Chapter Eighteen

Sorusuub G-class transport shuttle Gundark, hyperspace, 123 days before the declaration of the New Order

Even in hyperspace, the ship's hull still shuddered.

Ahsoka had spent more than enough time around starships to know that the violent and seemingly random tremors that had been rocking the small vessel ever since they'd left Coruscant were not a good sign as far as it's mechanical reliability or structural integrity were concerned. Where Ghes had acquired the nearly century old shuttle, she didn't know, and she'd spotted several suspicious stains that made her not want to find out. But, whatever the ship's numerous shortcomings were, it was, at the very least, fit for their mission.

"Hey."

The sound of Ghes's voice pulled Ahsoka's attention away from the control readout and any further thought of the decrepit vessel shaking itself to pieces.

"Hey." She said back, turning around in the pilot's chair to see Ghes walking into the cockpit carrying a mug of caf in each hand.

He'd repainted his beskar with a crude brown and tan scheme for this mission, mostly as a precaution against anyone recognizing his family colors. Much as it must have killed him to do it, Ahsoka thought he'd done pretty well making the new paint job match the down on their luck mercenary duo look they were going for; haphazardly applied and peeling in several places. It certainly must have taken more effort than the mismatched set of plastoid armor plates he'd put together for her, though that definitely looked like it had been scavenged off some battlefield.

"Are we still on course?" He asked, quickly glancing over the instrument panel before sitting down in the copilot's chair and holding out a mug for her to take.

"Somehow." Ahsoka sighed, taking the offered mug. "I'll be surprised if this thing makes it to Falleen in one piece."

"Look at it this way," Ghes said in what he probably thought was a reassuring tone. "if anything goes wrong, we'll both die and you won't have to say 'I told you so'."

"Comforting." She said, smiling thinly as she rolled her eyes at yet another of her husband's bad jokes.

Husband. Even thinking about it still felt weird to her. In a way, it was like when she and Ghes had first gotten together, when she'd been getting used to the idea of being in a relationship. Except that change had come by itself, whereas her rather sudden marriage had come as the result of a few other massive changes that she'd yet to fully process.

"So, assuming the ship doesn't explode and kill us," Ghes began, leaning back and kicking his boots up on the instrument panel. "what's our ETA going to be?"

"Should be around fifteen hundred." She read off the nav unit.

"Coruscant or local?" He asked.

"Local."

"Good. Just in time for dinner." Ghes said, sipping his caf. "I'm getting sick of ration packs."

Ghes had never really been much of a pilot, at least not from what Ahsoka had observed. He was just so hands off when it came to space flight, content to sit back and relax while the computer or, more recently, Ahsoka did the flying. Not that she minded, she loved flying, and she was damned good at it. She couldn't afford to be anything less as the apprentice of the best pilot in the Jedi Order…

Well, ex-apprentice; a mostly self-inflicted wound that still cut far deeper than she wanted it to. Ahsoka tried not to dwell on it, at this point she knew all too well that it would only make the pain worse, but it hadn't gotten any easier in the three weeks since she'd walked away from her old life. Ghes had been doing his best to distract her, though, and she had no idea how she'd have held together as well as she had without him.

Ahsoka wanted to believe that going on this mission was a good start at paying him back for everything he'd been doing for her, even if Ghes had been vehemently against the idea when Rep Intel had first approached him. But this was something Ghes needed to do, she was convinced. Much as he claimed to hate Duchess Satine and her pacifist "New Mandalorian" conclave, they were still his people, and something had happened to them, something that had left the rogue Sith Maul running the city of Sundari from behind the scenes. Something that Rep Intel believed had heavily involved Black Sun. So, long story short, she'd twisted Ghes's arm until he'd agreed to help out by posing as a poor mercenary to infiltrate the Falleen-led cartel. He'd thank her for it eventually, Ahsoka was sure, but for now she was just thankful to have a mission again.

"You know," Ghes began after he'd finished his caf. "My mother always said her biggest fear was that I'd end up working for Black Sun or the Hutts."

"Really?" Ahsoka said, disbelieving. She certainly couldn't see him working for a criminal syndicate.

"Mothers worry, I guess." Ghes shrugged. "Besides, that's what people expect from Mando'ade. It's hard for people to get past the reputation, even when they should know better."

Ahsoka nodded. She'd had plenty of experience with other people's preconceptions, particularly "normal" people. There was just so much they didn't understand…

Something occurred to Ahsoka, she wasn't sure why. It was probably just a stray thought, but it stuck in her mind for some reason.

"Ghes," She started, still a little unsure why she was even asking. "why have I never met your parents?"

"Why do you ask?" Ghes responded, hesitating just enough that she knew she'd hit on something.

"Well, it's just that, from the way you talk about them, you seem close." She said, trying her best to articulate what she'd been thinking. "You do still talk to them, don't you?"

"Yeah…" Ghes said noncommittally. "When I get the chance to. But you know how it's been with the war on, I haven't even been to see them in almost a year…"

"It's different now, though, isn't it?" She asked. "Now that we're married."

"I guess…"

"What?" Ahsoka asked, half joking. "Do they not want to meet me or something?"

"That's not it…"

"Then what is it?" She pressed. "Are you embarrassed of me or something?"

"No!" Ghes said defensively. "It's just that I haven't really…"

Ahsoka sighed and turned her chair to face him.

"You haven't told them about me, have you?" She said accusingly, folding her arms across her chest.

"Not really…" He said sheepishly, running his hand back across his scalp. "They know I've been seeing someone, my mother figured it out, but they don't know anything about you, or that we're married."

"Why not?" She demanded. "Because it's starting to sound like you really are embarrassed of me."

"Of course not!" He said quickly. "It's just not that easy of a thing to bring up…"

"Really?" She said, cocking an eyebrow. "How hard really is it to just tell them?"

"Yeah, that'll go over real well," Ghes scoffed. "Hey Mom, buir, remember that girlfriend I told you about? Well she's a Togruta, she was a Jedi, and, guess what? I married her without telling you!"

"Why should any of that matter?"

"It shouldn't." Ghes sighed, turning his chair and leaning forward so his forearms rested on his knees. "But I've told you how ner buir is, he has a thing against Jedi. My mother's not like that, but she wants grandchildren…"

"Oh…" Ahsoka said, looking away as she realized what he was saying.

She and Ghes couldn't have children together, that was a simple fact of biology. For her, that didn't change much. Growing up in the Temple, she'd never really thought any of that would be an option for her, so she wasn't really losing anything. Ghes though… He claimed it didn't bother him, but one thing about Mandalorians in Ghes and his father's strain she'd picked up on was that they were very family oriented. If Ghes's mother had thought similar...

"Hey," Ghes said, picking up on what was bothering her. "I made my decision on that a long time ago, cyar'ika, and I don't want you to think for a minute that I regret being with you."

"I know." Ahsoka said, feeling her face flush. She didn't know why Ghes thought he had to try so hard to reassure her. "And I'm sorry."

"It's not your fault…" He started.

"No." She insisted. "I shouldn't have started in on you like that. I guess I just didn't realize how complicated family stuff can get, since, you know, I don't have one."

"Yeah." Ghes snorted. "Just a bad tempered Jedi who caught us in bed together and literally tried to kill me."

That was a fair point, Anakin had become a lot like a father to her, and he'd certainly reacted like one when he'd found out about her and Ghes. If it hadn't been for him catching them, she had trouble imagining ever telling her former master about their relationship.

"Alright," Ahsoka agreed. "Anakin was pretty bad "

"Is." Ghes corrected. "Is pretty bad. He is still my boss, you know."

"I know." She began, then smiled slyly as something occurred to her. "And I guess, since you had to put up with Anakin for so long, it's only fair that I meet your parents and deal with whatever they have to say."

Ghes smiled and shook his head.

"Okay, okay…" He relented. "You win. I'll call when we get back and tell them we're coming to dinner."

"Thank you." She said graciously. "And quit worrying. I mean, come on, how are they not going to love me?"

Things were quiet for a while after that, not because either of them was upset or they didn't want to talk, but because Ghes pretty quickly fell asleep. It really didn't even bother Ahsoka much at this point. Well, it did a little, she supposed, and she really would have preferred for him to stay awake and keep her company, but she'd learned trying to keep him up wasn't much use. Even with the caf, once Ghes got comfortable on a long flight like this, he was out for at least a few hours. He talked in his sleep, though, so that was at least something.

For some reason, Ahsoka didn't know why, Ghes always seems to speak mando'a when this happened, and, not for the first time, she thought about trying to learn what was technically Ghes's native language. After all, it couldn't be much harder than learning Shyriiwook, and marrying Ghes was supposed to make her Mandalorian too. It'd probably be a nice surprise for him if she could learn it on her own. Maybe Rex had picked it up during this ARC training and could teach her? Or Obi Wan, he'd supposedly spent a lot of time on Mandalore…

And that brought back to something she didn't want to think about.

Ahsoka pushed thoughts of her friends to the back of her mind and dragged herself back to the present. Much as she might have wanted to reminisce right now, she needed to keep her focus on the mission. They'd be in hyperspace for another few hours at least. She could leave the autopilot on and try to get in some meditation before they made planetfall.

"Ahsoka… Ahsoka…"

Ahsoka's eyes shot open to find a familiar sight filling the shuttle's viewport; the blue and green sphere of a terrestrial planet set against a star-speckled backdrop.

Falleen, she thought immediately as she remembered their mission. But that didn't make sense, they'd been in hyperspace when she'd started meditating and she hadn't thought she was meditating deeply enough to miss them returning to realspace…

Unless she'd dozed off.

Oops.

She tilted her head back to see Ghes, leaning over the back of her chair and looking down at her with a smug look on his face. No, he definitely wasn't going to let this one go easily.

"You okay?" He asked with mock concern.

"I'm fine." She answered quickly. "I was just meditating."

"Sure, cyar'ika." He said, patting her on the shoulder and moving back to the copilot's seat. "Looked like you were 'meditating' pretty deeply."

"I was." She lied.

"Did you see anything interesting?" Ghes asked her as he sat down.

"What?"

"Like the future." He clarified. "That's something Force-users can do, right? Meditate hard enough and you can see the future?"

"It can happen." She said. "But I've never really…"

"Are you sure?" He interjected, no longer able to restrain the grin spreading across his face. "Because I think I was 'meditating' pretty hard too, and I saw a heard of Banthas pulling a Venator across a desert…."

"Fine," She huffed. "I fell asleep, okay, same as you did."

"But I wasn't the one flying." He pointed out. "We're lucky I woke up before that cruiser out there blasted us to dust."

"What cruiser…" She started, following the gesture Ghes made out the viewport to the glowing aft-section of a Munificent-class cruiser floating gently away from them. "Oh."

"Yeah." Ghes said.

"What did they want?" Ahsoka asked, though she suspected that she already knew the answer.

"They wanted to know why we were idling on the edge of Falleen space." Ghes explained.

It was about what she'd expected. Falleen had been one of the first planets taken by the Separatists in the early days of the war, so they had plenty of reason to be suspicious of any ship coming out of the core.

"What did you tell them?"

"The truth." Ghes shrugged, a hint of mischief in his voice. "You know, that we're Republic spies trying to infiltrate a criminal syndicate."

"Really?" She said stopping just short of rolling her eyes again.

"No." He said, still smiling a little at his own joke. "I just told them we had a long flight and my wife fell asleep at the controls, which is still true."

"Can you just let it go?" Ahsoka sighed.

"Maybe," Ghes said. "but probably not right now."

"Can't you just accept my apology and move on?" She groaned, starting to get a little genuinely aggravated with him.

"Maybe." Ghes said. "Of course, you'd actually have to apologize…"

"I…" Ahsoka started to say before realizing that, no, she hadn't apologized yet. "Fine. I apologize for falling asleep."

"And almost getting us killed." Ghes added on for her. "But I forgive you. Now, hurry up and take us in before they start getting suspicious again."

The reptilian Falleen were not a species known for their humility. Rarely was this more obvious than when walking through Falleen, capital city of Falleen, home planet of the Falleen. It was a city trying desperately to match Coruscant's grandeur, seemingly unaware of the insurmountable, millennia long head start that the galactic capital had over any competitor. But such unrealistic ambition was common in the mid-rim, what set Falleen apart from the rest was its inhabitants.

Ahsoka could count on one hand the number of Falleen she'd encountered, they weren't especially common even on Coruscant, and they tended to occupy positions were they weren't likely to interact with Jedi. There were a handful in the Order, but she'd never been introduced to any of them, and it was a safe bet that they wouldn't be very much like others of their species. Falleen were… unpleasant to say the least, especially towards members of any species besides their own.

Just walking through the crowds on their way out of the spaceport, Ahsoka could feel the arrogant sense of superiority that seemed to be a feature of the entire race hanging ever-present in the Force around her. There was a reason for that arrogance, of course, a unique part of their biology. Falleen had an unusual level of control over their own pheromone production, pheromones that were strong enough to influence most any sentient species in the galaxy. This influence wasn't anywhere near as precise as what Force users where capable of, but it was more subtle, and this natural ability had allowed a higher than average number of them to work their way into positions of power and influence in corporations, governments, and, if Rep Intel was to be believed, Black Sun.

"That's it." Ghes said through a mouthful of some sort of fried vegetable, pointing discreetly across the street at the brightly lit entrance of a club.

"Are you sure?" Ahsoka asked, pushing away what was left of her meal for a service droid to retrieve. "Looks a little… nice for a mob club."

"You expecting a few Hutt slime trails?" Ghes responded, wiping at the corner of his mouth with a napkin as he pushed away his own plate.

Ahsoka shrugged. She remembered a few presentations she'd seen during her time in the Temple before the war, mostly crime scene photos from raids Jedi had conducted on Black Sun cells alongside CSF. None of those places had seemed like anything other than seedy criminal hangouts. Then again, those had always been in the lower levels of Galactic City, and she'd only seen images of most of them after they'd been torn up by a firefight.

"Falleen don't run like that." Ghes continued. "They're the 'classy' kind of criminals; upscale clubs, fancy clothes, gourmet meals, that kind of thing. Buir always used to call them 'lounge lizards'."

"In that case, don't you think we may have overdone it with the disguises?"

It hadn't taken long for Ahsoka to notice that she and Ghes, clad as they were in intentionally downtrodden looking armor, stuck out in even the worst parts of Falleen. Even now, sitting at a table outside a small café, they drew sideways looks from pedestrians, a few of whom she picked out as taking more than a passing interest.

"They definitely know we're here by now."

"Probably." Ghes admitted. "But they don't know who we are. They'll just assume we are what we look like; poor mercenaries."

"I still don't like it." She said. "Walking in there without a good idea of what it is we're walking into…"

"Getting cold feet, cyar'ika?" He joked, propping his elbows on the small table and leaning in close to her. "Remember, you're the one that wanted to do this…"

"No!" She snapped, probably unnecessarily, but she was starting to get on edge. "I'm still good to go, I just don't like our 'plan'."

"What? We just walk in there and ask about doing a little mercenary work for Black Sun." Ghes said, jerking his head over his shoulder at the club "What's not to like?"

"The part where we're not sure who's in there." She pointed out flatly. "Or the layout. And this whole plan sounds like something really clumsy undercover cops would do."

"Except planetary security here is corrupt, so they won't be expecting cops." He countered. "And I pulled the layout from the public records right after we landed."

He pulled a small datapad off his belt and put it down on the table so they could both look at it.

"You sure these are reliable?" Ahsoka asked as she looked over the schematics on the small screen.

"No." Ghes shrugged. "Floor plan for the public part of the club's probably good, but I can pretty much guarantee that more than half of those fire exits are sealed and there are definitely back rooms that aren't on here…"

"But any intel is better than no intel." She sighed wearily.

"That's the spirit." Ghes joked, replacing the datapad on his belt and pulling out a thin, black cylinder. "Now, hold out your hand."

"Why?" She asked while complying with the request

Ghes quickly touched one end of the cylinder to the tip of her outstretched index finger, leaving behind a roughly two centimeter wide disk of what looked like very thin, clear flimsiplast with fine silver lines running across its diameter.

"Stick that to the side of your head." Ghes said before she could ask what the object was, miming the action by touching a spot just above his ear.

Ahsoka did as he'd instructed, finding that the disk that had only slightly clung to her finger adhered itself readily to the side of her montral.

Ghes picked his helmet up off the ground next to him and pulled it on.

"Check one, test, test, test. Can you hear me, cyar'ika?"

It took Ahsoka a moment to realize that Ghes's voice wasn't coming from his helmet's vocoder, but instead sounding directly into her montral.

"An earpiece?" She said, though she wasn't really sure that was the right word for it.

"Pretty much." Ghes confirmed. "It's basically one of the ear beads I have for my buy'ce, just adapted a bit better for your anatomy."

"How long did it take you to figure this out?" She said, smiling a little at the thought of how much effort he must have put into it.

"Not too long." He said dismissively. "Once I had the hardware figured out I just had to borrow a protocol droid to help calibrate it to your hearing."

Ahsoka laughed quietly and shook her head.

"You spoil me, you know that?"

"It really wasn't a big deal." He insisted. "I'm just used to being able to talk privately and that mind reading thing you do isn't very precise as far as conversation goes."

She rolled her eyes. Ghes really overdid it sometimes, mostly when it came to tinkering with bits of gear like this, but still.

"Well, we're not going to find anything out sitting around here." Ghes continued, standing up out of his chair. "Let's go."

Much as Ghes rarely let anything effect the outward calm and confidence he tried to project, Ahsoka could tell when he was tense. She could feel it through their bond in the Force, of course, but he also had nervous habits she'd learned to pick up on. They were little things mainly, tapping his finger against the hilt of his knife, fiddling with the retention strap on his holster, things you'd hardly notice of you weren't looking for them.

But she did something similar, didn't she? Checking and rechecking every item she carried with her, a little last minute reassurance that it was all still there. She did this again as she followed Ghes up and across a footbridge that would take them over the street they'd spotted the club across. Hanging far back on her right hip was the heavy blaster pistol she'd been carrying since Ghes had given it to her before their mission to Onderon. Along the front were three extra power packs for the weapon along with a pair of stun cuffs, mostly just to help sell that they were mercenaries and bounty hunters. Around back was a small med kit, a grapple and some line, and three low-yield mini-detonators. Finally, she had two stun batons, one on each hip, where her hands naturally rested.

The absence of her lightsabers bothered Ahsoka. She missed the feel of the weapons she'd left behind along with her old life hanging on her belt, the weapons she'd built and they had taken from her. It was another regret to add to the long list of things she thankfully didn't have the time to dwell on right now, but, unlike the others, it was one she fully intended to rectify when she got the chance.

Any doubt Ahsoka may have initially about the club's status as a front for organized crime vanished the moment she got a closer look at the two "bouncer's" standing guard in front of the place. Now, never having been one to frequent nightclubs, she wasn't familiar with what to expect a bouncer to look like, but she definitely knew a trained killer when she saw one, and the two men standing on either side of the entrance, a Falleen and a green skinned Trandoshan, certainly fit that category. Everything from their body language, to their barely concealed weapons, to the way they immediately honed in on her and Ghes spoke to a higher level of competence and experience than she expected from hired muscle.

"Can you get a read on that Falleen by the door?" Ghes asked into her "earpiece".

Ahsoka reached out with her senses towards the man, finding a focused and disciplined mind that was unsettlingly familiar to her.

"Yes." She answered softly, trusting Ghes's helmet to pick up her voice. "He feels like a soldier."

"That's because he is." Ghes said with more than a hint of frustration. "Never good when Fallen are on guard duty."

"What happened to them being 'lounge lizards'?" She joked, though Ghes's obvious distress was beginning to make her tense up as well.

"Just because someone wears shimmersilk doesn't mean their blaster won't kill you." Ghes pointed out. "Falleen are feudal, feudal societies have a warrior caste. I've only ever seen them around high ranking Black Sun; Vigos and the like."

"That's good, isn't it?" She asked. "Someone like that will have the info we want."

"Yeah " Ghes agreed. "But Intel said this place was run by some petty underboss, not even planetary level."

"So?" She scoffed. "Wouldn't be the first time Intel got something wrong."

"I don't know…" He said apprehensively. "Just doesn't feel right…"

"Now who's getting cold feet?" Ahsoka scolded. "You're not seriously going to try and scrub the mission over this, are you?"

"No." Ghes admitted with a sigh. "I guess we'll just play this one by ear."

"Business as usual, then?" Ahsoka joked, and she was a little relieved to hear Ghes chuckle despite himself.

There wasn't a line outside the door, which probably should have been another hint that there was something not entirely above board about the place, but it also meant they didn't have to push their way past anyone to get to the door guards.

"What's your business here, Mando?" The Falleen spat, seeming to just flat out ignore Ahsoka. Not entirely surprising, beskar tended to draw people's attention.

"Who says I'm here on business?" Ghes asked good naturedly, wrapping his arms around Ahsoka's shoulders. "Can't a man just take his wife out for a night on the town?"

"You're not on the lisssst." The Trandoshan, a head taller than his Falleen partner, hissed.

"I didn't even give you our names." Ghes said, doing his best to sound offended. "And I don't see no shabla list."

"Got it right here." The Falleen said, pressing the tip of a finger to his smooth scaled temple. "And we don't need to know your names to know you two aren't on it."

"Well then, I guess we're going to have a problem." Ghes growled, taking his arm off Ahsoka and stepping towards the two.

"Trussst me, bucket head," The Trandoshan said, opening it's oversized jacket to reveal a nasty looking blaster carbine Ahsoka had been able to spot the outline of from halfway across the street. "you don't want to try any of that around here."

"I'll take the big one." Ghes said over the com. "Get ready to put the Fallen down on my mark."

Ahsoka rolled her eyes and huffed. It was a wonder Ghes had trouble getting along with her old master considering how his idea of "subtlety" always seemed to involve him punching someone. Picking out the Trandoshan as the likely dimmer of the pair, despite their low cunning they weren't usually very intelligent, she stepped up beside her husband and crossed her arms.

"Come on, you don't remember us?" She said, putting as much Force-imbued suggestion behind her words as she could muster. "We were here last week, you let us in yourself."

She didn't bother with the usual hand-wave gesture, the creature was already plenty distracted by Ghes.

"I… I remember you…" The Trandoshan began in a distant, distracted voice. "You were here lassst week… I let you in…"

"What are you talking about, Sish?" The Falleen said, caught off guard by his partners sudden change in tone. "I've never seen either of them in my life."

"Your boss vouched for us." Ahsoka continued. "He said we could come and go as we please."

"The bossss vouched for them." He repeated, still in a daze. "He sssaid they could come in whenever they want…"

"What's wrong with you…" The Falleen said, his gaze ultimately shifting away from the taller creature and onto Ahsoka.

She saw it in his eyes the moment he recognized what was going on. Unfortunately for the Falleen, Ghes saw it as well and reacted faster, angling his gauntlet up and shooting a small dart into the man's neck.

"What the…!" The Falleen yelled, grabbing at the dart briefly before his eyes glazed over and he collapsed into a heap on the pavement.

"Huh…" The Trandoshan grunted, seeming to come out of his trance for a moment before Ahsoka snapped her fingers to bring his attention back to her.

"Your friend's had a little too much to drink." She said, adding the hand-wave gesture this time. "You need to take him home so he can sleep it off."

"Yessss…" The creature muttered to himself, bending down to pick up his fallen comrade. Within a minute, he had the body slung over his shoulders and was making his way down the walkway away from the club.

"You're getting a lot better at that." Ghes observed as the two disappeared around a distant corner.

"Thank you." Ahsoka said, allowing herself a hint of a self-satisfied smile. "What was in that dart?"

"Some neurotoxin I can't remember the name of." He answered, fiddling with the dart launcher on his gauntlet. "I want to say it comes from a snake?"

"Will it kill him?"

"Not sure." He shrugged. "Never used it in on a Falleen. It'll just make most humanoids comatose for about twelve hours. Seen it cause heart failure a couple times, though."

"Huh…" She said, trying to push any stray concern for the Black Sun thug's health out of her mind. She knew that the career criminal probably wasn't worth her sympathy, but part of her was still relieved she felt it. "Seems like these Falleen aren't as tough as you said."

"We got the drop on that one." Ghes pointed out. "Get into a fire fight with a few of them and you'll see what I mean."

"You make it sound like you have first-hand experience." She guessed.

"A few of buir's clients had trouble with Black Sun." He explained, moving to the club door and scanning the frame for security measures. "Security work's not like soldiering, you don't lose men often, but Black Sun…"

"Oh…" She said, hoping she hadn't stumbled on something sensitive. "I didn't realize…"

"You do the kind of work I did on Coruscant long enough and you'll have a history with everyone." He said, stepping back from the door, satisfied it was clear. "Once you get a taste of what a real war's like… Well, it puts things in perspective. You ready to go?"

"Yeah." Ahsoka answered, griping the stun batons on her belt. "Are we still playing this by ear, or do you have a plan now?"

Ahsoka could feel Ghes smirking under his helmet as he reached for the door control panel.

"You know what? This night is already starting out lousy, I need a drink."

The club was, well, Ahsoka wasn't really sure "club" was the right word. She was starting to understand the "lounge lizard" moniker, because that was really what the place she and Ghes were walking into looked like, a lounge. Most of the space was taken up by sets of low couches arranged around small tables, with a band on a stage up against the back wall playing soft, smooth music, and a small bar area off to one side. Scattered about the large space that she knew made up most of the club sitting in small groups were about a hundred beings; mostly Falleen, but with a few Humans, Twi'leks, Rodians, and other humanoids intermingled.

They didn't linger by the entrance, instead beginning to pick their way through the couches and patrons towards the bar.

"You remember the first bar I took you to?" Ghes asked quietly as they went.

"That special forces bar near the Fleetyards?"

"No," He said. "I'm talking about where we did that intel drop."

"Oh, yeah." She remembered. "Where that Twi'lek groped me and you knocked his teeth in. Why do you ask?"

"I don't know." He shrugged. "I was thinking about it."

"You think something like that's going to happen here?" She joked.

"No," Ghes laughed, glancing around at club patrons who didn't seem to be paying the two of them any mind. "But if it does, I'll let you handle it this time."

Ahsoka laughed along with him. Sometimes it was hard for her to believe that hardly a year had passed since she'd met Ghes. Less than a year since she'd done what was supposed to be unthinkable for a Jedi and gotten romantically involved with him. Less than a year since she'd met the man she was married to. So much had happened to her in a year, so much had changed…

"Did you know?" Ahsoka asked.

"Know what?"

"Did you know what was going to happen between us then?" She continued.

"Of course not." He admitted. "How could I have? We'd only really known each other for, what? A week at that point?"

"When did you know, then?"

"Huh…" He said, stopping for a moment to think now that they'd reached the bar. "I don't think I really knew until you kissed me that night on Umbara, but I'd definitely been falling for you for a while before that."

They choose two stools at the end, away from the few regular patrons seated at the bar. Ghes took of his helmet and placed it down on the bar top next to him, visor facing behind them.

"It was the same for me." Ahsoka continued once they'd sat down. "I must have spent weeks wondering if there was something there before, well… you know."

"Yeah, I know." Ghes said, flashing her that smile that he reserved for her, the one that showed a softness usually hidden behind his harsh features.

That change in Ghes didn't last as long as it normally would have had they been alone or among friends, he was back to "business" quickly, slapping his hand down hard on the bar to get the bartender's attention. Down at the other end of the counter, he clearly wasn't in any rush to acknowledge them, taking his time with the other patrons before leisurely making his way back their way, wiping what appeared to be an already clean glass as he went.

"How can I help you?" The man asked with very thinly veiled disregard.

He was another Falleen, of course, not nearly as physically imposing as the bouncer, but dressed about the same. From what Ahsoka could tell, he wasn't armed, though it was a fair bet that there was at least one blaster somewhere under the bar. What stood out to her was just how young he seemed, hardly any older than her. And from what he could sense of his mind… no, he wasn't any sort of fighter, he was just the bartender.

"Yeah." Ghes answered the man gruffly, making a point not to look directly at him, instead scanning the club like he was looking for someone. "Corellian ale for me, and for my wife…"

"I'll just have a water, thanks." Ahsoka finished. She didn't drink on missions.

"Really?" The bartender asked her, pretending to ignore Ghes as well as anyone could pretend to ignore a fully armored Mandalorian. "Are you sure I can't make you something?"

For a moment, Ahsoka found herself considering it. Sure, she didn't drink on mission, but what could it hurt, really? After all, the Falleen had changed his tone completely, replacing that borderline rude mock civility with what seemed like genuine charm…

And then she realized what he was doing.

Ghes reached across the bar and grabbed the man by his collar, yanking him halfway back across the polished counter to get in his face.

"You'd better turn that stink off, lizard boy," Ghes snarled, taking his other arm and extending the wrist mounted blade from his gauntlet so he was holding it at the man's neck. "before I find the gland that makes it and cut it out of you!"

"Come on now," He pleaded, laughing nervously… "Nobody wants any trouble around here…"

"He's still doing it." Ahsoka recognized, though she guessed it was probably just a fear reflex at this point.

One thing she did know about Falleen that they probably didn't even know themselves was that their pheromones didn't have much effect on Jedi. Otherwise, she'd probably have been tripping over herself to buy a drink, or do whatever else the lizard wanted her to. Then again, Ghes didn't seem to be affected by it much either without needing to be any sort of Force-user, so maybe it was as much a matter of mental discipline as anything.

"I know." Ghes growled, running the flat of his blade along the bartender's neck. "Getting ready to do something about it."

"No!" The man yelled, voice cracking as he lost what composure he had left. "I'll stop, I'll stop, I'll stop!"

"You'd better move away from that panic button while you're at it." Ahsoka added casually. "Unless you want me to take that hand."

"Oh, now you've done it." Ghes said, grinning evilly. "You've gone and pissed her off. If you think I'm bad… well, you should see what she did to the last guy."

The Falleen swallowed audibly, slowly bringing his hands out from behind the bar and placing them on the counter top.

"Just let me go!" He pleaded. "I'll get your drinks. I won't try anything else, just please don't hurt me!"

"Fine." Ghes said after a moment, retracting his blade and releasing the man's collar. "Get moving."

"Nice place." Ahsoka said, watching the bartender work faster than he'd probably thought was possible before tonight. "Two people can just walk in off the street and assault the staff without anyone saying anything."

She'd been more than a little surprised that no one had seemed interested in their conversation, not any of the other patrons, not any security, no one.

"Yeah, that is a little odd…" Ghes agreed, voice trailing off as he considered it. "What's your name, kid?"

"Malic, uh… sir." The bartender answered as he placed their drinks down in front of them.

"So, Malic," Ghes began, pausing to take a swig of his ale before continuing. "would your boss have cared if I'd gutted you right then?"

"Not really," Malic admitted nervously. "But mister… I mean, the Vigo, doesn't like trouble in his club. Normally the bouncers would have stepped in. I don't understand why…"

"We gave them the night off." Ahsoka cut in, smiling mischievously and letting Malic's mind do the rest of the work.

"Oh…" He said, sounding small as his voice caught in his throat.

"Don't worry about them." Ghes reassured him. "All you need to worry about right now is answering our questions."

Now that scared him almost as much as Ghes's knife had, Ahsoka could tell, put that together with him calling his boss "the Vigo" and it was pretty clear that he knew well enough who owned this place and what went on here.

"Relax, Malic." She said as reassuringly as she could without sounding "nice". "Do we look like cops to you?"

"No," He admitted. "But…"

"But nothing." Ghes said sharply. "You're going to tell us what we want to know. There's nothing you can do, that's just what's going to happen here. What's still up in the air is how we get you to tell us."

"All right…" Malic relented, visibly sagging as he realized just how trapped he'd become.

Ahsoka felt bad for the young man. Attempted phenomenal influence aside, he hadn't really done anything to deserve the trouble she and Ghes were making for him, he'd just been unlucky enough to be working today. It helped a little that she knew he was never in any serious danger from them, Ghes wouldn't really mutilate him, it was just a show. She tried not to think too hard about how easy that show was for them both to put on.

"There we go," Ghes said. "How about you start by telling us about your boss, the one who owns this place."

"I just mix drinks for him and his guests." Malic answered quickly, almost like it was an automatic response. "I don't know anything about any of his other business ventures."

"You know he's Black Sun, though, right?" Ahsoka asked, cocking an eyebrow. "I mean, you have to, you called him "the Vigo" before."

"That's new." Malic explained. "He only asked us to start calling him that a few weeks ago. I don't know why."

"I could take a guess…" Ghes grumbled under his breath.

Ahsoka nodded knowingly.

The brief Rep Intel had given them hadn't had much for them to go on outside Obi Wan's uncharacteristically vague report and what likely unreliable information everyone else in the Galaxy had about Mandalore's recent change of government. One thing that had been in there, however, was second hand intel from CSF, Corsec, and a few other law enforcement agencies about apparent power struggles within Black Sun. Rep Intel hadn't considered any of those reports particularly reliable, but from what they were hearing…

"That Falleen at the door tonight was new too, wasn't he?" Ahsoka guessed. "Brought in around the same time?"

"Not just him." Malic said. "There's at least a dozen other's that came in with the new staff."

"New staff?" Ghes asked, confused. "Not just extra security?"

"No," Malic started. "they…"

Beep beep beep.

Ahsoka wasn't sure what the signal meant when she heard it sounding through the "earpiece" Ghes had given her, but she didn't need to know to feel his reaction. They both turned away from the bar towards the back of the club, where a group of three Falleen, two Humans, a Duros, and another Trandoshan were making their way towards the bar in what looked like a rudimentary vee formation.

"Friends of yours?" Ahsoka asked over her shoulder.

Malic didn't answer, instead backing up to the liquor shelf behind the bar, bracing himself against it. He was terrified, wasn't hard to imagine why.

"Well he's not going to be much use." She said to Ghes. "Any idea what we're going to do about this, or is the plan still "improvise"?"

"There's only seven of them." He said dismissively, though she noticed his hand hovering over his sidearm. "I shouldn't even need to put my buy'ce back on."

"There's also three of those Falleen you were worried about before." She pointed out, leaning back against the bar and resting her hands on her own weapons.

"I wasn't worried," He shot back. "More concerned. Besides, they won't start shooting in here."

"They will if you do." She countered. They'd closed half the distance now, with less than fifty meters left before they were on top of them. "We're running out of room, you sure you want to wait for them?"

"Not really anywhere else to go." He said, glancing briefly around at the scattered groups of patrons occupying the couches around the bar area. "This is just about the only place we can do this without anyone else getting caught in the middle."

Ahsoka sighed. Bystanders always did complicate things. Battlefields had been so much simpler.

Whoever these goons were, probably whichever enforcers the Vigo trusted enough to keep around him, they had some idea of what they were doing. They used their vee to trap her and Ghes against the bar, with the Trando on one end, the larger of the two humans on the other. It sent a clear message, if not a subtle one; they wouldn't be going anywhere unless they were allowed to.

"What's your business here, Mando." The Falleen flanked by his two compatriots at the point of the Vee said.

"Why does everyone ask that?" Ghes asked indignantly to no one in particular. "Is it the armor? Does everyone think that because we wear it everywhere, we're always looking for a fight?"

"You assaulted our bartender." The Falleen responded flatly. "And I'm guessing that you two are the reason my men at the door have disappeared."

So he was the leader then, probably not the Vigo, but his chief enforcer, or head of security, or whatever other title the man had probably given himself.

"I don't know anything about any door guards." Ghes shrugged. "And I don't remember assaulting anyone either. Do you cyar'ika?"

"No," Ahsoka affirmed. This is where things got tricky. "We were just having a chat with your man Malic here about what a nice place you have."

She saw the thug's eyes flicker one by one over to where Malic still cowered behind the bar. Hopefully none of what she was sure was about to happen caught him, by mistake or otherwise.

"Enough!" The leader barked angrily. "Identify yourselves and what it is you're doing here before I have my men extract the information from you the hard way!"

Now this Ahsoka was a little more familiar with, being threatened instead of being the one doing the threatening. It may not have been a particularly good change of pace, but at least they were getting somewhere.

"I don't think anyone's asked us that yet." She remarked to Ghes. "Should we tell him?"

"Might as well." Ghes said, standing up off his barstool with an exaggerated grunt. "I'm Ghez Harken, this is my wife…"

"Ashla." Ahsoka said, giving the cover name she'd chosen, one of the moons of Tython, the mythical Jedi homeworld.

"We're what you'd call free-lancers." Ghes continued. "You got problems; delinquent loan payments, business rivals, upstart local politicians, we can deal with them for the right price."

"Bounty hunters." One of the other Falleen spat. "If you think we're just going to let you walk in here…"

"Don't speak out of turn, Valcen." The leader snapped quickly before turning his attention back to them. "You'll have to forgive my man's lack of tact, but I am afraid that we can't allow you to collect on whatever bounty you're hunting here."

"We try to avoid the "bounty hunter" label." Ghes said. "Had a bit of a falling out with the guild a few years back. And we're not looking to collect on anyone today anyway."

"Then tell me why you are here." The Falleen demand again.

"We're looking for work." Ahsoka said. "Have been ever since this stupid chaak'ar got us chased out of Hutt space."

"That wasn't entirely my fault." Ghes insisted defensively enough to make it believable. "You know how temperamental the oversized slugs can be. But then I heard Black Sun had taken some hefty losses and might be in the market for more muscle, so we decided to come to Falleen and have a look around."

The leader just looked at them for a moment, probably muling their story over in his mind. Ghes had made sure that they'd gone over it nearly a dozen times before they'd even left Coruscant. For her sake of course, because, in his words, "she couldn't act to save her life". Wasn't hard to guess where he'd gotten that idea. Ahsoka thought he was worried about nothing though; she made a much more convincing bounty hunter than she did a slave princess.

"So, I take it my door guards' disappearance was your application?" The leader said finally.

"I told you we didn't have anything to do with that." Ghes said, smiling wickedly. "But if you want to take it that way…"

The mouthy one, Valcen, took another step towards them, pulling back his jacket and palming the grip of a heavy blaster pistol holstered under his arm.

"You're not listening to this guy, are you, boss?" He snapped. "They've already killed two of our guys!"

"What would you have me do, then, Valcen?" The leader asked calmly.

"Let me kill them." Valcen said, staring daggers at Ghes. "I always wanted to see if Mandalorians are as tough as they say."

The leader considered for a moment, then nodded his consent.

"Just try not to make a mess," He said. "You know how the Vigo hates that."

Valcen grinned as he drew his blaster and took his time leveling it on Ghes.

"So that's how it's going to be, then." Ghes sighed, taking a step forward and cracking his neck. "I'll take this one, cyar'ika. If you could kindly kill any of them that decide they can't wait their turn."

Ahsoka nodded mutely. She had no intention of staying out of it, though, not when Ghes had a blaster in his face and his helmet was still on the bar. Valcen's blaster was a standard Blastech pattern, nearly identical to the one she had on her hip with the exception of a few mods. But there were a few parts on a blaster you couldn't, or, at least, shouldn't mod. The safety, for instance…

Valcen pulled the trigger, or tried to, anyway. The malicious smile left the thug's face as he took his eyes off Ghes and glanced down at his weapon. It couldn't have taken him more than a second to realize what was wrong, but that second was all Ghes needed. He lunged forward, grabbing the blaster by the barrel with his left and twisting it out of the thug's hand before following immediately with a right cross.

The Falleen was quick though, abandoning the weapon and freeing both hands to redirect the blow and launch a counterstrike that must have been more instinct than anything, because it glanced off the armor protecting Ghes's side. Letting his momentum carry him past Valcen, Ghes swung back around with an elbow that caught the thug high in the cheek, stunning him, but not putting him on the ground like a hit to the jaw would have. But that split second was enough for Ghes to follow up with a left hook that definitely did connect with his jaw, leaving him staggered… but still standing.

The grin returned to the Black Sun enforcer's face, his teeth now stained with blood. Even Ahsoka had to admit it was… disconcerting.

On the offensive now, Valcen threw a quick left uppercut, which Ghes caught on his forearm. The Falleen followed up immediately with a wild right roundhouse, sloppy and badly telegraphed, that somehow connected anyway.

Ahsoka sighed. Ghes was too used to fighting with a helmet on. He forgot to keep his hands up.

Ghes grunted and staggered backwards, catching himself on the bar next to Ahsoka. He spat onto the floor and wiped away the remaining blood with his hand.

"You're a tough one, Mando," Valcen said reaching into his jacket and producing an ornate but brutal looking vibroblade already humming. "I'm going to enjoy peeling your hide."

Ghes sighed and looked side long at Ahsoka, more annoyance in his eyes than anything else. She cocked an eyebrow and tapped her fingers on her stun batons. He shook his head and pushed himself off the bar. Stubborn as always.

Valcen lunged with his blade, looking for the gap in between Ghes's breastplate and the plate protecting his side. Ghes caught him by the wrist mid-thrust and pulled the weapon into his stomach, the tip chittering against the heavy armor plate for half a second before shattering. Grabbing Valcen by the jacket with his other hand, he drove his forehead into the Falleen's nose with a sickening crunch of bone and scaled skin.

"Aaahh!" The thug roared, stumbling back and clutching at his face.

But Ghes wasn't done, he grabbed Valcen by the shoulder, extended the blade from his other gauntlet, and drove it up into the Black Sun enforcer's stomach.

"Chakaar." Ghes growled, spraying bloody spittle over the Falleen's face, frozen in shock. He released his grip on the man and stepped back, allowing the enforcer to fall to the floor, not yet dead, but close to it as blood from the open wound pooled around him.

"Hmm…" The leader grunted, examining the bloody, crumpled heap of his subordinate and Ghes, swaying, but still standing. "Very crude, but effective enough I suppose."

"Thanks." Ghes said, stepping back to the bar, downing the remainder of his ale and wiping his mouth with the side of his hand.

"Anyone else want to try?" Ahsoka asked, eyeing the remaining thugs circled around them. There didn't seem to be any takers. "So, we've made our point then?"

"Oh, you have." The leader assured them. "My master will be very interested in you."

The Falleen glanced down at Valcen's body again. The enforcer was dead by now, but the pool of blood around him continued to widen. A few of the others were almost standing in it.

"Your husband has made quite a mess, however, Miss… Harken, was it?" He continued, addressing Ahsoka directly. "And I suspect you are just as dangerous. I prefer not to take risks when it can be avoided. Take them!"

The remaining five goons drew their weapons almost simultaneously, a mixture of blaster pistols and subcompact carbines leveled with a smooth professionalism Ahsoka hadn't expected. Ghes had his sidearm up an instant later. He fired.

"Ghes!" She yelled, fearing he'd hit a bystander for the split second before she realized; there weren't any. The club patrons were gone. Maybe ushered out while Ghes had been fighting the now dead Valcen?

No time to think about that now, Ahsoka reacted on instinct, throwing the stun baton from her left hip and smashing the Duros square in its nose-less face.

Ghes's fired again and the two goons closest to him returned fire outside of Ahsoka's field of view. She rushed one of the humans, punching him in the throat before he could pull the trigger, and drew her other baton to deal with the Trandoshan now on top of her.

Behind her she heard blaster bolts impact on beskar, Ghes let out a pained grunt and collapsed. Ahsoka swung the baton into the side of the Trandoshan's head, sending the creature stumbling into a table a meter away. She whirled around in time to see muzzle flashes…

...

Author's Notes

Hey, it's been a while, hasn't it? Bet you'd thought I'd abandoned this whole thing. Well, I sure showed you, didn't I?

Seriously though, a lot has happened in the past couple years, most of which hasn't been conducive to my humble authorial efforts. This chapter you've just finished reading has actually, bar a few recent edits, been done for a long time. But, my odd obsession with only releasing chapters in batches over the course of a few weeks has held me back from releasing anything for... well, for too long. Unfortunately, me releasing this now does not mean that I have the next seven chapters ready and waiting. I don't even have the next one, in fact. As of writing this, I have two chapters in a releasable state, the last two representing the events around ROTS/Order 66. In between this chapter and those will be six others; the next chapter which will finish up this excursion, a "filler" chapter that will introduce a pair of minor characters, and (currently) four chapter dedicated to a heavily modified Siege of Mandalore arc.

In a change from my original plans, the story will "end" after Order 66. As you may have guessed from the quotation marks qualifying that statement, this doesn't mean that I am done with Ahsoka and Ghes, or Star Wars in general. Order 66 represents the point at which the original content of Marczak transfers well into a more conventional novel format, with the second have skipping through nearly twenty-five years of time between the end of the Clone Wars and the Battle of Endor. Attempting to change this to do justice to such a broad period of time in a single fan novel would result in an unwieldly behemoth of a story I have no interest in writing. I'm sure there's somebody on here that would, but I am a firm believer that quantity does not equal quality, and a 900,000 word tome holds no appeal to me as a creative. I would much rather cover that time in a series of more modest novellas and supplementary short stories fleshing out my own particular Star Wars "canon" post-AOTC. There are a couple such stories I already have finished or in development that I have yet to release because it would make no chronological sense and anyone reading would be missing context and/or spoiling events of this story I have yet to publish.

This is all to say that I have not abandoned anything and I am not "done" yet. Watch this space, there is still more to come.