Coup de Grâce

[Alexander Tur'enne]

Alexander grunted, face grimacing as he slowly extracted it from the crook of his elbow. His arm felt clammy from where his forehead had rested for so long, and his neck and back ached in protest at even being asked to move at all. For a moment, the thought of a shot of whiskey to take the edge off floated through his mind, but he batted it aside. Someone on this damned ship needed to make it through the day without needing a drink in them.

Instead, he pried open a bleary eye, and stared at what had disturbed him. The light from the monitor screen was obnoxiously bright to his eyes, casting strange shadows across the bunk two meters away that any rational person would have chosen to fall asleep in, instead of letting stubbornness force them to remain at their desk to see their latest futile attempt through.

He ground the heel of his palm into his eye socket, trying to smear away enough sleepiness to at least read the damned blinking message before him, instead of it being a liquefied blur through whatever film of mucus or grime collected behind one's eyelids while you were asleep. He managed enough to make the letter shapes at least recognisable as what they were, though comprehension was still a long way off. He reluctantly teased the other eye open as well, squinting with one, blinking with the other.

Match found.

Okay, so comprehensible words. That was good. Matches found was always good. It was exactly the sort of thing you were hoping to end up with when you ran a - what the hell had he been running again? Oh, that's right. Facial recognition. Even better then. Matches were good. Matches meant that your facial recognition had facial recognised. That meant that -

Xander blinked a few more times, both hands smearing across his eyes quickly before he straightened up in his seat, fidgeting the angle of the keyboard just in case he might find himself needing to type something. Match found. That wasn't just good, that was huge. It had been three weeks since Commander Glayde - or just John now, he supposed; wouldn't be getting used to that any time soon - had given him the impossible task of finding someone that didn't want to be found. True, trying to track down the bassist from a band shouldn't have been particularly difficult; but it became more so when she had mysteriously disappeared without a trace, one of the band members showing up at a hospital in critical condition, all the obscure newsletters from the underground music scene spinning different theories on what had happened, most of them probably not containing even a single shred of truth.

But who cares about some bassist? John Glayde, apparently. According to him, this Sadie K'Vesh person was some top notch slicer, and was one of the few people in the galaxy that John Glayde knew personally and had decided that they could trust. Xander wasn't against it in principle: he could do a little slicing here and there if needs must, but he was a weapons tech not a programmer by trade, and for their purposes they needed someone with more of an edge than he had. Unfortunately, when the standard channels for trying to contact her had come up empty, the task of finding her had fallen onto Xander's shoulders - and Glayde had insisted that it be done quietly, drawing as little attention to themselves as possible. As if the task weren't already hard enough.

And yet, here was success, staring him right in the face. Or rather, staring into the middle distance off the side of his screen, because of the angle of the somewhat grainy alleyway security footage that they'd been able to get their hands on. It lasted only a few seconds: a brief glimpse of a man carrying a young injured woman in his arms, and helping her into the back of a speeder before hopping in himself and driving out of frame. There was no doubt that the woman being carried was Sadie K'Vesh, but the guy - the guy was an enigma. Fortunately, those few frames were enough to compile a crude 3D model of his features, and that was enough to fake a law enforcement query to the Empire's criminal database. And now here he was, everything the Sector Rangers had on one Mister -

"Vittore Montegue," Xander mused aloud, his eyes skimming over the surface details. "Now how the hell do we find you?"

[John Glayde]

* * *

Pain. Overwhelming. Searing. Each tiny movement was agony, held in silence by lungs too damaged to draw enough air to scream. His vision was blurred, and his hearing much the same, dark shapes and muscled sounds all he could process, faint flashes of red and blue, a whole half of his perception seemingly gone. He tried to move his head, but couldn't. Tried to speak, but all that came out were gasped attempts at failed breath.

"It will be okay, John."

He heard the voice but couldn't see the source. He tried to reach for it, fingers burning as they moved, but couldn't find anything to purchase. Gentle contact eased his hand back onto the gurney, insistent pressure insisting that he try not to move. The hands released him. No. Please. Don't leave me. I need to know someone is there.

He felt his consciousness suffer, the sharp sting of needles, the dull flood of drugs in his system. N-no. Stop. Don't make me sleep. I don't want to sleep. Where is she? I need her. Please tell me she's still here.

More words, even harder to understand than before, faint and distant like hearing them through water. Muffled voices. Shouted words. A clatter of things being thrown over. Then silence. Black, still, unfeeling silence.

A single hand on his hand, painful but welcome. A single voice, tense and raw and angry; also painful, but also nice.

"Don't worry, John." For a brief moment, he obeyed. "I'll make it be okay."

Pain. Fire. Burning. Piercing. Agony. The scent of blood. The scent of burning flesh. The feeling of slipping away. The feeling of being stolen away. I'm sorry. Don't let this happen. Don't do this to me. Please. Please.

Just let me die.


* * *

John's eyes snapped open, and for far too long his lungs were dead and still. It didn't matter: he felt the faint pressure as the rebreather that filled in where half of a lung should have been continued to cycle the residual oxygen out of his lungs, scrubbing out the carbon dioxide and pumping the harmless byproducts directly into his urinary system. His vision faded in slowly, the black giving way to a faint green as his synthetic eyes adjusted to the absence of light. A hand came to rest against his chest as he concentrated on willing his lungs back into motion, the eerie feeling of a missing heartbeat beneath his fingers grating against his mind. At least that much he was used to, for the most part: the artificial heart that the Empire had given him after he was supposedly killed in action had become a part of who he was now, and how he considered himself to be. The rest though, that was new.

Stiffly, John eased himself from the sheets, letting his legs fall one and then the other over the edge of the mattress, slowly easing himself until he sat. His hands rose, cradling his face, and John could feel the difference; he could tell where the real parts of him stopped, and the artificial replacements began. You weren't supposed to; the microsensors beneath his synthetic replacement skin were supposed to perfectly replicate both the texture of his natural skin and it's tactile sensitivity, but somehow Glayde knew. Perhaps it was because the fake parts were the only thing that didn't seem to constantly ache.

He reached for the cabinet beside him, grabbed the flask of whiskey, and downed a swig. It was lighter than he'd like it to be; he'd have to make sure to resupply the next time they hit port. Sadly it didn't have the effect that it used to: the chips and circuits that integrated his new cybernetics into the mushy parts of his brain were too sophisticated for alcohol to impair his vision, his balance, or his concentration. At best, it numbed the ache a little. But only a little.

John ran his fingers over his knees, absently probing the metallic replacements for his shattered bones. His feet shifted, tugging on artificial tendons interwoven with his organic muscles. 73%. That was how much of him was left. That was how much of him hadn't been smashed up, carved off, or cast aside. It was supposed to be a good number: confirmation that he was still more man than machine. All he heard from it was that more than a quarter of him was missing. They'd done a real number on him, the ambush that had started all this, but part of him wondered if he'd been better off just left to the whims of nature, to heal or to die as much as it saw fit. They'd told him that it was essential; that if they hadn't tried to repair the damage he'd never have walked again, never have seen again, never have been able to hold a blaster again. They'd told him that it was the right call; the only call to make. Had he been coherent enough to make the call for himself, John often wondered if he would have made the same choice, or if he would have been brave enough to let go, off to face his maker and be judged for all that he had done.

He felt it again, the sudden tug on his consciousness that had awoken him. It was a sound, but not a sound: a sensation that his mind reacted to as if it were the chime of a comlink, but that his ears never actually heard. He reached up, to gently touch his jaw, a small sensor in his fingertips interacting with another just below his ear, triggering the communicator that had been grafted into his skull. "Yeah," he said aloud, a subvocal microphone lodged subcutaneously in his throat picking up his words, digitising them, and transmitting them out through an antenna that John hadn't even dared to ask the location of.

I need to show you something.

Just like the sound that wasn't a sound, he didn't hear those words either. They pressed into his mind, like invading thoughts, and yet somehow he inherently recognised the voiceless voice that they belonged to. Xander. For the incredibly intelligent kind of man that he claimed to be, the man seemed to have a very poor concept of time and decorum.

"It had better be important," John spoke back.

Trust me, it is.

Were he a normal person, a normal person, he would have thought of the tightness in his chest as his heart clenching. He knew better. The pulse that pushed blood around his arteries and veins was artificial, produced by pumps and valves and servos. There was no muscle, no heartbeat, nothing to clench. The doctors had told him that were it not for his artificial heart continuing to function, he would not have survived. Damn the Empire, then: damn the outstretched fingers of what they had done to him still pulling the strings of his life even now.

In this case, the cause of the anxious sensation was far less physiological. "Is this the 'wake Charlotte' kind of important?"

There was a pause; John knew just how well Xander understood the undertones of that question. I'm afraid so.

John let out a sigh. It was a strange feeling, having to sigh on purpose, having to train your mind to breathe a little deeper in advance to make sure you could even do it at all. The reduced capacity of John's lungs made no different to him physically, his doctors - no mechanics - had made sure of that. His rebreather would continue to extract air from his lungs with far more efficiency than anything biological ever could have, and the same implant in his liver that filtered out the harmful byproducts of alcohol consumption also helped flush out the lactic acid from his muscles should they ever lapse into anaerobic respiration. For speaking though, for shouting, for sighs, for laughs, everything was changed. A lifetime of learned lung volumes had to be unlearned and relearned, else nothing sounded right. Hearty laughs became breathless chuckles. Normal speech became whispered words. Now was one such time where a little extra air was needed.

"Understood. We'll be there in a few minutes."

John stared at the wall opposite, at the cold, harsh metal that separated his cabin aboard his ship, the Lost Cause, from the cabin that Charlotte Tur'enne rarely seemed to leave. She was avoiding him, he knew that: she had plenty of reasons to, and John didn't disagree with most of them. It seemed like interacting with him required special effort, became something that was especially taxing, something that she only had the strength to work through for a few hours at a time. I'm sorry, Charlotte, he thought to himself, and for a moment wondered if his cybernetics would somehow find a way to transmit that sentiment to her. It'd make life far easier if it could; far easier than trying to make himself say it.

His eyes closed and he rose to his feet, a mistaken glance in the wrong direction forcing him to glimpse his reflection in the mirror that waited in ambush for him. The worst part was that the face staring back was his own - close enough, at least. On the outside, everything appeared perfectly normal, perfectly fine. Everything that unsettled him, everything uncomfortable, everything that disconcerted and gnawed - those things were all well and truly under his skin.

[Charlotte Tur'enne]

Charles couldn't remember the last time she had slept. Oh sure, there'd been snippets here and there of dozing, of closing her eyes and drifting off just enough that her mind started playing tricks. She hated those times. It was then that she felt more aware somehow and could swear she heard whispers at the edges of her unconsciousness. His whispers, filled with epicaricacy. Never sure if she was actually having her head invaded again or not, Charles had decided long ago that sleep was not for her. That didn't mean she didn't pass out from time to time, either. But there was a difference between actual sleep and just knocked out to oblivion from too much alcohol.

She'd opted for wakefulness though, for hells knew how many hours - more than she'd like, less than she deserved - and had stared at the blank dull shine of the bulkhead above her untill everything had been contemplated to the point of losing all meaning. The cot against one wall in the small room had been avoided, the floor that echoed the ceiling lain down upon instead. Nothing above, nothing below. Nothing between. Nothing inside.

Muffled as they were, competing with engine noise and whatever other monotonous sounds a ship made, Charles could tell people were talking somewhere in the ship. It reached her awareness like a soft hum, nothing more than vibrations in air in tones that suggested her brother and the Major. Commander. John. Whatever.

A hand reached up and dug the heel of her palm against her forehead before dragging itself downward, wiping across her face, pinching the bridge of her nose before pressing down and outwards along sinuses. She felt groggy, congested, and knew it had absolutely nothing to do with being ill.

Not that she wasn't sick, mind you. Though the extent of which was certainly up for debate.

Fingers roamed until they found her closed eyes and pressed inward, just enough until her body decided it should actually protest the action with a dull ache.

They'd be coming for her soon. They always inevitably did. Was her own fault for agreeing to go with them both, she figured. Of course, she did somewhat owe it to Xander and as for Glayde… well… that was complicated. It was always complicated.

Satisfied that she wasn't moving in that moment, her hand left her face, and reached out beside her towards the mostly empty bottle of cheap "Corellian" whiskey. It wasn't from home, didn't even taste like it, but it claimed it and well, with the way the Galaxy was, that seemed enough at the time of purchase.

A soft tink sounded far louder than it had any right to as her fingernails caught just the edge of the glass, the momentum transferred just enough to roll the bottle away from her. It wasn't far and any reasonable person could have just made the extra effort to grab it, but instead Charles simply rolled her head to the side to glare at it, as if the miniscule movement was an act of betrayal that was worthy of…

Lightning jumped from her fingertips and smashed into the bottle, sending shards ricocheting throughout the room and the remaining alcohol to seep across the floor.

"Frak me…" Charlotte groaned and returned her eyes to the ceiling just in time to hear the door to her room aboard the Lost Cause swish open. "I've gone fire eyed again, haven't I? Funny. I don't even feel angry right now."

[John Glayde]

John's hand had been mere inches from knocking on her door when he'd heard the glass break and the groan from within. In truth, it had been a few inches from the door for quite some time, loitering in the air, hesitating. Part of it was reluctance to disturb her; to intrude on the cocoon of solitude that she tried to surround herself with. Part of it was something else; something more, and also less. There was the fact that out of reflex he had planned to knock against the door with the index and middle finger of his left hand: both metal under synthetic skin, as were the bones of his forearm. It was a strange feeling, the phantom void where part of his hand still existed, and part not. Anything he touched with those fingers, he felt, but their latent presence seemed missing somehow, gone but not gone. There was a bitter irony in the fact that it was those fingers in particular that had been taken from him; but then, back with the Empire his trigger finger had never been his to control anyway, so what difference did it make now?

It ran deeper than that, though. Beyond this door was someone he cared for more than he was capable of admitting; and she was suffering, at least as bad as him, or worse. His suffering came from his body, from the way that it had failed him, his humanity slowly being taken from him piece by piece until he began to question who he even was any more. Charlotte's suffering was different: it came from a darkness inside, a twisted knot of hate and loathing for herself and for everything around, that manifested itself in explosive projections and violent anger that she could do little about except aim. John was the lucky one: all his guilt and self-disdain counted for less and less the further he deviated from his humanity; the less he became the man he was. For Charlotte it was the opposite transition: herself had become more, and that more only made things worse.

Even at his best, John had been useless to ease even the slightest fraction of that darkness. What hope was there, now that he was so much less?

Those thoughts fell aside as the audio receptors on the left side of his skull picked up on the sounds from within. It could have been anything, a simple slip, an accident, a deliberate attempt to break glass and do herself harm -

He froze as he saw her, laying on the ground, staring at the ceiling with a broken bottle beside her. He heard the words, but did not process them just yet, his false eyes sweeping across her, picking up on her heart rhythm, scanning for traces of injury, or of blood. None found; that was a small relief. But her question? John knew what she meant by fire-eyed; the burning irises that manifested in defiance of logic and science every time the inner darkness gripped her and forced her to do something outward. Today it was a bottle. Other days it was a chair flung across the room, or a cyborg thrust against the wall by invisible might. For now, no one important had been harmed; but it was a worry, for her most of all, a terrible feedback loop into her already volatile maelstrom of self-loathing.

Stepping over, John lowered himself to the ground, ignoring the glass that crunched between his knee; not even his real knee, anyway. With the outside of his hand, the edge of his little finger, the parts of him that were still bone beneath rather than whatever synthetic alloy or polymer the rest of him was, he gently brushed across Charlotte's forehead, as soothing a gesture as he could muster, guiding her hair away from her eyes until her gaze finally took the hint and found it's way to his.

"Nope," he said quietly - even more quietly than intended; damn lungs. Still, the softness worked to his advantage, his words even more gentle than he had hoped. "Still look pretty normal to me."

For once, he was glad of his inability to spontaneously sigh; the wistful one that wanted to escape would have been just plain embarrassing.

Still as beautiful as ever.

[Charlotte Tur'enne]

"Well, that's something at least." The quip was normal, though the lack of sarcasm that came with it was... Unfortunately also normal nowadays.

For a brief moment Charlotte recalled the threat she had narrowed at Glayde not all that long ago. There had been no or else, just a simple statement, not entirely an order but as close as she would ever give one to her former superior officer. His finger against her skin was in direct violation, but it was something Charlotte had already gone against. All it had taken was Glayde's near demise to utterly banish the demand of no physical contact. The entire incident still was a blur to her, as was everything that followed. Except for what she had done, what she had to do. The life she had to save when her own and countless others seemed nothing sort of worthless.

She wasn't oblivious to the effect it had on John, however. All was even again, she supposed. Both of them had been more than willing to simply let death come and claim them - albeit Charlotte more an active search than simply obliging - and both had been denied by the other with Xander thrown in for good measure to make sure you knew it wasn't just one person who gave a damn.

Charles wanted to enjoy this moment of seeming peace between herself and Glayde, this odd instance of agreeableness in a state they both seemed at least moderately okay with, but that urge in the back of her mind was railing against the soft pressure against her forehead and it just wouldn't quit. Not that she would actively do anything about that either. She didn't force his hand away, or even flinch away as part of her was desperate to do, but merely remained still. The only movement came from her outstretched hand, where the freed liquor had finally spread towards her and Charles let the back of her fingertips shift in the thin film of liquid.

"Xan find your wayward slicer?" She asked, voice still empty and hollow, as if the answer didn't really matter. It did though. It was the first step in something Charles well and truly needed to do. "Or you just checking in to make sure I'm still breathing, sir?"

[John Glayde]

Sir.

That was always his queue to stop. It didn't matter that the Alliance and SpecForce was a long way behind the both of them. It didn't matter what had changed, and what had happened. No matter how far they went, how much they tried; it all came back to Sir. It all came back to that nagging reminder that whatever this was, it wasn't friendship; wasn't voluntary. It was duty. It was mandatory. She had a responsibility to him, and he to her. Maybe there weren't orders any more. Maybe there weren't ranks any more. That didn't matter though, as far as Charlotte seemed to be concerned: from now until the end of time, he'd never be anything but her CO.

His hand fell away, fingers curling into a fist that didn't quite feel calibrated right, making it's way slowly back to his side, knuckles pressing themselves against the deck. "He'd better have," John answered, trying his best to sound that fake kind of stern you adopted when you were joking, but he didn't quite manage to put him off. Heart wasn't in it; or whatever the hell part of him it was that marshalled his emotions and enthusiasm these days.

He faltered, desperate for a comforting word or a helpful gesture that he could offer; but there was nothing. All he could do was be there; maybe front the credits from time to time if her booze fund started running dry. Helpless: that was John Glayde's life these days, summed up in a single all-encompassing word.

"I'll give you a minute," he said as he retreated, easing himself back to standing, a crunching backwards step taken over the broken and half-melted glass before he turned for the door. His mouth opened, as if there was more that he wanted to say; but it faded. Nothing to say that hadn't been said before. Nothing to explain that she didn't already know; or at least, nothing that she hadn't already heard - whether or not she listened and believed was another matter. His jaw clenched against himself, hand bracing against the edge of the doorway. "We'll be in the lounge when you're ready."

[Alexander Tur'enne]

* * *

Xander triggered the remote control for the holoprojector over his shoulder without even looking, his eyes not deviating from the two paragons of misery and sorrow sitting opposite. They had positioned themselves about as far apart on the crew lounge's curved couch as it was possible to get, and frankly their body language was embarrassing. Glayde was trying to play it off as casual, leaning slightly in her direction with his hand rested against the seat pad for balance, but Xander knew how much he wanted to be displaced a few metres to his right, hand on top of Charlotte's. She on the other hand seemed to be determined to compress her posture into the smallest volume possible, arms tight against her side, hands clenched, looking as if she was trying to recoil away from absolutely everything, will herself to collapse into a black hole of moodiness, and blink her way completely out of the universe. They needed to just screw already, or kill each other; either way, something need to happen to get rid of this damn stasis field that crackled in the air between them all the time. He'd knock sense into them if he were able, but he was smart enough to know that stepping on that particular nerve was likely to get him crushed by cybernetic hands, and roasted alive by cascading waves of Force electricity. Still, it was almost worth trying: at east they'd be working together or something.

"This," he began to explain, as the holoprojector shimmered into life, projecting a law enforcement holostill of the man whose name he'd discovered earlier, "Is Vittore Montegue." Images began to show up in sequence as Xander talked, each one called into being by the click of the remote. "This is the security still we had already, of him carrying an injured Miss K'Vesh out of the building on Nar Shaddaa we tracked her old band to. This is him and a somewhat healthier-looking Miss K'Vesh, caught on security monitors at a starport on Ubrikkia; and this is another few weeks later, in the lobby of a starport motel on Isde Naha." He offered a shrug, trying his best to sound and seem like some swanky criminal investigator from the holoshows he spent so much of his time watching while his sister and her... her John, there really wasn't another adjective for it, were busy competing for the title of Most Self-Loathing Sentient in the Universe. "The original footage we found seems more like a rescue than an abduction to me, and she doesn't seem to be under duress in any of the subsequent vids either. Seems like a safe bet that wherever this Vittore Montegue is, that's where we'll find our slicer."

He was pleased at himself, perhaps mostly because the two opposite were unlikely to offer any kind of praise and gratitude given their current headspaces; a certain sort of compensation, he supposed. He felt like a babysitter apologising for the behaviour of the stroppy children he was looking after, except the apologies were aimed only at himself. Still, if that was enough to impress them on his behalf, they hadn't seen anything yet; or he hadn't; or - whatever.

"Montegue is a licensed hunter with the Bounty Hunters Guild. Getting access to their records has been a little sketchy since they migrated their headquarters to Mandalore, but I was able to run a query through the Sector Rangers database, cross-referencing the registry for his ship, the Crimson Tide. Every recorded flight plan logged by him in the last several months seems to converge on Bespin: they've shored up their comms security a lot in the last year or so, so I haven't been able to scrub through the footage to absolutely confirm that's where she is, but as places to start looking go -"

[Charlotte Tur'enne]

"Why do we even need this girl anyway?" Charles interrupted as her body posture shifted, her entire self leaning off to one side as her arms crossed her chest.

She knew she'd catch hell for breaking up Xander's explanation, but the question had to be asked. Back with Dorn Force, if anything needed to be hacked into or information dug up, the task usually fell between Xander and herself. John had the both of them at his disposal so she couldn't even begin to think of a reason why he'd need an outsider.

"I'm just saying. You dug up all this information, Xan. On your own, at that. Why the hell do we need someone else?"

Maybe she was being overly negative. It was the Major who had gone on about the girl, but Charles would be lying if she said she even remotely was paying attention that day. Involving anyone else in the suicidal scheme she'd contrived seemed like a bad idea to her.

[Alexander Tur'enne]

"Because I'm a far better slicer than you are," Xander countered, his arms folding across his chest in almost the exact same defensive posture his sister had adopted, "And yet despite the fact that I am the smarter, more talented, taller, more attractive, and infinitely more amiable one out of the two of us, even I'm not good enough to do what needs doing."

He scaled it down a notch; the playful insult-based banter between he and his sister came as second nature to him, but so much had changed lately that Charlotte sometimes seemed to have forgotten the playful part. The expression on his face, and the way his eyebrows tugged in apology made it clear that he'd begun to fret about having crossed that line; instantly his manner shifted, arms falling awkwardly back to his sides, fidgeting with his pockets as he mustered a more valid answer for her.

"Short version is that Alliance Intelligence doesn't have our backs any more. With Dorn, the two of us could manage what we needed on the ground, but we always had Intel setting us up with idents, accounts, and the access we'd need when we got there. If I was good enough to slice my way through Alpha level Imperial security on my own, well -"

He offered a sheepish shrug. "- I wouldn't have needed you two to come rescue me from Corellia in the first place."

[Charlotte Tur'enne]

Okay, so Xander had a point. A good one at that. Having Alliance resources at your back was something Charles had always taken for granted and of course she hadn't factored that in since most of the time she'd spent without it had been in a fine stupor. She never really paid too much attention to the hows of a setup, that had never been her job. By the time it came for the LT to get involved everything had been figured out and all she had to do was follow orders. Guess those days were well and truly behind her. It was nice in a way, doing things on your own for your own self, there was just some adapting that had to be done and much like everything else, Charlotte was having a hell of a time trying to adjust.

"Fair enough," she allowed, the tension that had been building in her shoulders released a bit at the statement.

She let out a sigh, part in resignation, part in lets get this the hell over with. "So, Bespin, huh? That's... in Imp space, isn't it?"

[John Glayde]

That and pretty much anywhere else they were likely to want to go, unfortunately. The problem with hating the Empire and being betrayed by the Alliance was that when the two of them sat down to divide up the galaxy between them, it didn't leave you with a whole lot of places to go that wasn't within the territory of one or the other. John still got angry every time he saw a ship flying Alliance colours, over the part they had played in pushing Charlotte into the situation she found herself in now. He still blamed himself most of all, of course, and that darksider she didn't like to talk about came in second, but the Alliance was right up there at a close third. Throwing her under the after-jets like that; using her as a scapegoat because their own damn security measures couldn't wrangle a few wayward Jedi without it all falling apart. Typical Alliance snafu, and he'd just had enough; had enough of having traded a corrupt bureaucracy for an incompetent one.

For the most part, since Terminus, they'd stuck to the Outer Rim. A little trip to Polis Massa to weld him back together; few stints on some of the worlds too far out on the edge for either side of the Treaty to give a crap about them. But their lurking was over. Time to stop waiting, stop avoiding, and actually force the change they wanted to see.

"A daring incursion behind enemy lines," Glayde pointed out, the slight roughness that his stunted lungs leant to his voice turning the words into something out of a cheesy holovid trailer. His head shifted to the side, eyes turning to Charlotte; there was almost a smile. Almost. "Just like old times, LT."

The sentiment stabbed at him; laughed at him; mocked how weak and desperate a hope that really was. Two broken soldiers too adrift from their humanity to do anything but rage, hate, and fight; two utterly defeated Corellians, without much of a clue and even less of a cause, trying to find a place in the galaxy - or a way to leave it - that mattered at least the tiniest bit. Optimism traded for pessimism. Hope traded for hate. Faith in the future traded for bitterness at the past. Yeah.

Just like old times.

[Vittore Montegue]

* * *

Two hours. That was a new record. For most people, that'd be a complaint about how little they'd slept, but for Vittore these days it was practically a lie in. Head hit the pillow, brain dumped itself into REM, and then the dreams started. Kriff those. Woke himself the hell up after that. Saw enough death and dismemberment during the day to have it playing behind his eyes all night as well. Especially when his subconscious insisted on it being the same one, over and over.

Ones, now, he corrected as he reached the cooling unit in the Crimson Tide's kitchenette, pulling out a bottle of something caf-infused and alcoholic. Was some weird concoction that the Imperials seemed to be all about in this part of the Empire, but you couldn't seem to get anywhere else. Mix of some caffeinated, carbonated soft drink and some kind of beer, smushed together into what should have been some kind of unholy blend, but actually worked out not being all that bad. A weird blend of last night's beer and tomorrow morning's wake-up juice. Beverage of insomniac champions, that's what it was.

Ordinarily, he'd have bought himself a few hours of extra sleep with a half bottle of whiskey and a good amount of bed sheet face-planting, but he couldn't, not tonight. They were still on their way back from a job, rumbling through hyperspace towards Cloud City. It'd still be a few hours before they dropped out of hyperspace, barring some freakish miscalculation in Katie's nav route, or an Imperial Interdictor getting a little overzealous in it's customs patrols. The former never happened; the little astro-girl hadn't done him wrong yet, and he had total faith in her, not just to get them where they needed to go, but to take care of the ship once they got there, until Vittore managed to drag himself out of bed and into the cockpit to handle what needed doing. Right now, Katie would be sleeping in her little droid socket on the bridge, running diagnostics or subroutines or whatever it was she did in her downtime.

That was where Vittore headed, soda-beer in hand. Sometimes the swirling colours of hyperspace were soothing. Was normally something he saved for a hangover, but tonight's restless sleep had been particularly bad. If there was a chance in hell of winding down enough to get another hour or so of kip, he was gonna take it - it was either that, or let himself get all grumpy and irritable around Sadie. That sure as hell wasn't something he was gonna let happen.

As the bridge door hissed open, Vittore was surprised to see Katie's ocular receptor trained on him and illuminated, rather than front-facing and dim. He opened his mouth to speak, but the tiniest twitch of her servos rotated her conical headpiece one way and then the other. Was she shaking her head at him? Slowly her gaze turned, focused intently on the pilot's console, where Vittore could already see a blinking message on the screen. Frown firmly in place, he walked his way over, peering at whatever message Katie felt she needed to convey to him in text, rather than her usual droidspeak whistles.

She is sleeping.

Took a few moments and a glance to his right to understand the cryptic message. He hadn't seen her from behind, all bundled up as small as she could get in the copilot's seat, bundled up in that same shirt that he'd given her when they first met. Made him feel weird every time Vittore saw her wear it, wrapped around her like it was some sort of protection or comfort. Not bad weird; just wasn't used to people associating that sort of thing with him. Supposed he should get used to it. First Miss Shadowstar, then Miss K'Vesh, maybe even Mister Kira in a strange way - list of people who thought of him as some sort of respectable protector was growing. Strange to think of himself that way. Made him stand a little taller, truth be told, and made him wonder if this is how he was meant to feel - how dad used to feel, before - without the whole hunting obsession corrupting what it meant to be a soldier.

He waved a hand at Katie, making it clear her message was received, and quietly set his beer down on the console so he could ease himself into the pilot's seat without any undue noise. More care spent hitching his legs up, resting them crossed over each other above the diagnostic screens - he'd done this enough times to remember to flick off the control inputs, so he didn't accidentally kick the shields on or anything like that. Last, he fumbled out a small box from his pants pocket, unwound a set of earbuds from around it. A casual flip of the cover opened up the input port, and he checked the data card inserted, just to be sure it was the right one. The writing was scribbled on in overly fancy letters that definitely hadn't been made by his own hand, but the words were clear enough. Captain Sweeg.

He glanced across at Sadie; former bassist for Sweeg. Apparently she'd written most of the stuff on there too; or at least, that's what Atton Kira had told him when he'd handed the data card over. You might learn something, had been his reasoning, whatever that meant. No clue why Kira had a whole album of Sadie's songs; but that guy was creepy, so whatever.

A small sigh escaped him as he dragged his eyes away from the peaceful bundle of Sadie, settling the ear buds into place and turning his eyes towards hyperspace. His eyes were allowed to guide his hand towards his soda-beer and, with a swig thrown down his throat and a moment taken to dial down the volume on the audio player, just in case, he shut his eyes and hit play.

[Charlotte Tur'enne]

The Next Day

Charles could remember the last time she'd been to Cloud City. It hadn't been under full Imperial occupation then and she was on leave with some of the boys from Cresh. Made a game of pretending they were just a bunch of regular civilians at the time. They'd gone to some bar or other and she'd been chatted up by some mysterious stranger who bought her drinks before Captain Mardesh had gathered her up. Place had changed since then. Seemed cleaner and yet far more sordid somehow.

She merely disliked the place then, now she found it entirely loathsome. Probably had to do with the fact a Moff was calling it home nowadays, but she'd be an idiot to not think the enemy hadn't surrounded her back then, either. It wasn't that she hated the Empire more nowadays or anything - though she probably did - but things had just been simpler then. She'd been able to separate things better despite some wounds being quite a bit fresher.

Part of her genuinely wished she had gotten the job of looking for the wayward slicer rather than trying to hunt down the hunter she was associated with. At least then she could have stayed back in the ship, maybe and gone back to nursing - What? The bottle you vaporized earlier? Okay, so maybe a trip out was a good thing.

Charles cast a weary glance over at Xander, who actually seemed to be enjoying his time off ship. Whether that was sincere or just him being amused at her own discomfort was up for debate but it didn't really bother her that much. The quandary seemed like the type of thing siblings were supposed to have between each other and while the Tur'enne kids couldn't have been considered a good case study for that sort of thing for years now, it was nice, you know? Well, about as nice as Charles could ever hope for.

"So, we have any leads aside from just Port Town itself on where to find this Montegue guy or we going to wander around aimlessly and hope we just bump into him? Because let me tell you from experience, that sort of dren just doesn't happen."

There was a witty comeback headed her way, scathing and yet well meaning. It was like time had slowed and she could hear the gears working in Xan's head as he took what she said, processed it, and immediately returned with his own brand of well-aimed wisecrack.

Except it never got that far. It probably had meant to, but it was interrupted by shattering glass and a body flying through the front window of one of Port Town's skeevier bars. The ejected man seemed to take it in stride, getting to his feet in more or less swift fashion. Charles managed a small smirk - no matter where you were, some things never changed. Of course, in giving the guy a once over as he was dusting off the broken shards from his brown leather jacket, Charles' smile faltered entirely.

A deadpan glance was cast over to Xander and she held up a finger. "Don't even say it. Just. Don't."

[Alexander Tur'enne]

That just wasn't fair. That was poor sisterly conduct. Something so absurd, so happenstance, so will of the Force level coincidental literally falls to the ground at your feet, and you don't even give your beloved big brother the opportunity to say something witty and smug about it? Not fair.

Xander narrowed his eyes at her, about half a second before poking out his tongue in her direction before his mind changed. Instead his attention turned to their quarry, undeniably the bounty hunter that they were looking for. Xander leaned forward slightly, peering into the seething throng of bar fight that seemed to have exploded within. There weren't any teeny tiny red head slicers in there so far as he could tell, but that was like glancing out of a window at night and concluding that there was no sun. Just because you couldn't see it didn't mean it wasn't there.

Clasping his hands behind his back, trying to look as respectable as he could manage, he decided to put his sister firmly in her place as the obviously inferior sibling by stepping up and taking the lead in the conversation.

"Mister Montegue, my name is Alex-"

[Vittore Montegue]

"Hold that thought," Vittore interrupted, as a roar erupted from within the cantina that the bounty hunter had found himself defenestrated from, chased out into the Port Town concourse by an extremely angry-looking Devaronian. The burly patron roared as he leapt over the shards of broken glass, arm held high, an aggressive-looking knife covered in all sorts of weird pointy bits gripped in his hand, the vibroblade humming gently as it arced through the air.

With a swift but careful step, Vittore dodged slightly, a hand grabbing for the scruff of the Devaronian's shirt. As the momentum began to carry him past where Vittore had been, the brawler tried to turn, tried to redirect his knife; that was when Vittore struck, the handful of clothing whipping the Devaronian's body around, a carefully placed boot behind the ankles ensuring that his trajectory became an imminent fall towards the ground arrested only by Vittore's grip. With a precision strike, Vittore aimed a blow at a specific point atop the brawler's head, sending a shockwave of neural input that temporarily stunned the Devaronian's synapses and made him crumple unconscious to the floor.

Releasing him, Vittore turned his attention back to his two apparent visitors. "Sorry, Alex," he offered, not needing to muster any suave or swagger, finding it just naturally hanging out there in his voice, "But as y' can see, I'm kinda busy."

Working mostly on reflex, Vittore's eyes swept across Alex and the lady who was with him. Wife, girlfriend maybe? Nah, that didn't seem right. Body language was all wrong. There was closeness, sure, but more like family. Besides, Alex didn't exactly seem like the kind to bag a broad like whoever he was with. Seemed like she had all the toughness and roughness he was lacking, stacked on top of what she'd naturally started off with. Formidable little bundle of rage and violence, compressed down into a tiny body and hidden behind a pretty face and a smile that looked like it needed a little too much effort to be natural. Way she carried herself too, especially the subtle way she'd tensed up as soon as they clocked on to the bar fight - soldier, maybe? Definitely not Imperial, way too short for a Stormtrooper, but probably not CorSec or Corellian Home Guard - accents might have pegged 'em as being from that world, but there was too much fight there for her to have been content sitting around guarding her front doorstep. From the guy too, actually: he wasn't nearly so tough or intimidating, but there was something in his eyes that made him seem like not your average pretty boy. Might have been a bit of a pushover, but Vittore could tell that he'd get right back up and punch you square in the mouth if you tried it. Wasn't fair to call him the brains and her the brawn: was more subtle than that, more overlap than that, more like him and Cambrio in a way; or maybe more him and Sadie, with the bodies and genders flipped backwards.

Lady me, huh? he mused, giving that notion probably a bit too much thought. Guess I make for a pretty hot and badass chick.

Another shout emerged from within; apparently one of the Devaronian's compatriots had grown curious about were the red guy had disappeared to, and was planning on giving chase, causing Vittore still more trouble. He yelled, or at least, the Rodian equivalent there of - was more of a shrill warble, really - and began stampeding towards the broken window. Vittore whipped a blaster off of his hip, two shots snapped off in the Rodian's direction without even looking, stun waves cascading across the other brawler and dropping him wide-eyed to the floor. Surprise swept across Vittore's features as he brought the gun closer to his face to examine it. Huh. Not the setting he'd expected it to be on. Happy accident.

"If y' just hang on a few," he continued, eyes on the speculated brother and sister duo again, "I'll finish up this meetin' an' be right with ya."

[John Glayde]

* * *

John ran his hand across his face, trying to smooth away the fatigue. The middle and index finger stuck out, the artificial fingers not making contact with his skin. He wasn't sure if it was a hardware defect, or a problem with his neutral software. Perhaps his subconscious was just reluctant to touch himself with any of the unnatural parts of the new him. He folded all the fingers into a fist with intent, crushing them with his other hand until the knuckles popped - the organic ones, at least. The synthetic ones merely jabbed unmoving into his palm.

Still, they had their uses. It was all kinds of satisfying punching someone in the face with a fist like that.

For a quiet moment, he wondered if he should have gone along with Charlotte and Xander. The soldier in him always squirmed whenever he was forced to sit back and watch while others carried out his missions for him, even though his inner strategist understood the reasoning: it wasn't lack of faith in their abilities, just the simple restless need to do something. That soldier had become complacent of late though, weighed down my metals and synth polymers. He felt untested, not fully adapted to his new state of being, unsure of the best ways to employ himself any more. He had become an unknown quantity, especially to himself, and that made him a liability. So did the situation between himself and Charlotte. She hated him, and pitied him, and felt guilty all at once. When they were together, it was complicated; problematic. She was better left to simply be around Xander: there were times when she seemed almost like her old self when it was just the two of them. John tried not to feel jealous. Xander was her brother: her memories of him were fond ones, from before she'd answered the call to war. With John, her lasting memories were of missions, and objectives. He hadn't made the time to form any others with her; not until it was too late. Protocol be damned. Alliance be damned. He should have done more for her. Been more to her. Perhaps if he had, perhaps if he'd not deployed his uniform as a countermeasure, all the pain that she'd suffered in his absence might have been avoided.

John heard a sound.

All his other thoughts stopped. His body froze. He clung to clarity and focus, carefully structuring specific thoughts and specific syntax in his mind. The display from his ocular implants flickered, a graphic appearing in the corner of his vision, a constantly shifting audio profile of his surroundings. Careful considerations manipulated the frequency ranges the audio implants were detecting, screening out backwards noise, focusing on the clank of deckplates or the shuffles of motion. Dialling up the sensitivity, he heard the sound of breathing; of a heartbeat.

The ocular flickered again, a targeting reticle appearing in his vision. It moved as his left hand shifted, sliding carefully to his hip to tug free the Scout Blaster he wore. Still seated, still hunched over the datapad he'd been studying, he carefully shifted his aim towards the corridor that curved off towards the boarding ramp. "If I were you," he uttered calmly, almost disinterested, "I would come out from where you're hiding before I throw a grenade in there after you."

[Sadie K'Vesh]

"Now that's a fine 'how d' y' do', I'd approve 'cept it'd be me gettin' blown t' bits." Sadie stepped into view, not botherin' with the sneak act since John apparently had figured things out. Was odd seein' him again in person and she figured she was ready for it but well... things had changed a bit since last seein' the Alliance - or former Alliance - officer. "Hey, boss-man."

Was some good things about workin' for a paranoid piece of crazy like Shadowstar. The Boss Lady had pretty much ignored the assurances that no big gold armored bounty hunter was gonna come to Cloud City stalkin' her. Not that Sadie could blame her, near-death things had a way of flavorin' your views of the galaxy and such. So, Emelie had Sadie constantly keepin' an eye on the arrivals to the city. Security feeds at checkpoints and all. Weren't the easiest since she'd had t' slice into all the systems with nothin' but a datapadd and no proper network an' algorithms backin' her up; but Imperial security did a lot of the hard work for her. Facial recognition, voice checks, all that good stuff.

Still, it was damn near luck that she'd caught wind of a ship called the Lost Cause comin' in to port. Was somethin' about the people aboard that hadn't sat right with her. There was somethin' almost too clean about it. Had that sort of fingerprint of scrubbin' of idents that most folks wouldn't catch wind of but Sadie saw right through on account of her own usin' of those sort of techniques. Weren't odd that Cloud City had people arrivin' that didn't want to be noticed, not with the whole verse the way it was nowadays, but still - was always better to check than not. She didn't recognize two of the folks on board, but the third? Well, there weren't no mistaken him anywhere.

Had been a spell since the Novgorod, and since Sadie was proper sure that Cloud City weren't harborin' no damn Ssi-Ruuk bastards, Sadie couldn't think of a damn reason why someone who was far from friendly with the Empire would willin'ly step foot in one of it's cities. Course... weren't like John had exactly stepped actual foot on Cloud City yet. Still, nostalgia or boredom or whatever was a bitch and Vitt was off workin' on somethin' she hadn't been invited to tag along on and so Sadie had set out to go see her old friend.

She did feel a bit guilty about just waltzin' in though. It hadn't even been easy! Probably less issue to just give the former-Alliance Major a call an' make arrangements to meet for a caff than actually sneakin' on his ship but well... sometimes the hard way was the fun way.

Sadie glanced about the corridor she stood in, tryin' to look casual despite that creepin' urge to apologize for not doin' this th' proper way.

"I'd also say that Cap'n Raurrssatta wouldn't appreciate y' blowin' holes in his ship but... well... ain't exactly like we're on his ship no more, is it?"

[John Glayde]

Boss-man. Cap'n Raurrssatta. It was names and a voice he hadn't heard in too long, and a flicker of confidence that he'd figured he'd never hear again: something those lizard bastards should have stamped out good and proper. But no, Sadie K'Vesh was tougher than that. You stamped on her, and all you did was hurt your foot. The Ssi-Ruuk had learned that the hard way, and John was glad to be reminded.

"It's Cirrsseeto Quez now, actually," John replied, his hand emerging from beneath the table, abandoning the blaster on the surface so that his fingers could lace together. He didn't want any misunderstanding of what his hand had been up to under there, and while he didn't exactly feel inclined to aim a gun at the woman he'd come to Cloud City to find, he wasn't entirely ready to stand down, either. The targeting reticule disappeared from his vision, orientated towards the wall off to his right, it's trajectory all based on a gyro circuit between the synthetic bones on the interior fingers on his left hand. "Our former Captain is a married cat now."

The words were carefully chosen. Former Captain. That our. Coming out and explaining everything didn't feel right. He didn't know why Sadie was here; didn't know what sort of reason might have set her up to recognise his arrival and seek him out. Was this a warning visit? Had she thrown in with the Imperials, or the local authorities? One of the local gangs? Was she here to quietly determine if there was some ulterior Alliance-decreed mission that he was here to perform? Were there guards or mercenaries waiting beyond the ship's hull to react to whatever transpired here?

He forced himself to relax just a little - enough for it to be visible, enough to seem like he wasn't paying heightened awareness to everything around him. His vision studied her, looking for signs of duplicity; there was something off in the way she held herself, that was for sure, and something different too - he'd seen a glimpse of how badly injured she'd been on the security feeds when they'd first begun tracking her, and while he didn't know the specifics of why, he could see there had been an impact upon her. Not quite the impact he'd expected though, it seemed. A little less of her usual confidence and swagger perhaps, but there was something else that was lacking, too: that sense of restlessness that Sadie had always had, the kind that made you sure she wasn't likely to stick around anywhere too long. The side of her that always seemed adrift, but fine with it, seemed to have quietened down some. Was that why she was here? Had Sadie K'Vesh got out? Was Cloud City some fresh start, some clean break, some freedom from her old live that John was selfishly intruding upon for his own ends?

The hint guilt that crept into his voice and posture was genuine. "I heard about Nar Shaddaa," he offered quietly. There was so much said in those five words. Sympathy. Empathy. Curiosity. Condolence. Concern. He wanted to know everything, and wanted Sadie to know that he did; but he didn't want to ask, knew that was a question that a girl like Sadie wouldn't necessarily welcome. "How're you holding up, kid?"

[Sadie K'Vesh]

She made a face at the whole married thing, the name Quez tryin' to shake loose bells until Sadie pictured the mechanic dame who had the name. Huh, didn't see that comin'. Not that she'd really gone to lengths figurin' out much of the crew aboard the Rebel ship. That sort of thing lead to attachments and the like and Sadie had been interested in just 'bout everythin' 'cept. Was odd seein' John standin' there, made her wonder how the rest of the crew - if there even was a crew no more - was holdin' up these days now that peace was a thing. Weren't a bad lot of folks and truth was there was almost times she missed irkin' Tink by lurkin' around too long in his engineering type place.

John was one of th' folks who had taken a bit of an interest in her, though. Treated her like she was useful rather than just some piece of space trash they'd picked up. Course he'd been the one to suggest she go on the giant lizard death machine suicide run. Well okay, after she'd offered. Certainly weren't no soreness in it all. Had been a nightmare inducin' sort of job but everythin' turned up right as rain on Kamino the end. Heh... 'nother turn of phrase she hadn't gone and used since those days. Was funny, it weren't all that long ago but it felt like ages.

Was as John spoke up again that Sadie realized why it was that everythin' felt like it was so damned long ago in some far off place. Nar Shaddaa. She grew up there, had plenty of happenin's happen there, but Sadie knew damn well to what he was referrin' to. Bit of a subconscious tick that had her wrap an arm around herself, right arm reachin' across as if t' cover everythin' that couldn't really be seen anyway. Not that her arm alone would really have covered anythin' on it's own if it had to.

"Survivin'," she manged to mutter out b'fore her head went off tryin' to figure out exactly how John had heard about it. Bit of sloppiness on her part, too scared to look into your own past to make it vanish proper. Maybe she'd see about callin' in a favor or two. But nah, that would mean purposely lettin' other people in on it. Maybe Katie could manage it...

"You? Y' kinda... went off the grid a bit y'self." Weren't a whole lot that Sadie had managed to dig up 'bout the former Major aside from his resignin'' from his post and that weren't much more than a footnote in a document. Was strange, she'd gone lookin' for what sort of reasonin' could have lead John and his two cohorts t' Cloud City but everythin' came up empty. She doubted he'd tell her much, people didn't just drop off for no reason and most reasons weren't the sharin' kind.

[John Glayde]

Off the grid was one way of putting it. Felt more like he'd fallen off the edge of the galaxy, truth be told. Xander and he had chased Charlotte right to the Rim, all the way to Terminus; John almost hadn't made it back, in more ways than one. He thought about the blackness and the bottles he'd wound up staring into; thought about the discharge ring of a blaster barrel resting idly against his temple. Wondered how things would've turned out if he'd had the balls to end it then and there, freed Charlotte from the painful reminders he represented before the galaxy had been given the chance to go and make it worse; to turn it into an obligation she couldn't be rid of.

How to answer Sadie's question, though? Fine was the lie that came easiest, but that didn't really fulfil the requirements. Was too much of a blatant evasion. But how did you say the truth in a situation like this? My Lieutenant pissed off the wrong kind of folks, and when I tried to drag her out of it I wound up on the bad side of a gang of bats and crowbars, left bleeding and broken in an alley, and now 27% of me is machine and metal? I'm literally not the man you knew before; a whole quarter of him is gone? To say any of that would have felt like weeping, like begging for sympathy that John didn't even want.

"Crate by the door," was the answer he offered, easing himself from his seat and side stepping enough so that the table no longer obscured the view of him. He loitered there for a moment, suddenly feeling self-conscious and exposed. "Grey thing with the handle is a bio-imaging med scanner." He held out his arms slightly, presenting himself for scrutiny. "Probably easier for you to just look instead of listen."

[Sadie K'Vesh]

She squinted at him a bit, tryin' to judge if John was serious or what it was he was tryin' to get at. Turnin' him down seemed like the right thing to do, the good path t' take. Problem was - and damn if not enough people realized it - Sadie weren't all that good when you got down to it. Too much curiosity and not enough common sense. Was nice to know at least there was some bits of her that Bog hadn't manage to carve away. Was a shame it was that that got left behind though; probably could have done with keepin' that shy bit of innocence she had managed to hang on to for the better chunk of her life.

Caution was key as she edged back towards the door and picked up the scanner like the damned thing was gonna turn live and nip at her. Sadie kept givin' John a wary eye as she flicked the thing on and held it up slow like. Wasn't sure what to expect, really. Way he was actin' she half supposed she would see some bundle of wires and some odd lookin' bits and a big ol' timer countin' down to a big grand explosion. Hey, you heard about some weird dren over the holonet sometimes, couldn't really blame a girl for lettin' her imagination run away with her.

Truth it turned out weren't quite all that different. Well, minus the bomb. Though Sadie had to wonder if somewhere in all that cybernetic junk there weren't some sort of self-destruct mechanism. Weren't even like the guy had an actual heart left, it turned out. Though, even to the less than discernin' eye, Sadie could take a guess at the fact that piece seemed a bit aged compared t' the rest. Funny how things worked out - or didn't in some cases.

"Damn, John. And here I figured if the Ssi-ruuk couldn't take y' down nothin' could."

Felt weird standin' there after seein' stuff she figured most folks would never find out about. They'd done real good with him, that was for sure. Nothin' looked not him. Same couldn't be said for the other survivor in the room though. Yeah, she looked like herself but she was hidin' stuff too. Just didn't take a medical doohicky to see it.

Sadie sighed and let her hand holdin' the scanner go limp as her other reached down along the edge of her shirt, questionin' her rationale before throwin' that common sense bit out the airlock again. She didn't go exposin' nothin' untoward, just hitched up fabric enough to the bottom of her rib cage on one side, just enough to show part of what all covered her torso. As much as Vitt and Bumbles and the doc on Cloud City had done a good job of keepin' her from fallin' to pure pieces, lack of bacta at the time and her own lingerin' with the injuries in that back room had done a good job of makin' sure the marks weren't gonna go away. Not fully. Not ever. Skin on models that was smooth as anythin' and was supposed to be was instead lined in gouges and runs and symbols of all sorts. Strange enough, Sadie knew 'em all by heart more from feel than seein' 'em.

She made it seem like just showin' 'em at all hurt somethin' awful, and while John had said he had heard about what had happened, Sadie guessed maybe there was somethin' about seein' that would make up for him exposin' himself in a way.

"Don't really ever feel the same, does it?"

[John Glayde]

John wasn't sure whether it was his own self control or something in his cybernetics, but he was glad that his face didn't muster any kind of flinch or grimace or look when Sadie displayed the jigsaw of broken flesh that her body had become. It didn't take a genius or an expert to realise how deliberate those markings were, but the way that some intersected with others, the way there wasn't a pattern or a symmetry as far as John could tell, made it clear that this wasn't some sort of ritualistic thing: just some sicko carving on a victim for some warped reason that wouldn't make a lick of sense to anyone with even half a rational mind. Maybe they just got off on it. Maybe they were marking their territory. Maybe they just wanted her damaged, outwardly as well as inwardly; convince her that no one else would want her, to sap her spirit and remove the desire to try and flee.

Not just carvings, either - nasty tangle of scar tissue on her side looked an awful lot like a knife wound followed by some battlefield cauterisation. John had scars like that of his own; or at least he had, once upon a time. Who knows what the medics had carved off and replaced when they'd patched him up. Either way, Sadie had clearly been through hell; John couldn't think of many people who deserved that less than Sadie K'Vesh. He almost regretted coming here; almost regretted what it was that he was about to try and drag her into. Almost.

"They aren't supposed to," he countered, with a tug of a thin-lipped, warmthless smile. "Scars are nature's way of reminding us to stay away from harm and danger. Makes sure we remember what happens if we aren't smart enough or careful enough. Wouldn't be much of a reminder if they faded and we forgot."