feckyeslife

This wasn't the time for kind words and gentle actions. Rey shook Hux bodily, relief running hot down her spine as he sputtered to fitful wakefulness. "Get up! There's no time to lie about!" Rey snapped. Hux's expression cycled through confusion, irritation, and just a hint of fear before settling. He shook off her grip on his arm and opened his mouth - no doubt to unleash some venomous retort - as the frame of the shuttle creaked to underscore Rey's assertion. Rey didn't waste time levelling a wry look in his direction, instead turning to find the other inhabitant of the shuttle.

He would have blended in with the dark paneled flooring if not for his sheer bulk. Rey shuffled over to Kylo. She gingerly cradled his head as she turned his face to check if he was alright. His eyelids fluttered and his lips pursed tighter at the motion but he did not rouse. Calling his name and shaking his shoulder had much the same effect - nothing.

Something cold and dark slithered in her gut. "Wake up!" she yelled sharply with another shake. Above her stood the wavering form of Hux still with that determined twist of his lip.

He counted the minutes as he waited for the next signal from Kylo that would indicate that the man was about to enter the building. Part of Hux questioned if Kylo was really the best out of their group to be their main infiltrator, but it did seem smarter to leave Rey on the outskirts when she had the fleet-footedness to deal with runners. Kylo would push them out, Rey would give chase, and Hux was there to pick off any unexpected interferences. If it was absolutely necessary then Hux was also prepared to take out the mark. Just because they would get more for a live mark didn't mean it made sense to let them cut holes through Kylo or Rey. Hux rather liked them home whole.

"Any day now," Hux hissed into his comm. Rey echoed the sentiment with a grunt.

It was startling how quickly the world around her turned to madness. Their crew raced to load cannons, calling to one another while above it all Mister Gibbs coordinated with frantic shouts. Will was by her side, though, and that was something. He grimaced when she took a rifle but helpfully pointed out when she was underfilling the shot she prepared. There was a hint of pity in his eyes that spoke even when he didn't. She was the governor's daughter. She wasn't supposed to have to load and shoot rifles to save her own skin.

Elizabeth rammed the rod down the barrel with a vicious twist of her lips. It didn't matter what she was supposed to do; this was just practicality. It wouldn't do anyone any good if she cowered in the hold like a piece of livestock.

I wondered, just for a moment, what excuse he would have given Erudite for the sentence they had handed to his own daughter. I wasn’t stupid enough to think that he wouldn’t, either. For all his critique, for all his poorly-if-at-all-concealed anger at the dinner table, for all that Erudite had done even in the moments leading up to his death I knew that something in Andrew Prior didn’t allow him to truly believe that his faction was wrong.

After all, there were people like my mother helping those like me or like Evelyn slip through the system. And didn’t that mean that the system was being undermined? Didn’t that mean that somewhere in the depths of the vitriol and libel there was a kernel of truth?

He glared daggers at the interrogator. He didn't recognize the man but he did know the stamped metal on his chest. His mother's Resistance couldn't resist using the old insignia apparently. Sentimental to a fault.

"You're not to ask about her again," the interrogator insisted once Kylo's ears stopped ringing. Another smattering of blood drops joined their fellows on the durasteel surface in front of him.

Kylo bore his teeth in a mockery of a smile. It didn't match the furrowed brow and narrowed eyes that he leveled on the man. Pushing as hard as he could on the thread of Force, Kylo snarled, "You will bring her to me!" He could barely feel it. The Force. What should have been a roaring, crashing river in his veins had been slowed to a trickle, if that.

Red had called a meeting as soon as he found the body. Of course he did. He thought of himself as their de facto leader even as MIRA refused to declare one for voyages. Everyone works better in a flat organizational structure, according to HQ. Everyone except for this crew of nine.

Things had threatened to fall apart. Finding out there was a killer among your crewmates would do that. Red pulled things together at least for a little while. The crew had broken out into teams of two. All the better to watch one another's backs, right? That was all well and good until someone had to fix faulty wiring in one compartment and their assigned buddy had to address an overheat in the reactor.

Minutes ticked by on Rey's chrono. It was taking too long. Transport to the comms station had been clocked at sixteen minutes. Rey was approaching eighteen. The nagging sensation of wrongness thrummed with every check of the chrono. Eighteen point three five.

Rey didn't wait for the speeder to decelerate all the way, jumping and rolling from the craft to absorb the shock along her back rather than her side. Her auto-pilot would finish the decel. She had two point six eight minutes to make up.

A few wires cut loose from a security panel on the maintenance entrance granted her access to the comms building. Her chrono buzzed softly to let her know it had just hit twenty minutes. Late, late, late.

“You said this would be worth it?” Zuko asked.

She wanted to believe it. She has been fighting to trust her decision down in the catacombs of the palace. Gazing at the ocean and knowing their bow will soon be pointed directly for the heart of the Fire Nation once more, Zuko gripped the railing ahead of her.

Azula’s face twisted in a way the two never shared before - a smile. “Of course it will be, sister,” she insisted. “Father will be honored by what you’ve done here.”