The beep of the chronometer woke Echo abruptly from the light doze he'd fallen into. Rubbing at his eyes with the palm of his hand, he sat upright and peered at the chrono. 2230 already? He'd only closed his eyes for a moment. . .

"Yeah, right, trooper," he grunted to himself, getting to his feet. "Clearly, it wasn't only a moment."

After making sure no one had tried to contact the ship while he was dozing, he set to work performing the battery of security checks that Tech had lined up and ready to go. It only took half a minute, and reassured Echo about several things: nothing was close to the ship, no one was close to the ship, nobody had stolen the fuel or tried to tamper with anything in the ship long-distance, and the shields and jamming device were running at one hundred percent.

Echo stretched his arms up and back over his head, listening to the quiet clicks of his metal spine as it bent to accommodate the position of his muscles. No matter how many times he'd heard that sound so far, it never got any less . . . unnatural. Even unnerving, at times.

"Unnerving," he mumbled, with half a smile. Every so often, it occurred to him how much fun Fives would have had, making jokes about his prosthetics. Rex had once said that both Echo and Fives had horrible senses of humor, and Echo respectfully disagreed, because most clones including Rex often employed gallows humor, especially in dire situations. Even Commander Cody had made some casually morbid jokes that appalled General Kenobi and delighted Skywalker.

Echo glanced down at his comm again, double-checking that none of his teammates had tried to call him. They hadn't, and the red alert that would activate should any of their comms be tampered with was also inactive.

Everything was fine, and Echo had nothing to do at the moment. He held back a yawn. His left hip was twinging badly from the atmospheric pressure, and at this point he was half-tempted to just go to bed and let the rest of his squad wander in whenever they eventually made it back.

He decided against it, though, because the chances of something going wrong were high. Maybe once the others came back, he'd point out that he'd already been on guard and it was their turn now, and then he could sleep the rest of the night. Until then, he'd just have to do his best.

In an attempt to keep himself alert, Echo went outside to walk the perimeter of the landing pad. He closed the shuttle door behind him and set off at a brisk pace. After the first round, when his hip was hurting less, he focused on walking without a limp. It wasn't too bad, but it definitely wasn't easy, either. His prosthetic joints weren't always painful, but every once in a while his nerves seemed to decide that they'd had it with all the metal.

Or they decided to misfire and cramp up his remaining muscles. Or they decided to realize that his original limbs were actually missing, and that such injuries were supposed to hurt. Whatever it was, Echo usually ended up needing a strong dose of pain meds just to keep moving properly during these phases.

He hoped that this was just a bit of a flare-up, and that it would clear up with more movement. Echo kept walking, but the ache didn't clear up. In fact, it got worse until, on his third round of the landing pad, he found himself limping along, almost as bad as poor old Ninety-Nine used to.

Huffing, Echo withdrew a hypo of pain meds from his belt pouch and injected it into the side of his neck. He stood there, waiting for it to take effect. When the pain faded a little, he turned to head back towards the shuttle.

He'd just taken a step forward when he caught sight of something. It was hardly there, just a whisper of movement near the lift as someone vanished behind the support pillar, but Echo definitely saw it.

Moving slowly, he ducked behind another pillar and turned on his helmet's thermal imaging.

A figure wavered into existence behind the opposite pillar. Whoever it was stood facing the Havoc Marauder . . . watching it? He must be, because what else would he be doing?

Echo narrowed his eyes, hand drifting to his pistol. The figure stayed motionless for nearly a minute before suddenly taking several steps forward, out of the cover of the pillar.

Slowly, Echo shifted sideways, until he could tilt his head against an edge of the square pillar and observe whoever it was.

The intruder, who was just visible in the ambient light of Coruscant, wore a short, hooded cloak of some kind, and carried at least two knives and a pistol on his right side alone. Echo caught the briefest glimpse of his face as he stared at the Marauder, but the man turned away too quickly for the ARC trooper to make out any features except for a glint of sharp eyes. Other than that, Echo couldn't make out any details.

Maybe he didn't need to. The sheer amount of weaponry the man carried, and the fact that he was watching the shuttle so intently while lurking out of sight, were warning signs enough. Whoever this guy was, whatever his reason for sneaking around, he couldn't mean anything good by it.

The stranger ran a few steps forward, stopped near the Marauder's boarding ramp, and stared at the closed door of the shuttle. He tilted his head as if considering, then crouched and pressed one hand flat against the platform. The movement reminded Echo strongly of Hunter, and he narrowed his eyes. The sergeant sometimes touched the ground when he wanted to know how far away something was – especially something electronic. But surely this guy couldn't have Hunter's abilities . . . could he?

The cloaked figure straightened up, cast a slow look around the landing pad, and then twisted to face the lift that the Bad Batch had taken. He pressed a commlink on his wrist, typing in a long code, and lifted it to his ear. Echo could hear the faint beeping, but whoever was on the other end didn't pick up.

The stranger finally gave up and turned off his comm. Taking a step towards the ship, he reached up, closing a hand around one of the struts on the boarding ramp.

Quietly, Echo drew his pistol and switched it to stun. It was increasingly obvious that this man was no curious passerby, and at this point Echo wanted answers.

He hadn't even started to lift his gun, though, when the intruder suddenly looked up and whisked out of sight, back behind the pillar he'd originally been hiding near.

Surely he hadn't heard Echo . . . had he? Ducking back behind his own pillar, Echo waited, tracking the stranger through thermal imaging. The man was down on one knee, one hand clearly holding a gun. He seemed to be hesitating, head turning first in Echo's direction, then in the direction of the narrow walkway that connected the landing pad to the street. Maybe he'd heard something from that direction.

Then, without warning, the man leaped to his feet and ran for the lift, diving into it even though Echo hadn't fired or so much as aimed at him.

As the creaking metal door closed behind the stranger, Echo jumped up and sprinted across the platform after him. Whatever the reason for the man's abrupt departure, Echo had no intention of letting him leave without answering at least a couple of questions.

The lift started down, the chains it hung from clanking a little as the mechanism turned.

Echo quick-holstered his pistol and snatched the grappling hook attachment from his belt. Still running, he fired the free end into the edge of the landing platform and swung himself easily over the edge. For an instant, as he fell, he thought he heard a couple of voices above him, talking excitedly. They clearly weren't the voices of his teammates, though, so he disregarded them for the moment.

As Echo descended alongside the lift, hand closed on the line to keep his position stable, he considered how to get from mid-air to the lift itself without alerting his quarry. He didn't know how far down the lift went, or where the intruder would be stopping, so Echo went with the first idea that came to him.

He reached down pressed the button on the cable spool at his waist, allowing himself to free-fall for a couple of seconds. When the safety kicked in and jerked him to a halt, Echo was fifteen meters below the still-descending lift, right where he wanted to be.

He swung his weight hard to one side, then the other, using his weight to increase the angle of his trajectory. By the time the lift neared him, he had swung out far enough that he could close his fingers over the chains from which the lift was suspended. He cut through the grappling hook and swung himself up, between two of the four chains and onto the top of the lift, landing noiselessly. Once he was stable, he crouched, shifting a little against the increasing ache in his hip and leg, and settled in to enjoy the ride. He figured he might as well.

Around him, the glow of upper-city Coruscant began to fade into something much dimmer, more sporadic. Every level he passed was marked with a white light, but as the lift traveled farther down, the mostly-clean fixtures were gradually replaced by older, more damaged lights. The passing streets started out fairly busy, but got less occupied the lower they went. Figures shuffled through the alleyways that opened out onto nothingness, and by the time the lift was a hundred levels down, the air was filled with the smell of cold oil, fuel, chemicals. . . It was almost completely silent here, and Echo glanced around, gripping the top of the lift with one hand. Were there any people around?

Maybe not, he realized, noticing the surprising number of damaged and discarded droids. It was probably a dump or plant of some kind. Most of the droids he saw were common ones, like butler or maintenance droids, but there were a few policebots scattered here and there.

Five levels after that, the lift slowed abruptly, and Echo peered down to study the platform below him. This must be the end of the line, as far as this lift was concerned.

Satisfied that the stranger would not be escaping him, Echo slid quietly over the edge of the lift, hanging from it by one hand as he waited.

With a jerking thud and the clank of heavy chains, the lift ground to a halt, and Echo dropped to the duracrete, drawing his pistol again.

The door opened with a loud squeak, but the stranger did not emerge.

Frowning, Echo took a silent step forward. There was no way this intruder had escaped the lift, not without Echo noticing. Surely, he would have heard the door open if the stranger had tried to leave. He flicked on his thermal imaging again and smirked, noticing the motionless figure who stood facing the door. Whoever the man was, he must have realized he was being followed . . . and now he was in there with his gun, waiting for Echo to show himself.

Well, Echo could wait, too – at least for a while. He glanced around to ensure there was nobody nearby; for the moment, it looked safe enough. But he couldn't help realizing that he was in the middle of nowhere, exposed on all sides, and would probably look like a convenient target for anyone who figured on committing a casual bit of murder or robbery. The fact that he had a gun wouldn't slow down snipers, though. He'd have to be careful.

"I know you're in there," he said, keeping his voice down. "Why don't you come on out so we can do this the easy way?"

There was no answer.

"I don't need to see you to shoot you," Echo said, angling his gun to point at the outer edge of the sturdy lift. "Now – get out of there before I decide to get some target practice."

The figure's right hand dropped towards his waist, and Echo was about to point out that he had room to dodge deflected lasers, when the chains on the top of the lift rattled slightly, and the mechanism started to turn again. Someone up top wanted to use the lift and was trying to recall it. Surely the stranger would move now –

But he didn't. The lift was a meter from the ground, and Echo was just about to jump and grab it, when the door burst open and the black-clothed figure dove out. He landed in a somersault and sprang instantly to his feet, darting down the alleyway towards a large building.

Cursing under his breath at falling for such an obvious trick, Echo rushed after the stranger. His left knee almost buckled, and he willed it to cooperate – he couldn't afford it giving out on him, not right now. Leaning a little to keep weight off his left leg, he increased his speed, eyes fixed on the sprinting figure ahead of him.

The man dodged into another alleyway, and Echo switched visor mode again, tracking his quarry's movements as he flattened himself against one wall, probably intending to double back.

He wouldn't get to, though. Echo rushed past the entrance to the alleyway and ran a couple more meters before stopping. He waited, readying himself for a leap. Sure enough, the figure slipped out again, and Echo jumped him.

Whoever it was let out a startled gasp. A solid punch landed against Echo's collarbone – or would have, if he hadn't kept his armor on. Smirking at the resultant curse from his quarry, Echo grabbed at him, but the guy was like a Mon Cala eel. He twisted out of Echo's one-handed grip and was off again like a shot, this time towards a long, low building that had only one visible entrance.

Echo allowed himself to slow down, just a little. No doubt, this guy would try to run out the opposite side of the building once he was inside, but it was another hundred meters to the building, and there were no streets leading off this one. And Echo, for all the grief his prosthetics sometimes gave him, had a major advantage over most normal people, now. When he needed to, he could force the servos and joints in his artificial legs to put on bursts of inhuman speed.

He waited a moment, keeping to a slow run to conserve his energy. When his quarry was ten meters from the warehouse door, and had just cast a look back and seen how far behind him Echo was, the ARC trooper sprinted forward with every ounce of speed he could manage, ignoring the increased pinching in his hip.

The stranger reacted instantly, throwing himself through the now-open door, but Echo had already caught up. As his quarry darted aside, reaching for something on his belt, Echo grabbed his wrist and twisted.

The pistol fell to the duracrete with a dull thud, and Echo jerked the man around and shoved him back. The stranger fetched up hard against the wall, the breath forced from his lungs, and Echo held him there with his scomp arm across his chest.

"I've had enough running around," he said, and jammed his pistol beneath the man's chin. Despite this, the man kept his head down as Echo said, "Now, drop your knives."

Two metallic clangs sounded as the prisoner obliged. The hood of his cloak fell across his eyes, hiding most of his face from sight, but Echo wasn't too interested in moving either his gun-hand or his scomp link.

"I have some questions for you," he said. "Who are you, and why were you so interested in that shuttle?"

"Funny," replied his prisoner, and his voice was calm, if a little breathless. "I was wondering the same thing about you."

"I'm asking the questions here," Echo retorted. "What did you want with that shuttle?"

"Nothing."

"Don't lie to me," snapped Echo, shoving the gun harder into the side of the intruder's neck.

His prisoner didn't even flinch. "I didn't want the shuttle," he insisted. "And what's your deal in all this, you trying to steal it or something?" He huffed, almost as if in amusement. "By all means, feel free to try."

"Trying to steal it?" repeated Echo, flabbergasted. "Wait – what do you mean, feel free to try?"

His prisoner shifted, tilting his head away from the gun. "I just mean, if you manage to even start stealing it, you won't get very far."

"How do you know that?" Echo asked suspiciously. "Who are you, anyway?"

". . . good question . . ."

Losing patience, Echo shoved the prisoner back again and used his pistol to flick the man's hood away from his face. Instead of jerking aside, the man simply raised an eyebrow and said, "Nice to meet you, too."

Echo narrowed his eyes behind his helmet. His prisoner had tan skin and yellow-gold tattoos – two on his forehead and one that traveled from one cheekbone to the other across the bridge of his nose. Nothing about his appearance gave Echo any clues about his identity, except that he didn't recognize the tattoos as belonging to any notorious gangs on Coruscant.

He decided to try a different tactic than before. "If you didn't want anything with the shuttle," Echo said, "then why did you run when you saw me?"

"Are you part of the Twisted Star gang?" asked the stranger.

". . . what?" Echo demanded. "No."

"Then I wasn't running from you." The man glanced over Echo's shoulder and towards the warehouse door. "Listen, I'm in relatively imminent danger at this point, and if you hang around much longer you're also going to be in danger."

"What's the Twisted Star?" asked Echo sharply. It sounded like a gang name, and if there was a gang hanging around the landing pad, he needed to inform his squad.

"A group of real losers," said his prisoner. "Look – I don't know what your game is, but if those guys somehow managed to track me to the landing pad, then they'll probably track me down here. Let's just part ways as enemies and leave it at that so we can both stay alive."

He started to straighten, and Echo shoved him back again, then hastily pressed the comm button on the side of his helmet. "Not so fast," he told the man. "Maybe you're part of this Twisted Star group."

"Oh, for the love of –" The prisoner sighed. "I'm not part of it, I'm one of their sworn enemies. Happy now?"

For some reason, Echo believed him. "Not quite happy," he said, still waiting for one of his squad mates to answer his comm. "So, you're an enemy of this gang. And your reason for being up on that landing pad is. . .?"

The man narrowed his eyes at him and said, "Who are you, anyway?"

Echo didn't answer, partly because he had no reason to, and partly because none of his teammates had picked up. As a matter of fact, his comm was now blinking rapidly, which meant his teammates were definitely out of range.

For just a moment, Echo hesitated. He could take his prisoner at his word and let him go, or he could take him back to the shuttle with him and lock him up, or he could stun him and leave him here. . . of course, if the stranger was telling the truth about having a gang after him, Echo wasn't inclined to stun him and leave him to be captured.

"You're coming with me," he decided, and jerked his head to one side to gesture him forward. "But first, hands behind your back."

The man's gaze flitted over Echo's shoulder again. He seemed nervous, not laid back like before. "Uh, yeah," he said. "How 'bout – no."

Snapping one hand up, he grabbed Echo's wrist and forced the gun away from his neck, twisting Echo's arm hard. The pistol clattered to the ground. Echo stepped back, regained his balance, and drove his scomp link at his opponent's side.

Before he could even get close, the tattooed man twisted and caught Echo's scomp link and prosthetic elbow in either hand.

Echo was already preparing a new argument, in the form of a closed fist, but then the man stiffened, eyes unfocusing as his fingers spasmed on Echo's metal arm. He jerked back, wavering and breathing hard as if he'd just been shocked.

At the same moment, there was a scuffle and the sound of running footsteps behind Echo, and he spun just in time to see several figures rush into the room. The man who led the group wore a grey helmet, which had the insignia of a twisted star on the front.