Reaching Through Darkness

Ch 29
Karen

I stopped running when I heard the loud foot steps of an oncoming person. I made myself slow down to a reasonable pace and kept my head down, but acted busy. The person was a man in uniform who gave me one questioning look, but did not approach or question me. My heart raced wildly, but I forced myself to act cool and calm, like I belonged in the hall. I breathed a thanks to the Force. I opened a door that was labeled “clean up crew” and walked in a small closet. The room was crowded with cleaning supplies, but that didn’t matter. There was a table that I quickly cleared off and climbed up on. I raised my hands on the ceiling and pushed. The ceiling block opened up and I slide it over. I grabbed onto the small metal beams to test my weight. The beams were solid durasteel. I hauled my thin body through the hole and replaced the ceiling block. I quietly prayed to the Force no one would open the closet before I escaped.

It is strange to note that everyone who escapes always uses the air ducts and so was I. I always thought the ducts would be too small or too loud, but this one muffled all the sound I was created, crawling quickly on my hands and knees. I had no idea where I was going, but I knew I was getting as far away as I could from sith and that was a good thing. I peered down over a grate and saw heads of brown hair. Two men, dressed in gaurd uniform were pacing around in the room, restless and bored. I leaned my ear to the grate to hear what they were talking about.

“-he said some girl was on the loose. I didn’t even know there was a girl in here.”

“Yeah, well that’s the master for ya. If you ask me, I think he didn’t tell us because he’d knew would we go find her. I know I would. I’m awfully lonely for a femme’s body.”

“You and your sex. Don’t ya ever thing of anything else?”

“Hey, don’t knock unless you’ve tried it. I’m only here because my babe needs the money bad. She’s pregnant ya know.”

“Yeah and that’s the millionth time you’ve said that today.”

“Sorry, I’m just so happy I’m gonna be a father. Anyway, I think this whole girl thing is a myth, trying to get us all alert or something.”

I breathed and sat back up as much as I could without hitting my head. I expected my escaped to be notified to the guards, but I was glad no one knew where I was. I shifted my weight and froze as the ceiling block I was sitting on groaned under my weight.

“What was that?”

“Maybe it was your stomach.”

“I just ate!”

“I dunno then.”

“It sounded like it came over head.”

“There’s no one here. I wouldn’t worry about it.”

I could feel the board underneath me sink downward. My heart raced again. If I moved, the men would surely hear it. But if I didn’t move I was going to fall.

“Maybe it’s the girl.”

“Look, there is no way it could be the girl. All that is up there is a bunch of pipes and stuff.”

I heard a crack and started to crawl off of the block.

“I’m telling ya, there’s someone up there. And if it’s the girl-”

“There is no girl up there for the last tim-”

The block broke in several pieces. I had not had time to lift my knees and was pulled down and out. I fell painfully on the floor, dazed for a moment. When my eyes cleared, I saw two very shocked men staring at me. The scene was frozen like someone froze time. I scrambled onto my feet and ran for the door.

“Hey, you there!”

I reached for the door, an old manual one, and kicked hard to force the door to open. When the door sung outward, I raced through and into another gray hall.

“Stop!”

I ignored their orders and kept running. I turned left at the nearest cross halls and then right, trying to throw the guards off. The hall ended at the door. I could hear the loud, running footsteps of the guards chasing after me. I palmed the small screen of the access. The screen turned green and the door opened to an outside platform, overlooking the city. Part of the platform was covered. The rising sun angled the light, so there was a long shadow that reached the end of the walk. I slowly crept towards the end, wondering what I was going to do next. I had no where to go and not much time left before the guards would catch up. I walked ever so slowly to the end and looked down. There was nothing between and a long fall to my death. I breathed rapidly, unable to control my panic.

“Karen!”

I looked up and saw a small ship flew my way. I looked at the cockpit and was my master. I nearly started crying in relief, but was distracted by the screams coming from the door of the building. Master Mirmo stopped the ship abruptly and popped up the transparent hatch. I did not waste time and climbed in as blaster blots bounced off the sides of the ship. When I was seated, the hatch was back on and Mirmo was already directing the ship away from the building. I found myself close to hyper ventilating.

“Deep breathes, Karen. Are you hurt?”

My master was staring at me. I became aware of how horrible I looked. I hadn’t had a bath in days, there were bruises all over me, and there was a nasty welt on my face from the hard smack that Romness dealt me. Still, all of those wounds didn’t match up to what I had been through. I didn’t know how to tell my master what had happened so I lied and said I was fine. I added after a second to get me out of here as fast as he could.

“What happened?”

That was such a huge, complex question; I paused to consider it, while collecting my thoughts. There was too much to say, too little I had thought over. I remained silent in reflection.

“Karen?”

I realized how worried and upset my master sounded. I slowly told him I couldn’t answer that and just wanted to be quiet. He nodded and focused on flying. For a while we remained silent. I tried to relax my body, but I just couldn’t. My heart wouldn’t stop fluttering madly. I couldn’t get the imagines of Romness sitting on top of me. I started to sob out loud. Mirmo reached out with one hand and patted my thigh. I winced at his touch and drew back to the side of the cramp ship. He frowned at my reaction. I cried harder, ashamed that I couldn’t be touched.

“Shhh. It is ok Karen. Just hang on until we get back to Nea’s apartment and I will attend to your wounds.”

I nodded and forced myself to stop crying. I dried off my tears with my dirty sleeve. My stomach twisted into a knot. Nuisance hit me like a wave. I closed my eyes and tried to relax my body again. I told myself I was upset and if I could calm down, my stomach would relax. My stomach heaved and I nearly vomited. I clenched my teeth and demanded that Mirmo pulled over.

“Karen, just wait until-”

I shouted with urgency for him to pull over right then. He directed the ship to an outlook of a building and opened up the hatch. I jumped out, took two steps and was violent sick. Master Mirmo hurried out of the ship and to my side.

“Karen, Karen, my apprentice, what is wrong? What have they done to you?”

I couldn’t answer for several more minutes. When I was done, Mirmo supported me as I weakly walk back to the ship, shaking. I told him I didn’t know. He held me for a moment, rubbing my back, waiting for my limbs to calm down. I buried my face into his chest and cried again.

“Shhh. I need you to get back into the ship so we can get out of here. It is not safe for us to stand here.”

He helped me back into the ship and he climbed over me to the pilot’s side. The ship was put back into gear and we flew away in sad silence.