Showtime
Almost ready.
He sits cross-legged on the flat top of the dressing table, watching Nine; she stands in the middle of the room, tossing her head back and forth as long silver-white hair floats cloudlike from side to side and finally settles around her shoulders. He knows it's a wig- he watched her put it on five minutes ago- just like he knows her eyes are really green and not bright blue, but it doesn't make the change any less striking. He could have passed her in the street and not recognized her.
Which, Theron supposes, is the point.
"It's good," she says to Kaliyo, who looks up from fiddling with the airbrush. "Ready when you are."
"Of course it's good. Like I don't know how to fix it so it won't fall off." With a snort, Kaliyo smacks the compressor with one fist. "How many times have we done this?"
"Too many. Let me-"
Nine's holo rings. It's buried somewhere in the folded pile of her clothing, there on the table next to him, and when she gestures he reaches into her jacket pocket (a best guess, but that's where it usually lives if she's not wearing her tactical belt, which she wasn't today) and rummages until he can feel it vibrating against his hand. Pulling it free, he glances at it. "It's Lana. Right on time."
She wrinkles her nose. "It's that late already? Shit- hi, Lana."
"Hello to you, too. Not a bad time, I hope?" The figure in the projection's hooded, face cast in shadow, but he knows her voice almost as well as Nine's.
(Now that's a weird thought, but it might actually be true. They've spent a long time running together, literally and figuratively, all the way back to Rishi; in the years they spent looking for Nine he went weeks on end in deep cover where the only friendly voice he heard was Lana's.
If he never has to do that again, it'll be too soon, but he'd do it again in a heartbeat.
Nine was worth it.)
"I'm just a slow dresser, so I've got to get made up while we chat. You don't mind, do you?" Nine gestures toward Kaliyo and the airbrush as Lana pushes her hood back to reveal her face. "It needs time to dry, or-"
"By all means." With a shrug, Lana leans forward. "We're on schedule on your end, I take it?"
She undoes the sash around her waist and lets the thin robe fall to the ground, nonchalant and still talking over the rising noise of the compressor despite being about ninety-eight percent naked- that probably isn't legally qualified to be underwear, not that he's complaining. "Curtain goes up in half an hour. Two and a half to time zero."
Lana doesn't even blink. "I'm just about to leave for the rendezvous point. Veeroa and her team are on their way."
"Good." Turning, Nine lifts her arms and folds them across her chest and he watches the pass of the brush, the red letters etched on her side vanishing beneath layers of makeup. She's getting thinner, he thinks, even over the last few weeks; he can count every rib, her hipbones prominent where his hands remember curves, and he makes a mental note to make sure she eats later. "Theron will have his comm on all night if anything changes. Remember, if the turrets don't go down, get your team out of there."
Lana shakes her head. "This is our only chance. Even if things don't go as planned, we still ought to-"
"That's an order. You-" she snaps, her head turning back over her shoulder to look at the holo- "are not expendable, and we all know what happened to the first resistance team. Either this goes properly or it doesn't go at all."
"Yes. Understood."
Kaliyo prods at her thigh with a fingertip; Nine makes a quarter-rotation, facing away from him, (There's a little red spot, a perfect circle of irritated skin that isn't one of her old scars, on her lower back. She hasn't been hurt recently, he's sure- but when he looks beyond her he can see the chair on the far side of the room with its button-studded cushions and he thinks of last night and-
yeah, that one's probably his fault).
"It's going to be fine," he says. "We've got this."
"I hope you're right, for all our sakes." When she says it Lana smiles, though, and straightens up. "And since when are you an optimist?"
Nine makes another quarter-turn, looks at him and winks. "Someone's got to be."
Go, she says. Try to relax.
Easier said than done with so many things that could still go wrong, but when Theron slips through the security door separating the dancers' area from the club the place is already packed. Good. He weaves through the crowd, a little tension easing with every person he brushes against as he makes his way toward the main bar and his seat.
(He likes crowds. Crowds are easy to get lost in, to blend into, every extra body packed into the room another tacit addendum to his alibi- no, I didn't see where he went, but you know- there were so many people, it was hard to keep track-
For tonight they can use all the help they can get.)
He slides onto the empty stool as the Zabrak bartender plucks the 'reserved' sign off the counter. "About time," she drawls. "I've been kicking people out of that chair for an hour. What can I get you?"
After a moment's consideration- he probably shouldn't be drinking but they're not going to be climbing for an hour and he'd watched Nine knock back a shot of gin as he was leaving her dressing room; you try doing this completely sober, she'd said to his raised eyebrow, and she does kind of have a point- he orders a whiskey, neat, and slides a credit chit across the bar when she comes back with the drink.
"On the house." She pushes it back. "Boss lady's orders."
"Keep it. It'll make up for me camping at your bar all night."
"A manager who actually tips? Shit." Her smile makes it all the way up to her eyes as she pockets the chit and he nods at her over the rim of the glass. "Now I really have seen everything."
The band's up on the high platform above the bar, the singer pacing back and forth on a narrow walkway. As the song fades he cranes his neck to get a better look but that must have been the last of the set- the dancers are already gone from their places, vanished backstage, and even before the applause ends the whole room goes dim, spotlights arcing down toward the central stage to reflect off the velvet curtain.
Showtime.
Out of the corner of his eye he catches sight of Kaliyo, leaning against the wall beside the security door. She flashes him a thumbs-up, then cups her hand over her mouth to mute the noise of the crowd but his earpiece crackles a little bit anyway.
Fuck, it's loud in here.
"You ever seen her dance, spyboy?" Kaliyo switches over to a closed channel as he swivels in his chair to face the stage, drink in hand.
"During downtime. Not like this," he murmurs, ignoring the nickname. It could be a lot worse- she's got a particularly colorful one for Tora now- although her being out here does raise a question. "Hey, who's guarding the room?"
"I figured I'd leave the room full of bombs unattended." Her sigh almost pops his eardrum. "For fuck's sake. Tee-Seven's keeping watch- it says it's too busy out here. Something about too many spilled drinks. Make sure you've got a clear sightline to the stage."
"I can see fine."
She sighs again. "Not what I meant. Something's distracting her, and she needs someone to focus-"
Whatever Kaliyo meant to say, he loses it beneath the roar of the crowd as the curtains part and Sia'hla emerges, striding confidently to the edge of the stage. The contrast's amazing, really; he's watched her and Nine over the last few days and in private she seemed almost shy, soft-spoken and delicate and moving like a ghost through the hallways of her own club. (He knows why. They were practicing a duet one afternoon when he came in with another bagful of supplies, both of them in practice clothes, and he remembered what Nine had told him about the high-necked dresses but knowing what they hid was one thing and seeing it was something else entirely.
He's met a lot of men who did things like that to people too scared to fight back. He killed some of them. But the ones you can't kill?
You learn to walk very carefully around them. Hard habit to break.)
On stage, though, bronze dancing-costume shimmering under the spotlight, a beaded necklace around her throat, Sia'hla lifts her hand and she might as well have put the whole room on mute. The quiet's immediate, a scant few whispers quickly silenced. She smiles.
"I know what you're all thinking." She leans a little heavily into her Ryl accent- her Basic's way better than Teff'ith's ever was so that's almost definitely a ploy; he'd bet good credits she learned that trick from Nine- as the curtain starts to open behind her. "You're thinking: Sia'hla, you said you were retired. Yet here you are on stage again. And I did say that, yes- but tonight we have a special guest."
The quiet's breaking, murmurs from the crowd and a few whistles and cheers as the rest of the dancers come into view, carefully posed in small groups scattered around the stage. Not Nine, though. Where-
Sia'hla points upward. "You all remember Xari, don't you?"
"I just happened to be in the neighborhood, so I thought I'd drop in-" a voice far overhead, a glint of silver in the darkness and then another spotlight there- "and say hello."
He'd thought the long streamers hanging from the ceiling were just for decoration, but Nine's dangling upside-down beside a high catwalk, knotted up in one like a half-unwrapped present with stripes of pale skin peeking through widths of dark red fabric.
"And maybe do a little dancing, hm?"
"Oh, I don't know." Nine stretches out and some of the fabric unwinds itself; she slips a meter or two down toward the stage and he holds his breath- if she falls- "It's been an awfully long time. Why don't we ask them?"
Turning to face the audience (the crowd's at least ten deep against the stage now and the bar's packed, everyone trying to grab one last drink before the dancers start), Sia'hla holds her arms out wide. "Well? Shall we have a show for you?"
The roar that follows, in the seconds before the music starts, might have been a bomb going off.
(But that's not going to happen for a few hours yet.)
How is she not tired?
Half an hour and two costume changes in, he's not even sure she's stopped to breathe but there she is right back onstage, dancing, and looks right at him for a moment- maybe Kaliyo was right about that after all- and then she-
Oh, that's not fair.
Only a few songs to go.
Nine's making the rounds of the room, now, strutting along one of the walkways between the VIP tables but with so many people standing it's hard to keep track of her. He cranes his neck- someone's got one hand on her ankle with enough of a grip that she pauses, looking back over her shoulder with lips parted.
She probably doesn't need his help. (She definitely doesn't need his help.)
Still, he's about to get up and see what's going on when the woman next to him grabs her drink and heads for the dance floor; a dark-haired man slides into the vacant seat so fast it almost tips over, bracing with one hand on Theron's shoulder until all four feet of the chair settle back onto the floor.
"Sorry about that. Saw the chair open, though, and I bet she's coming over here next so-"
He knows that voice.
He keeps his glass half-raised in front of his face (it's been a long time since they've seen each other so maybe he's wrong- he really, really hopes he's wrong- but if he isn't, maybe he can still duck away before he's recognized) as he glances out of the corner of his eye but no, his implant's already scanning, its recognition algorithms beaming the information right into his brain because of all the things he needs right now, confirmation that he just totally fucked up their whole op is definitely high up on that list-
"Wait a second. Theron? That you?"
He doesn't even need the software. He definitely knows his voice.
100% match. Subject identified: Jonas Balkar. Republic SIS.
He winces (please let her not be looking please let her not be looking shit shit shit) and lowers the glass.
Balkar grins, reaches out to grab his arm- just like old times. "It is you. Force, Shan, where the fuck have you been?"
Shit.
"You know," he says, pinging Kaliyo's comm but he doesn't see her either; Nine's disappeared around the far side of the bar, out of his line of sight. "Around."
"Around. You up and quit and tell me by 'net message when you're already off-planet-" Jonas at least lowers his voice when he sees his facial expression but still, of all the places- "and then I don't hear anything for-"
Another wince. "I- look, I know, okay, and I'm sorry, but-"
"What are you even doing here?"
Pointing to his drink and then the stage, where Sia'hla's wound around one of the tall poles in a series of increasingly impossible poses, he shrugs his shoulders in what he really hopes passes for nonchalance. "Weekend? Same as you, right?"
"You hate clubs. You've always hated clubs." He's right. Of course he's right. "Seriously, Theron. There are some crazy rumors flying around right now about you and I wouldn't believe 'em at all except I heard it from Trant directly and-"
(No way. The SIS couldn't possibly have tracked him here. They've been so careful.
But this is Nar Shaddaa and there are cameras everywhere and this was always Balkar's turf.)
He cuts him off before he can say it, whatever it is. The last song's starting and he's got to get out of here. "Are you here to drag me back?"
Jonas blinks, hair flopping into his eye, and then starts laughing. "What? No. I'm just here for the show. I used to watch those two dance all the time back in the day. You thought I-"
There's a commotion at the far end of the bar and they both turn to look. It might have been his chance to get away, awful as he'd feel about ducking out on him- as much of a smug little shit as he could be sometimes, he'd really been the closest thing Theron had to a friend in the SIS even if you didn't count that whole thing at the Dealer's Den which they, by virtue of just never talking about it after it happened, had both pretended to forget- but he hesitates just a second too long and then Nine's stepping up onto the bartop and everyone's lifting their glasses out of her path as she dances along the length of the counter.
Well. So much for that plan.
Nine twirls, one high heel tapping staccato on the marble, shifting her focus onto him as she steps out of the movement and into a slow stretch; she does not , in point of fact, fall out of the pose when she sees who's sitting beside him but her foot does come down a little heavily and she pauses, just for a second.
She blinks.
She smiles.
He is in so much trouble.
When she gets to his end of the bar she struts right past Jonas until she's standing right in front of his chair, one foot on the backrest with a jeweled anklet he doesn't remember her wearing earlier catching the light, and turns him around with a light push.
"Hi, baby," she drawls. "Give a girl a hand down?"
Mutely, he reaches up to take her extended hand.
Nine doesn't step down to the ground, though- she stands right on his thigh (on tiptoe, at least, so no permanent damage) and dips her other leg alongside, folding neatly to sit down on the counter. His drink's still half-full next to her; she picks it up and takes a sip, her face unreadable in response to his raised eyebrow. "So-" she swallows. "How'd I do?"
Um. So they're just going to… okay. He's got this.
"Fantastic," he says. "Though I have a few suggestions, but we can talk in your dressing room before the next set."
"Talk. Mm." Nine leans forward, grabs him by both lapels and before he can say anything she's kissing him, one hand sliding up to the side of his neck and teeth sharp on his lower lip and as the crowd around them goes absolutely nuts, clapping and whistling, he feels her fingers spelling out a message.
What the fuck is he doing here?
Just showed up. Accident. And then- Sorry?
Does he know?
No.
Her skin's slick with sweat; her lips taste of salt. Do we tell him?
I don't know.
She sighs against his mouth and lets him go, backing away just enough to put a little space between their faces before she turns her head to look at Balkar, who's just full-on staring at them at this point with his jaw hanging open. "But you didn't tell me you were bringing a friend."
"Should I introduce you? Xari, this is-"
"Oh," Nine says, interrupting, "we've met. It's been ages, but Jonas here used to be one of my best tippers."
(He used to- oh, Void, he didn't think of that. What were the odds that she'd worn the same face when-)
Jonas closes his mouth, at least. "Didn't think you'd remember me. Like you said, it's been a while."
"Though I do wonder." She bends forward, her face between the two of them, her voice a stage whisper. "Did you ever figure out what happened to your datapad, Agent?"
"You- how did you-" Sputtering in confusion, he's halfway standing when Nine digs her heel into his thigh and he sits back down with a muffled yelp.
"On second thought, maybe we should start with introductions. Theron?"
He nods.
"Nine," he murmurs, leaning closer to Balkar's ear; it's so loud in here he doubts anyone could hear them but still, no sense risking it- "you know Jonas. Jonas, meet Cipher Nine."
"Call me Commander," Nine says with a wink. "But we've got things to do, I'm afraid, so I think you'd better come with us."
She hops down off the counter and saunters through the crowd toward the security door, glancing back at them as Jonas tries to say something about half a dozen times before finally managing something halfway coherent.
"She stole my- she's a Cipher?"
"Was."
"And you-"
"Yup." A lot of possible questions there, but almost all the answers are the same. Theron stands, wraps one arm around his shoulders and nudges him up. "Come on. I'll explain."
Jonas looks at him out of the corner of his eye. "That an order?"
"An offer. Only an order if that's how you want to do this."
"That was never your style," he says, rising. "All right. Lead the way."
"Let me get this straight." Jonas folds his arms across his chest, leaning forward. "You're going to blow up the building."
Nine sighs, stepping out from behind the screen with her climbing suit half-zipped; she's still wearing the silver wig and fastens her hair into a loose knot, but when she opens her mouth she sounds like herself again. "No. We're going to blow up the power conduit and the shield generator. The building will be fine."
"And you're sure it'll work?"
"As sure as we can be." He answers this time as Nine reaches for her harness and tosses his toward him. "The plan's good."
"And if it works then the orbital station goes too?"
He nods. "The Zakuulans call them Star Fortresses. But yeah, that's the idea."
"That's crazy."
"We've done it before," Nine says, tightening her harness straps. "Hoth. Tatooine. Belsavis."
"And Alderaan?" It comes off light but they can both hear the undertone in the question. Dad- Jace- must have told Trant everything; someone in the SIS has got a big fucking mouth.
Tee-Seven chirps irritably from the back of the room. Kaliyo's crouched beside the droid, checking the readout on the security panel, and she snorts in agreement.
"What Tee-Seven said. Not yet." Nine reaches for her gloves, shoves them into her pocket.
"But if the blockade goes… one less planet they control." Jonas shakes his head, incredulous. "You people are crazy. You know that, right?"
She's standing still in the middle of the room and you'd almost think she was calm. He can feel the energy rolling off her, though, waves of bottled-up tension, her eyes unfocused, just for a second, and-
(He knows what it looks like, now. He just wishes he could make it stop.)
She comes back to herself. "Someone has to be."
"Fuck it," Jonas sits up straight. "I'm in. What do you need me to do?"