Chapter Text
“Gaheris?” Mordred asked, surging to his feet to stand beside AC-LN. “Gaheris is here? Gaheris is alive?”
“Your cousin is a prince?” Lynette asked. Suddenly the old lady’s offer of seventeen thousand didn’t seem half as impressive. It must have been a drop in the bucket if her family was royalty. “Are you a prince?” Mordred shook his head.
“Yes sir, in the detention block,” Dinadan said as another map appeared on the screen. Lynette got to her feet and she and Ax moved to stand in front of the screen. The squiggly line wound its way from the command tower to the detention block. It was a lot shorter than the route given to the power terminal. It also led to the detention block.
“Woah, puppy,” Lynette said, facing Mordred and carefully resting a hand on his shoulder. “Just…slow down for a minute. I know this is important to you but you’ve got to think about where we are and where your cousin is. We can’t just walk into the detention block. Not without the old lady to protect us.”
“He’s been tortured,” Mordred said, his never leaving the video screens. Lynette looked back to see that AC-LN had oh-so-helpfully brought Prince Gaheris’ record up on the monitor. “He’s scheduled to be tortured right now.”
The record was incredibly detailed about what had been done to Prince Gaheris since he had been brought aboard the space station. Every conversation he’d had. Every torture session. The record even noted that the destruction of Lothian had been an interrogation session and had yielded ‘promising results.’ That wasn’t what concerned Lynette, though. No. What had her worried was the name of the interrogator in each and every session.
“Ursus,” she said softly. “Isn’t that the guy your aunt told us about? Her old student who betrayed the Knights of Avalon and destroyed the order?”
“Yeah,” Mordred said absently. It was clear he wasn’t listening to her.
“Puppy, hey! Pay attention!” Lynette said, snapping her fingers in front of his face. “This guy is a former Knight of Avalon. Have you been paying attention to the shit your aunt is able to do? She threw a Stormtrooper into a wall. She kept who knows how many of them from seeing us and she’s keeping even more from seeing her right now. You can barely defend against a training module blindfolded. We do not have what it takes to go up against this guy.”
AC-LN buzzed.
“Lord Ursus is currently meeting with the Emperor,” Dinadan said. “Logs indicate he never made it to Prince Gaheris’ interrogation session.”
“I’m going,” Mordred said. His tone left no room for argument.
“How are we going to get there without the old lady?” Lynette asked.
“We—I—you don’t have to come. This isn’t what you signed up for and we can’t even pay you anymore.”
“So what? How’re you planning on getting to the detention block on your own?”
“I’ll just walk there,” Mordred said, sounding exasperated. “I’m wearing the uniform. That should be sufficient.”
“You’re too short to pass as a Stormtrooper,” Lynette said.
“So are you,” Mordred snapped.
“Exactly. So let’s not be stupid about this.”
“Things are going to go bad as soon as we get up there anyways. It’s not like we can just ask them to hand Gaheris over and expect them to acquiesce.”
“All the more reason to make sure we get up there without drawing attention to ourselves,” Lynette said. “It’ll give us time to find your cousin and get out before they send up more troopers. Now, think puppy. You’ve got a decent brain in there. There’s got to be a better option than just walking up to the detention block and hoping we don’t cause a scene on the way.”
Mordred sighed, crossing his arms over the breastplate of the Stormtrooper armor. He glared at Lynette and she glared right back, her gaze unwavering. Finally, his gaze slid away from Lynette and onto Ax.
“Prisoner transfer,” he said. “We escort Ax up to the detention block.”
“You what now?” Ax asked. “Lynette may have agreed to join you on this folly, boy, but I have not. Besides, escorting me up to the detention block doesn’t solve your problem. You’re both still too short to pass as Stormtroopers.”
“We won’t be if you’re with us,” Mordred said. “It’s a perspective trick. You’re so short it will make us look taller to anyone passing by.”
Lynette quickly stepped aside as Ax went red in the face. She made her way over to the bodies of the dead officers. She had seen something on one of the men she thought might be useful.
“I’ll have you know, boy,” Ax huffed. “That it is considered the highest insult for you tall folk to refer to our stature in such a derogatory manor.”
Mordred blanched. “I—”
“Leave him alone, Ax,” Lynette said, stepping up behind the dwarf. “You know he didn’t mean anything by it. Besides, you’ve been ribbing on our height since we got here.”
Ax spun around to face her. His mouth was open to start yelling, but he paused when he found himself staring at the item Lynette had found on the dead officer. She had it hanging off her finger with her hand positioned at Ax’s eye level.
“What’s that?” he asked.
“Binders,” Lynette said.
“Oh no,” Ax said, taking a giant step backwards. “No, no. Not in this lifetime.”
“Come on, Ax,” Lynette said. “The puppy’s onto something with the perception trick and we need you up there with us. Three fighters up in the detention block stand a hell of a better chance than two.”
“And the binders will help sell it,” Mordred said. “Keep people from looking too closely at us.”
Ax turned to Mordred. “What if we can’t get them off?”
Lynette slapped one of the cuffs around his wrist when he wasn’t looking. Ax shrieked and jumped away from her.
“Look,” Lynette said. “It doesn’t even close around your wrist. You’ll be fine.”
Ax growled at her but didn’t make any further protestations about his part in the plan.
“Now you two,” Lynette said, pointing to the two droids. “Can you track us through the station?”
AC-LN started buzzing and clicking.
“AC can do it through the radio on your uniform, but it does not advise it,” Dinadan said. “Your radio would have to appear within the network and it’s far more likely an officer will realize your radio is not where it’s supposed to be.”
“What about these?” Lynette asked, holding out the comlinks she had found on the dead officers. AC-LN started shrieking excitedly.
“Yes, those will work just fine,” Dinadan said. “AC can track the signal between the two comlinks.”
“Good. I want every door to open for us when near it. Every lift to be there when we signal for it. As long as we keep moving we’ll be less likely to be caught.”
“Yes, captain,” Dinadan said as Lynette grabbed her helmet and the big blaster. Mordred did the same. Ax had managed to get both cuffs positioned on his wrists so it wasn’t obvious they couldn’t latch and was waiting by the lift doors.
“Please sir, captain,” Dinanda said. “What should we do if we’re discovered here?”
“We already voted on this,” Lynette said. The lift doors glided open as she and Mordred approached them. “Use the hyperdrive.”
“That’s not—we can’t just—how are we to—”
The bard droid was still sputtering as they entered the lift and the doors slid shut. The lift descended and deposited them back on the hanger level.
“You remember where to go?” Lynette asked, her voice muffled by the helmet.
“Yeah,” Mordred said.
They walked side by side, Ax between them. They both remembered enough of the map that they were able to move as a unit. Ax had apparently forgotten what he had seen entirely—if he had ever even looked. That ended up working to their advantage. It meant they could manhandle and prod him into turns and around corners.
AC-LN managed its end of things seamlessly. Every door opened for them. And the one lift they needed opened before Mordred even had a chance to summon it. A tech tried to get in behind them, but Ax snarled and lunged at him. As Lynette and Mordred held the dwarf back, the tech stepped backwards and motioned that he would take the next one.
“Well,” Ax asked as the doors slid shut. “If we’re going to start shooting as soon as we get up there, someone is going to need to give me their weapon.”
“Let’s try talking first,” Mordred said. “See how far that gets us.”
“Why?” Lynette asked. “You’re the one who said asking nicely wasn’t going to get us anywhere.”
“It probably won’t, but at least we can distract them before we start shooting,” Mordred said.
There was no time to tell him he was being an idiot and that the element of surprise was the best distraction they were going to get. The lift slowed to a stop and the doors slid open, revealing the detention block.
The space before them was small and circular, which Lynette figured could only work to their advantage. The large computer consoles in the center of the room would make for excellent cover. There was a long hallway off the back of the room. Lynette thought she could make out someone moving around back there. Something to keep in mind when the shooting started.
“What’s going on?” the ranking officer asked, moving out from behind the computer consoles to stand before them.
“Found him on the ship that was hauled in,” Mordred said. “He’s scheduled to be interrogated. Lord Ursus thinks he knows something about the droids.”
“Why wasn’t I notified?”
Mordred shrugged. “Things are moving fast down there.”
“Still, I should have been informed,” the officer said. He motioned to two guards as he turned away from them. “Contact the hanger and ask for a status report.”
The two guards made their way around the perimeter of the room. They stopped in front of Ax and one reached out to take him by the shoulder.
Ax moved, head-butting the first guard in the stomach and driving his shoulder into the chest of the other one. Lynette brought her blaster up and started firing. Next to her, Mordred did the same. They took down three of the officers around the computer in short order and Lynette decided to leave the rest of the personnel to him. She turned her attention to the ceiling and started blowing out the security cameras.
Next to her, Ax pulled the bindings off his wrists and grabbed a blaster off one of the guards that tried to grab him. He shot both guards before moving on to help Mordred with the remaining personnel. Two guards ran out from the long hallway and all three blasters turned on them. The guards dropped to the ground before they ever made it out of the hallway. Lynette didn’t know whose shot took them down and she didn’t care. What mattered was that their way was clear.
“Dinadan,” Mordred said into the comlink. “We’re in the detention block. Have AC open Gaheris’ cell.”
“Get going,” Lynette said as she stepped into the ring of computer consoles. “Ax and I will handle things here.”
Mordred nodded before disappearing down the long hallway.
“Detention block, report,” said a voice through one of the stations. One of the dead officers had slumped over it as he died. Ax grabbed him by the waist and pulled him off. Standing on his tiptoes, Ax reached for the radio. His hand grasped at air—not even his fingertips came close to touching it.
Lynette reached over him to grab the radio. She pulled at it and froze. It was locked in place and you had to be pressing the button right in front of it to speak.
She turned and looked around the room, looking for something Ax could use as a step stool. All she saw were bodies and that wouldn’t work. Dwarves were almost entirely muscle and also probably rocks. Lynette knew from experience that Ax weighed a ton. He’d crush any puny human he tried to stand on.
“You’ll have to do it,” Ax said, taking a step back.
“Right,” Lynette said, her gaze sweeping across the room again. “So…do you think they know that it’s a total sausage fest in here or is that something you just don’t keep track of on a station this big?”
Morgan could feel him as she made her way through the halls of the Empire’s space station. She almost reveled in his presence, even though it was more foreign than familiar. She couldn’t feel anything of the man he had once been. There was only Ursus—the Emperor’s bloodhound.
Nevertheless, it was him. Or at least pieces of him. And despite everything that had happened, she missed him desperately. She kept reaching out towards him with the force and was gratified when she felt him do the same. She only felt his anger—his fury at her sudden reappearance at his moment of glory. She felt fear—he knew she had the droids and he knew the danger that posed to the Empire. And sometimes she thought she could feel the lingering whispers of his love.
She couldn’t keep him from knowing that she was on the station. She would have appeared like a beacon in his mind, just as he did to her. There would be no hiding from him, so instead she made her presence obvious. He would get nothing from her. Unlike him, she didn’t poor her emotions into her use of the force. She was calm and her thoughts were empty. He wouldn’t know why she had chosen to reach out to him. He wouldn’t know about the fear that had settled deep in her gut despite her best efforts to banish it.
So long as she kept her mind clear, he wouldn’t learn about Mordred.