[IC] 'Floating' (Star Wars 2 BBY)

[Glitter Guppy]

For what felt like the ninety-ninth time today, Eryn wriggled out from under the elevated concrete slab and propped herself up on her elbows, pulling out the broken binocs she’d swiped from the trash three buildings over. She closed one eye over the cracked eyepiece and dragged a hopeless, practiced gaze across Abilene’s surface with the other.
Nothing new. No ships. No way out.
Oh my god. What a surprise. She just couldn’t even.

Disappointment had died days ago for her. Couldn’t even muster annoyance anymore as she dropped the binocs back on the tarp next to her and shimmied back under the makeshift slab shelter like some kind of crab returning to its shell. It wasn’t comfortable, but finding the concrete outcrop atop one of the only three story buildings in this dusty outpost had been a much needed shot of luck for her. The area was undisturbed, playing wall-less closet to a collection of old mining gear long past its expiration date, and with the way the slab had shifted over the top of the building, it offered her a vantage point without risk of being seen. Not a bad protection from any elements, either. From there, laying on her stomach with binocs in hand, she could track anything coming into Abilene from land or sky, and track she did.

So far, the only thing even remotely interesting going or coming past the town’s edge was the young couple sneaking off to make out undisturbed every other night.

Stupid teenagers.
She stared up at the damp concrete above her, running a finger across the multiple slashes in the arm of her leather jacket. Traced how wide and jagged each one was. Felt the dried blood still flaking off the leather under her touch. Brushed at the thick scar marks now knitted into her flesh.
Remembered the screams of her old captain.

Really stupid teenagers. They knew what was out there, and they still snuck out.
Not like she actually cared, though. Not her problem. They’ll die or they won’t. No one here mattered unless they were a way off this rock, and Abilene definitely wasn’t bustling with off-world activity.

“Not. My. Problem,” she breathed quietly as she scratched another line into the tally above her head with a bit of metal, a shower of concrete dusting her like snow.
Thirteen days.
Thirteen karking days and no end in sight.
A very, very small part of her had hoped at the beginning that whatever crew had survived and taken ‘The Wyvern’ would realize she was still alive and come back for her. They’d seen her during the chaos, she knew a few had.
After day four, that hope fizzled out, replaced by vivid, violent scenarios of what she’d do if she ever saw any of them again.

A rogue gust of wind rushed over her hiding spot, toying with the edge of the tarp she hadn’t dragged under the shelter. The sound drew thoughts of the instant noodle packages she’d stolen from one of the kitchens down the street, and the way her stomach growled, there was no denying it.
Time for dinner.

The one problem with this slab-shelter thing? You couldn’t sit up. Or, it would have been a problem for someone else.
Eryn contorted like a worm folding in on itself, her flexible Sorrusian bones briefly turning her into something out of a horror film as she reached around her feet to grab one of the brightly colored noodle packages.
It was gone in under two minutes, raw and crunchy, and the tiny heating pack included for cooking was activated and tucked into the breast of her shirt. The tiny bloom of warmth felt nice.
Eryn tucked the ripped packages into the stack at the edge of the shelter, stacking the rocks atop them like paperweights just in case of wind, and flipped herself back around to war-crawl towards the outcrop once more, enjoying the heat of the spice at the back of her throat. Felt better than dust. Tasted better than dust, which was all Abilene had to offer her up here.

Soon, she was perched, binocs in hand for the hundredth time today. Maybe this time. Maybe this time, someone would come.
She panned down out of habitual movement. There they were, sneaking out again. Stupid. Ugh.

Maybe this time.

[deegee]

The man who had adopted the surname ‘Fel’ sat heavily at the console behind the copilot’s seat. For the moment at least, he was alone, though he wouldn’t have put it past Jet, or hell, any of the folks aboard the UA, to pop into the cockpit to see how the conversation with Abilene went. He could’ve locked the door. But no. He’d never locked Wrench out of anywhere. Jet neither. Not even his cabin. He wasn’t about to start now. He breathed for a few moments, until the navacomp alert sounded. This was it. Stretching toward the main console, he cut in the sunlight engines, and right on schedule, Abilene sprang into reality, filling the viewport. The grey-green rock was barely the size of an average class-Zee lunar mass. He breathed deep, collecting himself. Keyed in the ident tag. A male voice, sounding very far away, badly static-laden. Fel boosted the signal, knowing there was little they could do, planetside. The atmo was thin, which did them favours when it came to broadcasting comms, but their tech level was so low, he knew this was as good as it was liable to get. The voice got stronger, closer.

“...dentified vessel, state your business, over.”

”It’s Fel. Unfair Advantage. I’d give you some hull registration number but we both know it’d be a bunch of numbers I pulled out of a hat. Need to talk to Abilene.”

There was a long pause. Long enough for Fel to start thinking they had lost the call. The ever-present comms ionization and ever-present static, like waves crashing on a beach someplace warm, didn’t help.

”Wait.”

He acknowledged, but the line had already gone dead. Now the waiting was killing him, and he started to turn the words over and over in his mind, which was usually when he ended up eating them. But just when he believed they had switched off, her voice, aged and weighted with experience and tough as nails, pierced the cockpit. The image was poor, but he could make out her shock of white hair, braided.

”Galdaart Fel, you doleadote Scrabjack – didn’t think I’d see your ugly mug around these parts anytime soon. What in the seven suns are you doing in my yard, son?”

”Good to see you, too, Abilene. And don’t go handing my thrusters to me. If you’re half the Harpy I took you for, you’ve already heard that someone paid Lotho Minor a visit. a pause for effect Figured I’d bring your druk back to you. Sure as a mudscuffer’s pant-leg ain’t worth nothin’ to nobody else. Now… you ain’t interested, I can just…” he mimes reaching to shut off the viewscreen.

”No! No.. we can deal. So that was you, handed the Buckets their daily dose of poodoo up the recharge port, huh? she cackled, devolving into fits of coughing, before coalescing into a wet chuckle. ”I would’ve paid good creds to see Kara’s face when you pulled the rug out from under him, and aboard his own rig, too. Seems I had you pegged wrong, kid. Never in the Typhoidic Nebula thought it’d be you bringing my world back to me.”

”You still got what we discussed, last time we was face to face?”

He couldn’t make it out too well, what with the bad picture, but her voice told him she was smiling as she replied. ”See you in the world, kid.” She killed the transmission, letting him eat static.

“Yeah. Yeah…” He killed the comms, and got up, transferring to his usual seat, and angled the UA toward the thick depression in the moon’s surface that was known locally as ‘Walden’s Scar’ and marked the closest visual landmark to the Abilene settlement. The thin atmosphere made travelling planetbound easy, and Fel spotted the settlement more than thirty seconds out at their current rate of descent. He cut thrust, and pulled in low, over the settlement, the cluster of small buildings battered by the UA’s repulsors, moving slow enough that it would be unmistakable to anyone there that the ship had arrived, and then banked South by a little over four miles, setting down atop a low rise, a steep canyon drop at their backs. It was a good spot. They’d see anyone coming, and their back was protected by an almost impossible climb.