Cloak and Shadows 7

The passageway was silent but I had the distinct impression I was being watched.

“Okay, you can come out now!” I yelled. Thrawn looked at me with a raised eyebrow. I just glared back at him. “Rukh, get out here right now! No hide and hunt games on my ship!”

There was a moment’s breath then the Noghri slipped silently out from where he had been hiding almost directly beside me. He was sneaky and silent. Now that my fright had subsided I got a good look at him. He was shorter than I was but he was powerfully built. His skin was a grey colour and he was, by human standards, pretty ugly. He had a short snub nose, sharp, needle like teeth and dark eyes that held far more intelligence in them than one might first believe. We just stared at each other for a moment until Thrawn broke the silence.

“Rukh, this is Merlyn Gabriel she is Lord Vader’s personal assistant. She is never to be harmed by you or your kind. You will treat her life with the same importance you would Lord Vader’s. Am I understood?”

“I understand.” He said in a gravely voice. He then took my hand and sniffed at it. I didn’t fight him. His clawed hands were cool to the touch. He let my hand go and stood back.

I just nodded, took the EV suit that Thrawn was handing me and began to get into it. I had to fight the sudden sense of claustrophobia that swept through me. I steadied my breathing and nodded to Thrawn who handed me the helmet. I hated suiting up, the feeling of being constricted, the sense of being confined and the strange metallic scent the oxygen always had.
With everything in place, I locked the helmet down and the flow of O2 started with a dry hiss. Thrawn went over the suit carefully, checking that everything was okay.

“You’re good to go.” He mouthed opening the maintenance hatch that led under the passenger compartments.

“Scanner’s in that box there, needs a lanyard on it.” I said, my voice sounding tinny from the helmet comm. Thrawn nodded and grabbed it. He clipped the end of the lanyard to the utility belt and handed the scanner to me. I slipped it in the large pocket on my right thigh.

“Admiral, I need you in the cockpit.” I said. “You,” I said pointing at Rukh, “go find some quiet place to sit and stay out of trouble.”

He looked at Thrawn who gave him a slight nod. “Yes, Lady Merlyn.” he said dutifully and stayed exactly where he was.

“Okay I’m going out for a walk, see you both in a bit.” And then I began to make my way down the ladder to the underbelly of the ship, to the external airlock. I grabbed the tether lines, clipped one end to the safety hook on the back of the suit.

The maintenance area was small and dimly lit. I walked carefully to the airlock. Opened the inner doors, watched them shut then began decompression. It took seconds, a warning light flashed and I knew that Thrawn was in the cockpit watching because my comm double clicked.

“I’m fine, just heading out now. Watch for invisible bad guys. I don’t feel like getting shot to day.” I told him as I began my little space walk.

“Be careful.”

“Copy that.” I answered then concentrated on walking with the magnetic boots out and under the hull of the ship.

Space is huge. Never endingly, overwhelmingly huge but most of the time when we are safe and sound in our space ships we never see how vast it is. We are surrounded by alloys and metals, engines and all the comforts of home and we don’t generally go tromping around outside because outside is not a nice place to be, even in a really good EV suit. The thing about space is probably the hardest to get used to is the lack of gravity, the lack of up and down. While the inside of the ship has artificial gravity or gravity plating and inertial dampers to offset spin and so on, outside there is none of that and were it not for the magnetic soles on the boots I was wearing with the suit I’d be free floating, grabbing hold of the hand grabs that were placed all over the hull of the ship. No gravity meant my insides had no idea what was up or down, it was a really disconcerting sensation and incredibly disorienting.

Most commercial or private pilots avoided EV like the plague and almost never went through any sort of formal training for it. Unlike the Imperial Navy, which had simulators for this sort of thing, the only experience we ever got with zero G and space walks was when we actually had to go extra vehicular to fix something in order to get to a space port to fix the rest.

My father had made certain I had some experience with this and had taken me EV for basic training three times. The very first time I had gone EV I had thrown up in the suit. It had been a very short, very unpleasant trip and a very long lasting memory. After that I usually made sure I took an antiemetic before I went EV, then again usually time allowed for it.

I tried not to look at the stars which spun slowly, even though we had stopped engines the ship still moved and that movement was making me sick. I took deep, slow and steady breaths and concentrated on the job at hand. With the scanner active I began to walk across the underbelly of the shuttle. My stomach rolled and I gritted my teeth as a wave of nausea washed through me making my whole body cold with sweat. I fought it because throwing up in an EV suit really was terrible. It had happened to me only once but that was more than enough to know I never wanted to experience that again. My insides just didn’t like zero G at all.

“Za’ar, you there?” my voice was shaky. I walked slowly from port to starboard and back in a slight zigzag, but the scanner showed nothing.

“Are you okay?”

“Just needed to hear your voice.” I said.

“What’s wrong?” he asked.

“You mean apart from the fact that I’m walking outside of my perfectly good space ship to find a tracking device that is allowing some invisible enemy to shoot at us and that the galaxy won’t stay still, then nothing at all is wrong. Just talk to me, okay?” I said. “I am trying to remember where it was my father had found the tracker the last time we had had this problem.”

“I cannot help you there, tekari I was onboard at the time your father discovered it.” He said.

“Maybe one of your famous best guesses then?”

I could sense Thrawn smile as he answered me. “Try near the port side wing.” He said. “Internal scanners show nothing but that was the side of the ship least visible in the docking bay.”

I nodded although he could not see me. “Copy that.” I said starting my way back over to the port side. It was slow business. I concentrated on staring at the ship’s hull and not the slow spinning stars all around me. Port-side had also been where I had to shoo away the maintenance droid. I didn’t think that was a coincidence.

“So, talk to me.” I prompted again.

“What do you want to hear?” he asked. His warm voice in my ear was a welcome distraction.

“Tell me about your trip as Kast.” I said.

“Well I suppose now is as good a time as ever.” He replied and then he began to describe in detail his adventure on Corellia while posing as a bounty hunter. His voice was soothing and it made it easier to concentrate on the job at hand and not throwing up but it was slow going. I sighed and scanned the hull. It wasn’t often I got to see a ship from this perspective, looking down on it not craning to look up or worse crawling under it. Walking across a ship’s hull in space with mag boots and tethers was tiring and tedious, when you are under a severe time restriction due to the threat of some invisible unknown enemy ship attacking you; well that just makes it even more fun. Searching for this tiny tracking device was like looking for a specific grain of sand in the desert.

“So, let me get this straight, the CorSec guys were father and son but they lied about it?”

“Yes. They did not trust me. I suppose they did not want that particular bond known publicly but if one looked close enough the resemblance was easy to see.” He said.

I sighed, wondering why people made things so complicated. “Go on.” I nudged as I trudged across the ship’s hull. There was significant carbon scoring across parts of it. It was a small wonder the ship that had attacked us had not done more damage

I smiled As Thrawn continued his story about his time posing as Jodo Kast. I laughed at some of the things he was telling me and shook my head in disbelief at others.

“Did this Corran guy tell you how he knew about Chassu’s works?” I interrupted in the middle of a description of Corran Horn's conversation about this artist’s works.

“Sort of, although I am not so sure he was actually telling me the truth.” He replied, “There was just something about him which gave me the impression he was a little better educated than most and he knew a lot more about the topic than he was letting on. Of course I am quite sure he was very surprised at my own interest in the art field.”

“You sound like a match made in heaven.” I commented dryly.

“Hardly.” He said and continued with his story. He was half way through a description of Thyne’s terrible taste in art when the scanner lit up. Right under the start of the wing join, there it sat. It was almost exactly where the maintenance droid had been fiddling with things. I would have to look into that when we got back or at least alert Thrawn to the possibility of a droid that wasn’t what it seemed onboard his ship. I stood for a moment and stared at the tracking device. It was tiny and I knew I would have some issues trying to pry it off with the bulky gloves. I bent close to it and studied it for a second and then figured that the best way to get this thing off the ship’s hull was not with my hands.

“I found it.” I said.

“Good, try to get it off intact and get yourself back on board, the chrono is counting down.”

“Copy that, now I need you to not speak for a few minutes.”

My comm clicked twice and I grinned at how well he took orders from me sometimes. I squatted down as best I could in the EV suit and concentrated on my breathing, finding my center. I found that thread of the force which wound its way around everything, with that in mind I pictured the little tracking device lifting up and moving towards me. When it was safely in my glove I slipped it into one of the flap pockets on my leg. I tucked the scanner back in the other pocket and began the trip back to the airlock.

“Got it, am on my way back now.” I said. I was hurrying as much as was possible in the bulky suit. That nasty sensation of all the hair on the back of my neck suddenly standing up on end was starting to worry me. I was almost at the airlock when a blast rocked the ship. If I hadn’t been tethered, even with the magnetic soles of the boots I might have come off, as it was I managed to grab a hold of one of the hand bars.

“What the hell was that?” I yelled.

“Get inside now!”

“I’m trying, it’s not like I can actually run in mag boots!”

“Hurry up!” he pressed.

“Not helping!” I yelled into the comm.

“I need to know the second you are in and the airlock is sealed so we can make another jump.”

I rolled my eyes but hurried anyway. Another blast hit the ship and she rolled like a pregnant bantha. I swore and gritted my teeth as the galaxy around me spun violently. The airlock opened up, I unclipped the tether from the ship and I scooted inside the hatch as fast as I could, slamming the close door button hard.

“Is it cloaked as well, I couldn’t see where the shots were coming from?” I asked as the small airlock re-pressurised. Another blast hit the ship.

“Cut the chatter and get inside now!” Thrawn said crossly.

“I’m in. Go!” I told him as I slipped through the inside door and shut it. The ship rocked and the engines whined. I felt Sigiri shudder as the hyperdrive engaged. The ship lurched forward and so did my stomach. I scrambled up the ladder to the main bay. The Noghri was waiting for me and grabbed my arm as I struggled with the last steps and hauled me up easily.

“You are safe, lady Merlyn.” He said.

I nodded, afraid to open my mouth. I ripped off the helmet as fast as I could, clapped a hand over my mouth and then ran to the head, the helmet clattered on the deck as I dropped it. I made it just in time to throw up in the toilet and not all over the floor. I hated going EV. When there was nothing left in my stomach I just knelt on the floor with my head resting on my arms, listening as the toilet vac-flushed, remembering to breathe and willing my head to stop spinning. Zero-G was a lot like being very drunk without having the fun of drinking.

“Are you okay?” Thrawn asked as he offered me a cup of water.

I nodded and rinsed my mouth out with the water. “Going EV always, always makes me sick.” I told him. “Usually I take something against it but that wasn't possible in this situation.”

He helped me up. “Come on, we have some time. I’ll make some tea, that should help settle your stomach.”

I got to my feet and pulled off the gloves, dug around the little pocket on my thigh and pulled out the little tracker device. He took it from my still shaking fingers and frowned. While he studied it, I washed my face and cleaned my teeth.

“The same design as the other one?” I asked struggling out of the suit when we were in the passage way and out of the tiny ‘fresher.

He nodded then helped me with my battle against the EV suit and turned to head back to the main passenger area. I followed him with the suit slung over my arm. When he reached the small galley he filled the kettle with water and put it on the small stove.

“Where’s Rukh?”

“I am here, Lady Merlyn.” the Noghri said from the shadows of the tiny dining area, his gravely voice making me jump in surprise. I had not even seen him.

“Do you ever not sneak up on people?” I asked. Thrawn, watching this exchange, just sniggered quietly to himself making me want to shoot him.

“I am trained in stealth.” Rukh answered.

“Well, maybe you could go and be stealthy someplace else?” I asked crossly, sitting down.

He just stepped back into the shadows.

“How long did you put us in hyperspace for?” I asked.

“Long enough to test a theory.” Thrawn answered. He made tea, poured a cup into which he put a lot of sugar and handed it to me. “Drink.” He said.

While I drank the tea gratefully, I watched as he played with the tracking device in his hand.

“You know who is doing this don’t you?” I asked.

“I have some ideas.” He replied. There was an edge to his voice that I had never heard before. I didn’t like it.

I sighed. “Why is there no peace and quiet when I am with you?” I asked.

“We do have our moments.” He said with a slight smile.

I just made a face and finished my tea.

“Feeling any better?”

I nodded.

“Right let’s get back to work, shall we?” He said getting up.

“That thing still active?” I asked nodding at the little device in his hand.

“Yes.”

“So, who ever is after us will find us the moment we come out of hyperspace?”

“Yes.” He said.

“And they’ll shoot at us again?”

“That’s the idea.”

I nodded. “I see.” I said. “And you have a plan that won’t get us killed?”

“I do.”

I gave him that look that said ‘uh huh’.

He gave me that smile which said. ‘A little trust, Miss Gabriel.’

I rolled my eyes. “Lord Vader will not be happy if I bang up the shuttle, you know, he just had the paint touched up.”

He gave me a tight smile that never quite reached his eyes. “Let’s hope we will have a shuttle to bang up after this.” He said.

I sighed as the ship came out of hyperspace and we slowed to a quarter speed with shields up. I glanced at Thrawn and checked over the instruments while he looked at the little tracker in his hand and drew a deep breath. I hoped he knew what he was doing.

“So what do we do now?” I asked.

“Now we wait.” He said.

“Great.” I muttered.

He just gave me a grin.