Chapter 13
Two ships sat side by side looking like two sides of an incomplete triangle. On one side was the Diversity. It was primarily white, with purple across the roof and in some areas; on top, near the back was a noticeable space where a smaller ship would normally have rested. The other ship was The Good Boy Express. This ship was half the size of the Diversity and was creamier white with numerous old grey patches. The doors of The Good Boy Express opened and a Twi' Lek walked out of the smaller ship while a human walked out of the the Diversity.
They both stopped some distance away. Kisto, the Twi'Lek rebel instinctively reached for his blaster when he saw Buck in his Stormtrooper uniform. When he saw that Buck had no weapon he relaxed and his hand wandered away from his blaster. They spoke not daring to get nearer to each other.
"You're quiet a good pilot." Buck said with a friendly smile on his face.
"Thank you," Kisto replied. "Most people say I was born to be in a cockpit. I was under the impression that I would be meeting Zack."
"He's... inside." Buck said just before Dyna walked out of the ship to join Buck.
"Well well well, this is small galaxy." Kisto said, smiling. "What's a street thief like you doing all this way, Dyna?" Kisto asked in a mirthful tone. Dyna hugged Buck's arm in response and hid her face behind his elbow. Kisto raised an eyebrow, "Is there something wrong?"
"We lost a crew member." Buck said as Dyna squeeze his arm harder.
"Oh... I'm sorry. Trust me; I know how that feels like."
Zack walked out of the ship. His green eyes were small as they were hidden behind puffy eyelids. He gazed at Kisto. "Kisto, thank you for your help."
Kisto could hear that his voice was course and soft, a far cry from the cocky Zack he met on Cirasso. The Twi'Lek nodded in response.
"Why aren't you in Cirasso?" Zack asked. "I thought your duties were there."
"My rebel cell was discovered shortly after you left." Kisto said. "We were wiped out... I'm the only survivor... as far as I can tell." Buck's eyes went wide. Now he understood what Kisto meant when he said he knew how they felt about losing one of their own. "I had nothing to do, so I decided to keep my eye on things."
Zack nodded. He imagined after Kisto's men were killed, the Twi' Lek suspected that Zack had double crossed him. However, their attempt at saving Ru' Bik proved that they had not. "We should collect wood to build a funeral pyre." Zack said to Buck before walking away to find wood in the rocky landscape with a few meter wide patches of trees grouped closely together, sprouting out.
/
Canoe and the rest of Saza's men stood at attention after doing their debriefing on the recent events. Saza paced up and down the length of her assembled men while talking.
"...we were able to stop the rebels' plot, kill one of them and captured one of their small vessels but I am still not happy." Saza said. "They got away, which means they'll still be a thorn in the Empire's side." She said before she stopped in front of Canoe. "Your blaster looks a little old, Lieutenant Ida, why is that?"
Canoe stared straight ahead, not daring to look into her eyes, as his quick mind made up a lie. Until this very moment, he had not realised that he had mistakenly taken Buck's gun and given him his. "I requested a new blaster after mine malfunctioned. I guess they gave me a second hand one."
"Likely story." Saza before she turned away. "The rebels were being helped by someone in Stormtrooper armour. I did not get a good look at him but I noticed how new his gun looked when he fired it at me. So either one of you helped the rebels directly or you helped this rebel in Stormtrooper outfit, which I think is more likely." Saza said before she snapped her fingers and Stormtrropers entered the room and began came relieving her men of their blasters. "I suspect the rebel in the Stormtrooper armour is the MIA Buck Johnson, which would make him a traitor."
A Stormtrooper took Canoe's blaster from him and marked it as his.
"I will have all your blaster's bar code scanned and if any of them is registered as belonging to Buck Johnson, then that Stormtrooper will not only be charged with treason but he will also have to deal woth me!" Saza said. "Dismissed!" She waved them away.
Canoe walked out of the room and watched as the other Stormtroopers took away the blaster that he had been holding. He needed to find a way to get that blaster back because if they discover that it was Buck's, he may not live to see prison for treason charges, not when Saza Ripper was involved.
/
Buck walked to the small forest patch that Zack was cutting down. He could hear Zack using his lightsaber to cut trees down. He could hear and see the trees crashing down until the trees fell outward like an opening flower petal to reveal a heavy breathing Zack in the middle with his green laser blade ignited. He looked at Buck and Buck felt a little scared. The look in his eyes was not a mourning look nor did it look like the old Zack.
"Buck," Zack said. "I see you're making some progress."
Buck looked down at the bundle of wood that he had under his arm. Because he did not have any cutting tool, he had to snap off branches of the trees instead of cutting them down like Zack. "Yeah, but I don't think I was needed in this. You seem to be collecting more than enough wood." Buck said looking at the trees lying on the ground.
"I thought Dyna was suppose to be helping me?" Zack said, looking around for Dyna.
"You scared her," Buck said. "And the way you're using that thing now," Buck nodded to the lightsaber, "I can see why she was scared."
Zack sighed before deactivating the lightsaber. "I just want to get this done quickly," He said as he bent down inspect a tree.
"I understand." Buck said hesitantly.
"Yes and after we put... her to rest then we'll complete the mission." Zack said.
"The mission? We failed, Zack. There is no more mission."
"There's still a chance to break Ru' Bik out or don't you want to do that anymore."
"I do but... I think we've lost too much."
"That is why we must not give up!" Zack said. "Because we've lost too much to turn back now. We finish this."
"At whose expense? Mine? Dyna's?"
"If need be, yes." Zack said.
Buck was about to raise his voice but he took a moment to breathe and calm down. Zack was in mourning after all and he felt this loss the most considering he knew Lona the longest. "I think we need to take a step back and revaluate things."
"So now you want to back out when you dragged us into this!" Zack shouted getting up and making his way to Buck. "When it's your fault that Lona is..." Zack stopped when he saw and felt the fear from Buck. He looked down at his hands and noticed that his he had subconsciously activated his lightsaber. Zack took a deep breath and put his lightsaber away.
Buck calmed down once Zack put away the weapon. He was not armed because he was amongst allies but he was starting to regret leaving his gun back at the ship. "We'll talk about this later. Hopefully we'll both have calmed down." Buck said.
Zack nodded and Buck left him to his work.
/
Canoe waited until his squad was about to sleep. He knew that in a few minutes, their blaster's bar codes would be scanned and once his blaster was scanned, they will discover that he helped Buck. He needed to change blasters so that he was not discovered. He was already able to secretly obtain another blaster. Now all he had to do was sneak into the place where the blasters were going to be scanned and switch Buck's one for the newly acquired one.
The first step to doing this was getting out of the sleeping quarters while making an alibi for himself. "Hey, Pado." Canoe said calling out to one of his comrades who was trying to sleep.
"What, Canoe?" Pado grumbled.
"I'm kinda hungry. Wanna go to the cafeteria?" Canoe asked rather loudly.
Pado groaned as he turned his body away from Canoe. "If you want to sacrifice sleep for food, be my guest but don't drag me into your life choices."
Canoe gave a short laugh. "Alright buddy, I'll see you when I get back." Canoe said leaving him to sleep. The first part of the plan worked. Now while he was going to exchange the blasters, everyone who overheard him would think he was at the cafeteria.
Canoe put on his helmet while walking through the halls. At a Star Destroyer, there were always people on duty and he did not want to be recognised. If anyone saw him they would think he was just another over eager Trooper who's too excited to take off his helmet and there were a lot of those on any ship. He found the place where he had hidden the replacement blaster and began making his way to where the squad's blasters were taken.
He reached the entrance to the room where the blasters were. Through the door, he saw that there was a white platform that led to a section that was suspended from the ground. The ground was so far down that it could not be seen, it was hidden by darkness. On the platform were three short, blue droids. They had huge eyes that doubled as torches and whatever their light shined on would be seen by their large binocular shaped eyes.
Canoe groaned. He had not been expecting the security droids but it made sense that security would have increased after the last rebel attack. The droids were rotating at different angles, meaning with all three working together there was no blind spot. However, Canoe had a plan to get past them to the room beyond.
Canoe then proceeded to open the sliding door only a slither before shooting out into the air. The laser bolt travelled up past the three security droids, immediately gaining their attention. The droids rolled to one side to investigate the flash of light that was now long gone. While their attention was occupied Canoe rushed past the door onto the platform. This movement alerted the droids and they simultaneously turned around to where Canoe was and saw... nothing. The droids returned to their normal surveillance.
Unknown to the three security droids, Canoe was under the platform, hanging from the bars that were underneath the platform. He began moving forward like a monkey across the platform bars. His arms began straining as they supported his whole body weight. Underneath his helmet, beads of sweat were already appearing on his face. He did not dare look down at the seemingly bottomless pit beneath his dangling feet. He knew that if his hands failed and he fell, it would be the end of him.
He got to the end of the platform. He swung to one end of the platform and let go with one of his hands. All his weight was now on his left hand. He grunted quietly as he reached for his blaster. He aimed his blaster and let out another shot which sped above the heads of the droids. While the droids investigated the new lights, Canoe lifted himself from under the platform and got into the room before the security droids turned to his position.
In the security room he fell to his knees, half not believing that he made it. He heard clanking footsteps and jumped behind some big machinery before a droid walked past him. From behind the machine he spied on the droid. The droid had a blaster in its hands and it placed the blaster on a table. A green laser line of light slowly pasted over blaster resting on the table. When the light had completely passed a voice sounded out, "Serial Number: 2749R2849. Registered to Corporal Pado Reese."
Canoe raised his eyebrows. The blasters were already being scanned! He snuck to where the other blasters were. All the blasters were in clear white cases. He saw that he was just in time as his blaster was next. He tried to open the case to replace the blaster but the case was locked! It did not matter how much he tried to pry it open, it would not budge. He heard the clanking footsteps of the droid as it returned to the blasters. Canoe was forced to hide as the droid appeared. It took the case with his blaster and via a magnetic signal discharged through its finger, it opened the glass case and took out the blaster. It headed for the table where the blaster would be scanned and placed the blaster on it. Before it could begin the scanning, there was a noise of cases falling over each other coming from behind it.
"Oh dear." The droid said as it walked back to the cases. While it was away, Canoe switched the blasters and returned to his hiding place before the droid returned. The scan began passing over the blaster, "Serial Number: 2681BG3221. Registered to..." The computer paused and Canoe held his breathe. Why had the computer stopped? Had his switch not changed anything?
The droid slammed his palms on the table, "Yes?"
The voice replied, "Lieutenant Canoe Ida."
Canoe breathed a sigh of relief. He waited until the droid was out of sight before he got outside and snuck past the security droids out of the room the same way he snuck in. Now he needed to complete the plan by going to the cafeteria and solidifying his alibi. At the cafeteria he ordered something plain, had a few small talk conversations so that they could attest that he was there and then left to go to sleep.
/
The funeral pyre had been built. Buck and Zack made a makeshift stretcher to carry Lona's body. They had to fetch it from the medical room and for the first time, Buck saw her lifeless body. When the red lightsaber blade had stabbed a hole through her chest, he instinctively knew that she was dead but until now, he had avoided seeing the body. He and Zack stepped over the medical droid which was on the floor in two pieces. Buck guessed what had happened to the droid but he did not say anything. They moved her on their stretcher and carried her out to her final resting place.
Kisto looked on as Buck and Zack appeared from the ship. He found it a little funny that they were making this planet Lona's final resting place. Only a few people knew of this planet and most of them were rebels. The planet was the site of many impromptu funerals of escaping and fatally wounded rebels. And here was Lona, who would also end her journey on the planet. He took it as a sign that she was indeed a rebel, through and through. The wind began to pick up. Kisto knew that the planet's winds could get intense the later in the day it got and he hoped that the ceremony would be over by then.
Dyna watched as the stretcher with Lona's body passed by. It was strange for her, seeing Lona like this. It was strange not seeing her chest rise and fall in time with her breath. A great sadness fell over her as she remembered the few good times she had with her and how she would never see her again and how she would never get the opportunity of knowing her better. Tears began to well up beneath her eyes. Dyna clenched her jaw in an attempt to keep the tears at bay. She felt like she had to be strong. She tore her eyes away from Lona's face and stared at the white sheet covering her body. Through the sheet she could see that her body was dressed in different clothes than the ones she died in. She looked at Zack and felt very sorry for him for she imagined that he was hurting the most.
Zack carried the stretcher from the front. He looked behind him at the face that belonged to the body on the stretcher. Although his eyes were on Lona's peaceful face all he could see was his failure to protect her, his failure to defeat the inquisitor who did this to her, his failure to save Ru' Bik. In his mind he kept seeing Saza stab Lona in the back, through her chest and how he was powerless to stop it. He looked forward again and made a promise to avenge her.
They moved her body to the pyre and set it alight. The four rebels watched on as the pyre caught on fire. They silently watched as the only sounds that could be heard was the wind, the blazing fire and Dyna's sobs.
Author Note:
Hey everyone! Thanks for reading... unless your skimming through the thing to check if its any good, in that case, thanks for skimming!
Anyways, this is the last chapter I wrote before my life got... busy? School, work, you know stuff of that nature. Unfortunately things haven't quietened down so because I'm behind on the writing, I'm going to put this thing on a short term hiatus. Its not permanent, I promise, it will be three months max! Just hang in there for me, we're almost done with this amazing tale (shameless promotion).
Thanks!
