Shipping Out

[John Glayde]

John watched in silence, arms folded across his chest as the ground crews swarmed up and down the access ramp to the old Cygnus Spaceworks shuttle that the Bothans had loaned him for his trip to Dac.

Despite his team's stalwart defense of their actions and performance, General Oruo'rel - Councillor Oruo'rel; Glayde couldn't stand the political mindedness of that bloody Bothan - had ultimately decided that SpecForce's resources could be made better use of elsewhere in the Alliance.

Though they were hardly keeping him in the loop anymore, Glayde had been paying attention to he rumours. From what he'd heard, Lieutenant Tur'enne had been pulled even further into the bowels of Alliance Intel, while Sergeant O'Hurn was off leading his own covert strike force. Even Oran Jsorra had managed to score a ticket into SpecOps; all in all, Glayde's team were doing pretty alright for themselves.

Except for Glayde. His command had been considered an experiment from day one, and that experiment had merely ended: not a failure; not a waste; just an abandoned prototype. Glayde had been promoted to lead the team, and while they couldn't shove him back into the roles he'd previously filled without it casting a negative light and making the whole Dorn project look like a mistake, Oruo'rel was hardly willing to give him a decent assignment befitting his rank either.

Political considerations had trapped him in a bubble, and that bubble had stranded him on Bothawui. SpecForce Command had thrown a few tasks his way - the odd mission in need of an advisor; even a few training gigs under the guise of letting the next generation of Rebels benefit from his experience. It was all boring as hell, and as a result Glayde was even grumpier than usual.

Eventually, he'd taken matters into his own hands. A few favours called in within the Navy had earned him a summons to Dac. The General of course was livid about being out-manoeuvred, so was dragging his paws as much as possible: hence the clunky old Nu-class shuttle that he'd graciously made available. The ship, typically designed for Hyperspace trips of a day or two at most, was currently being loaded up with extra supplies to sustain two passengers all the way to the Mon Calamari homeworld.

John glanced down at the chrono on his wrist. Speaking of two passengers; his mind idly wondered where his co-traveller was. Part of him was frustrated at the delay; part of him secretly hoped that his lateness would mean that Glayde could leave without him.

The first part shouted the loudest, and with a sigh the Major plucked the comlink from his belt. "Glayde to Onashi," he spoke, thumbing the activation stud. "Where the hell are you?"

[Serasai Onashi]

Before he left, he'd wanted - no, needed - to say goodbye to them first. So he met them where he always did, his two girls, the two luxuries that he'd allowed himself while staying with the fleet and playing coy with a few contracts that had been sprung his way.

As usual, the promise of both action and pay stemmed from the Rebellion. And he'd only meant to say goodbye to his main squeeze here in the gym, while the other happened to find him there.

"Well?" she asked, looking annoyed. Onashi snorted mentally, while lavishing his attention on his main girl. If Endra expected someplace romantic, like the recreation deck, or even the more lucrative Officers' Mess, where many a compatriot in the ways of war and love had used the darkness of space with the stars twinkling gaily to lower their lovers' inhibitions or woo them into a proper mating mood, she'd be disappointed.

"Shhh, baby. Your turn's coming," he said, waving a hand in her direction. She huffed, though a well hidden smile curved her lips. She, along with many women, still seemed to love themselves a "bad boy". His main girl almost seemed to coo under his loving attention.

"Why are you giving the weight machine so much attention?" Endra finally asked, her impatience and curiosity getting the better of her. It served her well in bed, but wasn't conducive to making things smooth in everyday communication. Actually, had he been truly interested in her, they would have served perfectly, but he wasn't, so those traits only annoyed him. Endra didn't wait for a response. "You know there are droids programmed to do the cleaning."

"They wouldn't give her the attention she needs!" Onashi shot back, seemingly offended at the suggestion that droids would properly oil and care for the machine that kept his body toned enough for the high gravity training and kata sessions he performed on a daily basis. She laughed, only slightly aware of how serious he actually was.

"Well, we have to eat in fifteen," Endra said, having had enough of the whole ridiculous charade in front of her.

"Can't," Onashi demurred, putting the final touches of lubricating oil in the pumping shafts. He kissed the back bar of the main framework almost lovingly. Endra's brow raised.

He wasn't a fool. He knew Glayde would leave without him if he was late. He caressed the weight machine one last time.

"Goodbye," he murmured.

"You're leaving?" she asked, her voice and cadence mostly normal, but carrying a hint of something dangerous. "When?"

"Eh?" he asked, finally granting the woman his full attention. "Oh. Yeah. I'm leaving in a few minutes."

"You were going to wait until now to tell me?" she asked, her left eye starting to twitch.

"I wasn't going to tell you at all," Onashi said bluntly, ignoring her clenching fists. "I was just going to leave."

"Glayde to Onashi. Where the hell are you?"

Onashi pulled the commlink from his belt and spoke quickly into it, ignoring Endra.

"On my way now," he responded, as Endra's shadow lengthened behind him.

***

Onashi smoothly ignored the look Glayde fixed him with as he stepped up to the shuttle, his duffle thrown over one shoulder, and his right eye shining darkly with a bruise ringing it.

"Well, I'm here," he announced needlessly, and checking his chrono. "And still early too."

He glanced over the shuttle, and grimaced.

"We're leaving in that?"

[John Glayde]

Glayde's mind was already preparing a response: some sort of retort about how Onashi's benchmark for "on time" - usually the absolute last kriffing minute - differed somewhat from the rest of the galaxy. The sight of a darkening fist-print on his face gave him pause however; his efforts were far more focused on fighting back a smile of satisfaction than on sarcasm.

He turned his attention back on the ship, and offered a single nod. "Only the best for General Oruo'rel's two favourite soldiers," he grunted. "Don't worry though: they're stocking us with enough supplies to last a week; the fight to Dac should only take a couple of days."

John fell silent, his gaze focussed on the shuttle, but he couldn't help a string of stealthy sidelong glances at Onashi's face. Eventually he sighed, arms unfolding as he turned towards the mercenary.

"I gotta ask..." He waved a hand vaguely towards Onashi's face. "Who was it this time? I need to find her and promote her before we leave."

[Serasai Onashi]

Onashi scratched his chin, remembering vaguely the Councillor Glayde was talking about. He still had the enduring urge to scratch behind the Bothan's ears to see if that would calm him down.

"Oh," he said, frowning in thought. "Her name's... Enda? No, that's not it. Endra? Yeah. Endra something. Engineer, I think. Either that or she works on the bridge. Apparently she somehow got the impression that I took her seriously, and didn't much like me showing her that I didn't."

He shrugged.

"Not much Officer potential there, I should think. Doesn't get a clue, but she's certainly tenacious. I finally lost her somewhere on the deck with all the fish tanks."

[John Glayde]

Glayde's eyebrow quirked. "You mean the Mon Calamari crew deck?"

He shook his head and sighed. Onashi's extra-vocational activities with the personnel assigned to Bothawui and her defensive fleet frustrated him no end. Technically, Glayde wasn't his CO anymore, and so didn't have to feel responsible for the negative impact that Onashi's antics had on his unit's reputation; but that was skant consolation to himself, or to any woman within a two-lightyear radius. Worse, Glayde had to admit that somewhere, deep down in the very back of his mind, he might have been harbouring a tiny spark of jealousy as well.

John pushed those thoughts aside, focusing on the oh so sweet prospect that after a few days of suffering, Onashi might completely be someone else's problem.

"Come on," he muttered, gesturing towards the Celeres, "Lets get on board and get out of here."

There was a momentary pause, before Glayde added:

"And no, you can't drive."

[Serasai Onashi]

"But you know how much I like driving," Onashi said in something close to a whine. Glayde seemed ready to offer his own rejoinder, likely another reminder of the whole 'Red 34' Simulation Incident, as he had heard it called. He didn't know how many times he had to remind everyone that he'd asked for an X-wing, and not a B-wing. He wasn't a kriffing Jedi.

Glayde's retort was cut off by a tech running up, a small bag clutched in one hand.

"Lieutenant Onashi!" he gasped. "Sorry I'm almost late, sir. An angry woman stopped me two decks down looking for you."

Onashi's grin became a bit strained. The tech smiled smoothly.

"I said I hadn't seen you."

"Good man!" Onashi said, loosening up and slapping him on the back. "And thank you for the books, too."

"I managed to get some of those Rodian philosophy and Chiss military strategy books in there too. The Chiss ones are the newest translations!"

Onashi's eyes glanced up to the back of the hangar, though his easy grin never left his face.

"Just what I wanted," he said in satisfaction. "Here's my payment." He leaned over and whispered something in the guy's ear. The tech's eyes widened and they shared a look.

And then the tech punched Onashi in the face. Onashi gripped the smaller man by the coat and threw him down the ramp, where he landed in a heap with a groan.

"Well, let's go, Glayde!" Onashi said, another bruise forming on the right corner of his mouth, highlighting the grin he sported.

[John Glayde]

For an idle moment, John wondered just what Onashi had said to the poor technician; but his better judgement kicked in, and he decided that actually, he'd rather not know.

Shaking his head and sighing, he punched a fist into the ramp controls, and followed Onashi into the ship.

The pilot seat was empty and waiting for him; but for some surreal reason it was located in the cargo hold, rather than the cockpit. It had been a while since he'd set foot aboard one of these old Republic attack shuttles; and while consciously he could appreciate the benefits of the pilot and copilot being able to quickly transition from the cockpit to the passenger compartment, the ascending chairs still struck him as a very odd way of doing it.

Filing those thoughts under 'Not Something To Dwell On Right Now', he settled himself into his seat, eyes quickly skimming the console for the elevator control. Prodding it, his body and seat shot up into the cockpit a few metres above; his stomach however remained firmly in the hold.

Grabbing the seat restraints - if the thing was going to move that damn fast, there was no way he was going to risk falling off it - he shrugged them over his shoulder, and added a comlink headset to his outfit; a few seconds of sustained holding on one of the controls automatically synchronised the device with the ship's comm array.

"Flight control," he spoke, keying in the relevant commands on a panel to his left. "This is the Velites, requesting permission to launch."

He hesitated, peering over his shoulder at his unfortunate 'copilot'. "Touch nothing."

[Serasai Onashi]

"Come now, John," Onashi said, likewise strapping himself into the co-pilot's seat. His duffel, to which was strapped his unique blaster rifle, was snugly stowed away. "As if a co-pilot's even needed for this. How long has it been since flight required cables?"

Onashi was aware that the co-pilot did fulfil certain duties in flight, but they were all simply to make the flight easier on the pilot, rather than being tasks critical for the very flight of the machine. At least, that was how he thought of it. He was probably wrong, but he couldn't be bothered too much by his lack of knowledge now.

"Besides," he continued as flight control radioed (another positively archaic term) their permission to Glayde, "It looks like you have this all under control."

He pulled his datapad from an inner pocket of his jacket and selected an interesting book on the nature of obedience by a human named Baum.

[John Glayde]

Letting out a sigh, John felt himself sinking into his seat - which was unnerving for a second or two, considering what the chair was capable of.

"Copy that, Control," he responded to the comm, checking the internal pressure sensors to be sure that the shuttle was airtight, before dialling up the power on the repulsorlifts. "Velites out."

Despite having had a few minutes to crawl back into place, his stomach was still stubbornly absent.

This was going to be a long flight.

* * *

Glayde sat at one end of the shuttle's hold; Onashi sat at the other. The internal space was only a few metres long, but it was as much space as they could give each other. Besides, Glayde wanted to be as close to his disconcerting elevator chair of doom as possible for when something inevitably went wrong; being as far away as possible from Mr Sleazy Optimism was just a wonderful perk.

It had been three hours; cooped up in Hyperspace, they were comparatively safe. Their course steered them well clear of all the known gravity wells, and given that they were flying from one openly Rebel planet to another openly Rebel planet, there was no need for the kind of circuitous route that Alliance ships usually navigated to conceal their destination and point of origin.

Of course, it was the unknown gravity wells that had Glayde worried - undiscovered solar systems; rogue planets with enough mass to drag them out of hyperspace; an opportunistic Interdictor captain fishing blindly in the hopes of snagging a stray Rebel ship.

Truth be told, Glayde could probably have found some way to worry about danger even if they were making the trip in a Death Star. He had elevated cautious pessimism to an art form, and he practiced regularly.

Take Onashi, for example. Three hours and four minutes had passed since launch, and he hadn't said a single thing: just stared at his book, deeply engrosed. Glayde should have been greatful; but Major Pessimism couldn't cope with that. Onashi was planning... something.

He decided to break the silence.

"Hungry?" he asked, heaving himself out of one of the troop transporter bucket seats, and onto his feet.

[Serasai Onashi]

"No, thank you," Onashi answered absently, underlining a passage with a stylus. "Not yet, anyway."

The shuttle's vibrations were soothing in a way, and more anxious in another. He'd switched the philosophy for a book on shuttle mechanical designs, which had a section on Clone War era ships. So far he hadn't really understood any of it very well, though the illustrations were very well done. Another read-through would likely clear things up.

With that thought, he set the datapad down and stood, stretching out the kinks in his back and neck with a series of pops as the joints realigned. Feeling loose and relaxed, he settled into a stance and began a kata, featuring slow and precise movements, and control of his breathing.

As he moved, he let his mind settled into a comfortable, relaxed state. Usually he would be attempting to clear his mind of extraneous thoughts, but the warrior took this moment to think. He thought about battle, philosophy, the intriguing white-haired woman he'd met some months ago, and what sort of prank he could best pull on Glayde that would loosen him up and perhaps dislodge the bar that had been jammed up his--

"Are we there yet?" he asked when he noticed Glayde had returned.

[John Glayde]

John shrugged, tearing the edge off an MRE packet.

Most people hated them - they considered "Meals Ready-to-Eat" to be a complete misnomer, deeming them unfit for consumption by anyone with a sense of taste. Glayde on the other hand didn't see the problem. Maybe he was just used to them: having once served as a Scout Trooper, you either ate MREs or didn't eat.

His secret was not to read the label. As soon as you did that, your brain decided what it was going to taste like, and noticed when it wasn't. That was dangerous. However, if you consumed in blissful ignorance, flavour innacuracy went out the window, and you could enjoy - relatively speaking - the anonymous-tasting snack.

"Check for yourself," he fired back, retrieving the sharpened duraplast spear that alleged to be cutlery. "Just keep your hands off the flight controls. I don't want you accidentally dropping us into a sun."

[Serasai Onashi]

"Such hostility," Onashi sighed dramatically, coming out of the stance and making his way to the oddly configured control center for the ship. "Where does it come from?"

He grunted in disappointment when he saw that they had two days and one course correction to go.

[John Glayde]

"I know you, Onashi," John replied, eyes not rising from the challenge of breaking in to his packaged meal. "Hostility is an unfortunate side-effect of that burden."

Some creative puncturing and basic leverage later, John managed to wrestle open the packet that - bearing in mind the planet they had just left - had probably been designed for a consumer with paws and claws. That probably explained he dimensions of the package too, and the eating utensils: or lack thereof. The bag looked big enough for a Bothan to dive in with their snout; the plastic spear was probably just to make sure the contents were definately dead.

"Don't feel bad," he added, sparing half an eye to keep the Lieutenant in his periferal vision. "I know you can't help being an ass. Not many people with your lack of conscience and moral fibre can break the habits of a lifetime."

[Serasai Onashi]

"That hurts me, you know. That hurts me right here," Onashi said in deadpan, a finger pointing to his heart. He strode to a seat, settling himself in atop the crash-webbing that he had only glanced at.

"I'll be the first to admit that I'm not the most refined man in the galaxy," he said with a lazy grin. "And my profession isn't one that makes many friends in genteel society. Still, I sense an inordinate amount of dislike, considering I haven't threatened, cajoled, or otherwise harmed you or yours.

"Is there... something you'd like to talk about, John?" he asked, doing a passable imitation of Healer Phil. The barely suppressed expression of amusement on his face belied any semblance of Onashi being serious himself. "Something you need to get off your chest?"

[John Glayde]

John let out a grunt.

"Nothing off my chest," he lied. "Though I could do with getting you off my back."

If Glayde was being honest - with himself especially - there were a whole lot of things he really needed to get off his chest. Unfortunately, the life of a commanding officer - and perhaps more importantly, the life of a person utterly addicted to being alone - didn't exactly come with a plethora of viable candidates to open up to. Almost everyone he knew was either a superior or a member of his command, and while a few of them were worthy of the kind of trust it would take to share those secrets, he had an unerring knack for pushing away anyone who got too close.

What does that leave me with? he asked himself. Do I keep wallowing in all this bottled-up angst, or do I just suck it up and get all touchy-feely and emotional with the next idiot who blunders along?

He cast another look in Onashi's direction, and sighed. "I'll be in the cockpit," he muttered, pacing across to the descended seat that would elevate him back to the shuttle's canopy and controls. "Try not to break anything until I get back."

[Serasai Onashi]

"Sure, sure, John," the mercenary said, waving off the Major (at least, he thought he was a Major now). "I'll get some sleep."

Glayde walked almost dejected across the shuttle to the cockpit. Onashi frowned a bit and raised one eyebrow. That man, he concluded, had some issues needing ironing out. Thankfully, he was a mercenary, not a shrink, and not only was he unqualified for dealing with personal issues of his compatriots, but he also didn't care to in the first place. Besides, being a mercenary didn't make him much better in the realm of issues. He simply let them go, where Glayde seemed to treasure each little heart-ache like a piece of platinum.

He made his way to the makeshift bunk that he'd made for himself (the ship itself didn't have a dedicated crew space), and went to sleep.

He wasn't sure how long he'd been asleep when the ship's engines cycled down to revert out of hyperspace, waking him up in the process.

There was a slight jolt, and suddenly, he was thrown from his hammock onto the floor.

"I touched nothing, Glayde!" he roared, as the ship began buckle under what he could only guess was multiple impacts.

[John Glayde]

Hyperspace was hypnotic; that was the only excuse that Glayde could find to justify having fallen unconscious. Ordinarily, he never would have let himself sleep at his post, regardless of the situation.

Fate, it seemed, had decided to bite him in the ass for it.

An automated alarm had sounded a few seconds before they reverted to real-space, ready to adjust course and engage on he next leg of their interstellar journey. Glayde had let the computer do it's thing, preferring to keep his piloting to an absolute minimum.

The second the blue outside the cockpit had turned to black, the ship had started rattling like it was being beaten on by a randy Hutt. A second later, something smashed an angry looking crack in the canopy; another something convinced one of the consoles to spit-take sparks over Glayde's leg.

One hand slapping away what could otherwise have become a fledgeling fire, his other tried to punch up whatever telemetry he could. A swarm of tiny fragments danced angrily across the display; a cluster of meteors that the sensors couldn't identify the edge of.

His frantic fumblings managed to activate the shields; the hammering died down, but Glayde knew full-well it would only be a temporary reprieve. He'd need to run status checks, pull up damage reports, run diagnostics -

The angry crack on the canopy extended itself of it's own accord. Glayde's stomach sank. "Diagnostics later," he muttered, and slammed a fist down on the button that would return him to the passenger compartment.

Nothing happened.

Glayde's stomach sank deeper, as several more attempts failed to do anything. His hand strayed instead to the intercom.

"Onashi," he called. "I have a big kriffing problem."

[Serasai Onashi]

Onashi, Glayde's voice said through the intercommunications speakers, I have a big kriffing problem.

"Undoubtedly," Onashi answered as the ship continued to be pummeled by... what was it that was causing such a commotion? "What's the problem? Can I shoot it, or are we going to have to resort to... more peaceful measures?"

Onashi said 'peaceful' like he was chewing on an unsavoury piece of nerf steak, burned and charred beyond the ability to consume.

It was unlikely that the Empire was anywhere near them at the moment. While he knew they kept dedicated patrols on the edges of Mon Calamari space, they couldn't police a blockade that size efficiently. They'd taken to merely keeping eyes on the traffic they did run across.

Pirates were more likely, but also quite unlikely, for the reason that the Empire and Rebellion were patrolling the space lanes around the Mon Calamari homeworld quite often. Skirmishes happened often, and while the lanes attracted all sorts of salvagers, pirates tended to leave such warzones alone.

[John Glayde]

Glayde's jaw clenched tight. Even now, Onashi somehow managed to be infuriating as hell.

"A meteor impact just damaged the elevator servos," he grunted, trying to be as succinct as possible. He jammed a finger into the descent control a few more times, just to be completely sure. "The seat is jammed; I'm stuck in the cockpit."

The chilling sound of the crack creeping across the transparisteel sent Glayde's skin crawling. "But if this crack on the canopy gets any larger, pretty soon I'll be outside the cockpit."

[Serasai Onashi]

"Ah, that is a big kriffing problem," Onashi said, grimacing.

He turned to look at the strut that held Glayde up in the cockpit. Elevator servos?

"Glayde, you do know I'm a mercenary, not a mechanic, right? What exactly should I be doing?"

The ship continued to be hammered by meteors. Onashi grunted and moved to the... mechanical arm (or whatever it was called) to examine it more closely and hopefully find some way to keep his only company on this flight from dying.