This is sort of a filler chapter, but don't worry, the plot really starts moving forward in the next chapter.


As it turned out, it had indeed been Matthias who'd proved. . . disagreeable. . . with the fancy flying they'd been doing, and vomited all over the dejarik board.

Kaz, his nose wrinkled in disgust, was eyeing the bodyguard like he wasn't sure whether to dice him, mince him, skin him, or all three.

"Go off on a rant at Matthias and I'll tell everyone what happened on Cato Neimoidia that one time," Inej warned, taking a seat next to Nina, whose eyebrows shot up into her hairline at the threat.

Kaz turned his glare on her. "Need I remind you, that wasn't my fault."

"No," Inej agreed, letting a smile creep its way onto her face again. She'd forgotten how much fun teasing Kaz was. "But it still happened. And I wouldn't say that particular story is exactly conducive to fostering respect and goodwill, is it?" She tilted her head, and her smile turned icy. She hadn't forgotten what had happened in the cantina. "Why don't you get something to clean this mess up with, then?"

Kaz pursed his lips. "Careful, Inej, or I might forget that favour I owe you and charge you the full ten thousand."

She narrowed her eyes further, but countered, "Then I'll just call in the few thousand other favours you owe me."

Kaz couldn't find a response to that. Glowering, he stalked off to pick up something to clean with.

Inej felt all the tension drain out of her as he went, and she leaned her head on Nina's shoulder. Her friend's hand came up round her waist and squeezed twice, the weight a comforting warmth against her side.

It hit her after a moment that everyone else was still sitting in silence.

"What," Jesper began, "in the nine hells was that?"

She slated him a tired glance. Today had been exhausting, between flying for dear life, meeting with Kaz, arguing with Kaz - everything about Kaz was exhausting. "That was Kaz being Kaz."

"Yeah, I got that," Jesper snapped back, "but-" He cut himself off after a pointed look from Inej and a mouthed Later. Instead, he turned to Wylan, sitting down next to him. "I'm Jesper, by the way. I'm the pilot. Well," he added, shooting her a glance that was half-bitter, half-accepting, "when she's not flying, apparently."

Wylan didn't have the energy to muster up a smile, but he said, "I'm Wylan. And this is Matthias."

"You're the one who was vomiting, huh?" Jesper grinned; Matthias glowered. "Don't like flying, much?"

"Flying's for droids," the bodyguard grumbled, sounding as unprofessional as Inej had heard him. "At least droids wouldn't end up throwing everything on its axis and have us clinging on for dear life."

"Matthias. . ." Wylan whispered fretfully, but after a sideways glance at him, his bodyguard ultimately ignored the admonishment.

"You should listen to the kid," Jesper supplied helpfully. "I mean, if you dislike flying so much, we can always set a bumpier course. Get you to appreciate the thrill of it a bit more." Matthias was fuming, by now. "Did you know this ship once made the Kessel Run in a record flight?" He patted the bench lovingly.

Inej nodded along. "It's true," she admitted. "We once made it in fourteen parsecs."

"Twelve."

She lifted her head from Nina's shoulder to look at Jesper. "What?"

"Twelve. Kaz and I made it in twelve parsecs, once. Well," he added, "Kaz can't fly the ship, so technically I made it in twelve parsecs."

Inej's mouth dropped open almost of its own accord. "You're joking."

"I'm not."

"Yes, you-"

"Flyboys and flygirls," Nina said loudly over the top of them both, looking at Matthias and Wylan, "are insufferable." She stood up and grabbed Inej's wrist, dragging her halfway across the room. "Get into the cockpit, you two. Settle your differences there, so we don't have to hear the pissing contest that ensues. We'll dump our stuff in the bunks and set ourselves up for a long trip in the meantime."

She shoved them both into the cockpit. They exchanged incredulous glances as the door slammed shut behind them.

"I thought a parsec was a measure of distance?" Wylan asked into the ensuing silence. No one listened to him.


"So you're a Jedi," Matthias said sometime later, once Wylan had gone to stake a claim on one of the cabins, his eyes narrowed and tone. . . less than impressed.

Nina resisted the urge to deadpan her response - Zoya would not approve - and instead raised an eyebrow. "Yes."

Matthias crossed his arms - an attempt to make himself look bigger, she knew. She fumbled for the Force and probed the man in front of her. He seemed. . . tense. Anxious? Angry? Hateful? Worried?

All of the above, Nina realised. But the most domineering emotion of all: Fear.

And yet he clung to his sneering bravado for just a little longer. "Prove it."

She raised the other eyebrow to join the first, then. Instead of answering out loud, she raised a hand, ignoring the way Matthias flinched at the action. Her satchel, lying innocuously on the bench, trembled for a moment, and then her lightsaber emerged from its depths and flew in a flawless arc to land in her hand.

She ignited it. The rosy colour of the blade stained the floor pink.

Matthias's face had gone stark white; he was whispering words she couldn't quite make out over the humming of her saber. She turned it off, and cocked her head at him. "That proof enough for you?"

His lips were still moving soundlessly. Nina frowned. "You alright?"

She took a step forward, clipping her lightsaber to her belt as she did so, but he shrunk back, a snarl on his face. "Get away from me, Jedi scum."

She felt an answering sneer begin to form on her own lips. Typical. "I guess there's more Imp in you than I thought," she scoffed. "The moment you see something or someone you don't understand, you decry it with 'scum'." She shook her head, picked up her satchel and made for one of the bunk rooms. She didn't have to listen to this. "You're not with the Empire anymore, defector," she called over her shoulder. "And you'll find that the Rebellion has very different ideas on the Jedi and Sith to your precious regime."

"You're right," came the reply. She paused, glancing back over her shoulder. Matthias was standing now, his arms and stance spread wide, his hands clenched into fists. "I'm with the Alliance to Restore the Republic. And the Jedi weren't just enemies to the Empire - they were traitors to the Republic, too, before it fell."

She gaped at him, her spine locking up and going rigid. "You- you actually believe that," she whispered, half to herself. She said it again, louder: "You actually believe that- that-"

"That what?"

"That nonsense! Propaganda! Complete and utter bantha shit!"

"If your Order didn't betray the Republic," Matthias spat, "then why are you all dead?"

Nina pressed her lips tightly together; she was mortified to feel tears spark to life behind her eyes. I won't cry. Not here. Not now.

"Because Emperor Morozova killed us all!" She was screaming, a dim part of her brain registered. She was screaming about it. "Because his apprentice Darth Koroleva hunted us down and executed us!"

Matthias stilled at that. "Koroleva? You mean-"

"Silver armour, speaks through a vocoder, carries a crimson lightsaber? Yeah, I mean her."

"The Emperor's right hand woman." She didn't miss the way he shuddered at the thought.

"You've had experiences with her?"

Matthias gritted his teeth. "Too many. She's terrifying."

"She killed my master."

He looked up, then, and met her eye. "What?"

"She killed my Jedi Master - my teacher. Zoya told me to hide while they fought, and Koroleva slaughtered her."

Matthias pursed his lips, but said nothing. Nina could sense that, despite their shared animosity for the Sith Lord, he couldn't bring himself to say he was sorry for a Jedi's death.

Because he wasn't.

To avoid his conflicted gaze, Nina looked down at her brown satchel. Clutching the belly of it, she could feel the hard metal of the second lightsaber at the bottom, digging into her palm. The lightsaber she'd recovered from the battlefield that fateful day, before Koroleva could add it as a trophy to her collection.

She looked up at Matthias again, face solemn. "I suggest, Helvar, that you start opening yourself up to the fact that most of the Empire's policies are pure propaganda. Because you're with the Rebellion now." He shifted uncomfortably at that. She turned to start heading for the door Wylan had disappeared into. "And you'll soon find that Emperor's favourite thing to do," she finished as she shut it behind her, "is lie."


They could hear a dim conversation going on in the main bulk of the ship, but Inej and Jesper sat in an initial befuddled silence after they were thrown into the cockpit.

"Twelve parsecs?" Inej broke said silence with.

Jesper's mouth tugged to the side. "Yup."

Inej shook her head, half in denial, half in amazement. "Wow. You must be an outstanding pilot."

Jesper scratched his arm. "Yeah, well," he said. "You're not so bad yourself."

They shared a smirk, before silence fell again. Inej stared out at the swirling blue of hyperspace, blinking to clear her vision every once in a while.

"It's not meant to be good, staring at hyperspace for ages," Jesper commented idly, gazing at the console.

Inej looked back at him briefly. "Oh?"

"There's an old folk tale that staring at hyperspace for too long makes you go mad."

She tore her eyes away fully, at that. "I'll keep it in mind."

Silence fell for another beat or two, before Jesper blurted out, "How do you know Kaz?"

Inej blinked. "We used to be partners. He'd do the smooth-talking and all the business transactions while I flew the ship."

"Why'd you split up?" Jesper frowned at the console.

Inej shrugged. "I got a moral code; he didn't. I left to join the Rebellion; he didn't."She paused, then turned to look at him. Jesper glanced up to meet her eye. "How long did you say you two have been working together?"

It was Jesper's turn to shrug, then, though there was something. . . forced. . . about the gesture. "A few months now." He had to clear his throat before he continued, "My dad died a little before that, I'd incurred a few gambling debts, mum died several years before, and I'd always wanted to become a merchant or something anyway." He gave a self-deprecating laugh. "So I left Corellia to become a smuggler instead."

Inej quirked her brow. "Corellia? That explains the Core accent."

"I don't have an accent-"

"You said mum. Not mom. That's a Core accent."

Jesper grinned. "Can't argue with that, I suppose."

Inej patted the console, somewhat lovingly. "So you've just been ferrying Kaz around the galaxy since then?"

"Yeah, well, it's not like he can fly himself, can he?"

"He can."

Jesper turned his head at that. "What?"

Inej met his gaze head on. "Kaz can pilot a ship himself. He just chooses not to."

Jesper shook his head, like there was a ringing in his ears he couldn't quite dispel. "What?" He didn't give her a chance to respond before he asked, "Why?"

"I don't know," she said honestly. "Your guess is as good as mine. But I've only ever seen him fly the ship once, and that was when I was too injured to do it myself."

Sheer, brightly-coloured clothing stained with blood, her own panting loud in her ears as the ship rocked underneath her, the twin mantras of I'm free I'm free I'm free and We're gonna die we're gonna die we're gonna die mingling in her mind-

She blinked. "It wasn't the best of times. Kaz flying the ship was the only chance we had of getting out of there alive."

Jesper forced a chuckle. "Knowing Kaz's proclivity for trouble, I can believe that."

"You can believe what?" said the subject of their conversation, almost defensively. Kaz stood in the entrance to the cockpit, clutching the frame tightly, as impassive as ever but with an ever tightening grip.

Jesper tensed up immediately. Inej couldn't quite decipher the emotions that flitted across his face.

"You know what," he said conversationally, to Inej, to himself, but not to Kaz. Not really. "I think I'll head back and made sure no one's stolen my bunk. I don't want to get into another fight with Matthias." He looked at Kaz, then. "Why don't you stay up with Inej, Kaz? After all, since you can apparently fly the ship yourself you'll be just the person to call on in an emergency, won't you?"

"Jesper?" Kaz asked, looking confused and somewhat - to Inej's surprise - concerned. Defensive. But what is he defending?

The Corellian just pushed past him out of the cockpit, leaving him to stagger back in shock.

Tentatively, Kaz crept forwards to sit himself in the co-pilot's seat. "What did you two talk about?"

He sounded grumpy again. Good. The concern - vulnerability - had been unnerving.

Inej just shrugged, a small smile on her face. "Stuff."

"Stuff?"

"Stuff."

"That's such a Jesper answer." Kaz shook his head. "I regret ever letting you two meet."

"Well, we have now, and you can't change that." There was something pointed behind the words, but not even Inej herself could tell what it was.

She stood up. "I think I'll be heading back to pick out a bunk as well. We've got a long journey ahead of us."

"Where to?"

Inej just smiled, and shook her head. "Don't look at hyperspace for too long, by the way," she added as she left. "Supposedly you go mad."

Then she left Kaz to his rueful cogitations.


Yes, I gave Nina a pink lightsaber. No, I don't know if they exist in the Star Wars universe. No, I don't care either way.