by Kathy Tyers
Instantly, he sensed that his news startled her. Did she know him? Should he know her? She turned her back and walked several steps away to rummage in a box on one table. She drew out a small square object. When she carried it back to Daye, she had regained her skeptical-crone expression. “Recognize this?”
Daye squinted his good eye. It was a c-board, and — by the Force, he recognized it! “That is a preliminary processing unit,” he said. “The heat deflection function of the armor dissipated energy momentarily, until the anti-energy field — ”
“Fine,” said Una Poot. “You’re real.”
“Tinian,” he breathed. “Has she been here? Who brought her? Is she still here?”
Una Poot’s laugh sounded like a snort. “She’s not on board, since that’s what you really want to know.”
His inner sense told him that her statement was literally true … but misleading. “Where is she?”
Una Poot hitched one foot up on a galley bench. “Listen, son. I have buried three husbands in space. Young love doesn’t last. So long as the Empire spreads, there is more important work to do than to sit staring into each others’ eyes. Can you live with that ethic? Because if you can’t, I don’t want you.”
“I can,” said Daye. “I let Tinian think that I’d died when the factory was destroyed. When I blew it up — from inside.”
The old woman’s frown wrinkles smoothed out. “Oh,” she said softly.
“I mean to dedicate what’s left of my life to bringing down the Empire.”
She grinned. “Good answer, boy. In that case, welcome to the Rebel Alliance. I’ll call down to the medic and tell him you’re on your way. But as soon as you’re out of the soup. I’ll have work for you.”
“Of course. That’s what I came here for. I had no idea you would have pieces to work with. That will simplify everything.”
He sensed faint surprise; she hadn’t meant to assign him R&D work. But she picked up his cue as if that’d been her plan. “We can’t afford to build it here. That’s the only problem. Toalar?” Una Poot turned to Daye’s Gotal companion. “Do you remember where the medical center is? Deck Three?”
“I think so.”
“Then get Daye Azur-Jamin down there on the double.”
Tinian woke up with an alarm klaxon ringing in her ears. Her leg throbbed the same rhythm. “What is it?” she cried. Then she remembered she’d bunked down on a stranger’s ship. Had she been betrayed?
Not by a Wookiee. If he thought she’d saved his life, the last thing he would ever do was betray her.
She stumbled in the only direction possible and found Chenlambec sitting in front of the Wroshyr’s command console. “What is it?” she asked again.
He bared his teeth and pointed at the viewscreen.
A huge wedge-shaped ship had appeared near Silver Station. “Star Destroyer,” she whispered. Adrenaline washed through her. A swarm of smaller ships, TIE fighters and others, swooped across the narrow distance between the Star Destroyer and the helpless station. Some had already reached it.
A light blinked on Chenlambec’s console. He swatted a control. A cracked voice came over a cabin loudspeaker. “ … now docked, this is Una Poot. We are under attack and outnumbered. Evacuate if you can. All ships now … ”
Chenlambec roared a challenge. Then he pointed at the other viewscreen. A squadron of Imperial fighters ran alongside Silver Station, pouring energy beams into the joint where two of its external corridors met. One long cylinder broke away from its neighbor. Gases spewing out of its cut end jet-powered the cylinder out to an even more desperate angle.
Tinian gulped. “My partners are in there somewhere! We’ve got to help them!”
Chenlambec roared a negative: he couldn’t afford moments, and she couldn’t help her companions by dying with them. He slammed a shaggy fist onto a control, then flicked a row of linked switches.
“Are you powering up?” Tinian clutched an overhead conduit. “Are we going to fight or run for it?”
He didn’t answer. The moment his ready lights glowed, he grasped a throttle momentarily — then flicked off the linked row. The Wroshyr lurched. Tinian assumed they’d just disengaged from the station. The Imperials, he explained, would fire on anything that was escaping under power, and his shields weren’t strong enough to absorb energy at this close range.
“Why not?” she exclaimed. “You’ve got to have shields!”
He barked: full shielding would cost more than the ship was worth. More than he brought home from a good bounty job.
Tinian gaped. People died because they couldn’t afford protection? She’d always taken armor for granted. Now she realized that poverty and peril sometimes traveled together.
Slowly, Silver Station seemed to drift away from the Wroshyr. Tinian caught herself holding her breath. This was just like before, waiting to be spotted and shot. Cheeve, Redd, and Yccakic —
Wait. She’d slept through the afternoon. By now, they should be on board Una Poot’s private tugship. What luck! Cheeve did have a knack for leaving town before trouble arrived.
Chenlambec suggested that if she didn’t want to watch, she hustle aft and strap down.
Tinian sank into his copilot’s chair. “I’d rather help, if I can.”
Chenlambec swept a hand across the row of engine controls: mains, laterals, retros. He would man the ship’s laser cannon if she’d stand ready to fire up all engines simultaneously. He would program a burn into the nav computer.
Tinian had always learned best under pressure. “I’ll do what I can,” she promised.
Daye had tried to relax when Silver Station’s Human medic lowered him into the tank and filled it with clear liquid. He tried to breathe normally through the mask. The synthetic fluid didn’t sting his eyes.
Then the medic released a flood of brilliant red bacta into the tank. Billions of tiny creatures seemed to crawl over him. A weird smell slithered into his breath mask. His skin twitched where he’d been wounded and started to heal, either naturally or covered with synthflesh. The medic had warned him that his body might resist treatment. He must relax and try to let the bacta work. It would seek out traumatized flesh. Healed tissue barred its way.
To keep from fighting it, he thought hard. He’d thrown everything away when he’d blown up I’att Armament. What was he becoming? A hopeless idealist, a freedom fighter?
He might survive now. The bacta might heal him.
(Microscopic creatures stung flesh, nibbling his scars — )
If the bacta healed him, he would run to Tinian —
No. He would still put Tinian behind him, both for her sake and so he could serve the Alliance freely. Besides, thinking about Tinian gouged fresh wounds into another part of him that was trying to heal.
He wondered if the bacta were dancing on his eardrums or if he heard an alarm. The medic had stepped out several lifetimes ago, actually only minutes, but —
Through red fluid and glass he spotted a huge dark form followed by one with Gotal horns. Woyiq and Toalar? The shapes came on quickly. The big one shrank again, moving away.
Then it returned, raising something overhead. Something with lots of right angles. A chair?
Daye’s tank split wide open. Fluid splashed the clinic floor.
Toalar seized Daye and started unhooking his breath mask and harness. He talked quickly while he worked, putting an amazing amount of expression into monotone speech. “Silver Station’s under attack. I don’t know if the Ranats squealed or if our ship was followed, but the Empire is here. There are scan pulses bouncing through everything. Una Poot’s got no defense force. The station’s coming to pieces.” Toalar had always claimed that his cone-shaped receptors picked up energy emissions.
“Here, Daye.” Woyiq flung him a brown cloth bundle. “It’s all I could find. I’m sorry. I hope it’ll do — ”
Before Woyiq apologized a second time, Toalar had slipped Daye into the cast-off Givin robe. Its sleeves dangled over his hands and
its selvage dragged past his feet, but it covered him.
“Can you stand?” Toalar asked. “Did the bacta take?”
“I’ll try.” Daye gritted his teeth and tried moving his legs. One tracked. The other didn’t. “You’d better carry me.”
“Right,” said Woyiq. “Up you get.” He turned around.
Daye wrapped his arms around the big man’s neck. Woyiq straightened. Daye tried to grip Woyiq’s middle with his legs, but only his right leg functioned. At least his shoulder didn’t hurt as badly as before. “Go,” he grunted.
He hung on until both arms and both shoulders ached, and then he hung on longer. Toalar dashed ahead of Woyiq. Brandishing a blaster, he peered around a corner and waved an all-clear.
Just as Woyiq followed around that corner, the corridor erupted in blaster fire. Laser blasts splattered the walls. Woyiq spun, and Daye flew off. He hit a wall feet-first. Newly regenerated nerves screamed bloody murder.
White armor appeared at the far end of the passage. “Go!” Daye cried. “I’ll just slow you down!”
“Good try,” muttered Woyiq as he bent over Daye. “We almost lost you once.” He seized Daye by both arms and heaved him over one shoulder.
Daye raised his head to look behind. A stormtrooper dropped into a firing crouch. Woyiq’s shoulder drove into Daye’s stomach. He curled around that shoulder, trying to cushion the gut-pounding bounce — and present a smaller target.
“Stop!” Toalar shouted. Daye raised his head again, tried to orient himself, and felt himself fall. He caught hold of something. Yellow foam sprayed his hands.
“Here they come!” Toalar shouted again.
Woyiq lowered his shoulder and ran at a tightly closed hatch.
Daye squinted to see what he’d activated. It looked like a flame douser, mounted by one clip to the bulkhead. He lunged at the clip and detached it, then scooted backward to lean against the bulkhead. He aimed the thick yellow spray past Woyiq and Toalar up the passage.
A white shape dashed into his line of fire. It arrived upright, went diagonal, and skidded out of sight horizontally. Woyiq presented his other shoulder and rammed the hatch again. It rang like a huge bell. Light appeared along one edge. “You’re through!” Daye cried, holding the spray steady. Another stormtrooper slid into the slime, through it, and past … but now they had troopers on both sides.
Woyiq picked up Daye and pushed him at the narrow opening. Daye reached through, slapping the wall high and low. Something gave. The hatch sprang open. Daye fell through a 90-degree gravity shift and hit the deck again. This time he rolled, absorbing the impact. He was going numb all over.
Woyiq picked him up like a doll and carried him in both arms. Toalar covered their retreat, firing behind them.
Woyiq took a right turn.
“No!” Toalar shouted. “Straight! We’re almost at the main dock!”
Woyiq sped up a final passage, around one more corner, and up a boarding ramp. He skidded to a halt at the sight of a blast rifle’s muzzle.
“Friendly!” called Toalar. “Una, let us through!”
Thank the Force! “Hurry it up!” Una shouted. “Did you get him?”
The tugship shuddered. Woyiq pounded down into its main passage. “They fired the explosive bolts,” exclaimed Toalar. “We’re underway.”
“Is that Daye?” Una hated repeating questions. Especially urgent ones. “We need that boy.”
Woyiq turned around and showed Daye and Una Poot to each other. Pink streaks on Daye’s face evidenced an incomplete bacta treatment.
“Good,” she said. “Bring him to the bridge.”
Daye asked, “Are the armor pieces aboard?”
“Yes, though I don’t know why.” Una Poot seized Woyiq’s arm and pulled the huge Human along. She felt like a Chadra-Fan hauling a Whiphid. “Our people can’t afford body armor.” Still, she knew people who might be able to develop it. The uniformed Alliance sprang to mind. This time, she didn’t dismiss the thought. With Silver Station about to blow, she’d have to lie low for a while … as soon as her tugship delivered one shipment to the Monor System. “What took you so long?” she puffed.
“Sorry,” said Woyiq. “Really, I’m sorry — ”
“We stopped to play tag with stormtroopers.” Toalar holstered his blaster and rubbed his perceptor horns. “Long day.”
“Get up here,” Una ordered. “Get Daye where he can see the main screen.” This attack would cost him dearly. They would never get him into bacta in time for complete regeneration now. He would need prosthetics, and from the twitch in his face, he knew it. She must give him hope. These sensitives could be delicate.
The tugship shuddered. “We’re hit!” cried a crewman.
“They worry,” grumbled Una. “These shields’ll stand four or five direct hits. The Sitting Duck was a fine ship even with two dozen culslon gas tanks in tow. We’ll make it. Over there, son. Look.” She pointed out a vector.
Silver Station shrank in the near distance. Farther away, a small, saucer-shaped ship swooped back toward a TIE fighter, firing energy bursts. The Imperial exploded. The saucer streaked out of the nebula and vanished.
Still cradled by Woyiq, Daye tugged the Givin robe closed over his chest. “Somebody hit back, anyway,” he said.
“That was your lady,” Una crowed. “She got away safe, too.” Tinian had also used precious comm time begging Una to rescue Cheeve, Redd, and Yccakic. Una had transmitted back: they were as safe as she was.
“Thank you,” Daye exclaimed. “But how do you know it’s Tinian?”
“She joined up with a friend of mine, a big strong Wookiee. Chenlambec needed a partner with her kind of abilities.” Partnering that pair had been a rare stroke of serendipity. Another long fuse now sputtered under the Emperor’s throne.
“Wookiee activists aren’t known for leading quiet lives,” Daye objected softly.
Drogue had been protective, too. He’d hurt when Una hurt. “You want to fight the Empire. So does she. But she needs someone to teach her. Are you going to deny her that?”
Before he could answer, Toalar pointed at the aft screen. “Look!”
Two squadrons of TIE fighters chased the tugship at full speed. They obviously wouldn’t reach firing range before the Duck jumped into hyperspace.
“This is some ship.” Daye tugged the Givin robe closed again.
Una grinned. “That’s why we held her for final evacuation. She’s my own, and I’ve kept the crew current.”
“But Silver Station’s in Imperial hands.” Daye shook his head. “We’re defeated, aren’t we. Una Poot?”
Una thought of the Rebel rabble waiting at Monor and the cargo stashed in her holds. She planted both hands on her hips. “Never. The Empire can’t beat us, so long as one of us lives. Every time we escape, we live to fight another day. If enough worlds rise, we’ll drive the Empire out of the galaxy.”
Daye’s dark eyes gleamed. “I hope we survive to see that.”
Mission accomplished: his gloom had lifted. She patted his uninjured shoulder. “As soon as we jump to lightspeed and my medic looks you over, how about a little music to help you rest? You’ll enjoy my nephew Cheeve’s band—”
“Cheeve?” Daye’s odd eyebrows shot up. “Sprig Cheever, of Druckenwell?”
Roleplaying Game Statistics
Tinian I’att
Type: Young Refugee
DEXTERITY 3D+1
Blaster: hold-out blaster 5D, dodge 4D, grenade 4D+1, running 4D+2
KNOWLEDGE 3D
Alien species 4D+2, bureaucracy 5D+2, business 6D, languages: Wookiee 6D+1, streetwise 4D, survival 4D, value 4D+2, willpower 4D+2
MECHANICAL 2D
PERCEPTION 3D+2
Bargain 6D, command 6D, con 4D+2, hide 4D+2, persuasion 5D+2, search 6D, sneak 5D
STRENGTH 2D
Climbing/jumping 3D+2, stamina 4D
TECHNICAL 4D
Computer programming/repair 5D+1, demolition 7D+2, droid programming 5
D, droid repair 4D+2, security 6D
Special Abilities:
Explosives Expertise: Tinian is especially knowledgeable about explosives, including their composition, construction and applications. She gets a +1D bonus to any skill rolls involving explosives.
Force Points: 1
Character Points: 12
Move: 10
Equipment: Bits of fuse wire, c-boards from prototype stormtrooper shield, several outfits
Capsule: Seventeen-year-old Tinian recently fled the industrial world of Druckenwell, where the Empire took over her grandparents’ armament factory. Killed in the takeover were both of her grandparents, her beloved Wookiee bodyguard Wrrl, and — she believes — her fiancé, Daye Azur-Jamin. Tinian has turned cold — her ability to open herself up to others as she did with Daye is gone. She considers herself completely alone in the galaxy, overshadowed by her own grief, and seems to care about nothing. Tinian insists she’d just as soon die as live. But before she dies, she wants to hurt the Empire as badly as possible.
Growing up in the I’att Armament tradition, Tinian served in almost every capacity at the company’s chief research and production facility on Druckenwell — droid programming, material procurement, line inspections, quality control and even security. Through her involvement in I’att Armament, she gained an intimate knowledge of explosives, including the ability to identify certain explosive compounds by texture and odor.
Cheever and the Band
Sprig Cheever’s band travels the space lanes, jumping from one system to the next, taking on whatever gigs they can get. Recently they’ve been on the run from Imperials while Cheever, his Bottom Viol player Yccakic and their sound droid help Tinian escape with c-boards stolen from prototype shielded stormtrooper armor.
Cheever is a slender Human sporting a neatly trimmed goatee. His easy-going nature is shown through his fluid posture. If Cheever isn’t leaning on something he’s slouching in a chair or comfortably draped over his KeyBed. Protecting Tinian is the closest he’s ever been to concerned, since she has little experience out in the space lanes.