Zoraida Cordova - A Crash of Fate

She forced herself to, instead, replay the instructions from Pall Gopal, the Rodian she’d met the night before. This one seemed to be a simple drop-off. Half the payment from Pall and the other half from his contact once she’d made port. It was the easiest money she’d ever been offered, and that meant it was too good to be true.

“Why me?” she’d asked him, sipping the fizzy juice he’d bought her to soothe the desertion and betrayal she’d experienced moments before. He might as well have said, Happy birthday. Your boyfriend is a filthy, lying womp rat.

“The Meridian ,” Pall Gopal said. “The original owner, Ixel Garsea, to be exact.” Even hearing her mother’s name stung like a fresh wound. “Your mother did a couple of jobs for me before she settled down. I keep track of my investments.”

“Investments?”

“Sold her the ship you now call home.”

She frowned at that. Her mom did say she bought the ship on Rodia. Or was it from a Rodian?

“My mother never mentioned you.”

“Did she tell you why she named it the Meridian ?” Pall waited for Izzy to nod, and she did. “When she saw it fly, it looked like an arrow sailing clean—”

“Across the meridian,” she finished. Her mother didn’t usually tell her stories, but that one was an exception. “So, what, I’m indebted to you because you sold my parents a ship?”

“On the contrary. Your parents and I were square, as far as I remember. May they rest in the Force.”

She wanted to roll her eyes but contorted her features into a stoic calm. Her parents had believed in the ancient cult, much good it did anyone. But she couldn’t insult her only prospect and job offer. If she wanted to be taken seriously, then what choice did she have but to accept it? It wasn’t like she was going to go chasing after Ana Tolla’s crew. They hadn’t truly taken anything from her except her pride and, well, her dignity. Not to mention a day’s worth of work.

Izzy would recover. It wasn’t like she’d ever told Damar that she loved him back when he’d said it months before. She told herself that she didn’t care. Lying to herself made everything hurt a little less, but not by much.

“Thank you,” Izzy said, trying to keep her words even. “How did you know I’d be here?”

“Sad when a generation loses belief, isn’t it?” The Rodian gave a wistful smile as he traced the rim of the cocktail glass. She said nothing. “But to answer your question, I recognized the ship. I’d heard about what happened—years ago. Then I saw your name on the ship manifest.”

Izzy knocked on the table, trying to keep her calm. She narrowed her eyes at him, like she could see through any lies he was telling. She was quite good at telling lies when it suited her, and she’d thought she was good at detecting them. Clearly, when it came to Damar she’d failed.

What was wrong with her? She couldn’t doubt skills she’d taken time to hone, because of that loser. You didn’t think he was a loser when you wished he’d kiss you , she thought, and cringed.

She felt very young when she asked, “What kind of job did my mother do for you?”

“Ixel once did a run for me that no one else would. Too dangerous.”

She knew that was all he would say. Izzy thought of her mother’s fierce green stare, her full lips, beautiful but somehow always set in disapproval at her daughter. She’d spent more time teaching Izzy how to clean a blaster than how to brush her hair, how to fly through an asteroid belt without tearing the ship apart than how to talk to kids her own age. Nothing was too dangerous for Ixel Garsea, even dying. Sometimes she hated her mother for all those things.

She decided the Rodian was telling the truth.

“Sounds like her.” Izzy bobbed her head to the strange music track that had replaced the live band, and managed a grin that didn’t quite reach her eyes. This deal could change her luck after a rotten day. She had to make sure it was worth it. “Is that what this is? Dangerous?”

“Depends on how many questions you can stand to ask without getting an answer. I need someone to deliver a parcel to the Outer Rim.”

“We are in the Outer Rim,” she said.

“Further out. The edge of Wild Space.” Pall touched his chin with Rodian suction-cup fingers, which had always reminded Izzy of flower bells. “It’s straightforward enough. Deliver the parcel, collect your payment, and don’t ask questions.”

She raised a brow. The last time she’d delivered something no questions asked, a dozen varactyl eggs had hatched in her cargo hold. “I like to be prepared in case something I’m carrying is going to eat me.”

“Very well. The contents of the parcel cannot harm you or your ship. It’s locked and you will not be provided with the key.”

“Let me get this straight,” Izzy said, leaning forward. She wanted to believe she had her mother’s ability to steel her facial features, to narrow her eyes into the kind of stare that had been capable of silencing even a Trandoshan thrice her size. But Izzy didn’t feel as menacing as her mother had once looked. “If something goes wrong I won’t be able to open it?”

“If a simple delivery is too much for you, Izal Garsea, then perhaps you are not your mother’s daughter, and I’ll find someone else.”

She was overcome with the urge to put a hole through his chest. Instead, she took a deep breath and sat back. “If you could find someone else, then why are you wasting my time?”

It was a bluff if she’d ever uttered one. There were hundreds of smugglers and pirates he could hire, especially on Actlyon. “Seems to me like you need me for a more specific reason. So, what is it?”

“My dear girl, no one in the galaxy knows your name, which allows for fewer complications. Like I said. It’s a simple delivery transaction. All of the information is here. I won’t offer again.” He placed a datacard on the table between them.

She should have dumped her drink over his head for that “no one in the galaxy knows your name” comment. He might as well have told her how insignificant she was, how she didn’t matter enough for the people she loved to stick around. No one knew her name? Well, she would change that. With or without Ana Tolla and Damar.

Izzy snatched the datacard off the table and raised her glass. “To new investments.”

He echoed her words. That’s when she realized he hadn’t told her where exactly she was going.

“You can reach me on this and this alone,” Pall said, handing her a holocomm. “I’ll be by your ship later to give you the parcel.” Then he left her at the table.

When she returned to the Meridian to wait for Pall’s delivery, she keyed up the datacard to read about her mission.

After thirteen years, Izal Garsea was returning to Batuu.

On his way to Dok-Ondar’s shop, Jules felt his speeder shudder.

He smoothed his hand across the dashboard and whispered lovingly, “Come on, I just gave you a new turbine engine.”

Jules rode between the rocky pillars surrounded by dark green shrubbery, careful to avoid Kat’s farmland in case Belen spotted him and asked him too many questions later. On the way, there was an outcropping of abandoned homes. Though it had been about twelve years since the fires, traces of bitter smoke from scorched debris clung to the area. He shook off the memories of that day and sped up.

As he approached Black Spire Outpost, Jules’s mood improved. Long gone were his aches and the doubt that crept into his mind at the thought of what might lie ahead. It was a good thing that someone like Dok-Ondar found him dependable. Around the Outpost, Dok’s word was worth its weight in the rare golden lichen that grew on the spires.