Vau watched N'Dara leap from the cockpit of the courier speeder. Turn and wave. The guy swooped around, tipping the craft so he could lean close to her.
"Look me up when you get back in town?"
Whatever reply she gave the pup was lost to him in the downdraft. Then she turned and jogged his way.
Sun had kissed her cheekbones, wherever she'd been. There was a hot flush on her skin, though, that he figured had very little to do with climate or exposure to the elements.
"You sleep with the delivery boy?"
"He's a little more than a delivery boy. I put some of my new skills to work." She hammed making a muscle with her arm. "They give preferential hiring to veterans. Somebody put a good word in for me."
Her wink was as audacious as the idea of her working as armed security transport.
"You're going to get killed without me to keep your head out of the clouds." He tapped her nose. "At least message man put some bloom in those cheeks. You were looking a little pale when you left."
"Havyyyk had her baby. Did you see?"
He obligingly feigned bored interest while she pulled up her comm'link and displayed the holo-image Enacca had sent her.
"That thing is creepy looking."
She gasped in horror. "He's adorable."
Vau gagged. Drew his lips and chin down. "What does one send a Wookie as a nursery gift? A stuffed Porg with removable arms?"
She put a fist to his gut, which he ignored with a chuckle.
"I missed you," she told him honestly.
"And I, you," he admitted. Slung his arm around her and hugged her into his side. He reached down for the duffel bag she'd dropped when she'd had to show off baby pictures. "I brought you a new visor. You're going to love the way Jaing tricked it out."
"You think so?" she asked, unconvinced.
"Perfect compromise," he promised.
Two weeks later she threw the protective cap off, heedless of the sensitive comm and vis components that could be flipped down and activated with just the blink of an eye.
"I can't take this anymore," she grunted with a growl. She reached up, tore at her head with her fingers, loosing the braids there so they fell out of the weave—frenzied, jerking motions of her fingers had them swinging free. She had her lightsaber out, igniting it as she bent forward, her chest heaving with the irritation she felt.
Vau backed away from her with the glow stick buzzed to life.
"You okay, there?" he asked carefully.
She stuck out her jaw. "Do you think I'd catch my hair on fire?" she asked him. "Maybe I should wet it first."
He made a face. "I think there are probably more appropriate tools… what the hell is going on?"
"I have a headache. Every day, every night. It feels like my scalp is actually bruised, my hair is so heavy. I needed to get it cut but forgot. It's driving me crazy."
No osik. Sane women did not just stop in the middle of the jungle to whack off a hunk of braid.
"Okay. Well," he held his hands up as he approached. "How 'bout you turn off the light show and I'll cut your hair for you. I have shears. And—I mean if you really want to go for the machete-look—use my beskad instead."
She flipped it off and straightened. Held out her hand.
He reached to unclip the sheath of the long knife he wore down the side of his leg.
"The shears, jackass. I have my own machete if I wanted to go that route."
"Then why did you start off with the zzzzip-zzzzooo," he asked, feigning the swordplay motions he'd seen all jetiise utilize.
"Knee jerk."
He shook his head as he sucked in a deep breath. Moved closer to her after he found the kit with the heavy shears near the bottom of his ruck.
As he finger-combed the lengths of hair out of the thick braids the heady scent of her shampoo—mixed with a good, honest sweat—filled his nostrils.
"I'd love to know what flower she's making your shampoo out of," he told her, inhaling deeply.
N'Dara smiled. "I know it must be rare. She gave me and Arraynarrykk and Rundyyyshk each a container of it and they made a big deal out of it."
"The idea of how much shampoo it would take to wash a Wookie boggles the mind."
"There was a lot I didn't understand about them when I was first assigned here. They're not primitive, not really. They never stink and they're fastidious about hygiene. They love tech, they're just choosey about what they embrace. I love them. Love it here."
"How much am I taking off here?" he asked her.
"All of it," she growled, her entire body tensing.
Vau had to laugh. "Yeah. No. I'm pretty sure there are girl rules about not cutting your hair as a reaction to stress."
"It'll grow back," she assured him.
He nodded. Sucked in a deep breath. Pulled his fingers through a huge hank in the middle of the back to give him some tension to work against. Pulled them just a little lower. A little lower.
"Do it, Vau," she ordered tersely.
"Okay. I'm just going to take about half of it off, then we'll see. It's a hell of a lot easier to cut more than to put it back on."
Half an hour later he decided it was as good as it was going to get, his career studies never having included hairdressing. It frizzed and waved, released from the weight of half of it's volume. Looked even fuller as it danced around. Each hank he'd cut had sprung from the blades of the scissor he'd employed as he moved around her. The sight of it had made him chuckle.
"Enacca isn't going to recognize me," she told him, running her hands through it with a grin.
"Eh," he argued. "How many blue-haired aliens could there be running around this planet with Mandalorian mercenaries?"
"You do make a memorable sidekick."
His face fell. "I am not the sidekick. If anything, you're the sidekick?"
"How do you figure? I was here first."
"I beg to differ."
"I meant here, here. Not like… in existence, grandpa."
He huffed out a breath and narrowed his eyes at her.
"I hope you get knots in your hair now," he told her. "Police up this mess and let's move out."
That made her stick out her lip. "You made the mess. You should have to clean it up."
"I was trying to keep you from zapping yourself."
She killed him when she just wiggled her fingers and made the earth or leaves or whatever do her bidding. It wasn't something she made a habit of doing, but it was kriffing handy as fek when they needed it. Now she just basically turned over the ground, then scattered leaf debris over it.
"Do you really not like babies?" she asked him as she bent to retrieve her cap.
He looked over his shoulder at her where he'd been pulling his pack back on.
"What?"
"You think babies are creepy?"
His brows shot up, not that she could see it. She was good at picking up his non-verbal cues despite the helmet, though.
"What on earth gave you that idea? I mean, I don't go googly eyes over them, but I get that they're a necessary evil. They can be all right."
"You said Pashyyr is creepy."
"Who is—that little furball runty thing? Yeah. Creepy. I don't know what I expected Wookie pups to look like, but it wasn't that."
"So it was just the cub-ness of him, not all babies?"
He rocked his head side to side. "I don't hate babies. I'm not opening a daycare or anything. And I'll forever be grateful that they handed the clones to us fairly mature and along with care droids those first years. I would not want to change a hundred diapers multiple times a day."
She giggled. "I never thought about that. That my guys would have all been babies at the same time. Did they have, like, big huge rocking machines to get them to sleep at night?"
"No, N'Dara," he said, his voice going tight. "Honey, they grew them in vats. Decanted them when they were old enough to take orders."
"What?"
"Mine were two when I got them. But they were already like kindergarteners. They had language proficiency and basic hygiene and life skills, some basic weapons training, had already been flash-trained a good bit. Ad'ra said she thought they started the indoctrination process while they were still in the incubation tanks. I don't-"
He trained his 360-view to glance at her.
She'd stopped dead and Mird with her, looking up at her distraught face. Her chest was heaving and he could hear her hyperventilating.
"You have to look at it like this: if nobody had ordered them, those boys would never exist. It sucked, and it sucks, and we're working on ways of fixing what was stolen from them. But, truth of the matter is that they only got brought to life to serve this purpose. So I'm going to be grateful for your Darth Tyranus or whoever the hell he was."
"Nobody held them? You put them to bed in tanks?"
"No. After they got out of the tanks they slept in barracks. Or dorms, I guess."
"They were little? Toddlers?"
He nodded.
She blinked back tears and walked up to him. Put her head on his chest and wrapped her arms around his waist. "I'm so glad they had you to take care of them. To teach them and love them."
"I was far from loving. It was a hell of a job and I did it well enough that most of them learned to be afraid of me."
"But they're still alive because of it, yeah?"
He nodded. "Most of them."
"How many did you train?"
"One hundred and four."
"How many are left?"
"I know the whereabouts of ninety-six of them. Lost three at Geonosis—all from the same squad. Most of my squads are still intact. The other four were from different units, different skirmishes."
"Are they KIA or do you have any other MIAs?"
"Just Sev."
She nodded. Hugged him hard again before moving away.
Sniffled along behind him for a long while before letting the monotony of the trek soothe her out of her misery at finding out that the clones had been institutionalized and treated like specimens of some great experiment. Which, honestly, they were.
Life found a way, though, and there was some hope on the horizon for their boys. Now he just needed a little slice of that hope to carry him to his lad so he could bring him home and give him the life he deserved.
.
.o0o.
.
"I am soooo tired."
"We're not stopping. I'm not, anyway."
She let out a giant huff of a sigh and he took a good long look at her in his 360° but she didn't look sick. Didn't look particularly give-out, either. Still tromping steadily and with no toe-drop or sloping shoulders to indicate exhaustion.
"Drink something."
She sucked her lips worriedly. "I don't like Mird being so far behind us. What if something happens?"
"What do you think is going to take him down?" Vau countered. The game here was small by all estimation- - at least from the indications from the outward signs. What trails there were traversed under the low-lying shrubbery and undergrowth. Trees were pretty busy but still nothing larger than the common nuna had reared an ugly head at them.
"Do you sense something?" he asked suddenly, flipping around to really look at her.
She made a face and shook her head. "I just wish he'd stay where I can sense him."
"It's good at taking care of itself."
"Did you rear him?"
"It," he insisted. "They're hermaphroditic. And no. Mird was nearly fully grown when we teamed up."
She smiled at that for some reason.
"I'll bet they make cute babies. Are they fuzzy and round like little balls of fluff?"
"If you wore a bucket you could entertain yourself looking up the information on the holoweb while we march. But you're atin, so I'm forced to remind you they're born with six legs, a skirt that expands to enable flight, and a tail as long as the rest of their bodies. No. No round fuzzy ball."
"Fluffy, though?"
"I haven't had reason to discuss it with Lord Mirdalon. Maybe if you accept your drumstick tonight you'll be back in favor and can ask."
Oh, he loved that scowl that came over her face when she wanted to slot him. Life wouldn't be dull. He imagined she was hell on wheels with an inadequate subordinate or lackluster clerk.
Not that the strill had been at all impressed at the shrieking that accompanied it's gift of the bloody haunch from some feathered local reptile.
Vau was just glad Mirdalon chose the woman as recipient of its hunting largesse.
"Are you getting reception?"
He nodded. "Clear as a bell. Are you not?"
She tapped her communicator. "I can't swear that I just don't have any messages, but it would be odd for my contact not to at least acknowledge my request."
That was worrisome.
"I'd feel better if you let the Skirata clan look into this individual."
"Passed all the requisite background checks and the politics are perfect for our cause."
"A sympathizer?" Even more worrisome. If they'd been taken in-
"Hellll no," she drawled. "Absolutely no political affiliation whatsoever. No parents, no hobbies except the next mission. He'd probably make a great bounty hunter except he's not keen to actually develop his own agendas. Hell on wheels with remembering and assimilating data, though."
"None of this is reassuring, Bubbles. If he's gotten in trouble and knows what you're about…"
She regarded him balefully.
"Do you see anything in my personality that would warrant you calling me Bubbles?"
He grinned inside his helm.
She wasn't so tough.
"Enacca is the one who suggested it."
"She was thrilled when we commed her about coming back on-station. I think she misses you when you're not working together."
"We've pulled one or two good ones. She's not stuffy about lizard guts."
No one could say she wasn't good with local lingo as she made a rude gesture.
"I hate you. I hate you with every single inch of my body."
"And were you twice as tall that would be impressive."
He knew when he lost her attention. Watched her lift her comm and flip through it again before lifting both hands over her head in a Shyriiwook gesture of victory.
Fek yeah.
"Spill it, Bubbles."
"Eat my dust, Metal-Man."
She was grinning as she jogged forward, already tapping on that datapad as she passed him.
He easily caught up and was just as rejuvenated when his own 'link lit up with the data dump she'd sent. He punched his own fist through the air as he scrolled. Fek. He needed this lead. Needed it like he'd needed no other news that had ever been handed to him.
Only one contingent of Bugs had been on-planet during that last disastrous battle before the Republic pulled out. And they'd operated out of the kelita at the end of this trail. Destered now, according to their contacts, but it was their next stop for mining for clues. Fate seemed to be handing him that very small break after all.
And when he next checked his messages? Jaing had forwarded an after-action report that mentioned his boys. Boss, Fixer, Scorch- - with their shiny new stormtrooper designations- - were still well and in tiptop fighting shape. Post-contact debriefing included a physical assessment and theirs were top-of-the-trees. Good news. Good news.
Maybe things were turning around…