Perhaps this was the beginning, the instigating factor.
They had to be careful, but they also had a job to do. A calling.
She passed by the Trilon wishing tree, smiling at her own contributions still waving in the wind, faded and worn. So many wishes, hopes, dreams, fears, oaths, promises, some going back decades and some only a few hours old. It was beautiful, the faith of the people of Black Spire. Stepping under the shade of the awning and up to the counter, she asked for Savi. It was more ceremonial, at this point, since she knew how to find Savi and was one of the few beings for whom his door was always open. But still, they were a people of ritual and respect, the Gatherers, and so she played her part.
Kimbe nodded and informed her that she could go on inside, and she inclined her head with thanks and ducked into the entryway of Savi’s personal workshop. Very few people in the outpost knew what truly happened within. They saw the scrapyard and Savi’s public showroom, where he sold their old goods and bought their scrap, but no one ever questioned what was stored in the bulk of the building or what Savi spent so much of his time doing with his collected junk. This hallway was mostly for storage and show, with a variety of old objects displayed on the walls. But if you went a little farther in…
Well, Savi’s workshop was private for a reason.
It wasn’t long before the old man walked over in his work apron, dusting his hands off before giving Ylena his full attention.
“It’s happening,” she told him. “This afternoon. The Resistance must make their move, for soon the First Order will leave and tell their superiors in the fleet what has happened here. We can’t let that come to pass. The consequences could be dire.”
Savi put a warm, wrinkled hand on her shoulder. “I know, child,” he said. “I’ve been listening. The heated water must eventually boil. What is it you need?”
Ylena looked down. “I’m…not sure. I feel certain we must help Vi. That she is part of our destiny.”
Savi’s nod was knowing. “And we have helped her. More than she’ll ever know.”
“But what if it’s not enough? Can’t we give her one of the—”
“No.” He cut her off firmly but kindly. “Just as we follow the Force but cannot access it, so is she bound by her limitations. The only weapons she’ll bring to this fight are those she has discovered on her own.”
“And our people?”
“We are not fighters. We serve a greater purpose. You know that, too.”
Ylena’s head hung. “I strongly feel that we are meant to play a greater role in this conflict between the Resistance and the First Order. Why else do we collect artifacts and ancient weapons? Why else do we learn all that we can from the legacy of the Jedi and the Sith if not to use it, as they would, to protect the balance?”
Savi sighed. “We are Gatherers, not Jedi. The flock, not the shepherds. We have no powers, no edict. We can only wait and watch and listen, not guide. We hold a candle but will not light any fuse. We do protect the balance, but not always by shifting the scales. This conflict is far from over. I’m certain we will play our part one day. But not today.”
“I suppose Oga has also come to call on you,” Ylena dared to venture.
A roguish smile. “She has. I have been forbidden from personally interfering with the escalating trouble between the Resistance and the First Order here at the outpost.”
“As you say.” She looked up, raising her chin; she’d heard the hidden truths between his words. “Then what if I wish to use my own money to purchase weapons. As a regular customer of the scrapyard?”
Savi’s laugh boomed, and Batlizards fluttered in the room’s dark corners, roused from their nests. “Then I would let you know that we have a great many old blasters that can be purchased at a very reasonable price. Tell Kimbe to load up the speeder.”
Tears shone in Ylena’s eyes. “Thank you, Savi.”
“You’re welcome, Ylena. Take care. And may the Force be with you.”
She smiled. “It always is.”
That’s one of the first things he’d taught her, when she’d become one of his loyal Gatherers—you couldn’t escape the inescapable. Perhaps she could not use the Force, but she could let the Force use her.
ARCHEX HAD LIVED IN FIRST ORDER quarters for so long that being out of doors on a planet like Batuu made the permanently knotted muscle between his shoulders itch. Such a place was too big, too wild, too…disordered. Some might consider the twitter of birds and rustle of leaves calming, but his idea of calm had been forged among perfectly polished plastoid, flawlessly smooth metal, and squadrons of identical figures who moved as one. The most tranquil thing he could imagine was his own cabin back on the Absolution, right after he’d shined his armor, shaved his head and face, and taken a shower while the cleaning droids had visited—and all on a good day when everything went as planned with no surprises, no one was out of line, and no mechanical or technological malfunctions occurred.
He longed to do a good job, to serve a function, but the chaos and noise of the Resistance outpost made him uncomfortable. That’s why he’d found a small room among the ruins that no one else seemed to care about, a place built of nothing but cold, clean stone where he could finally let all his masks drop and just…be.
Here, he could feel his pain. He could mutter to himself. He could catch his breath or rub the aching place under his ribs or beat on his leg with both fists or work through the fight combinations he’d taught tiny children so that they might one day graduate from his teachings and learn from Captain Phasma how to kill. He liked the symmetry of it—using the First Order’s teachings to make himself stronger now so that he could beat them in turn—or help beat them. He wasn’t very useful on his own, these days.
He was accustomed to being around thousands of people, yet four beings, a droid, and a pig nearly drove him mad. Even if his current companions were louder and less disciplined than anyone on a Star Destroyer, he still didn’t want them to hear him muttering, to see the rituals he needed to complete in order to feel like himself. It was private, this connection to what he’d once been: a man in his prime, unhindered by wounds, powerful and confident and strong, certain of his place in the world. Not only that, but he’d been programmed to never show weakness, and no matter how firmly his Cerean metaphysical guides had tried to break those connections in his mind, still they lingered, just as firm and unyielding as they’d ever been. Archex had simply learned to hide certain parts of himself to make those around him feel more comfortable.
That was the hard thing about leaving the First Order: They forged you into a weapon, but a weapon was useless without hands to guide it. Archex actually missed the whispers in his bunk—the orders, propaganda, and First Order philosophy slogans pumped into his brain while he slept. When someone else told you how to think, you could free yourself from decisions and just do your job. There was an elegant, tidy simplicity to that kind of life.
And that was another thing he missed—having a clear position, clear duties. As Captain Cardinal, he’d known exactly where he stood in the pecking order—the First Order organizational chart was easily accessible. He knew who was below him and owed him deference and who was above him and deserved his respect. But here, they were all equals—no officers, really, no chain of command. Just Vi, doing her best to lead, and without recent orders from her own superiors. Perhaps she had a rank, but no one used it. She had natural leadership skills but no proper training, especially regarding how to command.
And that was what truly cut the most deeply: In all their preparations for the assault on the First Order transport, Vi had given him no orders. No one had even mentioned him.
They’d completely forgotten him.
THE CANTINA HAD ALWAYS FELT LIKE home to Zade. Not this cantina, necessarily, but any cantina—the absolute reality of a cantina. It didn’t matter if it was Oga’s pub or any other bar on
any other world. He’d practically grown up in a cantina. He had fallen asleep on ale-sticky leather booth seats as a boy on Tatooine as his mother and stepfather drank heavily to forget the harsh demands of life in the dunes, and he’d sneaked into the seediest establishments possible before he was twelve, posing as a Jawa to buy the cheapest booze available. Half the time it would work, and he’d get sauced and shout “Utinni!” all night to keep up the charade. The other half of the time, he’d get kicked outside in the dirt in his stolen brown robes, seething with rage, swearing that he would grow up and show them.
Show what to whom, though? He still hadn’t figured that part out.
And now, to think he’d lucked into a job that combined his two greatest strengths: drinking and demanding attention. Not only that, but both activities were in the service of the Resistance. Zade had never been one for politics or labels before quite recently, but he hated the First Order now with the fire of a thousand suns.
The job should’ve been easy: Pick up a load of moogyyrko sap on Kashyyyk that would be refined into liquor later, party with the Wookiees for a couple of days, deliver the loot to Oga Garra at Black Spire Outpost on Batuu, and all his previous fees and fines would be forgiven. Nothing special, nothing flashy, nothing he hadn’t done a hundred times for a hundred different shady gangsters, and the deal had never gone awry in his hands. Honor among thieves and all that.
And it had gone fine—especially the partying-with-Wookiees bit—right up until the First Order hailed him, interrogated him about his cargo, used their tractor beam to suck his ship into their much larger ship, and stole every last barrel of sap. It had been such a businesslike theft, too, almost as if it had been a tax instead of outright thievery. A crisply dressed officer in all black had unapologetically explained that Zade was being “relieved” of his cargo, and that was it. No real explanation, no apology. They cleaned him out and let him leave.
Oh, and they killed his partner, Valoss, for trying to stop them.
Valoss had been his best mate since childhood, his navigator, his better half, the quiet and respectable side of their duo. And while Zade had accepted that sometimes the bigger fish caught and ate the smaller fish, Valoss had always had this obnoxious sense of right and wrong. The peculiar Devaronian just couldn’t handle injustice—or the loss of creds she could send back home to her family.
And she picked exactly the wrong time to go from the strong and silent type to the strong and stupid type.
“This is illegal theft of privately owned goods,” Valoss said reasonably.
“Pew,” the officer responded unreasonably, speaking through his blaster.
Valoss fell to the floor, and the officer looked to Zade, his expression as flat and blank as the clean silver walls surrounding them. He didn’t even look human in that moment—he was like a droid, expressionless and certain.
“Do you wish to register a complaint?” he asked.
Zade took a deep breath. “No, sir.”
“Then you may go.”
Zade was halfway back to the Midnight Blade before the officer reminded him to clean up his friend’s corpse, and he learned just how much Valoss had grown as he dragged her body onto the ship they’d been piloting together for ten years. As soon as he was out of range of that tractor beam, he’d ejected Valoss into space among the stars she loved per her once-hypothetical wishes and started drinking. He’d had enough fuel to get to Batuu, but that was it. They’d run out of cash and had desperately needed Oga’s promised delivery fee and clemency. And thus, when Zade landed without his cargo, his ship had been impounded by the minions of one furious Blutopian gangster. And here he was.
Ah, but now he had the chance to strike back at the heart of both the First Order and Oga Garra. Rusko had reprimanded him several times for speaking too loudly against the First Order in the cantina, but tonight—oh, tonight would be fun. Who cared if he got kicked out of the biggest cantina on the entire planet? Chances were good he would die in the fight, buying time for Kriki to reprogram that First Order ship. And if it didn’t work, the cantina would be rubble, anyway, after the First Order razed the planet. The planet Zade was trapped on.
His luck, lately, had not been good. As they said around here, annoying as it was, he did not have the better hand.
Valoss had been the better hand, and look where that’d gotten her. Zade liked to think of her orbiting the planet now, a third moon.
He gulped the last of his Outer Rim and licked the salt off the edge of the glass. He straightened the knot on his scarf and shot his cuffs, for all that they were ratty and dusty now, not at all how he preferred them. Throwing his shoulders back, he turned and leaned against the bar as he had on his first night here, surveying the room.
It was the busiest time of night, when both early pippa birds and night starmarks were buzzed. A Sullustan quartet was playing live jazz, a lively number that kept everyone in a good mood. Rusko, thankfully, wasn’t at his table, but N’arrghela and the Talpini were, just taking up space and staring down the clientele as the Wookiee picked her teeth with the bone from her Bloody Rancor.
Zade felt the tiniest thrill of stage fright. Sure, he’d been talking down the First Order for days, telling his own story and spreading the tales he’d heard of abuse in the market streets. He’d loudly described the bruises and cuts on Vi’s face and how Oh-li had plucked one of Jenda’s bloody teeth from the cobblestones. But tonight, he wouldn’t just be stirring up discontent and reminding everyone how close they were to the galaxy’s biggest bully. He wouldn’t just be spinning yarns about how the First Order could show up out of the blue at any moment, like some childhood monster, and destroy someone’s life, livelihood, and bone structure.
No, tonight, he would actually try to rile these people to action.
He was fully aware that just a few weeks ago, such a speech would’ve had zero effect on him personally. He would’ve sat in a shadowy booth, elbowed Valoss in the ribs, and said, Would you look at this poor sap? If you stay in place, of course they’re going to find you. That’s why we keep moving.
But now, he was staying in place. And he was going to fight.
He pushed away from the bar, just the right amount of tipsy to be charismatic, fearless, reckless, and boneless. He’d been watching the cantina door all night, but not a single stormtrooper had stuck their bucket into the business of the common man. Surely they had allies and toadies in the crowd, but he’d be watching for them—and gone before they could report on his activities here tonight. Yes, he was positively fizzing and high on life, but for once, he wasn’t nearly as drunk as he looked.
“My friends!” he roared, so loud that the poor Sullustan musicians in back all left their song on awkward toots and blats. The cantina’s chatter went quiet, the expectant silence punctuated with curious whispers.
“You all know me,” he began with a delicate bow. “But perhaps you don’t know my story. My name is Zade Kalliday, and my luck ran out when the First Order intercepted my ship while I was en route to deliver a load of liquor to our beloved proprietor, Oga Garra.” He blew a kiss in the vague direction of the dark hallway where Vi said one of the secret doors to Oga’s lair was hidden.
“Now my ship is impounded, my friend and navigator is dead, and I’m stuck here without a spira to my name.”
“Then how’d you get the drinks?” some naughty heckler called out.
Zade winked at him. “Ask your mother,” he quipped.
The crowd clapped and laughed appreciatively, warming up to him, and he stepped forward, for once letting pain show in his eyes. Tonight, he needed more than pizzazz—he needed vulnerability. He needed honesty. And he would deliver.
“Most of us live lives of quiet dignity. We toil, we reap, we drink, we die—with perhaps a few other pleasant pastimes in between. We instinctively shy away from pain, or else we’d all hop into the first pretty fire we
ever saw. We move away from fear, from cruelty. And so it’s easy to hear tales of the First Order and think—but I live a good life, so surely that won’t happen to me. We tell ourselves that if we just keep our heads down and keep working, the monster won’t see us. We toe the line, and we hope to be ignored by the beast at the gate.”
He paused, the crowd held enraptured, and drank a shot sitting untouched and forgotten on a table.
“But, my friends, the beast has passed through the gate. The beast is on our planet. In our outpost. The beast has planted spies among your fellow drinkers tonight, possibly among your friends. And these spies think, If I do as the beast asks, I alone will be immune to its hunger. But they are wrong. The First Order doesn’t care about any of you. Not a one.”
He hopped up onto the bar. “Let me say that again: The First Order doesn’t care about you. They only care about order—their version of it. It’s right there in the name. They only care about leaving no one alive who wishes to stand up to them. They want your silence, your complacence, your fear. They want you to turn your head when you see old women beaten in the street while minding their own business. They want you to ignore citizens of the galaxy being shot point-blank or dragged off to secretive interrogations that leave them broken and scarred. The First Order does not ask for your vote or your consent; they want only your obedience and silence.”
“Yeah!” a few voices shouted as fists banged on tables. A shadowy figure detached from the back of the cantina and fled into the night, and although Zade couldn’t identify them, he knew his time was now ticking down.
“People of the spire, the line between minding your business and defending your freedom is thin as a razor blade. You can’t tiptoe along it. You have to make that cut, draw that line in the sand, and believe that you can make a change. That your choices can leave a mark. That you can serve something better. There’s a hero inside each of you, waiting for your moment of greatness.”
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