Chapter Two: Blow a Kiss, Fire a Gun (Ziost)
Kovach flinches as though she'd reached out and slapped him.
"Ah." He glances down, his expression difficult to read. "No, Commander. I'm afraid in all the chaos, the reading rather fell by the wayside."
Theron stands motionless between them for a moment, eyes flickering back and forth, before he half-raises both hands in mock surrender. "I don't know whether to be flattered that I've got a dossier or glad not every Imperial knows me on sight."
"Neither." She steps behind him. "We have files on every known Republic agent, as you're well aware, and he ought to have known your face. I'm going to disarm you now, so please don't make this harder than it needs to be."
"You need my help." Theron keeps his hands raised, though.
Beckoning, she crooks her finger. "Agent Kovach."
"Commander?" Kovach takes another few steps away from the console.
She gestures toward Theron. "If he runs, shoot him."
If she wasn't looking for it, she wouldn't have seen him hesitate; Kovach's hand twitches at his side, fingers curling and uncurling, before he draws and levels his blaster. "Yes, Commander."
Traitor. She's sure of it.
"Ni- Cipher, please. I think I know how to fix this." Theron's tongue catches on her name.
("Will you tell me your name, at least?" They're still tangled in each other on the shuttle floor, half-dressed and out of breath, with twenty minutes to spare before the end of the truce. He props himself up on one elbow.
"I've already told you," she stretches, languid, kicking his jacket free of where it landed on her right boot and shrugging her trousers back up over bare skin, "my name is Cipher Nine."
"Doesn't exactly roll off the tongue. No nicknames? Anything?" Theron looks, she thinks, genuinely curious.
"You can call me Nine, I suppose." Her hair's come loose too, messy around her shoulders, and she tilts her chin to her chest to gather it back into its usual bun. "Why does it matter? We won't exactly be on a nickname basis soon."
"It still seems rude not to know what you like to be called, all things considered, so I thought I should ask. For next time."
She arches a brow and shifts onto her side, facing him. "Next time? While I wouldn't object, whatever happened to 'we'll probably never see each other again'- unless I've managed to change your mind?" Her kiss is a question, too, although a different one.
"Still no," he says against her mouth, "and we probably won't. But-" in reply he slides his free hand around and along the curve of her waist, undoing half her progress in reclothing herself with one swift movement- "we do still have nineteen minutes."
"Mm." Her arms slide around his neck as she settles back, hips tilting with the pressure of his fingertips. "Plenty of time.")
"Fix it how- more Jedi? If that's the sort of help you're offering, I'll pass." Unhooking both retaining straps, she slides both of his pistols from their holsters and sets them, out of arm's reach, on the far edge of the table; the knife in his right boot and the holdout blaster strapped between his shoulder blades soon follow suit, though she has to reach up the back of his jacket to get at the blaster and, grasping blindly, she misses the catch twice before she gets it on the third try and the little gun slides free.
When she does, the fingers of Theron's right hand flicker briefly, out of Kovach's line of sight. Good memory.
She snorts- his mouth turns up at one corner- and sits on the edge of the table, squarely between him and his weapons. "So, what was your plan, exactly? Send the Jedi in as a distraction, then get in here, get the planetary defenses down?"
"No way." Theron shakes his head vehemently. "When word got through that the Emperor was on Ziost, I sent my people- the Sixth Line, I mean. I figured maybe they could pin him down in a way the SIS or the army can't."
"Even the Dark Council never managed that, and they've tried twice." Perched on the tabletop, legs crossed, she sighs. "You risked your people on a very big maybe."
"Yeah. They wanted to try." His hands fall to his sides. "No one else knew about the op, though, so when it went bad…"
"You came to try to extract them?" Kovach chimes in from the far side of the room, aim still trained on Theron. Which you knew. Because you called him. "But your shuttle was shot down. We know that much."
He nods. "Pretty much. The minute I landed I had thirty of the Emperor's creepy puppets crawling all over my shuttle- had to blow the whole thing to get them off me, and even shielded I still fried my implants, but it worked. The shock did something to them."
"Killed them, you mean?"
"Only a few. Most of them got back up, but they were out of it… confused, staggering. When I got free of the crash site they didn't follow." Wincing, Theron shifts his weight off his right foot. "It might be a way to stop them. I thought someone should know, so when I saw the guns go down-"
"Commander? Incoming." Kovach's gaze is focused on the open door. "And if you'll permit me, I have an idea."
Her eyes follow his; two men in Imperial uniforms are charging up the stairs with weapons drawn and the single-minded stare of the possessed. "Whatever you're going to do, do it fast." She readies a grenade, just in case.
He whirls around and shoots the security console.
"Kovach, what the-"
The console sparks and hisses, and as it overloads so do the shielding panels on either side of the doorway; the two soldiers are nearly through when a double arc of electricity catches them and they fall, convulsing, booted heels drumming a rhythmless tattoo against the floor for what seems like an age. When they finally lie still, she exhales.
"Well, then." She slides off the table. "You may be onto something after all, Theron- and that was good thinking, agent, but keep your weapon drawn. We can't be sure until they wake up."
Theron rubs his forehead. "You're welcome."
He'd been right, though- after a few minutes both men awaken, completely disoriented and rather alarmed to find themselves held at gunpoint by Sith Intelligence (they'd been on patrol in the Industrial Sector, as far as they could remember). She jabs each one with a syringeful of kolto by way of apology for the impromptu electrocution and directs them toward Lana and the spaceport; once they're gone, she turns back to Agent Kovach and to Theron.
"So the theory is sound… electricity somehow breaks the Emperor's hold." Kovach paces, deep in thought, along the length of the table. "If only we could hit them all-" he stops short. "I've got another idea."
"I'm surprised you weren't recruited for Science division, with all these brilliant ideas of yours." And maybe you wouldn't have been a traitor. Oh, well. She's got bigger fish to fry than this one, for now.
If he even heard her over the flow of his thoughts, it doesn't seem to register. "I'll see if I can raise Minister Beniko. If I can get into the power systems, we might be able to catch everyone in reach of the grid, but I'll need her authorization codes-"
"Blow the whole system. It might work." Theron nods approvingly. "Should I tag along? You might need a slicer."
"No, I-"
She cuts Kovach off abruptly, turning to face Theron head-on. "I don't think so, Agent Shan. You can't possibly imagine I'd let you run off with Lana's pet agent- she'd be terribly upset with me." Their eyes lock for a long moment and she smiles, just a little too wide, head tilted and teeth bared; he blinks, once, but doesn't flinch.
"Well," he says, slowly, "we certainly can't have that, can we?"
Kovach, for his part, is already moving past them toward the door. "Give me ten minutes, Commander, and I'll send you the coordinates for the next rendezvous site-" he lifts one hand to his ear- "Hello? Minister, are you there? I think I know how-"
He's gone, then, through the doorway and out of earshot.
"Force, you're good." Theron slumps into a chair. "How long did it take you to figure it out?"
"Technically, about twenty minutes- here. You're going to need these." She reaches across to the far side of the table and slides his weapons back toward him. "But I knew the minute he saw you. He recognized you and tried to hide it, and he didn't even need to. He had several good reasons to know exactly who you are... and then when I told him to draw on you, he hesitated."
He tucks his knife away, sheathes his blasters. "Maybe he's just got a conscience."
"Bullshit."
"Yeah, well." Theron shrugs. "I have to say, I'm a little offended you told him to shoot me."
She rolls her eyes at him. "It wasn't personal. I had to see what he'd do- and anyway, it was only if you ran, which you didn't."
"I couldn't have run if I'd wanted to. But still." Resting his head in one hand, he closes his eyes; the bruises beneath them seem darker, deeper than when he'd entered the building and for a moment, she remembers Rishi. "It had to be you, didn't it? Out of all the people who could have been in this building, it had to be you. I thought you were on Nar Shaddaa."
"You've been keeping tabs on me, Theron Shan."
He makes a face. "Maybe a little. Call it professional interest."
"And yes, I was on Nar Shaddaa, but I go where I'm needed. I thought you'd retired from field work." She pulls out the chair next to his and settles into it. "Clearly I was wrong."
"Maybe I should have. This whole op's been a clusterfuck from the beginning."
She doesn't answer, but slips two medpacks out of her belt pouch and onto the table in front of him. He's silent, too, as he uncaps the first and jabs the needle deep into his thigh, but when he pulls his hand away his shoulders are straighter, his face less pained. The second needle sinks home; he rolls his right ankle experimentally.
"Better?"
He nods. "Much. Though not for long, I bet, once Lana finds out about Kovach."
"I'd be more worried if I were him. You know Lana's a pragmatist- she'll likely ransom you back to the SIS, assuming we don't all get killed. Kovach, on the other hand…" she draws one finger swiftly across her throat. "Although if this idea of his works, it may buy him a stay of-"
Theron's jacket pocket chimes insistently until he pulls his holocomm free, setting it down in front of him. "Hey, look. Something didn't short-circuit, for once… oh, no. No, no, no." He pales, pointing frantically under the table. "Hide. Fast."
"What? Why?"
He springs out of his chair, mouthing a name as the holographic image flickers to life in front of them- Saresh.
She hits the ground.
For the life of her she cannot understand how Leontyne Saresh ever became Chancellor; the woman has a voice like diamond cutting glass and a temperament to match. She can only see Theron's feet and hear their conversation, but it's enough. This is bad.
"-starting with New Adasta. And this time, I expect your cooperation."
He's shifting from foot to foot, an anxious habit she's noticed before. "Chancellor, please. Before you send the order-"
He really wasn't lying. Saresh didn't send him or the Jedi- but she found out, somehow-
"It's too late for that, Agent Shan. The fleet is already in orbit. The invasion has begun."
With a sharp click, the image dies. She crawls from beneath the table and stumbles over a chair, running to the door with him just behind her; they stop short, one on each side of the doorframe, and when they both look up the sky is dark, the Republic ships shadows against the sun.
"I'm going to kill him." She isn't sure who says it first but their voices blend together, passing sentence in unison.
Her comm rings.
Up next: Mercy (Ziost, Part 3)