Side-Arc: Beak “Puppet Strings”

            “Yo, Captain!” yelled Deander Irkot, an Iktotchi cargo worker. “Those stabilizers you were looking for had just arrived!”

            Olto Gabin stopped in his fast-paced inspection of the incoming cargo on the far side of the Sidewinder’s expanded cargo hold, long neck swiveling to focus his eyes on the Iktotchi. “I was just about to ask about those,” he said, smiling. “Splendid, Deander! Have the ones we need installed and stow the in the mechanics’ shop!”

            Irkot nodded, his downward-pointing horns thumping against his chest. “On it, sir!” he said, turning to the others on his team and giving orders. Gabin nodded in approval, amused that the young Iktotchi had once again brought up the thing that he was about to talk about, and continued deeper into the ship. Folding his lower arms behind his back, Gabin checked the ship over with his upper hands as he walked.

            The Sidewinder was showing to be in good repair, he thought to himself. The mechanics had just confirmed the shipment of those parts needed to get the Corellian Corvette spaceworthy again, so the crew was in high spirits. In three weeks, they said, the parts would be installed and tested out. The Corvette had sat on the landing pad in Cove Town for nearly six months; Gabin could well understand if the crew was feeling restless when they knew they’d be back among the stars soon.

            In the meantime, however, the Xexto captain was going to have to keep his people busy. The repairs were under way, at least, and those crew with extra skills were in the town, doing what they could to earn enough wages to help the Sidewinder afford the upkeep it needed. Gabin was certain he could keep everyone busy long enough to get the ship off the ground before that restlessness caused anyone any trouble.

            His impromptu visual inspection ended when Gabin was standing at the door to his personal quarters. He nodded in approval at the marking of red tape on his keypad; the crewmember on cleaning duty had finished with Gabins’ cabin, and with the red tape, indicated he had messages waiting for him inside.

            Keying his door to open, Gabin looked around the spacious (for a Xexto) captain’s quarters and smiled in approval. His crew were good people, and their work was evidence of such. He’d be happier if they were not on Saulapran anymore, but that would be soon. He went over to his desk and spied the four datacards arranged neatly by his personal terminal.

            Two were instantly recognizable to Gabin. Those had the all-too-familiar Saulapran Commerce stamps, indicating confirmation of payments to his ship for services rendered around the town and planet. Those would be for that transporting of high-market foodstuffs to their warehouse and that security contract for the Cove Town city officials. Neither were bringing in high profits, but every little bit helped with resupplying the Corvette.

            The third was marked with the Sidewinder logo, so it was a crewmember’s message. Gabin slid the datacard into the reader on his terminal and quickly scrolled through it. A maintenance technician was needing an order of alluvial dampers to go out with the next supply run. That was an easy fix, so Gabin moved the request to his itinerary and took out the datacard.

            The fourth datacard looked as if it had been recently used, and harshly at that. The edges were blunted, and its grill had small bends among the tines; Gabin wondered briefly if the card was even readable. The marking on the front of the card was done with shipboard tape and had been scrawled on with a pen: ‘Urgent, Private, R.T.’

            Gabin felt the nearly ever-present grin on his face fade as one of his stomachs tightened. Those initials, and with the obvious haste the card was set up…

            Gabin took the card and gently slid it into the reader. All that was one the card was simple text document, not even a holo.

            “Olto, I have the data you and the Senator asked for, but I can’t get it to you via a message drop. I might have been tagged on my way out through Bespin, so I sent the Comet on ahead and arrived on Saulapran alone. You said you and the Senator would owe me big for getting this data, so I’m calling it in now: get me off this rock. I’ll be waiting on Helicity #22, the “Rainbow Chaser”, to give you the data and arrange transport. Be careful; I saw a few Imperial soldiers on the main deck when I left the shuttle. -R.T.”

            Gabin stared at the text for a long moment, suddenly cold despite his quarters being set to a higher temperature than the rest of the ship. So, he had come through on the mission for the Senator, after all. Gabin had been skeptical on whether the human would have been successful, but he had done numerous jobs for the Senator over the past two years.

            But now he was stuck on Saulapran, and the one helicity he went to ground just had to be the one with an Imperial stopover station. Great.

            Gabin shook his head. It made sense that he would have ended up at Rainbow Chaser, even with the Imperial presence. It was the primary stop for off-worlders arriving on Saulapran, when they weren’t going to the surface, or ‘dirt-bound’, as the locals said. That was why there were Imperials on the platform in the first place. At least it was a small garrison; at last count, Gabin thought there were only two squads of Imperial Army troops on the helicity, with no stormtroopers at all.

            Arranging transport for the human would not be a challenge, Gabin thought. If he could keep his head down for the next month, Gabin could arrange for the Myatil to pick him up and fly him out to wherever he needed to go. The Myatil’s hyperdrive was currently disconnected, as a preventative to thievery, but the mechanics on the Sidewinder could get everything in it up and running in a couple days.

            After they fix the Sidewinder’s engines, of course, Gabin thought. Securing the data the human had in his possession would be trickier, however. He needed to go up to the Rainbow Chaser and secure the card in person, but a non-human tended to stand out among the populace of the helicities. Being a Xexto, Gabin was exotic enough to warrant Imperial attention. That meant there would be a good chance he would be questioned and possibly searched. Any personal computers or datacards would likely be confiscated.

            Closing his eyes in thought, Gabin considered his options. If he wanted to secure the datacard that the human was bringing, it would have to be with a device that could simply hold the datacard. If the human had been successful, then the data would be encrypted with the Senator’s own codes. Gabin himself would not be able to access the information, let alone anyone who took it from him. If an Imperial patrol took it and found out about the encryption, the Senator would be implicated…

            Gabin steepled his upper hands and drummed his lower hands’ fingers on is desk. He was going to need a datacard storage device that would not attract the attention of any Imperials but could also not attempt accessing the information unless ordered to. Datapads were programmed to access any datacards in their system.

            The drumming of his lower hands stopped suddenly. He did have one resource that fit the bill…

            No, Gabin thought, shaking his head. I promised them I would take care of him.

            Gabin looked over to the far wall of his cabin where his shelves were bolted into the bulkhead. There were a few odds and ends on the shelves, namely mementos from friends and family. In one corner lay a tattered gray scarf and a leather skullcap with human-sized goggles, both untouched for so long that even on the Sidewinder, they had a fine coating of dust.

            You knew the time would come that he would start learning, Gabin’s thoughts crept into his mind. They warned you that it would eventually happen.

            Gabin sighed, placing all four hands palm-first onto his desk. If that time was now, it was best that Gabin was present and able to help where he could. He reached for his comm and punched in a number.

            “Beak!” he said, smile back in place as the droid answered. “I have a sky-bound job for us! Get the Myatil ready to launch. I’ll be there in twenty minutes!”

***

Beak looked back and forth between the flight controls of the shuttle and his captain, nervousness beginning to override his primary search protocols. “Captain,” he said, “I feel obligated to remind you that I am not rated to fly the shuttle.”

“I know, Beak,” Captain Gabin said, lower hands resting in his lap while the upper two busied themselves with a datapad. “But not to worry! This is a simple negotiation for an upcoming ferrying job. You won’t have to make any daring maneuvers on the way there or back.”

Beak nodded, joints whirring in the quiet of the shuttle. “If I may ask, though, Captain,” he began, “if that were the case, then why are you bringing me along? Wouldn’t Mistress Wessiri be better suited for such a task?”

“If she could speak Rodian, absolutely,” Captain Gabin said, chuckling. “But as it stands, I might need a translator. Why clutter the ship with more people than I need? Besides,” he waved a dismissive lower right hand at the side viewport, indicating the town below, “Lina’s taken on a contract today in town, helping haul local cargo. We need every credit we can get for the Sidewinder, so while she’s doing that, we’ll be up here securing another contract further down the line.”

“Understood, Captain,” Beak said, though he was still uneasy about the assignment. Pulling back on the controls, he guided the Myatil to the lower cloud formations and oriented the shuttle towards the nearest rain clouds.

“Captain,” Beak said as he fed power to the Myatil’s thrusters, “I’m given to understand that the helicities were programmed with routes that avoided the worst weather on Saulapran. Why would one follow the storms, instead?”

“Advertising, mostly,” Captain Gabin said, his tone amused. “Helicity #22 is better known as the Rainbow Chaser. Its routes are designed to follow the formations of storms, as they have better odds of producing a rainbow when the sun breaks through.”

Beak absorbed this as the helicity in question came into view. He recalled what data he had concerning the helicity’s design as Captain Gabin commed Helicity Control for their landing pad. The platform was a fairly standard design for a Saulapran helicity: nearly a kilometer wide, the top of the platform was flat while its underside held the numerous repulsorlift engines and attitude thrusters that maintained its flight path. The top half of the helicity was ringed with landing pads that were bolted along the edge of the helicity itself, held in place by heavy braces. The ‘city’ built on the platform was confined to an hourglass shape, wide at the platforms’ edge and narrowed at the center. Beak noted that the tallest building was at the center of the platform, standing just over six stories high and tapered with communications antennae. On either side of the hourglass-shaped city, Beak saw that the platforms’ surface had been dedicated to parks or pedestrian-only markets.

Settling the shuttle onto its struts, Beak went about the post-flight shutdown with the speed and efficiency that only a droid with a recently-installed piloting program could. Captain Gabin had purchased the modular datacard specifically for this assignment, putting Beak’s torso-mounted datacard reader to good use. Sadly, as Beak could also be needed to hold sensitive data, he would not be able to hold onto the datacard in the future.

“All right, Beak!” Captain Gabin said as he stepped onto the helicity’s open platform. “Lock down the shuttle and we’ll be off!”

The ‘open platform area’ was, to Beak, something of an oddity for Saulapran: a well-manicured park. The buildings looked to be evenly spaced and rigid in their acreage, being shorter as they approached the edge. The borders between the cityscape and the parks were designed to serve as the pedestrian area and more open than the crowded structures. Beak could see shop fronts along the buildings’ sides, catering to the needs of residents and tourists. At the epicenter, with permacrete walkways spoking out to the landing pads, was an actual park. Beak was surprised to see a small lake in one area, and the rest of the implanted greenery supporting flower beds, bushes, and a few trees.

“I might have been overly prejudiced in my judgement of this structure,” Beak said, mostly to himself.

Captain Gabin nodded, proving his hearing was still just as sharp as it had been when Beak had been bought by the Xexto at auction. “That will happen,” he said. “The nobles of Saulapran were all immigrants and brought something of their home planets with them when they made the journey here.” He waved at the trees. “These are from Corellia, I believe. Junip’ta Saps.”

Beak considered the trees, making a mental note to ask Taran Scarn about the leaf patterns. Captain Gabin led Beak through the park and into the city, eventually taking one of the many stairwells that went down into the helicity itself. Beaks’ databank gave details about how most of the population, namely its ignoble workforce and any travelers not given an ‘above-deck license’, congregated in the ‘below-deck levels’.

“Am I to assume that the person we’re negotiating with is not one of the upper strata of Saulapran society?” Beak asked as Captain Gabin turned them into a crowded corridor of obvious laborers and ruffians. They appeared to be walking through a market area that reminded Beak strongly of the market streets down in Cove Town. He could have sworn that fish merchant had been dirt-bound just two days ago.

“If we’re sticking to just Saulapran,” Captain Gabin said over his shoulder, upper arms hanging loose while his lower hands were clasped behind his back, “then you’d be correct. But we would have to include ourselves in that same lot, and I like to think the crew of the Sidewinder to be a noble lot all to themselves.”

Beak’s eyes flashed in surprised dismay. “Of course, Captain,” he said hastily, raising his arms in a placating gesture that also served to move them away from a gaggle of Sullustan children running by next to him. “I merely meant—”

“I understand, Beak,” Captain Gabin said, laughing softly as he deftly moved through the children nearly his own height. “Come on!”

Beak looked to where the Captain was pointing: a sliding metal door that showed signs of disrepair, with a sign bolted into the bulkhead over the frame reading “Iron Ale” that showed water damage through flaking in its surface. The scene struck Beak as…dubious.

Before he could voice his concerns, Captain Gabin had already keyed the door open and strolled inside. Beak followed, eyeing the interior of the business with a critical eye. While the market corridor had been poorly lit and crowded, the Iron Ale was roomy and lightly populated. There was also a strong usage of wood furniture along with the metal fixtures and walls, which while it made Beak not trust the structural integrity, he saw it made the Captain visibly relax.

As to the population, Beak could only see five being in the cantina, excluding himself and the Captain. The bartender, a Draethos according to Beak’s memory, was cleaning a glass with deft movements and smiling at the newcomers with its seeming overbite. In one corner of the cantina and crowding an old-tech repeater display were a group of Ugnaughts, who seemed to be completely absorbed in a ghetrek’d match on the screen. The final occupant…

“Hullo, Gabin!” said the human sitting at the bar. “Took you long enough to come up the way, didn’t you?”

Beak eyed the human warily, wishing he had a medical droid’s bio-scan ability. He was a tall and lanky human, with unkempt red hair and a red-brown beard. He was clothed in long brown boots, oil- and grime-stained pants, and a tattered shirt, as if he were a scrounger from the helicity’s fringe society. There were numerous fine-line scars along the human’s hands, wrists, and arms.

Upon noticing the scars, Beak felt a subroutine activate within his perception circuits. Analyzing the scars, he surmised that they had been delivered by an unbelievably fine edge that somehow cauterized the injuries immediately afterward. He counted over a hundred-fifty lines on one arm alone, with the oldest along the back of his hand and the newest resting on his forearms. Judging by the placement of the scars and their orientation around his wrists, Beak surmised through his in-depth data that the injuries were self-inflicted but not intentional…

“Beak!” Master Gabin shouted, breaking through Beak’s musing. With a whir of servomotors, Beak shook his head and focused on his master.

“I’m terribly sorry, Master Gabin,” he said. “I honestly don’t know what came over me.”

Captain Gabin raised a bony eyebrow up at the droid, his expression concerned. “Why don’t you just stand next to me,” he said slowly, “and run a diagnostic check, all right?”

“Of course, Master Gabin,” Beak said, seizing upon the moment to distance himself from the awkwardness. Whatever subroutine was running had seemed to stop, but Beak decided he should check his management systems and see if it was still operating in the background. He moved to stand next to his master, while the human eyed him curiously.

“You always took in the strange strays, Gabin,” the human said. Beak’s photoreceptors flashed briefly at this, but he could see an odd smile on the humans’ face. “Granted, you took me in, so I’d say he’s par for the course.”

“You did perfectly well aboard the Sidewinder, Raza,” Master Gabin said. “Now, about this pickup.”

The human, Raza, launched into some explanation about needing transport to Tatooine so he could meet with his own crew, but did not want the Sidewinder to handle the job. Beak stood there, impassive while he puzzled out the recent changes. Why was Captain Gabin suddenly Master Gabin? In the past year of his service to the Captain, Olto Gabin had not only refused the title, but ordered Beak to never use it. Maybe that subroutine had occupied too much running memory and he had slipped into old habits.

“It’s going to be difficult, Gabin,” Raza was saying, fishing in his pockets for something or other. “Like it or not, she’ll be here right around the time the Sidewinder is ready to fly. I’d suggest getting the shuttle and lighting out for the Outer Rim, but that’s the problem: we don’t know who she’s hunting.”

“And running now just implicates everyone,” Master Gabin said softly. “It’s too soon for that.” He shook his head, bobbing on his long neck. “No, we can’t risk that. We’ll have to proceed as normal.”

Raza snorted in derision. “As normal, you say.” The human pointed a finger at Master Gabin. “When has any of your plans, much less the Senator’s, proceeded as normal, Gabin?”

Beak’s eyes locked on to the human as a different subroutine became active. His arms moved to rest on the bar between Raza and Master Gabin, his gears screaming with pressure as his arms bent back and forth.

“Kindly speak to my master with respect, sir,” Beak said, “or I will be forced to take offense.”

“Now-now, Beak,” Master Gabin said, his usually cheerful voice sounding harried as he patted at the droids’ arms, “stand down. Raza is allowed latitude in social graces, being a friend and personal ally.”

At the words ‘stand down’, Beak’s subroutines disconnected. With a lurch, he stepped away from the bar and the pair, both of whom were giving Beak odd looks. Beak focused his photoreceptors on Master…Captain Gabin.

“I’m terribly sorry, Captain Gabin,” Beak said, then turning to the human, “Master Raza. I don’t appear to be entirely myself today.”

“Thinner air up here, I’m sure,” Raza said, raising an eyebrow at Captain Gabin. “You never would wipe the memories of your droids, would you?”

Captain Gabin shrugged. “I prefer them to grow into their own people,” he said. “Better for them and the crew, in my experience. So, how do you want to handle this?”

Raza shook his head in tired amusement, then looked over at the bartender. The Draethos tilted his head at the human expectedly. Raza gave a theatrical sigh and slapped two coins onto the bar, which the bartender took and moved to the far side of the countertop.

Once the bartender was as far as he could possibly go, Raza pulled a datacard from a pocket. “It’s right here,” he said, holding up the datacard. “How can you keep it secure?”

“Easily enough,” Captain Gabin said, taking the datacard and turning his head up to the droid. His smile was not amused this time, but rather sad. “Beak, priority one security protocol, activate.”

Beak felt a slight electrical shock as multiple circuits clicked on to power new subroutines. His body froze for a moment, but the plate covering his torso datacard-reader swung open. “Captain?” he asked hesitantly.

“It’s all right,” Captain Gabin said. “I’ll explain it later. I need this kept safe,” he held the datacard up for Beak to consider it. “The information on this datacard is vitally important, and you’re the safest person I can entrust with it. Hold on it in your reader until we’re back on the Sidewinder. Do you understand?”

“Yes, Captain,” Beak said, not entirely truthfully. Captain Gabin slid the card into the reader, tapping the plate to close it over Beak’s torso.

“Stand easy, Beak,” Captain Gabin said, and Beak’s joints suddenly relaxed and let out hisses of compressed air. “I’ll explain everything in due time.”

“Un..,” Beak started, sifting through the subroutines as they faded away from his awareness, “understood, Captain.”

“We’re not out of the woods here yet, Gabin,” Raza said, pointing with his chin toward the door. Beak focused his photoreceptors to follow Raza’s hint to see four Imperial Army soldiers walking in, wearing their fatigues in a rumpled fashion.

“Heyo, long-face!” one of the soldiers said, looking at the Draesho, “get us a few pints, would you?” The man lurched slightly in his step as he reached back to indicate his fellow soldiers. “We’ve been through a few of the cantinas here, and we’re hoping to find an actual good beer somewhere on this hovering trash compactor.”

“Just a minute, sirs,” the bartender said, holding up both hands. “I’m afraid that according to Helicity Local Law, I cannot serve those who seem to already be intoxica—”

“Just pour the beer, no-chin!” one of the other soldiers said, slurring his words. “You wouldn’t want us to suspect you for aiding and abetting insurgents, would you?”

The Draethos visibly bristled at the threat while Raza and Captain Gabin both bent their heads together. Beak saw the bartender look at each of the soldiers for a long minute before he went to fulfill the order.

“What’s this, now?” a third drunken soldier said, swaying towards Captain Gabin and staring down at the Xexto with obviously malicious cheer. “You get lost on your way to the zoo, four-hands?”

Raza rose halfway out of his seat until Gabin waved him down. Beak wondered privately why he had taken offense to Raza simply being sarcastic while he was letting the Imperial openly insult his Captain.

Captain Gabin craned his head to look at the Imperial soldier, his smile still holding while he held all four hands clasped behind his back. “Why, no sir,” he said, “I’m afraid I haven’t. In fact, my friend and I here,” he indicated Raza with a tilt of his head, “were just about to have a round of beer ourselves. I’d be more than happy to buy you four a round as well.” Captain Gabin winced through his smile. “That is, provided you leave immediately afterward.”

The Imperial sneered at the Captain. “Why’s that?” he asked. “Are we not good company for you aliens?” He turned his sneer back to the other three soldiers, and Beaks noticed that they were now smiling with the look of drunken bloodlust. Something about that expression made Beak want to shiver, but he could not figure out why.

“Or you alien-lovers?” the soldier was saying, turning back to look hard at Raza. “What, you don’t prefer the company of your own kind, trash-peddler?”

“You really need to work on your insulting names, boyo,” Raza muttered. “I know two teenagers who can curse better than you, and one has a speech impediment.”

“What’s that?!” the soldier said, straightening his back to seem larger. “You got a problem with how I talk, you wannabe urchin?”

Raza raised an eyebrow, and opened his mouth to retort, but looked at Captain Gabins’ hands. Beak looked, too, and saw that his Captain was making several hand signals. Raza watched the gestures for a moment, then relaxed further back onto his seat.

“That’s what I thought,” the soldier slurred, before looking back at Captain Gabin. “Now,” he said, roughly placing a hand on the Xexto’s shoulder and attempting to steer him toward the bar, “I think you said something about buying me and my lads here a few drinks.

“Beak,” Captain Gabin said, sighing, “stand firm.”

Priority One Security Protocol reinitialized.

Beak did not fully understand what had happened or how it came to be, but when he next knew what was happening, he was tightly gripping the wrist of the hand that had accosted his master. According to the panicked shouts from nearby and the frantic struggles of the owner of said wrist, very tightly.

“I apologize,” Beak said, noting in the reflection of a nearby smooth surface that the lights of his photoreceptors had changed from gold to red. “But I cannot allow you to so manhandle my master. I also don’t believe you have that much time to continue in such a seemingly entertaining pastime.”

“Yeah?” the Imperial asked, slowing down in his struggle to free his hand, “and why’s that?”

Beak tilted his head slightly, ensuring he was looking at the Imperial soldier with both eyes, and squeezed harder.

The delicate wrist bones snapped loudly, and Beak’s gears sent warning signals to his awareness. He had somehow disengaged the safety restraints of that hand. But he knew his role in this moment, instinctively. He let go of the wrist, and the Imperial soldier collapsed to the floor, writhing in pain.

“Because you’ve had a rather nasty fall out there,” Beak said. He looked at the other three. “I strongly recommend you escort your friend to the medical wing, three levels down from here. The nearest working turblift is a nearby, less than a hundred meters away.”

The three unharmed soldiers gave each long looks before one of them stepped foreward and helped their injured comrade out the door.

“Beak,” Master Gabin said, “rest easy, and head back to the shuttle. Raza,” he looked at the human, still seated, “I’ll see you in a few weeks. Be ready to leave, if you please.”

Raza was gazing thoughtfully at the door where the Imperials had gone through, then shifted his eyes to focus on the droid. “Sure,” he slowly said. “Sure thing.”

            “Come along, Beak,” Captain Gabin said, and for the first time since he had been bought at the auction house, Beak could hear nothing but the serious tones of command in Captain Gabin’s voice. “We have work to do, and you’ll have question shortly thereafter.”

“Yes, Captain,” Beak said, looking down the hand that had broken the man’s wrist. Shuddering, he hurried to his captain’s side and walked out of the cantina for the stairwell.