"I'm not too young," he snaps knowing that it proves anything but the fact he is seasoned enough to ignore comments about his age.
He sighs.
"We've been doing it for 8 years. At this point I'm not too anything for nothing. Besides, don't you think in a week the Empire would be waiting for us? There are few survivors of the first Death Star attack. He is important, we know it, they know it. We'll have no chance if we wait that long."
Cassian knows he is right. But his words don't sound as an explanation; it's a mere excuse. 
He should go alone. It's too dangerous for Kay. The Empire doesn't forget. The moment the recognizes him will be the end for both of them. It's too cruel as well to put him in the shackles again after all this years. Even for a time, even for a mission. Even for the general Draven. But their chances with him are better and Cassian doubts he would choose to stay behind anyway.
"Next time we do as you told," he promises. "Look, if you think I won't pull this off let's switch. I'll be the prisoner, and you act as an officer. If that's what you worries about, my lack of experience with pretending to be someone I'm not. If it's about the fact that he knows who you are... Come on, after eight years no one cares. You are a rebel, whether you like to admit it or not. You're one of us. We are crushing the Empire one mission at a time. And now is the time. We'll be fine. We go in,  we find him, we take him, we get out of there. As simple as that."[status]odds? what odds?[/status][icon]https://forumupload.ru/uploads/0018/1a/00/59/628110.gif[/icon][LZ]<a href="https://swmedley.rusff.me/viewtopic.php?id=195#p10955">IDENTIFICATION CARD</a><div class="lz-hr"></div><b>Cassian Andor</b>, rebel[/LZ]

[status]odds? what odds?[/status][icon]https://forumupload.ru/uploads/0018/1a/00/59/628110.gif[/icon][LZ]<a href="https://swmedley.rusff.me/viewtopic.php?id=195#p10955">IDENTIFICATION CARD</a><div class="lz-hr"></div><b>Cassian Andor</b>, rebel[/LZ]It's impossible to find his face, or name, or special features in imperial database or warrants which is considered and proclaimed a miracle by many. That miracle might have a name and might be scowling on their way to the prison ship. Cassian doesn't promise he won't be beheaded. Neither he doesn't remind Kay he could stay behind. Because he couldn't, not really, and Cassian is grateful for that. He is adult enough to know that having someone to stay with you no matter how stupid and reckless plan you are following is rare and priceless privilege. Sometimes he remembers how safe he felt when he was a child and wonders if he imagined it. There's nothing safe in the world. And it has never been. Perhaps the more you grow up the more you know you can't be safe but can make someone else believe they are. So now he is going to make sure Kay is safe. He is going to make sure the general is safe too. There's nothing to discuss here.
So Cassian stays silent.
They reach the starship in half an hour. Cassian knows what to expect, but still shivers under his skin when he hears generated emotionless voice asking his name and reason to be here. It may ask a code as well. It doesn't look like this but it is the most important, pivotal point of the mission. Cassian doesn't have a code. No one does. Intellectual Processing Unit, the artificial mind of the prison, who speaks with him, might ask it. Then he'll have a chance to escape and everything will be over.
"Joreth Sward, bringing a prisoner in. Kay Tooesso."
He waits. If they calculated correctly, any officer on board will override the IPU protocol to get their hands on the most famous deserter of all time. The one who up to this point escaped the wrath of his previous owners.
"You must enter a co... Landing is granted. Proceed to the docking port 3. You will be expected."
Cassian wants to look back at Kay. But he only thinks of smirking. There will be time for that later.
They are expected. A small procession of four officers. There’s no need for more than that on a ship like this. Which means he could just free Kay and together they kill all four. But the real danger is IPU. People mean nothing. If any people are a weak spot and whey they beam with joy of witnessing someone who dared to rebel falling down Cassian lets them have it. He shows them a well-blended mix of pride because he has caught Kay and relief because he doesn't responsible for keeping him anymore.
Kay is immobilized at once and taken away. And Cassian joins the procession, asking on their way to filling papers.
"My navigation acts funny. While we are dealing with the procedure, maybe one of you droids will take a look?"
The younger officer - he is still a good five years older than Cassian himself, but he looks so unbearably young - call a droid. Any will work, but this one is good, Cassian decides. It's relatively fast, well armored, inconspicuous enough. There must be a lot of mechanic droids here.
Good. It's good.
Two older officers exchange glances with each other but stay silent until they enter the chambers.
"How long does it act that way?"
"Prepare the IT. We are going to need it soon," orders the other one to their young colleague.
Cassian expected to be asked a lot of questions. Mostly about catching Kay, and bringing him, and staying alive, and being a lucky bastard whose career will bloom because of that. But not this.
"A week or so. Not a critical thing. Didn't stop me from catching our friend. Just had to do some extra math on my way to you."
It's too late, he thinks. They smelled a danger and Kay probably was right. And all he can do...
"Oh, and make sure Tooesso is still awake. There's no use in interrogating a piece of sleeping meet."
Kay. They are suspecting Kay, not him. Good, this gives him some time. But when he tries to start his story, the older officer just shrugs him off, "We'll take it from here. Puck," the last imperial, a silent one with calm face and dark eyes rises them. Those are not the good eyes. Not even real ones. Just two prosthetics with lines of code running across pupils. "Show him out. We have a lot of work to do."
Puck walks noiselessly and stays silent on the way.
"Didn't expect it to be so... casual."
Puck stays silent.
It's fine. Cassian is good with trying to get a brooding dangerous man engaged in a small talk. He had a lot of practice over these years.
"Is there something wrong?"
Puck stays silent.
"I mean, what he can do here? Wake up prisoners and let them go free? Where would they go? We are on a ship."
"Into the Void," suddenly Puck says.
"What? Why?"
"They are not just prisoners, they are batteries. This prison in self-efficient, because it uses the energy generated by prisoners."
He looks at Cassian, who doesn't even have to pretend to look impressed. He didn't know this. Only the general, then, or else they will crush.
"So you don't have to be worried at all," he says.
Puck nods but walks faster now. They need more time, Cassian thinks. The droid in his ship should be bugged now, but he needs time to spread it through the system and to make all droids here go mad.
It's a good thing Puck walks faster, Cassian thinks and kills him with a blaster bolt to the back. There's no one around. Other three officers must be busy. No one could see them. But something flickers for the last one time in Puck's eyes before they shot down. Yet he feels that something just went profoundly wrong. Still he turns back. he has to do a lot in a very short time.
He hears someone's muffled scream somewhere far away.
And then the chaos starts.

Отредактировано Cassian Andor (23-02-2021 13:48:41)

[icon]https://forumupload.ru/uploads/0018/1a/00/59/335041.gif[/icon][status]odds? what odds?[/status][LZ]<a href="https://swmedley.rusff.me/viewtopic.php?id=195#p10955">IDENTIFICATION CARD</a><div class="lz-hr"></div><b>Cassian Andor</b>, rebel[/LZ]Cassian mostly hears droids and havoc they are spreading. But what he hears impresses him nonetheless. There's screeching, and scraping, and zapping somewhere on the ship. Somewhere inside it.
He can't let himself be distracted. Remaining officers might be busy, but there is always IPU. Right now it's strangely quiet, but it doesn't mean anything. It's busy with droids too, that's it.
Cassian studied everything they could find on the prison, so he knows where he follows. He needs to get to the control system of the ship. His original plan was to let everyone out, so they create additional distraction or run away too. But Ashmead’s Lock will crush without its prisoners. And that means he has to find the general and then to wake him up.
The door to the controls is open. Cassian is ready to take a shot, but there's no one inside. He locks the door and then checks cameras. He quickly finds the remaining officers. Or their remains at least. There's a cleaning droid routinely doing his job. It means not every droid is bugged. Some are still doing their job. Somehow it makes Cassian try the door once more. Locked. Good.
IPU is till silent but while he looks through the prison logs he notices something is spreading through the vent. Whatever it is, it's slow, and Cassian decides to ignore it. IPU must be busy with droids, so he is left to silently do his job here. There's a lot of prisoners here, and he keeps searching trying not to think that he might be late. The general is not here. Everything was in vain. He better find Kay and...
The shudder is not physical yet it is so sudden Cassian feels it. He flinches and scowls. The system went mad. It switches on and off, leaving parts of the ship without any energy. It may be IPU trying to lock down droids. It may be something else. It doesn't matter, because Cassian sees a name and a number he was looking for. Finally.
Cassian smiles.
It's even easier. There's no energy, therefore, there're no working locks.
He finds Kay on camera and leaves his retreat. It's terribly silent outside. There're droids powered down on his way, there are holes and dents on the durasteel walls. There are shots and explosions somewhere on the ship.
But there's also Kay.
"We need the cot," he says.
Then after a small pause asks, "Are you okay?"

[status]odds? what odds?[/status][icon]https://forumupload.ru/uploads/0018/1a/00/59/335041.gif[/icon][LZ]<a href="https://swmedley.rusff.me/viewtopic.php?id=195#p10955">IDENTIFICATION CARD</a><div class="lz-hr"></div><b>Cassian Andor</b>, rebel[/LZ]Kay should just lie down on the cot and stay still. Cassian doesn't say it aloud. They don't have time for arguing.
"IPU is switching the energy down. I think it tries to fight and detain droids, but... One of the Imps told me the ship uses the energy that's generated from prisoners. It flies on human batteries. If there ain't enough prisoners, we'll crush. And some locks don't work anymore. So."
There are marks of the ship's system battling droids everywhere, but none of droids or there remains whatsoever. Cassian still holds his blaster. He aims as soon as there is a slight movement on the corner of his eye. It's not a droid. A prisoner. Disoriented, tired, there's a black holes under his eyes, and everything in him is swaying. He tries to say something, but just hums. He is no danger to them.
"I think we are better off just knocking him unconscious and fixing him on our way back."
Cassian passes by the r=prisoner. He is not the prisoner they are looking for, and this time he can't say everyone. As usual.
"Turn left," he says. Then, "Now right."
Kay seems fine, but he always looks fine, even when he barely can stand or is bleeding out. Looks mean nothing when it comes to Kay.
He stops abruptly near the pod.
"We are here."
The door is closed, but the lock is off.
"He is here."

[status]odds? what odds?[/status][icon]https://forumupload.ru/uploads/0018/1a/00/59/335041.gif[/icon][LZ]<a href="https://swmedley.rusff.me/viewtopic.php?id=195#p10955">IDENTIFICATION CARD</a><div class="lz-hr"></div><b>Cassian Andor</b>, rebel[/LZ]"Would you?"
Cassian stops for a moment. The prisoners are outnumbered, weak, they may be a good bait, a way to sneak out, but they won't buy them a lot of time. Part of him hates thinking that way, being cold-blooded and not even thinking about helping prisoners anymore. But he doesn't have time for that either.
Being a spy is mostly being able to make hard, yet right choices, and being okay with it. Right now he chooses another way. Fighting is loosing time. And loosing time is luxury right now.
They are lucky. The only droid they see is heads to the fight and barely pay any attention. Is that because he still has imperial uniform on? Or is the system trying to save itself and keep as many batteries as it can? Doesn't matter. The way is clear. Their ship is waiting.
"Even if he would," Cassian looks at the general. "I don't think he'll be able to. I mean, look at him. He will tell us where are blueprints, and that's it".
But when he looks again, he frowns. What will he say about the Resistance that was scrapped together after the Death Star? What will he think about Cassian? Will he trust Kay? Is he the person he was before.
Cassian decides he better think of man as of an information he must bring back on base. That will do. At least, for now.
"We're almost there. We will make it, Kay. A couple of minutes more, and we'll get out."

[status]odds? what odds?[/status][icon]https://forumupload.ru/uploads/0018/1a/00/59/335041.gif[/icon][LZ]<a href="https://swmedley.rusff.me/viewtopic.php?id=195#p10955">IDENTIFICATION CARD</a><div class="lz-hr"></div><b>Cassian Andor</b>, rebel[/LZ]Kay looks better. Then he looks worse.
It's typical. There is an emergency source of power somewhere inside him. The one he can switch on and off as he likes. Kay claims it's just the adrenalin, but Cassian had seen people acting on it. No, what Kay is working on is his willpower and smashing stubbornness. The latter Cassian is particularly fond of, because he likes to think Kay picked this stubbornness from him.
As fond of Kay and their almost successful mission as he is, Cassian is still collected. He remembers what the imp said. They will go into the Void. They probably have already set their route there. So, it's time to leave.
He looks back at the cot with the general. His vitals were stable. He can wait, although Cassian wants so bad to see him, to see that he is stable and fine. Well, fine comparing to him being dead. Cassian sighs and sits on his seat. He can't dump piloting on Kay, not when he is like this. So he stays, he checks tumblers and switches.
The prison system might do something, but it doesn't. Perhaps, it's too busy with saving itself from destruction. Leaving is easy, jump to the hypes is almost gentle.
"We did it."
Cassian grins.
"We really did. Who'd know. You good, Kay?"
He is not, but he doesn't look like he is dying. At this point, Cassian knows that look too good to miss it.
But he is better to stay seated.
"I'll go and check on the general. He may be starting to wake up."

The last thing that Davits remembers is meddroid injecting him with a paralyser agent and then with a sedative. Not that it was necessarily needed given that he was restrained, beaten up and tired, but such was the procedure of being welcomed to the flying abomination of a prison called the Ashmead’s Lock. The first thing that he sees is the ceiling of a ship. It looks like an Imperial ceiling, but he could be wrong because his head is spinning, his ears are drumming, and he feels like throwing up. Which he promptly does, right there on the floor next to his flying cot.
His mind races — is he being transported somewhere? To his execution, finally? Davits remembers an Imperial prosecutor vehemently promising him he’d wish he was dead after the judge — also very much Imperial — announced his sentence. He still stubbornly doesn’t, because being dead is too final and he has things to do. The ship around him is definitely Imperial, but he sees no stormtroopers, no officers, it’s too empty and too quiet, save for the voices from the pulpit. Disoriented and frail, Davits can barely understand the language so the voices do nothing for him except letting him know he’s not alone. Well, of course he isn’t. Ships don’t fly themselves the last time he checked, although the last time he checked was stars know how long ago so things might’ve changed.
Davits does his best to sit up but only manages to nearly fall off the cot, his muscles long unused. Every move is like trying to lift a mountain. In this state the best he can hope for is to talk his guards to death. The thought makes him chuckle under his breath when he tries to sit upright again.

Отредактировано Davits Draven (16-09-2021 13:39:45)

Someone rushes to help him, and Davits lets them, even grabs the lapel of their Imperial uniform. If he was just a bit stronger right now, that could have been a fatal choice for the Imperial. However, Davits is as strong as a felinx kitten, and he’s sure the Imperial barely even notices his gesture. The Imperial’s voice sounds vaguely familiar, and then more familiar when he keeps talking, and then Davits manages to concentrate and just look at his face. The face is familiar and gives him a pause. Because if there is one thing that Davits knows about this world, it’s that Cassian Andor would have never became an Imperial officer. Not if it meant saving his life, not if it meant following his love, not if it meant anything. Cassian was born a separatist and raised on a rebel base. It’s the last face Davits has ever expected to see upon waking up. This face means that this isn’t an Imperial ship. This face means that the Rebellion lives on.
“It worked,” Davits says, his voice hoarse and barely audible. He doesn’t care because this remark isn’t for Cassian. It’s for Cracken, and wherever in the Force he is, Davits is sure the old friend is smiling his most shiteating, obnoxious smile.
There are things that you come up with, and they sound positively insane. But then you go to your friend, and together you wrack your brains, work out possible outcomes, analyse, brainstorm and decide that it’s not that insane of an idea after all. It’s a good contingency plan if something goes wrong. Then, of course, the Death Star appears at your door and completely obliterates almost everything you came to know and love while being in the Rebellion, your friend included, but it’s an entirely different story. The one he’s riding the aftershocks of right now. The cabin just about stops spinning uncontrollably, and Davits feels a bit more like a normal human being.
“Are you alone? What... how long have I been out, you said?”

Отредактировано Davits Draven (16-09-2021 13:39:33)

The Empire is built on the idea of its own infallibility and almost unlimited power, and every single one of its minions firmly believes in it. Of course, it does look like it, when it comes to things like the Death Star, the name that Cassian so mundanely explains without, perhaps, realising how many times Davits heard it while being prosecuted behind the closed doors eight years ago. However, there is one thing that the Empire never accounts for. The bonds forged between sentients. These bonds are invisible and might seem unimportant from Coruscant, yet these same bonds make the Death Star pale in comparison. The Death Star is a space station, ergo a thing that could potentially be destroyed with weapons, the right bunch of sentients, their ingenuity and a bit of luck. It’s a threat, yet it’s too material. Bonds between the right sentients, on the other hand, no weapon can destroy. The more one tries to unlink the two parts of a bond, the more they fuse together, and this togetherness births something equally beautiful and deadly for the foes. The only question is to find the right pair of sentients. And then more, and then more, until there is an entire Rebellion.
Of course, Kay is with Cassian. The news don’t surprise Davits, he just nods here and there, tries to move his legs off the cot to sit normally. His body feels old and tired, so very tired, but his mind is suddenly clear. He takes what Cassian is giving him, carefully thinking through what he just heard. The energy gel tastes like nothing, just a slimy thing filling his mouth, but after being unconscious for so long even it feels and tastes amazing. Tastes like freedom. Even his nausea subsides almost immediately.
“Like I woke up from a particularly bad dream which looked like it would never end. I feel better than I look. At least my mind does, and that’s the most important bit of me for now. There are things that I would like to learn more about, but first I should thank you both for the rescue. When I put you to work together back then, I expected an interesting outcome yet never something as outrageous as this. You did good, Cassian. Was it your idea or was it the Alliance’s idea?”
It sounds like Davits is talking about the rescue when he praises Cassian, yet there is something, a spark in his eyes that he is too weak to hide properly right now. It’s a spark that would be familiar to a good sabacc player or a racing enthusiast, to someone who bets on something big time and then sees it pay off. Not that Davits has ever expected the Empire to build something like the Death Star. He always thought they fought more reasonable foe than that, but alas. The main thing is that his bet on Cassian’s character turned out to be the winning one in the most unexpected and delightful way.