Kowak, 9 ABY
A warm, sticky rain poured from an angry sky as lightning struck one of the high points in the mountains encircling the city of Sciavos. Run-off gushed through gutters lining the streets of the dank, grimy city, draining into the murky Sciavos river roaring toward Kowak's largest ocean. While most of the city's citizens took cover within their sprawling food courts and squalid tenements, a figure clad in black sat motionless atop an ancient Kowakian temple. She gazed down into the square below, watching as dozens of beings with blue-green skin and thick, black ponytails shepherded dozens of frightened adolescents toward several awaiting trailers covered by tattered green canvas and hooked up to ramshackle speeders.
She recognized the blue-green beings as Falleen, the Black Sun agents she had been tasked with tracking. She had followed this particular group from Pasaana to Kowak after a large, violent massacre that had left most of the adults in a sprawling settlement dead. The Falleen had collected the children and loaded them onto a shuttle leading to Kowak, where she assumed they would be processed by the Black Sun lieutenant she had been tasked with assassinating. As the Black Sun agents milled about, occasionally shouting and cracking whips at the children, she entered a code into a wrist device. A pair of small panels slid apart, and an insect-shaped drone arose from a tiny docking compartment. A second code activated the drone, which fluttered into the air, its wings beating against the driving rain as it awaited its next command. The woman entered a third code, and the drone shot off into the square, circling around the children and the Falleen before settling atop one of the covered trailers. She pressed a button to activate her headset, then resumed her motionless vigil as she listened through the pouring rain to the conversation unfolding below.
"No, no, no! I told you, that lot goes to the Zygerrians, and that lot goes to Gyuti!" barked a particularly large Falleen whom she deduced to be in charge.
"And what about that lot?" replied a slightly smaller Falleen who appeared to have some degree of stature within their hierarchy.
"The Hutts?" interjected a third Falleen.
"Feh!" the leader spat in disgust. "The Hutts can choke on their own tongues. We keep them. Now stop talking and load 'em up so we can get out of this slop."
The leader cracked his whip, and his subordinates scrambled into action, bellowing at the children and shepherding them onto the trailers. The drone pivoted, watching over the children, the images of which left a hollow, burning sensation in the woman's stomach. One of the older adolescents talked back to one of the lieutenants, and the lieutenant responded by cracking his whip. She heard several young children cry out, and the Falleen's shouting and whip-cracking overwhelmed their protests.
She was just about to switch the drone's focus back to the leader, hoping he might yield some clue as to Gyuti's whereabouts – or at least which trailer might go to Gyuti – when one of the Falleen herding the children flew backward 15 meters. She froze, tensing at the sudden eruption of violence, thinking that the children might soon receive a beating. The confusion that followed left her uncertain who had done what, and the shouting Falleen swarmed around their fallen comrade, bellowing at the children.
"Who did it?" roared the leader. The children shrank back. He cracked his whip and growled the inquiry again. When nobody responded, he stalked forward and grabbed a young girl by the shirt, lifting her up and growling in her face.
As suddenly as the other lieutenant had flown backward, the leader dropped the girl and stumbled backward. He tripped over a curb and came down hard, banging his head against the ground. Several of the children parted, and a young girl with caramel skin and red hair stepped forward, her hand outstretched. The woman clenched her fist at a cold, clammy wave of recognition. She did not know the girl, but she understood what she had done. As the girl stood, terrified but defiant in the rain, her mind flashed an image of a black, skull-like mask towering above her. The image spurred a flood of adrenaline, and her breathing became shallow as her heart rate shot into the Kowakian sky.
"That one!" called one of the Falleen, who rushed over and grabbed her by the tunic. He reared back and slapped the girl, sending her stumbling into the other children. The other children caught her and propped her up as she swayed on the spot, disoriented by the blow.
The Falleen forged ahead and was about to strike the child again, when a voice called out, "No! Not that one."
The lieutenant turned toward the leader, who had risen to his unsteady feet. The lieutenant looked questioningly at the leader, but the leader brushed him aside. He kneeled down to the ground and began to whisper. The rain was so loud that it drowned out the whispering, and the woman maneuvered the drone down, carefully guiding it to the leader's shoulder.
". . . a pretty trick from a pretty girl," he said as the woman caught the last half of his statement. "I know just what to do with you." The leader ran his finger across the girl's cheek, which elicited a disconnected sense of terror and rage within the woman.
Her hand instinctively shot toward her blaster, and she was about to withdraw it and open fire, when the Falleen leader said, "This one goes to Gideon."
The woman's hand froze before she could remove her weapon, and she tensed, hanging on every word that followed.
"You think she has it?" one of the other agents asked.
"Oh, yes," the leader purred. "Does she ever."
"But that's 100 times the going rate!" another agent shouted excitedly.
The leader stood up with frightening speed and cracked his whip around the agent who had spoken. That agent went down hard on the ground, and the leader was upon him immediately, a knife withdrawn. The leader plunged the knife through the agent's chest and twisted, and the Falleen's scream echoed through the rain, which spurred a chorus of screaming from the children.
The leader arose, his blaster drawn, and he shouted, "I will take this one to Gyuti myself. Load these rats onto the trailers. One false move, and you die."
The other Falleen scrambled back into action, and within minutes, the remainder of the children had been loaded. The speeders sputtered into life and rumbled away, and the leader stood, watching them go, as the young girl stood beside him, still disoriented from the backhand and exhausted from reaching deep into a mysterious power that the woman knew all too well. It was a power she had embraced until it had become too painful, at which point she had dissociated from it completely. Another image of the man in black, his skull-like mask dominating the sky as she looked up at him, flashed through her mind, followed by his words uttered by his deep, distorted voice: Impressive.
She worked her way over the rooftops, leaping over the narrow gaps between the tightly packed apartment buildings, her drone trailing the man as he dragged the reluctant child through back alleys. She kept her distance, confident that the heavy rain and her dark clothing would obscure her movements. She followed the twists and turns, leaping over several wider gaps where alleys branched off. After several minutes of pursuit, the Black Sun agent stopped, and the girl collapsed to the ground in fatigue. He knocked on a door to a building directly across the narrow street above which she perched, and she heard a slot in the door slide open. The words, "I have something special for Gyuti," drifted up to her through the rain.
A snap followed, and the door slid open. Her drone fluttered down, landing in the Falleen's black ponytail. The hair obscured the visual as the drone settled, hiding from unwanted scrutiny. The gap between her building and the building he had entered was too wide to leap, and she scrambled back to a stairwell, then descended, listening into the feed as the Falleen moved through a series of hallways. As she descended, her wrist device projected a map of the drone's movement. As she reached the ground floor, the drone stopped moving, and she heard muted voices greet the Falleen. A knock followed, and the woman had the sense that the two beings now waited at a door.
She exited the building and cut across the street, swiping a metallic code key through the lock of an iron fence in the darkened building to the left. She entered the building, displacing a thick layer of dust on the floor, evidence of the building's abandonment, and she worked her way back to the back of the building.
As she reached the back, she heard a door open through the audio feed in her ear, and she heard a bustle of activity come to a sudden, silent halt. A guttural voice laughed, then barked in Huttese, "Ah, Garz-vel! To what do I owe the pleasure. Please tell me you haven't convinced yourself that you found another dung rat who can do a magic trick."
"She blew me off of my feet without touching me," Garz-vel declared, his tone of voice petulant.
"I've heard that story before," the voice called. The woman ran a spectral analysis on her device, and the device confirmed the voice as Gyuti, her target. She reached the back of the building and scanned a flashlight across the room. A wooden door, heavily chained, divided the two buildings. She reached down to her belt and removed an electro-shock prod. She moved toward the door and began to work on the chains as she listened.
"I swear it!" Garz-vel insisted.
"Only one way to find out," Gyuti retorted derisively.
The woman heard another commotion and listened as the girl grunted in pain, leaving the woman with the impression that she had been tossed roughly onto a table. Moments later she cried out, and a beeping sound suggested that some kind of electronic device had initiated.
As the woman waited, she cut through the first of the chains. As she began working on the second, a human voice called out, "M-count confirms sensitivity."
"Is it what he wants?" Gyuti asked, intrigued.
"Close," the human replied. "He's looking for higher, but he wouldn't turn it down."
"So what then?" Gyuti asked, seeking clarification.
"Not full price, but still decent compensation," the human clarified.
"Good enough for me," Gyuti declared.
"And what about me?" Garz-vel asked, a hint of menace in his voice.
"You?" Gyuti barked. "You go back into town and make sure everything is delivered on schedule."
Garz-vel bellowed, "No! She is mine! I found her. I want what's. . ."
A painful buzzing sound disrupted Garz-vel's demands, and the drone blacked out momentarily before its systems re-initiated. As the audio feed returned, the woman cut through the last of the locks and chains, and the door creaked open, revealing a darkened corridor beyond. Listening into the feed, she entered the darkened room, working her way through the dark as the night-vision setting activated in her goggles.
"Filth," she heard Gyuti exclaim in Huttese. A scraping sound followed, and she imagined somebody was dragging Garz-vel's unconscious body away. A faint whimpering sound coupled with an equally faint fluttering of wings mingled with the sound of a body being dragged. The woman pulled up the map, which indicated that the drone was in the next room over. She scanned the room, recognizing signs of recent activity, including deactivated computer terminals, chairs hastily abandoned, and even the remains of a few meals that appeared no more than a day or two old. A second scan revealed a door on the wall that would lead into the next room over.
As she moved toward the door, she heard the sound of the drone extricating itself from Garz-vel's ponytail, and shortly afterward, the visual feed returned. The drone was still in the room with Gyuti, and she entered a code, and the drone swiveled its viewfinder across the room. The girl had been placed in a cage and now sat hugging her knees to her chest and rocking slightly. Gyuti, a Toydarian with pallid blue-gray skin, fluttered above a terminal next to the human he had been speaking to. As she listened in to the audio, she heard the human expounding upon the M-count and the girl's potential value to their client. The drone's video feed scanned the very doorway behind which she stood.
She entered in a second code, and the drone swiveled, seeking a panel near the other entrance to the room. A few moments of searching later, she identified the panel she sought, and with another code, she sent the drone toward the panel. On her side of the door, she activated her own panel and waited.
"Do you think we'd get more if we ran her through Rotta?" the Toydarian asked in Basic.
The woman froze. The mention of Rotta the Hutt elicited another powerful, complex plume of emotion. Her stomach churned violently, and she felt heat seething through her. Rotta. Her employer. His promises that he was above such things.
"Maybe we will have to put out feelers to see who will bid the highest," the human said in response.
"Why don't we just take him straight to Gideon?" Gyuti asked.
"Because Gideon isn't the one who pays. We need to go through the proper channels," the human replied.
Seconds later, the drone's visual feed went dark as the lights in the room disengaged. The woman threw open the door and burst forward, firing stun blasts toward where the human and Gyuti stood. A pair of muffled thuds, the second with a sickening crunch, told her that the human and Gyuti had fallen to the floor, unconscious, and that the crunch suggested bones breaking as Gyuti fell from the air. The girl screamed, and the woman considered stunning her to keep her quiet as well.
She resisted the urge and instead knelt to the ground beside the cage, hissing through the breathing filter on her mask, "Shut up, or they'll hear you! I'll get you out of here, but you have to stay silent."
The girl backed away, still terrified, but she remained silent. The woman switched on her light and flashed it over the human and Gyuti. The human was middle-aged, balding, and had the look of a man who never left a laboratory. The sight of the Toydarian sickened her. Rotta had not told her Gyuti was a Toydarian, and she had always assumed that the Toydarians were in league with the Hutts. Gyuti had implied that they could traffic the girl through Rotta for a higher price – something Rotta had assured her the Hutts would not do. That was Black Sun's avenue, and Rotta was intent on undermining Black Sun as it rose in prominence. She cursed herself for being so naïve as to think Rotta was really above trafficking children.
She removed a metallic cylinder and screwed it onto the muzzle of her blaster. It engaged with a click, and she aimed the blaster into the human's chest and fired. A muted twang erupted, and the bright flash briefly illuminated the human's body as it jerked, then fell still. The girl whimpered in the corner, but remained silent otherwise. She holstered the blaster and removed a cable from her belt. She wrapped the cable first around Gyuti's wings and then around his ankles. She threw the cable over a beam on the ceiling and lifted Gyuti up, tying the loose end to the computer terminal. His unconscious body hung upside down, swaying gently back and forth.
After setting her flashlight on the terminal behind her, she removed her blaster again, and with her free hand, removed a vial from a pouch on her utility belt. She opened the vial and waved it in front of the Toydarian's snout-like nose. The Toydarian jerked violently into full consciousness. He saw the blaster pointed into his face and his eyes went wide. He made to scream, and the woman smashed him across the face with the blaster.
"Make a sound, and you die," she hissed.
The Toydarian went still, blinking against the light shining in his face. "Who are you? What did you do to Shenkun?"
As Gyuti remained silent, she raised the blaster in the air, and Gyuti flinched. "Why does Gideon want Force-sensitives?"
Gyuti looked back at her, attempting to make out her features as the light shone into his eyes. She lowered the blaster and pointed it at his face. As she waited, Gyuti gathered his phlegm and spit at her. She stepped aside, dodging the spittle, and with her free hand, removed her electro-prod.
She clicked on the prod, which sparked and glowed in Gyuti's face. "Girl, what's your name," the woman called out to the girl behind her.
"Zhey'la," the girl replied, her voice weak and timid.
"Zhey'la, cover your ears and close your eyes. Sing a song to yourself if you have to," the woman said.
The girl began to sing softly to herself, an old familiar children's song – an echo from a long time ago.
The shepherd led his nerfs to sea. .
Gyuti's eyes went wide as the woman moved the prod closer to his face. He scrunched his eyes shut as the prod moved closer to his skin.
"Should I start with the nose, or the eyes?" she asked, moving the prod closer to the alien's face.
And on the path he met a bee. . .
"Go to hell," the Toydarian snarled, wincing against the sparking device an inch from his eyes.
"I know the Toydarian's love a wager, so here it is: you tell me where to find Gideon, and you get to live," she whispered.
It buzzed and bristled, the angry bee. . .
"I'll scream, and my gua. . ."
The woman holstered her blaster and wrapped her free hand around Gyuti's throat. He choked and spluttered, attempting to scream. No sound came out but a raspy whisper.
As the nerfs hid by the treffle tree. . .
"Let's start with the eyeballs, then," she said, and Gyuti screamed silently as she moved the prod closer to his eyes.
"Nevarro!" Gyuti whispered.
"Gideon is on Nevarro?" the woman asked, releasing his throat.
"Not yet, but he will be," Gyuti said, his voice hoarse.
"Why does he want Force-sensitives?" she growled.
"Only rumors – he pays top-dollar for Force-sensitive children. Nobody knows. Nobody asks." Gyuti gasped.
The woman took a step back and said, "Thank you for telling me this."
She raised the blaster and fired into Gyuti's face. The Toydarian went limp, his eyes frozen in shock.
She untied the cable holding him up, and Gyuti's body dropped to the floor. She hoisted the body into a sack that she had placed in her hip compartment, and she sealed the sack, leaving it on the ground. She took her electo-prod and zapped the locking mechanism on the cage holding the girl.
"You can open your eyes now, Zhey'la," the woman said, her voice unexpectedly soft following the interrogation.
The girl opened her eyes, and the woman could make out her confused, scared expression in the dark.
"We're leaving. Do everything I say, and don't make a sound," the woman commanded.
The girl nodded her head, her eyes wide. The woman picked up the sack and hoisted it over her shoulder. She aimed her flashlight at the door she had entered through, and she gestured for Zhey'la to go to the door. She removed a thermal detonator from her belt and set it next to the terminal, setting the timer for two minutes. She hoisted the sack containing Gyuti's body, and turned away from the room.
"Let's go," the woman said as the detonator began to count down. She forged ahead into the darkened room, then down the corridor. She cut through to the alleyway, Zhey'la trailing silently behind her as they walked quickly through the rain-drenched streets. The streets were empty with the citizens having retreated to shelter to avoid the soaking. They made it several blocks away when the ground shook below them. A flash and a pillar of flame erupted behind them.
The woman and the girl paused to look, and the girl looked up at the woman. "Who are you?"
The woman looked down at the girl, who appeared terrified but relieved. "Call me Neeta," she said. Another name had almost formed on her lips, and she wondered at the lie. As she regarded the girl, she felt a curious mixture of resentment and relief. But as lights began to blare near the explosion, she shelved her emotions for later.
"Come on," she barked to the child, and they both set off down the alleyway toward her ship.