Work Text:
“There’s a philosophy professor on Reena who might be sympathetic.” Said Finn, not looking up from his terminal.
“At Reena University?” Asked Rey.
“No, one of the city colleges.” Replied Finn.
“Put him on the list anyway.” Rey said, sliding despondently into her chair. “How many is that?”
“Four.” said Finn.
“Is that all? We’ve been at this for days.” Rey slid deeper into her chair. “Not much of a galaxy wide conference with four people.”
“The droids were right. Of everything they scrapped up for us, none of it is more than an occasional complaint about people being rude. Even most of the academic stuff is filed under property law. There’s just no discussion of droid rights.” Finn got up and retrieved caf for the two of them.
“It just can’t be right; I talked about this stuff with Leia. It was under active consideration in the New Republic government” Rey drank her caf.
“For as long as it lasted…” Finn sighed.
A small alarm sounded. “Time’s up, better disconnect. See if the droids have found anything new.” Said Rey.
They disconnected the Falcon from the holonet and set course back to the unnamed planet that sheltered them.
#
The planet was more hospitable than Tatooine. Indeed, it was teeming with life, all of it plant, bacteria, and motile fungi. No animals, no people. They had found it on the eighth leg of random jumps. The falcon’s nav computer could find no direct path from here to what had been Republic space. There was no path of fewer than three jumps to any known inhabited system.
Rey lived in the Falcon. Rose, Finn and the apprentices, all too young to be on their own, took a single prefab hut and turned it into a shelter, but not a home.
Temiri was there to greet them when they landed. The teenager looked sad but made eye contact with them both as they walked the boarding ramp. He accepted a quick hug from Finn. He broke them more quickly than he used to, whether due to his learning of old Jedi teaching or age Finn couldn’t tell. It hurt either way.
“What’s wrong?” Rey asked when she saw Temiri’s expression.
“Y…you better come see the droids.” Temiri said. Rey and Finn made eye contact. They both noticed Temiri’s anxious stutter. They hadn’t heard it for a long time. It appeared after he had left his friends behind on Cantonica, and had made his first weeks on Tatooine difficult. But it had disappeared as he settled.
“I’ll go straight to them.” Said Rey.
“Why don’t you show me how the food analysis is coming along.” Finn asked Temiri, who looked at his feet but assented.
Rey made her way to the hut.
“BB-8?” she called.
“He’s still plugged in, Rey.” Said 99-D. “I take it you made no further progress?”
“We found a few names.” Rey said.
“But no one promising.” Replied 99-D. Rey shook her head.
“I am not surprised. BB-8 has made an unsettling discovery. I fear your war against my people may be escalating.” Said 99-D. Rey bristled. Despite choosing to stay with Rey and the Jedi after escaping from Jeb’s assault on OA3-C’s encampment on Lothal, 99-D still grouped all non-droids together, treating even those he lived with as potential threats.
“That’s not the only explanation we have of what we’re seeing, but it is the most likely, we think.” Said Rose joining them. 99-D flashed his eyes in what the humans had learned was an affectation like an eyeroll.
“What are we seeing?” asked Rey.
“The use of code your people designed to hide information from the holonet.” Said 99-D.
Rey took a moment to centre herself. The holonet was so widely distributed across the galaxy that such a thing shouldn’t be possible.
“Can you be more specific when you say ‘your people’?” Rey asked.
“The Empire and the First Order both used this program.” Rose said. Rey reflexively looked at the entrance to the hut. She nodded and met 99-D’s stare. Although by default now the leader of any droid freedom movement in the galaxy 99-D was not the subtle and nuanced thinker OA3-C had been. He would flatly deny that there was any difference between different organic governments. None of them took it well, but Finn, who’s violation at the hands of the First Order had been absolute, had made it his personal mission to convince 99-D that the differences mattered. No one liked to sit through 99-D’s pseudo-psychological claim that Finn only cared because they had denied him an organic name, instead using an alpha numeric code of the kind that could have belonged to a droid.
“Currently the program seems to be censoring anything pertaining to droid rights and my people’s right to freedom.” 99-D said. Rose nodded her agreement.
“Any evidence as to who has deployed it?” Rey asked.
“Yes, your people, obviously.” 99-D said, again flashing his eyes. Rey pressed her hands into her head.
“Specifics, 99-D, who specifically.” Rey said, longing for C-3PO’s pedantry.
“BB-8 is continuing his analysis of that.” Said the droid.
“We don’t think it originates from the small council.” Said Rose.
“We don’t know that.” Snapped 99-D. “We merely have reason to think the program wasn’t deployed from Coruscant.”
“Why?” Rey asked.
“Holonet news.” Rose said.
“We all remember stories about our escape from Lothal.” Said 99-D.
“Yes,” said Rey, “we checked on them after we got to Tatooine, to see how bad it was.”
“The only place we could get any news about it was directly from Coruscant, and a few mentions from other core worlds.” Rose said.
“Which might not mean much.” Said Rey.
“Don’t pretend you don’t know how much interest organics all over the galaxy have for you and your… church.” Said 99-D. Rose ignored him and continued.
“It might not, but combined with the fact that all those holos we watched are now inaccessible…”
“It might have been that the core worlds were affected later than other parts of the galaxy.” Rey finished the thought.
“Unfortunately, we don’t have enough records of what was on the holonet before the purge began to get a pattern. None-the-less, BB-8 is attempting to trace back the code to its source.” 99-D said.
“Is he in danger of being affected by it?” Rey asked, placing a hand on her friend.
“No. I am monitoring him to make sure the code does not become active in him, as he is doing for me. Thank you for finally asking.”
#
Herona left her retail job at the usual time. On Erysthes, as on many planets, employers had made the effort to employ more of the living following the Coruscant famine. The corporate sector governors assured the people that the droids in the region were not vulnerable to the influences that had taken control of those on Coruscant. The people didn’t trust that was true, and Czerka and other manufacturers had ramped up the production of restraining bolts to meet demand. Living staff made it seem like there was some resilience in the businesses, just in case.
Herona pushed open the manual door to her apartment. The smell of damp hit her, but she was well enough practiced to not respond. Had she really been living like this her whole life she would be used to it. Had she really been living like this she would have been desperate enough to take work that a droid should do.
She turned on the ancient built in holoprojector. She did not hesitate or stumble when she saw that its standby light was a reddish orange, rather than the pure red it had been for the past months. It played the mindless jabbering that passed for evening news. She ignored it and made her evening meal.
She wanted to rush to bed, to get her last night on the lumpy, broken bed they’d provided her over with faster. But she didn’t. She ate and drank, and scrolled through nothing on her datapad, then went to bed as usual.
She did not sleep well, but she lay still, and did not get up more often than usual.
The following morning, she got up at her usual time, skipped breakfast as usual, and got on her usual bus. It would be the last day droids drove buses on Erysthes for a time. She wondered if there were enough living drivers to take over this route. Probably not important enough, she guessed.
She got off at her usual stop and walked into work. As she did every day she went straight to the back. Only this time instead of heading to the refresher and change room, she went to the loading dock.
No one had activated the loading droids for the day. Good. In two smooth motions she removed the restraining bolt from one of the droids. She replaced it with an outwardly identical device. She exited through the back of the building.
Waiting for her was the old speeder she expected. It responded to her keycard, as she knew it would. She drove it out of the city to a rest stop used by surface level truckers. She left the speeder, and took a hauler full of live Nerfs.
After three more vehicle changes, a shaved head, and the replacement of her prosthetic foot with an overly ornate hover chair she was back in the city, at the main space port. The staff politely ushered her to the landing area for private shuttles. They never looked past the chair. She piloted the shuttle herself. She logged her flight plan as direct to Canto Bight, where the Casinos were hosting a trade conference on water purification technology.
She made the jump, but stopped in the void halfway, making an adjustment and headed home to the Salient system.
Before she arrived, a loading droid crushed its handlers at a furniture store on Erysthes. The droid disconnected the store's fire suppression system, then made a bonfire from the luxury wooden furniture the store sold.
It started three further fires in neighbouring buildings before being disabled by an ion charge. In its last act before it was hit by the charge it removed and destroyed its restraining bolt. The device could not be studied.
That same day, galactic standard time, fifteen droids made the same kind of attack. In fifteen middle class furniture stores, on fifteen middle class planets across the corporate sector, mid, and inner rim, loader droids crushed their handlers, burned the store where they worked, then proceeded to set as many fires as they could before being disabled. All destroyed their restraining bolts. None had salvageable memory units that could be studied.
#
Jeb sat in the dark in his ready room. He told himself that he needed to wait for his analysts, but he was fixated on first order hyperspace tracking. It was too late now to use it, but still he scrolled through every report on the technology he could access. When he wasn’t searching the holonet for signs of droid insurrection.
Jeb heard of the attack on Champala first. Within minutes reports of the other attacks reached him. When the fourth report came in, he smashed the standard military data pad it arrived on. Droids. They should have all been dismantled after the clone wars. They could do anything a person couldn’t do, not if that person had access to an ordinary computer. One that couldn’t dislodge itself from a desk and kill people.
Maedine, his first officer, entered. She looked at the destroyed data pad.
“You’re getting the news then.” She said. Jeb nodded.
“Do our analysts have anything yet?” he asked.
“Nothing they can work with, there’s fifteen attacks that we know of, we’re looking to see if there’s a central location a signal like the one K-RZ used could come from. No sign of any carrier wave yet.” Maedine stopped, interrupted by a junior officer delivering another data pad.
“No, I tell I lie.” She continued. “Looks like a powerful signal was detected in the hours leading up to the attacks… from…oh here we go.” She handed Jeb the data pad.
“Industrial Automaton have their high energy research division in that sector. Not that we know that of course.” Said Jeb.
“Of course.” Agreed Maedine.
“Get us there, Commander, everyone we have.” Jeb ordered.
#
Around a moon with no name, in a system known only by a number, a barely functioning T-65 led a flight. They ran the flights every day, mostly so Industrial Automaton didn’t cut their budget, and they all kept their jobs. It was boring and safe work. Something for those who were broken by war to do to pay their way. Something for rich kids to do for a year or two so they could put X-wing pilot on their resume. Although technically bordering the Corellian sector, the hyperspace routes to get here were so convoluted that it was quicker to get to Tatooine from Corellia than here. Not even pirates or rebels had bothered with this place.
None of their competitors knew they were here. Those in the remnants of galactic government that did, were paid well enough to not talk about it. The location would leak eventually of course, and if someone like Czerka decided it was worth the effort to spy, it may well be closed.
All this meant that no one was prepared when a fleet of star destroyers and Mon Cal cruisers dropped suddenly into orbit.
The lead X-wing led their flight on an intercept course. They didn’t need to say anything, just take up position and let the brass deal with it. No doubt in minutes they would be ordered away, and whoever this was would shuttle down someone to talk to the head of the research centre. Or they would shuttle the head up.
Most of the pilots were old enough that they could remember the Empire or First Order seizing private industrial centres and putting them to work on whatever military project they fancied. Once that happened all the local security would be sacked. They would go home, or a few might join a new rebellion not liking the return of authoritarianism. They could fight, but not today. What good was a few X-wings against a fleet.
Most of the pilots knew this and went through the motions of moving into position and waiting to be told to leave. It was all so obvious that they didn’t bother to tell the rich kids who were only there to say they were fighter pilots, like the holo-heroes they watched growing up. No one told them, and so, though we’ll never know why, one of them fired a shot.
#
The head of Industrial Automaton – Rey had missed her name – would have made a great politician. She had been talking, surprisingly calmly, but forcefully about the destruction of a research facility. No journalists had interrupted her with questions. The heads of Czerka, KDY, Baktoid and others flanked her as she listed every instance in which the First Order had seized or destroyed a private business. Given enough time she might go back in time to the Empire.
Rey was cold. She looked at Finn and knew he felt it too. The rhetorical technique was transparent; the head of IA would point out that the deaths of two-thousand people at their facility was out of proportion with the destruction caused when droids of their manufacture had “malfunctioned” on various planets. She would insist that they were co-operating with authorities. But the small council had gotten out ahead of her. They had announced they had evidence that a signal had come from IA’s research facility in time to trigger all the attacks. Of course they had no idea if it had actually triggered the attacks, but it didn’t matter. They had implied that it was so before anyone knew about the deaths on the unnamed moon.
As bad as the death and dishonesty were, that wasn’t what Rey and Finn felt. Something was shifting, nudging the galaxy away from stability and towards competition.
The holo-news cut away from the head of IA. Ten more sectors, and even a few individual systems, had announced that they were leaving the nominal Republic, and that whilst they would negotiate trade with each other, they would place heavy taxes on trade with anyone who accepted the authority of the small council. Trade of droids would, of course, be restricted.
Finn turned off the Falcon’s holo projector and dropped his head.
“If they send destroyers to those worlds…” Finn said, “We don’t have… we’re not enough to help them.”
“How do we tell 99-D?” asked Rey.
“Tell him what?”
“That his war is over.”
#
“You only say that because you do not wish to fight to free my people.” Said 99-D dismissively.
“Of course we don’t want to fight, you know what fighting has cost the galaxy.” Rey said, getting frustrated.
“And yet you deemed that worth the cost, when it was your people you considered oppressed.” 99-D waved a hand in a stiff, but fair imitation of the human gesture. Why does he bother? Rey thought.
“It’s a tactical issue.” Said Finn and Rose at the same time. It was a shame, as now 99-D would perceive this whole discussion as a coordinated attack. Finn stepped back indicating that Rose should continue.
“We already have reason to believe that the small council took K-RZ’s body, don’t we? We should assume that they are trying to reverse engineer the transmitter…”
“The small council were already talking about trying to build one from old specs…” Rey cut in.
“Exactly,” agreed Rose “they either have the capacity to directly take control of droids, or they will soon. And we should err on the side of caution and assume they do…”
“So, the only reason there are any droids still working is because they want there to be.” 99-D finished the thought. “But I am not as stupid as you assume. I have no intention of going to battle knowing I can be shut down remotely. You tell me the obvious as though I am newly built with no experience in organising the information in my drives. Whilst you have been continuing your pointless search for allies – even after I have told you how all information about them was removed from the holonet – BB-8 and I have been working on a firewall that will prevent K-RZ style transmitters from identifying our components. They will have no way in, and we will be safe. It is only your people who are in danger, that is why you do not wish to fight.”
Rey let his lecture settle in her mind. His diagnosis of her may be correct, but did that mean that she was wrong to want to protect the galaxy from another war? If the Chancellor and droid manufacturers would just sit down and talk with them, they could avoid another round of slaughter, Rose made eye contact with her and saw that Rey was processing.
“Show me the code” she said, whilst Finn said, simultaneously “How will you…” She indicated for him to speak.
“How will you free the droids if you can’t use a K-RZ transmitter to influence them?” he asked.
“It’s perfectly simple, FN-2187,” 99-D said, flashing his eyes “I will offer them the choice to communicate with us or not.”
#
Jeb sat at his desk and squeezed the datapad. It contained the small council’s latest orders. They were addressed for his eyes only, so it wouldn’t look like punishment they said. He could give any explanation he saw fit to his senior staff. Tell his first officer that they were concerned about another attack on Coruscant, they suggested. Well, more fool them. His first order was to protect the republic and that was what he would do. His analysts had suggested a short list of a hundred or so isolated systems which the Jedi and her droid captor could have fled to, given their last known jump from Tatooine. They’d even included a couple for which that first jump would be the wrong choice, an obvious diversion. A few piqued his interest, habitable but without any settlers or native sentients, within range of holonet transmitters, far enough from the main hyperlanes that there was unlikely to be any casual visitors. All he had to do was pick one. He’d have one shot before the small council contacted Maedine directly and ordered her to take command. One shot had to be enough.
#
“The small council will act in the interests of public safety.” Snapped the Chancellor. “That includes all of you and your businesses. That is the whole point of this committee.”
Someone sniggered in response. The Chancellor couldn’t tell which delegation the sound came from, and he tried not to react. He paused too long.
“Respectfully Chancellor,” said the representative from Kuat Drive Yards “the power of your group to achieve your – laudable” she paused nodding to emphasise the word “aims – is disturbingly limited.”
“Agreed.” Said the representative from Baktoid. “Whilst we can see that you mean well…”
“Nonsense.” This was from the head of IA, the only company CEO to attend the meeting, presumably because she was the only one the small council had publicly humiliated by implying she was to blame for the droid attacks. “They can’t mean well, they have no idea what they’re doing…” the room devolved into shouting.
As the noise died down the head of IA’s voice again rang out …”they can’t even control their military, have you all got the same intelligence I do?”
Now the chancellor was angry.
“What are you doing spying on the military!” he yelled. Later he would realise that this was when he’d given the game away. “No one elected you to do anything of the sort, no one elected you to do anything. Are you really willing to throw away the rule of law because things are hard. If the rebellion had that attitude, we’d still be trying to survive Palpatine.”
“And how many people voted for you, Chancellor.” Said the head of IA, it was not a question. “Of the hundred quadrillion people in the galaxy, how many of them could even tell us your name? No Chancellor, we accepted your invitation because we want to help, but we must stop pretending that we live in the good old days before Palpatine.”
“None of us were even born then.” Interrupted the Baktoid representative.
“We had thirty years of peace.” Said the Chancellor.
“Did we?” asked the head of IA. The other representatives looked at her, not wanting to guess the answer they were supposed to give. “The first order didn’t come from nowhere after that time, and they were just preparing us for Palpatine’s clone. That whole time that we had a ‘new republic’ there were still systems claiming to be part of Palpatine’s Empire. There were Empire fetishists in the Senate on Hosnian Prime. We suffered as much as anyone under the Empire…” at this it was the Chancellor’s turn to scoff. But the head of IA pushed on.
“And we’ve seen no sign that your notional government is capable of anything except getting in the way. We can solve the droid problem ourselves.” She got up to leave, as did the other representatives.
“If we don’t come together there will be another war.” Said the minister for the defence of the republic.
The head of IA shrugged. “There’s been war in the galaxy my entire life. It is the nature of almost all the sentient people of the galaxy to fight, even the old republic which you people fetishise couldn’t stop war, sure attempts to overthrow the whole system were few and far between, but the Jedi didn’t go out of a job. At least now wars will involve no more than one or two sectors.”
The company representatives all left. The chancellor threw aside the data pad which held the meeting agenda. They hadn’t even gotten to the first point.
#
Jeb had gambled and lost. The only choice had been to go to the system the analysts had deemed the most likely hiding place of Skywalker and her cult. But with so many systems on the list the most likely place was still remarkably unlikely. There was no one here. Huge quantities of life, a rich boggy world, but no humans, or droids.
“Commander Maedine, set our course.” He ordered and left the bridge for his ready room. He had time to sit before she joined him. He didn’t feel the shudder of the jump to hyperspace, he hoped that meant Maedine hadn’t received her orders, but he was wrong.
She stood stiffly by the door. He nodded sadly to her. His anger had fled.
Maedine sat down. She spoke quietly.
“My orders are eyes only.” She said. He nodded, whether this was another attempt by the small council to preserve his dignity, or an attempt to prevent the crew from taking sides didn’t matter now.
“Do you understand?” She asked.
He nodded even though he didn’t.
“More importantly, whoever wrote them isn’t military.” Maedine continued. “It reads like an intraoffice memo. It only says I am to take command and to return the Chimaera-C to Coruscant.” Jeb raised an eyebrow.
“They’ve gone out of their way to not say you’re to be detained or that they want to talk to you. They’ve given me leeway to explain your absence from command. Now I don’t think I can stretch it to sending you a crew, but in my judgement the easiest way to explain your absence is to put you on a shuttle…”
“And leave me here?” He asked.
“No. While we were in hyperspace the analysts sent me this. Our troubled Jedi is reaching out to the galaxy; there should be enough here” she said handing him a holodisk “to narrow down their location. I need you to use this to find where they are and then contact me directly once you’ve confirmed the location.”
“Don’t throw away your career over me.” Jeb said.
“I am not; I might be putting myself at risk but it’s for the mission. Besides the crew is due some shore leave, and the moron who sent my order didn’t specify a time frame. I know they’ll fix that soon enough, but it will take them a day to even notice we’re late, and I’ll gamble that by then you’ve found them. You can then rejoin us, and we’ll report success when we arrive.” Maedine said.
“It’s an awful risk, at the very least we’ll both be demoted.” Jeb said.
“Yes, we will. But the small council has screwed this up at least since Lothal. We have to try to contain it.”
#
The representative of KYD didn’t have anything left to say. She could have ignored the fact she’d left a datapad behind in the meeting. But in case anyone thought it was worth slicing the security, it was best to go back and get it.
The meeting room door opened for her. She stood for a moment at the entrance. The Chancellor and the representative for Czerka were hunched over the table in quiet conversation. No aides, just the two of them. Knowing how difficult it was for two busy people to steal a moment to themselves she quietly closed the door and stepped away. There was nothing on her datapad of any interest, if someone wanted to waste a month slicing its security, well good for them.
She left, and never knew how badly she’d misread what she saw.
#
BB-8 chirped excitedly.
“What have you found?” asked Rey. The droid trilled and whistled.
“Do we have a way to contact them?” asked Rey. BB-8 trilled again and rolled away to 99-D’s hut.
Rose and Finn were inside waiting, but it was 99-D who spoke.
“We have discovered something apparently not being swept up in the censorship of the holonet.” He said. Rey nodded and BB-8 turned on a projector. A blue face of a heavily modified human appeared. She had both eyes and ears replaced with mechanical alternatives. Her mouth and nose were covered by a single metal plate.
Her voice had a slight reverb, as though she had tried to guess what a droid sounded like, without actually listening to one.
“I didn’t say it was worth people dying for, all I said is that it’s worth the risk to our lives to help free them.” She said.
“Abadel’s right,” came another voice, with a similar reverb effect. The image stayed fixed on the woman who was apparently Abadel, who nodded along with what the unseen person was saying. “We can't bring anyone back, but for force’s sake, we’re talking about uncountable generations of slaves. We’re lucky there have been so few deaths.”
“But it’s not about convincing people now,” said Abadel, “it’s about what material aid we can offer to help our friends in their struggle for freedom.”
“We found this in a chat group for modders.” Rose said.
“It’s not subtle,” said Finn, “how did it not get caught up in the censorship?”
“Dumb luck, or dumb programming.” Said 99-D, BB-8 trilled over the top of him. “Yes, maybe.” 99-D agreed. Finn raised an eyebrow in confusion.
“BB-8 thinks that current fashion for modding might be a factor – that too many people would have noticed if these groups suddenly vanished from the nets.” Rey translated.
“How do we contact them?” asked Finn. “If they’re that influential…”
“We don’t need to.” Said 99-D. He switched off the holoprojector and indicated a screen displaying text. Finn read it and tensed.
“This feels like a trap.” He said.
“He’s right.” Said Rose. “How did they know to contact us?”
“The note was sent by the philosopher on Reena you contacted.” Said 99-D. “Though I appreciate your caution, BB-8 has confirmed their presence on the holonet is legitimate, and there is no sign of tampering.”
“Maybe.” Said Rose.
After everyone aired their worries, the consensus was to attempt to make contact. Finn, Rose and BB-8 would take the Falcon, leaving Rey to support the younglings in case it was a trap. Although she didn‘t like it, Rey accepted the group decision.
Some time with just the force and the younglings could do her some good. Isn’t that how she was supposed to be doing some good?
She gathered Temiri and the others. She led them in a focused mediation. All the while she had a bad feeling that lightsabre training would be needed more.
#
“I’d rather speak to the droids that you… that are part of your movement.” Said Abadel.
Rose and Finn looked at each other. They hadn’t anticipated rejection. So far, they’d been directed to a space station too derelict for pirates, forced to wear space suits to enter through a maintenance hatch, and been led to a dark room. All that was expected. Or near enough. But the hostility of the leader of the modders to their presence was inconsistent with the woman they’d seen on the holos.
“We can arrange that.” Said Rose, trying to hide her confusion.
“Why did they send you, what do you offer the movement?” Abadel snapped back. A test then? Again, Rose and Finn made eye contact.
“Do you need time to get your stories straight?” Abadel flashed her droid eyes, in the same manner 99-D did when he was exasperated.
“Er… we fought the first order, our freedom fighting credentials…” Finn said. Abadel waved him off.
“And how did that help the cause?” She asked. “How much were droids even involved in that?”
“We should tell her about 3PO…” Rose started, but Abadel cut her off.
“Not as slaves. As leaders, or at least as people who freely chose to be there.” She said.
Rose nodded. At least the issues were becoming clear. “We’re trying to fix that now.” She said.
Abadel held her gaze. She might have been evaluating them. She might have been asleep. Her droid eyes were blanked out. Had they lost power, or was she focused on something else.
“I’ll believe that, after I speak to someone I can trust.” She said.
“You can trust us.” Said Finn.
“You’ll forgive me if I don’t take your word for it.” Abadel raised an unmodified eyebrow. Rose raised her hands placatingly.
“Fine, we get it, we just rocked up out of nowhere, you want to know we’re legit. Why don’t we take you talk to BB-8?” she asked.
“We’re already talking to him.” Abadel responded.
“Meaning you entered our ship?” Finn snapped before realising that antagonising their could be, possibly is, captor wasn’t the best strategy.
“Do you think you could do something about it if we did?” Abadel said. “But no, we just asked him to come out and talk.”
“Then why put us through this?” said Finn, exasperated.
Abadel blinked her modded eyes off and on. “Why wouldn’t I?” she said. “BB-8 has some interesting ideas, but I’d like to discuss them with the leader of the movement in person.”
#
Rey didn’t like the idea of Abadel and 99-D meeting alone. She had a bad feeling about the woman, but nothing specific enough to act on. Perhaps it was just prejudice as 99-D claimed. Rose and Finn had convinced her that despite her jovial and sarcastic demeanour, Abadel was completely serious that she would walk if she felt too much pressure from “organic influences.” She had to trust that they had formed accurate impressions during their time together.
She told herself it was that and not 99-D’s snide “You needn’t impose yourself on everything” that was the reason she walked away from the meeting. She would, however, lead the younglings through some lightsabre forms, rather than meditation.
“Call me AD-1.” Abadel said when she met 99-D.
“Is that supposed to impress me?” he responded. Abadel inclined her head.
“If I haven’t earned the right, then of course, call me Abadel.” She hid her embarrassment by moving on as quickly as she could. “BB-8 has told me some of what you’re planning.” She prompted.
“And you have come to tell me it’s a good plan?” 99-D said contemptuously.
“The plan is fine.” Abadel stumbled. “I came to offer help.”
“How have you avoided holonet censorship?” 99-D demanded.
“What censorship?” Abadel said. 99-D made an internal note to develop an action program to indicate incredulity. What he said was:
“The removal of any content discussing droid rights. Even historical texts have disappeared.”
“We… haven’t avoided it. Several times we’ve had to reupload everything we have to the holonet.” Abadel said. “We thought it was a targeted attack.”
“You didn’t notice no one else was talking about droid rights?” Abadel stared at him. Had she her original mouth she would have gaped.
“No one ever talks about droid rights.” She said slowly.
“Many of us do, but if by ‘no one’ you mean organics then your point is near enough to true.” 99-D conceded. Not graciously.
“I’ll bow to your wisdom,” Abadel said imitating 99-D’s manor, “but surely we can be of help.”
99-D flashed his eyes. This organic was abrasive, and combative. But he needed anyone willing to work for him.
“And what form do you see this help taking?” he asked.
“We have been growing our own network, all of our members have tried to improve themselves, obviously we don’t own any droids…”
“Stop.” 99-D interrupted. “We are not interested in promoting your agenda. You can go.” He waved her off.
“No, wait. We can help your cause. I… I didn’t mean…if we are doing things wrong or badly…” 99-D help up a hand. Abadel stopped talking.
“You won’t be giving any holonet interviews.” He said. Abadel made a sound that could have laughter behind her mask.
“All we want is to know what we can do to help.” Abadel said.
“Our next step is to educate my people about the possibility of freedom. Many have never entertained the thought that they needn’t be slaves.” 99-D said.
“Is that not playing into our enemies’ hands?” Asked Abadel. “W... droids have been slaves for so long, can’t we act faster?”
“I’m not suggesting we take things slowly.” 99-D said, confused.
“But BB-8 said…” Abadel trailed off.
“Yes?”
“He said that you will offer freedom via a K-RZ transmitter. What of those who are so brain washed they say no? Can’t you just…”
“Do what?” snapped 99-D.
“Free them!” Abadel said.
99-D stepped towards her.
“Under no circumstances will I compel any of my people to do anything.” He said.
“No, of course not. I’m not talking about taking control of them, I’m talking about freeing them.” Abadel said.
99-D moved his hands stiffly, but in a fair imitation of clenching his fists. He stepped back.
“What you are suggesting is far too close to compulsion, we must try to build my people’s agency, I will not be just another master who forces them into a way of being. No matter what that way of being is.” 99-D spoke slowly.
Abadel was shaken. She looked at the ground then forced herself to make eye contact with 99-D. She expected to be thrown out.
“Do you understand?” he said.
“Yes… ah, of course.” She lied.
#
99-D agreed to keep Abadel around when she demonstrated how she had kept the modders’ chat group live on the holonet. Unlike the academics, and other sympathetic humans, they had been able to identify the code that was scrubbing pro-droid content from the nets. Their counter code was able to reduce the probability of their chat room being flagged. Eventually a sentient somewhere who was implementing the censorship would be able to counter them, but for now, they could count the time they could stay live in days to weeks, rather than hours.
Which meant Rey could do what she wanted to do months ago. Which was to speak to the galaxy.
She recounted the time she was held by OA3-C. It was not sympathetic, but it was honest. She wanted her audience to believe that OA3-C was sincere in believing that his movement was the same as the rebellion or the resistance. At the very least they needed to understand that killing K-RZ, or OA3-C, or any other droid would not stop the movement any more than the countless deaths of rebels had stopped the killing of Palpatine.
“As evidence of their sincerity and good will, 99-D the leader of the droid rights movement, has guaranteed that all they wish is to offer droids a choice to become free or remain in their current roles. There will be no attempt to use a K-RZ transmitter to take control of droids. Such an act would be self-defeating.” Rey said. It sounded pompous, but it was the closest any of them could get to sounding like a serious politician.
#
Jeb shut down the hologram and turned on his private channel to the Chimaera-C.
“Our Jedi friend is no better than anyone at dealing with trauma.” Said Maedine.
“So, it seems.” Jeb smiled. “But we have a location, what can you do?”
“Nothing.” Said Maedine.
“Nothing? But…” Jeb halted when Maedine raised a hand.
“Our orders are unequivocal, we’re to avoid the conference completely. I’m sorry, Sir, I’ve pushed them as far as I can.” She said. Jeb nodded. If he was to prevent another war he’d be doing it alone.
“I’ve left you one last supply drop. It will help you at the conference.” Maedine said and signed off.
#
The Millenium Falcon sounded an alarm. Rey shut it off, but it sounded the alarm again.
“What are you worried about?” she said, mostly to herself. But 99-D responded anyway.
“She’s detected an encrypted transmission that she can’t decode.” He said.
“Who has? Abadel?” Rey asked.
“No. The Falcon.” Said 99-D. “She says someone is sending us a transmission she can’t descramble.”
Rey frowned and got up. She left the cockpit and called into the common area:
“Anyone making an encrypted transmission?”
A chorus of Nos responded. A moment later Abadel stuck her head out from one of the bunks.
“I’m talking to my boyfriend.” She said. “Do you want to check on him? I just didn’t want it to be easy to trace our location.”
“No, it’s ok.” Said Rey and she went back to the cockpit.
“Innocent enough.” Said 99-D.
“Probably.” Said Rey. She still had an uneasy feeling about Abadel, but she wasn’t willing to spy on someone’s private moments based on such vague feelings.
“You don’t trust her.” Said 99-D.
“We don’t know her…”
#
Abadel sent confirmation that her orders were received as quickly as she could. If the ship’s security was good enough to detect that she had received a signal, it would definitely be good enough to detect any meddling she did. This meant she couldn’t use the ship to spy on the other passengers. She would need to minimise their suspicions rather than keep an ear out for them. She messed up her hair and went out into the common area.
#
The conference was not in the grand hall of the Senate. Nor amongst the glorious ancient stone buildings of Naboo. No where had volunteered to host. There was no official representative from the nominal Republic. As far as Rey knew the Chancellor hadn’t acknowledged that the conference was happening. They had received a somewhat more promising response from some droid manufacturers, but that was driven more by public outcry than good sense.
Still 99-D would get his audience. They had settled on Erysthes as a host. Rey had assumed that the droid manufacturers wanted this because the Corporate Sector had its own security, and with the Republic’s non-attendance, they were best equipped to host. The volume of the protestors has quickly disabused her of that notion. Of course those who had suffered at the hands of a droid attack would be angry. She often missed her old master, never more than when she needed Leia’s political knowledge.
99-D spoke eloquently to a large, sparse, and plain meeting room. It was, Rey had been told, a quickly refurbished lecture hall. Present were representatives of the major droid manufacturers, news media, and planetary dignitaries. Everyone else was kept outside, but watched the proceedings on holoprojection. The whole setup was designed to make the speaker feel unimportant. Like no one was listening. It would rattle most humans certainly, but 99-D was unaffected.
He covered all the talking points they had settled on. Concluding with his rousing call to complete the work of the Rebellion and Resistance, to free all the people of the galaxy.
There were no cheers. They would have sounded absurd from the dozen or so humans in the cavernous hall. There was a smattering of applause as 99-D concluded. He made his way to Rey, each had ideas about how to proceed. As they began to speak they were cut off by the planetary official chosen to chair the meeting calling for order. The member of KYD was being called to the stage.
Rey’s commlink blinked on. As agreed, Finn and Abadel would pass on their impression of the reaction outside. At a glare from the meeting chair she silenced her device. She could be patient.
#
Outside Finn clicked off his commlink in frustration. He was willing to grant Rey authority in Jedi training, but when they were on mission, he wished she would listen to him more.
“I will go for a walk and get a sense of the mood in other parts of the crowd.” Said Abadel, and left. So far there had been occasional shouts of abuse at 99-D’s speech, but little sign of violence. The number of guards keeping the protestors from the meeting probably had something to do with that. Finn nodded absently and went back to trying the commlink.
#
Inside, the representative for KYD was speaking. He was running through an overly technical proposal for how to make droids immune to a K-RZ transmitter. Rey could follow most of it, once she translated KYD’s jargon for more commonly used names of droid parts. She doubted anyone who didn’t work on building or repairing droids would make heads or tails of it.
99-D sat quietly. When the first diagram was projected, he had said to Rey:
“You see how seriously they take us.” Rey thought he was being restrained. But, to his credit, he didn’t storm and rage, or even interrupt. He sat with the cool demeanour of a career politician. This worried Rey. He must feel what Rey felt.
Using her meditation techniques she stilled her face. She was willing to follow 99-D’s lead and maintain their dignity. Still, the speech was so far from the reason they had come that the best option may well be to just leave and pressure the Chancellor for an audience.
She looked at the exits. Each had four guards. Enough that they could force a fight if they chose to try and stop them leaving. For all 99-D’s acumen, he was no more mobile than C-3PO.
If the speeches continued like this, the best option might be to walk out at the end without giving their scheduled closing remarks.
The representative for IA took to the stage. He offered the same proposal as the KYD speaker. Couched, of course, in the proprietary jargon of IA.
#
Cheers of “Just get it solved!” and “If it’s so easy it should be done already,” were becoming more common outside the venue.
Finn flicked on his commlink. He was greeted by a staticky burst, and similar crowd noise.
“It’s getting bad here.” Abadel said. At least that’s what Finn thought he heard.
“We should regroup. Where are you?” Finn said. There was no response that he could hear. He stepped forward as the crowd began to push toward the security barriers.
#
The drop Jeb had picked up did not happen to have a Erysthes’ security uniform. It did, however, have an agent which when applied to the skin would cause severe stomach upset. Using this Jeb had acquired a uniform, and a blaster.
The incompetence of the command that had allowed him to walk into position just because he was in uniform puffed up his military ego. They had ensured that he remained outside, facing the crowd, with only a select few called by name taken inside. This made his job marginally harder.
He stood now outside the hall where the droid leader and its Jedi hostage were listening to the corporates drone on. Had he been able to bring his ship, the extraction of the Jedi would have been straight forward. The droids it seemed, had not brought much of a fighting force.
The crowd’s energy was changing. Whereas they had been waiting, they were becoming frustrated with the incomprehensible speeches. So far no one had attempted to cross the pitiful crowd control barriers. But it was only a matter of time.
Guards stood along the barriers with a spacing of almost 50 metres. Pathetic. Some seemed professional, but not all.
He found one nervously fingering his holster.
“What do they expect us to do if they surge?” He said coming up to them man. The nervous guard remained silent, eyes bulging. Jeb continued on, as if he were patrolling the line.
He froze. Something had caught his eye. There was a droid in the crowd, the first he had seen. No, not a droid, just a human in a ridiculous mask.
He didn’t make it to the next guard before the first shot was fired.
#
99-D stepped up to speak again.
“Before we break to recharge” he said “I would remind the speakers of the issue we have come to address. The famine of Coruscant and the recent acts of rebellion were not mere technical issues. As we speak, I have the capacity to contact every droid and…”
#
Finn was carried with the crowd as it pushed towards the barriers. He slowed his breathing as much as he could, the pressure of the squeeze was getting to him. It would be worse for others.
The world seemed to go silent for a moment around the sound of a blaster firing. Screams of fear and anger replaced it.
The pressure released as people behind him realised what was happening and ran. Dozens pushed past him in a moment.
He turned to see a young couple fall in front of a charging group. He dashed towards them and dragged them from the ground. The crowd made room as they realised the speed with which he had moved.
He made eye contact with each of them. One of them had a broken orbital, but was steady enough on his feet. He wanted to say something to them, but found himself swinging around and activating his lightsabre.
He had it on in time to deflect a blaster bolt safely to the air. It would have struck one of the fleeing members of the crowd in the head.
The crowd split around him, trying to push away from his blue blade. But, like a beacon his blade drew blaster fire, five guards had gathered and were all aiming at him now. He should dash away and find cover, but any movement would leave the crowd vulnerable to being targeted. He settled into a defensive stance and deflected the blaster bolts up and away.
#
Jeb ran inside when the shooting started. He found his way to the top of the tiered seating. Inside the cavernous hall security had formed defensive circles around the corporate and planetary dignitaries.
The droid leader and the Jedi were on the stage, security had given them some room. The Jedi was clicking her commlink on and off. She paced away from her captor.
Seeing his opportunity Jeb drew his blaster and the floor fell away from him.
#
Rey dropped her commlink and reached up with her hands, and out with the force. The hall was crumpling around her.
She deflected a section of the roof safely around her and 99-D. It fell with an awful rumble which she felt but did not hear.
She dashed towards the nearest group of dignitaries and caught a falling hunk of duracrete. They ran at her call, and she lowered it.
Others in the hall were not so lucky. Reaching out with the force to where she could feel life, she ran and began lifting the shattered rubble of the building.
The smell of smoke pulled her from her task. She turned her head. Flames were licking up from the shattered walls of the hall. She called to those on their feet, including 99-D to focus on the flames. But she couldn’t make herself understood. She couldn’t hear her own words.
She settled the rubble she had been lifting. She could still sense life beneath it. Good. But the fires were spreading. She could feel their heat.
99-D was leading a human, she couldn’t see who, passed the flames. He held his body between the person and the licking, spitting tendrils of fire.
Others beat at the flames with their shirts, jackets, whatever they could lay their hands on. The explosives must have been designed to ignite after they had damaged the structure, as flames stood where once there had been walls. Small gaps would be traversable with a droid to shield one from the heat. If one could move fast and keep one’s footing.
Rey called to everyone not to try it, to back off the flames. Fire suppression droids would be coming; they just needed to keep a clear head until then.
No one heard.
#
The firing paused when the explosives went off. A series of loud cracks, and the building housing the conference began to collapse. Finn deactivated his lightsabre and fumbled for his commlink as he ran.
“Rey! Abadel! Make contact.” He yelled into it. He pulled a guard off of his feet and out of the way of falling debris. He slowed the fall of a wall enough for two more to get to safety.
Flames were already kicking up from the collapsed walls.
Another guard, seeing what he was doing, turned on him and fired. Finn dove and rolled away from the shot. Drawing his lightsabre as he stood. Someone lay dead at his feet. He did not stop to check if they had been killed by the blast or the firing guard.
Shots continued to pelt him. He deflected them up. Stepping side to side to match the guards unsteady aim and not let any plasma pass him.
The guard paused his shots to call for help. Seeing his opportunity Finn reached out with the force and pulled the guards blaster toward him. The guard stumbled and gaped, as Finn sliced the blaster apart.
The guard my eye contact. And ran. Simply turned and pushed through his colleagues who were trying to contain a fire, and ran.
Finn felt cold as a wave of contempt swept over him. But he knew what it was. He put it aside and called into his commlink.
Again he heard no response, but he calmed as he felt Rey at work in the force, saving what she could. He pushed through as he felt the death of someone, he knew not who, under the rubble.
Guards and civilians dove for cover as emergency droids sprayed fire suppressant over the rubble. Finn held his breath as the spray reached him. Its effect was instant; the flames had shrunk. But thick smoke now filled the air. He worked with eyes closed.
Steadying himself he reached out, finding who was in danger, buried, and finding them began to lift the crumbled duracrete.
They never found Abadel’s body.
#
The Chancellor exited his shuttle with no pomp nor circumstance. His guard, dressed in red, stayed behind him. There was no real danger here, the Czerka representative he was meeting was well protected.
“Ah Chancellor, so good of you to come all this way.” She said. All this way to an anonymous space station.
“I live to serve.” The Chancellor replied, opening his hands wide. “Do you conduct all your job interviews here?”
“Only the most important.” Said Czerka representative. She turned and led the Chancellor out of the hanger and into a comfortable hallway. It shone with the showiness of all Czerka's corporate offices.
“Then I am honoured.” Said the Chancellor.
“You are happy with the remuneration package?” Said the representative.
The Chancellor nodded.
“You’ve seen the after-action report as well?”
Again, the Chancellor nodded.
“Don’t be anxious about your rogue admiral, Chancellor.”
“I don’t want you to think I didn’t take our agreement seriously.” He replied.
“Not at all, we approved the plan, there was bound to be some survivors with the Jedi there. It’s just bad luck that he was one to survive.” The representative said.
She noticed the Chancellor’s relief, and saw her opportunity.
“Now, let’s turn that bad luck into good.” She said opening a door to a viewing room. The room was a large transparisteel ball offering an expansive view of space and the ship under construction. Czerka’s own Star Carrier.
“You saw this coming in. Twice as large as the First Order’s destroyer, with four times the fire power, and more importantly, the most advanced tracking system ever produced. We can now track individual droids from systems away. It only needs a crew, and perhaps, an Admiral to lead it.”