3. Lost and Found
Shiny and sleek, Goto's yacht dwarfed Ebon Hawk, and looked like she could handle icy comets, meteors showers and plasma winds. Nice ride. The alarm was blaring, and the vessel echoed with the movement of heavy equipment and droids. Goto was getting ready to meet the barrage coming his way.
"There is a computer console on Ebon Hawk, Bao-Dur," Atton called to his partner, after a quick duck and scan of the starboard hallway. "Log out, and come greet the welcoming committee."
"There are three lines of defense that I can see: battle droids, mine fields and the turrets," Bao-Dur purred. "Fascinating," Atton bit back, as a round from a blaster hit the door at his chest level. Whoever designed HK line, sure flipped the 'single-minded focus on the task' switch to the max.
"All of which I can shut down so it doesn't explode in our pretty faces," the Iridonian's voice could lull boma-beasts to sleep. "Please, do. I am attached to your regular features," Atton ducked again and threw his lightsaber at the HK-50 head. "We will need the overrides," the Iridonian concluded, brushed his hands on his pants, and swept towards the opposite side of the docking hatch. He ducked for a look, drawing another angry string of blaster fire. "If we find one, it's yours," Atton said absently, catching the returning lightsaber, "On three."
He tapped the count on the doorframe and rolled through, swirling his lightsaber to parry the blaster rays as he rose to his feet. Behind him, Bao-Dur did the same roll, but surged the Force, trusting Atton to shield him. He knocked out the closest HK-50. Atton dove through the breach, and chopped up the next HK in line. Rinse. Repeat. "Child's play," Bao-Dur drawled, "that's the thirty-fourth, thirty-fifth and thirty-sixth HK-50." The assassination brigade haunted Quinly since the day Atton saw her parade in the state of partial undress past his detention cell on Peragus mining facility. A thousand years ago to the day. "Let them come," Atton grunted, "we need spare parts."
They used the same tactics along the starboard hall. Goto's droids where of a different make than the HKs, but they fell just as easily to Bao-Dur's Force blast. It would have been a fast sweep, but the Iridonian kept sifting methodically through the remnants of the droid carnage. Finally, his mulish persistence paid off: he twisted something inside a crumpled head unit, it crunched, and a small panel came lose. "Here, that should help with the exterior defenses."
"Fore, then!" Atton polished the already gleaming walls with his back, made a check of the larger compartment, ducked back in the doorway. "Mines. Largish droids behind. That would be the exterior defense." Bao-Dur attached his precious panel to another console: "On it, Captain. Wait for it… wait for it…" Then, pianissimo: "Boom."
One of the charges exploded with a deafening crush, pelting the air with killing shards. The others hissed and went out, sending up mere wisps of smoke. "That's a shut down program?" Atton yelled through the haze. "Overload. I made do." Atton could barely hear Bao-Dur for the pounding of the metal feet. The droids were coming for them, now the mine field was not protecting them. Creative bastards. "Well, hang on to your horns," Atton muttered turning to meet the charging wall of fire and metal. "Worry about your own, Captain."
The familiar surge of Force swept past him. He rolled and hacked. Rinse. Repeat. Pure pazaak. Only, when it was over this time, Atton ferreted around like a Dantoine scavenger for the security datapads.
"Tell me this one was a shut-down," Atton said following a blind curve of a narrow passage. "It was a shut down." They walked past the silent turrets. "I like the shut-down." Then things got busy again. No time to talk, only to kill. Melt the metal, burn the oil, cut the wires, blast lights out.
"She is not on the bridge," Atton looked around ready to hit anything that moved funny. Not a stir. Thanks to their efforts, the bridge was now devoid of droids. And Quinly. "Did you think she would be?" Bao-Dur asked as fire and smoke blossomed in the purple air off the port side. The yacht shook, and Atton got thrown against the pilots' panel. It was better than the silence. It made him think faster.
"I don't know. This rust bucket is too blazing big." Another hit, off the starboard this time. Common, Disciple, you're slipping. "I will fly her off world and we search at leisure." Bao-Dur shrugged, pouring over the multicolored schematics on the panel: "I am sure the General will understand how it was easier to strand them fighting Nar Shaddaa's best than to check Goto's ballroom." He tapped his finger on a big circular compartment at the stern. "Her backside was too wide for just the cells and the hall. We must have missed a turn."
Atton swore and ran, or, rather, tried to run. The halls were much too narrow now that the yacht lurched and vibrated with the explosions, so the progress was slower, much slower than he wanted. Finally, there it was: the metal hatch of cold gray. Atton was happy to see that it was locked. The work stopped his hands from shaking and the hot dampness that spread all over his back after the battle was done didn't bother him any more. He tapped the lock, listened, picked on it with his trusty tunneler until the door slid opened. Atton straightened, and leaned against the doorframe, arms folded across his chest. He savored the view of the prize.
Ballroom, or whatever it was, was huge, round and shiny. Dead-centre, a woman sat cross-legged, immobile, apparently oblivious to the battle raging in the sky, to the open doors, to him. It lasted a heartbeat. The living statue's cat-like eyes opened, and Master Quinly came to her feet. "Atton. Bao-Dur. Let us move." Then she was in the hall, walking unerringly towards Ebon Hawk. If she brushed past him on her way, it was so impossibly fast that he did not feel it at all. He would have liked to. Very much.
Back by Ebon Hawk, in the docking hatch, they were greeted by a hefty flying sphere. "Whatever did you do to Remote, Bao-Dur? And when?" asked Atton perplexed. Bao-Dur pointed behind his shoulder. There hovered the Remote, a small useless thing. Bao-Dur maintained his droid helped him fix things. Maybe it did, or maybe he needed a pet. The swollen up version started a pompous speech, something about Goto needing to supervise Quinly's actions from a close distance.
"General, the shields won't hold for much longer," Bao-Dur's mentioned casually, ignoring the self-important droid's chatter. Quinly nodded her acknowledgement and paid attention to the Goto's droid just long enough for a clipped: "If you wish." The droid floated off, disappearing inside Hawk. Back to Bao-Dur: "Countdown?"
"Thirty," replied Bao-Dur, "twenty nine—"
He was at three, when Atton peeled Ebon Hawk away from the docking module. Plenty of time.
Taking off was pure pazaak, but landing her took some art, since the ground party retreated from the docks, leaving the Exchange thugs to their target practice. Good thing Exchange hated Goto so much; only a few ruffians followed their men. Atton opened the landing hatch and fired from the turrets a couple of time to discourage the wrong crowd from getting on board. Disciple was the first up the ramp. He had a look of a man who walked through at least one plasma burst. His fair hair was sooty, his robes - singed, and an ugly burn covered his cheek, neck and chest. Yet, the heady cocktail of youth, Force, and who knows how many battle stims kept him not only on his feet, but oblivious to anything but Quinly.
"Master, are you well?" he crossed the mess-hall in three strides.
Quinly did not reply, only raised her hand up in the air. For one mad moment Atton thought that she would push the man away. Instead, they both stood motionless, and the young man's skin and tissue mended. Quinly lowered her hand and caught Disciple on the elbow to steady him. "As talented as you are in the medical arts, you should have attended to it immediately," she said evenly, "and yes, I am well." Disciple beamed. Not a trace of ice in his eyes now.
The intercom beeped loudly, urgently in the cockpit. "Will you take the message, Atton, please?" asked Quinly. "I must talk with you, Mira, before we take off."
The transparent image floating over the com turned out to be Xarga, a Mandalorian from Dxun. "Vaklu's made his move against Queen Talia," the Mandalorian reported. "There is fighting on Onderon, Vaklu brought the Sith to fight against the Royalists." Atton nodded: "He's got balls. Or he is a fool." The Mandalorian shrugged: "There is also a ship here, on Dxun." "Reserve?" Atton asked. "Probably," Xarga shrugged, "I don't think they are any danger. Digging up an old burial mound instead of training. Like the old bones are worth a good soldier." He spat. Atton frowned; Sith looking for old bones sounded bad to him. "Thanks, Xarga." Xarga grunted: "We'll be seeing your frying pan here soon enough, lest I miss my guess." Atton buzzed off and went to look for Quinly with the news.
He was at the messhall, when he spotted Quinly sitting opposite from bristling Mira on a sleeping bunk. "It is a tough ship you want to catch. All of my crew is bound to me by the Force."
"Not all of them are Jedi!" Mira exclaimed.
"None of us is a Jedi," Quinly replied evenly, "and he is a Mandalorian."
"He is a man," Mira snorted derisively.
"Indeed," Quinly said, "You don't think highly of men, do you, Mira?"
"I don't have problem with them," the red-head laughed, "I dress like I do, they stare, a right hook, and the bounty is mine. Men's good for business."
Quinly leaned forward intently, and made Mira look at her. "We are not after bounties, Mira. If you stay with the ship, with me, you will shoot a blaster. And, if you do not have a blaster, and it is a biped, you kick hard at the groin, not the chin."
Atton grinned despite himself. Girl's talk, huh. He cleared his throat to attract Quinly's attention, but there was no need, she was already turning to face him, rising from the bunk (too bad that). "The message, Quinly."
She listened, nodded. "Mira? If you decide to leave, it will have to be on Onderon. Atton, get us to Dxun."