Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The star destroyer was still impressive, even stripped of her engines and suspended between the huge cranes on the scrapping docks. Black carbon scarred her durasteel belly plates, and the wound that had ended her gaped just behind her prow. Standing in the shadow of her massive belly, Cal Kestis wondered if he had known her when she was still in service. Her name and numbers were gone, sandblasted from her hull. Whatever she had been called no longer mattered, since the Bracca shipbreaking yards were the last stop for forgotten junk.

“Ready kid?” Prauf asked, interrupting Cal’s thoughts. The big Abednedo was dripping wet and he carried a stasis crate full of tools and harnesses.

“Yeah,” replied Cal. “Gonna be a long day.”

“Why did we agree to do this again?”

Cal shrugged. “You don’t see many of these old Venator class ships anymore.” Prauf looked at him suspiciously.

“I think you have a death wish. I used to work on these things when I was still an engineer. The ordnance gets more unstable as it ages. That’s why they pay triple time to scrap it. It’s more likely to blow up in your face than go quietly into the sunset.”

Cal grinned at Prauf. “I’ll make sure you’re standing in front of me then.”

Prauf laughed. “Kid, if this thing goes, it won’t matter what’s in front of you.”

Cal and Prauf ascended the gangway that had been built to access the old ship’s hangar, the easiest point of entry. The ship had already been stripped back to the wiring, and electricians worked to pull the thousands of kilometers of wiring from inside bulkheads, to be melted down and remade into components for the new Imperial ships. None of them looked at Cal or Prauf as they passed through.

They walked deeper into the ship, following the hand-lettered signs to the munitions pits. Other scrappers had left notes warning of hazards. One door was hastily welded shut and bore a skull and crossbones in dripping red paint.

“What do you think happened there?” Cal asked Prauf. Prauf glanced at the door.

“That’s a reactor hall. Whatever it was, someone probably had a bad day. This way.”

Prauf turned off down a narrow gangway marked by an array of brightly colored warning notices. The passage ended abruptly at a sealed blast door. Cal keyed the comm to summon the job foreman. Brisk footsteps clanked on the decking, and a guild droid with a discus shaped head appeared.

“Names and numbers?” it asked briskly. Cal and Prauf presented their identification cards, and the droid scanned them into its datapad. When their IDs were accepted, the droid handed Cal the datapad, which had the standard contract already open on the screen.

“Sign here,” the droid said. Cal skimmed the disclaimer and signed his name at the bottom. Prauf signed next to him.

The document was accepted and the screen read out the schematics for the ordnance he and Prauf would be salvaging. Cal scrolled through, even though he had spent the past several days reviewing the ship’s particular configuration.

“All fusion materials have been removed,” the foreman said. “You will have to take the torpedo cores out in a stasis crate. The ordnance pit was badly damaged during this ship’s last action. There is a temporary access hole to the proton torpedo bays.” It turned stiffly and cocked its head at Prauf. “The human will fit. You will not.”

Cal exchanged a glance with Prauf.

“I understand,” Prauf said. He clapped Cal on the shoulder. “I think I have some engine grease in the toolkit. We can grease Kestis up and get him through that hatch, and all I have to do is haul the crate out. Easy enough.”

“I do not understand,” the droid replied, cranking its dented head to look at Prauf, then Cal.

“Right, he’s joking about the grease,” Cal said. “He means we can take care of it.”

“Understood,” the droid replied in its flat, metallic voice. “Good luck, and ensure that you comply with all safety standards and regulations.”

Cal tapped his ID to the lock on the blast door. It ground open with a shriek and closed with a shudder and rain of sparks, leaving them alone in the munitions bays.

“You were joking about the grease, right?” he asked Prauf. Prauf looked thoughtful.

“Maybe. Depends on the size of that access hatch.”

Cal and Prauf stepped through the door and out onto the gantry above the munitions pits. The damage here was as bad as the foreman had told them. The pit access stairs had been sheared away, and without them Cal would have to have Prauf lower him down with a rope and harness through a ragged hatch sliced in the deck. Broken computer screens glinted darkly along the bulkheads. Absently, Cal brushed his fingers over one of the consoles.

The monitors suddenly glowed with readouts, and he stood next to a young woman with tightly braided hair and a smart uniform as she completed her morning checklist. She was drinking coffee, and Cal could smell it when she sat her mug on the console. He felt the heat of the mug on his hand.

He yanked his hand away, frantically slamming shut the barriers in his mind that had protected him for the past four years. Cal thought of the crew of the Albedo Brave, the Venator- class ship where he had trained with Master Tapal. He had often gone to watch them work, and he still remembered all of their names. He pushed the memory away. The past would easily overwhelm him, if he let it.

“Cal? You okay?” Prauf’s voice drew him back to the present and his friend gave him a look of concern. Cal grinned at him and hoped it hid his sudden shakiness.

“Just getting a feel for the place,” he said.

“What it lacks in comfort, it makes up for in triple wages,” Prauf said.

“That’s about all it has going for it.”

Prauf looked around, the greenish worklights casting ghostly shadows across his long face.

“She was a beauty once,” he said softly. “Something we could have been proud of, you know?” Cal patted him on the shoulder.

“I know. Doesn’t seem right scrap her for the Empire,” he said. It bothered him sometimes, knowing that his work on Bracca helped build the war machine that had forced him into hiding. Cal quickly shut down that line of thought. It only led him to the dark tangle of grief and guilt that he had worked so hard to lock away, when he asked himself if his life had been worth Jaro Tapal’s. He knew the answer.

“Can’t do much about it. Let’s get to work. Maybe we can get out of here in time to enjoy spending some of those credits.” Prauf’s voice broke into his thoughts and Cal was grateful for the interruption.

“Foreman wasn’t joking about the access hatch,” Prauf said as he and Cal looked down into the bomb bay. Cal’s entry point was little more than a hole in the deck with a short ladder hanging down into the torpedo bay. When the ship was still in service, this would have been an alternate escape hatch, not an entry to the munitions hall. The passage was too narrow for Prauf. Cal wasn’t claustrophobic, but the tight squeeze did give him pause.

“If something happens, you’ll have to haul me out,” Cal said. Prauf nodded.

“Yeah. You know I've got you,” he said. Cal had worked with Prauf for a long time, and Prauf was the only person he trusted on the other end of his safety line.

Cal unclipped the flashlight from its place on his harness and shined its bright light down into the torpedo bay. The massive proton torpedoes sat quietly in their racks, and Cal’s light reflected off of their slick black casings.

“What do you think?” Prauf asked him. Cal thought of his nearly-empty cupboard, and the three freeze-dried meals that he had to portion out until payday. He also thought of the promotions that came for riggers who took on particularly dangerous jobs. He grinned at Prauf.

“I got this,” he said, clapping Prauf’s shoulder. “Rig me up?”

Prauf unloaded the stasis crate, carefully laying out the harnesses and ropes used to keep the riggers as safe as possible as they climbed around the massive ships. Cal didn’t mind climbing without a harness, and sometimes it was necessary, but he knew that Prauf felt better when he used the safety ropes.

He stepped into his harness and cinched it snug around his hips and thighs. Prauf had already looped two lines around a broken stanchion and tied them off. He clipped both to Cal’s harness and Cal double-checked the carabiners, lightly touching each one to ensure they were locked. It was an old habit, even though he trusted Prauf entirely.

Cal thumbed the switch on the comm on his wrist. He could shout to Prauf if he needed to, but it was easier to hear over the comm.

“Comm check,” he called to Prauf.

“Roger that,” Prauf replied. “I hear you loud and clear.”

Cal stood at the edge of the access hatch.

“Ready,” he told Prauf. He lowered himself into the access hatch and tested the first rung on the temporary ladder. It felt solid under his boot. Prauf looked down at him.

“See you soon,” Cal said, and let go of the ladder so that he swung free over the pit. Prauf slowly paid out the line, smoothly lowering him to the deck. When his boots touched the deck, Cal stood under the hatch and shined his flashlight up at Prauf.

“You good?” Prauf’s voice crackled in his ear.

“Yeah. You can send that stasis crate down,” Cal said. He unclipped himself from the lines so that Prauf could send him the crate. It would be slow work, disarming and removing torpedoes a crateful at a time. Prauf reeled the line back up, and Cal explored the munitions hold while he waited for his supplies to come down.

There was not much left to remove, since most of the torpedoes had been used in the ship’s final action. Of her original complement of sixteen torpedoes, less than half remained. They were stowed neatly in their racks, kept secure by durasteel mesh cages. Debris scattered the deck, and Cal’s boots stirred blown-out insulation and wiring as he explored the pit.

He located the breaker panel and popped it open. He knew the connections would have been checked at each point in the scrapping process, but he always liked to confirm that the power was dead before he started a job. Some foremen weren’t above a bribe to overlook safety measures, if doing so helped the job go faster.

The small light on his current tester turned red as he touched each connection.

Dead.

Dead.

Dead.

“All clear,” he murmured to himself. Still, something bothered him, a feeling that wouldn’t be pushed away. He tested the breakers once more, unable to shake the uneasiness. Cal knew that feeling well, and it frightened him. He hadn’t intentionally reached out for the Force in nearly four years. Once it had felt warm and bright, but after Master Tapal’s death, Cal had been too afraid to reach out, because it felt more like falling fast into a deep, bottomless well.

“Stasis crate coming down.” Prauf’s voice crackled a little over the comm, startling him.

“Roger that,” Cal answered absently.

“Still good?” Prauf asked.

“All good.”

The stasis crate thumped gently on the deck, and Cal unclipped it from the lines. He guessed it would hold about one disassembled torpedo. He unlocked the torpedo cage and slid it back on its runners, surprised that it still ran smooth.

He cracked open the casing on the first torpedo, revealing wires looped around a central detonator. Cal tested each connection, then carefully tugged the detonator loose. Without the detonator, the torpedo was made inert, and couldn’t be triggered except by a fault in the wiring. Cal snipped the detonator free and separated it from the rest of the torpedo.

With his small plasma cutter, he sliced the long tube into sections. When the whole torpedo was disassembled, he dumped the scrap into the stasis crate. He closed the crate and activated the stasis field, an extra safety measure that would ensure the weapons remained inert while Prauf transported them to the reclamation barge.

“Hey Prauf, I’m sealing the crate and sending it up,” he called over the comm. He was immediately drowned out by the near-deafening boom of one of Bracca’s massive thunderstorms. His comm crackled with interference. “Hey Prauf, are you there?” Cal tried again.

“I’m here. That’s a huge storm.” Prauf’s voice sounded faint on the comm.

“Yeah. Good thing we’re inside,” Cal said. “Crate’s ready.”

The stasis crate seemed to lift itself as Prauf hauled it out of the hold. Cal unracked the next torpedo and opened it. As he pulled the detonator, a stream of water ran past his boot, racing along the canted floor. Another drip slid down the back of his neck and he wiped it away. He keyed his comm.

“Hey Prauf, did you say you worked on these ships when you were an engineer? Because this one’s leaking like a sieve,” Cal teased him.

“Leaking? Well of course she’s leaking, did you see that hole in her hull? Everything on this planet leaks, it's not a reflection on the quality of our work,” Prauf said with mock indignation.

“Of course not," Cal said. "The thunderstorm must have shorted out the exclusion field." A distant cousin to the energy shields used in battle, exclusion fields served the more mundane function of keeping precipitation and falling debris off of active work sites. The exclusion fields were unreliable at best, and most scrappers were used to working without them.

“Well if you’re worried about it, I can find you an umbrella,” Prauf replied. “Stasis crate coming down.” The crate thumped down gently on the deck and Cal tossed another detonator into it.

“Only if you’re going to come down here and hold it for me,” Cal replied. He snipped another detonator free and turned to place it in the crate. His flashlight caught the reflection of more rivulets, all streaming down the bulkheads and across the deck. Curious, Cal followed the water back farther into the munitions bay, ducking under a twisted i-beam that had once spanned the deck above him.

The feeling of wrongness came back, so powerful that Cal reached instinctively for the lightsaber that was not clipped to his hip. He clenched his fist on air, and unclipped his flashlight instead. The back of the munitions bay was a wreck, but Cal could hear running water. His boots splashed as he walked, and when Cal looked down, dark rainwater ran freely over the deck.

“Hey Prauf, there’s a lot of water down here,” Cal said.

“Sounds like a bad leak somewhere,” Prauf said.

“Yeah, maybe,” Cal answered absently. Cold water splashed his face, and when he angled his flashlight up a narrow bulkhead, he could see the rainwater pouring in through a gaping hole in the hull. The thunder rolled constantly outside. The storm must have been right over them. He backtracked to the torpedo racks, overcome by a new sense of urgency. Even though the ship was powerless, Cal did not like the idea of working in a pit that was slowly filling with rainwater.

“How’s it coming down there?” Prauf asked him.

“Almost done.” Cal reached for the last torpedo, but halfway through the motion he felt as though someone had put their hand on his arm. Listen, he heard Jaro Tapal say clearly, as though his Master stood beside him.

Cal stood frozen, Master Tapal’s voice ringing in his ears. He closed his eyes and stretched out his senses.

Listen...

The electrical hum was so quiet that Cal could barely hear it over the creak of the ship in her moorings and the noises of the shipbreaking yard. At first Cal thought he was wrong and that he was hearing things, but he felt it in his chest, running up from the floor through his boots.

Where? He looked around the torpedo bay, searching for any live connection he might have missed. He had tested all the breakers, he knew that no power ran through them. And yet, he heard and felt electricity. He ran a hand through his hair, smearing it with soot and grease as he tried to think.

“Prauf, what do you know about the torpedo bays on this ship?” he called over his comm.

“Not much. I wasn’t a weapons engineer. I did work on on the backup deployment systems.”

“What does that mean?”

“A failsafe to make sure the torpedoes could be used in case of a massive power loss. Basically it’s a big battery under the deck,” Prauf said. “It should have been one of the first things to go. They’re worth a fortune in heavy metals. Why?”

“Something’s wrong. The power’s still on down here somewhere,” Cal said. He watched the rain water running over the smooth, polished steel deck plating. Deck plating that looked untouched by plasma torches, and that had been soaking in water since the exclusion field had failed.

“Where?” asked Prauf.

“I don’t know. The floor’s clean, they haven’t cut it open. I think the backup’s still here, Prauf.” Cal heard his panic bleeding into his voice.

“Can you see an access hatch?” Prauf asked him. Cal shined his light on the floor, but the water only reflected the light back at him.

“No, nothing.” Cal slapped the button to seal the stasis crate, water sloshing around his boots. He felt panic tighten in his chest, and suddenly the bulkheads around him shifted from stripped out panels to clean, shining durasteel. He froze, staring at the torpedo rack in front of him that was once again whole.

He saw the weapons engineers in Republic uniforms standing beside him: one leaned casually on the torpedo cage, the other knelt by an open panel in the floor with a diagnostic unit in her hand. A strip of tiny lights glowed in the floor by the engineer’s knee as she tested the system. They blinked to life as she checked the power: red, yellow, green.

Cal’s heart was racing and he looked down at the wet floor. He knew the access panel was there, disguised in the deck, but he couldn't see it. He knew water had been pouring into it all this time, and he knew he had no way to cut off the power. He knew that the only way out was back up through the access hatch. He knew he was trapped.

A tiny red dot winked sluggishly to life at the corner of the torpedo rack, just where he had seen the engineer taking her readings. Cal felt his stomach turn to ice as the rest of the series slowly illuminated.

Red
Yellow
Green

Cal took one step toward the access hatch before the panel blew. A ball of blue flame engulfed the bulkhead and torpedo rack, expanding outward and upward with blinding heat. Cal flung his right arm up to protect his face and, without thinking, threw out his his left hand and reached for the Force to protect himself from the blast. The shield held for a few moments, half-formed, but something hot struck his right arm hard. He felt a sickening pop in his wrist and sharp pain shot all the way to his elbow. It shattered his focus, and the Force-shield failed. Cal’s feet left the floor, and he was flung hard against a ruined bulkhead. His head smacked a beam, and everything went black.

Chapter Text

Someone was screaming his name, very close to his ear.

“Stop,” Cal mumbled. “Stop…’m awake.”

Prauf was shouting at him over his comm. “Cal? Can you hear me? What happened? Do you copy?” He sounded worried, Cal thought distantly. His ears were ringing, and Prauf sounded strange and muffled.

“I’m here,” Cal said. Speaking hurt, and he tasted blood.

“What happened?” Prauf asked.

“I…. I dunno.” It was hard to focus on Prauf’s voice. Cal felt fear rising in his chest, brought on by the total darkness pressing down on him. Panic at the sense of being trapped swept over him. The air around him smelled hot and acrid and burned in his lungs.

He forced himself to be still, and reach for the calm that Master Tapal had spent so much time trying to help him find. With effort he took a deep breath, and another, until he felt the panic subside and he could regain his bearings.

Cold rainwater soaked his coveralls and made him shiver. He was twisted awkwardly against the solid mass of a bulkhead, and he remembered the electrical short, then an explosion. He also realized that he was not blind after all: he could see the faint blue glow of his comm reflected in the wet floor.

He knew he needed to get up, that there was still danger of fire. He tried to roll to his knees, and when he moved his right arm to brace himself, it sent a spike of agony straight through him. He knew it was broken, even without being able to see much. Fear seeped back into him; it would be hard to climb out of the pit without the use of his arm.

The rest of him ached, and he could feel the throb and sting of shrapnel cuts on his face. Warmth trickled down his cheek, and Cal felt the stickiness of blood when he touched the bridge of his nose with shaky fingers. His chest hurt, and breathing was getting harder.

Prauf’s voice crackled over his comm. “Cal, talk to me. What happened?”

“Something blew up,” he mumbled. Prauf’s swearing lit up his comm. Cal closed his eyes and coughed. He felt overwhelmingly tired and his head was swimming. He wanted to rest, maybe he would feel better when he woke up…

“I’ve got smoke up here. You need to get out of there,” Prauf said. Cal dragged his eyes open. He knew Prauf was right, but getting up seemed impossible.

“Are you clipped in to the lines? Cal, I need you to answer me.”

“No,” Cal said.

“You need to get yourself clipped into the harness so I can pull you up. Do you understand?” Prauf sounded calm but urgent.

Cal did understand. He knew that if he did not get up soon, he would not be leaving. A sick chill ran through him and some of the fog cleared from his mind. All he had to do was get to his feet, get to the safety lines, and Prauf would pull him out.

“Okay, I’m coming.”

“That’s good. I’m ready when you are.” Prauf’s voice was still utterly calm, warm and reassuring.

Cal needed light. He felt underneath him with his left hand, searching for his flashlight. It was still clipped to his jacket and when he switched it on it illuminated his surroundings in cold blue light.

The room was full of dirty smoke that stung his eyes, and he blinked away tears. Where the torpedo cage had been there was only a sparking, twisted mess of steel. The floor panel that protected the huge battery backups had peeled back, revealing burnt wires and smoldering insulation. Thin wisps of gray smoke rose from the floor. The stasis crate had done its job and sat unharmed by the explosion, still attached to the safety ropes.

Cal rolled to his knees and rested his forehead on the cold, wet deck. Water stung in the cuts on his face and dizziness washed over him. He pulled in a deep breath and braced his left hand on a bulkhead. He dragged himself to his feet, his knees threatening to buckle.

He looked down at his right arm and wished he hadn’t. It was a mess, his sleeve and the flesh beneath shredded by shrapnel. Blood soaked the dark blue fabric of his coveralls. A purple-bruised lump protruded from his wrist, and it made him queasy to look at it. He cradled his elbow in his left hand and tucked his arm against his chest, trying to keep it still. He braced his hip against the bulkhead and shuffled to the crate.

Smoke rose around him, drifting out of the hatch. He looked up and saw Prauf’s worried face looking down at him.

“Good to see you pal,” Prauf said.

“You too,” Cal replied.

“Get yourself clipped in and I’ll pull you up,” Prauf said.

The crate was still attached to the lines, and Cal had to unclip the carabiners and transfer them to his own harness. His right hand was useless. His left hand shook, and Cal struggled to achieve the angle needed to slide back the safety catch, unclip the carabiner, and attach it to his harness. Finally, he managed to get the lines transferred to his harness.

He looked up at Prauf. “I’m ready,” he said. Prauf nodded and he disappeared from the hatch.

“Hang on tight,” he called down. Cal gripped the rope with his good hand, keeping his injured arm tucked against his body. Prauf worked fast, but each jerk and lurch of the rope sent stabs of pain through Cal’s broken wrist.

At the hatch, Cal grabbed the ladder, but realized he needed both hands to maneuver himself onto it so that he could climb out to the deck.

“Prauf, I can’t reach,” he said.

“Okay, I’ve got you,” Prauf said. Blue coveralls filled Cal’s vision and huge hands gripped the shoulders of his jacket. Prauf pulled him out of the hatch with no effort. Prauf was such a kind soul that Cal often forgot how incredibly strong he was. Prauf set him on his feet and Cal slumped down to sit against a console, too weak to stand. He rested his forehead on his knees and willed his dizziness to pass. Blood dripped from his nose onto the deck between his boots. Prauf crouched in front of him and put a hand on Cal’s shoulder. Cal dragged his head up.

“Looking pretty rough there,” Prauf said as he looked Cal over. “I called the medic for you, but they can’t get you in here. We have to go out to the hangar,” Prauf cut away the safety ropes still attached to Cal’s harness. He held out a hand to help Cal up, and Cal’s hand was swallowed in his. Cal stood, swaying, and Prauf caught his elbow to steady him.

“I’m alright,” Cal said, and Prauf let him go. They made slow progress through the tight corridors. It took all of Cal’s concentration to stay on his feet and not trip over the torn up decking and fat power cables strung across the corridors. He stumbled often, and Prauf wrapped a hand around his upper arm, keeping him upright. Prauf navigated the maze of twisting corridors and tight passages easily, with the familiarity of someone who had spent his whole life working on starships.

Cal thought they would never reach the hangar at their glacial pace. He didn’t realize they had arrived until fresh air stirred his hair, flowing in from the open gangway. A medevac transport sat at the end of the ramp, waiting. The flatbed hovercraft was driven by a droid, and a Rodian female and human male in light blue medic’s uniforms hopped off to make room for Cal.

Cal sat on the edge of the transport. He hugged his broken arm to his chest and wished he were anywhere else. The Rodian draped a silver emergency blanket around his shoulders. Her medical scanner beeped frantically as she ran it over him.

“How bad?” Cal asked. His voice rasped in his throat.

“Bad enough,” the medic replied. She loaded an ampoule into a silver injector and pressed it to his neck.

“I don’t--” the hiss of the injection cut off his protest. Panic twisted his stomach; he was terrified of the powerful painkillers administered to badly injured scrappers. He had seen grown adults have full conversations with dead relatives while trapped under girders, so high on pain-blockers they thought they were back home. If the drugs made him talk, he knew the cost of giving away his secret on an Imperial world.

“Hush. It’ll help,” the medic said. The drugs worked fast, and Cal felt his thoughts slipping away. Everything had gone soft and hazy and the harsh glare of the worklights blurred around him. He felt himself tip backwards, and gentle hands guided him to lie down on the transport. The pain in his arm was already fading, and his body felt numb and light. Prauf looked down at him.

“Prauf,” he slurred.

“Here, kid,” Prauf replied.

“Don’t go,” Cal said. He was convinced that he would spill his secrets to every medic and scrapper he encountered on his way to the hospital. He knew Prauf wouldn’t let him talk, and Prauf would keep him safe.

“Wasn’t planning on it. They’re going to splint your arm now.” The Rodian strapped the splint closed and it hurt despite the painkillers. Cal tried to twist away and Prauf laid a hand on his shoulder, stilling him.

“Just relax. We’re about to go for a scenic ride,” Prauf said.

“You riding along?” the human medic asked Prauf.

“Yeah,” Prauf replied. “I’ll stay with him.” The transport dipped a little on Cal’s left side. He cracked open his eyes and saw Prauf sitting there, his legs dangling over the edge. Relief that Prauf was going to stay with him flowed over Cal. The medics swung back up onto the transport.

“Accident and Casualty,” the human said to the droid pilot, and they sped away towards the medical center.

Cal lost his bearings at the med-center. The painkilling drugs he’d been given had taken firm hold of him, and the sterile gray corridors were hazy and strange. Cal kept his eyes shut tight against the glare of bright lights. Voices ebbed and flowed around him, and Cal felt like he was deep under water, drifting and lost. Always though, he felt Prauf nearby, steady and calm. Cal could find him with his eyes closed, a tall blue shadow at his side.

“Hey Cal, they’re taking you into surgery now.” Prauf’s voice dragged him back to the surface. He had a sense of motion, and he opened his eyes to see Prauf walking beside his bed as an orderly droid pushed him down a hallway. They were approaching a set of double doors.

Don’t leave, Cal thought.

“I’ll see you in a while, pal,” Prauf said.

“Okay,” Cal croaked. The droid pushed him through the doors and Prauf stayed behind. The doors swung closed, and Prauf was gone from his view.

Cal felt a sharp jab in the crook of his left elbow, and everything went space-black for a long time.

“You have to get me out of here,” Cal pleaded to Prauf, who sat beside his hospital bed.

“Eat your dinner and I’ll think about it,” Prauf replied. He leaned back in his chair and stretched his long legs out in front of him. Cal made a face and poked left-handed at the bland mass of hot cereal on his tray. Completely lacking in spices, color, or flavor, it tasted as unappetizing as it looked. He forced himself to eat a few spoonfuls. If nothing else, it was hot and filling, and he was hungry.

“If you care about me at all, you’ll distract the nurses while I escape,” Cal continued, eyeing the window that looked out onto the shipbreaking yards. Climbing out would be tricky with only one working arm, but Cal was confident he could do it with Prauf’s help. Prauf folded his arms across his broad chest.

“The window’s sealed shut. Besides, you’re leaving tomorrow as long as all of your scans come back clear,” Prauf said. Cal leaned back against his pillows and stared down at his arm. Clean bandages looped around his thumb and covered his forearm to his elbow.

“I just don’t want to be here anymore,” he said, mostly to himself. He was tired of the constant monitoring of the nurses and medical droids, and missed the privacy of his own flat.

“I know,” Prauf said. “How’s your arm?”

Cal opened and closed his right hand. The surgeon had fused his fractured radius, and his wrist still ached where the bone had been regenerated. The shrapnel wounds on his forearm itched, healing.

“Feeling better. Only hurts when it rains.”

“Good thing it doesn’t rain much on Bracca,” Prauf said. Cal laughed, and winced when it pulled the cut in his lip. Prauf gestured vaguely at Cal’s face. “That’s looking better. Well, relatively speaking.”

Cal gave him a sideways glare. He picked up the datapad on his bedside table and toggled the screen so that the camera showed him his own image. His face was pale and bruised under his freckles. He raked his hair out of his eyes and winced when his fingers tangled on matted blood and grease.

He examined the healing cuts across his face. The surgeon had sealed them cleanly with liquid sutures, but he knew they would scar. Cal still felt lucky: whatever flying debris had sliced across the bridge of his nose hadn’t broken it, and the cut through his eyebrow ended millimeters from his eye.

Cal knew that if he hadn’t thrown out his hand and called on the Force, he would be blind, or dead. Even so, he hadn’t been able to control it, and his weak attempt to protect himself had mostly failed. Worse, he had used the Force without thinking, and the only lucky thing about it was that he had been alone and no one had seen him do it. Cal felt the old, familiar guilt twisting in his stomach. Master Tapal would be so disappointed in everything he had become.

“Don’t have anyone but scrap rats to impress anyway,” Cal said, laying the datapad aside.

“You’ll meet someone who thinks they’re interesting one day,” Prauf said. “You look pretty good for someone who blew up live munitions.” Cal appreciated his attempts at reassurance, but they didn’t make him feel any better.

“Have you heard anything from the Incident Investigation?” Cal asked, hoping to change the subject.

“Only that they’re easily bribed. Whoever missed that battery backup must have good connections,” Prauf said. “The report only says you didn’t complete the safety checks.”

Cal felt his anger rising. “I checked everything, twice,” he said hotly, looking Prauf in the eye. “I always do. The backup wasn’t on the schematics.” Cal was shaking, and didn’t realize he had clenched his fist until a stab of pain shot through his wrist. Prauf nodded.

“I know, Cal. The Empire doesn’t care about us, except for how much scrap we break up for their new ships.” Cal took a deep breath and tried to calm down, rubbing at his aching wrist.

“Of course they’re going to look the other way when enough credits are on the table,” Cal said, unable to keep the contempt from his voice. “Blame us riggers, we’re expendable anyway, right?”

“That’s why we watch out for each other,” Prauf said. “I’m sorry you got hurt.” His shoulders sagged a little with distress and Cal realized with sudden clarity how deeply Prauf cared for him. His anger ebbed away, replaced by gratitude for Prauf’s friendship.

“I owe you big time,” he said. “When you break me out of here, I’ll buy you dinner and as many of those fruity drinks you like as you want.”

“Nah, keep your credits. I’m just glad I was there,” Prauf said. Cal looked at him carefully. Something was bothering him. Usually Prauf jumped at the promise of Alderaanian fruit fizzes. He had that look that Cal knew well, the one Cal only saw when something was wrong on a job.

“What’s wrong?” he asked. Prauf sighed.

“I wasn’t going to tell you until you were out of the hospital. I didn’t want you to worry.”

Cal felt ice trickle into his stomach, and he knew what Prauf was worrying about.

“We didn’t finish the work,” he said quietly. The final crate of scrapped munitions still sat in the hold, abandoned after Cal had nearly blown himself up. He picked at the bandage around his wrist. “What happens now?” Cal had a bad feeling that he knew.

“If we don’t finish the job, we’ll be charged with negligence and breach of contract. We’ll likely be expelled from the Guild. The value of the scrap will be charged out of our pay.” Prauf spoke evenly, and each word sunk into Cal like stones dropped in deep water. The Guild’s rules were strict, meant to ensure that all jobs were finished.

Cal found the end of the bandage on his arm and unwound it. The shrapnel wounds were still angry-looking, sealed closed with liquid sutures. A neat pink scar ran up the inside of his wrist where the fracture had been set and the bone regrown. It ended just shy of the crisp black lines of the Guild tattoo on the inside of his forearm.

He looked up at Prauf and met his soft, deep eyes. The thought of going back into the wrecked munitions pit terrified him. The thought of being expelled from the Guild and a black mark put on his name was even worse.

“We have to go back,” he said.

Cal stared down into the black hole of the munitions pit. His heart beat fast in his throat, and sweat trickled between his shoulder blades. His right wrist ached, his fingers clenched tight on the safety rope. He hoped Prauf couldn’t see how afraid he was.

“You’re all ready, Cal,” Prauf said, coming to stand next to him. “You say the word, and I’ll pull you out. Okay?”

“Okay.”

There was no point in prolonging this. He was afraid, but it didn’t matter. Fear would not serve him here, and he would not let it overwhelm him. He had control, and that knowledge calmed him.

He stepped down onto the ladder, and Prauf lowered him back into the pit.

The Space Cadet was probably the worst bar on Bracca, but the bartender knew how to make Alderaanian fruit fizzes exactly the way Prauf preferred them: heavy on the fruit, heavier on the liquor.

“These aren’t half bad,” Cal said to Prauf, peering into his glass. The drinks were the right amount of tart and sweet, and came garnished with a tiny paper umbrella. Prauf had six umbrellas lined up neatly in front of him on the battered tabletop.

“You don’t seem to be having a hard time with them,” Prauf said. He reached across the table and added Cal’s three discarded umbrellas to his six. Cal couldn’t tell if Prauf was affected at all by the liquor, or if he just enjoyed the drinks.

“I wish I could do more than buy you a few drinks,” Cal said. “Thanks for getting me out of there.”

“Don’t mention it,” Prauf said. “Like I said, we gotta watch out for each other. Sure as hell no one else is.”

“Yeah,” Cal said. “Just glad you were in there with me.”

“Me too,” Prauf replied. He sipped his drink, looking thoughtfully at Cal.

“Cal, I gotta ask you something,” he said.

“Yeah?” Cal replied.

“How did you walk away from that explosion?”

Cal took a swallow of his drink, trying to think of an explanation that Prauf would believe. He was an expert engineer, and Cal knew he would see through a lie. He shrugged.

“Just got lucky, I guess,” he said.

The truth was, he didn’t know. He had called on the Force for protection, but his feeble shield had quickly failed, and Cal didn’t believe it had been enough to direct the energy of the explosion away from him. By some chance the electrical explosion hadn’t triggered the payloads in the torpedoes. He and Prauf had seen riggers walk away from worse-looking accidents, and be carried away from more minor ones. Prauf gave him a long look, and Cal felt heat prickling between his shoulder blades. Did Prauf somehow know what he had done?

“Yeah, you sure did,” Prauf said lightly, and Cal’s anxiety eased. He knew Prauf couldn’t have seen anything from his place above the pit. He doubted Prauf would ever turn him in, but he still carried the constant fear of being discovered. He would have to be more careful.

“So what are you going to do with your credits?” Cal asked, hoping to change the subject. Prauf leaned back in the booth and looked out the window. Rain poured down outside, streaming across the glass.

“Thought I might take a vacation. Maybe somewhere warm, where you can see the sun more than once a week.”

Cal laughed. He knew as well as Prauf did that riggers didn’t get vacations. “Where would you go?” he asked.

“No idea,” Prauf said. “But it’s nice to think about. What about you?”

Cal shrugged. He hadn’t given it much thought beyond a vague daydream of boarding a ship and leaving Bracca behind for good.

“You should buy yourself a ride out of here,” Prauf said.

“I’m not in a hurry,” Cal said. “Don’t have anywhere to go anyway.”

“You’ll regret not getting out of here when you had the chance,” Prauf said.

“Maybe,” Cal replied. He wasn’t ready to leave, not yet.

“Well, don’t wait too long,” Prauf said, and tipped back the rest of his drink. “Next time something blows up on you, you might not be as lucky as you were this time.”

Next time. Cal knew Prauf was right. As long as they worked in the yard, there would always be a next time.

“You’ll keep me out of too much trouble,” Cal said. He pointed out the window. The Space Cadet had a panoramic view of the shipbreaking yard.

“They’re firing up the ship-cutter,” he said, steering the conversation away from his future and the uncertainty he felt whenever he thought about it.

“Now that’s a view,” Prauf said. He watched, fascinated, as the ship-cutter sliced an ancient Separatist bomber in half, the flare of the plasma reflected in his eyes. He had never stopped being an engineer, Cal knew. Even when he was breaking ships apart, he was completely enthralled by them.

Cal leaned back and propped his boots up on the booth next to Prauf. He slumped down in the booth, content to stare out the window, away from the filth and noise of the shipbreaking work. For all its faults, Bracca had given Cal work he was good at and a place to hide. It was hard to imagine a life where he didn’t work with Prauf, digging in the innards of old ships and climbing free around the hulks.

He was safe enough, for now.