Hunter stood at the edge of a metal-boarded street, staring down through levels of slow, heavy traffic and trying to figure out what to do next.

Behind him, Crosshair asked a question that Hunter didn't catch, as the sergeant was too focused on the area in front of him. Tech murmured something in reply, and Crosshair gave a disbelieving scoff. "What do you mean, he lost the trail?"

"I mean exactly what I said," Tech retorted.

The sniper came up beside Hunter, looked briefly at the way the road cut off, and at the layers upon layers of air traffic, and said, "Hm. That's a problem."

"You think?" Shaking his head, Hunter turned away. In a city like this, there was no way he could just guess where the trail might pick up again. Who knew how far or how deep the gangsters had flown, taking Echo with them. . .

"Hey, Sarge?" Wrecker shifted, a heavy frown on his face. "What do we do now?"

The sergeant didn't have an answer – not yet, at least. He intended to find one, though, and soon. "Tech," he said, turning to the younger commando. "Can you give us anything at all?"

"Nothing that will necessarily help us." Tech adjusted his goggles, and then adjusted them again. "There are a good many gangs on Coruscant. In this sector alone, there are at least five that are known for transactions involving sentients, and three of those five run fighting rings. . . Hm. I cannot imagine they simply happened to catch sight of Echo, thought that he would do well in a fighting ring, and then proceeded to capture him."

"Well, he would do well in a fighting ring," said Wrecker. "But yeah – I guess, seein' him, they wouldn't have a reason to think he could stand up to much."

"Not only that," said Tech. "But it would be odd if they just happened to be near the landing pad, in enough numbers to capture him. Perhaps Echo saw something, and they caught him because he was a witness."

"Maybe," agreed the sergeant. He wasn't sure what to do, but at this point he figured standing around wasn't going to do Echo any favors. With a final look down at the busy airway, he said, "Let's get back to the ship."

Crosshair threw a toothpick over the edge of the road and watched as it disappeared into darkness, and Hunter snorted. Probably, somewhere far down, a random sentient was about to get hit on the head with a bit of wood.

"The other option," said Tech, "is that they could have attempted to capture Echo for his prosthetics, and then learned from experience that he can more than hold his own against multiple combatants – but even then, my previous points stand."

"Did you find any gangs who openly deal in prosthetics?" asked Hunter.

Tech quirked his mouth, shaking his head. "I was hoping to," he said, putting the datapad away. "It would have made our task much easier. Unfortunately, my initial searches did not give me any results."

Hunter led the way back towards the lift. "We'll use the Marauder's scanners," he said. "We might at least trace Echo's comm that way. . ."

"That is highly unlikely," Tech told him, walking quickly in order to keep up with Hunter. "If he has been captured, he would not have been allowed to keep his commlink."

"I know," admitted Hunter. "But we have to try something."

"True."

"Hey, I have an idea!" Wrecker elbowed Hunter encouragingly and shoved him into Crosshair, who shoved the sergeant back as if it were his fault. "We'll tell Quinlan about it and he can track Echo down!"

"He could, maybe," said Hunter, glancing at his chrono. "He'd have to have a trail to follow . . . unless you can use the Force to pinpoint Echo's location. But he's already half an hour late. It's two-thirty."

"Of course he's late," said Crosshair, rolling his eyes in a longsuffering manner. "I'll call him again."

And he did call, several times over the ten minutes it took them to return to the lift, but the Jedi Shadow never picked up. Hunter was beginning to suspect that something was wrong. . . well, more wrong than it already had been.

Five minutes after that, when the team had returned to the Havoc Marauder and tried contacting Quinlan through the shuttle's transmitter, and there was still no response, an idea that had been slowly piecing itself together in Hunter's head made him turn to the rest of his squad.

"Tech," he said slowly. "Echo's first transmission came from the landing pad."

"Correct."

"So," said Hunter. "What if that means Quinlan was already here at the time, and Echo was trying to let us know, and something happened to both of them?"

The other three considered.

"The odds of you being right are . . . fairly good," said Tech.

Hunter raised an eyebrow. "That's not good."

His squad mates exchanged looks again, and finally Crosshair said, "Assuming Hunter's right, we're in trouble."

"Uh, yeah!" Wrecker pulled his helmet off and threw it into the hall. "Now how're we gonna find Echo?"

"Well," said Tech. He opened his mouth, closed it again, and then sat in one of the passenger seats, fidgeting with his datapad. "We still have an option."

"Yeah?" said Hunter.

"Yes. We will simply have to use the process of elimination."

"Goody," said Crosshair, straightening. "I'll get my rifle."

Hunter rolled his eyes, and Tech blinked. "That is not what I meant," he announced, and turned back to his datapad.

For half an hour, Tech worked at the computer station, cross-referencing and researching. The others kept busy as well, with Crosshair and Hunter scouring the holonet for information on Coruscant gangs near the Senate district while Wrecker worked at cleaning up the cargo hold. He had a habit of cleaning and organizing only when he was worried about something. Hunter practically heard the comment Echo would have made, had he been there and had Hunter spoken his thoughts out loud. Echo would have pointed out that it was really obvious Wrecker didn't worry often.

As the chrono changed to three-fifteen, Tech shifted position abruptly, leaning back in his chair as he pushed his goggles up and rubbed at the bridge of his nose. "Hunter, there are thousands of these reports and sightings. I do not believe we have time to sort through or even categorize all this information – or, at least, Echo will not have time to wait for us to sort it out."

"Yeah." Crosshair shut off the team datapad, tossed it to the nearest chair, and got up from the floor. "We need a different approach."

"Any ideas?" said Hunter.

"I got one!" Wrecker replied, appearing from the hallway. "The Jedi. We could tell 'em that Quinlan's missing, and they'd start a search, right?"

He trailed off when Tech shook his head. "We could certainly attempt it," he said, his tone and expression dubious. "But Quinlan is a Shadow, and it is likely that he is not keeping in contact with the rest of the Jedi Order – and that they will not attempt a search for him. Their doing so could destroy his mission cover."

"Right," said Hunter. "And we don't even know he's missing. But we'll tell them if we can't think of anyone else."

There was a long silence as each of them tried to come up with more ideas. Hunter didn't know any of Quinlan's underworld contacts, and –

Without warning, Wrecker straightened and smacked a hand emphatically down on the control consol's surface. "Commander Fox!" he shouted. "Quinlan works with him, doesn't he? Fox'll know for sure which gang he was after, right?"

"Good idea, Wrecker." Hunter sat upright and reached for the comm. "Let me contact him right now. . . Uh – Hey, Tech? You got the CG's code?"

"Of course I have the CG's code." Tech pulled something up on his datapad, which he then passed to Hunter.

The sergeant hastily entered the comm code into the ship comm, hit transmit, and then he waited – and waited . . . and waited . . .

Finally, there was a click, and a tired but alert voice said, "CG headquarters. This is Warden. State your ID and business, trooper."

"Sergeant Hunter, Clone Force Ninety-Nine," said Hunter. "We need to get in touch with Commander Fox."

"Yeah, you and everyone else in the district," said Warden. "But at three-twenty in the morning? Really?"

He sounded distracted, and the commandos heard him pull away from his comm to issue orders to some squad or other. A few seconds passed before he spoke to them again. "Look," he said. "The commander's occupied right now. I can assist you, or you can leave your code and hope he gets to call back some time in the next four days. He's been swamped with 'urgent' calls and –"

"We're looking for Quinlan Vos," said Hunter.

"I haven't heard from him in a few days," said Warden. "Sorry. Anything else?"

The Bad Batch's sergeant cleared his throat and tried again. "He was supposed to meet us here well over an hour ago, but –"

"Yeah?" Warden hummed thoughtfully. "An hour or two isn't too bad a delay when it comes to him. I recommend you find yourself a landing pad and wait for him to find you."

"We're already at a landing pad," said Hunter. "And we think one of our teammates was captured, along with him."

"Well . . . that's definitely not an unreasonable concern." Warden sighed. "But I don't have much intel on him, he really works with Fox and the commanders –"

Hunter exchanged a look with Tech, who only shrugged. Clearly, this wasn't going to work as well as they'd hoped.

"Okay," said Warden. "I just pulled up Quinlan's file and it looks like he's working in the Senate district right now; or at least, that's what the last report from Commander Fox says, but I don't have access to further details."

Hunter opened his mouth, intending to ask Warden to get one of the other commanders if Fox wasn't available, but then a shrill alarm sounded on the other end of the comm. Warden started snapping orders, not even bothering to cut his connection to the Bad Batch as he shouted, "Kilo, Steele, security breach in Senate sector D twenty-five, sublevel three! Brick, notify Commander Thorn immediately. Steele, is your squad close enough to get men on the ground? . . . Right, calling it in –"

His voice cut off, and the comm light blinked off. Apparently, Warden had realized he'd left the comm channel open.

"Huh," said Wrecker. "I guess the Coruscant Guard are kinda busy."

"Of course they are," said Tech. "Rather like our squad, they seem to be permanently busy. And we would not be bothering them at all if we did not need their help to find Echo."

"We could fly to their headquarters," said Hunter. "But given the time of day and the security requirements, we'd just get stuck in a holding pattern, potentially for hours."

"Right." Crosshair folded his arms. "Guess we'll try calling the CG again in a couple minutes, then?"

Hunter nodded, because he didn't have another option right now. If he did, he couldn't see it. "All right," he said. "In the meantime, let's keep looking for intel on our own."

Echo sat against the cell wall, staring deliberately at the floor. Counting the cracks in the duracrete slab in the center of the floor gave him something to do and helped keep his attention off of the tiny room, and the aching pain in his joints, at least a little. He kept his face expressionless, and held his hand still when it tried to spasm.

The chilly temperature was harder to ignore. Echo had already been cold when he got put in here, and he was getting colder by the minute. Focusing his attention on something else seemed to help him keep from outright shivering, which was good. Maybe it wasn't worth the effort, but he just didn't want to give the camera the satisfaction.

Eventually, the cracks in the floor started to swim in his vision, and Echo transferred his attention to Vos.

His cellmate was lying on his back with his knees bent, eyes closed. Despite that, he seemed to know the instant Echo looked at him, because he said, "How you holding up, Domino?"

"I'm alive," Echo said grumpily. "What do you expect?"

"Dunno," said the Kiffar. "Maybe I'm just trying to make conversation."

There was a pause.

Then Vos spoke again. "The Batch didn't name you, did they?"

Echo sighed. "No, they did not."

"Okay, so you probably aren't named 'Cyborg', then."

"No, I'm not named Cyborg," said Echo.

For reasons unknown, the Kiffar was determined to guess his name. Maybe it was his way of staving off boredom, but his guesses were dreadful.

Echo was still smarting over the fact that Vos had suggested his name might be Sunny. Or Sunshine. Or Grim, of all things.

The Kiffar sat up. "Look, there are literally millions of potential names. How about a hint?"

". . . Fine," said Echo, folding his arms. "Here's a hint: I got my name, from my original squad mates, before any of this happened to me."

"Right," said Vos, thoughtfully.

"Right," scoffed Echo, and leaned back against the wall.

Vos didn't get a chance to guess again, because the door at the end of the hallway opened loudly, and several pairs of boots shuffled and stomped towards the cell.

The Kiffar jumped to his feet and helped Echo up quickly, both of them stepping to the back of the cell as Palabar and his goons stopped in front of the door.

The Quarren stared at both of them with his pale blue eyes, then pointed at Echo and gestured. "We have a few questions to ask," he said, slowly lowering his long-fingered hand to his side. "Come with us quietly, and you will not be injured."

"You mean I won't be more injured," scoffed Echo, but he stepped forward all the same. After all, getting outside the cell was a step closer to freedom, no matter how closely watched he would be.

"Just step outside," said Palabar, and gestured him a few feet away from the cell while the other thugs pointed weapons at Vos. "I'm sure you will be glad to know that you'll be out of here soon. I already found a potential buyer for you."

"Lucky me," said Echo, rolling his eyes. He tried not to resist when the Trandoshan came up behind him and clamped both claws on his shoulders, holding him still. When one of the Weequay moved closer, a datapad in one hand, Echo tried to distract himself from his surroundings by thinking about the future. "Just me, or did you find a buyer for the Kiffar, too?"

Palabar wasn't interested. "We always have buyers for Kiffar," he said, either ignoring or not seeing the surprised expression Vos pulled.

Echo breathed carefully while the Weequay stared at his scomp link and typed into his datapad. If he and Vos were sold to the same fighting ring, then at least they'd have a chance. A fighting chance. Heh. Maybe the Kiffar would be of good use there. . . he seemed to have a fair amount of knowledge in hand-to-hand combat. Probably knives, too.

"Are you sure?" said Palabar, coming closer, and Echo jerked out of his thoughts to realize he'd missed part of the conversation.

"It's not standard-issue," the Weequay answered. "Looks like a custom job."

"Oh?" The Quarren turned, narrowing his eyes to slits. "Where did you get these prosthetics, hm?"

"Military surplus," said Echo, rolling his eyes. Vos, who was watching through the window, smirked, but he also looked worried.

"Military surplus," mused Palabar, apparently missing the sarcasm. "But of which planet? Which civilization? This is unusual work."

When Echo didn't answer, the Quarren's gaze darkened. "Very well, we do not need you to tell us," he said. "Those who make custom prosthetics usually leave their special codes or marks."

The Weequay grabbed his scomp and twisted Echo's arm to one side, and a Rodian grabbed at the sleeve of his blacks and tried to push it up past his elbow. Echo jerked free and rammed the scomp into the Weequay's stomach. As the alien folded over with a groan, two more people rushed in to grab Echo, and a large clawed hand clapped over his entire face, half-suffocating him while someone pinioned his arms to his sides.

Dark, cold, immobilized – Echo panicked.

He didn't know what happened, he couldn't trace it, but the next thing he was aware of was when he opened his eyes. He was halfway down the hall, stumbling and tripping due to his reluctantly-moving prosthetics.

When he looked over his shoulder there were enemies on the floor, injured. Near the cell. Vos was yelling his name – his false name. He probably wanted Echo to come back, but he couldn't.

He looked back anyway. Vos was out of the cell, being held in place by the Trandoshan and a couple others. For some reason, Echo slowed.

"Domino!" the Kiffar shouted, catching his gaze. The Trandoshan put a forearm around his throat, and his voice cut off momentarily. But then he jerked forward, his voice coming back. "Domino, run! RUN!"

Snapping back to awareness, Echo ran.

He made it to the door and jerked on it, but it wouldn't open. There was a port for a scomp link – he slammed his right arm forward, plugged in, accessed the database, unlocked the doors.

Palabar was yelling, several of his men rushing towards Echo far faster than he could even hope to move. He fumbled at the old-fashioned door with modern locks, jerked it open, and rushed out into the hallway.

He kept running, limping badly now as the pain in his left hip increased to an outright burn. There was another door – he knew where it lead, somewhere towards the landing pad outside the gang's headquarters.

Echo slapped the controls and almost fell through the door.

Instantly, he was being grabbed from all directions, shoved forward and back, cuffed. Someone dealt him a ringing blow to the side of the head that knocked him sideways, and Echo gasped, slumping in his captors' hold.

Time slipped away for a bit, and when it returned he was back in the cell hallway, and the escape attempt had done nothing but make his captors angry. Vos was nowhere to be seen.

It took Echo a moment to realize that he was not in a cell. He was, instead, standing upright against a pillar, strapped so tightly to it that he couldn't move anything except his head, and Palabar was standing in front of him.

One of the Quarren's eyes was swollen closed, and there was a bloody gash down the side of his face.

"I hoped to sell you without injuring you," said Palabar, his beaklike mouth twitching in what could only be a smile. "But I would have needed to do this in any case."

"Do what?" gasped Echo.

"And do not put up too much of a fight," said Palabar, gesturing. "Or else –"

The yellow-skinned Trandoshan appeared around the side of the pillar, shoved Vos back against the cell wall, and chained him to the door. Then the big alien drew a knife and swung it at the wall just above the Kiffar's right hand.

Vos and Echo both stared at the blade, sunk an inch deep into the durasteel. Then they stared at each other. Echo was caught between emotions, his body warring between anger and fear.

"I thought you couldn't sell maimed prisoners," said Vos, sounding remarkably calm about the whole thing.

"I won't maim you," promised Palabar. "But I will have no trouble leaving you with a few permanent scars if you or Domino fail to cooperate."

Then a medical droid approached, and Palabar turned to stare at Echo, his one good eye gleaming with malice. "I do not believe our guest needs that prosthetic arm of his," he announced, and stepped back.

The fear won out.