“Karter!”
Karter jerked, his drink slopping down the front of his shirt. He scowled, attempting to clumsily wipe himself clean.
Giving it up, Karter turned irritably to see his companion, Jun Sato, standing to his left. Karter scowled. “So first you purge the ship of my spice, then you interrupt my drinking?”
“Yes! I just received a transmission. We have a mission.”
Karter sighed and threw back what remained of his drink, ignoring Sato’s scowl. He stood, staggering slightly as he did. There was a pleasant buzz in his brain, though he wasn’t quite as drunk as he wanted to be.
“You’re drunk?!” Sato hissed. Even angry, he knew to keep his voice low.
Karter grinned and clapped him on the shoulder. “Not as drunk as I wish I was.”
“It’s barely noon. How are we supposed to complete a mission when you’re drunk?”
Karter shrugged. “Shoulda told me about it this morning. What’s the mission?”
Sato hissed. “Not. Here.” Seizing Karter by the arm, Sato propelled him outside. Karter blinked in the bright light of Mycapo’s sun.
Back on their frigate, Sato pulled up a holomap. “I’ve received intelligence about an Imperial prison. They hold dissidents against the Empire there.”
Karter crossed his arms. “And we’re going to go break them out. Easy.”
“This isn’t a normal operation, Karter. It’s the Imperial prison on Kessel.”
Karter paled slightly and wished to the Force he had his spice left on the ship. “You’re insane, Sato.”
“Maybe. I wouldn’t try it normally. But my intelligence has told me that there may – there may be Force-sensitives imprisoned there.”
Karter felt as though he was falling. His ears rang and he rubbed them, desperately trying to make it stop. He shook himself. “Guess I better sober up,” he muttered.
“If you wouldn’t mind. I’ll prep the ship for takeoff.”
Karter was already stumbling back towards his bunk. It would take several hours to reach Kessel. He had every intention to sober up in the meantime and hopefully sleep off the hangover too.
Falling back onto his bunk, Karter clenched his eyes shut though, of course, sleep didn’t come easily. He growled. The Imperial Prison on Kessel. What was Sato thinking? The odds of Force-sensitives being there was slim. Sato knew that any Jedi and Padawans were sent to Mustafar.
But… What if he’s not wrong?
Karter had not encountered anyone like him since Order 66. As far as he knew, he was the last survivor of Order 66. And he had only managed that by staying on the move. And staying far away from Imperial prisons.
Unfortunately, his last idea for a job – deckhand on any ship that would take him to a different system then the one he had been in – had landed him on Sato’s Phoenix Home.
Karter had been unaware of its status as a rebel ship until they were suddenly being pursued by TIE fighters. But his actions handling the plasma cannons had earned him more of Sato’s trust, even though he hadn’t been looking for it. Now, inexplicably, Sato was treating him as a full crewmember, even a valued one.
But Karter knew it wouldn’t last. He would do this final mission to Kessel, because some part of him deep inside had to know if there truly were Force-sensitives there. After that, he would leave. There was nothing to be gained by tangling in sedition. Nothing but death and torture, especially for him.
Karter eventually drifted off into an uneasy sleep but was awakened much too soon by the sound of the ship’s hyperdrive powering down. He groaned – if the pounding in his temples was any sign, this was not going to be an easy mission.
Grabbing his small bag in which he kept his worldly possessions, he tied it securely to his back. With a last scan of his bunk, he ducked out of the room and into the flow of the ship. Sato kept roughly fifty people on the ship, but most were mechanics, intelligence, or droid specialists, not fighters.
Karter met Sato in the hangar, where a small shuttle was waiting to take them to the surface of Kessel. Sato nodded, apparently finding his appearance presentable. Karter was grateful Sato wasn’t Force-sensitive – otherwise he would have felt the pounding in Karter’s head with every step he took.
Force, but he would kill for a drink or a stim right now.
Two other men, whose names Karter hadn’t bothered to learn, rounded out the team. No point in learning them now either, not when Karter was planning to bail before the mission was even over.
Sato debriefed them and laid out the plan, but Karter was only half-listening. If the commander noticed that Karter had a travel bag strapped to his back, he gave no sign.
They boarded the shuttle and left Pheonix Home in orbit. The shuttle flew low, staying out of range of Imperial scanners. As it did, Karter peered out the open door, taking in the mines of Kessel as he did.
The spice mines of Kessel were infamous. It was where Imperial prisoners went to die, worked to death attempting to extricate the spice, with its myriad of uses, from the ground. The Empire maintained that the spice mined here was used in medicine, but Karter knew that roughly half ended up refined as the spice stims he used to muffle the voices in his head.
However, their shuttle flew them over the spice mines, red gauges in the ground where once forests had stood. Karter could barely make out the workers below, but his connection to the Force, restored with his sobriety, whispered of unspeakable fear and pain. Karter shut his eyes and tried to drown it all out.
The prison towered in the near distance, its walls red and dour, spotlights sweeping even in broad daylight. Stormtroopers swarmed over it, their white armor a standout against the red rock.
Their shuttle didn’t even land long enough for them to step out; instead, they all jumped, rolling to their feet and dashing under cover as the shuttle soared away towards the rendezvous.
They hurried along an outer wall, knowing they had only moments until the next patrol came by. Using grappling hooks, they ascended silently, and not a moment too soon. Stormtroopers passed only a few meters under Karter’s boots.
The prison was only five stories high, but schematics revealed another two or three levels below them in the bowels of the structure. Karter could only hope that no prisoners were down there. It would be next to impossible to get them out.
As he slid up over the warm red stone, Karter pressed his hands to it, taking a deep breath on instinct to help center himself. And as he did, he felt it. Pain. Fear. Terror.
He groaned and clutched his head, nearly vomiting right then and there. Sato had been right. There was at least one Force-sensitive here. And they were being tortured.
But, just as he had feared, the sense wasn’t coming from above him.
It was below.
Cursing his foul luck, Karter reacted on instinct. Reversing the grappling hook, he swiftly began repelling down the building, keeping a sharp eye out for stormtroopers as he did so. The last patrol had just passed. He should have time.
He could feel the confusion of his compatriots, but they were too professional to shout their surprise. Karter signaled that they should keep moving upwards.
He landed softly on the ground and retracted his grappling hook before running in a low crouch towards the ledge. The prison was built out of a hollowed mountain, which was only connected to the mines by a single bridge used to bring prisoners in. A spiraling road ran along the outside which allowed for stormtrooper patrols but it was narrow – no room to land a ship, which was likely by design.
Karter hesitated. He had no ship and no way to escape if Sato and the crew left him behind. He knew there had to be Imperial shipyards nearby, but he had missed them coming in on the shuttle. Scanning around him, Karter squinted through the haze created by the mines and spotted a ship lifting off the ground, likely ready to run a shipment of spice. He judged it to be two clicks away, a nearly insurmountable distance if he were being pursued.
It was then that he realized that his alcohol-muddled brain was not thinking clearly. Even his original plan – to help Sato and the others rescue prisoners but leave before returning to Phoenix Home – had been a flawed plan. There was no escape from Kessel.
A spike in the fear he was feeling brought him back to his present. Whatever happened, he was in too deep now. He had to help this person.
He growled and launched himself downwards, determined to be clear of the path before the stormtroopers came. He slammed into the path below, rolling to absorb the impact as he landed.
He darted to one of the access ports and keyed in the code Sato had given all of them at the start of the mission. He held his breath – if the code didn’t work, if Sato’s intelligence was wrong, then he was about to be surrounded.
The door blinked green and hissed open and Karter stumbled inside with a sigh of relief. Sato wasn’t completely useless.
Karter reached out with the Force, frowning as he did so. The waves of the Force were turbulent and chaotic, but he couldn’t decide if it was because of where he was or because it was his first time actively reaching for the Force in months. Either way, he knew one thing – the Force-sensitive was here.
Karter hurried down the hallway, allowing the Force to sing to him in ways it had not in years, broadcasting all of the fear and pain of the Force-sensitive that he could bear. He couldn’t risk missing the door.
As it turned out, Karter couldn’t have missed the prisoner’s door if he tried. Two stormtroopers stood outside of it, their weapons at the ready. Karter frowned, then groaned softly when he realized what he was going to have to do. Glancing around for cameras, he straightened his shirt and strolled out casually from around the corner, waving a hand at the two guards.
“You’re going to open this door and walk away. You’re not going to speak of this to anyone.”
For an agonizing moment, the stormtroopers gazed at him. Then, finally, one keyed the door and they walked away.
Finally. Karter dashed inside the prison cell. He glanced around him and recoiled at the stains on the floor and the palpable fear and misery and pain that hung over the cell. A chair that he was all too familiar with stood in the center of the floor. And strapped to it, her eyes red and her face bruised, was a small child.
“Kriff,” Karter cursed.
The child’s head snapped up, her terror growing as she took in the sight of him. She whimpered, drawing back into herself as best as she could with the manacles.
For a few seconds, all Karter could do was stare. The poor girl was emaciated, her face slightly sunken in a way no healthy child’s should be. She wore a prison jumpsuit, but it hung on her. There were scars on her face and her hair was matted with filth.
His scrutiny was increasing her terror. He could feel it. It sickened him.
Unable to bear her distress, Karter reached out with the Force and tried to project calm. Centering himself, he flicked his fingers at the locks and the manacles leaped open, freeing the young girl.
She sagged as her body lost the support of the manacles and Karter jumped forward in time to stop her limp body from hitting the floor. Her eyes were barely focused, roving the chamber in delirium. She was likely only six or seven, though it was hard to be sure, given how sharply her ribs were protruding from underneath the prisoner’s uniform she wore. Her brown hair was plastered to her head with sweat and bruises and wounds covered every part of her body that was visible to Karter.
Swearing profusely on the Empire, Karter lifted her gently, cradling her in his arms. As he did so, he took a moment to sweep the rest of the facility with his focus on the Force, searching for any other prisoners who might be Force-sensitive. He found none but he wasn’t surprised. He was shocked this little girl was here. By the Empire’s standards, she should have been on Mustafar.
However, there was no doubt that this girl was not, or had ever been, a Padawan. She had likely been born a year or two after Order 66. So perhaps that meant the stormtroopers here knew she had no useful intel? They were just abusing her because they could?
Rage crashed through him but Karter gritted his teeth and forced it away. It wouldn’t do him or the child any good.
He shifted the girl so he could free his right hand, disturbed at how easy it was to carry her with only one arm. He was almost grateful she had passed out. Hopefully it would make this easier for them both. Reaching to his holster, he pulled out his blaster.
Darting out of the cell, Karter checked briefly for stormtroopers before hurrying upwards through the inner workings of the prison. No way he could operate a grappling hook with a child in his arms.
He reached the main level with little incident. He was meters from the door when the alarms began to blare.
Ducking behind a group of crates, Karter waited, holding the girl tight to his pounding heart. Stormtroopers rushed past him.
“Set your weapons to stun!” he heard a commander shout. “We need to know who gave them this intel.”
Karter could hardly believe his luck as he watched the stormtroopers run into the upper levels of the prison. Obviously, his former associates had tripped an alarm or something. Karter hesitated, but he knew he could not wait to rescue Sato and his men. He had to get the girl out and to safety. Besides, he was hesitant to reveal her to Sato and his crew. He would have to explain who she was and how he had managed to find her, which was not a discussion he wanted to have with the rebels. Not only that, he was uncertain of how they would treat her – or him – when they found out the truth.
The way Karter saw it, it would go one of two ways. Either they would try to turn them over to the Empire, which was unlikely, or they would try to recruit them. Neither course was acceptable for Karter.
Besides, Sato and his men had backup. They would be fine.
A small detachment of four stormtroopers remained behind. Knowing he would have to be fast, he gently settled the girl onto the ground, hoping that she wouldn’t choose now to regain consciousness. Taking a steadying breath, Karter leveled his blaster at them. He took out two before the others could react. Darting around the crates, he smashed his blaster through the duroplastic helmet and faceshield of the trooper attempting to open his comms. The other trooper managed to fire two shots before Karter whipped his legs out from under him, sending the trooper toppling to the floor, where Karter ended him with a blaster bolt to the heart.
Grabbing the girl again, Karter ran from the facility, taking out two cameras as he went. There was likely still going to be evidence of his performance today. And it wouldn’t be lost on the guards – if they knew the girl was Force-sensitive – that he must be too.
Karter needed a ship.
He reached a small copse of wooded area, the last he could see for clicks around. He could feel the girl stirring in his arms and though they had little time, Karter wanted to assess her injuries and scout his best route to a ship.
Sitting down against a tree trunk, he took a deep, calming breath, trying to smooth his features. He didn’t want to scare the girl.
Her eyes fluttered open, revealing a startling amber color. Her right eye was bloodshot from a burst vessel.
Her breathing quickened as she stared at him and she struggled to sit up, her confusion and panic hitting Karter like a wave. He grimaced and grabbed the girl gently by the shoulders.
“Careful now, youngling. You’re safe. You’re okay.”
Her breathing was still ragged, but she stopped trying to sit up which worried Karter. Her injuries were likely severe.
Karter managed to smile at her though, trying to put her at ease. “What’s your name? I’m Karter.”
For several heartbeats, it appeared she wasn’t going to answer. But then: “M-Mira.”
“Mira,” Karter echoed. “It’s a pretty name. Do you have a last name, Mira?”
She shook her head, her eyes wide and frightful.
“It’s okay,” he soothed. “Mira, do you hurt anywhere?”
Slowly, she nodded.
“Where do you hurt Mira? Can you point?”
But she shook her head, her eyes welling with tears. “E-Everywhere,” she squeaked, tears beginning to run down her face.
Unable to bear her distress, Karter sent out soothing waves through the Force. As he did so, he used it to gently probe her, searching for injuries. The child wasn’t wrong – there was not part of her that wasn’t abused and aching. There were a few areas, however, that concerned Karter more than others.
“Can you move your arm, Mira?”
She tried and immediately dissolved into gasping. Karter placed a hand over her arm, even though she whimpered as he did. It was likely broken and Karter didn’t have anything close to resembling medical supplies. Her skin was hot to the touch, which meant she either had a fever or had been drugged.
And a growing patch of blood on her side had Karter even more concerned.
“Mira, I need to look at this okay?” Lifting her shirt, Karter’s fury nearly broke when he found open wounds on her side. He couldn’t tell what had inflicted them, but they were undoubtedly infected, which was likely the cause of Mira’s fever. They hadn’t just been torturing the child – they were well on their way to killing her.
Tearing the hem of his shirt, Karter wrapped it around the wound, binding it as tight as he dared. Mira’s eyes had begun to list closed again while he had inspected her wounds and he caught her as she slumped forward.
“Sleep, Mira,” he soothed, brushing her hair out of her bloodshot eyes. “Next time you wake up, we’ll be on a ship, okay?”
She didn’t seem to register his words but her eyes drifted shut and she was very quickly asleep again.
Carrying her cradled in his arms, Karter walked to the edge of the copse of woods, inspecting the shipyards, which were closer than he had hoped. But they were below him, closer to the mines, and trying to scramble down the ridge would be impossible without being spotted.
That left him with two options, neither of which he wanted to take. Either wait until cover of darkness to go down the ridge or circle the shipyard at a distance and attempt to go in through the mines.
Waiting until nightfall meant waiting all the longer to get Mira the medical treatment she so desperately needed. Even now, her breathing was hitched and there was the faint sound of fluid in her lungs. But, going through the mines likely meant shooting his way through, which would mean having to leave Mira behind in the woods while he secured a ship. And, if he was captured, she would surely die.
“Kriff,” he groaned. He was going to have to wait until nightfall. He couldn’t risk leaving her behind. Worse, if she woke up and he wasn’t there, she might wander off and he would never find her on this blasted rock.
While he waited, he wasn’t idle. He quickly set up a camouflaged blind among the trees, the better to hide from stormtroopers when they eventually came looking. He also searched among the trees for any plants that he recognized as medicinal, though that failed spectacularly. He suspected that very little of use had grown on Kessel in quite some time.
Three stormtrooper patrols passed incredibly close to the woods during this period of waiting. When he sensed them coming, Karter dove behind the blind, cradling Mira to his chest as tightly as he could and squeezing his eyes shut, dampening his presence in the Force as much as he could.
They only gave the woods a curiosity glance. The stormtroopers obviously suspected that their quarry had already left on a waiting ship. That was good. Hopefully Sato and the others had managed to escape and the stormtroopers thought Karter had gone with them.
Finally, Karter deemed it dark enough to move on. Mira had slept the entire day and she showed no signs of stirring even as he lifted her into his arms once more.
Carefully, Karter began picking his way down the ridge, his sights set on a kappa-class shuttle. It was old, a holdover from the Clone Wars and likely appropriated from the Republic, but it had a hyperdrive and shielding and, most importantly, it was sitting empty at the moment, its doors open and ready to receive passengers. Plus, he knew how to pilot it, having done so during the war.
Karter made it to the ship without incident, except for torn pants when he misjudged a step in the dark and tripped, falling head over heels for several meters and doing his best to shield Mira. She had been unscathed, thank the Force.
Glancing around, Karter quickly darted inside of the shuttle. It was just as he remembered it, the large troop cabin dominating the vast majority of the ship. He arranged Mira in the front row, buckling her in to the best of his ability, given her limp body. He had no doubt this escape was going to get bumpy.
Hurrying to the cockpit, he keyed in Sato’s codes, holding his breath as he went through the startup sequence. The ship thrummed to life and Karter clenched his fist in triumph as he grabbed hold of the controls and began to guide the ship out of the hollowed-out ship yard.
Someone attempted to hail him on comms but he ignored it, pushing the ship into the upper atmosphere as he worked to activate the navicomputer. The ship’s scanners blinked with incoming TIEs but Karter snorted as he threw the ship into hyperspace. He did it. He had gotten them away.
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