Ben--his hair recently dyed brown so that the red didn't stick out in anyone's mind--pressed his face against the shuttle viewport to stare at the permacrete below.

It was daylight outside, but his body was still on Fandom time and telling him he needed more sleep. "This is the planet they chose?" he asked Lekauf. "It's so...ugh!"

"Kind of the point," Lekauf replied as they walked out of their battered shuttle. To everyone else it was not a GAG ship carefully covered in Corellian dust, Corellian food crumbs, Corellian fabrics and any other number of touches designed to throw off a forensics team. It was just a battered old ship and Ben and Lekauf were two Corellian cousins out for a day on the town.

The rifle was folded in two inside Ben's jacket, and the vibroblade his mother had given him before he went to Fandom was at his hip. He'd rehearsed it all in his mind on the trip here--rifle to drop Gejjen, vibroblade to escape if seized.

They reached their vantage point just in time to watch the GA Chief of State enter the building across the street from them.

Ben's heart began pounding painfully in his chest. This was really happening. They just needed to wait for Omas and Gejjen to have their conversation--which was now coming in through the earpieces Ben and Lekauf were wearing--and then take the shot when Gejjen left.

The negotiations were fascinating. "I think you may need to do more than fire them now that they've become used to getting their own way." That was Gejjen, and Ben's ears pricked up. They were talking about Jacen.

"I think I know what you mean," Omas replied, "and I don't care for that solution."

"Niathal--ambitious. Dangerous. Solo--ambitious, dangerous, and a Jedi, too. We can solve your problem for you permanently."

And then Omas's reply: "If you do, I don't need to know about it."

Ben winced. This was a dirty game all the way to the top: he was planning to assassinate Gejjen as Gejjen was doing a deal to kill Jacen and Niathal, and Omas was turing a blind eye. Everyone could be bought if the price was high enough.

It was enough to make Ben ill. The meeting inside began to break up and a new voice crackled in his ear. "Ben, Gejjen's taking the south exit. Move right."

He jogged to the far end of the platform, keeping close to the rear wall, laid down and sighted down on a neat military haircut. As Gejjen walked, two guards in casual clothes weaved in and out of Ben's shot. At least one of them would be looking up when Gejjen dropped, trying to catch sight of him.

And Ben had only two minutes to blend into the crowd while getting back to the shuttle. It was just like trying to get in and out of Centerpoint Station--only back then he'd still thought this kind of thing was fun.

Ben held his breath, let the rifle adjust itself for wind and angle and felt his finger tighten on the trigger. One second Gejjen's head was filling the scope, and the next Ben was staring down at empty permacrete as the rifle kicked back hard against his shoulder.

Did I kill him?

He could hear screams in the air from three stories below him, and he began scrambling backwards. "Get out of there, Ben," came the voice in his ear, and he was certainly doing his damndest to comply, racing in a crouch to the elevator and trying to blend into the crowd that was now roiling around on the street.

"I'm right behind you," Lekauf said in his earpiece. "Walk down to the south doors and we can go around the perimeter to the shuttle."

Above him, a holoscreen was showing the street: yes, he'd killed Gejjen in a textbook head shot.

I can't feel my face, Ben thought to himself, fully admitting to himself how terrified he was. Ben got to the doors leading to the shuttle. They opened to a man in full Corellian Security uniform pointing a blaster at him. "Everybody stay where you are!", he shouted.

Ben's heart stopped.

"You're all going to be scanned for ballistic residue," the man continued.

"That's going to take hours," someone behind Ben complained.

"Then it'll take hours."

Ben activated his earpiece and spoke, barely moving his lips. "I'm going to find a weak point and get out," he said, feeling the gun pressing against his jacket. "I can jump anywhere, open any door, remember. I'll find my own way home."

"You do that and they'll know it was a Jedi," Lekauf replied. "Relax. Contingency plans, gentleman."

"I'm covered in trace," Ben said, beginning to panic.

Lekauf moved up next to him and tried to take the rifle away.

"What are you doing?"

"Contingency plan. Let it go, Ben."

"You're going to dump it?"

"Something like that," Lekauf said. "Stick with the rest of the team, okay?"

"You're nuts."

Lekauf grinned. "Just like Grandad." He moved back towards the central doors, then grabbed a woman tightly around the neck and held his blaster to her head. "Open the doors!" he screamed. "Open the kriffing doors or you'll be scraping her off the ceiling!"

Ben stared as the people around him began to scream and scatter. This hadn't been in the briefings.

"Kid," the Corellian Security officer began, "this isn't going to do you any good. We can talk--"

"Yeah, like you'll have a nice chat with me about Gejjen. I killed the scumbag and I'm proud of it! I'm a patriot, you hear me! They ought to give me a medal!"

Lekauf dragged the woman with him back to the shuttle.

"Okay, we go now," another GAG officer said in Ben's ear, coming up behind him. "Slow and calm. He bought us time."

Ben began to move, legs shaking hard under him.

Lekauf let the woman go, then sealed up the shuttle ramp.

"Come on," the officer begged Ben, tugging at his collar, pulling him bodily out the side doors.

Lekauf wasn't moving. Was something wrong with the ship? In the Force, Ben could feel him: terrified, triumphant, and oddly at peace.

Oh no.

"We can't just leave him!" Ben said, tears beginning to roll down his face, about to turn around and help, and to hell with the GA and the Jedi Council finding out that Luke Skywalker's son had carried out a political assassination. "We can't just abandon him!"

And that's when the shuttle exploded into a thousand pieces.

"Yes," the officer said softly, dragging Ben out. "Now we can."

[OOC: NFB, NFI, dialogue taken with love from Sacrifice, OOC welcome. *sniffle*]