Star Wars - Gathering Shadows - The Origin of the Black Curs - Unpublished Read Online Free PDF

sergeant and she didn’t object, even though she knew it was a propaganda tool. No Infiltrator assignment should ever have garnered that much attention, but this one had, and on her watch. Still, she accepted the promotion and went on about her routine business.
    Then, one day, rummaging through her locker, she found one of Leong’s gloves and her heart shattered into a million pieces.
    Now, lying on the floor in the dark, Jai recalled that moment with a great deal of distance. As if it had happened to somebody else. The memory was vivid, and she could access the sounds and smells and visions of the time with clarity. No matter how hard she tried, however, she couldn’t access the emotion.
    What would Leong say if he could see that Jai had let the Imperials take her? Surely he’d be disappointed. But after two months of feeling nothing, suddenly there had been an onslaught of pain, rage, fear, shame—every bit of which was preferable to numbness. For a couple of blissful days, her brain had been so ravaged by the interrogation that she had forgotten to be numb. And now she was back in the same old rut, wishing the pain across her back, the dried blood on her face, the memory of the Imperial soldier swinging the butt of his blaster rifle at her face, any of it would jar her back into emotion.
    “I’m starting to wonder if we’ve been forgotten. Personally I’m kind of hungry.”
    Harkness’ voice, coming out of another world. Jai had to mentally adjust herself. “Huh?”
    “I said I’m kind of hungry,” he said.
    “Hmm,” she said dully.
    “And that maybe they forgot about us.”
    That got Jai’s attention. “What—you think they left us to rot?”
    Rotting away, that was something that wouldn’t grant any real emotion, either. Her thoughts drifted back to Bevell Three.
    Several minutes later, there was a scraping sound next to Jai’s head. Harkness let out a quick, pained gasp.
    “What?” asked Jai.
    “Sorry. That hurt my eye,” he said.
    “I don’t get what you—”
    “Didn’t you see the light?”
    Jai hadn’t seen anything.
    “The hatch by the door. It opened for a second—” said Harkness.
    “I’m not facing the door,” Jai told him.
    “But you’re near the door?”
    “Yeah.”
    “I think somebody slid something in here,” he said.
    Jai lifted a sore arm and felt around where she thought she had heard the scraping noise. After a moment she touched something soft and wet. Burrowing her finger down into it, she touched metal.
    “I think it’s food,” said Jai. “On a tray.”
    “Taste it,” said Harkness.
    Jai licked her lips; they were metallic and salty with dried blood. “I won’t be able to. Anyway, I bet it’s drugged.”
    “You think?”
    “You’re the prison veteran here. Maybe they want us doped up for some reason.”
    “For what—another interrogation? They don’t need to sneak us drugs for that, not in our condition. They could just come in and—”
    Harkness stopped.
    “And what?”
    “Is it me, or did that food come awfully quickly?”
    He was right. It came as if he’d asked for it.
    “Oh, great,” said Jai. “We’ve been monitored.”
    How could they have overlooked that? She tried to think whether she had told Harkness anything about her past missions, or where she was stationed, or anything at all that could be of use to the Imperials. While she was still racking her brains, she heard the door open, and then footsteps vibrating through the floor, right next to her head. Light flooded into the room, and Jai shut her eyes.
    Somebody grabbed her by the hair, hoisted her under her arms to a near-standing position.
    “Get up, Rebels,” said a man’s voice.
    It was familiar, but Jai couldn’t place it, even as she was dragged from the room, even as Harkness began shouting, and his voice trailed off behind her.

    Platt and Tru’eb came straggling across the valley floor some time close to 0600 Standard, Tru’eb estimated. Somewhere beyond the