14

GALEN MAREK had that insufferable smirk on his face once more as Hera led him straight to the common room (lekku pointed sharply into her back). Ezra was still there, bent over the Dejarik table as he murmured quietly back and forth with the others. His ebony bangs cascaded over his face, obscuring it from view. His words were spoken in a voice too low to be heard from the entryway.

They were all so deep in thought that they might have never noticed Hera and a strange man standing in it, had that man not opened his mouth.

"Hi there," he said cheerfully, offering a cheeky wave. "My name is Galen, and I'll be helping you guys out while you try to find your Jedi friend. I heard he got captured. Er, again. Yikes, am I right?!" He laughed a little nervously.

Hera almost screamed.

They all looked up, aside from Ezra, who merely went silent. Zeb's ears slid back as he stared back at Galen, immediately taking a severe dislike to the scruffy-looking nerfherder.

"Uhh, Hera," he said, slowly raising a brow very, very high. His expression seemed to say You found a new boyfriend very, very quickly.

"Who's that?" asked Sabine hoarsely, her dark eyes wary.

Tseebo, who, of course, was standing beside Sabine, was slowly getting a very not so happy, incredibly petrified look on his face.

Galen just stood there grinning at them, like if he just kept doing that, it would soon win them all over.

"I know what you're all thinking," Hera said in a tone of extremely fake calm, shooting Zeb a look. "And," she muttered, her voice becoming very resigned, "I certainly don't know what I was."

Zeb lifted his hand, still staring. "Erm, is this scrawny little nerf seriously gonna be joining this crew? 'Cause if so, I'd like to object."

"Tseebo also objects," Tseebo announced, rigid with terror, his voice quavering.

Sabine tried to object too but sneezed into her elbow.

Hera sighed. "I'm sorry.. all of you. I didn't... I never meant to make a decision like this without the consent of the team. But-"

"-I'm stubborn, awesome, and far too incredible to turn down," Galen piped up with a huge grin on his face.

Zeb's was entirely unconvinced.

"Don't worry, guys," Galen continued, leaning against the wall as Hera scowled beside him. "You'll be glad I'm here."

Slowly, Ezra lifted his raven-haired head, turning his brilliant dark blue eyes onto Galen like all the others.

Stiffness crept along Galen's body as he slid his gaze to Ezra's. His eyes widened and his face turned deathly pale, mouth half open but vacant of words.

"We don't need your help," Ezra growled coldly, unblinking. "And we don't want it."

Galen barely seemed to hear him. He shuddered, finally stirring. His nose was crinkled, his eyes struck with horror. "W-w-what..." he stammered, repulsed and deeply disturbed. "Happened to you..."

Ezra's expression grew even harder. He didn't deign to reply to him, however, and merely looked away once more. "Go."

The others stared incredulously. Hera's face was sharp with concern as she looked from Starkiller - to Ezra- what -

Galen steeled himself, straightening. He pulled himself quickly back together to almost glare at Ezra. "I'm not going anywhere. I'm not scared of some kid." His eyes softened slightly. "But you should be afraid of what you've done to yourself. I can sense it. It's.. it's wrong."

Ezra was silent for a moment. His friends looked at him, but were unable to see past the dark, messy bangs.

"I told you to go."

Galen's eyebrows furrowed together a little deeper. Before he could say a word, Ezra spoke again.

"I might not be able to sense like what you've sensed with me anymore, whatever it is. But I don't need the Force to tell me that you can't be trusted." Ezra rose from his chair, whipping around abruptly to stare threateningly at the man. "So for the last time, you had better get out."

"You're making a mistake," Galen warned quietly. "I could help you find him. Whatever you've done to drive the Force away from you, you now have no way to contact your master, or to feel if he's around. And you certainly have no way to fight off any trouble you might meet along the way. These are both things that I could do easily. Let me -"

Ezra stepped a little closer. Galen flinched, then merely turned on his heel and strolled out the doorway.

Ezra stood still. The whole room, in fact, was unmoving. Everyone stared at Ezra Bridger in stunned disbelief.

After a long moment, Ezra finally took his eyes off of the doorway and turned to the others as though nothing had happened at all. "All right, now as I was saying, once we're on Bespin and find Lando..."

As the others emerged from their shaky silence, Hera quietly turned away and walked after Galen. She needed to see him out.

Galen, however, was nowhere in sight. He had certainly made short work of his exit.

Or so it seemed.

Narrowing her eyes, Hera tracked down Chopper. "Hey, Chop?"

"Bzzawrp?" Chopper rotated his dome towards her from where he had been looking at one of Sabine's paintings on the wall. Hera internally rolled her eyes. Of course the painting was of him.

"I need you to take a good look around the Ghost. Inside. Outside. Make sure there's nothing... where it doesn't belong." Hera kept her voice low as she leaned down and patted the Astromech. "Can you do that?"

"Wapp warrp warrr!" Chopper exclaimed, nudging her hand away with one of his arms before rolling around her and off on his way. "Wrrr wrr wrr."

Hera rolled her eyes for real. "Just tell me if you find anything, alright?!"

"Warrr! Wrr wrr! Pffffrrrrr."

"Chopper! Watch your binary!"

***

Galen was a little big to be crammed inside a ventilation shaft. But you had to do what you had to do.

"Yeah, it was disturbing," he muttered into his comlink, which was rather painful to hold when he had to press his elbow hard against metal to do so. "Real disturbing. It was like - like a void of just - wrongness around the kid." His eyes narrowed abruptly. "You wouldn't happen to have-"

"Don't worry about that, Galen." The feminine voice emitted from the device was crackling; she must've been really far away. Galen rolled his eyes, taking that to mean it had been too confidential for her to know - if she had anything to do with it at all. He had no idea. And he didn't like any of this. "Just keep an eye on them."

The voice from the comlink changed to a male one. "These orders come from the top, you know." There was definitely a smirk in his tone. Galen scowled silently; how he hated Boba Fett. The fodder-kissing brat was far too much like himself. "Remember, you back outta this - no money, and more problems."

Galen bit back a sigh. "Yeah, yeah," he muttered, then began to whine. "But how long does that mean I'll have to be stuck in this shaft?! I'm a grown man, for the Force's sake! And what am I going to eat? Where am I gonna-"

"I dunno, find your own solutions!"

"You sure don't sound like a grown man," he just barely heard Shadow mutter in the background.

Boba laughed. "You know your job, Galen! Get it done, and get it done right." He lowered his voice into a growl. "Or else. I'm not gonna get blamed for your screwups, Starkiller. So I suggest you keep me in mind."

"Sure thing, Boba," Galen said dryly, dripping sarcasm as he flicked back his hair. "Should be a piece of jogan fruit cake. I think about you allll the time. Your pretty face is just one of a kind."

It was Shadow's turn to start laughing (loudly) as Boba growled again. The signal clicked out, leaving Galen alone in the darkness with his sour thoughts of Boba Fett.

What irony that he had wound up working for some dumb bounty hunter he should completely outrank. In fact, it was EXTREMELY ironic, given all the money Boba had snatched from him over all the years...

Oh, I'll keep you in mind, Galen thought darkly, gazing down into the empty shaft below. Because when this is all over, I'm finally coming for you, Boba Fett.

His deep brown eyes softened slightly, unreadable as they continued to stare at the black void beneath him.

No matter how everything plays out.

***

Now, for my fellow Gravity Falls nerds who might be out there. DeCipher (-cheesy grin-) this for a joke that came to me after writing this chapter! xDD

(Hyphens indicate spaces between separate numbers)

8-5-'-19 19-20-9-12-12 9-14 20-8-5 22-5-14-20-19

Tell me what you translated it to, let me know if you need a hint - I enciphered it myself!

Have fun! ;D ~ Artemis