~@~ Can't Go Home Again

   It was local night when the small ship put down. The city was dark except for the slow flashing of landing beacons at the spaceport, and the dingy spaceport was quiet except for the muffled echos of a lone cargo ship that was still unloading its wares. 

   She paid her fees and made her way unassumingly through the city streets, out into the countryside.  The eerie silence of long absence hung like a shroud surrounding her, its shadow keeping the unknown at a distance for a short while longer. For eight years, Lara had carried the thought of making this journey.  She did not know what to expect at its end, and she was trying not to hope. 

   For several hours, she directed the small speeder by memory alone. The night was pitch black around her.  Timeless. When dawn finally started to break against the horizon, she looked around herself, startled. Her surroundings didn't match any of the memories she had been traveling on.

   Lara stopped the transport as her confusion gave way to disbelief. There should have been buildings, vegetation.  Life. She knelt to the ground to pick up a handful of soil.  Its remembered red-brown color was now a darker shade against her skin. She sifted it between her fingers – mostly ash. 

   Her eyes lifted to scan the lightening horizon.  For as far as she could see, the ground carried only the first layer of new life: mostly weed plants and a few small seedlings. The destruction was only three or four seasons old.  That would be about four, maybe five, years.... She had seen the blatant signs of corruption at the spaceport, in the absorbent ground fees and the veiled threats behind them.  She had expected it there, but she had not expected the corrosion to extend this far on world. A hard lump tightened Lara's throat. She had not expected this.

   This destruction belonged to something entirely different. Not the work of petty criminals trying to turn a fast profit, this was an organized and formulated attack, one meant to scare and intimidate the locals into cooperating. Someone had come here for a purpose, looking for something that was obviously very important.  Lara could think of only one objective that would bring such a person here. With grim urgency, she stood and headed back to the transport.

   This was personal.

   The speeder's throttle was pushed to the hilt, letting the wind tear relentlessly at her eyes and her ears as the featureless land continued to pass in a blinding blur.  None of that was what she would later remember – it was the awful silence in the remainder of that trip, as she drew closer to the excruciating unknown. That feeling was the most unbearable, torturous thing that she had ever felt. 

   Then the silence broke.  She knew.

   In that moment the balance shifted, and the weight of Lara's life crashed in on her.

~~ ~ () ~ ~~

   With time the raw emotions died down to a dull, though endless, ache. 

   She paced the floors of what had been her home, looking for any scrap she could find to tell her something about what life had been like for her loved ones after she had gone. But Lara had been left alone, with only the ghosts and the unanswered questions as company.

   The days and nights continued to pass, though she was spent. Sleep was something that didn't come for her anymore, and there was no more reward in memory than in grief. Only the questions remained. Those questions continued to taunt her, demanding answers that Lara could never realize, not on her own.

   There was only one more place she might go. 

~

   The way was considerably more grown over since the last time Lara had traveled it, but her feet found the path almost instinctively, as though they had a memory of their own. There had been so many early mornings when she had snuck out before it was light to race though these trees and fields....  She could have found her way blinded.

   The path came to an end at a small clearing. Lara ducked under one last tree limb and stood to look out into the open field beyond.  The sight caught her by surprise. As with the rest of her return, the place was the same, but everything about it had changed.

   She felt herself release a hissing breath that she hadn't meant to hold, as her eyes searched despondently for something familiar. The miles of fence, the barns and farmstead – all had once been spotless.  Now they looked their age and more, run down with disuse. The fields were overgrown, the animals, gone, fences falling away.  It took another second for Lara to regain her momentum and step out into the field, still looking around herself in pained disbelief. 

   A sudden wave of loneliness and added grief tugged at her spirit as she took it all in. 

   Lara took another step forward, and her attempt to reconcile sight with memory was abruptly cut short by reality.  A movement off to her right and slightly uphill caught her attention, jarring her senses into alertness. 

   She turned to see a lone figure standing roughly fifteen paces away, holding an old model compact blast rifle, which was pointed at her.

   "State your purpose, or I'll state it for ya," a gruff voice demanded.

   The face was kept in shadow by an oversized sun hat and the morning sun behind it, which was obviously the desired effect.  It put Lara at several strategic disadvantages.

   "I'm not armed," Lara stated in response, calmly lifting her hands and holding them, palms forward, at her hips.  A slight forward motion mixed with the reflexive challenge in her voice.  Disadvantage was far different than weakness, and the pull of so many grim reconciliations was not quite enough to drown out the will and instinct that had kept her alive this far. The journey would come to a finish here, but Lara was going to meet that finish on her own terms.

   So she stood staring into the bright morning light behind the gruff voice and the blaster, and waited to see if time had dulled the memory of the person holding it.

   "Lara?" came the stunned whisper of a reply.  The woman standing behind the blast rifle took a hesitant step forward and pushed her hat back from her eyes.

   "Yeah," Lara said softly.  She let her hands fall back to her sides as she took a cautious half step forward. "It's me."

   The woman walked forward, more hurried now.  Her eyes quickly searched over Lara's face, then she hugged Lara tightly. "Oh, Child," she breathed in that same stunned whisper.  Lara felt a flicker of a smile cross her face at the old nickname, then she had been smoothly pushed back to arm's length so that the older woman could study her again.

   The smile faded. Lara watched as the woman's face fell, abruptly remembering.

   "I'm so sorry," she said.

   "Thank you," Lara said softly. It was a measured response, words that really didn't connect.  She held the other woman's gaze and kept a strong front.

   "Come on!" The older woman exclaimed, breaking the awkwardness. "Let's go inside."

   She turned toward the farmhouse, and Lara followed a step behind her.

   "What happened here, Moranda?" Lara asked after a few moments, her voice showing the puzzlement of memory conflicting with sight.

   "Scavengers – the whole lot of them," Moranda spat in answer.  She turned to Lara as they entered the house. "Everything went to pieces after Endor," Moranda explained, her voice straining to stay calm.  "The fringe groups have all but taken over this part of the rim. They've scared out most of the upper class pop, and taken everything that isn't nailed down."

   Moranda paused a moment, suppressing a mischievous grin. "There was a time when I would have loved nothing better than to see those inflated credit-mongers run for their worth, but this wasn't what I had in mind!"

   Lara followed her inside and through a small hallway that led into the kitchen area. Her eyes reflexively darted across the room in a quick survey.  It was a little more sparse than Lara remembered, but otherwise familiar.  Moranda crossed the room in front of her, set the blaster down on the table with a quiet clunk, and motioned for Lara to sit.

   Lara followed her invitation, casually tilting a chair away from the table and angling it so that she could face toward the door and still be clear of the small room's only window. She didn't even pause to think about those reflexes.  After eight years, keeping caution and stealth in all circumstances had become an ingrained habit. The same ready alertness stayed about Lara as she sat down.  Leaning slightly forward to rest her elbows on her knees, she gazed across the table at Moranda.

   Moranda only shook her head, watching Lara intently. "I can't believe it." 

   Lara looked down at the floor for the space of a heartbeat.  "I guess there's not much of the girl you knew left to see," she said quietly.

   "No," Moranda answered slowly, "I can still see her. She's been through a lot, but she's still there."

   "Your horses?" Lara asked after a brief silence.

   "They were the first to go, after the spaceports had been cleaned out," Moranda answered with an emphatic snort.  "No, it didn't take 'em long to figure out what was most valuable on this rock."  The lingering anger in her voice was offset by the pride Moranda had taken in the animals she'd spent most of her life raising. 

   Lara looked down again, gathering herself. With all the strength and courage she had left, she looked back to Moranda to ask one simple question. 

   "When?"

   To her credit, the older woman didn't hesitate.  "The first group came five months after Endor.  Warlords, looking to take their chunk of the Empire while it was still up for grabs." 

   Lara felt herself nod slightly, her eyes unfocused.  "Looking for me." Her voice sounded harsh in her own ears.  Moranda started to say something more, but she paused as Lara spoke again.  "I already knew that, of course," Lara admitted, shrugging. Her voice had softened.  "What other reason would they have?"

   "That doesn't make it your fault."

   "I should have been here," Lara returned quietly, looking her in the eye.

   "Why?" the older woman asked gently. "What would it have done?"

   "It was me they wanted."    

   "Your family wouldn't have just stepped aside and let them take you. You know that."

   Lara swallowed her argument. She did know.  Moranda was right about that.

   "I still should have been here," she whispered the conviction again, unable to let it rest. 

   The silence lingered a few moments more.

   Moranda slowly got up and headed into the kitchenette, a little alcove set across the room.  There she began heating water, a start to making the tea she considered to be an aid in working through all problems. 

   Lara listened, the sounds bringing back memories of chilly mornings when the three of them had sat around this table debating some finer point or another, each arguing stubbornly in favor of their own favorite animal. Mark and Moranda had shared the same favorite, a well-trained old mare.  Lara had always insisted that her fiery filly would be the better horse in time.  She just needed a few more years' work. 

   With an effort, Lara pulled herself back from the past.

   "How were things, after I left?" Lara asked softly. 

   Moranda looked up from pouring the tea to stare at the wall in front of her. "It was hard," she answered honestly. "Mark was here, almost all the time, those first few weeks.  He missed you.  And he was afraid for you."

   Lara stared hard at the floor as Moranda came back to the table and slid one of the cups in front of her.

   "I think I heard just about every childhood story," she continued, "and he was around so much, I finally had to give him a paying job."

   Lara smiled a little, and nodded, as if in thanks.

   "He took over training Collist," Moranda added softly.

   Lara's eyes darted back to her, surprised.

   "I don't think she ever took to him the way she did you," Moranda confessed, "but he kept at it, and she came along real good.  I took her up to the mountain pasture and let her go, after." She glanced at Lara as her voice trailed off. "I wish I had let them all go now," she finished with a snort of regret.

   Lara reached for the cup in front of her and took a deep sip of the warm liquid. The familiar sensation offered a brief moment of calm against the awful restlessness that churned at her heart. She could feel the shift in other woman's mood as the silence grew.

   "He loved you a lot," Moranda said quietly.

   Lara felt her heart tighten, and for a series of heartbeats she wasn't sure that she could breathe, much less reply.  "Feeling is mutual," she heard herself manage softly, helplessly.

   Moranda sat back in her seat as she finished the last of her cup, and she let the silence hold a little longer.  "So what do you do now?" she finally asked.

   Lara sighed, genuinely taken aback by the question.  "I don't know," she answered slowly.  "For eight years, my only goal was to get back here.  Now that I have, there's nothing left."

   Again, the silence held between them.  There was nothing more either could say.

   As Moranda got up from the table, Lara felt it. 

   Keeping one eye on the older woman, Lara reached over to return her cup to the table.  When she sat back in her seat again, she made sure to slide the blaster toward the table's edge nearest herself.  If Moranda noticed, she didn't let on.  Not a hint of hesitation showed in her step as she walked over to the kitchenette and began to re-heat the remainder of the tea. Lara let another moment pass, staying aware.

   She didn't sense anything more.

   "What about you?" she asked Moranda absently.  "Why haven't you left?"

   "I guess I should have by now," Moranda answered regretfully.  "There's certainly been no reason for me to stay, not for a long time."  Then the older woman paused, and turned to smile at Lara.

   "Honestly?" she sighed.  "I stayed here for today, each day. I guess it was a way of keeping hope," she admitted more quietly, "but I always believed you would come back, and I couldn't leave it that way. I couldn't stand the thought of–" she hesitated. Moranda couldn't seem to find the words she wanted, or maybe she just couldn't bring herself to speak the harsh truth.  She shrugged at Lara and settled on a hand gesture that said, "the way everything is."

   "Maybe I just needed to be here," Moranda finished hurriedly, self-consciously brushing the rest aside.

   "Randa–" Lara stared at the older woman, unable to comprehend what she was hearing. Lara's voice had trailed off behind the slight shake of her head, and her brow furrowed at the inability to somehow express awe, gratitude, and utter disbelief, all at once.  "Thank you." 

   Moranda only smiled again and turned back to her work in the kitchenette, but Lara could tell that equally inexpressible emotions were at play within her too.

   The silence held a few seconds more before Lara felt the warning again. 

   A fraction of a second later there was a noise outside.  When Moranda looked out from the kitchenette, Lara was already standing.  Holding the blaster in a ready position, she gave its power charge a quick check and flipped the safety over. 

   Then she glanced sharply at Moranda. "If they come in blasting, I want you out of here." 

   Her voice was concerned, but left no room for argument or hesitation.  Moranda nodded in response.

   Lara crossed the room in a couple of steps, taking cover against the wall that would let her face the intruders as they entered the room from a right angle. She crouched into a combat-ready position and reached out for some sense of the situation.

   She already knew that they were amateurs, or they would never have given themselves away so early. Now they were wasting precious seconds in what sounded like internal squabbling.

   Lara suddenly frowned at the old blaster rifle in her hand, and started scanning the area around her.  She couldn't help thinking that if her enemies were as inexperienced as they were showing themselves to be thus far, she may not need the blaster at all.  That was just as well; these older model compacts took a long time charge reloading, which meant she'd only get a couple of quick shots out of it.  It would be much wiser to save it for a back up than count on it as her primary defense.

   She quickly found something else that would do and tucked the blaster into her belt behind her back. Then Lara settled herself against the wall again, wedging her side in at a closer angle this time. Prepared fingers calmly weighed the new weapon as she crouched, waiting. 

   It was only a few seconds longer until they broke the door in, still just the two of them. They worked their way inside, moving a little more cautiously as they came through the short hallway.  Lara stretched her senses, waiting for exactly the right moment.  Then just as the first man was about to turn the corner, she flicked her wrist to send the kitchen utensil flying past him. It sailed through the air in the direction of the kitchen window, and the sound of shattering glass rang out as it connected with its target.

   Lara was ready when the first of the two men jumped forward, extending his blaster toward the broken window. She quickly caught hold of his outstretched arm and twisted it behind him, taking the man's blaster from him in one quick motion.  Without wasting a moment, she brought the handle of the weapon down on the back of his head, knocking him out.

   Lara knew her distraction would spend its novelty the moment she grabbed the first man, but her assessment of them had been correct. The more capable of the two had been in the lead; he probably won the argument she had heard a few moments ago.  The second man had frozen, uselessly watching her disarm his companion. 

   As the first man fell to the floor, Lara dropped down to one knee, using his bulk as a shield during the few seconds she needed to regain her ready stance. Then she pushed off against his dead weight and, pivoting on her downed knee, Lara used a leg sweep to take the second man's feet out from under him.

   Still groping for his blaster, that man clattered face-forward to the floor.

   Before he could recover his equilibrium Lara had pinned him down, planting a knee between his shoulder blades. She quickly relieved him of his weapons, sliding them, along with the first man's blaster, across the floor to where Moranda quietly gathered them up and set them on the table.

   Lara threw a quick glance over her shoulder toward Moranda. 

   The woman was rock solid.  That utterly calm and cool expression suddenly reminded Lara of how many horses she had seen Moranda bring around with firm and gentle patience... and bittersweetly, of how she had wanted nothing more than to emulate that. 

   Lara turned back to the second mercenary and dug her knee a little deeper into his back for emphasis. 

   "Who sent you?" she demanded.

   "Pracos."

   Lara looked to Moranda for interpretation.

   "He's the second in command to this ravel. In charge of independent taxation."

   "And the more creative the better, I assume," Lara concluded without humor.  "Is that the only reason you're here? Think carefully about your answer if you'd like your spine to stay in one piece," she added, giving him another prod.

   "Yeah, Yeah! That's all."

   Lara held him for a five count, letting his fears sink a little deeper.  Then she stood, taking a step back and pulling the blaster from behind her.

   The man scrambled to sit up and back away from the weapon at the same time. 

   "Take your buddy," Lara said, motioning toward the unconscious man, "and get out of here.  If you know what's good for you, you won't say a word about this, and you won't even think about coming back. 

   "Go." 

   Lara watched his disbelief pass into desperation as he stood.  Then, as quickly as possible, he shouldered the second man and hurried away, fighting for his balance under the added weight.

   "How long do you think that'll stick?" Moranda asked, her skeptical tone showing the answer she expected.

   Lara considered it as she crossed over to the window, being careful to stay to one side as she looked out.

   "The one," she thought out loud, "he hasn't got so much experience under him.  This may actually put enough of a scare into him to change his line of work."  Then she turned to Moranda and walked back over to the table. "But the other is a career man.  He'll report back, after he's had a chance to nurse his wounded pride and embellish his story." 

   Lara sat heavily into her chair. "At most, he'll buy us a couple of days," she concluded.

   Moranda sat across from her, her face looking as tired as Lara suddenly felt. 

   "How long will it take you to pack?" Lara questioned.

   Moranda wasn't thrown by the assumption. "I keep a bag ready upstairs," she answered.

   Lara nodded. "We'll leave at first light tomorrow then. We'll need the daylight." 

   Moranda nodded slightly in acknowledgment, then her expression changed subtly. Lara could tell that she was trying to decide if she wanted to say what she was thinking.

   "You could have killed those two and been done with it," she finally stated quietly. "But you didn't."

   Lara looked at her curiously.  "You think I should have?" she ventured the possibility evenly.

   The familiar smile returned to the older woman's face. "I kinda expected it, but I should have known better." With that, she retrieved two cups from the now cluttered table and took them back to the kitchenette. "You knew they were coming a good while before I ever heard them," Moranda offered, another statement of fact.

   Lara studied her face. "I knew there was something wrong," she answered evenly.

   "And not killing – is that you, or is it a Jedi trait?"

   Lara fought a smile at her friend's frankness. "Mark told you," she said slowly.

   "Yes," she answered, just as slowly, "but I suspected it before then.  When they took you, I knew that was it."

   "You never let on," Lara said, leaning forward curiously.

   Her face softened. "When he told me, I wished I had.  I thought I was doing you more of a service by staying quiet.  I had no idea it was such a burden on you.  On all of you."

   Lara took a breath, slowly remembering.  "Burden is a good word to describe it.  It was a weight that I always carried with me, the fear of it being discovered."

   "I'm sorry," Moranda breathed, hints of frustration and regret coming through in her voice.

   "No. There's nothing for you to apologize for.  This was always a place I could come to, where being myself and having a future to look toward–" she paused.  "Those things didn't have to involve caution, or dread."  Lara looked down for a moment.  "I could forget that it was only a matter of time, that the Empire would come for me, eventually."

   "You knew that?" Moranda asked softly. "That it would happen."

   Lara suppressed a smile. "I didn't foresee it," she managed around the smile. "It was simpler than that," she added quietly as she looked back to her friend. "My family spent so much energy assuring me that it wouldn't happen, while I knew they were terrified that it would. Somewhere in the back of my mind, I started to expect it.  Like old age. It was something that would happen, sometime still very far away."

   She fell silent for a moment, her eyes going distant.  "As long as I thought of it that way, it didn't really touch me.  It was only when I let it get close...."  She hesitated.  "Mark was the only person who ever made that really go away." That truth hung in the air between them, unexplained, for a long moment. "He was my safety," Lara finally breathed. "The only person I ever completely trusted."

   Her eyes came back slowly from the past, and Lara shook her head, a little disgusted with herself. "Not that you needed to hear all that," she breathed.  Lara swallowed hard and hurriedly pulled herself back from things she hadn't intended to revisit.

   "If you needed to say it, that's good enough for me," Moranda decided. The words were kindly spoken, though her normally gruff voice was just a bit too ragged.

   Lara felt her heart beat more heavily for a handful of seconds.

   "Did he know?" she felt herself ask numbly, the urgency in it, hard to hide.

   Moranda nodded.  "Yeah," she breathed softly.  "He knew.

   "I honestly think he would rather have gone with you than stayed behind, no matter what."

   Lara nodded reflexively. It was hard to hear, but there was also familiarity in Moranda's description.  That familiarity brought comfort, and a hint of a smile to Lara's disconsolate face.

   "I told him to have faith, that you could take care of yourself, and that you would get back here. That always made him smile. He knew how strong you are, and he couldn't argue with that."  Moranda smiled and leaned toward Lara. "I was right, of course," she added lightly, before she leaned back in her chair again.

   "So," she prompted Lara with the same lightness. "You didn't answer my question."

   Lara snorted at the challenge in her friend's voice. "I'm no Jedi," she retorted, "so I guess it's just me."

   Moranda waited.  Lara's curt rebuttal had been offset by the abashed smile underlying it, and Lara spared her friend a more honest smile now. She realized that the older woman wouldn't accept her answer as the avoidance it was meant to be; Lara would have to follow up with a more honest answer. 

   "Most beings are too quick to go for their blasters," she stated cooly.  "If you look for other ways, they're usually there."

   "It sounds a lot like Jedi to me." Moranda decided.

   Lara shook her head slowly before meeting Moranda's eyes again.  "I had to find ways to be able to live with myself, even in the Empire.  I don't know if that has anything to do with the Force. It was more of a struggle for self-preservation."

   "And after the Empire?" Moranda asked carefully.

   Lara looked at her for a moment, deliberately forcing the guilt-driven defensiveness under control before she let herself answer.

   "I did what I thought I needed to do," Lara said finally, the words struggling for conviction even in her own ears.

   Moranda let the silence sit.

   "Would you change your decisions," she asked quietly, another challenge, "or refuse what you have, if you could?"

   Lara swallowed hard and looked her in the eye, but she couldn't answer. 

   Moranda called her on it.  "I didn't think so," she chided gently. Then she leaned forward again as Lara looked away.  "Don't let your grief bury you, Child.  You've done the best you could with what you've been given."  More quietly, almost urgently, she breathed another challenge.  "You've got to pick up the pieces and move on." 

   Moranda emphasized the words with a smile and a slight squeeze of Lara's arm, but when Lara's gaze returned to hers, the hopeful support in Moranda's face abruptly fell away.

   Lara nodded an acknowledgment at the heartfelt words and managed a smile. 

   "We'll have to start early tomorrow," Lara offered quietly.  "You had better get ready."

~

   She sat staring at the walls long after Moranda had gone upstairs, remembering the rather queer expression on her friend's face. Lara regretted that; she had not meant to be so transparent.

   Moranda was one of the few people whose advice Lara really respected.  She knew Lara well, and she was her only remaining friend. She may well be right, Lara admitted to herself... about everything.

   Exhausted, Lara leaned back in her chair and closed her eyes against the tears, and the grief, and the guilt. Moving past it was not something that she could even remotely comprehend.

~~ ~ () ~ ~~

   Late in the next day, Lara and Moranda stood waiting in an open-air hanger as a charter pilot readied his ship for takeoff.  From the shadows across the way, two men stood watching.  One nervously rubbed the back of his head as he turned to his companion.

   "I told you, that's her. Dare."

   "Dare," the man repeated with an air of greedy wonder in his voice.  "Bringing her in, I could make my own destiny."  Another moment passed before he lowered his macrobinoculars and added, "Your loyalty won't be forgotten."

   "Thank you, Lieutenant Pracos."

   "Are you sure?" he demanded sharply.

   "Believe me, I'm sure."

   "All right, let's move in."

   "But, Lieutenant–" the first man interrupted uneasily. "Perhaps it would be better to gather some reinforcements."

   Pracos looked at him blankly, as if just seeing the man for the first time.

   "–Sir," he amended, "we can't forget who we're talking about.  Second to Lord Vader, himself." He hesitated. "I 'd like to live to see my reward."

   Pracos looked a little exasperated, but he knew a good argument when he heard one.

   "Yeah, fine. Let's get back to the Boss in a hurry then."  

   With that, they retreated unseen.

~

   A few blocks away, several body guards stood outside one of the seedier cantinas.  This was in addition to the regular muscle who had made their reputations, as well as the reputation of the club, by turning away unwanted patrons.

   "Hey, where do you think you're going?" one of the large aliens grumbled as he and another of his species prevented two jumpy humans from rushing inside.

   "Come on, Hack, you know it's us," the first man protested impatiently.

   "We don't have time for this," Pracos interjected from behind him. "We've got to see the Boss.  It's important."

   "Not today, boys," the burly alien answered, somewhat amused.  Then his voice dropped a few levels as he gestured toward the extra security.  "Boss's already got company."

   The two men looked behind them and to both sides, noticing the extra guards.

   "A very special meeting," the bouncer continued. "Now, you wouldn't want to interrupt?"

~

   In the run-down building's back room, four more guards stood ready as two men sat around a huge table.

   The first man was thin and middle-aged, in stark contrast to the well-built and well-dressed body guards standing close behind him.  With shifty eyes and a sycophant disposition, he evoked the image of a prey animal that was attempting to become the hunter. 

   Across the table, similarly flanked by two more of the alien body guards, the second man lounged.  His deceptively lazy eyes and bulky body only served to exaggerate a battle-worn face and the scars that he carried with pride.  He took great pride in his physical toughness, and relied heavily on intimidation.

   "I've heard all this before," the big man rumbled a complaint. "I want more."

   "I have given you the top of my lines in all that I have done–" his smaller associate insisted grandly.

   "And you have been well compensated for supplies and goods, Imago, as we agreed."

   "As well as certain, extras," Imago prompted, his voice leading.

   "Which I might point out, ultimately, never materialized," the big man warned, his voice becoming dangerous.

   Across the table, the man called Imago swallowed noticeably, but was otherwise undaunted.  "If you hadn't gotten overzealous," he dug in, "other approaches might have been successful. The information was not at fault."

   "The fact still remains–" the larger man continued, before breaking off as he heard a knock at the door behind him.  He sat back impatiently as the door opened and two men were escorted in. 

   "I trust that this is of extreme importance," he said, turning that dangerous voice and an equally dangerous gaze to meet them.

   "Y– Yes, Sir," Pracos answered, almost curtly. "We believe we've located Dare"

   "Well..." his boss noted, lending a suspicious and menacing gaze back to the table.  "Isn't that interesting?" he said slowly.  The silence was permitted for long enough to make his associate squirm. Then Pracos' boss directed a command into the thin air between himself and the two men at his side.  "Do you believe that you can arrange a force for her capture?"

   "Yes, Sir," they both answered, clearly relieved. 

   "Any orders, Sir?" Pracos asked, a military-style curtness returning to his manner.

   Their boss turned to give them another scathing stare. "Instruct the force to be prepared for anything, and remind them that they are authorized in using any means to take Dare, alive," he concluded strongly, pointing at each man in turn to emphasize that command.  Then he turned away.  His gaze searched out the empty air again, as the two men waited for him to give the small gesture which would dismiss them.

   When the door had closed after them a moment later, he turned to lock eyes on Imago.

   "Our agreement still stands," he concluded abruptly. "If you wish more from it, then you must offer more."

   The thought of rebuttal seemed to occur to Imago, but only for a brief moment before it slipped away.

   "Very well," Imago agreed, appeasing his inflated ego by treating the concession as though it were a victory. "We will proceed as agreed upon. For now," he stated haughtily.

   "For now," came the icy response. 

   "Good day, Fasad Imago."

   "Laus," Imago acknowledged cooly.

   Laus swivelled in his seat and sat watching the door intently for many moments after Imago and his guards had departed. "But only for now," he finally murmured to the empty room.

   "Soon, Waton Laus' only negotiations will come through complete domination."

~

   The pilot took a few steps down the ramp to announce that it was time to board.  Lara glanced toward him and then back to Moranda, knowing that their time was drawing to a close.

   "I'm afraid I know the answer already," Moranda admitted, "but I've still got to ask. Lara, come with me."

   Lara took a deep breath and let it out a sigh.

   "Come with me, Child–" she tried again, "there's no good in your bein' here."

   Lara shook her head. "I can't," she said softly.

   Moranda's eyes started to tear up.

   "There's too much pain for you here," she stated, her voice barely reaching a whisper.

   Lara dropped her eyes to stare at the ground; she'd never seen her friend cry.

   "Little by little, you'll die inside," Moranda whispered, pleading with her to listen.

   A bittersweet smile crossed Lara's face as pained eyes lifted to meet Moranda's worried gaze. 

   "The pain's not in this place," she confided gently, simply.

~

   Lara stood squinting into the bright blue sky until the ship was no more than a bright light against it, and then it flashed out of sight completely. A sense of finality settled over her in the wake of that one small success.

   "I'm glad that someone could get out of here alive," Lara spoke the heavy emotion out loud, and knew that now she was truly alone.  "May the Force go with you, my friend," she whispered. ~@ ~ ~