She reached under herself, her hand following the cold metal floor, finding a latch.
“Just make sure you don’t—”
She lifted the latch and immediately crashed to the floor of the bridge. The element of surprise, her only ally, had turned on her. She leapt to her feet and assumed a fighting stance, ready to take on all comers.
The bridge was empty.
* * *
—
“Clear!” said the ensign.
Kelos approached a control panel in the center of the bridge. “Transfer firing control to this console.”
“Yes, sir.”
Ela took a deep breath. Kelos held his finger over the button, pausing for effect, to twist the knife further.
He lowered his finger.
“No!” she cried out.
Kelos turned toward her, his finger hovering still, as he raised an eyebrow. “A problem, Lieutenant?”
“Please, sir.” She lifted her chin, determined. “Allow me.”
He smiled and gestured for her to take his place. “By all means.” Without hesitation, she assumed his position in front of the console.
* * *
—
Baudu dropped down behind Tal and took in the abandoned controls, the chairs spun around as though their occupants had just stood up.
“This…was a lot easier than I thought it would be.”
Tal rushed over to the control panel and pulled up the ship reports. “I’ve got to shut us down.”
An alarm sounded. “What’s that?” Baudu spun around.
A red light started blinking on one of the screens: WARNING: TARGET LOCKED.
“We’re being targeted.”
“What?”
“I’ve got it handled.” She slid into a seat and began trying to regain control of the ship. “I hope.”
The screen turned solid red. “Tal…!”
* * *
—
Ela pressed the button to fire.
Silence followed.
Then the ensign spun around to face Kelos. “Confirmed hit, sir.”
Kelos was studying Ela. “Sensors report.”
“Uhh…” The ensign turned around. “Complete destruction. I’m reading a lingering energy cloud, likely from excess Tibanna gas we put on the U-33. No signature of the ship.”
“Very good. You may return to your post, Lieutenant.”
Ela returned to her control panel and tried to shut out all thought, all distractions. She reset the weapons and comms, locked them behind her security code, then assessed the remains of the onboard Tibanna cannisters.
When she finished, she realized Kelos was watching her appraisingly. Finally, he shared his verdict: “Betrayal demonstrates character. It suits you.”
Ela returned his look with a cold disdain that she felt to the depths of her soul.
* * *
—
Exhausted, Ela finished her shift and headed back toward her quarters. Of course—she stopped herself. She needed a different venue. Someplace unlikely to be under surveillance.
* * *
—
“I owe you. I thought for sure you wouldn’t go along with our…emergency, worst-case scenario, wow did this go sideways plan after I was forced to get creative with the disguises. You didn’t have to do any of this, I know.” The glowing blue form of Tal smiled at her from Cloud City a short time later.
“Of course I did. I said I’d do what I could, and I don’t go back on my word.” Ela undid her constricting officer jacket and tossed it onto the bed. Recently vacated, these officer quarters provided exactly what she needed. The breezy scent told her the space had also been cleaned to her liking. “Besides, you’re the sexiest rebel scum this side of Corellia.”
Tal laughed. “I’ll take it. But maybe you should get out while you can. They could find out you blew up a few canisters of Tibanna gas instead of us. More than a few. I ejected the ones you planted onboard our ship, too.”
“They’re all fools. Kelos especially. I knew he couldn’t resist the idea of blasting a helpless ship into particles. He was looking right at me as I dumped our excess gas capsules into space…” She mimed the commands she had entered into the console. “…targeting the weapons on them instead of your transport. He was so focused on reading my expression, he didn’t look at my hands or the console. He one hundred percent believed me.”
“I almost believed you.”
“Next time give me a little more information about what you’re planning, so I’m not surprised.” Ela collapsed onto the bed. “Only one way I like to be surprised.”
“Fair.” The hologram did not do justice to her eyes. “Ela. I know we don’t…do this. But it means a lot, what you did.”
Ela pulled her hair down, letting it fall down her shoulders. “Are you alone?”
Tal failed to suppress a grin. “The miners are all back home with their families, hiding out while we figure out what to do about your Imperial friends. Rajin has a new son. Kiren is getting treated. Right now, I think they’ll talk to me before Baudu does. But he’s a hero now. He’ll come around.”
“As long as he doesn’t come around now.” Ela leaned down, beginning to slowly undo her boots, knowing she had Tal’s attention.
“Ela?”
“Yes?”
“Leave the boots on this time.”
RIGHT-HAND MAN
Lydia Kang
It wasn’t the worst wound he’d ever seen.
The surgical droid 2-1B viewed the patient in front of him. Commander Luke Skywalker had a clean amputation of his right hand, via lightsaber. It had been a long time since he’d seen such a wound. Simple enough. His vital signs were remarkably stable, save for a slightly elevated heart rate. The patient seemed calm at first glance, but 2-1B could tell quickly that his muscles were tensed and his mouth was a taut line. The pain was there, no doubt, but the lightsaber had thankfully cauterized the bleeding. There was one good thing about Jedi and Sith combat—no blood. It saved him and his FX droids a lot of messy work.
Beyond his operating station, the large viewport of the Redemption’s surgical suite yawned wide and dark, a view that was either soothing or menacing, depending on the point of view. Most patients preferred to face the wide expanse of velvety black speckled with bright stars. Rebel cruisers and X-wing fighters flew alongside the medical frigate, a comforting sight. The spinning fire of a nearby protostar was unusually brilliant. An excellent distraction, sometimes more powerful than painkillers and a dose of bacta. But Commander Skywalker chose to turn away from the viewport, as if something out there was too uncomfortable to face. How very odd.
Away from Bespin and the Empire, they were safe now.
“I shall begin by cleansing the wound, removing the dead and cauterized tissue, and testing your nerve endings for compatibility with the cybernetic attachment,” 2-1B said as he gathered instruments on a hovertray. “After that, I will apply bacta to ensure successful synergy, Commander.”
Luke said nothing, only stared straight ahead.
Too-Onebee turned his mechanical head to see what Commander Skywalker was staring at. He thought perhaps Princess Leia or the commander’s favored droids had entered the room, but no. Just a wall of supply compartments.
“Commander Skywalker. Are you in pain?” 2-1B asked.
For the first time, his patient looked up. “Pain?” he asked, as if he hadn’t quite heard the droid’s words.
“Yes. I can certainly give you some painkillers.”
Commander Skywalker blinked, and he looked down at the stump of his arm. “I don’t think they’ll work on me.”
“Why, of course they will. All humans and humanoids are sensitive to our pharmacologics.”
“No, thank you.”
2-1B stopped his s
upply gathering and walked closer to his patient. “Why would you choose to feel pain? That is illogical.”
His patient shook his head. “It’s not that kind of pain.”
The droid nodded. His patient suffered beyond the flesh. That he understood, though sometimes it was not obvious upon first examination. Still, his heart rate was elevated. There was truly physical pain. And yet, his patient chose to suffer.
“Suffering can lead to problems with healing. You must not close yourself off to help, Commander.”
The patient looked up at the droid. Too-Onebee paused, then continued to busily clean off the stump and remove remnants of burned tissue. His hydraulics were incredibly sensitive; 2-1B’s mechanical touch was cold, but he tried to be very gentle.
“Suffering leads to more than just that,” his patient admitted.
“I treated you on Hoth. Do you not remember, Commander?”
“Yes, I remember. I asked for you specifically. And please, call me Luke.”
“Yes, Commander.”
Luke’s eyes flashed up at him.
“My apologies, sir. Luke, then. If that makes you more comfortable.”
He nodded.
“You may not remember, but when you were in dormoshock on Hoth, you resisted within the bacta tank, too. Only when you agreed to assistance did your healing begin properly. Bacta is a living thing. It needs your cooperation.” He added, “Luke,” as an afterthought, though it sounded a bit forced. He might have shouted the name a little.
“Really?”
“Yes. Flesh is flesh, but the will is quite powerful. Time and again, our medical data banks show the strength of the connection between a being’s thoughts and the corporeal.”
“The Force,” Luke said quietly.
“Well. I don’t know if our medical data banks call it that.”
Luke smiled a tiny bit. It was the first time his body relaxed. Not completely, but just a touch. “Call it whatever you want. But you’re right.”
Too-Onebee continued to remove tissue from his patient’s stump. Luke looked down at it and winced at the sight.
“Really. You ought to stop getting into so many life-threatening situations, Luke.” (This time, he didn’t shout his name.) “You are becoming my most frequently returning patient. One day you might return to me beyond repair, and I should not like that.”
“I can’t help it,” Luke said. “I don’t have a choice.”
“Do you not?” 2-1B responded. Just a casual response, but he didn’t expect his patient to go suddenly cold and grim-faced. He appreciated stoic patients, but the silence grew until he felt compelled to fill the void. “Now, once you have your new hand, it will feel very strange at first. Your brain will send signals to move your fingers, but occasionally it will feel as though there is a delay, even if there is not. Your nerves will still be recovering, so do expect your hand to spontaneously contract once in a while. And you may still have phantom pain while your nerves heal.”
“Phantom pain?” Luke asked.
“Yes. Your nerves were cut through entirely. They will sometimes experience the memory of that injury, even the memory of that hand. Some patients feel the pain, as if new, for the rest of their lives.”
Luke’s eyes looked glassy, and he dropped his head and sighed. “That’s a long time.” He glanced up at his caretaker with curiosity. “Do droids feel phantom pain when their limbs are cut off?”
“Our circuits have memory,” he responded. Then it was 2-1B’s turn to be quiet. He disliked when patients asked questions that probed too deeply into his own thoughts. It was all so much easier when he had a task to accomplish. Using a syringe, he carefully extruded the translucent bacta gel onto the freshly cleaned wound. “There. I have cleaned off all your scar tissue, and the bacta is already working on the nerve, muscle, tendon, bone, and skin. Now it’s time to begin the attachment process for your cybernetic hand.”
Too-Onebee went back to the supply wall and began selecting instruments for the next phase. For some reason, this procedure was not going the way he thought it would. Usually, 2-1B would have completed his task by now. But with Luke, he was working more slowly. He was baffled by some of his patient’s questions about 2-1B’s own sensory input and memories. No one ever asked about a droid’s injuries or pain. It occurred to him that with this artificial attachment, they would have this part of themselves in common. He paused, unsure where he ought to store this new information, before continuing. He picked up the appropriate-sized cybernetic hand, already pre-covered with synthskin to match Luke’s skin. His patient held out his good hand.
“Wait.”
“Wait? For what?” asked 2-1B. An FX droid rolled nearby, its cylindrical body slowly spinning with its multiple arms extending and contracting, thinking it was needed for assistance. “Oh, do go away, Effex-Seven! If you’re needed, I’ll call for you.” Too-Onebee shook his head. “Twenty elbows in the way, and Trandoshan toenail clippers always at the ready. That ridiculous droid.” He turned to Luke. “As you were saying?”
“Maybe you shouldn’t attach the cybernetic hand.”
“Pardon?” If 2-1B were human, he’d have dropped the surgical clamp in surprise. “What in the Maker’s name—why would you not want a replacement?”
“Maybe this was meant to be. Maybe I was destined to lose my hand, in exchange for something else.”
“In certain cultures, the amputation of a hand is done in exchange for the crime of thievery. But Luke, you have not stolen anything, and our laws do not condone such punishments.”
“It’s not that simple. I made mistakes.” He looked away, but even 2-1B could see that his face was stricken. “I could have learned the ways of the Force better. Faster. I was so stubborn. I was too foolish to see the trap in front of me.” He looked at his stump, with its tissues shiny from the recently applied bacta. It must have tingled; many patients reported the sensation at this point in the process. He banged his injured arm onto the examination table. His voice cracked as he muttered, “I could have saved Han.”
“Luke, I—”
“Even Yoda said, ‘this crude matter.’ ” Luke pressed the fingers of his good hand to his chest. “I don’t deserve to have it fixed. And maybe I don’t need to. If I learn the ways of the Force, one hand alone doesn’t matter.” He looked unsure. “Right?”
“The Force is not in the repertoire of my medical data banks,” 2-1B replied. “Medical droids and the Rebel Alliance are quite responsible for keeping people alive, too, you know,” he added, a touch haughtily. Oh, these creatures. Always thinking they could rush off to battle, while it was the medical droids and crew on ships like the Redemption that stitched them back together and healed them. Was that the Force at work? He didn’t know. Perhaps.
What he did know was that he was programmed to heal. How he ended up caring was another matter. But he did care. Luke was in pain, after all. In many ways. “Don’t deserve to have it fixed? All beings deserve to be cared for, to be healed.” He said this rather adamantly, and Luke seemed surprised by the passion in his words. “Moral perfection is no requisite for care. That would be cruelty itself, as no beings are perfect. As for your other comment…there is limited information in my programming on how the Jedi and Sith heal with respect to cybernetic implants. There could be many who live with artificial limbs and are, as you say, strong with the Force.”
Luke’s eyes widened at his words. “Sith? Like Darth Vader?”
“I do not know. When new data is gleaned, we medical droids share our data as a collective. Often the Empire destroys its own medical droids, so I know little of Darth Vader’s medical status. However, my understanding is that Darth Vader is heavily incorporated with cybernetic parts, if that is what you are asking.”
Luke was quiet again as 2-1B brought the disembodied cybernetic hand to the examination table on which Luke
rested his injured arm. His patient stared at it as if it were evil incarnate, a look of utter disgust that slowly transformed to an expression of anguish.
“Father,” he said weakly.
“I’m sorry, what did you say?”
Luke shook his head. “Nothing.” But he still seemed somewhat repulsed by the artificial hand.
2-1B cocked his head. “If you choose not to let me attach the new hand, that of course is your right and your decision. It is true that by giving you what you’ve lost, it will not necessarily make you…complete. Normal.” He searched for the word. “Whole?” Too-Onebee was well equipped with programming to make him more sympathetic. But it was a bit rusty, so to speak. Straightforward patient care was easy, but it went better when he used all his programming. It did take extra effort, though, and it made 2-1B somewhat uncomfortable. Perhaps that was why organics suffered so.
“All I know is that I can help you,” 2-1B continued. “And your friends can help you. After all, when a bone is broken, it requires time to mend. A crutch to lean on. Accepting such assistance is not weakness, nor is it gallant to forgo such treatment. Sometimes the harder choice is to accept help.”
Luke held up his stump, looking at it this way and that. “Crude matter.” His eyes went to the artificial hand. “It won’t be my hand, though.”
“It’s your tool, just as many other things in your world are your tools. A wheel instead of a leg; a mechno-lens instead of an eye. What does it matter? There is no shame in this.” Too-Onebee began to prepare the cybernetic hand for the delicate connections to Luke’s stump. “There is nothing inherently good or bad in it, unless you choose to use it as such. And it shall become a part of you. Every creature in this universe alters and evolves from minute to minute. We are not the same as we were only a day ago. We are ever changing, fated forever to exist in a state of decay and creation.”
“You’re a poet, Too-Onebee,” Luke said, a gleam of humor in his eye.
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