An Offer You Don't Refuse - 9.075

[Taataani Meorrrei]

Space travel was, is, and will always be for nunas.

It was necessary, but a necessary evil. Even in the best of circumstances it was a chore to endure, and these were far from the best of circumstances. The quarters were usually too small, the air too cold, too dry, too recycled, too not-quite-right. In space you had no natural day and night cycles. You didn't know what was early and what was late. When you arrived, you had to reset your biological clock to some other planet with a completely different rotational schedule. That usually involved stimulants, alcohol, and/or too much / too little sleep. These were just the major frettings. Forget trying to wrap your mind around dressing for a place with a cold climate or worrying about a breathable atmosphere. Holo-meetings could be done from the comfort of your office, barefoot, in luxurious plush carpet.

Still, Taataani had travelled enough to plan around these unpleasantries like a professional, and she had a series of rules in place:
Charter your own travel: Mass transit, even first class or whatever they offered for preferential treatment, was for proles and rubes. Too many other people. Not that she wasn't a people person but that environment prevented mingling in a way she was comfortable with. Also you will never get a decent bit of sleep on one of those, no matter how hard you try. Also, private transit tends to be liberal on the eccentricities of the traveler, including and most especially the need to smoke while on board. This shouldn't even be an issue since they've invented air scrubbers, but if you have to suffer the hoi polloi, someone will always complain if you light up.
Dress in layers: Being able to offset a drop in ten degrees on a new planet with a convenient shawl or a knit jacket kept the shock in transitioning down to a minimum. Also with a bit of coordination, dressing in a somewhat modular fashion could allow you to mix and match, and keep things fresh if you needed to extend your stay. Taurrifar was expert at choosing outfits, and the rule was no fewer than two a day, with another four outfits per week in case of special circumstances on a longer trip. Her favored mate always made sure to go over the arrangements with her briefly before they travelled, as he would have also taken the trouble of making appropriate alterations to outfits in advance, where needed.
Alcohol: Almost any flight will serve it to you, sure. But they'll serve it wrong. Caridan crimets with Naboo varka and a vermouth that tastes like you could smear it on a pancake. No, crimets demands jirin, and jirin comes from Kashyyyk. No, Imperial embargoes do not change this fact. Even at a 400% markup, you order Kashyyyk or you don't order at all, because then you're ordering a drink that isn't a crimets but is in fact something you cry into as a consolation for drinking over-sweet grog with the subtlety of the fat person squeezed into the seat next to you. A crimets needs to have a dry, pithy bitter bite to pair with the right kind of subdued, barely-tasting-of-flowers vermouth, and that is from jirin, and it's not optional. There's at least thirty other drinks that are probably very important to have on a flight to avoid fraying your nerves to the breaking point, but use the crimets as the brief example. Suffice to say, you need the right alcohol, and the right person at the ready to put it all together for you.
Privacy: Whether it's sleep, sex, or worst of all, business. You need it. You don't get it crammed in common use areas with every other plebian in the galaxy.
A full sized refresher: Not up for debate and you should be killed if you disagree. This includes a sonic shower. Some lesser modes of travel try to mask the fact that you're going a day without a full cleanse with little towelettes. Even humanoids without a sensitive nose can tell, and they will avoid you. It's not even a big fuss about aromatic oils and salts because those can be brought along if absolutely necessary.
Food: Even with the best-laid plans this one goes wrong. Of course, the Cizeri option for almost every in-flight meal consists of nervous laughter from your steward, and if you're persistant, a watery Bloody Amidala with non-fresh oysters chucked in the bottom as an afterthought, which neither food nor drink does it make. So if you choose to suffer, you stuff yourself before you travel, and endure a protracted starvation for however long it takes to reach your destination, or you make sure that amenities are stocked. Nothing grandiose, there's no need to butcher fresh venison, but a live well is lovely and a few small food pens don't hurt for variety. Oysters are fine, but only an idiot knows if they're not day-boat caught. If in doubt, snails keep better, and sajoi best of all.
Don't fly alone: It's sometimes unavoidable when on business, but if you can afford to charter and have abided by the rules above, you should also have company with you. Unless you need absolute quiet to do busy work on your travels, you're not going to want to read a novel or watch some derivative dopey holo that is playing. The company of others (others that you choose to bring with you, that is) is infinitely more stimulating. Sometimes literally. Even if you have to resort to just chatting up the pilot, make sure you are capable of doing so.With all of this said, none of it is guaranteed to keep you from being miserable, especially if you travel after getting bad news, like a summons to Coruscant because the Imperial Navy is eager to have your business bid on a contract to supply their cruisers with sublight thrusters. It's not sexy or headline-grabbing, but it both has the potential to be lucrative beyond your wildest dreams, as well as being destructive to your conscience when you supply people you morally oppose. But one thing is for sure. You don't say no. At least not in so few words.

Figuring those words out was going to take Taataani the whole damn distance from Carshoulis Prime to Coruscant, and she needed a distraction. First, a perfectly-prepared Caridan crimets. That helped. After a sip, she looked to her side, and to the pilot currently ferrying her on her way.

"What'ss jyourr name?"

[Ben Merasska]

"Ah, Ben Merasska, ma'am," the pilot responded, blinking and sparing the felinoid female a half-surprised glance. Normally the big-wigs he shuttled around didn't even give him the time of day. The really bad trips were the ones where they did. He still couldn't quite remember the time he shuttled a senator's son and his friends from Coruscant to Corulag, and he still couldn't work for Core Worlds Shuttle Service, despite the incident having happened years ago.

He in fact always came prepared for the eventuality that someone would try to seem like a common man's man:

Dress for the Occasion: He normally wore the loudest and most exotic shirts he could find (and afford). Contrary to popular belief, the odder he seemed, the less likely the 'guests' would talk to him and more about him amongst themselves. Even if they were alone, he would go the opposite route and go for the blandest clothing he could find. The more boring the look, the less likely someone in a smaller group of passengers would speak to him.
Always look busy: This one is known throughout the galaxy as the employee's method of skirting actual work. Even if it's simply reading schematics, looking busy or pretending to do work will deter most if not all of the nosier passengers. If you're desperate, actually do work. Some passengers can tell the difference.
Prepare fake alarms: This one was controversial and a bit dangerous. Ben almost never resorted to this path, because of the problems that could be had if there was an actual situation which precipitated an actual need for an alarm. That said, it was useful for cutting off the most determined of chatter-uppers from engaging him in conversation.
Don't Fly Alone: There are a couple reasons for having a co-pilot on a largely automated shuttle or transport, but one of the more important lesser reasons was to run interference and deflect the questions and the attention away from the pilot, who usually had a job to do. Good, diplomatic co-pilots were a commodity fiercely fought over in transport piloting profession, for precisely this reason. Some noted that the system largely fed on itself: by the time the co-pilots became pilots, they had lost all interest in chatting with their passengers (seeing it as a symbol of lower status) and would perpetuate the system by fighting over good, diplomatic co-pilots.Always was a term that didn't lend itself to relativity much, and so Ben had to amend the term: Ben usually prepared all of the above (and more) to stave off the mostly inane and distracting conversation of his passengers. But that kriffing cheater Davak had to go had land that cushy mission transporting the models of the Leia's Secret Catalogue (not named after the late princess and senator of Alderaan, but after the woman who founded the lingerie line that could be modified for most humanoid species), and his choices were either:


1. Go by himself, or
2. Take a protocol droid


Taking a protocol droid would have led him to commit suicide, and probably more problems and distractions than it would solve. Thus here he was, by himself, taking a rich Cizerack and one of her mates to Coruscant (as it was still called in the Mid and Outer Rim).


"Anything in particular I can, ah, help you with?"

[Taataani Meorrrei]

This was an opportune time to skewer him for any possible foibles and offenses committed thusfar. She was relatively comfortable, the climate control wasn't set to some obnoxious level. Taurrifar had already seen to her refreshment and provided her with a pillow and blanket to have at the ready. She wasn't hungry, but that eventuality had been seen-to and the JS-77B Interstellar shuttle they travelled in had enough room to handle that necessity. The refresher was small, but it suited all of the most basic needs.

That left company. Taurrifar, of course, was a dear to talk to about all manner of things, but she needed a cleaner distraction. Plus, he still had a few bits of her luggage to sort. Ben Merasska was it, then.

"jI'm fjine, thank jyou."

She paused for a sip, and her left ear twitched a little as she tried to place his voice. It was very familiar, but she hadn't a clue from where.

"jYou ssound famjiljiarr. Have jI hjirred jyou beforre?"

[Ben Merasska]

Oh I'm fine. I'm fine. Then why did you ask my name to begin with?!

"Not that I can recall, ma'am," he said, checking the readouts on the sublight engines and the hyperdrive core. It was hard to be 'personable' while also trying to remain 'aloof'. Short, but polite answers were usually good. Not in this instance, however.

She did remind him of something though. Someone, more like. But the only Cizerack he knew - the only Cizerack he'd ever met - was the mechanic Cirrsseeto Rraurrssatta (he always butchered the guy's surname). It wasn't likely that he'd managed to pick up some relative of his out of all the Cizeracks on the planet he could have accepted a job from.

Her voice, however, was what kept that niggling little feeling from disappearing. He ignored it with all the grace and aplomb a lifetime of ignoring things could impart to a man. He also ignored the bad feeling he got from deciding to continue the conversation.

"I've never actually transported Cizerack passengers before," he said, making sure not to make eye contact, but also trying not to seem rude. "This is a first for me."

[Taataani Meorrrei]

She smiled knowingly at that. Male, human, and booking work in the cluster? Even through an agency she didn't imagine that it was frequent. Of course, Taataani knew agencies priced that out. She'd done her homework, and then turned around and insisted on a discounted price from the agency that she knew she'd get. Was it wrong to cash in on a system built by bigots? Maybe.

"Well jI'll prromjisse to be gentle forr jyourr fjirrsst tjime. Keep uss jin a sstrrajight ljine and make good tjime and jI'm prractjicalljy docjile."

Setting her cocktail into a holder designed for such contingencies, she worked on preparing a thin cigarra.

"Wherre'ss jyourr home porrt, jiss that how thejy ssajy jit?"

[Ben Merasska]

Her crack about being gentle made him smile. Her question about his home port wiped that smile off his face more quickly than a Star Destroyer reverting from hyperspace right in front of him.

"I don't have one," he said simply after a moment. Remembering Alderaan still hurt, but he shifted his mind to the hum of the engines, the smell of his uniform, and the sight of the stars, unblemished by an atmosphere, though he was sure there was a gas cluster somewhere in the direction the cluster was facing. The stars' twinkling had the effect of being behind a pane of flawed glass.

He settled the shuttle into the right vector and pushed the hyperspace lever forward. The stars disappeared into the tunnel of hyperspace.

"Probably should find one, though," he continued as nonchalantly as he could. "But I enjoy it too much out here."

With the ship now on course, Ben decided that conversation was now unavoidable and turned to look at the Cizerack. Oh yeah. Definitely rich, and definitely not trying to be personable. She was just bored enough to engage him in conversation.

"I guess you don't, then?"

[Taataani Meorrrei]

He stiffened a bit when she asked about home, and then opted out. Probably some sort of rolling stone romantic like more than a few spacers she knew. Still, something in his body language told her to steer clear of that.

"Don't get me wrrong, jI love trravel. Jusst ussualljy the end rressultss. Ssomethjing about the ajirr...the ljight..."

She lit her cigarra, a plume of purple smoke rising above her wig.

"Of courrsse therre'ss alsso the 'what jif we all explode' parrt, but jI don't conssjiderr that a phobjia, jusst bejing awarre."

Finishing her sentence with an exhaled breath of smoke, she glanced over again.

"Sso wjith the trravel and no ssettljing down, ssoundss ljike jyou'rre rratherr marrjied to the job, then? No Mrs. Merrassska?"

[Ben Merasska]

"Ha! This isn't a life well suited for a married man," he said, leaning back and enjoying the safety and sheer invincibility that he felt at the moment. He was just some normal guy. War? What war?

He didn't want to laugh, but the thought of him married was just ridiculous. He managed to keep the outburst to a minimum. He then decided to address her first point.

"Everybody always focusses on the whole exploding thing," he sighed. "Don't worry about the hulking Star Destroyers who'll fire as soon as hail ya, or that a star could explode and gamma radiation could strip an atmosphere bare. Asteroids, comets, malfunctioning atmospheric gear leading to asphyxiation if you're lucky on some worlds... and that's just the stuff from the black. Once you actually get on a planet and can breathe, there's still the stuff on the planet itself that could kill you."

[Taataani Meorrrei]

"Frrom everrjy sspacerr jI've met, jyou'd be rrjight on the monejy about that, jI ssupposse."

She thought about Sanis. Yep, that fit the bill. Of course she hoped her son would be the iconoclast. Even if it was Lyanie Qaez that would make an honest man out of him. The thought of him continuing to be a rambler gave her few comforts.

As for the mortality discussion? She gave a little shrug.

"Ljike jI ssajid, jit'ss not a phobjia. jYou'rre rrjight. Morrosse, perrhapss, but rrjight. Bessjidess, at leasst gojing that wajy would be qujick."

Another drink, and a sigh. She wasn't afraid of death. At least not in any way she'd given serious thought to. There were things beyond that which terrified her, and things which led to her talking to Ben, to get her mind off of them.

[Ben Merasska]

Ben shivered and grimaced, deciding that he'd enough of this particular conversation. It wasn't so bad, but all he needed to was to trip up about one particular thing and this rich Cizerack would likely try to claw him. After they landed, of course, as to claw him mid-flight would be reckless.

"Maybe it's the ration bars, the cramped quarters, and the attendant lack of privacy," he grinned. "Always having to fix or rig something so the ship can fly better, and after a while most stars look the same. If you've seen one red giant, you've seen 'em all. Familiar isn't so romantic. And that's if the lady's crazy enough to live with a spacer. When she doesn't, she or he breaks and ends up sleeping around because of the long deployments. Spacers don't tend to be married for long."

He paused, and hesitated at the sight of her expression. Had he said something wrong?

"Seems like you're plenty married though," he continued. "Don't you Cizeracks, uh, take multiple wives or husbands or however that goes?"

[Taataani Meorrrei]

"Mosst do, barrjing the occassjional Cizeri sspacerr, of courrsse."

Taking another sip, she swirled her glass a little, watching the scant amount of natural fruit oils in the drink cling to the glass in a way the rest of the drink didn't.

"jI have fourrteen, all told, jincludjing Taurrifar."

She gestured to the rear of the ship, where her ever-faithful sorr-fai sat at the common table.

"He keepss thjingss rrunnjing ssmoothljy. Keepss me ssane, whjich jiss no eassjy tassk."

Exhaling another purple breath, she ashed into a recession in the console to her right that afforded the luxury.

"Esspecjialljy lateljy."

She interrupted her somber segue with a detatched laugh.

"Wjish jI could trrade placess wjith jyou forr a month orr two, Ben. Makjing jit frrom pojint A to pojint B ssoundss njice."

[Ben Merasska]

Oh, great. What was he supposed to do with this? He could try and go all sympathetic, but in cases like this, where his simple, quaint lifestyle was envied by the complex and exhausted rich person, he wouldn't be able to pass it off as being sincere. Because it wasn't.

Now she was looking at him. He'd waited too long. She'd probably noticed his incredulity; and things had been going so well, too!

"Simple ain't always easy, ma'am," he replied finally. "Actually, it's the opposite. I'm at point X at the moment."

[Taataani Meorrrei]

For a moment, she tried to parse how this pilot's simple life might in any way present a complication for her. Logistics? Hardly. She managed a corporation that spanned the galaxy. Hours? Maybe longer, but how hard could you work sitting all day in a chair?

"Hopefulljy onljy metaphorrjicalljy, dearr."

She reclined in the plush passenger seat, watching the stars go by. She sipped her drink, smoked, and pretended he was somebody she could have these conversations with. Of course that fantasy in itself skirted on danger. After all, she was now at the point of keeping secrets away from family.

"How long untjil Corrusscant?"

She refused to call it Imperial Center, no matter the fashion. It was Coruscant when she was young, it was Coruscant thousands of years before that. It would be Coruscant forever.

[Ben Merasska]

"Hopefulljy onljy metaphorrjicalljy, dearr."

Ben knew that condescending tone of voice. But she stayed quiet afterwards, so he wasn't about to try and muck up the precious few moments of quiet he had. He didn't think about much during those moments; a few stray thoughts about Lyanie and the Cap'n and Chaz meandered by, followed by ruminations on how odd the feeling would be if a Verpine were to rub its antennae against his hand. He was trying to figure out the most alike sensation to the one in question when the Cizerack asked him another question.

"How long untjil Corrusscant?"

"About another four hours or so, depending on how long we need to recalculate the hyperspace coordinates for the next jump," he replied, checking the inertial dampeners' display.

[Taataani Meorrrei]

"Doessn't a computerr do all that forr jyou?"

The matriarch tipped her glass up again, hoping that the four hours remaining would pass with ease.

"No auto-pjilot to keep awajy the doldrrumss?

A thought crossed her mind, and she smirked.

"Tell jyou what. Sshave half an hourr off that tjime and jI'll gjive jyou a thoussand extrra crredjitss."

This would at least make things interesting.

[Ben Merasska]

"Lots of calculations go into hyperspace jumps. Not only that, but the engines have to cycle between each jump, or you'll get an overheat... a thousand credits? We talking Imperial Credits or some back-world currency?" Ben asked, looking at the Cizerack warily. He'd been played before, and wasn't keen on being burned by some dopa maskey rich passenger. She didn't seem like the type, but business people were the most slippery and dangerous of all the kinds of people Ben had ever met.

The fact that he, as an employee of the transportation company which owned the ship, was prohibited from taking any sort of "bribe or tip, or monetary compensation of any kind" from the passengers didn't cross his mind at all.

[Taataani Meorrrei]

Taataani cut loose a boistrous laugh, amused at the thought that she'd swindle for such a small amount. Recovering, she plucked an imperial chit from her handbag for the pilot to inspect as much as he pleased.

"jI'm fljyjing to Corrusscant, jyou thjink jI'd carrjy a rruckssack of sseasshellss orr ssomethjing?"

She let the techno-jargon slide off her back. Never her thing. Suffice to say that he was either going to be genuinely busy or crafty enough to pretend to be.

She finished her drink, and satisfied that Ben had verified the veracity of his potential bonus paycheck, she recovered her chit as she rose.

"Well, jI'm gojing to lassh mjysself to the grrjindsstone forr an hourr orr two and sstarre at rreporrtss. Taurrifar..."

The Meorrrei first husband rose from his seat as his name was called, bringing a dossier with him. She slapped at it as he approached, and exchanged a brief conspiratorial glance with him. That dissolved into saccharine pleasantness, and she snatched the dossier from him, strolling past, only to stop and look back.

"Make Captajin Merrasska some tea. jI thjink he would apprrecjiate jit."

[Ben Merasska]

A thousand Imperial Credits. He smirked and raised an eyebrow, tossing the cred back and nodding at the Cizerack businesswoman (feline? person? cat? Ben wasn't quite sure what sort of noun to affix to her, and it was disconcerting; perhaps he should have looked at her name on the datadisc).

She laughed like it was beneath her to try and swindle him for a thousand; Ben had seen people conned out of five, because five creds each spread out over the galaxy equaled more creds than he suspected the Alliance/Rebellion/Those People had ever seen in their lives. As a group. Some of them were business people themselves, and may have seen numbers close to that amount.

He brought up the display of the hyperspace route they were travelling and began to calaculate which ones would cut their time by half an hour.

They were travelling a well patrolled and maintained route which skirted between the mid and inner rims for a bit before turning slightly - in relative galactic terms, which meant it wasn't slight at all - out into the mid-rim to avoid a black hole.

Ben grimaced as he traced an alternate route that would allow them to reach Coruscant in just under three and a half standard hours. The alternate route would take them through a couple areas known to be targeted by pirates. This would be a piece of patogga, if there were no surly scallawags haunting the hyperlanes.

"Making a withdrawal from the First Ben Merasskan Bank of Courage," he murmured as he input the coordinates and vectors into the navicomputer. "This better be worth that thousand creds."



Everything was in fact going well. Ben was even in good enough of a mood to take the tea that was offered to him by... her (frak, he couldn't remember her name!)... husband. They stopped, the hyperdrive cycled down and back up, and they were off again.

One hour into their new three and a half hour detour, the proverbial hydrospanner was thrown into the engine hatches.

The hyperspace mine went off silently due to the black, but the impact on the ship was more than enough to offset that. Ben, in the middle of a nap, was awakened rudely by the wave of force that brought them out of hyperspace and into a planetary system.

"Why oh why did I have to make that withdrawal?" he said to himself as he checked all the instruments. "I couldn't have resisted temptation from some devil-woman and just been Ben the straight shot pilot. No, I just had to accept the deal to make all that money."

[Taataani Meorrrei]

"Captajin Merrrasska, what was that?!"

The intercom from the passenger's quarters chimed in with a sharp rebuke from the Cizeri Matron. The door to the quarters remained blissfully sealed for the moment, restraining tempests real or imagined within.

"Djid we hjit ssomethjing? We hjit ssomethjing, djidn't we?"

[Ben Merasska]

"Djid we hjit ssomethjing? We hjit ssomethjing, djidn't we?"

"Definitely not worth a thousand credits," he grunted, keeping the ship stable with one hand while trying to get some activity on the other systems.

Finally, he managed to bring the ship to a halt on a tiny asteroid-moon orbiting a large gas giant. The ship shuddered and rocked as the ship slowed, and the struts made contact.

"Problems with the inertial dampeners too," he sighed. "Just great."

He heard activity behind him, but ignored it while he pulled out a datapad and began a checklist of disrupted systems, and what was absolutely essential as opposed to what he could sacrifice for a better chance at getting back on track and on their way to Coruscant.

[Taataani Meorrrei]

The door to the personal quarters slid open, and Taataani strode forward. Gone was her elaborate outfit, or at least the outermost layers of it, revealing a simple silk top and matching skirt. Gone too was her artfully-styled hair, which now hung heavily over her shoulders in thick red ringlets. The twitch in her tail belied her souring mood.

"Get uss movjing, Captajin."

Her tone was clipped, and she accentuated her displeasure by crossing her arms. Behind her, a bare-chested Taurrifar eavesdropped from the door. She ignored him, and devoted her full attention to Ben. Inwardly, she was trying to avoid a panic. Being a no-show to this meeting would be a disaster.

[Ben Merasska]

"Of course, Ma'am!" Ben said. "I'll just have us get going right away. Our close-range scanners aren't operational, so getting us through this - " He gestured to the gas giant, and the hundreds of moons that could be seen orbiting it " - will likely get us killed. We don't have a responding hyperdrive, so that three hour time limit we've got just turned into..."

He looked at the navicomputer.

"Oh... give or take fifty years, at the highest sublight output."

He gave her a sideways glance and lifted the datapad to highlight what he was saying, though the text was a bit too small to make out.

"Not to mention that we ran into a hyperspace mine. Lots of people lay hyperspace mines. The Hapans do for sure. The Empire does on the most dangerous Outer Rim routes." He stopped, his annoyance turning into a bit of anxiety, but he kept a lid on most of it. "But mostly it's Hutts and pirates who lay hyperspace mines, so they can loot ships and take really rich people and hold them for ransom. The pilots and others they kill because... well, they're not very nice people."

He smiled and continued to rant. "But I'll get us moving right away! Because it's not like there are any pirates out there, you know, leaving hyperspace mines out as a prank..."

[Taataani Meorrrei]

Bad, to worse.

As if fretting over blowing off the Imperial Navy and her shareholders wasn't trouble enough, Ben began to babble about other more acute problems, such as the trouble with hyperspace mines, and the assholes who lay them. That at least took the heat off of him, and having her think that he was an incompetent pilot. That would've been embarassing to deal with.

Mentioning pirates placed her in a strange sense of Deja Vu. She only hoped that this time it was Barton Henning doing the dirty deed. Preferably in a ship with a functioning hyperdrive.

"A sshjip."

Ignoring her pilot's prattling for a moment, Taataani drifted to the viewport, seeing distant movement. What looked like a star a few seconds ago was now certainly moving, albeit slowly, and moving to their position.

"Captajin..."

Her ears started to swing back, preparing for something the pit in her stomach was beginning to dread. Taurrifar, sensing the sudden change in her demeanor, emerged from his hiding spot to see what was the matter.

The speck was now clearly a ship, and Ben was still talking.

Taataani whirled around, slapped the datapad from his grasp, and brusquely shoved him against the viewport, smooshing his face slightly against it so that he could give the approaching vessel his undivided attention.

"Captajin!"

[Ben Merasska]

"Oh."

It looked like a commandeered picket ship.

Pirates liked to use commandeered picket ships.

"Oh."

Ben allowed himself one shudder. Any more than one and he might not be able to stop, and then he'd surely be dead. He nodded, his face still mashed up against the viewport, and slipped into the pilot's chair once Meorrrei (that's what her name was!) let him go.

He gripped the flight controls and sat there, watching the ship approach.

"Wait for it..." he murmured, mostly for his passengers' mental health, as they were getting progressively more agitated. "Wait for it..."

The picket ship slowed and turned, thrusters facing them. Ben rapidly powered up the ship, flicking switches and smacking a couple consoles that weren't cooperating.

They lifted off the asteroid-like moon, and blasted off in the opposite direction of the picket ship. His tactic bought them about one minute's worth of space between them and capture.

The ship bucked.

"Now that we're noticed," Ben sighed, keeping his attention on the sight in front of them: a number of rapidly approaching moons. "Let's try and not die. Making a withdrawal from the First Ben Merasskan Bank of Courage. Yes of course, how much would you like to withdraw? Oh, I need... two weeks' worth. Very well. Your balance comes out to... one year of courage left."

As he spoke, he deftly swung the ship around one moon and straight toward another, rounding that one once before moving to the next moon. Thankfully there were enough. Despite their close calls, the picket ship had to move further away to avoid the moons' trajectories.

The ship bucked as soon as they left the dangerously protective screen of moons. Ben grimaced, whimpering under his breath, and flew them straight toward the gas giant.

"Hold on," he said. "This could be a bit bumpy."

[Taataani Meorrrei]

The sudden acceleration wasn't expected, and Taataani heaved backwards, saved an embarassing fall by her ever-attentive husband, who made sure to secure her in a seat before tending to his own. She stayed seated for about two seconds before unsnapping her strap and carefully negotiating the trip back to her quarters, much to Taurrifar's chagrin.

"Bumpss wjill heal, Captajin! Expossurre to vacuum won't!"

She quickly, if ungracefully, made her return to the seat up front, splashing down as the ship bucked under the influence of the approaching gravity well. Grimacing, she again secured her harness, and placed her ornate pistol in her lap, keeping a white-knuckled grip on it.

"Rrememberr what jyou ssajid about pjirratess and rrjich rranssomss?"

Eyes forward, she wore an expression of grim resolve.

"Not agajin."

[Ben Merasska]

"Please follow us in, please follow us in, please follow us in..." Ben murmured under his breath, only stopping to give Meorrrei a worried glance, and then another anxious look at her pistol. "Please follow us in, please follow us in..."

The ship began bucking more often, though not as violently as was the case with hits from the blaster cannons on the picketing ship. He skimmed the surface, racing around the circumference of the planet. The picketing ship kept its distance, but its shots were wide. Soon, the ship turned and followed them into the winds of the gas giant.

Ben turned them further in, resulting in an even bumpier flight.

"So," he said, his voice bouncing as much as the ship was. "This has happened before with you?"

A display suddenly began showing static. "Scanners are back online!" he said happily, even as another system sounded an alarm and he turned it off.

He turned the shuttle to face the picketing ship and kept it in sight as he led the pirates deeper into the ever strengthening winds of the gas giant.

He stopped the ship and held their position just above the most violent level of storms. In the bottom corner of viewport lightning flashes and turbulent clouds of rich colour were vying for control of what little could be seen at all.

All three sat in strained silence as Ben slowly turned off as many non-essential systems as he could, until all that remained were the life-support and sub-light engines. The picketing ship slowly drifted by them, and Ben eased them into violently turbulent level. Three pairs of eyes were fixed on the pirates' ship until it disappeared into the gaseous distance.

Ben let out a long, slow breath and then slowly eased them back out into the upper layers of the planet's atmosphere and then out into the orbits of the planet's moons.

He flicked a switch, and the scanner flickered on, though the readout was frequently cut out by static. The other systems slowly came back online, or enough to allow Ben to read off which ones were operational enough to be of use.

"There's a planet further in. We need to land before they come back out."

[Taataani Meorrrei]

"That'ss a long sstorrjy, Captajin. Keep me aljive and jI'll tell jyou."

In the tense moments of hiding between storm clouds, Taataani could do nothing, not even see. She looked back to Taurrifarr, who met her eyes, only to return to his own window, hoping to see trouble coming.

What seemed like eternity passed, and it seemed the pirates had overshot them. Ben plotted their escape. The transport reached beyond the gas giant at an impossibly slow pace, and Ben began to think of the next step.

"No, we..."

The matriarch cut herself short, realizing that the only way out of this was to lay low and pray they could fix the damage done, to buy them the means of escape. No longer was she even thinking about the meeting with the Imperial Navy. Life and death had a way of simplifying things.

She looked back, as if trying to peer through the maelstrom to catch a glimpse of their pursuer. So his gambit had paid off, it seemed. Turning forward again, she caught sight of the planet they aimed to hide on. It was couched in a gray and white patina, with cool colors throughout. It certainly looked nothing like Carshoulis.

"jI don't ssupposse therre arre anjy nearrbjy rressorrt worrldss to hjide on?"

[Ben Merasska]

The planet - still unnamed, as the navicomputer was mostly unresponsive - laid on the outer fringes of the habitable zone around the star, which was cooling itself, if the color was any indication.

"Look out the viewport and tell me if you see one," Ben said, shooting a meaningful glance at the scanner display, which was now only showing static.

He glanced back curiously at Meorrrei's husband, but was soon intently watching the readouts for the sublight engines. Both of them were glaringly red on the display. Ben grimaced.

"We're not out of this yet," he said. Once more, they descended into a planetary atmosphere and felt the violent shaking of a ship buffeted by turbulence.

"Come on, we can make it..." he urged, the steering column gripped in white knuckled hands. But the engines finally cut out, causing the alarms which were previously silent to begin blaring again. Ben could only hum in terror, while he wrestled with the ship to keep it from yawing and turning their crash landing into a tumble. Auxiliary systems cut in, giving him a tiny bit of control.

"Engines are gone..." he gritted out, desperately trying to keep the nose of the shuttle up. The shuttle broke cloud cover going well over seven hundred miles an hour, and below was a huge expanse of thickly forested mountains.

As they fell Ben's focus strengthened and narrowed to the point where he couldn't hear anything at all. He could feel the ship nearly breaking apart around them, and he assumed the passengers were screaming or yelling, but he was so intent on landing the shuttle and surviving the event, he blocked it out.

Sound slowly leaked back in, until they impacted the canopy of needled trees, and one second later, hit the ground. Ben's head rocked forward, and he saw black.

[Taataani Meorrrei]

...engaging emergency...


...repulsors...


...brace brace brace!"

The world blossomed into red stars, fading to a field of snowy white nothing. The nothing was comforting in its ignorance, in its deprivation. White light, white noise, comfort. It was so very comfortable.

The first signs of discomfort was a feeling of cold.

"Ugh..."

Taataani blinked, watching her breath exhale in a faint puff of vapor. She shivered, and was now aware of a splitting headache, and...

Bleuuughhh

...her breakfast hit the deck as her stomach roiled with intense nausea.

It was then that she heard the scream. Her eyes tracked up to Ben, who sat motionless in his seat. No, the scream was behind her.

Disoriented hands fumbled for the controls of her harness, not quite sure yet how to work the clasp. As the stink of ozone and burned plastic crinkled her nose, she began to slowly gain awareness of exactly what happened. But the scream was still beyond her, and it terrified her.

[Ben Merasska]

Ben Merasska could count the times he'd awakened from unconsciousness that he was not party to inducing on one hand. He was proud of that record, but it also meant that the memories were much less familiar, and the responses were not ingrained.

The first thing he felt was pain. He ached all over, but his head was the worst. He knew one thing, and that was he likely had a concussion. Things felt woozy, and he had hard time really focussing on anything.

Then he heard the screams. He'd heard screams like that before, but never so drawn out; he'd heard people dying over the communications and in dogfights: the quick pained scream and realization of pain and then silence.

He undid the crash webbing and straps and promptly fell out of his seat, moaning softly as he recovered from the sudden bout of dizziness movement caused. He slowly lifted his head up and saw Meorrrei's husband, still shirtless, his mouth wide open and his chest heaving. His legs were caught between a section of the bulkhead that was bent in at an extreme angle and the seat he was still strapped into. The seat itself had broken from its anchoring to the deck of the cockpit and was now pushed against the back wall.

By the time the sight seeped into his consciousness enough for him to realize what was happening, the Cizerack male's screams had drifted into still skin-curling soft heaves of pain. His voice had given out.

He pushed himself to his knees and glanced about the cockpit of the shuttle and noted with some relief that the viewport hadn't cracked or otherwise broken. He forced himself to focus on the trapped Cizerack.

With a calmness he would not have otherwise had, Ben unstrapped the male from his seat and staggered his way into the galley.He dug through the drawers and cabinets for a moment before finding some painkillers. He staggered back to the shivering, shirtless male, and injected the drugs into him.

He sighed and stood up once the man had stopped screaming and closed his eyes. He was still shivering, but at least now he wasn't screaming. He staggered almost drunkenly over to Meorrrei herself, and shook her slightly, ignoring the steaming puddle of bile and partially digested food on the floor near his feet.

"Hey. Hey. Come on, wake up," he slurred, finding it hard to keep her in focus. Her form blurred and then cleared again. "Wake up."

[Taataani Meorrrei]

Taa absent-mindedly reached up, flicking what appeared to be dried blood off her brow as she tried to situate her wig, which she could feel sat askew on her head. It was a silly thing, but that kind of awareness was automatic and so was one of the first things she could control.

Suddenly she snapped into sharp focus, and her pulse quickened when she knew the sound she was hearing.

"Taurrifar!"

Her hands clumsily redoubled their efforts, this time managing to free herself from the straps. She rose, then tumbled, then regained her footing as she scrambled over to where her husband lay pinned.

"Help me move thjiss!!"

Reason had left her entirely, as there was no way to budge the heavy metal from its resting place, now biting into both of Taurrifar's legs just above the knee. Still, she heaved, gritting her teeth as she found new reserves of strength.

Taurrifar, feeling the mercy of the painkillers Ben had given him, shook his head as he mouthed a few protests in Cizeri. He looked to Ben pleadingly, hoping he'd rescue her from this delusion.

[Ben Merasska]

"Warm first," Ben said dazedly, though Meorrrei's voice gave him something to focus on. He decided to try again. "He needs to be warmed up first. Clothes."

He sat down heavily, his muscles suddenly feeling like liquid lead. He shook his head as his vision swam once more.

"Clothes," he said again. "Blankets."

He looked up and out of the viewport, but it was mostly covered in a thin white blanket of snow.

[Taataani Meorrrei]

Giving one more futile tug, Taa turned to Ben, and reluctantly nodded. Rising shakily to her feet, she stumbled to the ruined aft and the cabin, pulling the ruined duvet and a suitcase behind her moments later. She tripped and fell on a sectioned of buckled deck, her wig finally surrendering the farce and tumbling off, revealing a head of crudely-cropped and thin grey hair beneath.

Not even bothering to afford herself the dignity any longer, she regained her legs, returning to her husband to lay the duvet over the carnage, followed shortly by a hurried rifling through his personal tote, looking for a sweater she knew he packed.

"Don't worrrjy, jit'ss bad but nothjing we can't take carre of. We'll get jyou out of herre, okajy."

She gingerly eased Taurrifar's larger frame forward, which he protested with a groan, as she led his arms through the garment, one by one. The nausea was rising in her stomach again but she didn't dare let it break her resolve again.

Taurrifar moved with his own resolve, working the sweater the rest of the way, as best as he could, until it was midway down his torso. The front was awkwardly pulled down, and the duvet pulled up. Already it was starting to spot with blood. Taataani had no idea how bad he was hurt, but she doubted her own words.

[Ben Merasska]

The sounds of activity in the back of the cockpit drew Ben from his dazed regard of the snow-covered viewport.

He looked at the flight controls, now all but useless, and at the console, where a few light blinked, warning that systems and damage had been sustained. There was still auxiliary power, at least.

He flicked a switch, and watched the interplay of lights. Things weren't looking good. It was likely the shuttle would never leave this planet. He closed his eyes, trying to focus beyond the daze of his concussion and sighed.

Looking back, he saw that Meorrrei and her husband were fairly wrapped up in each other. He let them have their moment, and shuffled his way back into the galley. When he returned to the cockpit, he had painkillers again, only pills. He tried to crouch next to the two, but ended up falling into the back wall and sitting.

"Here," he said, offering her the bottle of pills. "Take two of these and call me in the morning."

Where was Chaz right now, he wondered, closing his eyes and feeling his aches pull him into sleep.

[Taataani Meorrrei]

Ben was brusquely interrupted from his unsafe bliss by two hands shaking his shoulders.

"Captajin, wake up!"

There was steel in her voice, but something else, mingling with the wild look in her eyes. A smoldering look of desperation was there and gone in an instant. The only thing left was urgency.

"We need to wake up. Caf, sstjimss. Whateverr we have."

She felt at the gash at her head, still paying no mind to the deep insult of her lost wig. What had been such a closely guarded thing once was quickly abandoned.

"jYourr pupjilss arre wjide. jI've dealt wjith morre than enough wjild cubss to know a concusssjion when jI ssee one."

She frowned.

"jI thjink that makess two of uss."

Shaking her head, the Matriarch began to rummage around the cabin, stuffing a few things here and there into a carry-on bag of hers, the valued contents that filled it a moment before were dumped on the floor without ceremony.

"We have to go forr help, and we have to watch each otherr."

[Ben Merasska]

With a tired groan, Ben stood and leaned against the wall of the ship and rubbed his arms. It was getting colder. Meorrrei was rattling off what needed to be done, but all Ben heard was 'caf and stims'.

"Galley," he grunted, her urgency filtering through her voice and his ears and into him. He looked down at her husband and frowned.

"We need a lot of things," he said out loud though still unaware of Meorrrei, meeting Taurrifar's bleary and drug addled eyes with his own. The headache was slowly lessening.

"First we need to get him out of there and patch up his legs. Then heat. After that we can worry about everything else."



Despite the lessening of his headache, the effects of slamming his forehead into the flight controls continued. They needed rest and cold compresses or ice packs for their heads. The concussions were making things ten times more difficult, at a time they couldn't afford to be handicapped.

Meorrrei had found the caf, but without anything working, there was no real way to make any.

"Listen," he said, sitting down again and resting his head on the wall again. It was cool, and he reveled in how comfortable it was. "I need to sleep."

Meorrrei looked like she was going to argue, so he lifted up a hand, which wobbled unsteadily.

"I'm not going to be any good without some sort of rest. Keep an eye on me," he continued, his eyes beginning to close again. "If I start losing my breath or looking bad, wake me up."

[Taataani Meorrrei]

He was stating the obvious, which was just adding fuel to the fire of her frustration. Of course they had to get Taurrifar free, but how? The bulkhead pinning him weighed orders of magnitude more than they could lift combined. If that wasn't happening, then what? Cut him out? With what? Taataani looked around, but in a desperate way, not knowing what she was looking for.

She made her way to the galley, cramming the bag full of baggies of caf grind and things with sugar. She tore a baggie open with her teeth, foregoing the brewer and simply poured some of the grind in her mouth. The taste and texture were beyond unpleasant but she could feel her heart quickening somewhat, which helped.

Storming over to Ben, she shook him free from his idea of sleep.

"jYou have to eat thjiss. We don't have tjime to ssleep, we have to hurrry!"

She looked back at her husband, whimpering under the grace of the painkillers in his system. She tried not to imagine the stain of red on the comforter at his legs growing.

"We don't have the luxurrjy of rresst, Captajin."

She wrung her hands nervously.

"Orr tjime."

[Ben Merasska]

Ben shook whatever she'd made into his mouth, and gagged, coughing up much of it onto himself. He shook his head, but within a few moments, the rush of added glucose and caf spurred him from his torpor.

Ben looked at Meorrrei and back to her husband, trying to puzzle through the dilemma with his state of mind.

With a grunt of effort, he pushed himself to his feet and stumbled back into the engine room. Sparing a glare at the inactive conglomeration of parts that made up the thruster and engine system of the craft, he began digging through the room for any tool that could be of use.

A few seconds later, he re-entered the cockpit and dropped it next to Meorrrei and her husband. With hands not so deft, he pulled a fusioncutter (http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Fusioncutter) from the box and flicked it on.

"Keep the blankets and anything that can burn away from it," he mumured. "This will not be pretty."

Biting his lip, he put the burning head of the torch to the metal of the seat which was pinned underneath the Cizerack. Sparks flew, and smoke began rising from the point of cutting, and more dangerously from the pinned male's clothing and blanket.

He cut through the bottom of the seat at an angle, hoping to create enough free space for them to slide the seat, and the man sitting in it, from the hull that had been pushed in, like the metal of a food can.

Ben fell forward when the blade of the fusioncutter bore through the bottom of the seat, and the seat itself shifted, almost spilling Taurrifar onto the pilot and the still lit cutting tool. Ben flicked the cutter off with his thumb, drunkenly tossed back in the general direction of the box of tools, and gestured to Meorrrei to help him pull the seat from under the bent hull.

[Taataani Meorrrei]

Dutifully, she went to work, pulling her husband free from the crushed bulkhead. The sudden relief of pressure worked sharply through the painkillers, bringing renewed cries of pain. Taataani quickly put a hand to her mouth so that she didn't audibly gasp.

His legs were crushed just above the knees, to the point where it was hard to believe that they'd be saved. Worse still, without the weight of the bulkhead to staunch the bleeding, a spurting pool of crimson began to form anew. This wasn't something she was used to. Who could be? To such horrors like this, happening in such a raw and real way to somebody you loved? What should she do? What?

She remained fixed to the spot, motionless and indecisive. For someone so used to being take-charge in all other matters, she was useless when it mattered most. Irony was terribly cruel.

[Ben Merasska]

Ben had been a soldier, once. A fighter pilot. He'd gone through survival training, though the odds of being shot down instead of outright destroyed were astronomical.

"Hey," he said, looking at Meorrrei. She was staring at her husband like she'd turned to stone at the very idea that he was hurt. "We need bandages. Gauze, tape, and blood clotters. In the galley, third drawer to the right."

To the right of what he never exactly specified, but he wanted the woman to get a grip on herself so he could close his eyes and get some sleep. She didn't seem able to do that when her husband was bleeding out in front of her.

Ben realized that the concussion was actually helping him here. If he were in possession of all his mental faculties, he would have likely turned into a gibbering mess from the male's screams when he first woke up. It almost made him laugh.

[Taataani Meorrrei]

She could hear Ben's voice, but it was background noise. She kept looking from Taurrifar's legs, to his pain-contorted face. It took impossibly long moments being stuck in this traumatic loop before she realized that Ben's voice had words in them. She looked to Ben, mouthing the items he'd mentioned absent-mindedly, then the urgency kicked in. Legs stumbled as she turned, wanting to sprint for the medical kit but lacking the strength or coordination for it. She braced against another bulkhead, recovered, and quickly returned to the galley. Her frantic sense of purpose returned, and she proceeded to tear the aforementioned drawers apart, pulling at the needed first aid goods as fast as she could.

[Ben Merasska]

Meorrrei haphazardly tossed him the supplies he'd asked for, making him thankful that the packages of gauze were sealed.

"We need to get these," he gestured to the trousers Taurrifar had been wearing, now mostly stained with blood, "off him. Or open them so I can wrap his... legs. We can worry about splints and bones later."

There was a good chance the bones were shattered, in which case a splint would be about as helpful as a shot of painkillers in the actual healing process.

Meorrrei once again needed him to tell her what to do a couple times, but she quickly ripped the fine cloth from the cuts, revealing a miasma of dark blue skin, holes, and bone in one leg sticking out prominently. Ben swallowed bile and got to work.

He wasn't a healer and when he was finished, it showed. He'd quickly set Mister Meorrrei's legs and wrapped them with gauze and tape, but they both had been worried about moving him until they were finished.

"We have to get him into a bunk. Laying down. Sitting down will make his legs heal badly."

Ben wiped his nose, spreading blood across his mouth and face. He'd nearly vomited several times during the process of patching up Meorrrei's husband, but barely managed to keep control.

"We have to fix up a stretcher or something to move him on. Moving his legs too much now would be bad."

[Taataani Meorrrei]

Taataani nodded wearily to his instructions, and looked at Taurrifar. He was cooling down from his most recent bout of agony, and caught his breath as he waited to move. He placed his large hands around hers as she knelt beside him.

"Saaia'ei, do not worrrjy overr me. jYourr Captajin hass sskjill. jI feel..."

He closed his eyes a bit, squeezing a little on her hands.

"...fjine."

Finding a new well of reserves in the display of her husband's resolve, Taataani leaned forward, kissing his blood-smeared cheek.

"jYou'rre gettjing off thjiss planet and to ssafetjy, Taurrifar. Sanjaara, jI've been too carrelesss, thjiss jiss mjy fault."

She shook her head.

"jI won't losse what matterrss to me mosst."

Taurrifarr looked to Ben, and reached a hand to him.

"Captajin, therre jiss ssomethjing jI need."

He looked to Taataani.

"Wjith all mjy hearrt, majy jI have a moment wjith hjim?"

The Matriarch took a moment to look between them, and nodded. Another kiss and she stood, retreating to respectable distance in the galley again.

[Ben Merasska]

Ben blinked, amazed that the guy was able to speak at all through the intense pain he must be feeling.

"Ah, sure," he said, at the same time wondering if he really had a choice in the matter. Could he just tell him 'Sorry, but no can do. Gotta stay alive here'? It was absurd, and Ben knew it. "What is it? If it's better service, sorry about that, but I'm the only one around, and I'm not much of a cook."

[Taataani Meorrrei]

He smiled weakly.

"jYou'rre funnjy, human."

He looked back to make sure his wife wasn't eavesdropping on him. Clasping Ben's hand, he looked at him squarely, speaking low.

"Prromjisse me sshe makess jit to ssafetjy."

He paused, catching his breath.

"...even jif that'ss at the expensse of mjy own ljife."

[Ben Merasska]

"All this talk of death and dyin' never sat well with me," Ben replied quietly, grinning at the other man. He wasn't sure where this calm and backbone was coming from, but he knew that he was going to be avoiding concussions even more than he had been before.

"It's not set in stone you'll be dyin'. And I'm not too keen on breathing my last here either, so just rest and we'll be getting you into a bunk." Ben paused. "If worse comes to worse, we'll all be carrying each other out of this. But I'll keep an eye out for your lady, if it'll help you sleep and get better."

[Taataani Meorrrei]

He considered the request put on him, and nodded.

"Lookss ljike jI have ljittle chojice on that. Thank jyou, Captajin."

He nodded, and glanced back to Taataani.

"Saaia'ei, jit'ss okajy now."

Taataani returned, dragging the broken galley table along behind her with some effort. Clenched in her teeth was a small bottle of alcohol. She came to a stop, eased the heavy table down, and extended the bottle to her mate, twisting the cap off.

"Drrjink. We'll move jyou when jyou'rre rreadjy."

The shaking in her hands was gone.

[Ben Merasska]

Ben winced. That alcohol should have gone onto the wounds as a cheap anesthetic.

Taking the fusioncutter again, he cut the remaining anchoring pole from its bottom and settled the table on the ground. The cutter sputtered out. Ben tossed it to the side.

"That's the last of that, unless we can find more fuel," he muttered. Carefully, he directed Meorrrei on how to grip the man's body without jostling his legs too much. They lifted him up and placed him on the table, if a bit roughly, causing the injured man to gasp and grit his teeth.

It took more doing to get the table through the small spaces of the ship, but finally, they had placed Taurrifar on a bunk and placed a number of blankets on him.

Ben looked over the dark, chilled galley after leaving the cabin and leaned against the wall, feeling a sudden wave of lethargy steal over him, as well as a resurgence of his headache.

He grabbed a couple more painkillers and downed them quickly.

"Distress signal," he murmured. "Heat."

[Taataani Meorrrei]

She wouldn't know up from down when it came to sending out a distress signal.

"jI can gatherr thjingss to burrn."

She set off to gather floatsam and combustibles, glancing back at the bunk where Taurrifar was put up. She noticed at that moment her neglected wig lying on the ground. With the scant amount of dignity she could afford, she retrieved it, placing it on her neglected real hair with as much care as she could manage, and then set to the task.

The next few minutes were a blur of business. She set her thoughts only to gathering things to burn. Fortunately they touched down in some kind of taiga forest. There were sparse stands of evergreens, and a few that had been snapped or splintered by their crash, as well as other things on the ship. Before long, she'd assembled a pile adjacent to the crash. It took a moment to find her misplaced lighter, but she was soon rewarded with a fledgling fire.

She turned back to see how Ben was doing, only to see him slumped against a wall, asleep. She stumbled over to where hey lay, and gave his shoulders a shake.

"Wake up, come on!"

She placed her hands on each side of his face as she looked at his well-dialated eyes.

"What do we do? The djisstrresss ssjignal. Captajin, come on."

[Ben Merasska]

"You know," he grumbled, "I'm not actually a captain. I just pilot... er, piloted the shuttle."

His eyes remained dilated, but not nearly so badly as before, and his few minutes of napping had helped him out immensely.

"Ah, right. Distress signal. Beacon. Whatever."

Meorrrei helped him stand, and in short order, he spilled into the pilot's seat.

"Let's see..." he bent over reaching under the flight console and pried open a panel. "Yep! Found it. Just a twist of this here... and there we go!"

Ben frowned.

"You know, those pirates might still be up there. If they are, we're pretty much begging to be kidnapped and/or murdered. Viciously."

[Taataani Meorrrei]

Taataani frowned at his response to the honorific. Maybe it was Nar Shaddaan tradition to adopt the title if you owned a ship, then? She didn't want to admit it, but she needed a Captain. She needed somebody near her who knew what they were doing. Maybe Ben did, but he didn't act like the Captains she knew. He was an unknown.

At last with some of the urgency taken off for the moment, Taataani flounced down ungracefully near the fire. She was starting to feel all the aches and all the pains without the adrenaline to benefit her. Capt...Ben's words offered her little comfort. Again, she pulled out the pistol she'd kept close since the chase began.

"Do we have a chojice?"

She checked the power cell and the other mechanisms the way Kallum taught her. It gave her some solace. Her face was grim as she looked the beautiful weapon over. Setting it aside briefly, she tried to lay back against a piece of hull plate, groaning as she hit a sore spot. She shifted and settled once more.

"Have jyou everr done thjiss beforre?"

[Ben Merasska]

"Ah, no," Ben laughed. He paused and frowned. "Actually... I have. Well, not exactly this, but... you know."

Now that he was more coherent, relatively speaking, Ben noticed a number of things. Firstly, the viewport was mostly shattered, but still held together. Secondly, there was a fire burning inside the ship. Thirdly, his hands were stained red.

Pushing aside the urge to wash his hands of the blood on them, he turned to the Meorrrei matriarch.

"Let's get some heat in here, without having to worry about the smoke, eh?" he said. "I'll need some help, though."

He led Meorrrei back into the engine room, and began to remove panelling until much of the wiring to the engine was visible.

"An astromech droid would be amazing right now," he grumbled. "What we're doing is trying to get the engines to supply the life support systems a little power. I'm not a mechanic, but I do know a bit about electrical systems and such."

He settled a toolbox from a nearby cubicle on the floor next to them and showed her the items within, holding them up and letting her get a good look at them while he spoke.

"This is called... well, I don't know what it's called, but it allows me to see if a charge is running through the wiring. We've got some standard hydrospanners and wire cutters, along with some electric tape... connectors... and some loose fitting and brackets. Even if we could get the engines running again, this thing isn't space worthy anymore. But working heat is key, and we can boost the distress beacon's signal with the sensor array."

[Taataani Meorrrei]

None of this made the slightest sense to Taataani, but hearing it was a painkiller of sorts to the injuries born by her self confidence. She watched Ben pore over the tools and the plan, hoping some of this would come to her so she could be of some use in getting the engines to function. It didn't help that her sudden inactivity was spurring the same symptoms of concussion that Ben had weathered inconsistently. Even in her uncomfortable position, her eyes started getting heavy.

"Tell me...how to help."

She almost whispered, her words slurring on the end as she looked at the fire.

[Ben Merasska]

Ben stopped and looked at her warily.

"Well, I was hoping you'd be up for a bit more, but it looks like you'll be passing out soon," he said, standing and wiping his hands on his trousers. "So nothing too hard for you. I'm going to need some tools handed to me, and I'll be neck deep in wires and all that. So just sit down and rest."

He stood and walked to the other cabin, where another two bunks were nearly pristine. He pulled the blankets off of one, and brought it over to the matron, draping it over her shoulders.

"We'll need to rest soon. It's bad to do too much with a concussion, so just rest. Sleep isn't good at the moment, but I don't think I'll last too long anyway."

He turned and got to work, occasionally asking for a tool or connector, or tape. Meorrrei was a bright sort, and got the hang of all the different tools quickly if still a bit hesitantly. She lasted another hour before Ben couldn't keep her awake any longer.

Ben himself lasted two hours. He fell asleep with his arm halfway in a panel, and the voltage meter held loosely in one hand.

[Taataani Meorrrei]

You'd be surprised at what you can do when you're cornered and have few options. Sleep came lightly with fits and starts, but the sound of a popping coal on the fire brought Taataani wide awake, stabbing her arm - with pistol in hand - at the direction of sound. Her ears peeled back and she peered ahead wild-eyed, certain there was malice behind what she heard. Her heart beat in her throat, and she took quick breaths.

Nothing.

She eased the weapon down, feeling her heart still thrumming with lethal purpose in her chest. It brought every aching part of her body back into acute focus, which helped to further eat away at her bout of drowsiness, if only for the moment. She noticed Ben, asleep where he fell, and eased forward, carefully pulling him free from his awkwardness.

"Ben? Come on."

The light was starting to fade, and soon night would come. Already it was far too cold for comfort. She eased him to a more comfortable resting spot, conveniently adjacent to her, so she might benefit from his body heat.

"How arre jyou feeljing?"

[Ben Merasska]

Ben blinked, and wiped the crust from the corners of his eyes.

"Not bad," he said, sniffling and wiping his nose. "Cold, but that's no surprise."

He looked down at the blank screen of the voltage meter and powered it on again, and finding the wire he was looking for, watched the readings. He sighed in disappointment.

"There's a lot of work left to do before we have power again," he admitted, powering down the meter again, and carefully wrapping the leads around it. Setting it to the side, he poked the embers of the fire and watched as sparks popped up and drew his eyes to the ceiling, partially obscured in a thin film of smoke. "It'll probably take all day to finish. We still need food, and water, too."

He shifted, enjoying the warmth, and yawned again.

[Taataani Meorrrei]

Mention of sustenance made her aware of the dull ache at her middle. The live cages in the galley had broken apart and the vittles within were probably long gone. As for water, there were patchy snow banks in the distance. If they couldn't find water any other way, there was always that.

"jIt'ss been a whjile ssjince jI've hunted. Let'ss hope ourr prrejy arre sslow and sstupjid."

Her eyes watched for movement beyond, and the tell-tale glint of eyes reflecting back firelight. None yet. Maybe once she had a portion of her strength back, she could make good on her part of this survival bargain.

[Ben Merasska]

"Hopefully we won't need to do much chasing," Ben replied sleepily.

He woke up to the painful sensation of the desperate need to urinate. When he returned, he rifled through the small locker he had in the cabin Taurrifar was sleeping in. His eyes opened, and were hazed with pain and drugs.

"You're doing all right?" he asked quietly. The Cizerack nodded, closing his eyes again. He whispered something softly, but Ben could quite make it out. He frowned, feeling the male's head and noting some heat. Not quite hot enough to denote a fever in humans, but still warmer than he was used to.

He pulled his coat out of the locker and pulled it on, buttoning and adjusting the thick material until it settled more comfortable over his frame. It was a far cry better than before, but Ben was still wearing trousers too light and thin to adequately keep himself warm.

He busied himself with finding loose branches and wood for a fire, and looking around the ship itself and their crash site. Luckily, the ship's landing had left them with plenty of debris for fires. They had come to a rest on a rocky, but still forested incline, mostly bare of small vegetation. It actually reminded him of some of the mountains on Alderaan.

The wind was soft, but still very cold. After rekindling the fire, he entered the ship and began working once more on the engines, hoping to get the auxiliary power back online before the batteries feeding the emergency beacon died.

[Taataani Meorrrei]

Sleep brought no comfort, but when Taataani woke, she was at least more sure of foot and felt a little more capable of facing the cruelty around them. She shivered a little, drawing her now-filthy overcoat tight around her as she watched the shrinking fire. A moment to warm her bones and she stood, walking around the crash site in the early hours of daylight starting to break again. The day and night cycles must be short on this planet...moon...or whatever.

Exploring as Ben worked, she kept her pistol close, taking Ben's cautions to heart about potentially inviting their own doom should their attackers be listening for their beacon. They could only hope that wasn't the case. All Taataani had to defend her was this pathetic pistol and a searing determination to live and to keep Taurrifar alive.

The sound of rushing water got her attention. On the orders of survival, water was high on their list. She didn't have anything to gather it, but she could always return. More importantly, she watched the small creek for movement that she soon discovered. Fish! Now, all she had to do was...

SPLASH

...in a well-timed strike, she plunged a hand beneath the water and recovered some kind of scale-less bottom feeder, or at least that's what she guessed. Taking time to bolster her own strength first so she could attend to the rest, she wasted little time in tearing the fish apart, devouring it live and fresh, sparing nothing but bone as she ate. With clean bones the only testament to her sated hunger a few minutes later, she wiped at her oil-smeared face and prepared to catch more.

[Ben Merasska]

"Come on," Ben murmured, his tongue poking out of the corner of his mouth. One hand held the voltage meter, and the leads were held precariously between his fingers. "Come on..."

The meter beeped, and numbers began dancing across the screen. Ben grinned and laughed.

"Got it!"

The engines weren't running, but they had auxiliary power systems running again, which made getting the main engines to put out enough power for their needs much easier. Standing, he grimaced as his knees and back popped into alignment, and made his way outside of the ship.

"Ah, food," he said appreciatively on seeing Taataani by the fire. She was wet and quite dirty, but the look of satisfaction was hard to miss.

[Taataani Meorrrei]

Some things you learn and forget, like Applied Quantum Logic (a traumatic experience to be sure), and some never leave you, like knowing that from world to world, fish almost always swim the same way. Taataani's smile was almost jovial, gesturing to the pile of a half dozen fish she pilfered from the stream. Sure, now she was freezing, but the sense of a small triumph was keeping her warm, at least until the fire could finish the job, and get the damp out of her clothes.

"Two forr jyou. Two forr me. Two forr Taurrifar, jif he feelss ljike eatjing."

She gestured dismissively.

"jIf jyou want them burrned ljike jyourr people do, that'ss on jyou."

For emphasis, she dug her claws into a fish, and brought it up to cram a mouthful.

"Feelss ljike jI'm a ljittle gjirrl agajin, campjing out."

[Ben Merasska]

Ben took one of the fish and held it over the fire, grinning at Meorrrei's change in mood. She'd done something, something that had helped them survive, and was understandably elated, after everything had spun out of control.

Control was an illusion, Ben knew, but he still liked some semblance of it. They still didn't have heat on the ship, but with the auxiliary power supplies back, it wouldn't take long to reroute some power to the climate controls.

"You know, it does remind me of camping," Ben agreed. "My father would take me and my brothers out camping. We'd pile into the speeder and go for hours. He didn't stop until we had to jury-rig our comm units' transceivers together to get a bad signal."

Ben grinned again. He'd not thought about his family for quite some time. It wasn't as bad an experience as he'd thought.

[Taataani Meorrrei]

Peeling a bit of fish off in a bite, she swallowed.

"We neverr had jit sso rrusstjic. Even when we made an efforrt to go to the wjilderrnesss, motherr jinssjissted on brrjingjing a ssmall convojy."

She thought about old nostalgic memories, of a half dozen overloaded speeders, and one overblown prefabricated housing module. Power everything, and not a luxury left behind, seemingly.

"jI had to prractjicalljy beg to hjike bejyond ejyessjight frrom camp."

She deferred to him and the survival skills he'd obviously shown.

"Ssoundss ljike jyou got the betterr lesssonss frrom rroughjing jit."

[Ben Merasska]

"Maybe," Ben answered, pulling a chunk of flesh from the fish and chewing thoughtfully. "I still can't set up a tent to save my life. Or fashion a good fishing pole out of branches and woven grasses"

The sunlight began to lengthen, setting the snow on the distant mountain tops alight, gleaming brilliantly in the cold, clear air. It was quiet around their crash site, but Ben was hoping that it was more the trauma of the crash and not that there was a predator of any kind lurking around them.

Everything was conspiring to remind him of the past.

"We decided to go in early spring once. We made it to a river, big evergreens around, a lot like these, in fact. And it started raining. My father and I, heh, we needed to set up the tents in the rain." Ben started laughing. "I was horrible at it. My brother had brought his girlfriend and they sat in the speeder and got the heaters and stuff ready."

His soft huffs of laughter turned to deep hiccups as he spoke through it.

"We finally got the tents set up, and my brother and his girl took the one I set up. We wake up in the middle of the night to screaming. My brother needed to piss, so he went and pissed on a bee-hive. He had to run, but was still pissing as he ran. He tripped over my tent, and the pegs came loose and his girl ended up rolling down through every puddle on the way down the hill side. And it started raining again as my brother was trying to get her out of the tent, and he's still pissing, and my father and I are shouting out things for him to do while we're laughing. We had to carry her up, wrapped in the tent like a cocoon."

Ben finally settled down, and took another bite of his fish, savoring the warm and distinct taste of fish-meat.

"The tent was too small for us to all share it. I ended up sleeping in the speeder while we waited for the tent and blankets to dry. They never let me set up a tent again."

[Taataani Meorrrei]

Taataani blinked at the pure testament to bad luck Ben laid out in front of her.

"Oh dearr..."

Shaking her head, she smiled, thinking back.

"The worrsst we everr endurred wass when we'd have a hunt. Of courrsse, the rrou'kai'touua thjing to do...ah..."

She trailed off, not sure how to explain that concept in Basic. She scrunched her face a bit in thought.

"Ljike forr jyou...a male...forr humanss to ssajy macho? That, but forr a woman. Asss a teenagerr mjy ssjissterrss alwajyss wanted to catch ssomethjing larrge on a hunt."

She paused momentarily to suck a fish eye from the head in her hands, and continued.

"Morre than a few tjimess, what jI hunted...caught me. And carrjied me. And carrjied me...jinto the camp...knockjing everrjythjing overr, and nearrljy trrampled me when jit got tjirred."

For emphasis, she rubbed at her exposed and disheveled head.

"So no, thjiss jiss not mjy fjirrsst concusssjion. And not mjy fjirrsst campjing djissassterr."

The good memories helped, and her voice turned almost pleading.

"Majybe ourr luck wjill turrn arround."

[Ben Merasska]

Ben laughed, imagining a younger Meorrrei riding a large nerf-like creature into a campsite, holding on for dear life, all for the shot at bragging about the largest kill. Thinking of nerfs reminded him of the mountains in spring again, with the herds moving slowly, enjoying the thawing of the snow covered hillsides.

Ben shook his head, realizing he was picturing the scene on a hillside he could barely see through the distance, instead of the greener hillsides he remembered.

"I wouldn't call this a camping disaster," Ben answered slowly, licking his fingers. "We weren't planning on camping, it just sort of... you know, happened."

He spitted his second fish after gutting it, and frowned slightly, the feeling of familiarity growing on him. The guts, the fire, the scenery...

"These fish are familiar," he frowned, and then looked up to give the trees a closer look. "These trees are, too."

Carefully setting his fish down on one of the rocks that formed the barrier of their fire, Ben stood and looked around more closely. Taking a deep breath, he walked up to a tree and pulled one of the needles from a low hanging branch.

"It can't be possible," he said, and took off at a run through the trees, heading up the mountain they'd found themselves on. He could hear Meorrrei following him, but he ignored anything she said, his entire being filled with the potential...

He stopped, finally finding a clear outcropping that allowed him a clear, unobstructed vista of the mountain range they'd crashed into.

"It is," he said, laughing in relief, pointing into the distance. "It's a colony world! Look!"

In the distance, silhouetted by the position of the sun in the sky, was the stern end of a positively ancient colony ship. Nearby was the undeniable outline of dwellings, built from stone and metal, though no activity could be seen from their vantage point.

"A colony world!" Ben said, grabbing Meorrrei in a hug and spinning her about. "A colony world!"

[Taataani Meorrrei]

The dawning look of hope caught a spark in her eyes as they widened.

"Then therre could be..."

Her pulse quickened as she moved to survey what Ben had suddenly discovered. She looked, and the tempo of her tail sway confirmed it.

"Ben Merrassska jI could kjisss jyou!"

A wash of emotions bubbled up, as well as the terrified urgency for Taurrifar. She turned around, embracing her fellow survivor as she pressed lips in forceful procession at each side of his face.

"Saia'charthnaai ra hei nainthe we can do thjiss, Saanjarra, we can!"

She wanted to run for it immediately. She wanted to just take off and go until she fell exhausted, then continue onward. As long as she could find someone to help.

Then she looked back to Taurrifar, and the dilemma set in. Going for help would be leaving him to survive on his own for a day, maybe longer. Could they afford that?

She looked back to the vista, and exhaled deeply.

"How do we do thjiss?"

[Ben Merasska]

Ben's exultant smile lessened to nothing as the implications of Meorrrei's questions sunk in. By the looks of the terrain, it would a day or two of travel to even get there. Depending on the state of the people there, it might take a day of talking and negotiating something or other for supplies and clothing. And then, the trip back.

He followed Meorrrei's look back to the shuttle, barely visible in the distance. Travelling with him in tow would likely be worse, even if they had something to carry him. Could they both afford to leave him by himself for that long?

Ben looked back at the old colony ship and sighed.

"One of us will have to go. The other will have to stay. I don't think we should leave him by himself, and we definitely can't bring him along."

[Taataani Meorrrei]

Taataani nodded, knowing this meant she was about to have to make one of the most difficult decisions she'd faced in a long time. She closed her eyes.

"jI'll go."

When she opened them, her expression was one of a weary, steadfast, and grim determination. She headed back to camp, and went to where Taurrifar was being sheltered. Kneeling at his side, she placed both hands on his chest.

"Hello therre, drai'eerra."

The male, who had been asleep, cracked open his eyes, and when he saw Taataani, he smiled.

"We've found a ssettlement. Out jin the djisstance. jI thjink thejy majy have a doctorr, orr ssomeone who can help."

Taurrifar gulped heavily from some water she offered, and she blotted the clammy perspiration from his forehead with a cloth.

"jI'm gojing to go fjind ssomeone, Taurrifar. ssomeone to help jyou."

He started to stir, worried for her safety, and she put both hands on his shoulders.

"Mjisstrresss, jI'm...jI'll be okajy to wajit..."

"Goddesss damn jyou ljissten to jyourrsself jyou sstubborrn krrou'i. jYou'rre hurrt."

Her voice wavered a little.

"And jit'ss sserrjiouss, Taurrifar. Pleasse. Let me do forr jyou everrjythjing jyou desserrve. Let Captajin Ben help jyou when jI'm gone. Be sstrrong forr hjim whjile jI'm awajy. He'll need jyou to be."

Taurrifar reached up, running a hand through the thin tuft of grey hair that was Taataani's real head of hair. Until now, he was one of the few that had seen her this way, but it was how he knew her most intimately. He smiled.

"jI wjill wajit forr jyou, saarra'mai, ljike an old trree wajitss forr the sseassonss. And jI wjill keep Captajin Ben ssafe."

Taataani leaned down, and shared a kiss with her husband.

[Ben Merasska]

Ben gave them their time alone, as much out of respect as awkwardness and unfamiliarity. Meorrrei was going out, alone, into an unknown situation. Ben would have done it, but only as a last resort. He would have, first, tried to see if there was any way of contacting the settlement first.

But the beacon had been going for just over a full standard day by now, and if the settlement had any sort of equipment, they'd have heard the beacon and responded. That wasn't a good sign.

While Meorrrei sat and spoke with her husband, Ben got together as much equipment as he could. He squeezed a bit more power of the auxiliaries and got the ship's short range communications working after a bit of jury-rigging and a large antenna made out of an ugly assembly of spare wiring.

"Here," Ben said as Meorrrei walked down the boarding ramp and into their makeshift campsite. He handed her his jacket, and a couple thicker shirts. "This should be better for you than just a sweater. It's not the best, though, and it's not waterproof, so try not to get wet."

He pulled out his comm unit.

"I've got the short range systems working, but they drain power from the auxiliaries too quick for us to keep them on all the time. Send a ping from my comm unit when you get there, and I'll get the thing running and we can communicate."

He hefted a pack, filled with clothing, some dried fish, and her husband's boots, pilfered some time earlier.

"Good luck," he said, pulling on a thick sweater over a couple layers of tunics. "If it takes more than a day, find some place dry and start a fire. Don't try and travel at night."

[Taataani Meorrrei]

She was loaded down, cold, wet, tired, sore, and sleep deprived. Any other day, these offenses would be the greatest transgression she'd ever faced. Life had suddenly snapped her ridiculous existence into sharp focus. These things did not matter. They must not matter. What mattered right now was lying in agony in that makeshift shelter. And he was worth every toil and every iota of suffering.

"Ben, thank jyou."

He'd been an invaluable anchor to her in this tragedy. There was no way she would be able to pull herself together without him, and the words she gave as payment seemed painfully short of the mark.

"Sstajy warrm. Sstajy out of ssjight. Keep hjim ssafe. Keep hjim companjy. Talk to hjim, okajy? He'ss..."

Her voice caught in her throat, and she swallowed hard.

"jI need to go. Ja'irra korra'nai, Ben. The besst of luck."

She didn't linger for a response. Turning away quickly, she began her trip at a hurried clip, blinking burning tears out of her eyes she didn't want anyone to see her shed.

[Ben Merasska]

Ben watched her go, pushing every last word threatening to come out of his mouth back down his throat and into his lungs. He'd only waste her time, and they didn't need him trying in vain to convince himself that she wouldn't die and leave him alone on this planet alone with her husband. He'd always worry about it, until it did or didn't happen.

He turned and looked at the campsite, which was rough looking and very much centered around the hulk of the grounded shuttle. He tried to keep himself from focusing on how quiet things had gotten; how the only thing he could hear was the whispers of the trees moving in the wind.

He fled the outdoors, heading inside and checking on Meorrrei's husband, who was moaning softly in his bunk. Ben moved to give him some more painkillers, but stopped when he saw exactly how much was left.

Meorrrei's husband looked at him, making Ben want to look away.

"Ssave it," he murmured hoarsely. Ben nodded, putting the rapidly diminishing medical supply away, and left the room, heading back into the engine compartment to work on making the climate controls functional. If he was warm, then perhaps he could sleep and recuperate more easily.

Taking the voltage meter in one hand and a hydrospanner in another Ben schooled his expression into one of determination, and went to work.

[Taataani Meorrrei]

The gentle slope of the landscape put momentum behind her, and Taataani started out at a brisk pace. She weaved through stands of evergreen trees, listening ahead and behind for signs of trouble. Regularly she would stop, swivel her ears, and pick up the pace. She didn't pause to think, to reflect, or dwell on things that might slow her down. She simply moved. Her breath came out in steamy puffs as she trudged onward, losing her vantage and temporarily losing sight of the old colony ship as she descended the gently-sloping mountainside they had crashed on.

She held onto her blaster for dear life. It was her fighting chance against the great unknown around her.

[Ben Merasska]

Around Meorrrei, the forest was silent, the only sounds the wind in the trees and the crunch of snow beneath her feet. Lower down the mountain they'd crashed onto, the evergreens grew more thickly, and were interspersed with the skeletons of brush and bushes.


-------------------------


Ben stopped working on the climate controls in frustration two hours after he'd begun, his fingers numb and bruised from the growing list of mistakes he was making. He saw crystals growing on the wiring; the moisture in his breath was freezing onto them.

He stopped by at Meorrrei's husband's bunk, and winced as he looked at him.

He stepped out of the ship and kindled the fire from the coals it had left behind, and ate some of the fish they'd left to dry near the fire, and cried.

[Taataani Meorrrei]

Taurrifar heard the human reaching his breaking point, and he cleared his throat a little. He felt a strange chill, and drew the blanket tighter around him.

"Captajin?"

He didn't want to hear him cry. He didn't need anything to cause him to lose hope.

"Captajin, come herre."

He waited for Ben to arrive.

"Do jyou ssjing, Captajin?"



-----------------------------

Taataani had to move carefully, and had to be sure of her direction. To someone without a reference point and with no map skills, that was a difficult feat. In the taiga, she had to occasionally scale a tree to find her bearings, and that exposed her to the biting wind above. She was starting to lose her energy reserves. She moved slower and slower. The dull ache in her body intensified with every mile. She paused beneath a tree, catching her reserves, and tucked into a piece of fish, following that with water. In the trees beyond, there was the sound of movement. Wild game, perhaps. She watched for any movement, but every moment she lingered, she felt herself wanting to sleep.

[Ben Merasska]

Ben hurriedly wiped his eyes and nose, sniffling and grunting, surprised at himself for his breakdown. He didn't lie to himself; he knew he wasn't the most emotionally stable person. Still, his chest hurt something awful.

He expected to hear his father, older now, calling his name, asking if everything was ready for supper. He expected to see his brothers walking out of the tree line, laughing and dirty, carrying bundles of wood for the next day's worth of fires.

He'd run so far, for so long, and here of all places it caught up to him completely, the emotional knowledge that he was it, the last of his family. He thought of Juroden, and of Ranneth, and it struck him then, that Ranneth was right.

Alderaan was dead. Alderaanians were dying out. The Empire had declared war and won with one shot from the Death Star, and though it was long since destroyed, now a ring of debris around Yavin, it couldn't bring back anything.

Ben Merasska was alone in the galaxy.

He pushed everything back down into his stomach, and could feel the acid churning, trying to eat away at it, but it was indigestible. He knew it would come back up, but perhaps he could keep running, and find his island of peace.

He stood, and walked back into the ship, and sat next to Meorrrei's husband.

"I did sing, once," he said with a watery grin. "My family stopped me and told me it classified as torture."


----------------------------------------------


As Meorrrei travelled, signs of civilization began to appear, though most of them were hidden and so beaten by the elements they weren't recognizable as anything other than once having been made, not grown.

As she rested beneath the tree, a huge, four legged animal ambled into sight, and let a long, slow, low reverberated from its chest out through its nose. It ignored Taataani for the most part, simply watching her, its head low, brandishing it's large rack of horns jutting from its head in a lazy warning.

Behind it ambled three more of the creatures, all dark brown and hairy, making their way down the mountain-side to the mostly frozen river below.

Beyond them, interestingly, what looked like a cairn of rocks was assembled. The top most rock was oddly shaped, and set too perfectly on the others to have been placed there haphazardly.

[Taataani Meorrrei]

Taurrifar smiled at the self deprecation.

"Asss long asss jyou feel what jyou ssjing, krai'ssha to whateverr anjyone elsse ssjingss."

The Cizerack inhaled deeply, and when he sang, it was a quiet, slowly-metered verse, and one he repeatedly broke meter to catch his breath within.

"Shai'a l'os maa'tiie ne
Oi'rre na hui'me te
Voi na'kee'kee russ
Shai'a l'os maa'tiie ne"

He gestured to Ben to try with him on the refrain. He went slow enough for the human to at least mime the words. As he said, it didn't matter, as long as you felt it.


----------------------------------

Seeing a break from the eternity of tundra in her midst, Taataani instantly made for the cairn. She needed something to keep the fire inside her alight. Something that told her that just beyond the distance, there was someone who could make things right. Nothing natural set that cairn in place, and she was certain that whatever the colony ship had brought, was now leaving messages for her to find.

She hoped. It was all she could do.

[Ben Merasska]

Ben hadn't been lying about his talent with singing.

"Shai'a l'os maa'tiie ne
Oi'rre na hui'me te
Voi na'kee'kee russ
Shai'a l'os maa'tiie ne"

But the meter was what saved him. He allowed the song to push away the feelings gnawing at his gut and focused solely on it, and by extension, the moment. He did indeed let himself feel the song, and what he felt, he liked.

"What does it mean?" he asked.


---------------------------------------


The cairn stood in the middle of a small patch of treeless ground, and the stones looked ancient and worn. The top most stone was not stone, though it looked weathered and worn. It was a small block of duracrete, and on it was a small plaque of durasteel, in which was carved, messily but still clearly enough to be read.

Sleeper Ship Discovery Farren Serrille A Good Man

There were no dates, nor an age for the man the rocks covered.

Meorrrei traced a finger along the lettering, and frowned on seeing a discolored mark beneath the man's name. She pressed it, and it sunk, slowly, into the durasteel that surrounded it.

A woman's voice echoed through the small clearing, almost indistinct due to the age of the recording.

"Farren Serrille, a biochemist, age... around thirty. Died of infection due to a bite of a wild hound. Without antibiotics to treat the wound, and were unable to reach home, north by northwest, before the fever took him."

The recording fell silent, save for the static and what was undoubtedly the sound of the wind. Taataani waited for a moment, and turned to leave, but the recording became clearer, and the sound of the wind in the background was lost against the backdrop of someone weeping. A man's voice was picked up, but she didn't need to hear clear words to know the man was trying to soothe the woman.

"He was a good man."

The recording ended.

[Taataani Meorrrei]

Taurrifar gestured for the water canteen. He sipped lightly, and with a careful swallow he explained.

"Mjy fatherr taught me when jI wass ljittle. jIt'ss a ssong forr fatherrss and ssonss.

On the ssummerr grrasss jI rrun
Therre'ss no carress todajy
Though jit majy be cold tomorrrow, ssoon agajin
On the ssummerr grrasss jI rrun."

He pulled the blanket a little tighter.

"The besst ssong jI can thjink to ssjing rrjight now."



---------------------------------------------


Taataani had felt cold for hours. Now that cold cut her to the quick. She replayed the message in her head over and over again as she continued to trudge on. It was a message of hopelessness. She tried to banish it from her head but it was freezing her reason like frostbite.

Finding a respite from the wind, she stumbled into a small dell and found a patch of ground on a leeward side of a hill that was barren of snow. She needed to rest. Easing down to her knees, she pulled her tail in around her middle, trying to stay warm. She looked for some bastion of defiance inside her to tear down whatever this bleak message had built in her mind to poison her resolve. Finding little to console her, her entire body began to shake with a quiet but agonizing sob. Her eyes closed tightly and her teeth bared, as if she couldn't even surrender the indignity of letting the sound of crying escape her. So she suffered in absolute silence.

[Ben Merasska]

"It's not bad at all," Ben said, trying not to look down at the shapes hidden by the blankets. "I like it. It's very... uh, domestic. Homely, or homey, if you know what I mean."


He leaned back and looked up at the ceiling of the bunk, feeling the cold seep in through the layers of clothing.

"The fact that you can sing at all says a lot," he said, looking at the gusts of mist as they billowed from his mouth.

"That you can sing and feel it, well, I think you're the most stable of us at the moment." Ben grinned again.


----------------------------------------------


The cairn behind her was silent, bearing witness to her defiant outpouring of grief and hopelessness.

The trees stood about, their brown, green, and white livery all surrounded her.

But within them, a shape moved.

And in the distance, there was a long, moaning howl.

[Taataani Meorrrei]

A distant problem worked itself out on Taurrifar's face. He looked to Ben.

"jI'm not gojing to walk agajin, am jI?"



-------------------------------------


Taa startled herself awake. The position of the sun in the sky hadn't changed much, she must have only dozed off, exhausted by her travels and her sudden outpouring of grief. She shivered, wiping the traces of saline from her cheeks as she drew up into a crouch, hear ears triangulating the origin of the howl in the distance. Unable to tell if it was coming or going, she pushed onward, finding some reserve of determination within her.

She had to keep moving. That message was for the man who died here. No one else would die here. Not now.

[Ben Merasska]

"Hey now, no need to get all melodramatic on me," Ben replied quickly trying to head off what was likely to be a subject that would make him feel ten times worse if he let himself dwell on it. "A couple days in bacta, and there are some great doctors for prosthetics."

He shifted in his seat, desperate to find some other subject, but unable to think of anything.

"You'll barely even notice they're not real," Ben continued, blundering forward with caution set aside for later review. "I knew a guy who needed to get both arms and a leg replaced. No one ever beat him in arm-wrestling ever again."


----------------------------------------


Following one line of the message - north-by-northwest - Taataani found herself coming upon more cairns, at first a few, but then groups of four and five and more, until finally they no longer appeared.

In the darkening twilight, the shadow of the colony ship's husk loomed dark against the backdrop of stars twinkling in the clear sky, and it was positively huge.

She had no more than ten minutes' travel to reach the hulk; time enough to reach the site before darkness fell completely.

The howls were growing louder, as well.

[Taataani Meorrrei]

"That'ss a cleverr wajy to thjink of jit, jyeah..."

He admired Ben's careful administration of catharsis when he needed it. He wasn't upset. It was just a big thing to think about. To lose something you take for granted every day. Would Taataani see him the same way again? Would she still feel for him the way he knew she felt? He had to believe it, but the injury that stung greatest of all was his pride. He knew his station in house Meorrrei. The sun would set.

"Ben, don't let herr ssee them. Okajy?"



------------------------------------------


She hated these monuments to the dead. Every Cizeri curse, her mind lashed upon them. If she could spare the energy, she'd tear them down, these silent mocking witnesses that long ago forgot who they honored and now only served to tell her what she couldn't do. Whatever tragedy they bore witness to, it was not hers. Not yet.

Now, the hulk of the colony ship was nearly upon her. Her gait slowed to a trot, rather than a desperate scramble. She was winded, exhausted, hungry, and thirsty. Her head pounded from a resurgent headache. In the distance, a howl began to draw near that could only herald trouble. It would not stop her.

She remembered her comm. Pulling it from her pack with frigid fingers, she mashed the transmit button.

"Ben....Ben jI'm herre!"

[Ben Merasska]

"I don't think that's something we can hide," Ben answered honestly, but still his tone indicated that he agreed to try and keep Meorrrei from seeing them. He paused, suddenly wondering something. "How do they feel? A lot of pain?"

He lifted up the blankets and looked on with a desperate sort of horror as he saw the thoroughly soaked wrappings; brown and a deep dark red stained the cloth and even crossed over into the bunk itself. A sickly green tinge was arcing along the edges of the stains, weaving through them malevolently. Ben looked up at Taurrifar, but the Cizerack was looking up at the ceiling of the bunk patiently, and Ben had shifted his gaze back to the male's legs before Taurrifar could return the look and see the bad turn of events.

Ben's mouth worked, trying to form any words, but the sight of the infection growing in his legs robbed him of speech and he was suddenly aware again of the giant ball of despair sitting in his gut. He needed to vomit.

Ben placed the sheets and blankets back over Taurrifar's legs and nodded slowly; he was never good at lying or hiding things unless it was by accident, so he was never more glad to hear the pinging sound that heralded Meorrrei's arrival at the colony ship site.

"I'll be back," he said, patting the bunk beside the disabled man gently, and jogging out of the bunk and around to the cockpit. He threw himself into the seat and powered up the communications array he'd set up, hoping that the antenna would do its job.

Ben... Ben, jI'm here!

"Great! Can you hear me? Is there anyone there? Anyone at all?" Ben could hear her, but the connection was very dirty, and cut through with static. There was no way for a hologram to be projected, so all he could see was a vague form that was frequently distorted and sometimes completely disappeared.


-------------------------------------------


The colony ship stretched up to the heavens like the ruins of an ancient temple, its grasp torn down by jealous and greedy hands of gravity and the elements, which would not release it from its grasp.

It was covered in snow, and looked like an otherworldly mountain, both like it belonged where it was while simultaneously seemingly like it came from and belonged somewhere else.

The area around the colony ship was noticeably bare of debris, indicating that something or someone had cleaned it up. There were no entrances into the ship from what Meorrrei could see, but the few building she could see were stone ruins, whose very purpose lay forgotten beneath the snow.

[Taataani Meorrrei]

Taa's gait slowed to a careful walk as she wandered among the increasingly-organized ruins at the ship's outskirts. Save for the howling, she heard nothing else, and saw no one. Like the cairns, this place was empty.

"Therre'ss no one, Ben."

She frowned at her defeatist tone, and pressed the comm close to her mouth again.

"jI'm sstjill lookjing."

She carefully approached the shipwreck. It looked like some bizarre cathedral in a way. Close enough to touch the hull, she brushed a hand against it, pulling away at the chilling touch of cold durasteel.

She looked back at the ruins. What happened to this place?

[Ben Merasska]

Ben grimaced and swore under his breath at Meorrrei's response; it was somewhat surprising that the people from the colony ship didn't live within a ready made shelter, though it was possible that they'd moved somewhere else. What reason would have made them pack up and leave?

He hoped it wasn't far, because they needed help, and fast.

"Do you see any entrances into the ship? It's getting dark, and sleeping in a tree might be more difficult. Try and find somewhere safe. It'll be much easier to find things in the daylight than by moonlight."

Ben looked back through the cockpit arch, as if he could see the state of his only other companion on the planet. He looked back at the communications controls and the fuzzy, indistinct image projected by it.

"We can't afford to make any mistakes," he said finally. "Let's see if things don't look different in the morning."

[Taataani Meorrrei]

Ben was right. The light was quickly dimming again. She didn't want to face the biting cold without shelter. Quickly, she scoured the perimeter of the wreck, looking for a door. None was found, but she did find a jagged gash in the hull. Carefully climbing through snarled shreds of durasteel plate, Taa entered the abandoned ship. Her eyes, accustomed to seeing in dim light, glowed a faint blue as they cast back what little light they picked up.

"Ben?"

She whispered into the comm as she ventured ahead.

[Ben Merasska]

"I can hear you, but the signal's very weak," Ben answered, fiddling with a knob and trying to get a stronger signal. "Did you find a way in? Get your blaster out, and make sure it's got a good pack in for strong bolts. There's no telling what's nesting or living in there now."


--------------------------------------------


There was very little light inside the ship; and it was very cold. She'd entered into a room, which had once likely been a large supply closet of sorts, though most of the fabrics had rotted, and plants were growing where once a pile of bedding had been situated. It was cold enough on the planet that some of the designs on the scraps of the linens left in the dirt and decomposed blankets were recognizable.

The door was ajar, with barely enough room for Meorrrei to attempt to open the door further and allow her entrance into the bowels of the wrecked colony ship.

[Taataani Meorrrei]

The signal had turned to static crackle, and Taa at last turned it off. She wasn't going to get any further use from that thing in the ship. Carefully, she maneuvered cramped quarters, her night vision kicking in and leaving her surroundings in a dim monochrome. Her breath came out in careful puffs of steam as she gripped her pistol tightly. Slight groans in distant metal were magnified by echoes in the distance, creating phantoms for the matron's ears to chase.

[Ben Merasska]

The door was easily moved, much to Meorrrei's surprise; though it wasn't easy, there was no real pressure against her application of force to widen the opening the door offered.

Slipping through the door, Meorrrei's eyes adjusted more to the near complete lightlessness of the interior corridor she found herself in.

Aurebesh was emblazoned on the walls in a dark color, inhibiting complete understanding, but the generally lighter colors of the interior of the ship, mainly light grey to a dull white, enabled her to see a mostly clear hallway, regularly interspersed with doorways, though all of them were completely closed.


-----------------------------------------


Ben watched the image projected by the communications panel slowly fade out. She had to be on the ship.

It was unlikely that the ship had power, but even for so long without running, there had to be portable power generators for when the ship made landfall. She'd try to call again, he hoped, and hopefully would be able to give him enough information for him to deduce where she was on the ship; from there he could give her directions to find some portable generators and hopefully other supplies.

One portable generator would give them climate control in less than half an hour. Two would be able to get their signal onto more frequencies. If all she found was that, the journey would have been worth it.

[Taataani Meorrrei]

"Hello?"

...ello...llo...o...

In the pitch darkness and tomb-like silence, she stood fixed to the spot, her anger and her desperation rising to the breaking point. They were supposed to be here. Someone was supposed to be here. They had to be here!!!

She ran to a door, attempting to pry it, but the mechanism stuck a quarter way through. Taataani beat against the durasteel impotently, shrieking in a sound that thundered through the corridors.

"OPEN THjISS DOORR DAMN jYOU!!! OPEN!!! OOOPEEEEN!!!"

In the dark, she found the faint outline of something solid and metal. Hoisting the pipe off the deck, she swung it at the door, battering it with all of her impotent strength, impotent anger, and useless desperation.

This ship didn't care. There was nobody left to care.

[Ben Merasska]

All was silent save for Meorrrei's screams. As her voice broke and her screams echoed, the sounds of howling echoed softly through the metal of the ship, likely through more tears and openings.

A hiss of static finally reached her ears as she lost her breath. Turning quickly, she caught sight of a vid panel at the far end of the corridor, completely lost in snow.

[Taataani Meorrrei]

She spun about, delirious and half-blinded by the sudden light source as she ran towards it. Skidding to a stop in front of the monitor, Taataani looked it over, trying to find something to hone the signal in, or at least some way to access the power source. Ben needed power, didn't he? If she couldn't get some answers from this derelict, maybe she could at least buy them some time. She refused to leave here with nothing. She wasn't a believing person in a religious sense, but she believed there was some kind of justice in the way of things.

She ran a hand over the monitor as she worked, hoping for the best. Some way to speak to someone out there. Someone who could hear her call for help.

[Ben Merasska]

"...Someone's there...hold...signal..."

The vid-screen flickered to life, showing a woman's face staring intently into the screen, wearing a uniform of a kind Taataani had never seen before.

"You need to hurry. Hounds have dens in this part of the ship," she said, her voiced clipped and business-like. "Power is out in all sections and decks, but I can restore power to every section you pass through, one at a time, to keep them out."

The woman looked at her intently, and nodded finally, as if determining something in her own mind.

"I can run a signal through the vid-screens. Access them and I'll let you through. I will not if there are any hostiles around you, understand?... Done... incoming. Detect..."

The signal was lost, slowly, and the woman's voice faded into static.

[Taataani Meorrrei]

Contact at last, but still no catharsis. Still no end in sight. But this woman had to be found.

As the screen died, Taataani turned, her eyes again working to adjust to near black conditions. Hounds. Her ears twitched, picking up the amplified echoes of distant howling that had followed her for the past few hours. Her heartrate quickened, and her tail raised for counterbalance. She found the weight of her pistol reassuring as she moved along the corridor as indicated. In the strange coffin of a ship, sound was a malleable thing. Her ears, capable as they were of teasing the location of sounds out, were of limited help with every reverberation. Still, in the inky darkness of the hallway, another monitor flickered in the distance.

She didn't wait.

She ran.

[Ben Merasska]

The corridors were long and dark, and Meorrrei found herself going down multiple dead ends.

But she finally found another vid-screen.

"Ah, you're back," the woman said intently. "I've been attempting to route power to different sections from here, but I can't completely. You'll have to go a roundabout route, and for that I apologize."

She stopped and looked at something off screen.

"You need to head through the medical bay. There's a lift there that can take you up to the next level."

[Taataani Meorrrei]

A lift?

She turned around, again her eyes taking seconds to adjust, and trudged on. At the nexus of several hallways, she could see the doors and control that indicated it was a lift. Like the systems in other places, these were without power. Undaunted, she pressed her pink tongue through her lips as she pried her claws into the opening, and gave the doors a heave. The tracks slid, but there was no car waiting.

"A cljimb, then."

She spoke to nobody, her voice still casting off steam in the pale blue her eyes reflected back.

"Whoeverr jyou arre, jI'm comjing. And then jyou'rre gojing to help me."

Feeling inside for the support cable, she gave it a healthy tug to determine if it was load bearing. Finding satisfactory resistance, she wrapped her legs around, shimmying up the cable with speed, not knowing if some calamity would change her situation in a heartbeat. Fortunately, the lift held just fine. She reached the level indicated on the previous screen, and with similar effort, prized the doors open. The Aurabesh before her clearly stated MEDICAL LEVEL

She tumbled forward to terra firma, her small blaster back in her hand from where it had been tucked into her belt previously.

"Now wherre?"

She looked for lights. If the woman was routing power, that was as good a sign as any.

[Ben Merasska]

The medical bay was huge, in actuality spanning an entire deck of the ship.

As Meorrrei stepped forward, more lettering became visible: MEDICAL LEVEL SECTION C.

She walked deeper into the level until she entered a large, darkened room, with a recessed, dried pool, and ivy growing up around several large columns. As she entered, the lights flickered on, and in front of her were several snuffling hound cubs.

Skeletons littered the area around them, but no adults had appeared as of yet.

[Taataani Meorrrei]

What were these...things?

Shrinking back from the sight, Taataani looked at the remains in the feeding den. Ostensibly, the remains of some of the survivors she saw from the cairns. Heartrate quickening, she caught the beasts distinct scent, as she looked left and right for signs of the creatures that actually caused this carnage.

The woman said she'd have to go through the medical section. Through, to where?

Her ears could hear distant movement, and she frantically took advantage of the light afforded her. There...on the wall! A map. She was...here. The next section opened up...

Taataani looked down a long corridor with plenty of open space. No. Not in the open. There had to be another way. Back towards the den...columns. They led up to a utilitarian overhang and a snarl of access ducts and pipes.

She made her move, heading back to the den, and leapt onto nearest ivy-covered pylon, climbing it with urgency.

[Ben Merasska]

The cubs picked up Meorrrei's scent and sounds easily, and followed her as she tried to find a way out. They tried to jump and follow her up the column, but were unable to get very far before falling. As she reached the halfway point, a massive adult hound loped into the room and growled, smelling prey and seeing her just barely out of his reach.

He snapped and jumped.

Meorrrei barely avoided the creature's jaws, and saw that there was a second level as she came closer to the top. Another adult hound charged in, looked up, and ran out again, howling, sending reverberating chills through the matriarch's spine.

And she could hear the tell-tale hiss of a vid-screen above her, as the lights below her dimmed.

[Taataani Meorrrei]

Taataani tossed a look back, wide-eyed as her adrenaline granted her wings. Her tail hiked up as she continued to shimmy up to the next level ascent, just in time to catch the next monitor. Eyes lingering at the massive beast that stalked below and then charged off, she whirled back to face her only link to the living in this place.

"What the hell arre thesse thjingss?!"

Her ears splayed back and she caught her breath. When she spoke again, it was lower.

"jI need to fjind you, and jI need to fjind jyou now. Wherre arre jyou?! Help me!"

[Ben Merasska]

The vid screen continued to remain full of static, but the woman's voice came through clearly.

"I do not have time to explain them in depth to you," the woman said. "They are hounds that escaped their kennels when this ship crashed onto the planet. The main computer of this section of the ship is in the bridge. The ship's main computer is working against me, still following through with its programming. We'll need to shut it down to keep this "

There was only static for a moment, but the woman's voice came in loud and clear.

"I've managed to isolate a lift for you to use to get up to the bridge. Do so now, it will allow you to bypass the other creatures that have escaped."

[Taataani Meorrrei]

The matron was furious. This power play wasted precious time, and she wasn't about to let ten thousand hounds or some rogue computer deny her what she needed. Misplaced anger resulted in a swat at the screen. Extended claws ran four parallel scratches deep into the glass, but the static-shrouded face was unmoved.

"jI'm not jyourr puppet. jI'll ssee jyou on the brrjidge, but jI want pajyment jin full jin ansswerrss."

She turned her back on the screen, picking up her pace yet again for the lift. Her ears and eyes tracked for any movement of those dread hounds, as she clung tightly to her blaster. Nothing opposed her for the moment, and she skidded to a halt in the lift, pressing the controls to access the bridge.

[Ben Merasska]

Meorrrei entered the lift and it rose. And continued to rise, until it stopped, and the lights flickered out, and then back on.

"Damn. The computer's trying to block access to the bridge. I can reroute the access to a terminal on the floor you're on. Simply turning it on should allow me to force the lift to the bridge. Be careful."

The lights dimmed, and Meorrrei stepped out of the lift, to see a large screen on the wall, flickering on and off. Something was written on it, but the meaning was incomprehensible.

A loud hissing filled the air, and a voice emanated from seemingly everywhere at once.

"CREW, BE WARNED. SPECIMENS HAVE ESCAPED CONFINEMENT. SECURITY SYSTEMS OFFLINE. EXIT THE DECK AND REPAIR SECURITY SYSTEMS. THANK YOU."

Ahead, the corridor was blanketed in dim lights, and what seemed to be a plethora of spiders' webs.

[Taataani Meorrrei]

Instinctively, Taa reached up to press her hands against her ears, lessening the offensive noise all around her. Blaster still balled up in her right fist, she grit her teeth and re-steadied herself, pressing onward. She lead forward with the barrel of her weapon, using it as a ward against the spiderwebs, severing the ones directly in her line of approach.

Eventually, she arrived at the terminal, looking over the readouts with expectation of her next instructions. Her tail twitched, snapping up and down. This charade had to end. Now.

[Ben Merasska]

"Activate the terminal. There should be a switch along the side."

Meorrrei quickly activated the terminal, and glared at the vidscreen; lights flickered on around her, and the terminal's coloring switched from red to green.

"Good, I can now keep that blasted computer from playing with the lift systems. Try and make it back to the lift. Be careful."

Meorrrei turned to leave, and saw now a large room, illuminated for the first time in what seemed to be ages. A viewport was visible and the sight within was of several mechanical objects, and a small box, from which wires were hanging loosely.

A seat was situated next to the box, and within it sat a skeleton, hair still clinging to the bone. A door with a glowing green activation switch was visible.

She could go and get the microgenerator, or continue on to the bridge.

The sounds of growling and pounding feet began to echo through the halls.

[Taataani Meorrrei]

At the sight of the generator, Taataani bolted for it, but she paused mid-stride. While the generator would help to power the beacon and keep heat on, they still wouldn't be out of this mess. Like Ben had said, the pirates could very well answer that distress signal with another attack.

Was that all to be found here? She'd feasted upon disappointment since reaching the first cairn, but a part of her too stubborn to be cowed refused to believe that the sum of her toils would only result in a few more days of power and a prayer deferred.

She closed her eyes.

"Taurrifar, keep fajith jin me."

And with that, she headed to the bridge.

[Ben Merasska]

The doors of the lift opened, and the bridge was revealed, finally. The rising sun illuminated the room brightly, and the dust covering every surface was thick and grey as ash.

Meorrrei stepped into the bridge and blinked, covering her eyes as lights blinked on, all over the bridge. A voice, the woman's voice, echoed over the speakers on all the consoles.

"Welcome. I am MAICOM, the computer assigned to run the essential tasks of the Discovery sleeper ship. I have waited for contact from the survivors who left this ship for two hundred and twenty three galactic standard years, five galactic standard months, seventeen galactic standard days, twelve standard hours, and roughly fifteen minutes and thirty seconds.

"I apologize for the way in which you were brought here. Your intervention has allowed me to assume complete control of the remains of this ship."

[Taataani Meorrrei]

So that was it, then? There was no one.

Her hope dashed yet again, she closed her eyes, a tear squeezing past in her left eye, rolling down her cheek.

"Pleasse."

It was a whisper.

[Ben Merasska]

"I do not understand. For what are you asking? If it is within my ability to do, I shall. I detect a distress beacon. I can amplify this signal if you so desire. My battery fed power reserves are enough to perform this task, along with other necessary subroutines, for three days, fifteen hours, fourteen minutes and 54 seconds.

"...Or is it some other task I can complete for you, or some sort of assistance I can provide?"

[Taataani Meorrrei]

Her heart lifted at this news. Placing both hands on the nearest railing to the interface, she leaned forward, her ears raising with expectation that maybe her toils would be worth something after all.

"Ampjifjy the beacon! We need help! Mjy hussband..."

Her voice wavered and she swallowed down her fears that, now upon the cusp of success, were redoubling in their fresh urgency.

"...we crrasshed herre. He'ss hurrt badljy. Mjy pjilot jiss helpjing, but..."

She couldn't say it. She couldn't. But I don't know how long he will make it.

She bit down her doubt, no. She wouldn't dare. New resolve was found, and she looked to the computer once more.

"Whateverr can be done, pleasse."

[Ben Merasska]

"Of course."

The bridge computer went quiet for a few moments.

"Long range scanners detect power levels of crashed shuttle dangerously low, and are nearly below the threshold for complete signal and power failure. Working on possible resolutions."

After another few moments of quiet, the computer began whirring to life once more. A projector lit up, but flickered, and finally went dark.

"Holoprojector disabled and no longer functional. Possible solution remains. This system runs from energy stored from the engines, which are no longer active, and the power core, which is failing into a number of batteries stored in various parts of the ship. Four batteries remain here. They are small enough to be carried. If you do take, please leave one battery to allow me to run the lift and complete shutdown process."

[Taataani Meorrrei]

Some help was better than none at all. Was she expecting an automated droid medical shuttle to whisk Taurrifar to functioning facilities where he could be tended to? Expecting was the wrong word. Hope was allowed to be irrational.

Taataani moved to the batteries indicated. With their size, she could carry two of them. Carefully disconnecting them as instructed, she turned to leave, and didn't look back.

Once gain it was on her. The only difference this time was that she was certain of it. Hope deferred, hope changed.

She ran.

[Ben Merasska]

The trip back down to the bottom level of the ship was fast, now that there was no struggle to control it.

The lift opened, revealing the dark interior of the first area she'd gone through.

"With the remaining five hours of time remaining on reserve battery supply, I will continue to amplify the signal. Maicom wishes you success."


----------------------


Ben grunted as he reset the wiring, desperately trying to ignore the fevered groans of Meorrrei's husband in his bunk.

"Come on," he gasped, sweat beading down his forehead. He glanced at the voltage meter and swore as he watched the numbers changed, and not for the better. The reserve batteries were running low, and there wasn't much time to get the power core back up and operational.

The comm suite pinged, causing him to drop the meter and wiring and run into the cockpit.

"Meorrrei!" he nearly shouted. "Are you there?"

[Taataani Meorrrei]

"jI'm herre! Ben! Ben! Can jyou hearr me?!"

She had everything she'd get from the derelict. Every answer, however lacking, was hers to have. Now, she carried the means to their success with her. Woe to anyone or anything in her way.

She grit her teeth through the pain, the cold, and the exhaustion that thraetened to undo her. If there was doubt that she was made of inferior stuff, this would be the moment that disproved it. She ran, lungs churning battery acid, and muscles pumping fire.

"Ben?!"

[Ben Merasska]

"Meorrrei? You're alive!" Ben gasped in relief, looking at the speaker as if it could convey his deepest gratitude to her. "I'd ask you what you found, but we need you here."

Ben stopped, trying to think of a way break what was happening there, but unable to grasp anything that he would ever want to say.

"Things aren't looking good."

[Taataani Meorrrei]

"Ben!"

She gasped, still mid-stride. She wasn't going to stop. Not now.

"Ben, jI have powerr forr the beacon! Wajit forr me!"

Furiously, she ran. This time, she wasn't going to wait. Not for night, not for fatigue. Not this close. Never again.

"Tell Taurrifar jI'm comjing. We'rre closse!"

[Ben Merasska]

Ben leaned back as the link closed and stared at the speaker, before standing and moving back to Taurrifar's bunk. The male was shivering, and whispering something to himself over and over again.

Ben slowly knelt beside him and felt a helplessness he'd only felt once before.

[Taataani Meorrrei]

She ran.

Time was meaningless. The only thing that mattered was running now.

Sun rise, sun set.

She was exhausted. She stumbled and fell. No stopping. Not for anything. Her body ached. Muscles pumped lactic acid. Every league she ran was an experience in torture. Never in her life had she pushed that hard.

There was no one. Only her. It was up to her to save Taurrifar. To save Ben. To save herself.

Nearly upon the landing sight, she saw in the distance a shuttle approaching. The lines of it were of a Sienar design. RESCUE!!!

At last she paused, her body failing her, and she fell to her knees.

"Ben!!! Oh Saanjarra!!! We'rre rresscued!"

[Ben Merasska]

"Hold on," Ben murmured, watching Taurrifar shudder. "We have battery packs now. We've got power."

A familiar, and very eerie sound filtered through the hull of their shuttle and forced Ben to look up, as if he could see through the layers of durasteel and metal into the blue sky above.

Standing, he pulled the blanket over the cizerack's body and walked outside, fully expecting the pirates to be out and ready to shoot him. The sight before him forced him to lean against the wall, on hand going over his eyes to counteract the glare of the sun.

[Taataani Meorrrei]

She was overwhelmed with her joy, and as the shuttle turned in the distance, she could see the familiar Imperial Gear stamped on it's dorsal fin as it began the wind-down toward landing. Not a particular fan of the Empire, she was never more happy to see them than now.

"They'rre not pjirratess, Ben! They'rre herre to rresscue uss!"

Her body shook with exhaustion as she willed herself to her feet, and she could just manage to drag the batteries. But she happily did it, eager to be reunited with Taurrifar, not a moment too soon.

[Ben Merasska]

The shuttle turned and dropped close to their crash site; there wasn't any real room for a landing right next to them. Meorrrei was panting, fatigued and nearly dead on her feet. Ben ignored the sounds of the shuttle offloading its contingent of soldiers and personnel, and ran over to Meorrrei.

"Things aren't looking good," he said, holding her up. "He's got a fever. We have to get him a doctor."

[Taataani Meorrrei]

"Taurrifar!"

Taataani's voice cracked and rasped as she gasped for her breath. She sagged under her weight, letting Ben support her a moment as the batteries fell from her grasp. What had seemed such a titanic effort was seemingly for little to nothing. It didn't matter. As long as her husband made it, she could walk on the fires of Mustafar for want of water that never came.

Ben's words of trouble caused her to stir. Bloodied and blistered feet pumped against the ground, and she pulled herself from his grasp, falling to the ground as she remembered how to walk again. By now she could see the shuttle gangplank dropping. The first ones out were stormtroopers, but quickly behind were men in white cover-alls, with cases and stretchers.

"He'ss jin therre!"

She waved frantically, pointing at the crash site.

"Mjy hussband! Pleasse!"

Remembering how to at least hobble, she made her way forward, until she herself was intercepted by two medics, immediately bundling her in an insulating blanket.

"Madam Meorrrei? Madam Meorrrei? Please, remain calm."

She fought against them, trying to shed their embrace as she gestured to Taurrifar, as if to make everyone stop and tend to him first.

She looked back at Ben, wild-eyed, as he too was met by medics determined to tend to his trauma.

[Ben Merasska]

"He's got an infection in both legs," Ben said quickly, meeting the eyes of the medic and waving him off. The medic's eyes narrowed. "Her husband. He's got a fever, and he's sweating so much the bunk is soaked."

Ben nodded to emphasize the truth in his statements, and the medic nodded, gesturing to his companion and the two rushed into the shuttle, disappearing up the loading ramp and Ben staggered over to Meorrrei and sat down heavily next to her while the stormtroopers fanned out and made a perimeter.

[Taataani Meorrrei]

"Madam Meorrrei, you have to stay still. You've got advanced hypothermia. We've got to stabilize your core temperature and get you hydrated!"

She finally relaxed at the sight of the medics parcelling up Taurrifar and carefully loading him onto a stretcher. A rack was suspended for an IV, but the intensity of the attention around him didn't waver. She strained to hear.

"...his pulse is flagging..."

"...thirty cc's of dichlorozan..."

"...fluid on the brain..."

"...heartrate irregular..."

She lay on the stretcher they secured her to and shrieked.

"Pleasse! Saanjarra pleasse!"

[Ben Merasska]

Ben wasn't laid on a stretcher, though he felt he could have a good lie-down as he watched the medics work on the woman's dying husband.

"Into the shuttle," a stormtrooper ordered shortly, no real room in his discipline and training for sympathy and compassion. Ben followed Meorrrei and laid a hand on her shoulder as she cried.

He couldn't say it would be fine. He wasn't a newcomer to lying, but that sort of empty platitude now was worse than worthless.

He didn't look as the medics pushed the stretchers onto the shuttle; the medics were all but ignoring him now. He sat, at first a couple seats away from where Meorrrei was placed, but she reached out a hand for him, and he moved closer, and grabbed it, following her gaze to her husband, who seemed to notice nothing of what was going on around him.

[Taataani Meorrrei]

The medics were true to their trade, and had an IV in Taataani's arm quickly. The saline that would help rehydrate her was also met by a sedative at the port, a precaution taken to account for her unpredictability.

Distantly, she could feel it taking hold. Her body's pleas for rest, long-ignored, were becoming persuasive. She felt heavy. The cold lost its bite. Sound lost its sharpness. She could still see Taurrifar plainly as the medics worked. She smiled, feeling the warm embrace of a hand that knew how to hold another. It was his, wasn't it?

Might as well be.

Taataani's pupils dialated as the drug eased her down. Her breathing slowed. She never wavered in her grip on that hand. It was warm and it knew every nuance of what it meant to feel.

"Rrememberr when we..."

She exhaled, a smile on her face a tell-tale sign that she was far from this place. And so was he.

[Ben Merasska]

Meorrrei fell asleep, and Ben watched as the medics' fevered pace slowed down, and stopped, both of them placing their instruments down and looking at the male cizerack in silence, before one took the sheet draped over his lower half and pulled it up to cover the whole body.

The other medic noted down the relevant information on a datapad and turned to the pilot, and began checking him over.

"How long have you been down there?" he asked, the shuttle shuddering and lifting off.

"We were down there for two days, I think. I'm not sure. Maybe three. Four?"

Ben let Meorrrei's hand fall to her side and told them everything.

[Taataani Meorrrei]

In her dreams, there was no pain, no fatigue, and no cold. She saw him as she always saw him when she closed her eyes. The contours of his face so perfectly etched into her sense of the familiar.

They sat under the shade of the bayossa trees, sipping wine, with the softest grass beneath their bare feet.

Eventually she would wake, and he would not. But for now, it was all perfect.

The shuttle carried the survivors and the fallen alike from this world of tragedy. There would be new days to come. Much colder days than they'd known. But they would remember what it was like to run on summer's grass, because remembering took the chill away, if but for a moment.