"How do you feel about asset denial?" N'Dara asked him when they'd marched a fair piece.

What else was there to say to that but to tell the truth?

"Under the right circumstances I'd endorse it 100%. You see anything that tingles your familiar-beacon and I will drag every innocent out of that hole, then blow the prison that held you so sky-high that even a being's atoms won't recognize each other."

A glance at his three-sixty told him that answer had (A)impressed the hell out of her & (B) not been where she'd been going with that question.

"I meant a power plant."

"I could be convinced. Is that what that thump was?"

It had stopped. Just as suddenly as it had started. Which he found unsettling but N'Dara hadn't even brought up.

So now she was looking at the back of his head like he was crazy.

Women?

Women were a pain in the ass under normal circumstances. This one was going to drive him to drink or else unleash the homicidal maniac who'd been warring for headspace with the aristocrat and the peripatetic war lord these last months.

"What kind of depot do you know of that makes the whole ground vibrate?" she asked.

"I am going to confess to you that while I have a deep-seated love of tech and healthy appreciation for modern conveniences, I have never been personally involved in the creation or conduction of raw power."

"Oh."

His thoughts were not the thoughts of a benevolent partner.

His thoughts were the thoughts of a man exhausted from what was—from him—an unusual show of emotional outpouring. Plus he was frustrated by lack of intel after hyping himself up for days on end, hoping—even though he knew better—that he'd have something to go on now. A solid lead. A frigging direction other than what may very well be another wild goose chase. He'd wanted a video with captors who appeared to treat POWs with respect, maybe a blurry shot of Twelve-Oh-Seven being his usual self as he was cuffed, then loaded into a prisoner transport where the driver just happened to angle a datapad so the holo-cam picked it up. Or even asked for directions from a Sep in clearly identifiable uniform.

'Oh.' That's all she has to say? Oh?

"Don't get me wrong. I get the basics… wind, water, fossil fuels, bio-energy, even fission and fusion. I'll know a windmill before one of the props hits me in the head and I get alternative power types. I just don't know what happens to get there. I'd have to look up how to get max damage out of an act of sabotage."

"What if I told you that I dated a guy once whose job was actually hardening various types of grid against possible subversive threats."

"I'd be all ears here, bubblegum baby."

"Do not ever call me that again."

He snickered. Cut audio to internal when the look on her face cued that N'Dara might be sitting on a little homicidal pressure cooker herself. Why that tickled him so much he chose not to dwell on.

"Keep going," he ordered. "Your boyfriend talk in his sleep?"

"Better. He worked from home. Kept odd hours with time changes from planet to planet where his company had holdings."

"Well, well, well," Vau hummed.

Mirdalon seemed to like it and bounded up in front of him. Thrashed that deadly tail and wiggled in near-ecstasy. Vau bent, scratched the knobby chin, and repeated the pronouncement for the strill's pleasure.

N'Dara caught up to him and giggled at his oratory teasing.

"Tell me why you were asking about taking out power plants," he demanded while they both stroked and tickled the beastie.

She crouched, popped what looked like nothing so much as an accordion-folded egg out of her pocket. A well-placed tug had it expanding mid-air. Dots and symbols covered the holo-map.

"If we're here, and headed here, this wouldn't be so far out of the way that-"

"Paleness, I am completely with you."

"I'm not bomb squad," the woman advised. "I don't carry that kind of ordnance."

"What kind of ordanance do you have?"

"Just a few tape charges… in case I need them for prisoner extraction… and a P.Y.R. Oh-Oh arrangement."

He physically looked up at her, which she appreciated.

The low whistle that came to her through his helm made her want to crow.

"Aren't you just shrapnel and sunshine?"

"You approve?"

"Absolutely. Let's see if we can make your map match up with mine…"

.o0o.

The blood in Vau's very veins went rigid at the sound of her screaming.

He abandoned all sense of op awareness and careened down the corridor at breakneck pace. Caught her when she came bowling out of a doorway. Shoved her behind him without registering at first that she was clawing at her face and head and hair, shaking with the high-pitched sound that came from her tightly clamped lips.

"What is it! What did you get hit with!?"

He tried to identify what weapon or booby trap she'd set off—something chemical or biological. It didn't appear to be acid and had no odor. He caught her forearms and was glad of his armor when the act of restraining her kicked off some other instinct in her subconscious. Holstering his blaster he quickly reached to haul her up against him; she fought him now in remembered terror instead of the fresh threat of this new attack.

"N'Dara! It's me! Let me help you! You'll just get more on you if you don't stop!"

It wasn't melting her flesh and she wasn't discolored. Didn't even appear damp, as though something had sprayed her.

"I don't know what to use to clean it off if you don't let me see what it is!"

Water wasn't the best choice for some things. Any number of blights would require one of the other solvents or deactivating agents in his med kit.

"Get it off of me!" she sobbed, almost incoherently.

"N'Dara," he begged. "Honey. Give me just a second."

He swept his scanner over her. Didn't register anything. No bioweapon or anything other than the usual pH of her skin. She'd torn off her visor, her shades. Fucked her hair, but that wasn't his problem.

"What did it look like? How did it deploy?" he asked, absolutely scared witless now.

He couldn't fight what he couldn't see.

"Um…" she sniffled, schooled her features a bit, although that delicious-looking lip of hers fought her bid and trembled uncontrollably even as she tucked it into a line. "Like, maybe this big. There were a bunch of them. Kind of whitish-grey-ish but that horrible yellow-green-grey."

"What?"

The sniveling was heart-breaking. She was so obviously trying to be brave. He wanted to tuck her up somewhere safe.

"Can you see? Is your throat swelling or anything?"

She shook her head. "They just came out at me so fast. I don't think it actually, like, dusted me with that shit or anything."

Dust of some kind. Maybe an inhalant? If it was intended as an irritant she seemed immune to it.

"It just scared me. I'm so sorry."

He patted her on the head. Tilted her so he could examine her scalp and searched for any trace of particulate on her skin. Ran the palm of his black-gloved gauntlet over her from brow to crown, then cheek to jaw. Nothing showed when he glanced down.

"I don't see any dust or powder," he told her. "Do you think you got back fast enough it didn't actually touch you?"

"I'm so sorry. I'm such an idiot. I know you have to be thinking it…"

"No. It's okay. I want to check it out, though. See what might be in there that's worth the trouble."

He meant one thing. She thought he meant another. To Vau's mind if somebody went to the hassle of guarding a place it meant there was something to hide, something valuable. To N'Dara, it sounded like he meant the trouble of putting up with her.

"Um. I dropped my torch. I dropped it when I felt them up against my face."

"I'll get you another one. Let me go see… Stay right here, okay? You're breathing okay?"

She nodded. "I don't want to be in the dark by myself anymore."

"No osik. Fine. Stick real close, but stay behind me."

He'd be able to use her flashlight as a beacon and leave her far enough back that she should be out of range if he set off anymore perils left to ambush the unwary. Bastards. Hutuuns. He glanced over his shoulder at her. She was semi-crouched as she followed him, one hand wrapped around the strap of his backpack. She'd picked up Mird—not an insubstantial weight—and was holding the thing across her chest, draped over one shoulder, like some ugly monkey baby.

Vau shook his head. That strill was going to get spoiled living with her.

"It was probably the light, right?" she asked softly. "But why were they down here? I didn't think they lived in catacombs and stuff. Bats, sure. But not-"

He hated bats. He hated bats like all that was holy and sacred. Gods almighty, he hated bats.

Just don't think about it, Walon, he ordered himself. So what if there were bats. Bats were in lots of places. Nothing to indicate they were in here. Although she was right and this kind of cavern dwelling would be right up their alley. Don't look. Don't look. Just let it go.

Of course he had to look.

He shone his big, heavy torch upward, toward the ceiling. The light in his helmet wasn't as good as the ones on his scope assembly or this free-held version.

Aw, fek. The light dissipated before it had a chance of reaching the apex of the room someone had carved out of this mountain. Still… did he hear a flutter? A shift or ripple? Maybe it was just Mird?

"I don't see them," she whispered.

"If you think you recognize where you were, sing out."

"I lost my cap trying to get away."

"Noted. I'm keeping an eye out for it."

Mird yowled piteously in sympathy.

"I know it, baby," she whispered. "I can't believe we had to come this way. This is one hell of a shortcut, Gandalf."

"Do not call me Gandalf. I don't even read fantasy and there's no such thing as demon-dragons or curses or magic or wizards or any of that BS. Or most zealots' heaven and hell for that matter. Religion is just mass-accepted brainwashing."

"Yeah. We're gonna die."

"You believe in that shit?" he asked her.

"You would not believe the powers I've seen. Of course I believe."

Of course she did. Little help here, he implored whatever powers might be listening. He'd ignored gods and goddesses since before he stopped kneeling in chapels and on prayer benches with his mother. This mission—an obsession, no lie—had seen him offering bargains and pleas to whatever deity would return Sev to him.

Plus now her.

"You're going to get scratched up if Mird decides to make a leap for it," Vau warned. "You'd do better to have strill claws on the floor rather than in your soft parts. There's a command to stay on my six."

"He makes me feel better," N'Dara told him.

Just like a big, gold, drooly teddy bear, Vau grumbled in his head. With fangs and six feet worth of claws in addition to all those loose flaps.

He held up his hand to halt progress when her visor and shields came into view. A light flickered in an opening a bit around the bend. When she stooped he arrested her movement, then crouched to scan it before reaching to retrieve it, handing it back to her. She took his hand and directed the torch all around, looking for predators or other obstacles, perhaps.

"Calm down. We're almost there."

"Yeah. But the gift of flight makes running into them again almost inevitable. And if they're attracted to light you're a frigging beacon."

"Was it something alive?" he asked, not kosher with their little side-quest anymore.

"Uh… yeah. Did you think it was some kind of vampire zombie-moths or something?"

He straightened and turned. "Moths? Like with teeth?"

Her face was stricken as she yanked at her cap one-handed. Strands of hair just hung everywhere and the effect was adorable. She shoved the shades back into place and pressed her lips together, carefully breathing through a tiny sliver of just one side.

She was a mouth-breather. He'd told her one time to breathe through her mouth and she'd taken that one directive to heart, so ever since he'd tried to encourage her to breathe through her nose—that it was more efficient at getting the oxygen actually into her lungs amongst other pros. No go.

"You're going to hyperventilate," he warned her.

"Blow me."

"You're blowing hard enough for the both of us," was his rejoinder. "Moths?"

"You're afraid of bats. I caught you looking."

"Moths with teeth?" he reminded her.

She shrugged. "Why would they even be down here? What's down here to eat?"

"I thought they ate plants and nectar and stuff. Fabric. They're attracted to keratin. Your hair, I guess." That was to pay her back for the bats comment. He knew it. Looking at the way she narrowed her eyes at him, she knew it, too. He grinned inside the protection of his bucket. Wonderous things, the buy'ce of a beskar'gam.

.o0o.

.

The shortcut was worth it...

With little to no time lost from their estimated original goal-ETA they were able to belly right up to the power depot and slink back out with no one any the wiser. Vau let out a long, satisfied breath and braced his hands on his hips.

He looked like some kind of wonder-knight surveilling the entirety of his realm, N'Dara thought. She was so proud of him when he managed to convey any kind of emotive response outside of his go-to sarcasm.

"If they look up here will they spot you?"

He shook his head. "Doubtful. The matte black isn't reflective."

"You've got the belt buckle. It's shiny. And so is-"

She registered a moment's disquiet so close to heartbreak that she was sorry she'd brought it up. In order to glance at the jeweled piece he had to tuck in and bend over a bit. Lean out before looking down. Now his thumb rubbed vacantly over the gleaming red eyes.

"This was a gift."

"I'm sorry."

"It's not a buckle. It's a clip. To keep the web belts from shifting when you wear a lot of gear. It was custom and it's precious to me."

"I didn't mean anything other than-"

He turned. Patted her on the shoulder. "Let's go. While I look like a hole in the dark, you stand out like a turd in an oyster bed."

"You have the prettiest way with words."

"So you've said."

"When we're done? I'm filling out a 1616/26 on you."

"Welllll I am just shaking in my boots," he promised. Bit back the grin. "What the fek is a sixteen-sixteen twenty-six?"

"Your periodic performance review."

"Aw, now that hurts my heart, navy. You haven't even gotten to sample the goods yet."

"The package is disturbing."

The package was disturbing. He made her heart race and her belly turn flips. It was bad enough when he was an ass, then those times he showed that he could be a real, live person instead of a machine-shell just made it worse. She was a sadomasochist. She'd suspected it before and now she was damn certain of it.

Even knowing it was coming she jumped when he tapped the button and the sky behind them burst into instant light and sound.

Live with a man who did this for a living and learn to make some run-of-the-mill military surplus supplies, a few twists of a few wires, and both a maintenance department and a fleet hanger could really give you some serious bang for your buck.

"Shab," Vau drawled. He didn't have to look over his shoulder. "When a jetii decides to give up the handlebars for an aerial lightshow, your kind doesn't disappoint."

"Just move," she swore softly. "Hell. I accidentally thought nice thoughts about you for ten whole seconds."

"Probably concussed from flipping your lid earlier."

What she flipped next wasn't lid-shaped.

The terrain quickly became interesting enough that further banter was wasted breath. He marched her all night and most of the next day. Wondered briefly how a being who talked so fekking much could just disappear into herself the way she did sometimes.

Never complained. Not really.

Not that he was complaining about that. Still, it was hard to keep tabs on a partner when they kept withdrawing into themselves for hours and hours at a time. Vau reminded himself that she'd been out here for months with seemingly little contact and no daily interaction. While she seemed like the type who'd just talk to herself, she had enough op-awareness to keep her mouth shut.

He wondered if she'd be one of those who kept music or audio going in their buckets or if she'd be the type to keep up a running commentary in the privacy of internals only.

The silence didn't last past them shucking their rucksacks to make camp the next evening.

.

.

"Are you related to Wookies?" N'Dara asked Vau, staring up at his face.

When she went to her tiptoes she could look him eye-to-eye. On her very tiptoes. On the sloping riverbank.

"That's not why I shave every day," he groaned.

She laughed. He liked when she laughed. Sometimes, when they were marching, shutters came down over her eyes. It was a harsh look that crossed her face then and he had no problem reconciling that woman with the one who'd decided to take him down before he could escape with any data that might aid in her quest.

"I meant because you're tall."

"I grew up in a home where the nutritional content of food was important and we had instant access to healthcare. Not overly tech-heavy, but certainly efficient. I always knew where my next meal was coming from. No one ever had to tell me to finish my greens."

"I like greens," she told him. She found a stone and attempted to skim it over the surface of the water.

"I had no choice and was not encouraged to develop opinions about what went on my plate."

"Mom not a good cook?"

The nose wrinkled and half her blue freckles merged into one. She winged another one.

"That's not how you do that. No. My mother would probably be lost in a kitchen. We had help. Thank all the gods I never worshipped there. Because my mother would have forsworn food for religion, I'm sure. You have the worst form of any being in the galaxy. Can you truly not skip rocks?"

She just lifted a brow at him. Flung the small stone in her hand into the air, had it bounce on the surface with what she had in her.

"Cheating doesn't make you right," he told her. "Watch."

He selected a rock. Showed her a wrist motion, sent it skipping clear to the other side.

N'Dara's jaw dropped and she turned to him.

"Your eyes… do you…"

She wore yellow-tinted anti-glare shooting glasses. But he'd sworn her eyes had been dark. Now they appeared much lighter.

"How did you do that?"

"I showed you. Why do your eyes look different?"

"They change blues. I think some of its mood, some of it's just weather or what I'm wearing or something. I don't spend so much time staring in a mirror that I could map out the patterns for you."

She hunkered down, set her face. Did the same thing he had, only to see her pebble plunk beneath the surface.

"No." He slid up behind her. Ghosted her hand through the motion. "Elbow, then wrist, then follow it. It's all snaps, but smooth from one to the other so the stone gets your energy."

She hopped up and down when the stone jumped twice.

"You are fekking adorable sometimes."

Mird came over to celebrate, too. The long, whiplike tail lashed the ground happily at her antics.

"I need another one!"

He cast around. Didn't see another suitable one.

"Screw it," she called. He ducked out of the way when several of them came shooting back into her hand, dripping wet. Then she reconsidered. "Is that cheating, too?"

"I…" He didn't have an answer to that. "How did you bring back just the ones we'd thrown? Why didn't every round stone in the creek bed come back?"

"I just called the ones that we'd touched."

"Jedi can do that?"

She lifted a shoulder. Half-bent and concentrated on the wrist flick.

"I can."

"So, like a search aak, if I give you something, can you track somebody with it?"

"No. But like at the turbo lasers, I can feel if somebody's been there. I can tell if somebody died or what kind of energy they left behind—if they were scared or excited or happy. But I have to have something to connect them to get individual identities from the force echo."

"How long does the trail last?"

"I don't know. You go in some places and the feelings are so layered up you can't discern individual vibes. I don't have a good definition for it, I can't graph it or chart it for you. If we get close to somewhere Sev's been I should be able to pick it up. You're a tuning rod for me. Your connection to him will make the aura resound in me. Probably. It worked earlier."

"And the rocks?"

"They're still buzzing where you touched them. Plus… I could see where they landed," she told him with a smirk.

Everything in him wanted to drown her.

He reared back to pop her on the ass when she prissed past him.

Mird declined the piece of dried fruit she offered when she opened the pouch they were calling dinner.

When he joined her, offering the smoky dried paak loras he enjoyed, she narrowed her eyes at him again.

"Is everybody real tall where you're from? Originally. Not your I-wanna-wear-a trooper-suit homeworld. Or are you super-tall even there?"

"I don't recall being unusually tall. I do remember my mother being significantly shorter than my father. You'd probably fit in with her side of the family."

She picked up a pebble. Pretended she was going to skip it across the lake and used the force to jump it across the clearing and up his chest plate.

"I've never met a jedi like you," he told her. "I'm trying to peg you into a known hole."

"I'm not a jedi," she reminded him. "That ship sailed."

"I knew Camas."

"I'll buy you a nice sympathy card next time I'm in town." Her body language changed.

"Bardan Jusik liked being Arligan Zey's apprentice. He said it was less a father-son role and more managerial. He said that some relationships are more comradely, some more familial, some just a partnership you know isn't going to last."

"I worshiped the ground Master Camas walked on. He was the epitome of cool. I just didn't realize how cold cool could feel when you were at ground-zero."

"Why'd he take you on?"

"He was being encouraged to take on one of us. There were a lot of prospects and he was one of the Masters who wasn't bogged down on the council. I think he aimed to get there and thought Master Yoda's recommendation was career advice."

"So much for that aspiration. Maybe they'll give him a nice seat on the big council in the sky now that he's joined the force."

"He's not dead," she told him, point-blank.

"What?" Vau nearly bobbled his drink.

She lifted her brows and shook her head. "He didn't go down the night the order collapsed. I can feel it."

"You can still feel your old master?"

She nodded, wary. "I tried reaching out. It was an old link and when I was alone and scared—they already knew they had a jedi, so what harm could it cause? I'd felt the order shatter, the force rippled with the pain of the tear in our fabric. When I reached out, he's who I defaulted to. Or, one of them. But he's the one who reached back. He's not dead."

"Can you feel anybody else?"

"Of course."

He was dumbfounded.

"Could other jedi? Like calling role? If you listed out as many as you remember, could you tell me who-"

"Why?"

He jerked liked he'd been slapped. "Well. I don't know. I don't know why it seemed so important to know all of a sudden."

She eyed him warily. "I'm not turning in jedi who escaped. Not even to get Sev or my… guys… ba…back."

Her voice slowed. She felt a coil in her belly.

"I might," she admitted.

He shook his head. "I'd never ask you to do that."

"Thank you." She felt him watching her. Studying her. Wanted to cringe away. Envied him the anonymity of his full-face helmet.

He saw the way she had to work to swallow. She packed away her meal unfinished.

"You need to eat. To keep up your strength."

"I'm not hungry anymore."

He just studied her, a frown marring his brow that echoed hers.

"I'll keep first watch so you can meditate."

"I don't feel like meditating right now," she told him quietly. It wasn't cool but she pulled out her tunic liner and donned the hood. She flipped out her bedroll and wrapped her blanket around herself. Just cocooned up and shifted to lay on her side with her back to him.

"I didn't mean to upset you," he said again. "I would never ask you to make that choice."

"I could, though," she told him. "I could recall as many as I can remember—the older ones I knew would be the most likely to survive anyway, right?—and I could track them, offer them help, then… make the offer? How would I make the offer? Who could I go to who would have the power to find the ones still imprisoned?"

"Don't go there, N'Dara," he warned softly. "You'll drive yourself mad."

She glanced up and over her shoulder at him, then rolled back over.

It was a long time before he saw her shoulders relax and even then he doubted that she slept.