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Chapter 10
THERON
Saradi and her team had finally made it to us. I’d hated how indirect we had to be laying out breadcrumbs practically for them to find us. Neither Lana or I dared poke our noses any farther out than the local produce market and the liquor store every other day. We both had enough bounties on us to make running into us a very lucrative proposition for some lucky pirate. And there was no lack of those around.
Fortunately for us, Lana and I liked being on the holonet enough that we weren’t going completely crazy doing research and nothing else. I was teaching her a few slicing tricks, but, of course, not every one I knew. We still didn’t have a solid lead on Revan.
And here Saradi was, in person. I felt like I was maybe thirteen again, trying to get up the nerve to ask Marissa Elert to the academy dance. She was standing there just like Marissa had, that one day - with the Huttball Captain standing behind her. I nodded to Vector, motioning them to come inside the safehouse. It wasn’t particularly luxurious, but we’d managed to get a few comforts. Some pillows and some screamingly fast, very sweet killer tech. That’s all you really need, right? Oh, and alcohol. We had lots of that.
“Home Sweet Home, “I said, grinning back at them.
“So, what’s the situation?” Saradi asked me, looking around with interest.
“Well, the Revanites are here, on Rishi, but we can’t let them know we are on to them. We need you to go out and make things hard for the Revanite allies, the Nova Blades.” I answered. She knew a lot about this but I had some intel to fill in blanks.
“I hate to admit it, but I haven’t been able to slice into the Revanite system yet. “
“That’s probably made you crazy.” She said “well…crazy -er.” She smiled up at me.
Luckily, my implants can control my pulse if I need to. I mean, Vector was standing right there. She wasn’t really flirting with me..was she? Nah. Vector smiled when she said that, so I don’t think he was going to take me out back in the alley and bash my face in or anything.
“So, Pirate Queen, go out and give ‘em hell, ok?” I said, smiling back. “As always, we’ll run the ops from here, so keep in touch. As we get info, of course we’ll loop you in.”
“It’s really good to see you,” Lana said, almost wistfully. Wait. Did..did Lana have a crush on her too? No, of course not. Theron, get a grip. The entire rest of the galaxy didn’t see everything through your lens.
“It’s totally good to see some familiar, friendly faces. Even Kaliyo.” I said, startled to realize how true the statement was. She just gave me that icy Kaliyo stare. “Um, or not….” I turned to my computer console as they left the safehouse, Lana walking them to the door.
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So, our mayhem and disruption was working. Saradi and her team were out causing the most trouble, but Lana said there was a location nearby that might be a Revanite hideout. We were going to take a chance and to give it a once over.
Hiding behind some crates, I could see several people I actually knew – Republic troops…or I suppose ex-Republic troops if they were here. This was bad.
We’d decided to make an end run around them to see if we could get to their server room to do some slicing. I moved, per our plan, and ran right into a security team.
“Hey! Who are you? What are you doing here?” one of the guys asked me, roughly, blaster pulled and in my face.
“Wow, Theron Shan,” a voice said. It was Renny Alton, a past co-worker who had been thrown out of the SIS for …reasons. “I don’t think we have to ask him what he’s doing here. It’s pretty clear.” He said, gesturing to the server room.
I was turned in such a way that I could see Lana and Jakarro (with Ceefour strapped to his chest). Jakarro looked like he wanted to pull some arms off but was stopped mid motion. Lana was force holding him in place and also force silencing him so this group couldn’t hear the amazing amount of noise he could make when angry. Or not angry, for that matter.
What was that about? We could take this group, easy.
“You’ve got about fifteen bounties on you,” Renny said. “That’s a lot of money. We could be very rich.” He said to the other two guys.
“No, Revan’s gonna want to talk to this guy.” The one with the blaster in my face said.
I know he didn’t know that Revan was a relative. My great times 10 or so grandfather. I don’t think Revan knew that, either. Oh ..wait. I’ll be introduced. It’s going to come up. Terrific.
The third guy stepped up and put a bag over my head. Really? He keeps a bag in his pocket to put over people’s heads at a moment’s notice? Then there was a lot of moving around, some of it in a shuttle, and then some more blind pushing me around.
I was pushed roughly into a chair and the bag came off. My hands were tied behind me, and the light in the room was very bright. A figure in robes and a mask walked slowly into the light.
“They told me your name is Shan.” Revan said. “You are Satele’s son. I didn’t know she had a son.”
“Yeah, lots of people don’t.” I said blinking to get my eyes to adjust.
“Who’s your father?” he asked. I didn’t say anything, just looked at him.
Lightning fast, a fist came out of pretty much nowhere, and bashed me one on the jaw. Ow. My implants help with pain that might be caused in an interrogation, and they were working now. They didn’t help with the swelling and bruising, but at least it wouldn’t hurt as much.
I don’t need to bore you with what went on after that. It was pretty standard, including more fists to the face and most other parts of my body..kidneys, stomach..if it hurt, this guy punched me there. I think I learned more from the questions they were asking me than they were learning from me. Suckers.
Suddenly, alarms started blaring and lights were flashing. I heard booted footsteps running past the room’s closed door down the hall outside. After ten minutes (the punching hadn't taken my chrono offline), they were still blaring. Plenty of time to check an intruder and shut the alarm system down.
“You going to get that?” I asked Revan.
He glared past me at the guy with the fist – who I hadn’t yet seen, but believe me, knew was there.
“Go,” he said to him.
A few more minutes and the shouting got louder, with more alarms, if that was possible.
“You know… you’re going to need more than you’ve got here to stop her.” I said, although it sounded like ‘thtop her’ because my lip was swollen.
Revan was wearing a mask but I could pretty much feel him glaring. I mean, that’s what I’d be doing if I had me being a smart ass in the same room with me.
He stood up and went out of the room. Ok, good. As far as I know, it was just the Fist guy and him. I twisted my wrists to get out of the rope tie that was securing my arms. Rope was pretty low budget for an operation like this, I thought.
On a table in the corner were my blasters. So far, these guys had completely violated Rules 1 through 27 of the ‘interrogating a witness’ spy code…leaving my weapons in the room with me. But that was fine with me.
I walked out the door like I belonged there, heading in the direction of the gunfire, because that was clearly where whomever (hopefully Saradi and her crew) was making a mess of the Revan’s HQ. I had to fire at a few people coming down the hallway, and I ran into the main room.
Saradi was standing there, talking to a holo transmission of Revan. What respect I had for him went way down. What a chicken. He already left the building and was now on holo? Whatever.
She looked over as I ran through, and we connected. I mean, seriously. If it was an electric connection it wouldn’t have been so strong. I felt it all the way down to my toes. For a minute, time stopped around us, and it was just the two of us standing there. Her expression changed, then she brought her rifle up and blew away a couple of droids behind me.
“I’m here to rescue you.” She said, indicating Vector beating a couple of security guys to a pulp on the other side of the room.
“Much appreciated,” I said, still staring at her. She was so beautiful. Then the reality of the situation hit me. “We have to stop them. The fleets are going to come out of hyperspace right on top of each other, and it’s going to be ugly. There are his operatives on either side, waiting to sabotage the fight. We don’t have any time!”
“Let’s go.” She said, and they started back the way they came. At the door, I said “I still need the lists. But I know where to look. I’ll be right there.”
“Do you promise?” she said, looking anxiously at me.
In a fight, her expression never changed. Anxious was…well that was good, right?
“I promise, “ I said, wanting so much to touch her.
“Vector, let’s go!” she said and they cut a path out so I could get back to the servers. At this point there was so much confusion, no one saw me, and I would be able to get the info I needed. I wanted to get back safely to her. Also, I wanted to get in Lana’s face to find out what the hell throwing me to the wolves was all about.
“I’ll meet you back at the place.” I said, not giving any information about where.
She nodded and the waded into the middle of more droids.