Grego’s ten hours had passed, and the time to act had come.
Ayna had found herself a dark little corner in the bar and stayed there for the last hour, with the hood tucked down low and a drink in front of her. She wasn’t inconspicuous enough to be conspicuous. Just enough to not be noticed.
Whatever meeting had been going on in Zan-Kiko’s stronghold was over, and the gangsters had been filing in in twos and threes. They didn’t wear distinctive outfits, but she nevertheless recognised them by their demeanour, their expectation of respect and fear from people, and the way people indeed got out of their way.
These were the local predators. And while they were away Ayna was going to walk into their lair.
She got up and slowly strolled out onto the floor, keeping away from the lights as well as she could. She’d had her eyes on two potential marks for a while now, and both had obligingly been drinking fast and hard.
“Will the collar shock me for theft?” she asked quietly.
There was a moment of silence on the other end of the earpiece.
“No.”
“Did you just deactivate a feature?”
“No.”
“Would you admit to it if you had?”
“Possibly not.”
“I will admit this association is nothing if not exciting.”
That was it as far as jokes went. For a moment Ayna thought of Kiris’s observation of her switching between modes like some machine. Then she just focused.
One of her potential marks was very drunk by now, but the woman’s company had pressed in closer around her. The other was more solitary, and simply leaning up against a pillar. She strolled past him, making it look natural and never turning her face directly his way. Then, just as she passed and the song on the speakers blared, she lifted an access card from his pocket.
She continued on at a calm, unhurried pace, and never looked his way again.
A bit of a throng had formed between her and the gathering of Zan-Kiko thugs. She didn’t understand the language the group was using, and couldn’t tell if they were just a very passionate bunch or if a fight was brewing. It was hard to tell the difference with some peoples. A table formed the only break in the shouting, hand-waving pack of people, and she opted to go under rather than over it.
She passed between metal legs and flesh legs, and continued on into the chaotic mess without anyone noting her passage.
Zan-Kiko had a beat-up set of couches all to themselves, and better lighting than the rest of the interior. They glowed to her eyes like saints in frescoes, ironically enough, and she evaluated each person’s state of awareness as she moved diagonally towards their general direction.
Once she was as close as she dared, she found herself a square metre or so that wasn’t in use and simply stayed there for a little while, making it seem to a casual viewer like she was taking part in nearby discussions.
She normally didn’t do specific targets like this. Random thefts were generally the safer option. And if she incurred someone’s enmity and was unable to shake them, then her only option was to flee back to her captor for safety. Without the price for her freedom.
But this was the battle for the price, and soon enough a pair of gangsters left their comrades and headed for the bar. Shouted threats parted the crowd, and it only partially solidified in their wake. Ayna used the moment of restructuring to discreetly place herself right where they’d passed. She watched from the corner of her eye as the two gangsters bought two drinks each, then looked completely away.
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The crowd let her know as they returned, and she moved along with them as they demanded passage again.
One thing she’d noticed while skulking about these last few hours was that most of the access cards in use on this station were of the same make. So as the two men passed near her she reached into the pocket of the one in the rear. In one motion she took his card and replaced it with the one she’d taken earlier. With a little bit of luck the theft wouldn’t be noticed until she was well away.
They continued on their merry way, greeted by cheers from their fellows, and Ayna stuck her hands in her pockets, holding her little treasure. She strolled off casually again, heading for the exit. Predators noticed fear.
She’d taken a few steps out into the hallway when a man and a woman she knew to be a part of the gang almost walked into her. It was only natural for the locals to shrink away from these people, and so she promptly did the same.
They passed her by with just a single glance that she attributed to her skin. She continued on and passed through a section of what passed for public space around here, then found that one particular flight of stairs, leading up. She traversed it for a couple of floors, then stopped and waited until she was sure that no one was nearby. Then she lay down flat and crawled in between two particular steps.
Maintenance of this station had clearly been haphazard over the years and decades. Some project or other had in one section left a bit of empty space between floor and ceiling. It was just wide enough for a lithe, flexible person to traverse without too much difficulty. She’d checked earlier, and now went through the whole exercise again.
“I don’t suppose you’d consider just storming the place?” Ayna asked softly, mindful of echoes.
“I estimate there to be at least three hundred armed, dangerous people on this station,” Kavia Sari told her. “All of them hostile to my kind. I do have my limits.”
“Right.”
“I remind you that I am not forcing you to do any of this.”
“Yes, yes.”
After a few moments of silence she arrived at the other side.
Zan-Kiko’s stronghold did have a back entrance, but as Grego had indicated it was not for visitors. Ayna supposed the tall shaft had once been for a now-gone cargo elevator. The car and machinery had been replaced with a rather rickety set of stairs. Ayna’s little back route took her to a landing halfway up. Or rather, above the landing.
The drop was about three metres, and this entire thing hinged on the landing below being a relatively sturdy section. Up on the top landing, by Zan-Kiko’s back entrance, stood an armed guard.
“Alright, I’m starting this thing,” Ayna whispered. “I need you to not distract me. Please keep quiet.”
“Understood.”
She moved her neck a little, feeling the ever-present collar. She thought of days and weeks and months spent in a prison cell, all blending together. She thought of the crew of the Addax. She could make new friends easily enough; it was just a matter of being positive. But these particular ones had gone through danger with her.
She thought of the prospect of the Hunter simply going back on her word for a little extra money, and her own efforts being for naught.
Ayna took a series of deep breaths, and thought of her childhood back on Dwyyk. She thought of her first time seeing loud, clumsy off-worlders, and of biology classes. Ayna had paid little attention to explanations of the forces behind everyday life. She vaguely remembered the teacher talking about their superior ability to store oxygen in the blood so they could go longer without drawing a breath, how they got away with a softer heartbeat than most of humanity’s variations, and other biological oddities that set the people of Dwyyk apart. All in the name of minimising noise.
She thought of the lethal forests of home, and how they affected her people. She thought of the elders, be it those who actually managed a full lifetime on their homeworld, or who returned to it in their twilight. Some still practised the alavak. Once they’d enjoyed everything life could possibly offer and only a slow fading remained, they chose to say their farewells and don a traditional shift. Then they walked off into the forest and finally let it take them.
After a lifetime of evading the dangers of the wild they finally got to face them, on their own terms. Ayna’s own generation had dismissed the alavak at every mention of it, but been reminded that every generation did so in their early years,
Finally, she shut it all out, and acted.