The cargo hauler trundled up the long and winding road to Hastaati base, the boxy speeder swaying in the strong wind, their destination a mere silhouette in the night, obscured by flurries of snow. Luna sat in the front compartment, next to the driver, a Klatooinian woman who wore shades even though it was dark out, and who for some reason refused to tell the Nexus her name but otherwise seemed friendly enough. 'Just follow my lead,' she said to Luna, over and over again.
She's nervous, Luna thought, eyeing her up. She had good reason to be. Even though she had evidently made this trip dozens, perhaps hundreds, of times, there was no escaping the fact that this time was different. That they'd be making away with a bit more than the usual stolen goods. It probably didn't help that Luna had refused to divulge the exact nature of their mission, a fact that had rankled Master Xin.
'How are we to help you if you refuse to divulge what exactly it is that you're stealing?' he had growled at her just that morning. It wasn't the first time he had put forward such a question. Nor was it that first time that he had reminded her: 'are we not allies?'
'We are allies,' Luna had agreed calmly, though that calm was hiding a tempest beneath the surface. She had long since lost patience with Xin, and was now only staying calm through sheer force of will. 'But this is a decision that goes above even my head. This is the way of Crimson Dawn,' then a thought struck her. 'If it helps to soothe your ego, I can grant you a greater portion of the reward.'
Xin bristled at the condescending words, but bit back any angry retort that he was no doubt screaming in his mind. He bowed slightly, and Luna had seen enough of the Muun's bows of respect to understand that his was insolently shallow, but at this point she didn't care. If all went well, they'd be gone from this planet within a day, never to return. 'That will be sufficient. Thank you, Mistress.'
'Coming up on the first marker now,' the Klatooinian driver said. Luna could see nothing outside, no marker, nothing. 'It's just a phrase. There's no actual marker,' the driver clarified. 'They've been watching us the moment we stepped out of Anaxe, but on their radar proper now. From now on, there's no going back.'
Luna nodded, double checking her equipment. Her small hold-out blaster was tucked in her waistband, the security cylinder in her inside jacket pocket. She wore regular, every day clothes, the kind a normal delivery driver would wear, but underneath she wore a very itchy First Order technician's uniform, and she squirmed a little in her chair, trying to scratch an itch on her back, the movement succeeding in only making it worse.
The hauler crested a hill and Hastaati base came into view, and Luna finally got her first up close look at it. It loomed above them on a large, flattened crag on the side of the mountain. Even at night the exterior was fully lit, and she could see the low, squat buildings that looked like they extended into the mountain itself. At the edge of the crag was a small landing field, with several cargo shuttles at rest there, and a handful of TIEs, though to her experienced eye they looked to be undergoing repairs. She had no doubt there were more fighters hidden inside the base, kept safe from prying eyes and the cold. All too soon, the hauler had approached the security checkpoint that marked the entrance to the base. A stormtrooper stood in front of the gate and signalled them to stop, though they needn't have bothered, for the driver slowed the speeder down to a crawl, stopping a good five feet from the gate.
The driver reached for the datapad by her side and had already lowered the window and poked the datapad out before the stormtrooper had even reached them. 'Heya, Fives,' she said amiably.
'Wotcha, Snett,' the stormtrooper, Fives, replied, taking the datapad from her, thumbing through the manifest. He nodded his head in Luna's direction. 'No Berin today?'
'Boss has hired some new staff,' Snett, the driver, said coolly. 'I have the job of training them up.'
'Joy of joys,' Fives grumbled. He handed the datapad back, waving them through. 'All clear.'
Snett waved her thanks and drove on through, swinging round away from the lit front to their left to the darker back entrance to the right, heading into a bright receiving bay, where they were greeted by several stormtroopers.
'So,' Luna said, 'Snett, huh?'
'I don't want to talk about it,' Snett said darkly, then got out to talk to the stormtroopers.
Luna got out and went to the back of the hauler, unlocking the tailgate and throwing it up. In the darkness she could see nothing but a couple of boxes. All good. She peered around the edge of the hauler, beyond the talking stormtroopers and into the recesses of the bay, picking out the locations of the security cameras. 'Stay here,' she said quietly to no one in particular, then walked up to join Snett.
'This the newbie?' said one of the stormtroopers.
'Yeah,' Snett turned the word into a yawn. 'She's a bright kid, but a little clueless.'
Luna tried to make herself seem small, tucking her head down, hunching her shoulders and bringing her arms and legs together. She was aiming for meek and nervous but she felt like she was succeeding only in looking cold, which wasn't exactly wrong either. She looked at the nearest security cam.
'Don't worry about that,' the stormtrooper assured her, turning to the cam and giving it a rude gesture. 'Not recording. This isn't our first time.'
Luna nodded and smiled gratefully, visibly relaxing. 'So is the cargo on its way? What do we do now?'
'Kett will be down with the goods soon enough,' Snett answered for the stormtroopers. 'We just have to wait.
Luna nodded, rubbed her hands together dramatically. 'If it's okay with you, I'm going to go wait in the hauler. It's a bit cold.'
'Snett and the stormtroopers shared a look. 'You go,' said the stormtrooper who hadn't spoken yet. 'Let the grown ups handled this.'
Luna had to remind herself that, in this situation, she was just a dumb kid off the streets and not the second in command of an elite squadron, and that she absolutely could not give this stormtrooper a dressing down like she were his superior officer. Instead she looked down at the floor and stepped back into the front compartment of the hauler. She checked her chrono, marking the start, then looked out the window at Snett and the stormtroopers as they talked and laughed. And then she looked at the air conditioning panel. It looked like a regular panel, similar if not exactly like other air conditioning panels in countless other landspeeders. This one, however, had been rewired to serve a different purpose. She checked her chrono one last time, then eyed up the on-off switch to the AC. She flicked it on.
The engine whined beneath her, went silent. Snett and the stormtroopers stopped mid laugh and looked at her. Luna tensed the engine gave out a piercing shriek and the repulsor field beneath the hauler deactivated and the two tonne speeder fell to the floor with a bang.
