Star Wars: Rebel Rising(49)

Hadder stood up abruptly, his chair scraping against the floor. “Come on,” he said.

Jyn followed him to the bedroom she’d slept in the previous night. He went to the little shelf and pulled out the wooden box. Jyn had noticed it before, but as it wasn’t hers, she’d tried to ignore it. Three hypo-injectors lay at the bottom of the box, rolling around as Hadder handed it to Jyn. She looked at him curiously, but he nodded, prompting her to inspect the needles. They were empty.

“‘Haidera serum,’” she said, reading the label and stumbling over the first word. Where had she heard about that before? “Oh,” she breathed, her eyes widening.

Hadder nodded grimly.

“This was your sister’s room,” she said, looking around at the small space with new eyes. “And she had bloodburn.”

Bloodburn was a rare disease, mostly affecting younger people who spent a lot of time in space. It was incurable and often fatal, but haidera serum injections could help.

“That’s not what killed her, though,” Hadder said.

Jyn put the empty hypo-injector back in the box. She was only dimly aware of bloodburn, but she knew how addictive haidera serum could be and how easy it was to overdose.

“Mum has it in her head that it’s her fault. After Pop died, Tanith started working with her on the ship. Then she got sick, and…” His eyes flicked back to the box. “And she’s convinced that bloodburn runs in families. Nothing I’ve ever been able to say has swayed her to believe I’d be safe to fly.”

There was so much longing in his voice, such deep desire that Jyn was certain there was nothing Hadder wanted more than to fly like his mother, and that was the one thing he was forbidden to do.





“I do have a bike though,” Hadder said. “Want to see?”

He led Jyn to the hangar his mother used. A combination of droids and people were unloading the freighter with mag-lifts. Hadder waved at them cheerfully as he led Jyn to the back of the building, where a speeder bike was propped against the wall. It was a patchwork affair, cobbled together from different parts. “You made this?” Jyn asked.

Hadder nodded proudly.

“If you have skills like this, you should be the one to work on that broken droid.”

“Oh, I have,” Hadder said. “That hunk of junk is beyond help. It’s futile. Mum probably just didn’t want you to think you were getting charity. You don’t look like the type to like charity.”

Jyn glowered. She didn’t like charity, and she didn’t like the fact that both Akshaya and Hadder were apparently perfectly fine with deceiving her into taking it.

Hadder, however, was completely oblivious to Jyn’s scowl. “Come on,” he said, throwing a leg over the speeder and scooting forward in the seat for Jyn to join him. She climbed aboard behind him. He flicked the repulsorlift, muttering, “Come on, come on,” under his breath as the engine warmed up. The speeder wobbled as the repulsors kicked on, and he adjusted the capacitor dials. “Ready?” he asked. “Hold on.” Jyn tentatively wrapped her arms around his waist.

With a lurch, the speeder bike zoomed forward. They raced through the tall, blue-green grass, the long strands whipping against their legs. Hadder whooped in glee, leaning forward into the cool wind and pulling Jyn with him. Jyn looked behind her at the trail they cut through the grass, but Hadder’s eyes were focused on the horizon. He pushed the bike harder and harder, and Jyn knew he was imagining what was just beyond the horizon.

She let herself fall into the joy of it, the speed, the wind, the reddish light as the sun dipped down, the startled vulpors that leapt through the grass, their long, silky tails swishing as they chittered angrily at the speeder. The faster they went, the more Jyn let herself pretend there was nothing more than that moment, there, nothing but speed and wind.

Her fear and anxiety melted away. She let her hands slip from Hadder’s waist, trusting him to keep the bike steady. She raised her arms up, tilted her head back.

She closed her eyes.

She was flying.

Hadder kicked at the controls, and the speeder started to turn, circling around. Jyn gasped, her heart lurching. She grabbed Hadder as the bike spun out of control. He whooped with laughter as he let go of the handlebars, twisting to hug her as they slid off the bike together. The speeder went a few meters without them before petering out, and together Jyn and Hadder hit the tall blue-green grass and rolled, the momentum forcing them to wrap their arms and legs together as they whirled through the grass. When they finally slowed to a stop, Hadder was on top of Jyn.

She pushed him off. “What did you do that for?” she asked, standing, feeling a little wobbly after their unexpected dismount from the bike.

Hadder grinned. “It just seemed like fun,” he said.

“We could have broken our necks!”

Hadder stretched out in the grass. “Yeah, but we didn’t. Besides, we weren’t going that fast.”

Jyn couldn’t help laughing at him.

“Mum’ll be at the refinery until late,” Hadder said. “We don’t have to go back in.” When Jyn didn’t move, he added, “You always look as if you’re about to run away. You’re allowed to just…I don’t know. Sit?”

Jyn shook her hands, trying to dispel the nervous energy that was already winding its way inside her. She reminded herself that she liked being on the move. She had loved the spontaneity of Saw’s missions, how she’d never known if he’d knock on her door with a blaster and orders to fly halfway across the galaxy or if she’d spend the day training. She didn’t know what to do with herself when she had neither a mission nor the expectation of one.