CHAPTER EIGHT – WHERE HAS'T THOU BEEN, SISTER?

LUX

"Saw, do any of these holos look familiar?"

Saw's still carefully propped up in bed, but it only takes a few seconds of his scrolling through the photos to decide.

"These two," he says, selecting Jack's and Maria's holos. "These are the two that broke into my house and attacked me."

General Tandin gently pats his shoulder. "You did well, Saw. Now go back to resting."

"I can't sleep," Saw protests.

Tandin breaks in. "Do you have any leads on the music box? I'm sure that will help him sleep."

"Not yet, but we know who they are now," I lift my hand over the button to end the call. "Thank you, Saw. It really helps."

Saw opens his mouth to say something but Tandin cuts him off. "Thank you, Lux and Ahsoka. Check back in as soon as you have any more information, please," he says and ends the transmission just before Saw can shout over him.

Ahsoka raises an eye marking at me. "Is Tandin staying with him in the hospital this whole time?"

"They're probably transferred him to the palace so someone could be with him. I imagine they haven't succeeded in getting ahold of Hutch, and you and I are in no position."

"That's good. I was worried about him being all alone." She chews the end of her stylus. "Okay, the militia and the Ryloth authorities will send us whatever evidence links back to Jack and Maria and we have a positive identification. Now all we need is the trap."

"The media is quiet so we won't scare them off, but this is Coruscant. There are bachelors everywhere, and no landlord will think twice as long as the rent payments keep coming in. As long as they keep hold of the victim's checkbook, they can keep writing checks until the money's gone. That'll give them a standard month to get new rent money, and so on." In my opinion it's really a brilliant trick. I just wish they weren't killing people as part of it.

I sit down on one of the chairs just as Ahsoka gets out of hers. "We know they're expecting, so maybe we can use that to our advantage, somehow. Or we could fake a group of vulnerable bachelors to draw them in."

My stomach growls. Loudly.

"Ahsoka? Before we spring the trap, I'd like to announce that the last time I ate was the breakfast I had at my house. Yesterday."

"Didn't you eat on the transport?"

As evidenced by my clenching and growling stomach, the answer is an enormous no. "I was sleeping to make up for the time difference, and when I wasn't asleep I was trying to ignore the kicks to my seat so I could sleep."

Ahsoka shrugs; I've no doubt she's familiar with that particular strategy and the annoyance of having one's seat kicked. "After we spring the trap we can go to Dex's to wait it out…"

"And considering our luck they'll walk into it before we've even placed drink orders. Ahsoka, the last time I ate was also the last time you had anything. We need to eat something before one of us gets the shakes or passes out from hypoglycemia."

My mother was very big on the "eat before you get the shakes" philosophy. Five years old and not hungry? "Eat before you get the shakes!" Ten years old and didn't want lunch? "You have to eat it or you'll get the shakes." Twelve years old and stuffing sweets into my mouth? "Lux, eat some protein so you don't have a sugar crash and get the shakes."

Mina Bonteri succeeded in at least one parenting goal: I eat healthy food on what she would consider an acceptable schedule. Most of the time. And I don't get the shakes.

"Let's order takeout," I suggest. "That way, we don't have to stop working and we can eat. Best of both worlds."

Ahsoka considers.

"Not Nubian," she says after a pause. "Anakin eats way too much Nubian takeout."

"I think that's our dinner!" I cheer, jumping to my feet and racing to the door.

Ahsoka rolls her eyes. "Lux, there's something called 'self-control' I'd like to talk to you about."

I could care less about self-control, because I'm famished. I open the door as fast as I can, stuff some credits into the delivery person's hand, and grab the bags with a shouted "Thank you!"

"You and food," Ahsoka scoffs.

I set the boxes onto the table, completely ignoring the last comment. "I can't believe you don't notice how good this smells. I was salivating before I even opened the door."

She goes back to her datapad while I pop open the nearest box. The scent hits my nose like a wave of glorious perfume. Oh, do I love Chandrilan.

"I had the spicy bantha bites. What did you have?"

"The same thing," Ahsoka says. "Just put it in the fridge, please. I really need to get this work done."

I put my hands on my hips. "Ahsoka, come off it. You need to eat something or else…" I can't repeat my mother's famous argument, so I come up with the next best threat. "I'll call Padme. She wouldn't be pleased to hear about this."

"You wouldn't dare," she replies, knowing full well it's the truth. I wouldn't dare.

So I move on to a threat I'd actually follow through on. "I'll feed you like a baby."

Ahsoka actually scoffs at this. "Ha! You, spoon-feed me?"

Oh, it's on.

I spear one of the bantha bites with my fork and hold it out. "Open up, Master Jedi."

Ahsoka's head snaps up. "You're not serious."

"I'm completely serious." I hold the fork immovable in the air. "Eat, m'lady."

She bursts out laughing. "What are you going to do, stuff it in my mouth?"

"You underestimate my power; I volunteered at a daycare," I shoot back. "I have fought against the will of toddlers and won. Do you want to see the full extent of my power?"

She sighs and drops the datapad. "If it can overcome toddlers, I wouldn't be surprised if Sith Lords ran in fear," she replies before delicately taking the piece of food off the end of my fork. Her eyes close. "Oh my force. This is amazing."

I can't take it anymore; I spear another bantha bite and pop it in my mouth. It tastes how an angel descending from the heavens and handing you a million credits must feel.

"We got side dishes too. They smell great, and I wonder how they taste … Ahsoka?"

Ahsoka has both containers of cheese noodles and holds her fork out at me, grinning devilishly.

"You think you're the feeding expert because you volunteered at a daycare. Think again. I worked in the crèche." she boasts. "They never wanted to eat unless it was candy, and then the caretakers would go bananas if they had too much. It seems like there's a thousand different ailments for little kids."

"There are." I remember having to get an armload of vaccinations as a child. "My mother was always worried about me getting one of them. If I had the sniffles, she busted out the vitamins."

"The way they talk about them, the caretakers in the crèche would have you think you'd never make it to adulthood without vitamins." Ahsoka laughs. "It was almost funny."

"Must be across the board," I joke. "Caretakers and daycare workers and teachers and mothers, always worried about…" It hits me. "Germs."

Ahsoka looks up. "I know that look. What are you thinking?"

"Germs," I repeat. "I can't believe we didn't see it. We don't have to stage some elaborate trap, we don't have to cause a manhunt, we don't have to do much of anything!"

"Lux, slow down," she orders and nearly knocks over our food cartons standing up. "What are you getting at here?"

"I think I know how to catch our killers."

THIRD PERSON

Maria flies into their new apartment clutching a piece of flimsi in her hand.

"Jack, did you see this?"

"See what?" He leans on the mop. "I thought you were going to stay out for the rest of the day; there are too many chemicals here."

"Forget the chemicals," she bleats. "This is a health advisory, Jack. A health advisory for human women who conceived on Ryloth within the last year. There was some kind of toxin in the water that can cause birth defects. I have to get a scan."

"A scan?"

"Yes, a scan. They need to check him to make sure he's healthy." Maria repeats.

Jack shakes his head. "Are you nuts? You can't go to the doctor! How are we going to pay for it?"

"Not a doctor," she scoffs. "The public health department will do them for free. And then if something's wrong I'll go to the hospital and get it done. If I don't have any money they can waive the fees."

"I'm not sure about this," he worries. "It's probably nothing. You've been careful this whole time, and considering how much we moved around that's saying something. You and the baby are going to be fine."

"How do you know that? I still had to drink water."

"And you're going to be fine." Jack gestures to the kitchen floor. "I still have a lot of work to get done here and if you're worried about birth defects you shouldn't be inhaling bleach and ammonia and God-knows-what else is in these cleaning cabinets. Go find a park or something for the next few hours and bring something back for dinner, will you? It's too hot to run the oven."

Maria pauses and then looks at the floor, the white tile still smeared with the evidence of how they got this apartment. She doesn't want to scrub that from the grout and she definitely doesn't want to be around the chemicals. Leave those tasks up to Jack."

"Fine," she says. "I'll go waste five hours somewhere or other. Maybe there's a playground I can check out."

She leaves the apartment and walks down the street toward the nearest health department, passing the health bulletins as she goes by.

The woman behind the front desk remembers where she's seen the blonde human as she takes her information. When the girl sits down to wait her turn for her appointment the receptionist checks the holo the department sent to the staff about a police sting operation.

Yup. That's her, all right. Looks like the outstanding warrant which allows her to circumvent the privacy laws is about to be fulfilled.

She goes into a back room and calls the number on the wanted holo.

"Ahsoka, we just got a bite!" Lux shouts, jarring Ahsoka from her half-asleep state on his couch. "Maria just checked into a health department in Coco Town."

Ahsoka jumps to her feet, wide awake. "Are you sure?"

"The staff swears it's her. She must take a good wanted holo."

The jokes slides off of Ahsoka. "Coco Town is industrial and it fits their criteria. Not exactly the best place to raise a family, but it's cheap enough and a great place if you're a couple of killers. Is Jack with her?"

"They say she's all alone." Lux yanks his shoes on and crams the last of his bantha bites into his mouth. "Now I don't know about you, but I have a lot of questions for her. Let's pick her up."

"This is the waiting room?" Ahsoka asks.

The security officer nods. "When you come in she's sitting on your left, by the holozine cart."

"Thank you," Lux says as he and Ahsoka enter.

"Maria Reyes?"

The blonde woman looks up from her holozine. "Yes? I -."

She freezes when she sees Lux and Ahsoka, clearly not who she was expecting.

"I already explained my situation to the receptionist," she says sweetly and goes back to her holozine. "I'm here because of that health bulletin for human women who conceived on Ryloth. Something about birth defects."

"The only problem your baby has a chance of inheriting is webbed toes," Lux says. "And that's easily corrected at birth."

Ahsoka comes forward. "Maria Reyes, you're under arrest for theft, breaking and entering, the murders of Rassk, your town's apothecary, Vern Kassel, and the attempted murder of Saw Gerrera."

"What? I'm here for an ultrasound and you're arresting me for murder? This is a mistake. I can't even see my own feet; how am I supposed to commit murder?"

"With a slugthrower," Lux says, shaking with rage. "Or maybe you beat them with that music box you stole."

"I didn't steal a box!"

Ahsoka ignores her and locks the binders around her wrists.

"You have the right to remain silent."

And that's one down, one to go!

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Until next time,

LS