Star Wars Republic Commando: Knight of Honor ✓

Chapter 33

Author's Note: If you have any tips writing tips, please feel free to comment.

As always, I continue to hope that I am doing justice to the spirit of Star Wars as well the respective authors and characters from which I borrow. Again, I gratefully accept constructive criticism as a means to help me develop my skills further as a writer.

Mandalorian (Mando'a) words

Ika (EE-kah): diminutive suffix written as 'ika - also added to a name as a very familiar or childhood form, e.g, Ord'ika - Little Ordo

Shabuir (SHAH-boo-EER): extreme insult - *jerk*, but much stronger

Vode (VOH-day): brothers, sisters, comrades

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Chapter 33

I finally got my freedom after ten years on that blasted, miserable Kaminoan hellhole, and they told me I only had about four months to live, and probably one month in relative comfort before they pumped me full of pain meds. All I wanted was to find my sister-in-law who was carrying my brother's child...a child that I don't even know was a son or a daughter, and these doctors insist that I probably would have died long before I even got close to finding them. So, now I'm confined to a bed, living out the last of my days as I watch the malignant cells eating me alive.

Excerpt from Gan Pohin's final message to Crimson, with instructions to be delivered to them only after he has passed away

Tochin Moon III, 786 Days ABG

As they walked deeper into the forest, Arlesse was numb to everything but Jas' touch. She wasn't even aware of the tears that silently lined her cheeks or the way the blanket fell from her shoulders and dragged on the ground behind her. She could only see her father's face and the way he had always been honest with her. There was never a moment when she thought he had lied. Her father had told her that he shared a special relationship with her mother, and Arlesse always believed that Darian loved her father with the same enthusiasm that Vollan loved her. She never once thought that their marriage was nothing more than a political arrangement. The idea that her mother was...inspired by another man sickened her.

Jas saw on his HUD the sight of Les'ika behind him, and it hurt him to see her shattered to a betrayed child. Her tears were not mourning one of his comrades this time but a fantasy she believed was true for her entire life. She looked like a pathetic waif, one of the survivors left behind after the Separatists had destroyed a city. Her clothing was no longer in the splendor of a royal princess, and her wild curls had been without proper care for days, leaving them nothing but a thick mane about her. The blanket she depended on for comfort had fallen off her shoulders, becoming little more than a burden for her to carry.

Jas stopped walking and turned to face her. He took the blanket in his hands and set it onto the ground. Gently he helped her onto the blanket and took a seat beside her. Confirming that they were far enough away from Zech and the others, he opened the seal to his helmet and set it onto the ground next to him.

Taking her hand into his again, Jas spoke softly but with assurance. "Zech will say anything to give the Separatists a chance at your world. He's trying to break you by using your parents' relationship against you. You can't be sure he's even telling the truth."

Arlesse shook her head and wiped one of her cheeks with her sleeve. She glanced at Jas but turned away quickly and decided that the empty patch of dirt on the ground was easier to concentrate her thoughts on instead. "Zech didn't deserve to know my mother. He made her sound..."