Name: Storyteller's Dream

Disclaimer: I do not own Star Wars

Title: Wisdom's Key

Rating: T

Main Pairings: Captain Maze/ Lesia Marit (OC)

Secondary Pairings: Rev/ Keira (OCs)

Secondary Pairings: Ordo/ Besany

Secondary Pairings: Darmen/ Etain

Notes: Characters are out there, sorry. I wrote this thinking that Captain Maze must be bored sometimes working for Jedi General Zey. Lesia Marit's name is pronounced Less-a Ma-rite. I'm willing to entertain ideas on a title here.

Summary: Stuck in an Office, ARC Captain Maze doubted he'd ever see action. But when vital new intelligence comes up and people start dying it's up to him and a civilian aide to prevent it from falling into the wrong hands.

:: ~ :: - Comlink Speech

Italic- Thoughts

" ~ " - Speech

~*~ - Scene or PoV change

He first saw her when he was coming back from lunch. No, that's not right; he's seen here before as she's a civilian aide to General Arligan Zey. He doesn't know why he's suddenly taken a notice to her now. She's not like the other aides who usually try to attract his attention. Instead of being tall, slim, and beautiful with short skirts, she's short, chucky, and rather plain wearing a long skirt. Not someone that he should be noticing.

She walked pass him, giving him a small smile that was nothing but friendly. She had to look up at him, not even coming to his shoulders. The action of looking at him caused her to have to press her glasses back on her face. He watched her walk towards the wall where the mail boxes were kept. She was looking up towards the top shelf and saw that her name was up there on the top. It was oblivious that either someone taller had to help her by getting her mail or she had to stand on something.

Lesia Marit. Her shoulders lowered for a split second, before she starts to look for something to stand on. He heard someone snickering behind him. She came back with the stood and set it up so she could grab her mail. He didn't know why, his reflexes were slow when he saw that the stool wobbled and he made to grab her, except that she didn't know that he was behind her.

Clone ARC Captain A-26, or Maze stared at the young woman sitting on his lap on the floor. He had never been knocked down before by anyone save Jango Fett during training. He couldn't see her face right away under her mass of brown hair, but he could tell she was embarrassed.

"Sorry Captain." She whispered before slowly climbing to her feet. "I didn't know you were behind me." She held out a hand for him to use to stand up. He realized that she figured that he wouldn't take it. He took it, though he kept most of his weight on his other hand. She looked at him in surprise, giving a view of her gold-green eyes which were too big for her face and hidden behind those glasses. He couldn't read anything pass the surprise and embarrassment, someone who wanted to just vanish.

"I should apologize myself. I should not have come up behind you." He went to pick up his helmet only to find it floating already chest level. He grabbed it while looking behind him to see General Zey and another Jedi standing there. The Jedi girl stepped forward enough so that General Zey couldn't see her face and grinned at the both of them. He noticed that the two Jedi were not the only ones staring at them. Ms. Marit was turning redder, but didn't look like she was going to cry yet.

"Heyas Lesia! Afternoon Cappy." The Jedi girl chirped. Maze rolled his eyes remembering that Jedi Knight Kioni Entar loved to see if she could annoy him and Cappy seemed to be her fondest title for him. He knows understood what it meant when they said that people grew on you, otherwise he'd have shot Kioni by now.

"Afternoon Jedi Kioni." Ms. Marit responded shuffling the disks in her hands.

"Captain Maze, Miss Marit is something wrong?" General Zey asked. Jedi Kioni rolled her eyes at General Zey, reminding Maze a lot of Bardan Jusik, General Zey's former Padawan.

"No Sir. I saw that Miss Marit was about to fall and went to catch her. Unfortunately she didn't realize that I was there and result knocked us both over." Maze responded. He didn't miss the snickering whispers of the women in the office and indeed narrowed it down to four women who were always trying to attract his attention. Kioni turned around and stared at the women who were now coughing.

"That's odd, Captain, what did Lesia fall off?" Kioni asked keeping her eyes on the women.

"My stool broke, Kioni, under my weight." Lesia responded.

The stool lifted up chest level and floated to the female Jedi who studied one of the legs. It was oblivious that someone had meant for Lesia to fall since the leg broke in an unusual way.

"Lesia?" Kioni asked.

"My fault Kioni."

"I see."

"If that is everything, Captain Maze, I have some things to discuss with you and General Entar." General Zey said impatient for the conversation to end. Whatever was between these aides was best sorted out without them.

"Of course sir." Maze responded. General Zey turned and walked off, while Kioni glared after him for a long moment. Maze went to follow him when he felt a slight pressure on his wrist. He turned to see Lesia's eyes on him.

"Thank you for the attempt to save me, Captain Maze."

"You're welcome Miss Marit." Maze said uncomfortable.

"It's Lesia, sir." She immediately went back to her data pads, obliviously embarrassed.

"Then you're welcome Lesia." Maze put on his helmet and followed the two Generals.

~*~

She was embarrassed. Lesia Marit hadn't meant to fall. She knew that someone had cut the stool's leg, but she had hoped to catch herself. And then to just knock over Captain Maze, an ARC trooper...

The hazing at work was getting rather dangerous. Not just to her, but to everyone else. She could have seriously hurt Captain Maze... well perhaps not since he was wearing his white armor.

"Can't wait till I get off." She murmurs mournfully.

"Aw come on, I can't be that bad." Lesia glanced up at another trooper that works with the aides. CT-0451 or Rev as Lesia was able to nickname stood over her with a heart-stopping grin that worked on everyone but Lesia. Probably why he hung out with her. She was safe.

"You did hear what happened today." It was a statement, not a question. Rev pressed his lips together and nodded.

"It's made it to every department. Although the story changes a little bit every fifteen minutes." He had the decency to look upset on her behalf, but Lesia was already wondering if she could get him to shoot her.

"Darn." She shuffled some more data pads around. Both her and Rev look up at the chrono. They got off soon.

"Say, Les, I'm gonna meet with Keira soon. Why don't you come with us? Get out and eat?" Rev said trying to think of a way to ease his friend's stress. Keira and Lesia were really good friends. In fact, he knew that he wouldn't have Keira if not for Lesia.

"Thanks Rev, but if I nearly killed Captain Maze, think of the damage I'll do to you. I'm having a klutz day." Lesia said trying to make it sound lighter than it was.

"You are not a klutz. And you can't do any damage to me. Remember ARCs are supposed to be stubborn, I'm supposed to get out of the way." Rev said calmly and apparently not noticing that the ARC was right behind him... "And Captain Maze is right behind me, isn't he?"

Lesia nodded and watched the trooper turn pale under his tanned skin.

"Time to go..." Rev said and did the fastest one-eighty Lesia ever saw anyone do. Captain Maze, his face carefully blank watched him leave. Lesia figured that if he was anything like Rev's last Sergeant he would think they were talking about him more than the 'I almost killed him comment'. Maze stared at her for a long moment again before walking away.

"Lesia, heard you had a little excitement." Lesia watched her relief, Mirax Krim walk in. Mirax was tall, slim with dark hair looked at Captain Maze and gave him her best smile. Captain Maze didn't seem to notice. Lesia began to log out of the computer quickly, knowing that Mirax was going to rag her. She didn't expect for the woman to pin her down.

"What did you think you were doing?" Mirax hissed angrily. Lesia knew that she needed to escape and fast.

"I didn't do anything." Lesia protested.

"They say you jumped on Captain Maze." Mirax snarled.

"I fell on him. Didn't jump, fell. It won't happen again. Swear." Lesia tried to squirm out of Mirax's way. Mirax narrowed her green eyes into slits before giving her a cat-like smile.

"That's good. That's really good. You and I are going to get along really well if you remember that he's mine."

Personally, Lesia didn't think Captain Maze would take too kindly to everyone claiming him, but she held her tongue and took off for the lifts. She was surprised to see Rev- and Captain Maze holding the door for her. She should take the next one down, but rather than wait ten minutes she rushed him.

"Thank you." She wheezed, though not sure to whom. Maze didn't look at her and Rev's head was tilted to the side.

"What did Mirax have to say?" Rev asked. His helmet was on, distorting his voice. He watched Lesia push her glasses up on her face.

"Nothing interesting." Lesia was quick to say and winced when she realized that it was too quick. Rev started to press the stop button. "Don't you push that button boy or I'm gonna, gonna... forget to bake you that cake you're so fond of!" Really there was nothing Lesia could think of to keep Rev from hitting that button. He knew that Mirax and she couldn't get along.

"Oh now I can't have you do that." Rev said calmly letting his hands fall to his side. Lesia knew he wouldn't forget it. Maybe she should call in sick for the eight years. He might forget by then.

She frowned when she noticed that now he was staring straight ahead which meant one of two things, either Captain Maze was dressing him down or Rev was looking at both of them for some reason. But the lift ended on the bottom floor and doors opened wide. The receptionists stared at the three of them and Lesia had to bite back a groan. If she made it back to her apartment without falling and dying that would be the only good thing that happened.

Captain Maze had already left, leaving Rev and Lesia to walk out after him. Lesia hated the eyes on her and Rev knew it. Then again in the eight months they've worked together, he's become like a brother to her. Maybe that's why she can take his ribbing so well. He switched places with her, looking like a menace which served get people to look away from them.

Again, they meet up with Captain Maze who's waiting for a bus back to the barracks. Standing not too far away with her speeder is Keira, Rev's girlfriend. She looks worried as Rev walks over to meet her. With his helmet on Lesia can't his lips. She settles in to wait for the bus behind Captain Maze. Her hope was to get a seat as far away from the ARC Captain as possible.

"Captain! Captain Maze!" Keira called out. Maze looked over at her. "Come on, I'll take you to the barracks. Come on now. Don't be shy." It was clear Maze was confused.

"Captain, Keira is safe and she's serious. She'll take you to the barracks." Rev offered. Maze shrugged and walked over to the speeder with clone trooper and young woman.

"Lesia get over here now!" Keira snapped making Lesia rush over and bump into Maze's back. Keira smiled sweetly at Maze and then shouted at the two of them to get in the back seat. Maze moved gracefully in while Lesia did the best she could. Once again she was embarrassed. Keira and Rev were friends while Captain Maze was a stranger to her.

The ride to Lesia's apartment which was between the Intelligence Building and the barracks was strained. Every so once in a while Keira tried to engaged her two unwilling passengers in a conversation, getting silence and grunts for answers from Maze and mumbles from Lesia. After ten minutes of grumbles, silence, and mumbles Keira gave a snarl of her own which won her a whimper from Lesia and an 'I'll tell you later' look from Rev.

Keira pulled up to Lesia's balcony, waiting for Rev to jump out and be the gentleman.

"Are you sure you don't want to go out with us Lesia?" Keira pressed.

"Honey you don't need a third wheel." Lesia allowed for Rev to pull her out, but she was embarrassed; he lifted her up making her thinking about her weight. "Rev unless you want to visit the doctor about a bad back, don't lift me okay?"

"Oh Les you aren't that heavy." He protested once again.

"Les, we still have Captain Maze." Keira said ignoring the startled noise from behind her.

"No, that's quite alright. Captain Maze might have something planned tonight." And it doesn't include being dragged along by another clone and his crazy girlfriend. Lesia said waving her friends away. Keira sighed but pointed her speeder towards the Clone Barracks.

Lesia waited until they were out of sight before going inside. Her apartment was plain, colors tending more towards browns and bay. She sighed and fell onto her couch, grimacing as her glasses fell down her face. Her apartment was meant for a family of five, but after her family died she paid extra to keep it. She kicked off her shoes and groaned remembering the embarrassment of today. Would anyone miss her if she didn't go in tomorrow? Rev might. After tomorrow was the weekend and she didn't have to work. She could hide out for three days.

No she couldn't. The minute Rev didn't find her she'd have him and Keira beating down her doors. Sometimes I wonder why I adopted the man. Oh right, my family had just died and the young, injured man struck a cord with me.

Getting up she noted that she would be black and blue in the morning, but she could ease some of the bruises with a good shower. With a sigh she grabbed her bed-clothes and walked into the refresher.

~*~

As promised, the young woman who was Rev's girlfriend dropped him off at the barracks. It amazed him, they still offered to take him with them. He didn't really know Rev and certainly didn't know Keira, but they were willing to take him out. He didn't take them up on their offer, instead going back to his room at the barracks and taking off his armor to clean it.

He allowed his mind to play over the events of the day and decided that most women were to be avoided at all costs. Some, like Keira and General Kioni Entar were weird and unusual but nothing to be worried about. Others like Lesia Marit were...

He didn't know. Lesia tried to make herself as invisible as possible. Someone like her would raise alarm flags. A-26, Maze keyed in to get access on Lesia Marit. He wondered if there was anything that could be explain by the events of today. The computer came back with some information.

Name: Lesia Marit

Age: 23

Weight: 160lbs

Parents: Kansan (Father-deceased), Elea (Mother-deceased)

Siblings: Agni (Brother-deceased), Que (Sister-deceased)

Workplace: Galactic Republic Intelligence

Lives: Galactic City, Coruscant

Known Companions: Keira Gorman

Maze only had one thought in mind. This woman has no life. Maze sighed and wondered if there was anyway to get any more information on this girl...

"Does a certain by-the-rules ARC Captain have a girlfriend?" A sarcastic voice that was really no different from his own dragged his attention away from the screen.

Maze glared at his doorway which currently held the Null-ARC Captain Ordo. He and Ordo had a rough understanding of one another. It didn't mean that he wanted the Null in his doorway. Ordo walked in, letting the door shut behind him. Maze looked up at him again, seeing the grimness in the Null Captain's expression.

"What's wrong Ordo?"

"One of the aides from this shift as come up missing."

Maze sat back, blanking his screen immediately. His mind was on all the aides that were working there right now. There was Kina Quanta, Kiron Orrs, Jan Sho, Mirax Krim...

"It's Mirax Krim." Ordo said waiting for Maze to stop going to thru his list.

"How long has she been missing?"

"Lunch ended two hours."

Maze's eyes shot up to Ordo's face.

"Are we going after her?" Maze asked snapping back into his armor. Ordo nodded, gesturing to the screen.

"Last time she was spotted near Marit's apartment." Ordo said as the two ARC troopers walked out to Ordo's 'borrowed' speeder.

~*~

A shower was just was Lesia needed. Now sitting on the couch in her over-sized robe she could read her fantasy novel and eat dinner. She pushes her glasses further up her nose wondering if she should schedule that eye surgery... no she liked her glasses in spite of them being an eyesore and pain in the ass.

Just as she got the novel where she liked to read the buzzer to her front door went off. With an eyebrow raised she goes to the door, keeping to one side. Rev was always imparting words of wisdom to her about weird things. She looked through the cam, surprised to find Mirax Krim standing there looking pissed. I swear I'll never speak to Captain Maze again.

"Mirax?" Lesia asked thru the comm.

"Let me in Marit. I have something for you." Mirax snarled. "Come on girl!" Lesia sighed and ringed the woman in. Mirax must have flown up the forty levels to Lesia's apartment and almost ran her over in an effort to get in the door.

"Mirax? What's this all about?" Lesia asked unsure as to what was going on. The beautiful woman raked a sneering glare.

"You can't tell me you actually wear that stuff." Mirax walked into the main room.

"I'm home. No one cares what I wear. Why are you here? What do you have for me?" Lesia asked.

"Listen to me girl. I work for the Separatists. They know you have the data. You don't give them this, we'll release a bio agent and kill every clone and non-human on Coruscant." Mirax said advancing on Lesia and putting a data disk in her hand. "You don't follow these directions everyone dies."

Before Lesia could get away, Mirax shoved the data pads into the folds of her robes. That's when they heard something and saw on the balcony ARC troopers. Lesia recognized Captain Maze. So did Mirax who pulled a blaster out. Lesia twisted away as blaster bolts shattered the glass and Mirax fell in a hail of fire. Lesia ended up on the floor, curling into the kitchen, waiting for Captain Maze to come shoot her.

The sound of the men walking in, the crunch of glass under their booted feet and Lesia knew it was probably the end of her. She could see their reflection in the clock, the clock that showed her that the new day hadn't started yet. I should have known today was going to be a bad day.

"Lesia. It's Captain Maze. You can come out now; we aren't going to hurt you." Captain Maze stood with the other Clone Captain. But Lesia wasn't so sure since their side arms were still out she should believe them. The second Captain backed out of the reflection along with the others. All she could see was Captain Maze.

"Lesia I know you're in the kitchen and that you can see me in the reflection of your chrono." Lesia scooted deeper into the kitchen as Maze walked closer. If she picked up anything to defend herself, she could cause him to strike out at her. And she knew quite well that she couldn't defend or defeat an ARC trooper.

Maze carefully turned the corner to find Lesia curled up tight against the cupboards. He looked over at where Mirax laid, still and unmoving. Mirax had handed Lesia something and now it was hiding in her robes. He didn't want to scar her anymore than he had to but he really needed that data. He lowered himself to his knees watching her he undid his helmet.

"Come on Lesia, its me. I'm not going to hurt you." Maze said trying to figure out how to get her to calm down. Judging by the white-knuckled grip on that door, he wasn't getting it done. He looked at his appearance wondering why she had never feared him before and what was different. He had removed his helmet with his right hand, he had used his right hand to guide him down onto his knees.

In his left hand was his blaster. He had only put one away. He lift his left hand and making sure that he had her attention he placed it back in its holster.

"It's back in the holster. I am not going to use it on you. I swear Lesia, I won't har-"

"Don't lie to me." Lesia snapped trying to uncurl and stand up on her own. "You followed Mirax here, blew my apartment to shreds and killed a woman. Don't tell me you aren't going to harm me Captain Maze!"

Maze seemed to mull over her words as another trooper came over. He had blue striped armor and was without his helmet. Maze glanced at Lesia noting that she was getting some color back into her face then at Mereel who was eyeballing her kitchen for something to eat.

"Get Out Of My Kitchen." She spaced the words out equally.

"I'm hungry." Mereel tried to look pleadingly at her. The woman instead started to look even more creeped than before.

"That works with OTHER women. Not me. Right now I'm about to have a psycho moment. I need only to see a Mando and Jedi trying to be friendly and I'll do it. Get out of my kitchen." Lesia was starting to sound really creepy to Maze. Mereel looked behind them and frowned.

"You sure you'll have a psycho moment? Cause you've gotten rotten luck if that's tru-" Lesia shoved pass both of them and stopped to stare before crumbling to the floor.

"Anyone care to explain?" Jedi Knight Bardan Jusik as before turning back to Mandalorian Sergeant Kal Skirata.

~*~

She knew that the Separatists wanted the data that Mirax Krim had. She knew that Mirax was using the entire population of Clones and even aliens to make sure that Lesia would do her job. On her way to stop Mirax she felt the aide die. It would stand to reason that the Null-ARC Troopers and Captain Maze had gotten to Mirax before she could. That was fine. General Zey may not understand, but General Kioni Entar had seen what would happen if the aide had gotten any information back to the Seps.

But did the data get to Lesia? She couldn't feel Lesia like she could feel the others thru the Force. She needed someone to get in next to Lesia and protect her without getting the ARC troopers angry about someone treading on their territory.

What was that one clone's name?

Jedi General Kioni Entar does not work by the rules of Jedi Order all the time. To her, not everything is black or white but grey as shadows. So the idea of bailing a Clone out, even a traitor doesn't bother her in the slightest. Neither does how she plan to get his compliance. Everything has a price. Jedi General Kioni Entar doesn't plan to be in the Order for too much longer. Maybe it's for the best.

The drive to the cells where high security prisons are kept was quicker than she had thought possible. The Warden was waiting for her, flanked by two of the 501st that remained planetside. Warden Analisa Torans and Kioni Entar come from the same small planet far away from the Core worlds. She knows what goes on before anyone else does.

"I am here for Prisoner 78515, the Clone known as Sergeant Slick."