(A/N)- I think this is the chapter where things really started coming together, and it's probably my favorite so far. Hope you guys enjoy!
Disclaimer: *looks up copyright law* Huh? Oh no, I'm not doing anything.
Chapter 3: The View From The Control Tower
-SW-
Klipspree - Jargoon Spaceport - Hanger 37 Air Traffic Control Tower - Visual Control Room
12 minutes before "The Incident"
Celeste Pells, Imperial air traffic coordinator, clocked into her shift at exactly 1058 standard galactic time, smile bright and cheery as ever.
"Morning everyone!" she greeted in a chipper tone, to various unenthused flat mumbles from her co-workers.
The techie didn't mind, crossing right over to her station and dropping her bag next to the chair. Plopping into her seat, she immediately snuck her personal datapad out of the bag and turned it on, opening it back up to Chapter Thirteen of Arleen Tarokin's Sabers of Passion.
The book was technically contraband—as most fun things in life were—banned by most official holobook outlets for its positive (if salacious) depiction of the Jedi Order and for general indecency. It was a relic from the days of the Republic. Or so she was told. But if one knew where to look (and had a decent private holonet connection), they were still available for download and purchase in the deepest recesses of cyberspace, and Celeste was nothing if not persistent in her quest for Arleen Tarokin's full body of work.
Modern romance writers just didn't come close to the passion and tension and sizzling chemistry, she bemoaned again to herself.
Surreptitiously checking to make sure no one was watching—because this was definitely material not safe for work and would get her in a lot of trouble—she skimmed the page until she found the place where she'd left off.
She settled into the exploits of Princess Antiphone of Naboo and her handsome Jedi Knight bodyguard Kin-Adi Nightstriker, eagerly devouring the words like the two leads devoured each other's mouths.
The radio chatter continued behind her in a steady stream.
-SW-
"VCX-100 please transmit your clearance codes for landing approval."
"Copy that, Tower, transmission commencing."
"Thank you VCX freighter Tontine, you are cleared to land at Platform A in Bay 3."
A very ordinary-looking, unassuming Correllian freighter pulled up in the air and hovered for a moment before slowly descending into one of the hanger's open air bays, right at 1100 standard time.
-SW-
"Control Tower this is the Solaris Massis requesting permission to dock for repairs."
"We see you Solaris, stand by for clearance."
A beat over the line and then:
"Proceed to Platform B, Solaris, we'll have a repair crew sent to the bay and waiting for you."
"No need, Tower, we can enact repairs ourselves. The old girl here is a bit of a finicky model, doesn't like unfamiliar hands touching her, if you know what I mean."
A soft, aggravated, "Oh my god..." from a female voice.
"Understood. Let us know if you change your minds."
"We will do that," promised the pilot.
Another unassuming Correllian ship, slightly more ragged and less put-together looking than the VCX, descended from above and carefully slotted itself into its assigned bay.
It completed its landing cycle at 1109.
-SW-
A flash of silver blipped by the window, circling the spaceport.
"S-161 XL, we have you on our scopes, please identify."
A soft garbled word that sounded like it may have been a swear and then, "Uh, hey there Control Tower, this is the luxury yacht, uh... Velvet One, you got any room down there for one more?"
"Transmit your credentials Velvet One, we'll see if we can fit you in."
"You don't need our credentials."
"...We don't need your credentials. Please descend to Platform 5 in Bay 4, S-161."
"Thanks!"
The sleek bodied ship dropped and settled into place a few seconds into 1110.
-SW-
The technician who'd cleared them blinked and then shrugged, bending over his station again.
-SW-
Klipspree - Jargoon Spaceport - Hanger 37 Air Traffic Control Tower - Visual Control Room
THE INCIDENT
Kin-Adi's sky blue eyes sizzled like the heat off his saber.
"Oh Princess," he sighed, broad shoulders dipping with the motion, "I fear my attachment to you has grown very strong indeed." He fixed her with a white, winsome smile, stealing across his perfect cheeks. "It's enough to make me Fall."
"To the Dark Side?" Antiphone asked, quirking a manicured eyebrow.
His powerful arms swept her up suddenly and she gasped as she found herself flush against his chiseled chest.
"Into your embrace, My Lady," he purred, voice low and husky with a thrilling edge.
Celeste muffled a rather embarrassing noise of delight and skimmed to the next page, leaning back in her chair and putting her heels up in her seat, curling up with her datapad in her lap like a schoolgirl with her pillow at a sleepover.
The quiet room took no notice of her squealing, the soft murmur of radio chatter from patrols on the ground and ships in the air playing out in a steady, calm stream.
The air unit cycled on, thrumming.
Someone to her right coughed a bit, clearing their throat.
Celeste brushed some loose hair out of her face.
"LS-506 can your patrol divert to Sector 4? Getting reports from the technicians down there a grate is loose in the outer wall, south side."
"Copy that Sergeant, we'll take a look."
Someone moved a piece of flimsi.
A quiet slurp of caf echoed from various stations.
The supervisor chewed his lip, studying his word puzzle very intently.
"Uh, this is LS-022, was there supposed to be maintenance working in the lower corridors?"
"Not to my knowledge, LS-022, what's wrong?"
"Door Mark B-7 looks like it's been removed from its tracks."
"Huh. That's weird, let me check with the crew."
The air unit hummed pleasantly.
A chair squeaked.
There was a scritch of a stylus on flimsi as the supervisor marked down an answer in his puzzle.
"Dry dock to Security, can I get a squad down here? There are unauthorized persons walking around in Level 4."
A creak. Someone stretched, yawning widely.
A ship lifted off from a bay on the far side, the vibrations rattling the windows a little.
Celeste thumbed down another page.
"LS-3347 reporting what sounds like blaster shots fired in Hall KY8, moving to intercept and investigate."
...
"What the? Is that a Wooki—"
The voice cut off with a yelp.
A couple eyebrows raised curiously, but the techies soon settled back into their normal mundane tasks.
Someone munched a bit of sandwich from their lunch bag..
The supervisor whispered to an underlying, plying for an answer to part of his word puzzle.
The chrono on the wall ticked.
"Sorry, can you repeat that, director?"
"I said put all sectors on alert! There are intruders in the facility!"
Blasterfire could be heard in the background of one of the comm lines.
Celeste sighed, puffing out a breath in aggravation. She was this close to the big damn kiss, she could feel it, and all the racket was making it harder to read.
She pinned her eyes on the line she'd left off on, determined to soldier on.
Kin-Adi was waxing poetic about the princess's star-filled eyes.
"Come in LS-506, can you confirm the insurgents are on Level 5 now?"
"Negative, Sergeant, I said Level 6."
"Hang on a minute, getting a report of another squad encountering them on Level 3."
"How many breaches do we have?!"
There was some cheek caressing now, okay, that was promising. Celeste read on, almost skipping over the words of an eloquently penned love confession in her haste and eagerness.
"By the stars above you are insufferable," the princess murmured, the flush in her cheeks belying her words and demonstrating her true feelings. She leaned into Kin-Adi's touch, her face drawing closer to his...
A comm chirped. With some annoyance the supervisor pulled himself from his puzzle and answered it.
"Yes?"
He listened for a minute.
"Understood." He clicked the comm off and signaled. "Commander says lock it down."
Someone else took up the order—Thank stars, Celeste thought—punching the button for the general alert PA system and warning the entire hanger that all departures were grounded until further notice.
Celeste adjusted herself in her seat and read on, and was rewarded for her efforts with the long-awaited kiss she'd been expecting.
...And then things started getting saucier and she got even more intrigued and excited.
"All sectors on alert, there are Rebels inside the facility! Repeat: There are Rebels inside the facility!"
"They're in the North Tower! Squads 10 and 11, we need backup on Level 8!"
Celeste leaned in a bit closer to her datapad. Oh ho, were clothes beginning to come off? Spicy indeed. She bent like a gremlin, almost in half, the increasingly frantic chatter on the comms washing over her like light rain.
Someone muffled a yawn, startling to attention.
A cough came from the far side.
The air unit ticked up a notch, humming pleasantly.
The passion between the two leads in her holonovel was increasing and Celeste was riveted in place. Just a few more pages. She'd read just a few more—
"What d'you mean there's four Jedi?!"
Celeste's eyes froze, widening slightly. She didn't look up, but now her attention was fully captured by the voices behind her, and she listened with a kind of horrified fascination.
"Five?! And a Nightsister?!"
Concerned murmurs fluttered around the room and in spite of their training and long-honed habits of ennui, multiple techies were now starting to look a bit nervous.
"We can't hold out! We're being overrun!"
"We're gettin' killed out here!"
"Someone tell me what's going on?!"
There was a long shriek of terror that rang out over one line.
The supervisor had now put away his puzzle, setting it to the side and standing up to lean over the shoulder of one of the techs, brows furrowed.
"Commander Bells, ah... do you... do you want us to do anything? Else? Hello?"
The supervisor's question went unanswered, and the comms dissolved into increasingly alarming updates.
Which seemed to consist mostly of screaming.
"Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhh!"
"The project's out of control! It's overtaking the hallway! It's—blubblubblubblurble!"
"The hell's a Lasat doing here?!"
"Mommy!"
Celeste listened with morbid intrigue as someone in the room straightened and scooted closer to their station.
"VCX freighter, you are not authorized to take off right now. I repeat—You are not authorized to—"
"Blow it out all your holes."
KA-BOOOOM!
The control tower shook as a massive orange explosion shook the structure, pluming from the hanger below them.
Fire alarms joined the shrieking general alert to produce an even louder cacophony as the gathered crew watched with numb dismay as several ships made a break for it, some lifting off into the air and getting the hell out of dodge, a couple heading towards the beleaguered IRO facility.
The supervisor took a while to stir and when he did he just pressed the open PA system with a small, inadequate, "Uhhhhh... be advised Imperial garrison, we have structural damage to Bay 3 and 4, requesting assistance from a fire crew, over."
None of the hysterical voices on the line answered him.
Celeste curled up tighter into her seat, her back sliding down the chair as she pulled her datapad up closer to cover her face, focusing back on the sordid words with a long Nooooooooooope echoing through her thoughts.
-SW-
Klipspree Airspace - Imperial Cruiser The Revenant - Conference Room B
8.5 hours after "The Incident"
"Do you mean to tell me," Gideon said tersely, a vein in his temple throbbing purple, "that while a city-wide Imperial alert was going on... you were sitting there reading smutty romance novels?!"
Celeste felt sweat beading on her brow and resisted the urge to swipe at it, gulping nervously.
"I kind of figured if I didn't look at it it wouldn't be my problem?" she offered with a timid grimace, her face screwing up with the most embarrassed of chagrin.
Darth Vader leaned forward slightly, the hrrrrrch-choock of his breath loud and ominous.
Oh she was dead. She was so dead. Celeste meeped, wide-eyes gaping at the black, skull-like mask.
A pregnant beat, in which she bade goodbye to all her loved ones and her pet rock Sandy.
Then, Vader asked:
"What is the holonovel you were reading?"
Celeste swallowed back a lump. "Uhhhh..." she stammered. "Sabers of Passion? By Arleen Tarokin?" she answered.
...
Vader leaned back, nodding a bit with satisfaction.
"You have excellent taste," he complimented. "That was one of Senator Amidala's favorites as well." His weight shifted to his back foot as all seven feet of him adopted an air of casual lightness. "Arleen Tarokin remains unparalleled in her grasp of the genre."
Hysterical relief crashing over her, Celeste sagged, blurting, "Omigosh right?! I can't stand these new authors, no appreciation for the craft whatsoever!"
"Indeed," Vader agreed with a sage nod.
Encouraged, Celeste continued ranting. "And don't even get me started on the whole 'clandestine Imperial lovers' trope it's just so played out and—"
Gideon gaped at the conversation unfolding before him. He drew out his flask and looked at it, focusing and refocusing his eyes on the little silver bottle before holding it away from him and starting to upturn it.
Before he could pour it out the Imperial stenographer snatched it from him with both hands, slotting it to her lips and taking a long couple of swigs, swallowing audibly with several loud gulps as she horked it down like her life depended on it.
"Gah!" she breathed once she finally came up for air, smacking the bottle's bottom solidly on the desk.
Gideon figured she needed it more than he did and didn't comment further.
(A/N)- See y'all next time readers, the shenanigans continue!