Lekku. LOG-017. Quiet Between Explosions.

LOG-017. Quiet Between Explosions.

The cargo bay smells like detcord and sweat.

Kedo’s rigged the place with enough simulated charges to flatten a hangar deck. Not real, mostly. Some are rigged just close enough to spark if Hex (where the clone got the name from, I’m not sure of) screws up.

Which is the point.

Torren paces the upper catwalk, calling the drills down over local comms.

Hex moves through them with clipped steps and too much muttering.

“Red line, left panel, second fuse.” Torren calls.

Hex grunts. “Got it.”

He doesn’t ask questions.

Just yanks the plate, separates the lines with gloved fingers, and cuts clean.

No delay.

No drama.

Just movement.

Next charge.

Behind a sealed crate, half twisted into the frame.

Kedo’s standing back with his arms crossed, expression unreadable under the helmet.

“Timer’s down to ten.” He warns.

“I know.” Hex shoots back.

Eight seconds later, the trigger’s bypassed, and the charge clicks dead.

I watch from the forward steps, helmet in my lap.

Lira’s beside me, pretending not to be interested. Her eyes track every movement. She’s cleaned the same blaster pistol three times in the last hour.

Trix is on the mezzanine, betting silently with herself and losing.

—

“You do this often?” I ask.

Hex doesn’t stop working.

“Back in the field.” He eventually relents. “They called me when things needed to go quiet. Or loud. Depending.”

Torren smirks. “You always complain this much?”

Hex pulls a strip of wire from between his teeth and tosses it at him.

“Only when the drills are this lazy.”

—

It’s the final test.

A full diagnostic breach, blindfolded.

Kedo steps forward, tosses the wrap toward him.

Hex catches it, ties it tight, then kneels beside the last charge.

Four wires. Two duds. One soft trigger. One timed.

He sniffs once.

Then cuts the soft trigger clean through.

No explosion.

Trix lets out a low whistle.

“Alright.” I grin, standing. “You’re not useless.”

Hex pulls the blindfold off and squints up at me.

“That a compliment?”

I shrug. “Better than what I give most new hires.”

He grins back, just barely. “Then I’ll take it.”

We leave the charges half dismantled. Real ones next time.

Hex doesn’t ask what his first mission’s going to be.

Which is good.

Especially considering I haven’t decided if I want him on the front or the fuse just yet.

—

Lira finishes first.

Always does.

She doesn’t say anything, just breathes out sharp, plants a kiss under my jaw, and rolls out of bed with the kind of smooth, post coital grace that makes it look like she was never really there to begin with.

Her bare feet pad against the cold floor. No flinch. No shame.

She grabs her pants. Slings her belt over one shoulder and doesn’t glance back.

The door hisses open and closes behind her, like she never came in at all.

I stay in bed a while longer.

The sheets are warm. My body isn’t sore. My head is clear in the worst way, like there’s too much air and nothing to fill it with.

I sit up.

Stretch.

Move like I’ve got time to waste.

I don’t.

But pretending feels good sometimes.

When I finally get there, the galley’s quiet.

It’s a late cycle. Most of the crew’s either asleep or pretending to be.

I reheat whatever Trix labeled ‘not poison’ in the cooler and sit by the viewport, spoon in one hand, bare feet pressed to cold metal.

Outside, stars drift past in slow silence.

Inside, I eat without speaking.

No one joins me.

But I prefer it that way, so whatever.

—

The bar doesn’t have a name.

Just a half dead neon sign and a gun check at the door that misses two blades and a shock wire. That’s fine. If the place had real security, I wouldn’t be meeting her here.

It’s neutral space. Blackglass station. An outpost carved into a half moon between trade lanes no one talks about. The kind of place where war is just something you hear in rumors and bloodstains.

I sit in the back booth.

She finds me without being called.

Clan Rook.

You don’t see many of them anymore. Not outside shadow work. Not without a body on the floor behind them.

She’s older than me. Forty, maybe more. Gray streaks through her braid. Jawline scarred. Left eye cybernetic and humming low in the dark. Her armour’s black, matte, with a red sigil burned into the pauldron.

She doesn’t ask to sit.

“Captain Vesk.” 

I nod once. “Vorna, I’ve heard of you.”

“That’s not a good thing in my line of work.”

Fair enough.

We don’t drink. Not yet.

She orders recaf and scans the room once like she’s counting exits. Or people she doesn’t want to have to kill.

Then she gets to it.

“I heard what happened on Zai-Venn. Republic and Separatists both wanted you tagged. Good feather for your helmet.”

“And you?”

“I want work.”

I study her face.

Not much to read there. Not pride. Not desperation. Just boredom.

This is someone who’s carried a blaster too long to need to justify it, even by Mandalorian standards.

“You running from something?”

“No.”

“You trying to make a point?”

“No.”

“So…why me?”

She leans forward, quiet.

“Because you don’t make people kneel to be useful. A lot less ceremony too. Feels like I’d be a good fit.”

That hangs in the air.

I nod once.

“No oath. Just work.”

She taps the table, metal fingertip clicking against duracrete.

“Then I’m in.”

We don’t shake hands.

That’s not how it works.

But when she stands, there’s something steadier in the way her shoulders set. Like she found something that might be worth holding onto again.

Even if she won’t admit it.