Chapter Text
This was the easy part of the job: go in, meet the contact, get the coordinates.
Simple.
Hera's fingers drummed on the tabletop, the duro-plastic slightly tacky from some unwiped spill. Beside her, Kanan crossed his arms over his chest and he leaned back in his chair. It was a miracle the seat didn't give out from beneath him—its four, rickety legs seemed to be held together by nothing but mesh tape and grime.
"How come you never take me to nice places?" Kanan asked, casting a look around the dingy cantina. The day shift at the nearby synthefood factory had just ended, which meant the place was packed with unwashed organics looking for a drink. With all the noise and the crowds, no one would look twice at the quiet handoff happening at the back table. At least, that was what Hera hoped for—the success of their mission depended on it.
An astromech-style serving droid rolled over to the table, its flat head retrofitted with a serving tray. The Novanian grog Hera had ordered was balanced there, and she accepted it with a quiet "thank you" before the droid wheeled away. It was only for appearances, of course—she never drank on the job—but she couldn't help but notice the way Kanan's eyes snagged onto the glass as she set it on the table in front of her. He ran a hand over his mouth, and Hera could see the bob of his throat as he swallowed hard. Then he dragged his gaze away, clearing his throat quietly as he looked toward the door.
Notably, he had not ordered anything.
"Were there always this many Imps on Gyndine?" Kanan muttered. Hera glanced over her shoulder to see a pair of stormtroopers in the doorway. Instinctively, she lowered her head. Kanan did the same beside her, angling his body toward her and away from the door. His elbow came up to rest on the sticky tabletop, his hand on his cheek to obscure his face.
"The garrison went in last year," Hera replied, smiling as if Kanan had said something funny and putting a hand on his knee. From the outside, it would look like innocent flirting, but it allowed her to get close enough that none of the other patrons would overhear their conversation. "Probably just a random patrol. They'll leave soon."
Kanan snorted softly. "Seems like the Empire is everywhere now."
"Guess we have our work cut out for us then."
Cautiously, Hera cast a surreptitious glance toward the door. The troopers were gone. She let her hand drop from Kanan's knee, the danger passed.
"And this is where Fulcrum's missing ship was bringing the cargo?" Kanan asked. He blew out a breath, shaking his head. "Seems like risky business, trying to move beneath the nose of a full Imperial garrison."
Hera looked at the people around them, dirty and tired and seeking solace at the bottom of a glass. She wondered if things had been different on Gyndine before the Empire, before the farms had been paved over to make way for the synthefood factory. "We go where we're needed," she said. "And the places with the most Imperials are where the rebellion is needed the most."
Kanan nodded but didn't look convinced. "I just hope this Fulcrum knows what they're doing."
Skeptical, as always. Hera knew it wasn't love of the rebellion that kept her new crew member around. And it certainly wasn't the money either—they barely had enough credits to cover the cost of her drink, and it was the cheapest thing on the menu. No, he had entirely different motivations for joining the cause. Hera felt a faint heat creep up her lekku, but she didn't have time to dwell on what those motivations might be as she suddenly heard a cheerful voice from behind her.
"Elana! Long time, no see," said the voice, using the fake name Fulcrum had provided. The accent sounded vaguely familiar. "Do you have the results of the race? Heard you put all your money on Chasing Hope."
Hera turned at the sound of the code phrase. "Yeah, last time I bet on fathier ra—" she began, but the response died on her lips at the sight of the man who settled into the chair across from them.
Hera sensed Kanan stiffen immediately. He reached for the blaster on his thigh, but she quickly grabbed his hand beneath the table before he could do anything stupid. She forced a smile and interlaced her fingers through his, playing it off as though they were just a young couple holding hands. In reality, she simply didn't trust Kanan not to go for his weapon again, because the man Fulcrum had sent them to meet, who had just joined them at the back of the cantina, was a clone.
So much for this being the easy part.
His curls of black hair were streaked through with gray, and a long scar ran from his temple to his chin, but his features were unmistakable. The clone troopers had been a permanent fixture for much of Hera's childhood during the Separatist occupation on Ryloth. It was jarring, seeing a face she knew so well on a total stranger. She knew that for Kanan, that face represented something much, much worse.
She still didn't know much about Kanan's past. It was a topic they tiptoed around with vague statements, even when they were alone. Still, Hera had some strong suspicions. She had, after all, seen some of the things he could do, things that no ordinary organic should be able to do. And he let little things slip sometimes— locations and names of battles that had happened during the Clone Wars as if he had been there himself. All the clues were there, she simply had to connect the dots. In her line of work, she heard things—things the Empire didn't broadcast. She had heard the rumors about the end of the war, about the clone troopers turning their blasters against the Jedi traitors. She had noticed the way he tensed whenever they passed a clone in the street.
"Sounds like you could use a good luck charm," their informant replied, reaching into the pocket of his coat. He plunked a small, metal chip onto the table, shaped like an elongated octagon. It rattled quietly as he slid it over to her. "Here, take mine."
It was a sabacc shift token, a piece that could be played during a round to change the rules of the game or influence the outcome. Hera wasn't much of a gambler, but it was a fitting metaphor for a resistance trying to alter the whole galaxy when all the cards seemed stacked against them. From Fulcrum's mission brief, Hera knew that inside the thin token she would find a tiny data chip containing the last-known coordinates of a missing Corellian freighter. This was their next assignment.
Casually, she reached for the token. But before she could grab it, Kanan put a hand out to stop her.
"How do we know we can trust you?"
The words were sharp, an accusation. The clone blinked in surprise. Then he laughed humorlessly, looking over at Hera as if she might share in the joke.
He gestured with a hand. "Who is this fucking kid?"
"You already betrayed the Republic," Kanan continued in a low voice, leaning forward on the table. "You became the Emperor's lap dogs and enforcers—the first soldiers for the Empire. How do I know that token isn't a trap?" His lips pulled back in a silent snarl. "And don't call me kid."
With each word Kanan spoke, Hera watched the clone's expression change. The man's teeth gritted together. His brows darkened into a scowl.
"You think we had any choice?"
Hera saw a muscle tick in Kanan's cheek as he clenched his jaw the way he did whenever he was trying to hold his emotions in check. "'Good soldiers follow orders', right?"
A fist slammed the tabletop, making the sabacc token rattle. "You don't know anything!"
"Then tell me," Kanan shot back, his voice a challenge. "What don't I know? Because it seemed pretty clear to me when those troopers turned their blasters on their friends."
This was getting too intense. They were starting to draw attention. Hera still held tightly to Kanan's right hand, keeping it safely away from his blaster, but she knew she needed to watch his other too—he had a mean left hook. She'd seen it in action on plenty of other missions.
The clone just scoffed, sitting back in his seat. "You wanna know the truth?" He beckoned to the server droid, and it rolled over. He grabbed a glass of the grog and knocked it back in one swallow.
"The truth is," the clone said, wincing against the burn of alcohol, "that both sides were fighting with droids. The Republic just chose to make theirs out of flesh and blood, manufactured in a test tube."
He said the words "test tube" as though they were something filthy that left a bad taste in his mouth. Or maybe that was just the grog.
"Droids, huh?" Kanan let out a bark of laughter, short and harsh. It was an ugly sound. "Funny, I never saw any restraining bolts."
"That's because they're in here!" The clone jammed his fingers against his temple, his eyes taking on a wild gleam in the low light. "In our brains! We had no choice, the chips made us!"
Oh no. One of the paranoid, conspiracy-theory types. Hera needed to get Kanan out of there before things really went south. She swiped the token off the table and stood, dragging Kanan up with her, never letting go of his hand. She gave the clone a tense smile.
"Thanks for sharing your luck," she said quickly, remembering to keep up their cover story. "Maybe we'll see you at the betting tables."
She hustled Kanan's tall frame through the crowd to the door, tightening her grip on his hand to keep from losing him in the press. He didn't resist, letting her drag him along. The smell was awful, sweaty bodies and bad alcohol all around. Another serving droid, this one a protocol model, shuffled by in the chaos, and Kanan reached out to snag a glass from the tray it carried. But Hera watched as he pulled his hand back at the very last moment, letting out a growl of frustration that she could barely hear in the noisy bar. Then, with one final shove, they broke through the crowd and stumbled out into the street.
Hera took a deep breath of fresh air, clearing the cantina from her lungs. She turned to Kanan.
"What. The. Hell was that?"
She wasn't angry exactly, but the heated exchange with the clone had left her rattled. The evening air was welcomingly cool on her skin.
Kanan still glowered, kicking at the dirt. "That was a clone, Hera." He spat the word "clone" as if it were a curse. "We can't trust them."
"You nearly blew the whole job!" Hera was careful not to use the word mission, not out here in the open.
To his credit, Kanan looked a little abashed at that, eyes lowered to the ground.
"I'm sorry," he muttered, scratching at his hairline. "I lost my head a bit. But you need to be careful." He looked up to meet her gaze. "You put too much faith in people."
His blue-green eyes stared into hers with an intensity she rarely saw from him. It was then that Hera realized she was still holding his hand. She didn't let it go. Instead, she squeezed it gently.
"Hey—" she offered him a small smile—"I put my faith in you."
He didn't smile back. "See? That's what I mean."
Hera didn't like it when he got this way. He could be a real grump sometimes, but this was different. Something was bothering him. She could see it in the worried line that formed between his heavy brows, and the way he chewed at his bottom lip. There was a slight tremor in his hand as she held it.
"Kanan," she began carefully, not quite sure how he might react, "I can ask Fulcrum not to set up our meetings in bars anymore if—"
Kanan abruptly dropped her hand, then shoved both of his into his pockets.
"I'm fine," he interrupted quickly. Then he seemed to realize his tone was sharper than he'd intended and added in a softer voice, "Let's just get back to the ship."
Hera watched him for a long moment as he started back toward the port without her. His shoulders were hunched and tense and his steps quick, like he was itching to break into a run. They hadn't been together very long, less than a year, but she'd never seen him this upset before. Well, only once—in the crystal caverns on Cynda, holding Obidiah's hand for the last time. Part of her wished that he would talk to her, that he would open up about the ghosts of the past that so obviously plagued him. But another part of her knew that was a dangerous path. Because the closer she let herself get, the harder it would be to hold herself back.
Slowly, she made her way back to the Ghost. She tucked her hands into the pockets of her flight suit as she walked, and her fingers touched metal—the shift token. She made a fist around it, gripping so tightly that the edges dug into her skin.
If only this was a game she could change the rules to.
