Chapter Twenty-Six: Breakout

[ladyofleithian]

In which Ben goes to search for Jaina on Jakku (which goes as well as you'd expect) and Lisaris bails Narudar out of jail.

Disclaimer: I own nothing.

 

In hindsight, heading out to Jakku might have been a case of not quite thinking things through, but Ben had had to do it.

It was a matter of stealing a ship from the hangar in the night and having it jump to hyperspace. Ben had reached through the Force if only to find Jaina -- because he refused to believe that she was gone.

Even as he wove through the seemingly endless desert, his uncle’s words echoed in his mind. Going out in the desert by yourself is dangerous, Ben...

But Ben could do dangerous. He could remember going on expeditions in the jungles of Yavin with Annie and Thomas when he was younger, and the scraped knees that resulted. He could remember breaking his ankle at four years old when first getting his lightsaber crystal. He could remember the slavers, damn them.

This shouldn’t have been difficult and yet the heat...the heat...

The heat seemed to go on forever. The endless sands...it made Tatooine, he thought, look like Naboo. Even far from the downed Star Destroyer from the battle that happened long before he was born, Ben already doubted he could feel more lost.

But he had to keep going. Jaina was out there. Jaina was in pain...

Ben practically gulped down the contents of his canteen in the moment he took it out. He hadn’t expected to be so thirsty wandering Jakku, but then again, he didn’t expect Jakku to stretch out into what felt like eternity. The endless desert, where the town seemed to be so far away.

Now, he thought, he could focus. He could stretch out. Jaina was here, he simply knew it. She was afraid, very afraid, very uncertain.

He stumbled under the heat, the heat that seemed to beat down on his head even as he walked, burning against his scalp, and he cursed himself for having thick hair. Even with a Padawan braid, it seemed that he could not escape the burning heat. It beat down on his neck, on his shoulders, on his skin.

Stay steady. Don’t fall over. Get to water -- get to the outpost where you can find water, at least -- if they have it...

If

if

if...

And then Ben could have sworn that Jakku’s seemingly endless sky spun above him, and the ground rose up to meet him.

***

It was later that Pava brought in Ben. Covered in sand, lips cracked and bleeding, skin burned, but very much alive. Poe didn’t walk, but ran towards Ben in that moment, BB-8 whirling after him.

“Ben -- ’’

“He’s badly dehydrated,” Pava said. “He needs water. And it looks like he hasn’t had much food either.”

In her arms, Ben muttered something that sounded like, “...Jaina.” His voice was so hoarse that it was barely audible at first, but as Poe approached him, he could hear more. So that was what Ben was doing out there. Searching for his little cousin.

Pava laid him tenderly down on the bed even as Poe went over and filled a cup to the brim with water. He walked over to Ben, the cup sloshing in his hands, and held it out to Ben’s lips.

“Ben. It’s okay,” Poe said, soothingly. “I got you, Ben.”

Ben drank from the glass almost as if he was dying of thirst. All things considered, Poe thought, it was a miracle that he was still alive. That he hadn’t died, actually. They’d nearly lost Ben.

He’d nearly lost Ben.

And even that thought was terrifying. If he’d lost Ben, if Ben had died in that desert...

“Poe,” Ben said, still whispery. “You came for me.”

“I always will.”

“Need more...water...”

***

When he awoke, he was in medbay, blinding white medbay with the sort of shine that he hated. He blinked, wishing his eyes would water, but instead they stung but didn’t water.

“Ben, it’s okay. Just drink something.” Poe’s voice, the sweetest sound that Ben could possibly hear in this moment.

Water. Ben gulped it down urgently; he hadn’t thought that he would miss water that much, but after Jakku, he had a feeling that he would have gulped down every bit of water there was if it soothed his ravaged throat.

“You scared the hell out of me, Ben,” Poe said. “All of us. If Jess hadn’t found you...”

“Jaina’s gone.”

“Easy, Ben.” Poe’s hand smoothed over his forehead, and there was something about that touch that was supposed to be comforting, but Ben could still feel Jaina’s presence all but screaming in his ears. She was still out there, and Ben couldn’t do anything to save her.

“She’s gone, Poe, she’s gone.” He was shaking now. His voice cracked, and he wished that he could cry, but it was as if Jakku had dried up his tears.

Poe held him then, rubbing circles on Ben’s back even as Ben wept.

***

It was midnight when Lisaris appeared at the door to the interrogation room, and Narudar could not help but be filled with a sort of awe. There was something about him, standing there practically gleaming in the darkness of the hallway outside, that filled Narudar with the sort of reverence that one would have had for their Mandalore in times past.

“How did you get here?” Narudar said.

“A bit of camouflage.”

And Narudar would have to take Lisaris’ word for it, of course. There were things about the Force that, as a non-Force sensitive, felt almost like stepping into a whole different world. Still, a world with someone like Lisaris in it...

It was worth thinking about. Worth living in. Worth fighting for.

“You took quite a risk, I have to add,” said Lisaris.

“How?”

“I understand that it’s natural Mandalorian impulse to brag to all and sundry about their battles,” said Lisaris, “But you took a great risk. And not even an admirable risk. I had to make sure all traces of us were scrubbed from the databases.”

“Did you?”

Lisaris nodded. “Our hacker’s taking care of it right now. As I said, you took quite a risk, Narudar. And a foolish one. Pragmatism in all things over pride.”

“Forgive me.”

“Just don’t do it again. At least, when you speak, be sure not to tell the interrogator your life story.”

“Duly noted. So what do we do now?”

“There’s still much to do,” said Lisaris. “We need to report back to the Supreme Leader for our new assignments. But first...” A tilt of his head. “Looks like there are some guards up ahead. Pretty unfair, isn’t it, at least for them?”

“Yeah. Poor bastards.”

Narudar took out his blaster and opened fire. The guards fell to the floor, and with the combination of blasterfire and Lisaris’ red lightsaber cleaving through their opponents, Narudar knew, in that moment, they were unstoppable.

Comments

[pronker]

I like the comparison of the two pairs - Lisaris and Narudar, Poe and Ben - as they show compassion and ruthlessness, respectively. And way to go with experimentation with font, re the 'if's, because that's a draw with writing a long story in that one can experiment with one or more chapters without losing the main drift of the story. :)

[ladyhadhafang.livejournal.com]

Thanks! I didn't really think of that, but well put.

And yeah, re: the "ifs", I was really trying to get at the feeling of Ben falling unconscious due to dehydration. And very well-said! Seriously. :)