The alarm buzzes sharp against the rusted durasteel wall. I thumb it dead before it rattles my skull any harder. My bunk creaks as I roll over, feet hitting the cold floor with a thud that echoes in this cramped pod. The thin gravity here on Zehara makes everything feel wrong, my body half-floating even when it's planted, every motion carrying a lag that turns routine into something the muscles have to negotiate. I reach under the bunk to start the morning. Raw Avabush leaves crinkle in my palm, brittle and dry, their edges catching the calluses on my fingertips. No fancy spice resin for me. That stuff costs more than a week's tips, and my credits run thin these days. I pack the joint tight, spark it with the old lighter. The flame stutters in the starved air, fighting for oxygen like everything else in this industrial graveyard. Earthy smoke curls slow, hanging in the ion mist before the scrub vents thrum and drag it toward the ceiling in lazy spirals that stretch and pull apart like a client's promises.
I take a deep pull, let it sand down the edges from last night. The client was a bad one, all grabby hands and empty promises. Faked the intimacy, same as always. My stomach twists at the memory, acid climbing the back of my throat, but I swallow it down with the next drag. No time for that rot. The smoke helps, turns the sharp regrets into dull aches that settle somewhere behind my ribs instead of clawing at the front of my skull. I exhale slow, watching the cloud feather toward the viewport on the left wall. Outside, the slag-burners belch fire, perpetual vibrations rumbling through the walls like the small rock itself is breathing, its lungs full of molten waste and bad intentions.
The joint burns low. I stub it out on the edge of the cot frame, careful not to scorch the synth-silk sheets. Faded logos stare back at me, some old corporate brand from core worlds I'll never see again, their colors washed to ghosts by a hundred wash cycles and a thousand bodies. I cross to the sink on the right, the mirror fogged from the ventilator's exhaust. I wipe it clear with my sleeve, the smear revealing my face in streaks. Scarred and worn. Womp-rat scratches from a bad tumble last week pull tight under the makeup I dab on. The stuff stings, cheap as it is, grit mixed with pigment that burns the broken skin, but it hides the marks. Can't afford clients turning tail over a few blemishes. That's credits walking out the door. I tuck the hairpin into my updo, the vibro-needle hidden in its core. Sharp and silent, never leave without it. It sits secure, a small weight against my scalp, familiar as the ache in my lower back. I thumb the test switch once, feel the soft drone vibrate through my fingers and into the bones of my hand.
Water sputters from the faucet, biting sharp as I scrub my skin clean. The soap's synthetic, smells like processed ore dust, but it cuts the grime from pores that never seem to close on this rock. I work it into my arms, my neck, feeling the grit scar my palms like skin polished by shifts you don't remember starting. Body maintenance drags on, tedious as always, the daily inventory of a working asset. I grab the lotion from the tools drawer under the viewport. The drawer mag-latches with a click, revealing the white-noise scrambler puck tucked in the false bottom, its housing scuffed from too many pockets, too many close calls. I pocket it, a small bulge against my thigh. I then squeeze out some lotion. It fights the dust that seeps through every seal, turning my skin to cracked leather if I skip a day. I rub it in slow circles, starting at my shoulders, down my arms, over the pale scars from old jobs. Each one tells a story I don't want to remember. A knife slip here, a client's rage there. A long white line along my forearm from the time I flinched instead of held still.
While the lotion sinks in, I heat a synth-meal pouch in the micro-unit. It beeps soft, spitting out something that passes for protein. Vac-sealed ration pod, tight against the dust. I tear it open, spoon the glop straight from the pouch. Tastes like tin and an empty ledger, but it fills the hunger. Last night's cut barely covered the room rent. A taped note on the mirror spells it out in Lysara's neat hand, the same numbers that run through my head every morning like a prayer I never asked to memorize. House split fifty percent. Room and linen twelve credits a day fixed. Security levy eight percent surge during no-law window. Supplies restock fee two credits per shift. Late check-in penalty fifteen credits. I chew slow, staring at the cheap holoprojector guttering Huttese ads on the wall. Credit-chit readers gleam with Aurebesh overlays, promising quick loans I know better than to touch, their interest rates buried in fine print designed for the desperate and the illiterate. The vents drone steady, pulling at spilled perfume beads from last week's accident. They slow-float like pearls on the air kick, one sticking to my lash. I flick it off. It lands on the credit reader with a tiny clink. Sweat halo omen, if I believed in that crap.
I stand at the mirror again, checking the makeup. Scars hidden, eyes lined just enough to draw without screaming desperate. The hustle shows in the lines around my mouth, but I force a practice smile. Convincing enough for dim light and lonely men.
My mind drifts to that night on Coruscant. Neon Angels bar pulsed with pall, neon pink and green swirling over the counter where I stood. Dead glyph etched across its surface, dormant, no hum, just dead weight. Janitors mopped the floor near the entrance, dragging crimson into streaks from the mess of fools playing hero. Patrons whispered, drinks trembling in their hands. The soldier playing hero stepped up, his uniform caught the neon, some red and white elite mark like a foreign military badge I'd never seen before or since. The credits he took from his belt clinked loud onto the scarred counter as if he clinked them on purpose. "Enough to get you out of this pit," he said, voice steady, like he wanted me gone fast. I didn't count it or care, just nodded and gave him that stupid trinket that Pyke goon couldn't stop talking about. Go. I went. The start of a long vacation. My fingers released the slab, pushed it across, scooped the credits quick, stuffing them into a pocket. Deal done, fast, clean.
The hyper-jumps ate it all, stranding me here with these outcasts at the galaxy's edge. My gut floats against my spine. This rock will never be home. Furnace stacks vibrate perpetual, shaking the viewport where I've grease-penciled escape maps on the underside, routes drawn over routes, none of them funded. Lights pulse on slag-burner cycles, casting shadows that dance like syndicate ghosts. I tuck the hairpin one last check, hand steady. The joint's ash lingers on my fingers, earthy against the citrus lotion. I wipe my hands clean on the rag, synth-meal's hot-ion sting lingering on my tongue. The mesh tote slings heavy over my shoulder, anti-static lining crinkling as I adjust the strap against the groove it's worn into my collarbone over months. My pod door mag-seals behind me with a pneumatic sigh as I step out, locking away the cramped space that doubles as home and business.
The corridor stretches narrow, walls grooved from years of vibrations that rumble through Zehara's core. Flickering overhead strips cast long shadows, making every corner feel like a shakedown waiting to happen. My boots crunch ore dust scattered across the floor, each stride lifting a beat longer than it should. I grip the handrail to steady myself, fingers brushing bare metal as I pass other pod doors. A cough leaks from one, a comm beeps low from another, sheets rustling as workers stir for the day's rut. The air thickens with recycled currents, carrying trace spice and sweat from neighboring pods, proof that personal space here blurs into the job the moment you open your door. The corridor opens to the bar area, and I shoulder through the swinging partition. The communal space greets me with dim lamps casting a hazy glow over a dented counter bolted against the tremors. Mismatched stools cluster around it, a few already occupied by roommates trading the morning's gripes. Madame Lysara stands behind the bar, datapad glowing in her hands as she scans last night's logs. A Rodian mops nearby, cup-fingers squeaking on the handle. A Zabrak polishes a horn down the counter, wincing as he works a sensitive ridge. The air thrums with their chatter, a mix of loyalty and friction that binds us in ways none of us chose.
Lysara looks up from the datapad and squints like she's gauging the room's gravity by my face. "Morning, Ryari. You've got foundation caked under the right eye—wash it clean before you go. I need you on today's market run still. We're short on M-9 sealant filters; the filters have been coughing now for three days. Grab bulk synth-meals—the green label, not the orange; the orange turns to paste in only days with this thin-pull. Two sleeves of razor cartridges, a case of stims if the vendor isn't playing cute, and lotion base—the cheap vat stuff is fine." She sets the datapad down and finally gives me the full stare. "Prices jump at dawn tomorrow. The freighter put a 'weather surcharge' sticker over last week's and called it even. So today we buy everything we need for the next cycle. Keep every receipt; if it isn't on flimsi, I can't make up the difference on whatever the total is, and I'm not eating it." The Rodian slides a stim patch across without any sort of glance at me. "Your eyes look dead. Take it and pretend you slept last night."
"Bill me," I say. "Already did," Lysara answers, tearing a paper slip and sliding it over. "Filters first. If you have to choose between stims and filters, you choose filters; I can talk a client down off their jitters, I can't talk the vents into pushing air." The list is neat, with quantities and two underlined alternates in case the main vendors decide to play gods. "You're back by second shift bell. If the concourse gets crowded or the levy boys start asking where you're from, you turn around and come home right away. I'll take the hit before I loose any of you. And Ryari—" She leans in just enough that the bar light picks the silver in her lashes. "If you do come back in a hurry. Shake any tail in the service tunnel by the coolant towers if you have to." I tuck the list into my pocket, feel the mesh tote's strap bite into my shoulder. "Anything for the back room?"
"Grab kwevva oil or myrrhweed salve. You smell like bush, and I'd bet your pod does too. And watch for the filter vendor, he'll try to sell you M-8s in an M-9 box, have him crack the crate with you watching. He pulls that twice a month and swears it's the freight clerk." The Zabrak snorts. "He swore that to me last week. Twice."
"Then you bring me his name," Lysara says, already palming the datapad again. "Go. Before someone decides they need something else." I push off the bar, the chatter settling under my skin like a worn-in ache, and shoulder through the side door into the tunnels toward the market hub.
The tunnel from the brothel stretches narrow, its walls pitted from years of smelter runoff that courses through Zehara's guts. My boots crunch against scattered ore dust, each step pulling my body forward like the rock itself is offering a head start on something you'll never outrun. Acrid fumes coat the fine hairs inside my nose and leave a chemical film on my lips, the corridor's ventilation pushing stale gusts that taste of processed iron. I clutch the mesh tote, its strap wearing the groove in my collarbone deeper, and run through Lysara's list in my head again. Filters, green-label meals, razors, stims, lotion base. Filters first. Always filters first.
The corridor opens to the Zehara market, a chaotic sprawl of stalls wedged into the labyrinth of lightfall tunnels. Pulsing light strips cast uneven glows over crates stacked against trembling walls, their buzz blending with the shouts of smugglers bartering through clouds of dust and coolant vapor. The air bites, sour with chemical tang, regret distilled into breathable form. Vendors hawk goods from behind makeshift counters, ration pouches and stim patches piled beside spoiled stock, their surfaces slick from brownouts that killed refrigeration sometime last cycle and nobody bothered to fix. I weave through the crowd, bodies pressing around me, elbows brushing too close, every touch registering in the part of my brain that catalogues threat before contact. My eyes scan for the green-label rations Lysara demanded, avoiding the orange ones that decompose into inedible sludge within days at this altitude. Prices are scrawled on holo-boards, numbers jacked sky-high by protection fees that change names every quarter but never change hands. Haggling here feels like working a difficult client. Every deal a performance, every smile a calculated investment against being shorted. My mind churns, calculating credits against need, running the math the way Lysara taught me to think about it, not what you want but what kills you first if you don't have it.
I stop at a stall, its vendor a grizzled human with a scar splitting his brow, the kind of wound that healed without bacta and never let you forget it. His crates brim with green-label pouches, but the price board stutters with a fresh levy hike, numbers ticking upward even as I stand there. "Forty credits for a sleeve," he grunts, not looking up from his datapad. "Take it or walk away hungry."
"Thirty-five, and you throw in two razor packs," I counter, voice steady but pointed. He squints, sizing me up the way everyone on this rock sizes everyone up, gauging how much fight lives behind the ask. Then he shoves the pouches across with a nod. I slip the credits over, fingers brushing the hairpin for reassurance, the vibro-needle's dormant hum a ghost sensation against my scalp. The deal feels like a small win, but the math doesn't lie. After filters and stims, I'll be scraping the bottom of the grocery allowance, the margins thinner than the atmosphere on this forgotten asteroid. I bag the pouches, the tote's lining crackling with static, and move deeper into the market, eyes darting for the next vendor.
A wiry figure brushes my elbow, too deliberate to be accidental. I freeze, heart kicking up, the instinct older than thought. Spice-veined eyes twitching like he's riding a Kessel high, breath reeking of synthetic burn that wafts warm and sour across the narrow gap between us. A Pyke courier, one of their low-level eyes, always watching, always marking, always reporting up a chain that ends in rooms I never want to see again. His glance lingers, and a sick twist hits my gut. They've noticed me. Not now, not here, not after all this time running. I force my steps forward, casual, keeping my gait loose and bored the way you learn to walk when someone's deciding whether you're worth following. My fingers tighten on the tote. A reedy whine trails me, not the scrubbers. A microdrone, hovering close, its buzz threading through the market's noise like an insect that knows exactly where you sleep. I duck toward a stim vendor, hoping to lose the drone in the crowd. The stall's cluttered with patches and vials, half of them cloudy from power flickers, their contents suspect even by fringe standards. "Stims, ten credits each," the vendor snaps, a Twi'lek with lekku twitching at the chaos. "Hurry up if you want it. You're holding up others." I nod, sliding credits for a small case, but my eyes flick to the drone's shadow, now hovering near an overhead conduit. My chest tightens, the same sick panic as a client's hands grabbing where they weren't invited, that spike of violation that lives in the body long after the brain files it away.
The tunnel narrows ahead, stalls thinning into a dead corridor where the light strips have given up entirely. A figure steps into my path, broad under a hooded cloak, vibro-blades glinting at his belt like promises of specific violence. His voice rasps, wrecked from spice or worse, each word deliberate like he's conserving energy for a strike. "You. Hey, you look familiar. Ever heard of a place called Neon Angels?" A Pyke enforcer, his menace clinical and professional in a way I recognize from the other side of transactions. My throat locks, trauma spiking through my nerves like those nights on Coruscant, hands pinning me, no escape but to fake compliance and wait for the gap. I back up, tote clutched tight, but the corridor's blocked, his frame filling the exit. The drone's whine sharpens, pinning me between tech and muscle. I don't answer, heart hammering against my ribs hard enough that I can feel my pulse in my teeth. My fingers brush the hairpin, its hum a faint promise, but there's no room to draw it, no angle that doesn't end with those vibro-blades finding me first. The market's noise fades, swallowed by my pulse.
I dart left, slipping past his reach, boots scraping rusted grating as the low pull carries me in a long lateral bound. The enforcer's rasp cuts through, "Not so kriffin' fast," his heavy steps trailing, deliberate but close, the thud of his boots a metronome counting down what happens if he catches me. The drone's pitch mirrors my turns through the tight service tunnel. I weave past exhaust pipes, shadows stretching long under sputtering strips, sweat beading on my skin and lifting off in the weak pull before it can drip, tiny spheres trailing behind me like a breadcrumb line. I veer hard at each junction, muscle memory from the escape routes I've walked a hundred times in my head, the grease-pencil maps on my viewport finally earning their keep.
My tote slips, ration packs and stims tumbling into the open air as a frayed edge snags its strap, the packages tumbling slow and stupid like my credits turning to vapor. I thumb the white-noise scrambler puck in my pocket, its pulse jamming the drone's signal with a soft throb I feel more than hear. The enforcer's footsteps grow fainter, his cloak snagging briefly on a pipe as I feint right, then left, dodging through the maze of tunnels that smell like machine oil and forgotten maintenance schedules. My lungs burn, the air too stale, too starved, but I keep moving. The tunnel curves, dim light spilling ahead from a known junction. I slow, chest heaving, and peer out. Lysara's place looms in the distance, bar lights pulsing like a fragile beacon. Almost home, hands empty, credits wasted, stomach knotting at the loss of an entire haul that Lysara counted on and I dropped like an amateur.
Hours grind past after the market scramble, the shift settling like sediment in the brothel's corridors while my pulse still carries the residue of the chase. The bar area hums with low chatter, low lamps casting a hazy glow over the gouged bartop. The air carries spilled liquor and sweat, the baseline perfume of every night that blends into every other night. Lysara leans forward, her datapad glowing with red tallies, eyes sharp as the math resolves against me. She slides it aside with a soft click, her fingers lingering on the edge. "You lost the entire haul, Ryari. You kick sixty back to the house, I'll swallow the forty and call it tuition. Next run you take the house muscle—no debate. For this round, someone else does tomorrow's route." Her voice cuts steady, but she reaches across, squeezing my arm once, brief and firm, the only softness she'll allow herself in a room where weakness is a luxury that gets charged to someone's account.
"That's a heavy skim, but I hear you. I'll earn it back fast." I say, voice low, shame curling hot in my gut like bad protein glop. She nods toward a stranger nursing a drink at the far end of the counter, lips tight. "You will. Got a new client waiting, asked for you by name even." The bar's chatter dulls as I weave through mismatched stools, spotting the client slouched against the counter, human, plain, his gaze too sharp for the dim light, too focused on the exits for someone who just wants a quiet hour. I flash a professional smile, the one that shows teeth but not desperation, gesturing him to follow. "Heard you wanted the best. This way."
My footsteps float light in the low pull, echoing off scored metal walls down the tight corridor, air stale with filtration whir and trace spice from the pod where someone always burns too much and never opens a window. I lead him to my pod, the mag-lock clicking open, sealing shut with a muted clunk behind us. His eyes sweep the room, too calculated, cataloguing the viewport, the drawer, the single exit, and I feel the assessment like an icy finger tracing my spine. "Only enough credits for quiet time. Nothing fancy." he says, voice flat, but the lie sets off my hustle instincts, the part of me that reads clients the way card players read tells. I force a smile, leaning close, faking a warmth that costs less than the lotion on my skin. The air crowds with his presence, foreign in my small space. I guide him to the bunk, my hand on his shoulder, fingers light but assessing the tension in his trapezius, the way his weight shifts forward instead of settling. His skin feels clammy under the fabric, pulse quickening as I press closer.
I trace a line down his chest, unfastening his shirt with practiced ease, my breath warm against his ear, the mechanical comfort I sell packaged in gestures that look like desire. He shifts, hands finding my waist, gripping just enough to test boundaries, and the touch sends a familiar twist through me, raw and invasive, the body remembering what the mind has filed away. I lean in, lips brushing his neck, tasting salt and tension, the metallic undertone of someone running on stims and adrenaline. His fingers dig deeper, pulling me onto the mattress, bodies aligning in the low glow. The sheets crinkle under us, cool against heated skin. I move with him, hips rolling slow, drawing out soft gasps, my own breaths measured to match his rhythm, to control the tempo the way you control a negotiation, keeping the leverage on my side of the mattress. His hand slides up my thigh, rough calluses scraping, and I arch just right, keeping control in the motion. He mutters low, "You know Coruscant—ever spend time there?" The name hits like a spike driven through the base of my skull, trauma flooding back, hands that pinned, no room to breathe, the taste of neon and fear. My throat tightens, but I deflect, voice husky. "Never been. And you paid for quiet, remember? Break it again and I start charging extra." My pulse hammers, but I keep the act going, leaning closer, letting his guard drop as my fingers hover near the hairpin.
His hands roam bolder, pressing me down, questions slipping between breaths, probing my past like fingers seeking the weak seam in a pocket. I shift atop him, thighs tightening around his hips, reclaiming the position, the high ground. His breaths come shorter, his body responding to the friction, the slow grind building heat between us that I manufacture the way the vents manufacture air, functional and invisible. The space fills with the scent of sweat and synthetic lotion, the air cycler's murmur drowning softer sounds. I lean forward, chest pressing against his, lips trailing along his collarbone, nipping lightly to elicit a shudder that runs through him like a current. His grip on my back tightens, low groan escaping as he attempts to strip me of what's left of my attire. I whisper nonsense against his skin, words meant to distract, to heighten the illusion of a woman present instead of a woman working. My bare skin meets the scrubbed air as he lets out another satisfying groan and I move fast, hand cupping his ear, thumb under his jaw as a decoy, the intimate gesture turning lethal before his brain can process the shift. The hairpin pulls free, and I drive it under his jaw, vibro-needle nicking his lingual artery. The oscillation severs a hole clean through, blood spraying in slow lightfall arcs that paint the wall in spatters that drift instead of drip. His body jerks, two seconds of spasms, a shallow gurgle, then still. Brine-iron hits my palate as the needle vibrates against skull bone. I step back, breath steady. No hesitation, just survival in this daily rut on the galaxy's edge.
I press the comm stud on my wrist, the soft buzz vibrating against my skin as I call for Lysara. The pod's air sits dense, thick with blood still hanging in the low pull, droplets turning slowly in the recirculator's current like a mobile nobody asked for. I kneel beside the client's body, his lifeless form slumped across the bunk, and pat down the pockets of his pants that still lingered around the knees with steady fingers. My hand brushes a small puck, its surface cool and smooth, a faint glow pulsing from its edge. I pry it free, thumbing the display to reveal metadata, a relay node tied to a black-channel spur off the Kessel Run, cartel-maintained, coordinates pointing straight to this dump. My gut clenches, the realization settling hard and specific. The mag-lock then clicks, and Lysara steps in, her boots scuffing softly on the duracrete floor. Her eyes flick to the body, then to me, face set in a blank mask, no trace of surprise, the same way she reads a bad night's ledger. She tosses a pair of enzyme packets across the bunk, their weight lobbing across the gap before I catch them. "You breathing?" she asks, already bored of the corpse. "Good, hit high on the vents. Enzymes first, then towels. Move," she says, voice flat, like she's reading a supply order. She then flicks her wrist to speak low into her portable. "Ryari. Pod E-12. One cleanup."
I tear open the packets, and the citrus-metal scent cuts through the blood's ozone bite, searing my nose and flooding the back of my throat. I grab two towels from the drawer, their coarse fibers already stained from past jobs, the ghost impressions of other nights layered into the fabric. I start sopping the mess. The blood pools in slow, floating beads, clinging to the fabric as I press it against the mattress, each bead bursting on contact and spreading into the weave with a warmth that contradicts the death it came from. The impending house fees loom in my mind. Twenty percent for service, eleven for disposal, a tax on survival I know Lysara will drill into me later, her voice calm but unyielding, the numbers as non-negotiable as gravity. The janitors will haul him to the slag-burners, his body reduced to ash in Zehara's core, just another mark scratched into the house's ledger, no name, no investigation, no questions that anyone with power cares to ask. I wipe the hairpin's vibro-needle clean with a corner of the towel, the needle's vibration steadying my hands as I retuck it into my updo, its weight a quiet anchor against the chaos. The house keeps moving, its rhythm unbroken, another client logged as too handsy, another night swallowed by the grindstone. The filtration grate whirs louder, pulling the citrus-metal scent into its current, mingling with the distant tremor of smelter cores pulsing through the walls. The cot's sheets stay rumpled, soaked with the thin sheen of blood and enzyme, a silent record of the fringe's cost that the next wash cycle will erase.
The cleanup in my pod took until the late night, if you can even call it night on this excuse of a rogue asteroid where the smelter light never changes and the clocks are suggestions. The weight of the shift presses on my joints, the citrus-metal tang of enzyme packets long faded but a phantom taste I keep swallowing away. Each step through the corridors carries the residue of the scrubbing, my fingers raw from towels and chemicals, the small muscles in my forearms burning from wringing out what used to be a man. Furnace cores rumble deep in Zehara's gut, their vibrations pulsing through eaten-out metal walls, mingling with the distant moans from pods where clients and workers still tangle in the unrelenting rhythm of this place.
I push through a beaded curtain, the strands clattering softly as they drift in the lightfall, one clinging to my robe with a static snap before floating free. I step into the main bar area. Red lights stutter overhead from power fluctuations, casting shadows across gouged tables and the faces of those gathered for tip-out. I slide into a seat at a table already crowded with the night's survivors. The air smells of cheap perfume and charred food from the bar's grill, undercut by the sour bite of synth-ale foam clinging to mugs in beads that hover and tremble at the rims. My hands, sticky from handling credits, fumble with the pile we pool together. I count my cut, chits clinking dully, the meter running in a galaxy that never stops billing.
Across from me, a Twi'lek, Tal'isa, leans back, her lekku twitching as she smirks. "Another night chained to the chit, another hit to the haul." Her voice drips with sarcasm, the brand that masks the weariness we all carry, her fingers drumming on the table as if to shake off the night's residue. She pauses, snagging a floating bead of foam mid-air with a quick flick. "Heard the Jedi and Je'daii are throwing some gala on Ossus, signing their big pact like it's a holostar wedding. Doomed from the jump, if you ask me." Tharik Venn, a Zabrak, grunts, his scarred hands cradling a mug. "By my ridges, that Knight Reaper's probably far from those goody two-shoes." He shoots a glance at Lysara, who sits at the table's edge, her face tight. "What do you say, Madame? You buying their theater?" Kalia then tugs at her mother's sleeve, interrupting with a small whine, but Lysara brushes her off gently, her steel softening for a moment before snapping back. Tharik continues, his tone teasing but loyal in his gravelly laugh. "Nonsense." Lysara's eyes flicker, a guarded flash crossing her face at the mention of the Je'daii General. She deflects with a tight smile, sipping her ale. "Rumors are cheap. We take each night one at a time." Her words carry a weight that silences the table for a moment, her hand resting briefly on Kalia's shoulder before pulling away.
Kraal Ten'vos, a Gran, slams a fist on the table, sending a mug and foam beads feathering upward, one bead clogging a nearby exhaust louver with a soft hiss. "Kriff their galas from all angles! I'd rather bash heads than bow to core-world pomp." His boisterous laugh fills the space, his horns catching the red light as he gestures wildly, snatching a floating bead and crushing it between his fingers. He recounts a brawl with a handsy client that needed to be thrown out, his tri-sight metaphors painting the fight in layers of depth and shadow, the way only a Gran can describe violence, three perspectives at once. One of the Mirialan dancers, Sylune, sits quieter, her tattooed fingers tracing patterns on her arm, ink following ink in absent loops. Her voice comes soft but weighted. "They preach balance on polished stages while our nights vanish down in silence that never will give back what it takes." Her words land like a truth we all know but rarely speak aloud, her gaze distant as a drifting curtain strand brushes her shoulder. I sip my ale, the bitter foam prickling my lips. The galaxy's stories paint heroes and pacts in glowing light, but here, factions are just another tax on our survival, their reforms blind to edges like this one where the air itself is rationed. I glance at Tal'isa, tossing a question to bring back the energy. "Think their alliance will form a new Empire?" Tal'isa snorts, rolling her eyes, her lekku flinching slightly. "An Empire!? No unity like that ever lasts, specially out here." The table laughs, a brittle sound that masks the fatigue we share, the sort that settles into your bones like ore dust into ventilation and never fully clears.
Lysara shifts, her gaze distant as she murmurs, "Let them have their ceremonies. It means little for us." The air grows thicker, the ionizer's acrid burp mixing with the grill's charred grease. A client stumbles past, slurring for another round, and a janitor grumbles as they haul a sack toward the furnace stacks, the bag sagging limp and nobody at the table watching it go.
The bar door blasts inward with a deafening crack, shards of metal twisting free and drifting in shrapnel snowfall through the gravity, glinting under the stuttering red lights like credits scattered from a broken till. I freeze, my hand halfway to my mug, as six figures storm through the smoke-veil, their boots thudding against the deck plates with the cadence of people who've rehearsed this entrance. The leader, a hulking shape in scarred black armor, ignites a lightsaber with a guttural snap-hiss. Its crimson blade roars to life, unstable and chaotic, rough edges spitting sparks while two quillon vents bleed excess plasma in hissing streams, ancient malice given form and set loose in a brothel on a forgotten rock. The air fills with ozone bite and a metallic tang that clamps my throat shut, the weapon's thrum vibrating through my chest like the furnace stacks' roar compressed into a single tone.
Behind him, two acolytes in tattered robes follow, one spinning a double-bladed lightstaff that sweeps low and burns the air with twin scarlet arcs, the other clutching a single-bladed saber, its glow steady and precise. Three soldiers in ragged, dark plating bring up the rear, their blaster carbines already charging with low whines, barrels sweeping the room like predators scenting blood. No warnings, no demands. Just brutality crashing into our worn-out night.
Screens erupt as the chaos swallows the bar. The leader surges forward, his crossguard saber arcing through the air, and with a flick of his free hand, he unleashes a surge of dark Force energy that lifts Tal'isa off her feet, her lekku whipping wildly as she chokes mid-hurl of a synth-ale bottle. The bottle shatters harmlessly in a spray of foam beads, but he closes his fist, and her body crumples inward with a sickening crunch of bones, blood misting from her mouth before he flings her aside like discarded trash, her form drifting into a wall with a dull thud that echoes long after the sound should have died.
Tharik roars, charging low, his vibro-knife gleaming as he slashes at the nearest acolyte. But the lightstaff wielder counters with a whirl, the double blades burning a cauterized gash across his chest, steam curling up while the stink of scorched flesh clogs the vents. Tharik gasps, staggering, only for the acolyte to extend a hand, Force-pushing him back into a table that splinters under the impact, his body pinning down a fleeing patron in a tangle of limbs and drifting debris.
"Lysara!" I shout, grabbing her arm as Kalia clings to her mother's side, wide-eyed, fingers white on the fabric. We bolt for the back corridor, my feet pushing off the deck in bounding drifts, the gravity turning our escape into a frantic glide. Pods line the walls, doors half-open where clients and workers spill out mid-session, half-dressed and confused. One burly smuggler, pants around his ankles, fumbles for a holdout blaster and unloads at the intruders, bolts sizzling past. A soldier snaps off a reply shot, cratering the smuggler's chest in vaporized tissue, but the leader gestures sharply, and the Force yanks another worker from a pod doorway, slamming her into the ceiling with bone-shattering force before his saber sweeps through, bisecting her in a flash of cauterized meat and rising steam.
Tiks dodges behind an overturned stool, snatching a glass shard flung from a ruptured ventilation grate, its edge glinting as they lunge to stab at an acolyte's side. The single-saber wielder parries with a precise sever, the blade humming through Tiks' arm in a clean cut, blood atomizing into mist that hangs suspended. Tiks screams, clutching the stump, but the acolyte thrusts forward with the Force, choking the life from them until their body goes limp, drifting like a broken doll amid the crimson ghosts of blood droplets. Kraal bellows forward, dropping low to gore a thigh with his horns, but the leader intercepts, his saber crackling as it deflects a wild blaster shot from a corner patron, the bolt redirecting into the Gran's forehead in a hiss of ignited bone. Kraal stumbles, flames licking his skin, only for an acolyte to sweep the lightstaff in a burning arc that severs his legs at the knees. Sylune then leaps out from behind the bar and slaps a sticky stencil over a soldier's visor, occluding the view for a lunging stab with a hidden blade. The soldier fires blindly, tagging a wall in scorch marks, but the other acolyte lunges, single-saber piercing her through the midriff in a precise thrust, the blade's hum vibrating as it withdraws with a sizzle, her body slumping forward while torn fabrics drift in singed scraps.
We round a bend, Lysara pulling Kalia close, her breath ragged. "Through the service hatch," she hisses, pointing to a narrow panel at the corridor's end, smelter heat shimmering from vents below. But the leader barrels after us, his crossguard saber crackling arcs that cauterize stray bolts mid-air from desperate patrons firing holdouts, steam rising in his wake as soldiers hold the line, blasting craters into walls to suppress the sporadic fire. A pod door bursts open beside me, another worker and his client tumbling out in torn fabrics, only for the leader to extend his hand, Force-choking the client mid-gasp until veins bulge and eyes turn blood-red in silent horror, the body crumpling before his saber slices through the worker in a merciless arc, gasps cut short in the sweet-metal stench of scorched hair.
My heart pounds as we skid to the hatch, Lysara fumbling the latch, but footsteps thunder closer. No way out. The corridor dead-ends here, backed into a corner of bare duracrete and humming conduits, the slag-burners' hush below mocking our frantic breaths. The leader looms, his saber humming low, snarling as he Force-pulls a final resisting patron from cover, the man's blaster clattering away before the blade impales him with a wet sizzle, the body discarded in a drift. He grabs Kalia by the arm, yanking her forward as she screams, clinging tight. "The prizes are ours," he growls, his voice a fanatical rasp through his helmet. Lysara begs, her voice fracturing, "Her father knows nothing of us, of her! She's a child! Take me only!" But his grip clamps down on her as well, dragging them both as tragic shields in an unrelenting grasp.
The acolyte with the single saber steps forward, his tattered robe whispering against the deck as he grabs my wrist in a vise of cold fingers. Rough cord bites into my skin, binding my hands behind my back with a quick twist that sends a jolt up my arms, the material slick and unyielding like the house's endless ledgers of debt. I struggle, my boot glancing off his thigh plate with a dull clang, but he shoves me against the scored wall, the conduits thrumming hot against my spine. His mask tilts, eyes hidden behind a slit of shadow, and a faint pressure builds in my throat, the Force squeezing just enough to make my vision blur, stars dancing in the red pall of emergency lights. I gasp, tasting blood.
The leader turns his helmet toward me, the crossguard saber's unstable blade still humming low, sparks venting in angry hisses that scorch the air. Laughter rumbles from his vocoder, low and mocking, as he gestures with a gauntleted hand. "You led us straight here, little nightflower. That precious puck's signal lit up like a beacon when your guest earlier never showed up and went silent. Knew they'd botched it, but no matter." His voice rasps with fanatic glee, the words carving through the smelter's distant rumble like a vibro-knife through flesh. He points at me, the armored finger steady. "The girl, do with her as you will. Burn the rest and this place to the ground."
"Yes, Lord Xytherion," the acolyte mutters, his grip tightening as he drags me toward a side alcove, the corridor's end narrowing into a half-lit storage nook cluttered with crates and flickering consoles. Lysara's fractured pleas echo behind us, Kalia's sobs cutting high, but they fade as the acolyte's grip tightens through the Force, choking my breath ragged, defiance burning in my chest like the smelter fire that never goes out.
"Kneel," he growls, voice a low grind like shearing durasteel, forcing me down to my knees on the grated floor, the metal biting cold through my robe. He presses his unignited saber's hilt against my temple, the cylinder's chill seeping into my skin like the outpost's endless brownouts, and I think, no, not like this, not after all the fights I've clawed through just to scrape another credit.
His fingers snag in my updo, yanking the hairpin free with a sharp tug that sends strands cascading over my face like a veil, his movements hesitant, almost ashamed of the intent flickering in his eyes. His free hand fumbles at his belt, the rasp of fabric parting, the dim light catching the pale flesh as he steps closer, the hilt's pressure cold and final against my skull, his advance churning my stomach like bad ration glop gone septic. The stink of his sweat hits me, sour and metallic, mingling with the death stench still hanging in the air from the slaughter outside, my bound hands straining against the cord as he holds them above my head, fingers numb but desperate. He grabs a fistful of my hair, yanking my head forward, a violation crawling the raw dread pooling in my gut, the humiliation scorching deeper than any outcome imaginable. My vision blurs with hot tears I refuse to let fall out of spite, the alcove's shadows closing in, but in that split-second haze, my fingers brush his saber's hilt loosen now in his other hand, the cylinder's familiar weight a fleeting anchor. I grab it, thumb finding the ignition switch through muscle memory born of too many close calls with scavenged junk, the defiance surging like a final tip-out, no, they won't take this last piece of me, the crimson blade snapping to life with a crackling roar that fills my skull with plasma, the heat blooming instant and absolute, my jaw slacking as the end hits, the world tilting into nothingness.