The mess hall was already getting busy. The dinner hour had just begun. Falling into line behind some other acolytes, Kory collected a tray of food and went looking for a table. By habit, she looked for the farthest, darkest one, but someone had already claimed it. The Sith Pureblood raised her head and gave the approaching human a hooded yellow stare.

Kory swallowed and settled down at a different table instead. She didn't need her gut feelings to scan that message. Of course it wasn't actually her gut, was it? Had her father known she was Force-sensitive? Had he had it too or did her mother give it to her?

Kory stared at the bowl of roasted nerf broth. The overseer's revelation had left her with a million questions she'd never get answers for. Not anymore.

"Hey."

Kory looked up and some of that gloom turned into a surprised smile. "Hey." She scooted to the side and Gerd sat his muscled bulk down next to her.

Alif approached next, skirting around the edge of the hall like a mouse-droid trying to steer clear of stomping feet. He hovered over the third seat, flicking them both cautious glances. Kory gave him a reassuring smile, Gerd raised a brow, and the smaller boy slid in like a smuggler skulking into port.

A fourth tray slapped down. The zabrak glared at each of them before he sat down and ripped into a grain roll. Kory'd learned his name was Nical. She already knew he had a temper. Surprising that he'd joined them. Then again, maybe he didn't have anyone else either.

Gerd reached up and rubbed the pale strip of flesh on his neck with a spade-sized hand. Kory gave him a sympathetic look, "Feels strange having air up there again, yeah?"

"Yeah." he nodded slowly, "Stranger thinking it's Sith that'd get this off."

After Harkun's welcome-speech the slaves had been herded up and sent through medical tests in a cold sterile room that looked more like a torture chamber than an infirmary. That was also where their collars had been removed and they'd been given new uniforms to replace the old slave rags. Black tunics, black leggings, black boots.

They'd been shown to their quarters and assigned to their acolyte groups for the basic training and then the slaves had been just...turned loose. No sentries in the hall to ask what the kriff they were doing outside their pens, no curfews when they turned probe-droids loose with stunners and sonics.

The strangest thing to adjust to was the saber-foil clipped to her back. It wasn't a military grade vibroblade, but it was still a weapon. Just carrying it was violating four years of enforced taboo and the fear of some trooper spotting her and executing her on the spot was a hard one to bury. Kory moved the stew around with her spoon and nibbled on a bread roll.

Gerd nudged her shoulder. "What's wrong?"

Kory tried to smile, "Guess I'm not hungry." The smile wasn't working so she let it drop. Gerd's concerned look melted her resistance and she shrugged helplessly. "I've seen slaves killed before. Not like that," Kory shook her head. "Right now, I can't stand the smell of cooked meat."

Kory pushed her bowl back. Nical grabbed for it but Gerd's hand latched around his wrist. The bigger human stared down the Zabrak's angry expression and pushed the bowl back in Kory's direction. "You need to eat."

Kory grimaced and spooned some of the stew. Blasted shame. It was good, but right now all she could think about was that boy's expression as he was cooked from the inside out.

Nical rubbed his wrist and glared at Gerd. "Don't be nerf-headed. That overseer was just making an example so the rest of us toe the line. They need us. That's the whole reason they brought us here, remember? To train us as Sith. "

Kory nodded and tried to put her feeling into words. It wasn't just the stew or what she'd seen was a feeling that'd started creeping up as soon as her foot touched the surface of this planet. An uneasy feeling, a quiet dread that'd been crawling into her bones.

Maybe I don't want to be a Sith.

Kory'd meant to keep that thought inside. She hadn't realized she'd spoken it until she heard Alif make a strangled choke. Kory's eyes jerked up and the color rushed to her cheeks.

Alif quickly ducked his head. Gerd gave her a startled look. Nical just snorted and mimed a droid getting their power cut, universal symbol for someone who'd short-circuited their brain.

Kory frowned hotly, "I'm just saying I'm not looking forward to killing people. Especially other slaves." She glared at her meal, "Excuse me for being cross-wired."

"Maybe we don't have to." Gerd said quietly.

Kory frowned, "What do you mean?"

Gerd looked at his hands. "I mean, it's like having a blaster right? I can pull the trigger or I can leave it in the holster, but just because I have one doesn't mean I'm going to start vaping every organic I see."

"Like they'd ever give us blasters" Kory said.

"Yeah, bad example." Gerd rubbed the back of his neck. "Look, we're all Force sensitives right? Doesn't it make more sense to learn how to use it then leave it alone? Just because we learn how to doesn't mean we'll actually use it like that."

"We're slaves. This is our job, isn't it? What else are we going to do?" Alif asked quietly, "Run away? Outside the Academy's nothing but wasteland and predators. Even if there's a spaceport, none of us know how to fly and even if we did, there's all those warships and fighters." The small boy shook his head "Wouldn't get a single parsec before we were space-dust."

Nical slammed his cup down. Water splashed violently across the table. Alif ducked down and Kory flinched back.

"You're all worse than Neimoidians. I don't want to. I don't have to. I don't have any other choice." Nical glared at them and then dropped the nasally tone out of his voice.

"Well I want to learn." His eyes were feral, angry orange. "If I could shoot lightning, I wouldn't be here. Soon as I can? I won't be here." Nical bared his teeth. "But in the meantime, if they want to teach me how to use the Dark Side, I'll be more than happy to do whatever it takes."

"Even killing other people? Slaves like us?" Kory asked. "You're okay with frying Gerd here? Or Alif, or me?"

"In half a heartbeat." Nical looked at her expression and laughed. It was cold and jagged. "Sithspit, Brental must've been cushy. Where've you been during this galaxy? Didn't you hear that overseer?"

"Nical." Gerd said softly.

Nical ignored him and glared at Kory. "Only the ones who are willing to do whatever it takes are going to make it. Everyone else is going to be eating dirt. At least the skunt here's smart enough to keep his head down, and rock-head's got that muscle. You're not going to make it a week before someone cracks your skinny asteroid."

Kory jumped up but Gerd put a hand on her arm and pushed her back down. The bench creaked as he leaned forward. "Hey Nical? Did you know Cortosis ore is tougher than bone?"

The Zabrak snapped his horned head around, "Yeah that's fascinating poodoo, rock-head. What's your point?"

Gerd slowly got up. It was like watching a time lapse of a mountain forming. He put his spade-sized hands on the table and leaned forward. "Nothing. Just pointing out that I've been breaking something harder than your skull eighteen hours a day, every day, for six years. Maybe think about that before you start threatening people."

Gerd stared at Nical. Nical glared at Gerd. Kory and Alif looked between them and started eyeing escape vectors.

When the fight happened, it was nasty and brutal. A contest of massive strength versus speed and ferocity. Acolytes whispered about it in the hallways. More than one new-blood, Kory included, had spine shudders about it for weeks afterwards.

But Gerd and Nical weren't involved in it.

The Sith Pureblood forked the nerf patty and sliced away with the knife. She popped the meat into her mouth and chewed. She felt the the three minds coming towards her like warning tones sounding missile locks. She didn't move her eyes, but she watched in her peripherals.

Three Twi'leks, all slaves, and with enough facial similarity to be from the same clan, if not the same family. Nothing she hadn't dealt with before.

Tali kept eating as they came to a stop in a tight triangle a couple of meters away.

"Are you lost, Pure?" The male in the back of the triangle grinned grinned, showing needle teeth.

"She's not lost, she's a slave like us." The female in the back had a voice that could poison honey and a nasty trio of scars across her face.

"Poodoo. Who's ever heard of a Pureblood slave?"

The Pureblood had seen their type before. Pack predators. The two in the back were followers, the one in the front was the leader. A big worm-head with a scarred fighting face. His nose was a clawed lump of cartilage, and his hands, like Tali's, had thick black shards closer to talons than nails.

This Twi'lek could be a problem, especially if he got those hands around her neck.

He spoke like he was crushing gravel with his bull-necked throat. "Now, now. No reason not to be friendly, after all, we're all slaves here." The scarred Twi'lek flexed massive shoulders in a liquid shrug. "Your Empire enslaved us. Why they enslave you?"

The fork stabbed the patty, the knife sliced through. Tali popped another strip into her mouth and ignored him. Her lessons had started at puberty, when the fire-ant stings under her scalp began ridging up into bone-spurs thick enough to notice.

They were the kind of lessons that could only be taught playing Odd Nerf Out in the cold dark of a spice-mine, where half the workforce were hijacked Imperial slaves and the other half were culled from Republic border worlds.

They weren't the kinds of lessons these Twi'leks could've known because the bigger Twi'lek ignored her aura of Don't mess with me and took a step closer. Her eyes glanced at his left hand and noted something flat palmed in his knuckled grip.

"Maybe she failed her master."

"Must have been a big poodoo failure."

Tali didn't answer them. The Twi'leks were a bunch of jackukats sniffing around the campfire. They had to test the waters, build up their courage with a hundred little feints before they committed to a strike. The triangle broke up. The female draped herself into an empty chair, the smaller male stepped to the right and scootched his butt up onto a table. The bigger male stepped forward, claiming the prestige of the spotlight.

"Maybe she's an orphan." He grinned, flashing those needle teeth, "Family dead, no one to hide behind."

"Or maybe they kicked her out themselves."

The lead Twi'lek took another step forward, now he was almost directly behind her. She could smell his breath on her shoulder. It had an open-grave reek. "You have lovely skin. Lovely red. Just like my sister. They called her Yum-Yum because of her lovely red."

He crouched down to put his mouth next to her ear. Carrion meat joined the grave reek. One lekku draped around her shoulder like a Hutt's bloated tail. "I ever tell you what happened to my sister, Yum-Yum?" The Twi'lek's mind was overflowing with violent images of what he was going to do to her.

Tali's throat was starting to get parched but she cut another strip and ignored the water. His jaws parted like a Firaxa about to snap down.

"It wasn't very nice, what they did, Wasn't very nice what I did to them either." His lekku twitched faster, "So maybe I not tell you, Lovely Red, maybe I just show-"

Sudden jerks caught attention and fired up reflexes. Tali pulled the fork out of her mouth and smoothly sank it into his lekku like she'd mistaken it for a slab of nerf.

The Twi'lek roared as three tines of twelve-centimeter steel nailed his lekku to the table. His left hand flashed out. Tali scooped her head under the dinner knife he'd palmed and twisted the fork. His snarl cracked several octaves higher and his head jerked up but Tali's hand was already cupping the back of his skull. She threw her weight down and introduced his face to the table's nylasteel surface.

She didn't stop until mucus-stained blood and toothy shards spat across the dented table. Tali stepped back. The scarred Twi'lek slid off groaning, and drunkenly swiping and she followed him down. One knee dug into his back, an empty hand hauled his other lekku back and his head sprang up for her knife to tickle the pale green flesh of his neck.

By this point the other Twi'leks had gotten over their dead-lock disbelief enough to start forward with angry shouts and murder in their eyes. The Pureblood flashed her feral yellow eyes at them and pressed the meat knife against the scarred Twi'lek's pulsing artery. They got the message and froze in their tracks.

Satisfied they weren't going to interfere, Tali focused on the massive Twi'lek underneath her.

She brought her mouth close and slowly hissed into his ear in broken Twi'leki, "You remind me of another worm-head. Couldn't take hint. Want me show you what happen to him?" Her voice was a vibroknife purr "Or you take hint?"

The Twi'lek stayed silent. The Pureblood bounced his head against the ground and he snarled "Alright, alright! I take hint! Hint!" Between his shattered nose and his missing teeth it came out like hynth, hynth.

"Alright." Tali said "Hint."

She jerked his lekku towards her mouth and bit down.

At first the Twi'lek bucked and screamed but Tali pricked his skin with the knife, threatening to turn a scratch into a high-pressure spray so that just left him the screaming as she gnawed through the two inches of lekku in her mouth. It was tough and rubbery, but her jaws had plenty of practice with fingers and ears and sensory horns.

When she was done, he was reduced to a curled mess. Whimpering wasn't the right word. What was coming out of his shattered mouth was a sort of high-pitched, soft-voiced keening. The kind of noise an animal made when it was overloaded with pain.

Tali swallowed the lump in her mouth and swiped her sleeve across her bloody lips. She straightened her chair, sat back into it and after a moment's recollection, ripped the fork out of the Twi'lek's other lekku. Tali flicked some yellowish tail fat off her fork and returned to her nerf patty.

One of the Twi'leks sounded like they were about to be sick. Tali didn't look up as they scraped their friend off the floor. Their footsteps faded. Only then did the Pureblood put the fork down, pick the glass up and flush the slimy taste of tail-fat and copper blood down her throat.

Night.

The dorm room was a featureless alloy-plated box. The floor was the same oddly ancient stone tiling Kory had seen throughout the rest of the academy. The walls were bare durasteel. A pair of ceiling lumens cast harsh shadows more than bright light into the box.

The only other illumination came from the door panel and the faint red glow of the heat vents set into the bottom of one of the walls. They looked shiny. New. Like the lights they seemed incapable of actually dispelling the cold gloom.

Kory was starting to suspect nothing would. It didn't seem to be an actually physical cold, it felt like something that bypassed barriers of flesh and fat and blood and went straight to the bones, burrowing in like a parasite or cancer. She wondered if it was the Dark Side she was feeling and fought back a shudder.

There was an equipment rack beside the door. Kory fumbled with her saber-foil before she figured out the mag-locking system and slotted it into its rack. Then She took off her boots and set them inside one of the two matching footlockers set in front of the stainless steel bunk bed. The other footlocker was untouched. It'd been empty earlier too when an officious 2V droid had shown her to her quarters before dinner. At this point, Kory figured she was either the odd slave out...or her assigned roommate had already been killed off.

Just one more cheery thought to keep me up tonight.

Kory turned off the lights. Deep black darkness instantly filled the room, lit only by the infernal red glow of the heat vents. The darkness pressed down on her like a choking sensation and a hundred phantom claws prickled against her neck. Kory whirled back and lunged for the lights.

Click.

The harsh white snapped back on, raking the room into gaunt shadows. Her heart was racing. Kory rested her forehead against the cool wall and cursed.

"This is stupid" she said quietly, "I'm too old to be afraid of the dark."

No one agreed with her lie. She was all alone. Maybe that was part of the problem right there. The factories on Brental had always worked around the chrono. The hammering of the industrial presses, the motor-whirrs of the fabricators, the creaking of the conveyor belts. Noise and motion had permeated everything. Even the feeling of other bodies jammed in next to her, or the odors of a hundred different species filling her nose. It'd been miserable and frantic but also unmistakably active. Alive.

The room felt too silent without them. Unnaturally silent. Like a hidden predator holding its breath. And she was alone in this silent, waiting room.

Kory gritted her teeth.

She tried to sleep with the lights on, but the harsh surgical white seemed to stab into her no matter what she flattened against her face. And as soon as she stopped rustling, the hidden buzzing of the power energizing the lights grew louder and louder until it competed with her own heartbeat.

Kory threw off the sleeps in helpless frustration. She was just about ready to try dragging one of the mattresses into the corner and sleeping with her saber-foil when something knocked against her door.

She found Gerd waiting on the other side. He took in her bare feet and rumpled hair and his expression quickly turned apologetic.

"Sorry, I didn't know you were sleeping." He started to turn away.

"No, no" She blurted, "It wasn't working anyway. Come in."

Gerd hesitated. The dim corridor lighting cast shadows across his chiseled planes. "I don't want to intrude."

"You're not," she insisted, "Trust me, right now I could use the company."

Kory stepped back and Gerd stepped through, bowing his head under the doorframe and the hatch slid shut.

Gerd looked around and frowned "You have this room all to yourself?" He sounded more sympathetic than envious.

Kory nodded and put her saber-foil back in its rack, "I don't suppose you're my new roommate." Her tone was a little too hopeful to pass off as a joke. Her despair was a little too pathetic when he shook his head.

"Sorry, I'm bunked with Nical."

"Lucky."

"Oh yeah, he's been a real catch." Gerd looked around "You're really all alone in here?"

"For now." Kory looked around the stainless steel box and grimaced, "But I can't shake the notion that I'm going to wake up and find that Pureblood looming over me."

"I doubt your luck's that bad." Gerd shuddered, "I think even Nical's feeling a little meek knowing there's someone more feral than him walking around."

"Sure. What's a Zabrak with anger issues next to a Sith that actually eats people."

"Lunch?" Gerd winced, "Sorry, bad joke, I know."

The conversation faltered. Kory looked for something else to fill it with. She didn't want Gerd leaving. It was selfish and childish but the presence of another person instantly crippled the gloom. If she held her breath someone else's exhale filled the gap. And Gerd took up so much space that if Kory turned her back there was no way some ancient dead horror could materialize in the gap in between.

"So...I'm guessing you can't sleep either." Gerd seemed to be able to read her thoughts and she nodded, grateful for the opening."

"Apparently my idea of a lullaby is ten different bodies farting and snoring and scratching themselves around me."

Gerd snorted, "You should try being a mining slave."

"Oh yeah?" Kory crossed her arms and leaned against the bunk. "You're saying it was worse on Yeden II?"

"Ygdis III and yes, definitely," Gerd nodded, "Sure we only slept four to a pen, but this was four big, brawny, miners, and one of the ones we had was a Gamorrean."

Kory's brows raised. "You're joking." The porcine aliens were more commonly found with Hutts. Most Imperials didn't like using walking pigs who could turn around and smash an obnoxious overseer to pulp if their tiny brains were pushed far enough.

Gerd shook his head seriously and her jaw dropped, "But - didn't the Gamorrean cause any trouble?"

"Oh he wasn't too bad" Gerd sighed, "The only problem was that the proti-slop they fed us gave him gas. Major gas."

Kory covered her mouth "Oh no."

"One day the Gamorrean had an extra serving of slop. That night...well," Gerd shook his head sadly, "I was the only one who managed to get my hands on an oxy-breather from the equipment stores. Everyone else died in their sleep."

Kory's lips started to tremble. She bit them and said carefully "That must have been terrible."

Gerd shrugged, "Oh I got off better than the Gamorrean. Last I heard, the Imp scientists had him locked away on a steady diet of proti-slop, trying to create a new chemical weapon."

Kory couldn't stop laughing. Shoulders shaking, head down, she wiped the tears from her eyes. "Did you really spoon a Gamorrean?"

"All I'm going to say is if it walks like one, smells like one and scratches like one-" A pillow slammed into Gerd's chest and he surrendered with an easy grin. "Well he smelled like one."

He took the pillow and handed it back to her. Kory held it and studied the textures her fingers were knotting into it. "Hey...Thanks."

Gerd didn't raise his brows and say For what or It's just a pillow. He rubbed his square chin and shrugged, "It's no trouble. I just wanted to check in. See how you were doing."

"Make sure I wasn't being murdered by my roommate?"

"Not exactly. I mean yeah, I'd definitely be cracking skulls if I saw that, but...well, what you said at the table…" For some reason Gerd blushed and looked away, "Don't take this the wrong way but I don't think anyone else needs to be hearing that. I know where you're coming from but the acolytes,the teachers, blast even some of the other slaves-"

Kory held up her hand, holding off the rest of it. His concern touched her. The fact that he was so worried touched her more.

"I scan you loud and clear." She smiled, "It was a just knee jerk reaction, yeah? I've seen scum like Harkun, I don't ever want to be something like that, but, like you said, they can teach me whatever they want, but I don't have to use it. Thanks for pulling my head out of my asteroid."

Gerd nodded, "I'm glad to hear that." He stepped forward and dared a smile, "Besides, It's impossible for you to be Harkun. You're too nice. Too pretty too."

Kory's mouth crooked up "You know your gems are pretty terrible ."

"Well" Gerd shrugged easily, "I only found this gem this morning." Carefully, his fingers reached out and touched her cheek. Kory's breath quickened as he gently scooped the hair away from her ear. "I haven't had a chance to polish it yet."

He watched her, looked for how she'd react. She nodded slowly and felt her heart hammering in her chest. "Okay…" she whispered, "That was pretty good."

Kory felt his pleasure light up, a spark of pure joy that cut back the dark atmosphere that'd been hovering in this room since before she got here. She also felt the heat of his hand against her cheek. It made her heart quicken and sent all sorts of interesting sensations racing down her body. She looked up slowly into his eyes. "Hey, you know on that shuttle?"

"Yeah?" Gerd's thumb gently stroked the texture of her skin. He really didn't seem to mind the bumpy scar he found. Kory swallowed and didn't finish. She kissed him instead.

In a word? It was good. It was very good.

Especially when his other hand came up and cupped her shoulder and his mouth pressed against her with a hunger that spiked Kory's heartbeat into the red. A little moan eased out of her mouth as they both came up for air and she finished her sentenced.

"You really were cute."

Gerd's face lit up with a brilliant smile and that zinged something in Kory's mind. She stepped back and Gerd turned away to try to stifle his giddy grin with something more appropriate to a boy of his size. He coughed and cleared his throat, "Well since we're being honest, I wasn't lying either when I said - "

Gerd looked back and froze. "Oh. Blast."

Kory held her balled up tunic and shivered as the cold air hardened her buds. Her arms stayed tight across her chest. Then she slowly lowered them.

"You uh want to…"

She gestured and Gerd's eyes got even wider and he started to splutter "Y-yeah! It's just, usually..." and the cold air cut deeper as Kory froze.

"I mean, I don't usually-"

"Me neither."

Someone swallowed. Maybe they both did, frozen in that moment.

Then Kory hit the door lock and Gerd started hopping like a one-legged astromech droid as he wrestled with his boots. Kory's leggings puddled to the floor, Gerd's tunic followed in short order.

Something clicked and the darkness rushed back in but this time she didn't give a damn because his hands were cupping her goosebumped flesh, scooping her up and carrying her to the bunk. She landed gently and shivered at the cold air on her naked legs. Gerd's massive frame bent over her, close enough she could feel the heat from his skin like bathing in sunlight and the shivers changed to something else entirely.

"It's just usually, takes me longer to catch the hint" he whispered in her ear, "blast...you're beautiful."

Kory laughed, delighted and startled, nervous and excited as Gerd lowered down on top of her. Their mouths joined together. Their bodies joined together. The darkness watched and brooded silently, unable to touch either one of them in this moment.

For a time, everything was warm.

The door was locked when she arrived, but the Sith Pureblood put her hand against the panel. There'd been a reprimand for the mess hall incident. The Overseer, the one with the red hair and whispy beard had snarled like a bulldog for almost an hour, but she got the feeling he was mostly angry at the gutter-trash tactics she'd used, or how public it'd been.

Weathering his barrage had delayed her from settling in and the probe droids were already sweeping the shadowed halls. None of them spotted her of course, but she needed rest.

The bio-scanners in the panel read her palm and unlocked the door. Tali stepped through and wrinkled her nose at the stink. The bottom bunk was creaking so she turned on the lights.

For a moment, she lost control and her eyes widened at the sight before her.

A warty brown hand came into focus first, then a massive toad-like head, cracked with scars and thick leathery flesh. Two tiny marble eyes of liquid black glared at her evilly. Arms fat with muscles crossed the centerline of a barrel-chest criss-crossed with more scars and some gladiator kill markings

Tali stared at him and stepped forward calmly. Inside her mind was racing. A Houk. The Overseer had assigned her to a damned Houk. That schutta. She casually unclipped her saber-foil and slipped it into the rack like she didn't have the slightest worry and stepped away.

She reached for one of the lockers and the Houk made a low snarl.

"That one Slek's."

Tali moved her hand over to the next one. "Then this one's mine." The liquid black jellies wicked under eyelids. Watching. Calculating. She looked him in the eye and didn't blink.

Finally he made a dismissive grunt. He'd seen her in the mess hall earlier. Seen how she sent those Twi'leks packing. Like all good predators, he wasn't in the mood for prey that could bite back. All he said was "Turn off light or Slek crush," then the Houk squeezed back into the bottom bunk like the galaxy's most malicious jack-in-the-box.

Tali took off her boots and turned off the light. She waited a second as her eyes adjusted, but this darkness was nothing compared to the solid blackness of the spice mines. The Sith Pureblood silently climbed the ladder and lay down fully clothed on top of the covers.

She listened to the grumbles of the Houk's breath below her, waited for them to slip into the deeper rumbles of true sleep. Then Tali slipped her right fist out of her sleeve. She fell asleep the same way she had for over fourteen years. With both ears cocked and a knife under the pillow.