STEALTH and TRACK: BOOK ONE

C H A P T E R T W E N T Y-F I V E

FERN'S POV

The morning came, and Echo and Wrecker had taken Omega out to do... Well, they didn't say, but I was invited to join. Tech immediately objected to that, claiming he needed my assistance with accessing the mass inventory data of the abandoned cruiser. Evidently, he has recognized my talent of hacking into systems now he has seen what an exceptional mechanic I am. He hacked away, and it was my job to boost any systems that failed while he did so. For the majority of the morning, we worked in silence. Once high noon struck, the lingering question in my brain finally blurted out.

"How's your head?" I replayed Wrecker, having succumbed to the insidious inhibitor chip, literally seizing the intellectual clone in a chokehold and chucking him into the med bay wall, knocking the latter unconscious. Before I too fell victim under the chip's influence, I had attempted to wake Tech, praying he wasn't too badly injured. I don't know how long he was out, since I had trouble recalling what happened after I woke up being carried by Hunter...

"Huh?" Tech blinked, then glanced up from his datapad with a brow raised. "Since I no longer sustain any pulsating agitation in my cerebrum, I would calculate that I am more competent than my situation before the surgery."

"A 'It's fine.' would've been suffice." I grumbled, rolling my eyes to the side, and decided that that was enough chatter and carried on with my task. Tech paused, as if to contemplate my disgruntled reaction to his smart response. His mouth gaped open for a moment and then closed, deciding he wasn't going to poke the fire.

Hunter strolled over and knelt down between me and Tech, resting his arm on his front knee. "Well? What's the possible hull we are looking at?"

"I have just locked into the existing data, meaning every single file since the system was never swiped after this cruiser was scrapped." Tech adjusted his goggles. "I can confidently deduce we can salvage enough to put an end to our debt with Cid."

"Our debt with Cid?" I groaned, knowing the Trandoshan's motives. She'd probably been charging us the moment we stepped into her parlor all those missions ago. "If you're wanting to swipe enough to repay her in one go, we are going to need something substantial and valuable. Like the cruiser's entire hard-drive."

"Fern, you're a genius." Tech monotonously stated.

"If we sell that sort of intel, we wouldn't have to work jobs for awhile." Hunter's eyes beamed. I wasn't completely onboard.

"Hunter," I leaned towards the sergeant. "Remember what Rafa said? We need to be cautious about who we sell crucial intel like this to. If it falls in the wrong hands, I would feel guilty..."

"I know," Hunter nodded. "Let's say we sell it ourselves and not hand it over to Cid to barter. We can find anything on this cruiser that's worth value. Cid won't know what to do with all the credits."

"Oh, she'll find ways." I smirked.

Suddenly, Hunter's comm was signaled and Echo's voice came in, "Hunter, Tech, Fern, we were spotted by scrappers."

"Don't worry," Omega chimed. "Wrecker's in pursuit."

"That's not comforting." Tech shook his head.

"Echo, get a visual." Hunter ordered, and nodded to me to follow him. By the time we found the others, they had tied up the stunned guild members and we dragged them back to the mouth of the cruiser where we had been camping out for the past couple days. Echo was persistent on leaving now that our cover was blown, but Hunter, referring to our conversation earlier, insisted we needed to stay and salvage what we could in order to earn some money. However, that wasn't enough to convince the cyborg clone.

"Echo," I stood up. "We may not be arms smugglers, but we don't really have a choice at this point. There's no Republic for us to rely on for supplies anymore. We're on our own, and being in debt with Cid is no fun whatsoever. I'm on Hunter's side on this—we are presented with an opportunity here and we have got to take it. Besides, I already told Hunter that if we do sell anything we find valuable here, we make sure the consumers' motives are innocent first."

"Fine." Echo grumbled, crossing his arms in half-agreement.

"Alright. Tech, Fern, you two head up to the bridge, get the power back online, and gather any intel you can get." The sergeant nodded to me—it was my idea, after all. "The rest of you are with me to the armory."

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THIRD PERSON POV

When Fern and Tech reached the bridge, it was in absolute ruins, with almost every inch of metal in the flooring and main console rusted and molded from the polluted water. There were exposed wires all throughout the navigational and lead panels. Along the walkway, there were shattered glass and loose metal scraps littering it. It was pitch-black inside; the sun had nearly set. The female clone tripped over a bent pipe and faceplanted into Tech's armor from behind.

"Ouch," she groaned as she rubbed her nose with one hand and gently pushed off his back with other. "What is this armor made of?"

"Its material originates—"

"It's rhetorical, Wired-Brain." Fern managed to suspend another one of Tech's lectures. "Let's get this gold mine up and running."

It didn't take long for the two clones to start up the electrical power throughout the abandoned cruiser. Simple code and done. Now, for the fun part. Tech flattened his back onto the floor and arched his way underneath the main console. He then pulled a few colored wires loose, electrical sparks crackling, and plugged them into his trusty datapad. A few minutes later, Fern knelt down at his side and cocked her head to get a better view. "Any luck?"

"Sufficient amount of luck." Tech paused on his task to scoot himself out and raise his upper body. In doing so, his helmet lightly knocked against her forehead. 

"My fault. Continue." She ignored the brief throbbing while squeezing her eyes shut and waving her hand at Tech, who was just confused on how clumsy the female clone has become, despite her enhanced skills being stealth and agility.

"Whoever scuttled this ship didn't wipe the hardware's data imprint. I'm transferring files, but we still need to copy the master drive." He pulled a tool from his belt and handed it to his squad mate. "If you would do the honors."

"No problem." Fern smiled, accepting the device and walking over to the panel harboring what they desired. Her head mindlessly tilted up; her eyes squinted to look through the dusty window pane, which exhibited the vast junkyard that must've contained hundreds if not thousands of discarded Jedi cruisers and destroyers. The moonlight illuminated the desolate wreckage. She sighed heavily at the magnetizing view as she leaned on the metal surface.

She briefly wondered if she had ever been aboard one of these ships before it met its final resting place on this junkyard planet. She had visited a hundreds of planets via Jedi cruisers for the majority of her reconnaissance missions. Other times, she flew her own personal ship that she decked onto one. She had even been on the bridge when it was alive and operating, meeting her Jedi generals, receiving her mission(s), and reporting in.

It all seemed so long ago, when in reality, it had only been a few months. Fern exhaled an airy sigh before letting her head drop in dead weight, and that's when she noticed a blinking red light on the console.

"Hey, Tech," She pushed off the slanted surface and walked back over to the clone. "Did you accidentally trigger the proximity sensor?"

"Most likely a short circuit." He waved it off.

Simultaneously, three vessels soared over the bridge. "I don't think so." Fern gulped, and Tech jumped to his feet. As they both observed through their bino-specs the ships landing, the latter beeped his comm. "Hunter, we've got company." He sounded concern, and Fern noticed why.

"Is it more scrappers?" Hunter asked.

"No," Fern answered, her eyes narrowing through her specs at who just emerged from one of the shuttles. "It's the Empire. Actually...it's worse. It's Crosshair..."