#a'sha

It was quiet on the bridge without Quinn there continuously updating his logs.  A’sha stood at parade rest, staring out of the viewscreen at the empty void ahead of them.  They were currently adrift as Quinn made some adjustments to the hyperdrive after an incident on Ilum.  Of course, she had Vette overseeing him.  It was still very difficult to trust him.

Pierce had become a welcome distraction and bedwarmer since Quinn’s attempt at betrayal, but while intelligent, the soldier was hardly a scintillating conversationalist.  And she still couldn’t trust him, either.  Pierce was ambitious.  And while it was hard to imagine a soldier of his ilk climbing higher than the personal entourage of the Emperor’s Wrath, people did do stupid things in the name of ambition all the time.  

She was tired of feeling as if her back had a target painted on it all the time.  She rubbed the horns on her forehead.  There’d been whispers that a Zabrak should not be so high in the Emperor’s esteem.  Broonmark had taken it upon himself to hunt a few of the whisperers down, but it had only quieted a few of the louder ones.  

She stepped forward and sat down in Quinn’s usual pilot seat, allowing herself to feel the fatigue she usually fought.  As she collapsed a little more gracelessly than usual, she dislodged a small, real-paper notebook.  The pages were thick and bound by wire and two thick slats of wood.  She frowned and glanced back at the bridge hatch.  It had to be Quinn’s.  No one else came up here except him.  Well, besides herself.  

She flipped it open at random.  Her eyes widened.  It was a sketch.  Of her.  Asleep.  Her hair spread over the pillow, and down her back, curling around her horns and tattoos.  Her eyes were closed and her face was peaceful.  And she was nude.  Well, she did sleep that way.  She was laying on her stomach, though, her head on her outstretched arm, the blanket over her hips.  Did he sketch this from memory, or had he watched her sleep?  When had he drawn this?

She flipped forward to the more recent pages.  Some were of her angry, her eyes blazing, her lightsabers activated.  Some were of her studying, when she knew he’d been there, but not with this book nearby.  So, either from memory, or from a picture he took.  

The last picture, though… she dropped the book on her lap and put her head in her hands.  

Never once, in any of the pictures, had he covered her alien features.  Never once had he hidden her horns or tattooes or her yellow eyes.  Some artists might, she knew.  She’d seen them.  Some historical figures “humanized” to hide their alien heritage, “for the glory of the Empire.”    He’d never done that in any of the drawings he’d made of her.  Not even the last one.  

It was a full on bust, as accurate as he could make it, right down to the tiny chip in the front right horn she’d never gotten sanded out, from blaster fire on Tattooine.  Every dip and whorl from her tattoos in stark contrast on her face.  Next to it, he’d written:

This is the Emperor’s Wrath.  No one else.  A’sha of House Maelwaedd is a Zabrak and to the Glory of the Empire she is not human.  And will never be human.  I want this record, at least, to reflect that.  Let the Galaxy tremble at her Wrath if they try to erase her.

It was small.  It wasn’t nearly enough.  But it might be a start.  

~*~

When Quinn went on shift after a restless night’s sleep — truthfully, he didn’t sleep much these days — three days after fixing the hyperdrive, he found a package on the pilot’s seat.  Bound in red ribbon, a slightly larger notebook sat in his accustomed seat.  Frowning, he untied the ribbon and and opened the front cover.  In bold, black handwriting, she’d written, “For accuracy, the chip is on my left front horn.  And there’s now a small crack on the back right one.  Got that on Belsavis.  If you wish to verify, come to my quarters before docking at Makeb.  -A’sha”