Danse Macabre/Part 6

Antifol watched the Jedi leave, then rounded on Gravo in a fury. "Do you have any idea what you just—"

"I just saved your ass," Gravo spat.

"I'm about to have Republic Intelligence breathing down my neck!"

"Did you want me to tell them what I was really doing on Axxila?"

"If it wasn't for your petty whining in the first place, the Jedi would never have come here!"

Gravo's dismissive look morphed to disdain. "Hey, I'm out there running the risks for you, and you can't even assemble some kind of a cover story? The hell kind of inside man are you?!"

Antifol flushed and stormed to the door. As he had expected, half of Antifol's crew and a handful of others were still clustered outside; a few were watching the Jedi vanish toward Anaxes Citadel, but most eyed him warily. "What the hell are you all staring at?!" he roared, and his shipping clerk jumped. "Get back to work!"

Most of them retreated with wide eyes, although Gravo's first mate glowered insolently until Antifol shut the door in his face. Locking it and retreating to his desk, he made a show of searching for a datacard, swiping a pile of them across his desk. "Work all my life…build this business off the sweat of my own back…"

"Commit treason…" Gravo tacked on.

Antifol glared, hating the man more every moment. "You're just as deep in this as I am."

Gravo snorted, rolling his eyes, and Antifol took the opportunity to open his desk drawer with a look of frustration. By the time Gravo had stopped shaking his head and looked back, Antifol had drawn out his disruptor pistol, and he had the satisfaction of finally seeing some fear on that bored face. "Hey now…"

"Want to insist on that bonus now?" Antifol demanded, laughing at the absurdity of it, how small the man and his concerns were. "Got something else to say about our fee structure? Anything you want to say to Republic Intelligence now?"

Gravo backed up slowly, hands raised. "Take it easy, boss…we can still salvage this…"

The pistol hummed as Antifol turned off the safety; Gravo froze in place. "Nothing else to say?" Antifol mocked. "Ex isn't so important now? Bills not so pressing?"

"I got no problems, boss…"

"Pity—I do. On top of everything else, now I have to hire a new captain."

Gravo's eyes widened, but before Antifol could pull the trigger, he felt the disruptor pistol fly out of his grip. It rocketed across the room, narrowly missing Gravo's head. Gravo lurched to the side, but the next second he reached around the back of his belt and drew a holdout blaster. He had only half-lined up a shot when his own weapon sprang out of his hand and he whirled to follow its progress.

Two men stood shoulder-to-shoulder at the base of the stairs up to the executive offices, each holding one of the confiscated blasters. The spacer dress Gravo's crew had found them might make them blend in at a distance, but up close only a great fool would mistake them for merchant crew. From the hard set of their chiseled jaws to the broad chests and thick arms that even loose crew coveralls couldn't hide, they were clearly ready-made for hard fighting—intimidating even before one noticed their red-and-yellow eyes. They had matching expressions on their matching faces; only a lightsaber scar from one's left temple to his jaw set them apart.

They stared, cold, silent, and unmoving. Antifol swallowed when the silence became too much to bear. "Gentlemen. I don't mean to involve you in a personnel dis—"

"Jedi," one of them said over Antifol, who stopped speaking at once.

"Two Jedi," the man with the scar added in the same voice.

"You let them come here."

"Here, where we are."

"I couldn't stop them!" Antifol said. "I tried—"

"You tried serve a lie right to a Jedi's face with only a morsel of truth," one man sneered. "Idiot."

"Who were they?" the other, scarred one asked Gravo.

The insult chafed, but Antifol wasn't fool enough to argue with these people, and he could only watch helplessly as Gravo shrugged. "A Miraluka and a Zygerrian. Surprised the Miraluka didn't see you."

"How fortunate for you both that we know how to hide," the unmarked man commented in a tone that didn't make Antifol feel particularly fortunate.

"A Zygerrian," mused his comrade. "Kal-Di's Padawan."

"He must be here himself."

"Obviously. They'll want to surround the bug with their best."

"For all the good it will do." Sickly eyes turned back to Gravo. "No sign of other Jedi?"

"Nope," Gravo shrugged. The two men stared at him, and after a moment Gravo's casual veneer started to chip, nerves showing beneath. "No. Sir."

One of the men nodded while the other started to pace. "Kal-Di isn't enough. They'll send other Knights."

"Darakhan?" the unmarked man asked.

His brother with the scar stopped, and they exchanged a look Antifol didn't follow. Eventually the scarred man brushed his cheek. "I should be so lucky."

"We—" Antifol started. He stopped when those identical, fiery stares fixed him like spotlights, but forced himself to press on. "We can make inquiries? About the Jedi?"

The men traded another look, then shook their heads in unison. "Stealth and subtlety don't seem to be your forte."

Antifol found a little backbone to reply, "I did as I was asked. I got you here."

"I got them here," Gravo pointed out.

"On my ship, at my orders!" Antifol snapped.

"And did you run the border? Risk the Navy pulling you in for a spot inspection?  You parked your fat ass behind a desk and sent me to be your errand boy, and if I'd gotten caught, you'd've washed your hands and laughed while they sent me to some penal colony in—"

"Enough," the scarred man snarled. "You've both fulfilled your purpose."

"And what now?" Antifol asked.

"What do you mean, what now? You know why we're here."

"But what about us?" Antifol demanded. "Republic Intelligence is coming! What am I supposed to tell them?"

"They want us to be spies, right?" Gravo interjected quickly, his eyes narrowed; thoughtful was such an alien expression on his face it took Antifol a moment to recognize it. "So let's be spies. Just not for them."

Their two guests looked at one another, but Antifol shook his head. "That'll never work, they'll see through it! We're talking about professional spies!  Jedi, even!  You think we can fool them?!"

"I don't think you can," Gravo retorted.

Antifol bit back his response, not wanting to be censured into silence again. Turning deliberately away from Gravo, he told the two men, "I've done everything Lord Aresh asked of me. Decades I've been here, smiling at the aliens, bowing to the Jedi, waiting for him to be ready to do something.  I've given everything I have for him, and I'm happy to do it!  But I can't stay here.  Not now."

The two Dark Jedi studied one another; Gravo tried to say something, but they each held up a hand in unison to silence him. Antifol was just starting to wonder if they could carry on a whole conversation in their minds when they suddenly turned away from one another. "You're right," the scarred man said. "Our master rewards the reliable."

"We can't leave you here for Republic Intelligence," his brother concurred. He tossed Gravo his pistol. "You. Come with me.  We need to ensure the Jedi don't meddle with our other incoming shipments."

"What should I do?" Antifol asked as the unmarked man ushered Gravo out the door.

The scarred man stepped to his side, handing the disruptor back. "Type up a note, quickly. Evil accusations, slander and falsehood, reputation destroyed…that sort of thing.  Your disappearance needs to be believable—a man in your position doesn't walk away from all this for nothing."

Antifol nodded as he sat and typed. It wasn't hard to find the frustration or the anger to pour into the words, and the Dark Jedi nodded encouragingly. "Good. Do you have any family we'll need to take care of?"

"Hmm?" Antifol had to think about the question; he had gotten quite into his condemnation of the Republic and the Jedi. "Oh, yes. My wife and my daughters.  We'll need to get them offworld too."

"Of course. A family with your sensibilities can grow and thrive in my master's territory." He laid a hand on Antifol's back, reading over his shoulder and nodding. "That's good. You should mention your family, too.  How they'll be disappointed.  Devastated, even."

It seemed a little macabre, but it fit with the narrative, so Antifol added it in. The Dark Jedi patted him on the back, and Antifol found his hands flying across the keyboard, mentioning each of his daughters by name, giving vent to his grief that his wife should lose all the comforts he had worked so hard to provide her. The feelings just seemed to rise up within him, as if something sleeping had woken from a bad dream to weep.

"Goooood," the Dark Jedi said. "Excellent, Antifol. You tried so hard to do what was right, but you weren't strong enough, were you?"

"I…I wasn't strong enough," Antifol found himself saying, though he frowned as he said it. The words appeared there on the note; had he typed them? "I should've kept my cool with the Jedi. I almost gave everything away…"

""Republic Intelligence will be here soon. You deactivated the security holos down here, right? You wouldn't let us be caught like that?"

"Of course not!" Antifol assured him. He typed another sentence, although he trailed off without closing punctuation, not sure where it was going. "When Gravo commed ahead I disabled them."

"For a thug, he's a quick thinker," the Dark Jedi observed.

"A certain low cunning," Antifol forced himself to concede, then found himself admitting, "not like me."

"No," the Dark Jedi agreed, entirely reasonably. "You would've ruined everything, wouldn't you?"

Each pat on the back deepened Antifol's shame, a gesture of affection he deserved less and less. "I…I would've," he whispered. "That Jedi was so powerful, and I'm just…just me…"

"It's amazing you managed to get us here."

"It's amazing I managed to get you here. Gravo and his crew did the real work."

"But now that we are here, there isn't really much you can do to serve my master anymore, is there?"

"There…isn't much I can do anymore. Gravo and my other captains know the lanes, the ways around the Republic.  I just handle the administration, a dozen people here could learn to do that."

"My master needs the best."

"Lord Aresh…he deserves better than me." Antifol felt sick, knowing it was true. All his life he had prepared for his moment, and when it came he had almost bungled it.

The fingers dug into his shoulder; even through his jacket they seemed to burn. "And your family…"

"They'll be so ashamed of me!" Antifol's stomach heaved. The thought crept into his mind and he couldn't force it away—Emera's look of anguish as they were forced out of their home onto the street, his daughters' misery as they lost their places in school, their friends, the bright futures they could have had, all because their worthless father didn't have enough brains to mislead a blind woman. "I…I can't face them!"

"You don't have to," the Dark Jedi whispered.

Antifol looked at the disruptor pistol. His heartbeat sped into a gallop, but the Dark Jedi's words echoed in his mind. "It's better this way."

It's better this way.

"It'll only hurt a second."

Only a second…and losing everything will hurt so much more, for so long…

"The Republic is coming. When they get here they'll take everything away from you."

''I'll lose everything. I'll lose Emera and the girls anyway…''

"It doesn't have to be that way…"

It didn't. The company provided for dependents, Gravo's whining to the contrary, and as Antifol read over his document, he knew it would keep his family's honor intact. They could deny his crimes with dignity, and not have their property seized by aliens and Jedi…the thought made him sick. He couldn't stand it a moment longer.

The barrel of the pistol tasted bland…but only for a second.