Four days. The longest time Armitage had ever let his sister stay in some sort of captivity before retrieving her was four days.
Back in simpler times before she'd joined the First Order when the word 'criminal' sounded like an apt title to a young, scrappy pilot, her older brother would appear outside whatever cell she'd managed to wake up in within the planet's first rotation. He'd always greet her with scathing words that berated the lifestyle she'd fallen into, pay whatever fine she'd racked up for herself, and insisted that there would come a day where she'd have to get herself out of her own messes because he'd be too busy doing nefarious things abroad a star destroyer in Wild Space.
("You're only here for all that civic shit. I take care of plenty messes that you never have to deal with." Mara had retorted one time before brandishing a large cut across her right shoulder. The slash had been inflicted by a Ryyk blade in the midst of a fighting match she'd joined on a dare. Winning the skirmish hadn't stopped the Batuu peacekeepers from restraining her on charges of aggravated assault.
Armitage gave her a tight-lipped look, "How noble of you to spare me from your other pointless excursions.")
If she had been imprisoned somewhere in the Inner-Rim, she'd wait three standard days at the most. In the one rare occasion when she got arrested on a Core World, only a few hours passed before some operative Mara had never seen before came to free her. Her brother vowed never to venture that far into the galaxy's center while the New Republic was in power and he kept true to his word. That still didn't spare Mara a lecture as the unknown man played a recorded holovid of Armitage giving his usual spiel on how purposeless her life had become. She never knew how he would manage to find her each time, but he and those self-righteous speeches always did.
Takodana, a forest planet on the edge of the Mid-Rim, was the only time she'd doubted him. The girl had spent four days in a cell nursing a broken rib, staring at a paint-splotched ceiling waiting to hear the obnoxious accent the Hux men shared cut through her train of thought. In the last hours before he appeared, she wondered if maybe her brother had truly given up on her. Maybe he thought she'd perished in the fire set by the Gauvian Death Gang that had destroyed her personal starfighter months earlier. Maybe he finally had given up on her like he always threatened.
Yet he did show up eventually, bringing news of their father's passing and offering her a position in the First Order. She guessed that he'd waited longer to come as a method of wearing her down or a type of punishment.
Stranding her on a deserted planet after her squadron had been completely decimated had to be a punishment. Mara was sure Armitage was coming for her, but not after she suffered just a little due to her failure.
And Maker be damned, she was suffering. She was being forced to scale over odd rocks and listen to the Resistance man make small talk with his droid every few minutes. Only every so often would the two of them exchange words.
"For goodness sakes, stop humming!"
"And why would you want me to stop singing? Doesn't singing lighten the mood? Make everyone happier?"
"Now that's hypocritical. You said you didn't like humming."
"I said I didn't like your humming. There's a difference."
It'd been hours since they left that dreaded cave and Mara was tired. She was tired of sand, tired of heat, tired of the amount of optimism the man beside her continued to express every fifteen minutes like he'd been programmed to do so. As she kept climbing over large, bleached red rocks, an ache began to persist in her legs and her throat began to dry. Her lips became chapped and her hair stuck to the back of her neck in a sticky, sweaty mess.
Please don't let it be four more days of this. Please please please.
She didn't want to dwell on the problem of her impossibly destroyed fighter and her mind wandered to the few, lovely moments of a happier wasteland from her teenage years. Back on Mandalore when she found time to leave the flight academy to visit her extended family, her Aunt Ly would always quietly sing her soft melodies. No matter where she would go, she'd always manage to end up with faint tune spilling from her lips.
So when the man behind her started to hum, it sparked a deep memory of a more pleasant time. The images of her aunt in the market came to mind, singing beneath her breath as she looked over the local fruits. After promptly telling him to shut up, a few minutes later she found herself doing the same thing.
"What's wrong with my humming, Blondie?" The man was obviously offended at her comment, becoming more irritable as the hours droned on in a stupid desert surrounded by heated rocks that slightly burned to the touch. The sun had risen higher into the sky and the shadows that had brought some fleeting refreshment had diminished.
Mara didn't face him, jumping down onto the closet secure bolder, "It's irritating, like that stupid nickname. 'Blondie', so original."
"So what am I supposed to call you? 'Evil pilot lady'? You haven't exactly told me your real name."
"Not that." She muttered, scouting the horizon to see if they were heading in the right direction. BB-8 plopped down beside her, a metal clang echoing throughout the plateau when he landed.
A small carved out village seemed to be perturbing from a mountain-like structure at least a half-mile away. It'd be quite a climb, but hopefully there'd be something useful.
"And while we're on the subject," Mara observed her next place to land, "you haven't exactly told me your name. I've been calling you asshole in my head this whole time."
The man climbed down a large rock to her right, gaining a few yards in front of her, "Dameron works."
Mara was immediately surprised at how easily he'd given up his name, whether it be first or last. Then again, it could be a flat out lie. But no matter, she now had at least something to address him by. There still was a familiarity behind the word, like she'd read while skimming the holonet or seen it before somewhere else. It wasn't a common one and Mara hadn't known anyone else who called themselves Dameron.
"What about you?" He asked, turning back to see her descend down to the sloped rock, "You gave me the location for your base, but no identification."
She shrugged, watching as BB-8 slid down beside her, then made his way to his master's side. She realized she'd end up saying her name sometime or other, so why not just say it now? She was out of the cave and was pretty sure he wasn't going to kill her until they got to their base. Her stubbornness had died down after Mara's plan of not saying her base utterly failed after that animal bit her.
And she hated the nickname Bala-Tik used to refer to her as when she was with the death gang.
"Mara." She simply stated, shorting her original name and not daring to utter her last, "Now, since we are on a trusty-name basis, can I have a pistol now?"
He, Dameron, drew in a large breath that ended in a dramatic sigh, "Trust is a very heavy word. Correct me if I'm wrong, you made a few death threats against my life awhile back. Now this may sound crazy, but my natural instinct to protect myself is telling me giving you a blaster isn't a good idea."
The woman couldn't really blame his logic. That didn't stop her from pressing her point, "What about if that thing shows up again? If I get mauled, you don't get any of that precious enemy info you need."
An unspoken barrier separated them by a few yards once terrain smoothed out under them to drop in elevation. He gestured vaguely in her direction now that he wasn't preoccupied on keeping his footing, "What about those sticks you have with you- They're weapons right? One shows up, you hit 'em with those and I'll do the shooting."
"They're batons and I hate that plan. Remember the last time it got close to me?" She brandished her injured hand wrapped in the last of the bandage's scavenged from Dameron's X-wing, "C'mon, I promise I won't shoot you."
"You sound desperate."
"We're on a deserted planet probably full of wild animals. My only company is an enemy and his droid. All I have to protect myself is my batons. Yes, I am desperate, I will admit that."
"I don't trust desperate. Or evil pilot ladies." Dameron shielded his eyes from the sun as he looked up at the cliff ahead, looking up to spot the small village nestled into the cliffside. No sign of life could be seen from so far away and further proved the theory the village was abandoned. What was unexpected was the set of stairs carved out from the red rock.
Mara followed the man's gaze to discover the stone steps. A small shred of relief came over her and then the reality that they'd have to still walk up to the small civilization set in, "Well shit."
"It could be worse." Dameron told her, at which she grumbled.
"It could be better."
"We could be dead or have no steps and be forced to climb." He countered and Mara did have to admit to herself he did have a point.
Still, she tossed out the idea, "I could not be stranded here and this could just be your problem."
Dameron chuckled a bit, starting towards the carved steps, "Well that's your own fault, isn't it?"
"What are you suggesting?" The blonde's mind went to the damage report her fighter displayed, knowing she's been taken down by one, powerful shot that didn't come from any X-wing.
He shrugged as they went up, "Well, if you'd been a better pilot-"
"You wanna have this conversation again?" Mara snapped at him while she dodged one of BB-8's mechanical 'arms' that pulled him up each step, "Let me remind you the person you're talking to brought you down with one precise shot during a full on dogfight while falling out of the sky."
"Yet you're still trapped here with me complaining." He took a second to look back at her irritated face before continuing up the steps, "I may not have shot you down, but one of my pilots did. You were blown out of the sky by 'Resistance Scum', that you think is so below."
Mara sighed in frustration, not thinking before the words came out of her mouth, "I'll have you know that one lucky shot took off most of my wing. That's the first time I've crashed in years mind you-"
"Wait, did you say 'took off most of my wing'? That's impossible." Dameron came to a full stop. Mara crossed her arms in front of her chest nodding.
The man pondered on the fact a second before repeating, "That's impossible. I guess my people are better than you think."
"Really?" She said exasperatedly, shaking her head at his ignorance, "You might not the 'impossible' in that sentence, meaning it can't happen. Something else did."
"All we had was X-wings. A malfunctioning system sometimes can't calculate all the hits it receives. Either way, we're both stuck here." Dameron told her before starting up again. The path upwards became tighter to the rock as it got higher, resulting in the trek becoming to slip off of. A misstep and you'd be falling fifty feet.
Mara had taken more care to where each of her footsteps landed, but still brewing with angry competitiveness, "So what makes you so good, huh? One famous stunt and a few missions with this Black Squadron and suddenly you think you're the best pilot in the galaxy."
"I'll have you know," He mimicked her tone from earlier, causing her to scowl, "That one famous 'stunt' was no small feat. My squadron and I have made a name for ourselves, and we've earned all of it. Since when did your Fascist organization crank you out of their never-ending supply of so called 'expert tacticians'? You just like Agent Tererx and the ones that followed, all military geniuses and expert flyers we have bested. Suddenly a new one comes on the scene and it supposed to be just as intimidating."
Mara's eyebrow raised as she stepped more away from the side in order for her not to plummet down, "Just because you somehow evaded a few old Imperial officers trying to resurrect the glory days does not prove that much. Yet here I've been the entire time, surviving you all. I designed the attack patterns the new training school is practicing, see how long you maintain that title you flaunt after we exploit your weaknesses. And what have your basic maneuvers been? Recycled exercises from the Rebellion that always leave your left side open."
Dameron forced a laugh, realizing she actually had a few points. Still, she glossed over a few crucial facts, "So your pilots will do better than mine because of new patterns? That's-"
Will you both be quiet?
Both looked at an angry, beeping droid. BB-8 was pulling himself up the steps, but didn't look otherwise annoyed to Mara. Though droid's never seemed annoyed, more sounded. The orange and white ball made it past her.
"Sorry pal." Dameron shot a look at the blonde, who return it with a quick sneer, "Some people don't know when they've lost."
The rest of the walk was rather quiet, with the occasional comment from the astromech acknowledging how high up they really were. This caused both humans to glance down and become just a little more nauseous. Mara genuinely felt that she's throw up before remembering she hadn't eaten in a good amount of hours and probably had nothing to gag up.
The hike lasted less then a half-hour. When the small group arrived at the village, as expected, no one greeted them. The place was dead quiet, the only sound being that of the wind whistling through the small cracks in the red rock.
Mara peered into the first adobe house she saw. She was met with a roof that was a little too low and an empty one room house made out of the same colored rock that surrounded her everywhere she went. There was one window, the edges chipped with age.
The floor was smoother than anything else. It seemed worn by constant footsteps trampled upon it, but deep carves were sliced into the ground, rough under her touch. Mara sat down on the floor, her fingers tracing along long marks that seemed foreign in a place mostly sculpted by intelligent life.
Claws had sliced where someone had once lived. The more Mara's eyes took in the tiny room, more marks became apparent on the walls and floor. Faint red contrasted against burnt orange rock, dried blood splattering the ceiling in some places.
The blonde expectations of this place were met. Whatever had bitten her hand the day before was capable of killing an entire village. Perhaps it was a pack of beasts. That idea seemed more realistic to her as she observed the too silent room.
There was no evidence of the massacre besides the blood stains and claw indents. Mara figured there would've been at least ravaged household items, any sign of life before the attack. Nothing was there in that small house besides herself.
The sculpted home did resemble one she'd seen. The distant cries of screams echoed in her head as she looked at the blood. She saw memories from not so long ago. Young children, sometimes even babies, being taken ripped away from their mothers as they screamed. Their houses set on fire as ships ascended back into the dark skies while families became fractured.
It's for the good of the Order, Armitage told her, Their sacrifices will be appreciated. Father would've been proud of you today, Marana.
Father would've been proud.
That was what he told her whenever she doubted, reminding Mara that after everything she'd done to let her family down, what she did now was right. Those few words snaked her way into her thoughts as she watched one recruitment mission she flew for. She stood and spectated as a young mother was shot in the stomach, crying out for her child.
Father would've been proud.
She had found herself questioning her choice to join the Order more and more with every mission she flew once she gotten out of that dreadful tactician room and became more involved active duty. With that one sentence, Mara assured herself she was doing something correctly for once in her life. For once she wasn't screwing up. She was finally needed somewhere for her talent and expertise. She was finally valued.
But what did her choice cost? Now her pilots were dead and she was stranded on a stupid desert planet with no real hope of getting off. If she hadn't taken Armitage's offer a little over a year ago, she might be in a much better circumstance and no one would've died on her accord. Maybe if she'd never joined her brother, that mother might still have her child.
Now, it was just the Dameron's hate for the Order getting to her. Mara's dismissed her thoughts of old memories and stood up. She exited the carved house and moved on. She spotted BB-8 disappear into another home, then quickly roll out, then go into another. Mara's guess was that he's not found anything more than her.
"Looks like this place suffered an attack and whoever found them either raided them or took the survivors somewhere else." Dameron appeared from behind her, walking out of a adobe house.
She nodded, briefly looking back around her, "Yeah, all I found was dry blood and claw marks. I'm guessing whatever killed all these people was the same creature that thought my hand was dinner."
"But where is it? The wind blew all the sand over its tracks, but this is the first we've seen of it. All of the signs seem months, perhaps even years old. It doesn't seem like it's been here in the last week." He observed as BB-8 gave up searching through the houses and rolled back up to him.
Mara glanced over off the side of the cliff, gulping a bit as she saw the drop. She still continued conversation, "How do we know it has or hasn't been here lately? What sign would it leave?"
Dameron shrugged, "Fresh blood trail? This thing's gotta eat."
"What does it have to eat? I'm pretty sure we're the only thing on the menu."
"BB-8 saw a lizard about an hour back."
Great. Just great. First heat, endless sand, now scaly lizards? Nothing about that discovery eased her mind.
The droid nodded it's cute little head, then rolled off. The astromech beeped something about following him before disappearing passed a house. Mara wandered around the corner as Dameron called out, "Where you going pal?"
BB-8 answered, telling them that he thought he'd found a trail. Both of them obliged and followed, Mara cocking her head to the side with some curiosity. The other part of her wondered why she decided to follow a droid she knew nothing about.
Around the corner of houses was a cave that lead into the rock. It had a visible light at the end and a soft decline, and BB-8 went right into it.
"Must be a better way back down." Dameron commented while following his droid without any hesitation.
Mara watched as he walked forward, getting a creeping feeling rising up her base of her spine. Still, she began to go with them, "We have no idea where this goes."
"You wanna take the stairs?"
His words bounced off the dank caves wall. The heat seemed more intense inside and the humidity was ridiculous. It felt as if she'd walked right into an oven. Her parched throat burned for water and Mara tried to ignore her stomach begging for food as BB-8 kept beeping at Dameron.
"Do you see something buddy?" He asked the astromech, who replied excitedly that he was sure he spotted a shadow moving.
The cave wasn't very long, and soon enough they were out in direct sunlight again. The decline got a bit steeper while tall archways of rock towered above them, but more or less they were going down a less harrowing road then the one they climbed up.
BB-8 rolled over to what looked like the opening to another cave, though it diverted from an open trail clearly going down. Mara kept walking forwards when both man and droid stopped suddenly. The blonde kept going, not seeing a reason for them to not continue.
"What are you guys-"
"Shhsh." He whispered fiercely underneath his breath. She finally stopped, curious as to why both BB-8 and Dameron suddenly had become like statues. It was only when she made no sound did she hear it.
Multiple snores from inside the cave she just passed.
Dameron motioned for her to come closer while he stepped next to the mouth of the cave. The astromech ceased all sounds as he rolls over silently to his master. Mara went to the other side of the cave, listening to the sounds of creatures in deep sleep.
Beside the her, Dameron shouldered the large blaster that hung from his shoulder. He checked to make sure it was operational while Mara asked, "Do I get a blaster now?"
"No." He answered quietly, peering into the darkness of the cave. He glanced at his droid, nodding his head towards her, "Make sure Mara stays put while I go in."
"What?" She questioned in disbelief if his stupidity, "You're going to go in there alone?"
"I'm not going to do anything stupid, just see how many of them there are. Get in, get out."
"That sounds like an excellent plan. An excellent plan if you want all of us to die!" She whispered-yelled under her breath. The man chose to ignore her, gesturing at BB-8 again. The droid came up to her, and to keep her in check, showed off a small, bright flame.
Try to leave, I'll burn you.
"How cute." Mara mocked the smaller astromech as Dameron entered the cave. She looked down again at the droid, rolling her eyes, "You realize your master's going to get himself killed."
Yeah, he does these things a lot. He usually regrets them later.
A few long, silent moments followed as Mara was held at flame-point. Any longer, she'd actually be somewhat convinced he'd somehow survive the little escapade. That small flicker of almost existent hope was short lived as a roar erupted from the cave.
"Damnit, that was a really stupid idea!" Dameron screamed as he bolted out of the cave.