Photophobia

The Enemy

Soon he discovered the remains of the rebel shuttle. It was nothing more than a husk. The swath of destruction behind it was far greater than he had anticipated. Hux hid behind a tree and observed the enemy craft.

It was a small, old Y-Wing-model. If memory served correctly it was usually manned by two pilots. An odd choice to try to capture him – an PX-freighter would have been more-

A rustle in the coppice stopped his train of thought. His eyes darted to the large tree where the noise was coming from, he trained his blaster into this direction.

To his surprise a dark-haired woman in a brown jumpsuit emerged from the underbush. She limped towards the shuttle, holding her right hand. Judging from the dirt on her clothes and the pained expression on her face she wasn't doing well.

She entered the shuttle. Hux waited for a moment, but nobody followed her. Was she the sole survivor of the crash? This was probably the best chance to capture her and interrogate her – even if somebody was still out in the forest he had a hostage.

He gritted his teeth and crept as fast as possible towards the shuttle while still holding his blaster. The burning pain in his hip began to fade as he closed in. He was just in time as he heard somebody moving inside the shuttle, and just when he arrived at the airlock the woman stepped out of it.

There was shock and anger visible on her face. Hux quickly scanned her for weapons but it seemed that she was unarmed.

"On your knees, rebel scum," he said.

She put her left hand behind her head and knelt down. The way she pressed her right hand against her chest indicated that it hurt.

His eyes darted back to her face. He had seen her before. That curly hair ... he inhaled sharply. "I know you – you're the rebel who was with that traitor. You tried to sabotage the hyperspace tracker."

She glared at him with unveiled disdain. So, she had recognized him as well.

"Is the traitor in there?" asked Hux. He twisted his lips. "He's dead isn't he?"

"Finn is alive and well. And that's more than you can say about Phasma," she snapped.

How dare this filth even talk about Phasma? Hux felt himself getting angry. "Get up, I want to see him myself."

He directed her into the cockpit. Hux checked the body slumped over the controls in the pilot seat. The man was dead and regrettably it wasn't the traitor. So the woman was alone. He felt relief washing over him and he relaxed a little. They wouldn't take him prisoner. He wiped his face. Strange: It was a poorly planned operation – even my rebel standards.

And they couldn't have known that he was on his way to the Ghrma system ... but he had no time to think about that. He had to focus.

"What were you doing in here?" he asked.

She frowned. "What do you think, Hux? I checked the long-range transmitter."

Hux glanced at the console. "It's obviously burnt out. You can't possibly-"

"Of course I can! You don't-"

The insolence! He pointed his blaster at her. "Don't interrupt me!"

No discipline, he thought with a scornful snort. Not surprising from rebel scum. But perhaps she still could be useful? The jumpsuit suggested that she was used to working with tech. "Are you a technician?"

She chewed on her lower lip, after a few moments she finally answered: "Mechanic. But I know quite a lot about all the other stuff as well."

Finally some good luck, thought Hux. He wasn't completely inept but he still was far from being a decent technician. The chips in his shuttle were fried of course but perhaps there was a way to force her to repair them?