Hunter jolted abruptly from a dreamless sleep into complete wakefulness. He stayed still, listening carefully as he took in his surroundings in an attempt to discern what had woken him. He was lying on his back on the floor, head turned to the right. The pale, flickering light of the Trayus hallways that was so familiar by now cast its weird glow across the room. The sergeant's teammates were close by, he was sure of it, but he couldn't see them, and he certainly couldn't hear them. They might have wandered off –

No, he remembered suddenly. We're not in Trayus anymore. The instant he realized where he was, he was able to see the walls of the bunkroom around him, even though they still seemed to be overlaid with a pale green glow.

But his eyes were open. He was awake.

Before he could do more than recognize that, he was hit by the overwhelming impression that something deadly was approaching. He tried to look to the opposite side and couldn't. His heart rate picked up as he tried unsuccessfully to move his head, to reach for his knife, to blink – anything.

The encroaching sense of danger made everything around him darken. A sudden, heavy weight pressed against his chest, constricting his breathing. Hunter gasped, vision clearing abruptly, and looked up into the expressionless golden eyes of a four-armed statue. It was kneeling on his chest, hunched over itself with all four hands clutching at his shoulders and arms as it leaned close to his face, gazing blankly at him.

Behind the statue's head, just in Hunter's line of vision, Wrecker walked across the room and out the door. The sergeant struggled harder against the paralysis that had spread through him. Didn't Wrecker see it?!

The statue rotated its head to watch Wrecker leave, then blinked slowly, its previously unmoving mouth twisting into a short-lived grin of satisfaction as it turned back to Hunter.

Hunter panicked, but he couldn't yell, or even breathe. After an interminable moment, the statue drew back and plunged its sharp fingers into his chest. Everything around him disappeared in an overwhelming rush of noise and darkness. When it faded, Hunter found himself standing, clinging to the upper bunk with one hand as he doubled over, trying to regain his breath. The green light was gone, and so was the statue. . . No. This kind of thing had happened before. The statue had never even been here!

Hunter straightened with a jerk, half-tempted to punch the wall, then twisted around and leaned back against the bunk frame instead. It took him a few moments to steady his breathing. Tech, in the upper bunk across from him, had propped himself up on one elbow and was watching him with a blank, half-asleep look on his face. Wrecker was gone.

"Hunter?" Tech asked blearily.

The sergeant dragged a hand down his face and sat on the edge of the mattress, leaning forward with a huff. "What time is it?"

"Fifteen-forty," Tech flopped down again.

It had only been six hours since they returned to the Marauder? Hunter blinked and mumbled, "Feels later."

"Mmm," Tech agreed into his pillow, already drifting off.

Hunter listened for a moment. No one else was in the bunkroom, but he could hear the murmur of quiet voices from the cockpit. Quinlan said something. Hunter couldn't make out the words, but for some reason hearing them reminded him of Zenaya and how easily she had overpowered all of them.

Frowning, he stared at the wall and wished he could slip into the cockpit and set a course for Nar Shaddaa. Quinlan hadn't openly ordered that they stay in orbit around Malachor, but Hunter knew he intended to stay until Zenaya was dead.

Feeling even more tired than before, Hunter shook his head and lay down.


It was well past midnight when Wrecker woke up again, feeling stiff but much better than before. His head wasn't pounding, and the dizziness was gone. Good.

Across the room from him, Hunter was also up, wearing a new set of blacks and making his bunk with military precision. For a moment, Wrecker thought that was kind of weird. It looked too normal, after everything that had been going on in Trayus.

"Whatever," he mumbled to himself. "A little normal is good." He got to his feet without hitting the upper bunk, then stretched, elbows and knees cracking loudly.

In the dim light from the open door, Hunter met his look and smirked, then cracked his knuckles. Wrecker popped his back. He was about to do the same with his own knuckles when he heard a rustle from behind him, and turned around just in time for Tech's pillow to hit him square in the face.

Wrecker snatched it away, almost yanking Tech out of the upper bunk after it, then hurled the pillow at him. Tech sat back abruptly. Instead of returning the blow, he fumbled around to locate his goggles.

From near his bunk, Hunter straightened and tilted his head absently to the side, cracking his neck.

"Hunter . . ." Tech put his goggles on, blinked owlishly once or twice, and said, "If you continue to do that, the results –"

"Nope," Wrecker interrupted in a cheerful whisper. "We don't want to hear it."

Tech almost appeared to consider that for a moment. Then he huffed, rolled his eyes, climbed out of the bunk and left the room.

Stretching his arms out to either side, Wrecker glanced at the bunk above the sergeant's. Despite the brief disturbance, Crosshair was still sound asleep. Good thing, too . . . he'd practically been climbing the walls earlier that night.

As Wrecker reached for his armor, he wondered why Crosshair was so stubborn about asking the Jedi for help, or asking anyone for help. He wasn't the only one, though. Hunter was often stubborn about it, too . . . and Quinlan was even worse.

Anyone would think I didn't want to help. Wrecker considered, then shrugged off the thought. It didn't really matter. By this point, he'd learned not to ask for Hunter's or Crosshair's permission. He'd just add the Jedi to the list.

After storming into the cargo hold, Quinlan had made it through five and a half sutures before getting so lightheaded he almost passed out. It took him so long to recover that by the time he straightened up from where he'd been leaning against the crate, Wrecker was on the last one. Wrecker never dealt with stitching up injuries because his hands tended to get in the way of themselves, but there wasn't anyone else to do it, not with Quinlan stubbornly refusing Hunter's help. Besides, Hunter was awful at it anyway.

The cut was bad enough, Wrecker realized. Even with bacta and Force healing, or meditation or whatever, it was going to take a while to heal – a few days at least, more likely a week. Vythia had really done a number on him . . . back while she was still Vythia, anyway.

After patching Quinlan up, Wrecker had gone to bed. He'd thought that everyone else had, too, but when he woke up four hours later, Crosshair was still wandering nervously around the ship. Wrecker had been forced to practically shove his younger teammate over to Quinlan, who'd gazed at them in bleary confusion, not remembering – until Wrecker reminded him – that he had to remove the Force-trick he'd used to keep the sniper alert.

As Wrecker fastened his greaves, he bit back a yawn, once again wondering how the whole Force thing worked. It was weird. All Quinlan had seemed to do was touch to Crosshair's forehead and look at nothing for a few seconds before stepping back and muttering, "All set. Sorry about that."

At Crosshair's nearly silent exhale of relief, Wrecker hadn't been able to resist nudging the sniper and whispering, "See? That wasn't so hard, was it?"

The glare he'd received in reply had been nowhere near its usual intensity.

Wrecker grinned a little. Casting another glance at the chronometer, which said oh-forty-nine, he checked that his left vambrace was tight and stood. "So – Hunter."

Hunter was studying a piece of his armor. "Yeah?'

"What're we doing?"

The sergeant looked up, confused, and Wrecker gestured vaguely, not sure what exactly he was asking about.

Hunter hesitated, then left the room, speaking over his shoulder as he did so. "First thing I'm doing is fixing my cuirass."

Wrecker joined him in the hall and glanced at the long, thin cracks that traveled up into the chest plate. "Yeah – wow, that leviathan cracked it good." As they turned into the cargo hold, he added, "You think it's actually dead now?"

"The leviathan?" Hunter opened a big crate and started digging through a pile of supplies they kept. "Last I saw, it was pretty much dissolved."

"Good." Wrecker started checking his helmet for damage. "I figured it was dead when the headache disappeared, but with Zenaya healing it like that the first time . . ."

"Not this time." Hunter shook his head. "I felt it die." He paused his movements, as though suddenly realizing how strange that sounded, than shrugged.

The two of them worked in silence for well over an hour, cleaning and patching up their armor. Once Hunter's cuirass was mended, they checked over the rest of his armor, then Wrecker's, Tech's and Crosshair's. Not that either of the younger squad members had worn it since before running back into Trayus . . .

Wrecker picked up the sniper's cuirass, studying the spots where the statue's fingers had punched through. Tech's repairs were good, like they always were, no question about that. But as Wrecker continued to check over them, he realized how lucky Tech and Crosshair were that the leviathan hadn't grabbed either of them. If it was able to crack Hunter's armor that easily, anyone not wearing armor would have been crushed to death. They must not have taken the time to put on their armor because they rushed in after Hunter and Wrecker as soon as they realized they were in danger.

Wrecker sat back on his heels, thinking back over the fight with the monster as an uncomfortable realization started to poke at the back of his mind.

"Hey . . . uh, Hunter?" he said, rubbing the back of his head. "I was just thinking . . . If we hadn't gone back in after Vythia, the whole fight with the leviathan wouldn't have happened."

"Yeah." Hunter looked up. "Of course, it would probably have killed us from a distance, so it's just as well – "

Wrecker hardly heard him. "And if we hadn't gotten separated, we'd have left Trayus a lot faster," he went on. "And then the whole ritual couldn't have taken place."

"We don't know that," Hunter replied slowly, setting aside Tech's helmet. "She – I mean, Zenaya – only needed Quinlan."

"Yeah," Wrecker agreed. "But it's kinda weird, isn't it . . . I mean, he and Tech and Cross only came back into Trayus because of us. And then he stayed because they went missing. . . But why'd we go back into Trayus?"

Hunter hunched his shoulders a little, looking uncomfortable. "I – was thinking about that earlier. I don't know why."

"Yeah, me either." Wrecker frowned. "You didn't have a reason?"

"I thought I did at the time, but when I think back . . . We should have left Vythia."

Wrecker nodded slowly. "It's weird, but I don't remember why I went in."

"You said we had to get Vythia out," Hunter said. "And I thought we had to find out what she was up to. It just – made sense at the time."

Shifting uneasily, Wrecker put down the armor. "Hunter . . . you don't think that Zenaya was making us think it was a good idea, do you?"

The silence dragged while Hunter studied the floor in thought. Tech entered the room and sat down between them, studying something on his datapad.

"Maybe," Hunter said at last. "In the Core, when the wind was keeping us from reaching the altar . . . I think Zenaya was there all along, Wrecker. The storm when we first left Trayus – that was her trying to keep us inside."

Wrecker shivered. "So, you think maybe all the storms we were her following us?"

"I do not believe that was the case," Tech said, looking up. "At least, I do not believe all of the storms were caused by her. For example, the ash storm that began as we were leaving Adas Academy occurred because of a massive thunderstorm which appeared to form naturally, and was not centered on our position. However, analysis of sensor data indicates that the storm as we left Trayus was centered immediately on our ship."

"But the one outside Adas ended so fast," Wrecker said, remembering the strange, almost cut-off end to the violent wind.

"Yes." Tech hesitated. "Admittedly, everything on Malachor is – odd, to some extent or another. Quinlan said it is because everything has been twisted."

"Well, that's for sure," Wrecker grumbled. "And now we've gotta go back down there and hunt down Vyth – I mean, Zenaya."

"Is that the plan?" Tech asked.

Hunter's expression became one of disapproval. "You heard the plan last night."

Tech smirked a bit. "Well, yes; we heard Quinlan's plan. I assumed we were not going along with it."

"Same here," Wrecker said. "We've done some really dumb stuff, but nowhere near that dumb."

"Yeah." Hunter raised an eyebrow in consideration. "I can't tell which plan would get us killed fastest."

"Probably . . ." Wrecker thought about it. "Yeah. Plan Thirteen."

Tech opened his mouth, closed it, then reconsidered and said, "Actually, I believe it would be Plan Seven."

"Aw, Plan Seven's great," Wrecker argued. "You guys never want to use it."

"For good reason." Tech tilted his head.

"Well – it still wouldn't kill us the fastest."

"That's not the kind of plan I meant," Hunter said disapprovingly, getting up from the floor. He put both hands on the crate behind him and hopped up to sit on it. "And even if it were, the one that would definitely get us killed fastest is Plan Thirty-Six."

Wrecker considered the last time they'd practiced Thirty-Six. "Yeah, okay, maybe you're right. But which plans were you talking about?"

"The half-plan I had and the one Quinlan had." Hunter glanced at the door. "Where is he, anyway?"

"In the cockpit, asleep," Tech answered. "If I understood you correctly last night, you thought our only option was to hunt down Zenaya directly. Or, rather, you thought it was impossible but at the same time you preferred it to Quinlan's plan."

"Definitely preferred it to his plan."

"Despite how easily she could overcome us?"

"Yeah." Hunter shrugged and pulled his knife from his vambrace. Tilting it back and forth, he watched the light on the blade. "An ambush might be even more dangerous than a full-on attack. But either way, there's no way she wouldn't know we were coming."

"There might be," Tech said unexpectedly. "We do not know exactly how well her ritual worked. Vythia might still be – ah – present, for lack of a better term."

Hunter blinked in surprise. "You mean she might end up killing Zenaya herself?"

Wrecker shifted, remembering how the Nautolan woman had turned the knife towards her own heart when she realized what was happening.

"It is a possibility, but I do not think it likely," Tech said. "I doubt Zenaya will allow that to happen. Even when she was first taking control it seemed easy for her to stop Vythia. But perhaps her Force-abilities will weaken as time passes."

"I dunno," Hunter answered. "Quinlan was going on about her getting more powerful, not less."

"Hm." Tech's eyebrows creased in a frown.

Wrecker was surprised when he didn't say anything else. He must really not have any ideas. "Well, uh . . ." He glanced between his teammates. "We'd better come up with something. Unless we want Quinlan to keep going with his plan."

"Or unless we leave and call in the Jedi Council," Hunter said.

The other two commandos looked blankly at him.

Hunter shrugged once. "It's an option."

Tech fidgeted with his datapad. "It . . . is an option. Technically, at any rate. But Quinlan made good points last night about why that was not a good idea."

"I know." Hunter looked a little uneasy. "Except, if we all get killed, Zenaya will be loose on the galaxy anyway. Unless we booby trap the Marauder or something like that." His gaze slid to Wrecker, then moved abruptly over his shoulder.

Wrecker turned to see Crosshair lounging in the doorway. The sniper was a lot less pale than he had been, and the weird, distant look was gone from his eyes.

When the silence had dragged for a few seconds, Crosshair looked at Hunter and asked calmly, "So, you want me to hit Quinlan over the head so we can get back to the Mid Rim without breaking orders?"

Hunter snorted and shook his head. As Crosshair seated himself on the crate next to him, the sergeant turned back to Wrecker as though waiting for an opinion.

Wrecker shrugged. "I guess going after Zenaya's not any more dangerous than the other stuff we do."

When Tech opened his mouth to argue, Wrecker covered it with one hand before continuing. "I mean – there's always a chance we'll die in any mission."

Tech shoved Wrecker's hand away with a frown. "Yes. But this time we are not going to be up against droids or opponents of equal skill. Zenaya is incredibly powerful, and it is likely that she is incredibly intelligent as well. We managed to survive the leviathan, which was less powerful and less intelligent, only because Quinlan utilized the power of the Dark Side."

"Hm, yeah." Crosshair put a toothpick in his mouth and bit down on it. "And . . . has anyone stopped to wonder what'll happen if he decides to use it like that on her?"

Tech looked thoughtful.

Wrecker didn't answer. From what he'd seen, all it took was Quinlan getting scared and mad enough, and suddenly he'd been able to lift and throw a creature – one that Wrecker would never have been able to lift – as though it weighed next to nothing. It would have been useful if he'd been able to do that earlier. . . but if he could do it on Zenaya, they might actually have a chance.

"I don't know that he can," Hunter said. "Even with the Dark Side – even the way he used it on the leviathan. . ."

Crosshair raised an eyebrow.

Hunter didn't notice. "If Zenaya could keep us from talking . . . I don't know."


At oh-five-thirty, Hunter decided to check in with the Jedi. Even though Zenaya's consciousness wasn't hovering over them anymore, as far as he knew, and even though they weren't on the surface of Malachor . . . well, the last thing the squad needed was to find out too late that Quinlan had been trapped completely in some sort of weird Force-vision.

But when he stepped into the cockpit, Quinlan seemed calm. He was sitting upright in the co-pilot's chair, hands folded in his lap as he meditated with his eyes lightly closed. On the consol in front of him lay the green kyber crystal from Hunter's lightsaber. It was flickering, ever so slightly.

Hunter rested his forearms on the back of the pilot's seat and leaned forward, staring out at the planet surface below. The dusty greys and dull reds of the entire planet were spotted here and there by what looked like smudges. Ash storms, most likely. In the southern hemisphere there was a massive thunderstorm, which rotated visibly even from orbit. The scattered ash was drifting into the atmosphere like smoke from a raging fire.

Hunter glanced at the Malachor system's star, which was half-hidden by the curve of the planet, then let his gaze wander over the silver and grey glints of the orbital graveyard, floating kilometers overhead.

Several minutes passed before the flickering green of the kyber crystal grew brighter, catching his attention. He watched it until it went dull, then looked at Quinlan, who was now leaning back in the co-pilot's chair and watching him.

The sergeant raised an eyebrow.

"I'm going to steal your lightsaber," Quinlan announced noncommittally.

Because Hunter was confused, he didn't bother with a reply. Instead, he spun the pilot's seat around so he could sit down and face the Jedi.

"I could take the padawans' sabers with me," Quinlan continued. "I might, actually. But they won't hold up as well. Even the crystals won't."

"What about Bastila Shan's crystal?" Hunter asked.

"It destroyed the emitter on my lightsaber. I wouldn't even try it in yours."

As Quinlan set to work reassembling the black sentinel hilt, Hunter fiddled with the engine readouts.

"Hunter?" Quinlan asked eventually, in an absent voice. "Are the others around?"

"No, they jumped out the airlock." Hunter huffed and glanced at him. "Yes, they're around. They're preparing for the next part of the mission."

"Mission." Quinlan locked the kyber crystal in place and looked up, waiting for an explanation.

"Tech located the Phoenix. Zenaya landed halfway up a mountain, near some sort of building. He can't tell for sure, but he thinks she went inside."

"She did." Quinlan stood up, clipping the hilt to his belt. He'd changed into another of his black outfits, but this time he was also wearing the shoulder-piece that held the symbol of the Jedi Order.

Hunter followed him into the cargo hold, where Crosshair was helping Wrecker check detonator tape while Tech alternated between studying a map and scribbling notes on top of the nearest plasteel crate.

Pausing, Quinlan surveyed the activity before turning to the sergeant with a questioning look.

"We can't have Zenaya leaving the planet," Hunter said. "As you pointed out. So, before we go in after her, we're destroying the Phoenix. Just in case."

"Yes," said Tech. "But first we intend to enter it and retrieve all of Vythia's codes."

"What for?" Quinlan asked. "Nar Shaddaa?"

Hunter nodded.

"Yes," said Tech. "As we no longer have Vythia as our way in to the Prince's stronghold, taking her codes seems like a wise precaution. At the very least, it will save us some time."

"Good idea. Hunter said you tracked Zenaya down."

"It was not hard, with only one ship on the entire planet."

"How long has it been since the Phoenix landed?"

"I cannot tell for certain." Tech paused, underlined something on the crate, then frowned and crossed it out. "However, thermal imaging shows that the ship has completely cooled off, indicating that it has been at least several hours."

Crosshair gave the last strip of det tape to Wrecker. "What difference does it make?" he asked, sounding both curious and suspicious.

"Uhhh." Quinlan rubbed at the bandage on his forearm. "None, I guess. Except if she's been there for a while, she must be after something. That place she landed – it's her old palace."

Wrecker sealed his pack. "I didn't know she had a palace."

"Neither did I, before she told me. . ." The Jedi twitched slightly. "Good thing is, I don't think she meant for me to know a lot of what I learned."

"I do not understand." Tech hopped up to perch cross-legged on the crate. "How did she tell you without her being aware of it? More specifically, do you mean that she intended for you to learn at least some things, or that she accidentally imparted all of the knowledge you gained?"

There was a short pause before Quinlan answered. "I don't know."

Tech's gaze, looking slightly taken aback, flitted to Hunter, who said, "Quinlan, is there anything you do know about this – palace?"

"Not that would be helpful. Except . . . I thought I recognized something. When we broke into Vythia's ship, there was a drawing of a room, with a shadow of a statue or a person falling across an altar, or a crypt or – something like that."

Hunter nodded. "And you saw that room? When Zenaya . . ." He paused uncertainly, remembering how the dark apparition had put her arms around the Jedi. He settled for a vague gesture. "When she – talked to you?"

"I saw it, yeah. That, and other things. But when I saw that room again last night, I didn't see what cast the shadow." He frowned in realization. "And I should have. I saw the whole room that time."

"Was the shadow itself there the second time?" Tech asked cautiously.

"No. But it should have been." Sounding irritated and confused, the Jedi shook his head and pressed a hand against his temple. "Never mind. Ignore it. It was just a vision. It might have meant something – it might have meant nothing at all. Let's just get down to the surface and get this over with before we all go insane."

Hunter almost asked if Quinlan was sure he wanted to try, but the sharp look in his eyes made him hesitate.

"Beginning descent." Tech left the room.

"Crosshair," Hunter said, turning to the sniper. "When we get to the surface, you're on watch. Tech, Wrecker and I will handle the Phoenix."

"Got it," Crosshair said. He checked that he had the extra datapad, then gestured toward the gunner station. "I presume there's a reason we're not blasting the palace into rubble from a kilometer away."

"Yeah," Hunter answered. "A lot of the palace is inside the mountain itself. We've got no guarantee she'll be killed unless we go in there and do it ourselves."

". . . We?" Quinlan asked into the short silence.

Crosshair glanced at him, rolled his eyes, and headed out into the hall.

Wrecker followed him, grumbling. "I was looking at the scans, and those Sith sure knew how to build, I'll give 'em that. The whole place is a – a honeycomb. The hallways and rooms are staggered beneath each other. All you'd do is collapse the top of the mountain on the first couple levels and never touch the rest."

As Tech started to answer, Quinlan looked uncertainly at Hunter. "I thought –"

"I thought we had this argument last night." Hunter folded his arms and rested his weight on one foot. "Or don't you remember?"

"I remember Wrecker saying my plan was stupid." His expression lightened into a brief, self-deprecating smirk. "Which – okay, yeah. It was. I don't know what I was thinking."

From the hallway, Crosshair's voice floated in. "You weren't."

Hunter glanced up, but the sniper had already vanished.

"But you guys are going to handle the Phoenix," Quinlan said. "I'll head inside."

"No," Hunter replied shortly. Then he sighed. "We don't really have a plan. The easiest thing to do would be to destroy her ship and leave her stranded here, head back to the Mid Rim. Of course, we have no guarantee that there's no other ship on the surface."

Quinlan was staring at the floor, an expression of real worry on his face. It looked like he wanted to say something and couldn't figure out how to say it.

Just as well. Hunter didn't really want to hear it. "There's not much time left to discuss it," he said, starting for the cargo hold door. "We'll be landing in a couple of minutes."

Somewhat to Hunter's relief, the Jedi did not answer. He didn't join the others in the cockpit, either. Hunter stood behind Crosshair while Tech guided the Marauder down in a careful loop.

As they approached the coordinates, Hunter caught sight of a gleam of silver – the Phoenix, glinting in the morning sunlight. He glanced at the chronometer. "At least we aren't doing this in the middle of the night."

"Yes," Tech agreed. "Though of course, if the palace were on the other side of Malachor, we could simply wait until nighttime, at which point it would be broad daylight there."

"Yeah, yeah." Wrecker flicked Tech. "We all know that."

"Oh. Good." Tech paused to shoot him a prim look. "I thought you may have forgotten."

Crosshair leaned forward and poked Tech in the ribs, then withdrew hastily to avoid an elbow to the face.

"All right, that's enough," Hunter ordered, looking down at the scanner. "Focus, Bad Batch. I'm not picking up anything near the Phoenix. You see any signs of life?"

"None," Crosshair replied, but leaned forward to get a better look anyway.

"I'm not seeing anything either," Wrecker agreed. "Guess she's inside after all."

"We can hope, anyway," Hunter mumbled, recalibrating the sensors for heat signatures. When he still saw nothing, he said, "Tech? Take us down."

Tech obeyed, nudging the shuttle into a steeper descent.

Hunter straightened and turned away, intending to get his knife, then paused in surprise. Quinlan was standing in the doorway, a hand on either edge, effectively blocking Hunter from leaving the cockpit.

"Guys, listen to me," he said, before Crosshair could do more than raise an eyebrow. "I should go in after Zenaya by myself. If I fail, someone needs to warn the Jedi about her. And besides – there's no point in your going, because I won't fail."

Crosshair looked up lazily and removed his toothpick from his mouth long enough to say, "You're not a very convincing liar when you're nervous."

Quinlan cut his gaze to the side. "I'm not lying."

"Yeah? Well, you're not telling the truth."

"Crosshair, of all the –!" Quinlan gritted his teeth. "Someone does need to warn the rest of the galaxy."

"Okay," Wrecker said agreeably. "That leaves three of us to go with you. Tech can take the Marauder back up and stay in orbit until we call him back down."

Tech had brought the Marauder to a halt, so that it was now hovering a hundred meters above the ground. Twisting in the pilot's seat, he gave Wrecker a harsh look. "Thank you for volunteering me for that task," he said sarcastically.

"Well – uh." Wrecker gestured. "He's kinda right –"

"Except for the minor fact that I have already jettisoned our escape pod with an active emergency beacon, the signal of which will take three point five days to reach the closest Republic Fleet, warning it nearly as quickly as I could by flying there in person, and except for the fact that the Marauder cannot be piloted by Zenaya because she –"

Wrecker towered over him. "Yeah, well, he's still right –"

Stepping between them, Hunter put a hand out to either side. "That's enough, both of you. Quinlan, Tech already took a lot of precautions to ensure that the Republic and the Jedi will be warned either way. We've programmed the Marauder to self-destruct if anyone apart from ourselves tries to start it over the next forty-eight hours."

Quinlan opened his mouth and closed it again.

"Hidden retinal scans," Tech said. "I did not get a chance to obtain yours, Quinlan. I would not recommend you attempt to start the Marauder."

"Yeah, those'll work," Crosshair interjected, as if he hadn't already known about it. "And if we all die except for you, Quinlan, just drag one of us over and falsify the scan."

Hunter winced and raised an eyebrow.

Quinlan dragged in a breath, then slammed both hands flat against the walls on either side and snapped, "You know perfectly well that this is a suicide mission!"

"Of course we know," Tech said.

The Jedi looked completely at a loss for words.

"Those are what we specialize in," Hunter told him.

"And we've always been fine," Wrecker added. "Just 'cause we're likely to die doesn't mean we will."

Crosshair watched the whole exchange with a dry smirk, probably satisfied that he'd gotten through to what was really making Quinlan hesitate.

When Quinlan still didn't say anything, Hunter stepped forward. "Listen. Whether you like it or not, five of us against Zenaya will be better than one." He gestured for Tech to continue the landing. "Besides, if we returned to Coruscant and reported that we'd left a Jedi general behind . . .? I don't imagine Command would approve."

Usually, a statement like that would have had one of his squad mates remarking that the Bad Batch was notorious for not actually caring whether or not Command approved, but this time, none of them said anything.

The Marauder settled onto the ashy surface of the mountain with a faint thump, and Hunter stepped towards the hallway, raising an expectant eyebrow when he realized that Quinlan was still in the doorway. "What is it?" he asked.

The Jedi shook his head and glanced at each of them. "You . . . specialize in suicide missions," he said expressionlessly.

"Yeah!" Wrecker laughed. "You're still on about that? Come on, let's get started!"

Quinlan turned and went to the main door. He paused with his hand on the release for the boarding ramp and glanced back, a reluctant half-smile on his face. "Just so you know, there is something seriously wrong with all four of you."

"Hm." Crosshair flung his toothpick into the cockpit. "We've been accused of insanity in the past . . . multiple times."

Wrecker laughed, and Tech smiled a bit as he checked his dual pistols.

"Seriously wrong," repeated the Jedi. "If I didn't know better, I'd say you were insane."

"Yeah, well." Hunter sheathed his knife and gave him a challenging smirk. "I guess that means we got the right Jedi then, doesn't it?"