrot—"

"Later," Alaric replied, pulling his blaster out of its holster and checking it, to make sure the power was full, Jacen guessed, but he was startled when the captain tossed him the weapon. Only by well-trained reflexed was he able to catch it, albeit clumsily, and he still clutched it like it was going to go off. "Get ready, Jacen; we're going to need all hands on deck." His eyes burned like the sun as he regarded him. "We're making a delivery; you're coming with. Keep your eyes sharp, but let me do the talking. Only speak when you're spoken to—actually, it might be better not to say anything at all," Alaric admitted, scratching his head.

Seela clicked her tongue. "You expecting trouble?"

"It's Zelada; I'm always expecting trouble when it comes to him. Just bring him along. We might need the numbers. Lara," he added, turning, "you stay with the delivery. We go with the usual formation; I'll take the first load, for him to check it out but you don't bring the second until I've given you the signal."

"What's the signal?" Jacen asked, bemused.

"That they've paid us," Solara replied, linking her arm through his and tugging him away. "Come on, I'll give you a few pointers on shooting."

That was probably a good idea because the first couple shots that he took outside of the ship, just firing at a couple bottles that she had lying around, were terrible. He awkwardly pointed the blaster again, but must've missed by a mile.

Solara, watching him as she sat against the landing platform, came over. Her hand moved to his and a shiver went down his spine as he realized just how close she was. Never had he been this close to a girl before. In fact, he thought, this was probably the first girl that he'd ever spent any amount of time with, Inquisitors and their apprentices notwithstanding.

She smelled like muja fruit, he thought as the wind played with her hair.

For her part, she seemed not to notice his inward dilemma, adjusting his grip. "Don't hold it so tight," she advised, smooth hands brushing over his. "You should keep the weapon firm but loose. If you grip it too tight, you'll end up losing your shot. There, that's better," she approved, stepping away so he could fire again. "Try again."

Jacen kept his hands the way that she showed him, but it still felt wrong in his hands. Probably because he'd been using a very different weapon his whole life, he thought, fingers itching to grab the nearest pole and start swinging. It wasn't a blade but he could probably do some damage with it.

"Why are you helping me?" he asked suddenly, taking his finger off the trigger and lowering the blaster to look at Solara. "Don't get me wrong, I'm—I'm glad you are, but . . . why? You guys seem like . . . like you don't need the trouble."

"Do we really need a reason to screw with the Empire?" Solara's tone was impassive as she stepped towards him. "I don't. The Empire destroyed the only family that I had and more than once, they've tried to destroy this one. We're not so easily broken." Her soft blue-green eyes were suddenly fierce but she wasn't looking at him; she was lost in another time. "Every person on this ship hates the Empire for one reason or another, Jacen; don't try to overanalyze it. But if you want to know why I brought you on board . . . you looked like you needed help."

Jacen shook his head. "People don't help each other for no reason."

"Says who?"

"Everyone that I've ever met."

Solara chuckled, her gaze returning to him.

"Somehow, I don't think you've met someone like me before."

That, he thought, was true. He'd never met anyone like her before. And he didn't think that he would ever meet one again. For the first time since he set foot on the Blue Siren, he was actually sorry that today was going to be the last day on it, because Solara complete mesmerized him. Her smile, her gentleness . . . he didn't think that he would ever meet anyone quite like her, even if he lived to be a thousand.

"I don't think I could ever thank you for it."

"You don't have to. Besides, it was fun sending those bucketheads on a wild goose chase," she joked. "Now, we gonna stand here all day or you gonna shoot?"

Jacen sighed but did as he was told, raising the blaster again to aim, but just as he was about to pull the trigger, she poked him in the back of the head. "Keep both eyes open, silly," she informed him. "You can see twice as well."

That . . . actually made sense. Jacen hadn't even realized he was closing his right eye but now that he was actually aware of it, he realized just how foolish that had been.

Keeping both eyes firmly open, he gripped the blaster again and fired at the bottle, but, while he was definitely closer, the shot was still a mile wide. He winced as he hit the side of the ship, hoping very much that Alaric didn't notice.

Thankfully, the captain was nowhere in sight, but that didn't mean that all of them weren't. Marak happened to be walking by, moving some crates off the ship, just as the shot went off and he howled with laughter.

Jacen felt his cheeks burn, embarrassed, but was relieved when Solara retorted, "And how good a marksman were you when you picked up a blaster for the first time?"

"I picked up my first blaster when I was seven."

"Try twenty-six; Alaric told me the story of having to drag your drunk ass out of prison and teach you how to fire a blaster at the same time." Solara dismissed him with a wave of her hand, turning again to Jacen, giving him a thoughtful look. "Maybe all you need is some motivation . . ."

"What kind of—"

The question died on his lips when she moved away from him and right across the platform, stepping in between the two bottles that he was shooting at, and he stared at her with wide eyes.

"Shoot," she ordered him.

Even Marak looked worried now. "Lara, I'm not sure that's a good idea . . ."

"Shut it," she said cheerfully, "unless you'd rather be the target?"

She looked back at Jacen, who felt like someone had dropped a chunk of ice in his stomach. "Take your shot."

"I . . ."

"Take the shot, Jacen," she ordered.

He looked in panic at Marak, who didn't lose his equally worried look but apparently was more scared of Solara because he kept his mouth shot. Prying his tongue from the roof of his mouth, he tried to say, "I don't—"

But she didn't let him finish.

"Take the shot!"

Jacen swallowed but raised the blaster, barely managing to keep his gaze from shaking, but forced them to stay as still as possible as he aimed the blaster at the bottle to the left of Solara fearfully.

She looked back at him trustingly.

"Fire," she told him.

Against his better judgment, he took a deep breath and fired.

The bottle exploded, ceramic pieces scattering across the platform, but Solara didn't even miss a beat. "Again," she ordered and Jacen did so, moving to the right of her and firing again once he thought he had a good shot.

That bottle too shattered.

Letting out the breath that he hadn't realized that he was holding, Jacen lowered the weapon, exhaling deeply as he bowed his head, relieved that he hadn't hit her. He didn't dare look up, even when he saw her boots right next to him.

"See? You can do it," she said gently, her hand on his shoulder. "Easy, you're okay."

Somehow, Jacen didn't think so. The urge to throw up was so powerful that he moved to the edge of the platform, but the sight of thousands of feet underneath him didn't help quelling his stomach any.

"How's he doing?"

Forcing his head around, Jacen saw the captain armed to the tooth coming down the gangway with Seela right at his feet. The sight of him was an instant reminder that he wasn't letting go of the blaster anytime soon.

That didn't make him feel any better.

"He'll be okay," Solara said. "He didn't even come close to hitting me."

Jacen threw her a dirty look.

"Same trick I used on you?" Alaric guessed, looking disapproving.

Solara grinned impishly. "Yep!"

Alaric frowned at Marak. "And you didn't try to stop that?"

"Hey, you try telling Solara not to do something," Marak protested. "You've an easier time pulling the ears off a gundark."

Jacen snorted, his amusement fading instantly when the captain turned back to him, steely eyes unamused but he said nothing, just turned to his wife. "We should send for the rest of the delivery before long. If anything happens—"

"We come in guns blazing," Solara suggested.

He glared at her. "No. If anything happens, the two of you leave here and don't even think about coming back. I don't need any heroics from the two of you."

"Kaa'lia, everything will be fine. You worry too much."

"Yeah, just somebody please explain why the guys are the ones going in and us girls are the ones being left on the ship," Solara grumbled, folding her arms over her chest.

Both Seela and Alaric laughed.

"Maybe when you're older, kid," Alaric said, ruffling her hair affectionately. Solara made a face, pushing his hand away. "Besides, you're the ones that wants to be the pilot. And the pilot stays with the ship."

"Not if she knows how to shoot, she doesn't."

"But she does listen to her captain and her captain is saying to stay here." Alaric holstered another blaster to his hip while fingering something in his pocket. "And if you hear any explosions, take off and come pick us up."

"We're blowing something up?" Jacen asked nervously, wondering what exactly he had gotten himself into, but much to his relief, Alaric shook his head.

"Not unless we have to. Marak," he called over, "you and Jacen get these containers moving. Zelada doesn't like being kept waiting." To Jacen, he added, "You stay close to Marak, follow his lead. If you hear me say, 'There's a lot of fine ways to die,' you be ready because that's when we're about to start shooting."

Jacen gulped.

"You'll be fine," Solara reassured him. "These things rarely end in a gunfight. That's happened once . . . maybe twice."

"Three times at last count," Marak corrected with a smirk.

It would've been more amusing to see Solara, Seela, and Alaric all turning to glare at him at exactly the same time were they not preparing for battle, Jacen thought, but the sight still made him smile slightly.

"Let's get a move on," Alaric ordered. "Sooner we get this delivery done, sooner we can find another job worth doing."

"I'll call Dak, see if he has anything," Seela told him, "but Imperials are hounding down his business like everyone else's. We might have to stop by Jekk'Jekk." She smiled as she was met with groans all around the crew. "I know, so one of us will have to sort out the breath masks once we're done here."

"I hate Jekk'Jekk's," Solara complained. "It took me weeks to get the stench out of my hair after last time."

"What is it?" Jacen asked, bewildered.

"A cantina, but it has so much cyanogen fumes that it's lethal for humans," Solara told him, "so we have to use breath masks to go inside. On the fun side, they also don't have a problem selling to minors." She grinned impishly at Alaric, who shook his head at her. "Hey, I've only done it once. Wasn't worth the headache."

"And I don't need two drunks on my ships, kid," the captain told her, inclining his head towards Marak. "This one's bad enough."

Seela chuckled. "But he's a better mechanic than all of us put together, so we do need him, kaa'lai." She stepped towards her husband, kissing him. "Be safe. And come back in one piece, all of you."

"We'll do our best." Alaric gestured towards Jacen. "Let's move."

Doing as he was told, Jacen took hold of the handles on the cargo and started moving through the corridors of Nar Shaddaa, staying between Marak and the captain, who led them with a calm sort of attitude, but he couldn't help but feel like eyes were all around him and he had the sudden urge to grab a helmet to hide his face.

It was obvious that they knew this place well because several people greeted them as they passed and Alaric even stopped to talk to a couple of them, but never loud enough for him to hear.

Only when they reached the next sector did Alaric turn to enter a building. A Twi'lek male was posted at the door but other than giving the three of them a distrustful look, he made no move to stop them as Alaric stepped inside, leading them in.

The first thing that he saw was a dank, bleak space that was only livened by the music around him, coming from above. Several Twi'lek were present, of various hues, but Alaric ignored most of them, heading straight towards another guarded door.

"Tell him Durron's here."

Jacen watched all of this warily, heart beating very fast, but remained where he was as the guard said something in his native language into the comm. before stepping out of the way as the door opened.

All three of them made their way inside and a very well-dressed orange Twi'lek was waiting for them.

"You're late," he informed them. "I expected you hours ago."

"Mechanical trouble," Alaric said smoothly, unmoved. "We had to make some repairs before we could leave Coruscant. But the goods remain intact." He remained where he was, the two males staring each other down. "We gonna stare at each other all day or would you like to inspect the goods?"

Snorting, the Twi'lek waved them in and another Twi'lek came out of nowhere to take a look at the cargo that Jacen and Marak brought in.

"Surely this cannot be all of it," he said in dismay. "Did you lose something?"

"You know the deal, Zelada," Alaric replied, "half now, the other half when I get paid. Unless there's some problem with that?"

Zelada smiled but held no warmth to it. "Small problem, my friend. As I said, you were late . . . and perhaps missed the bulletin that the Empire posted. They are looking a freighter that escaped leaving Coruscant. Firefly class, FT-1 model." There was a glint in his red eyes as he activated a holo on his desk and, to Jacen's horror, there was a hologram of the Blue Siren, plain as day. "That is your ship, is it not?"

"They're taking too long."

"Relax, sama," Seela said gently, stirring the pot as she added several more fruits into the mixture. "I'm sure they'll be calling any moment now. Alaric knows what he's doing."

Solara shook her head; she couldn't explain why she was so sure that something had happened to her family, to Jacen, that something had gone wrong, but she had the nagging feeling in the very pit of her stomach that something had.

Occasionally, she would get those strong feelings, when she knew something had happened even when she had no way of knowing that something had. Or she would know about things, sometimes before they happened. No one talked about it, about how she could know about Alaric breaking his leg when he was planet side or the time that Marak was being surrounded by thugs, or when a bounty hunter caught up with Seela, determined to take her back to the ones that had enslaved her.

But they all knew she could do it.

She knew that she could do it but she didn't ask questions, not since the day that Alaric told her that what she did was very dangerous and could possibly get her killed, if the Empire ever found out.

So she kept her mouth shut about it, except during those times when she was so sure that something had gone wrong.

This was one of those times.

And she hated being on the ship, unable to do anything when she got them. Patience had never been her strong suit.

Getting out off of the couch, Solara started for the gangway. "I'm gonna go check on them," she said abruptly, "I'll come back for the—"

But she never got to finish.

At the same moment, she was thrown to the side of the ship, by an explosion coming from somewhere in the Refugee Sector, and the soup that Seela was making ended up on the floor as both women were thrown off their feet.

"What—" Seela suddenly changed direction, abandoning the mess and making straight for the cockpit with Solara at her heels, but they didn't have to wonder for very long what had happened, because they could see the smoke coming out of the side of the building. "Is that—?"

"Zelada's den," Solara whispered, horror rising through her as she jumped into the seat and was about to take off when the commlink crackled.

"Marak to Blue Siren! Marak to Blue Siren!"

"We're here, Marak," Seela said urgently, turning on the comm., "what happened?"

"The captain is down! Repeat, the captain is down!"

Author's Note: Ha, ha, cliffhanger! I'm actually really enjoying this story, the small amount of reviews notwithstanding, but I always love hearing from you guys, hearing your theories and ideas. Sometimes I incorporate suggestions into the story because they're so good. So please, please, please review if you like it or if you have a theory as to who Jacen is. I know, but I always like hearing what other people think.

Lady Dawson