23

                                    

                                          
Tw: Sickness, death, violence, mentions of kidnapping and forced marriage?
You're going to hate me for what I'm about to do.


"I hate people who engineer diseases to use as weapons," Kara muttered under her breath as they explored the abandoned base under the surface of Naboo.
"That's an oddly specific thing to hate," Rex commented.
"I've met some weird people." Kara squinted, the darkness making it very difficult to see.
"You okay?" Rex worriedly asked. 
"Yeah, my eyes are just having trouble adjusting," Kara told him before tripping over nothing. She managed to catch herself and smiled sheepishly at him. 
Rex wordlessly flicked his helmet's light on, illuminating the corridor ahead. The others behind him followed suit, doing as their captain did.
"How are we going to find it?" Tup asked, drumming his fingers along the barrel of his blaster. "Do we just have a tracker for mysterious diseases in vials?"
"We'll search for it," Rex said, glancing backwards. "Old school."
"This won't take long at all," a clone next to Tup grumbled.
"I'm with him." Kara pointed at the clone who had spoken. "Why are we searching for it? Why don't we just lock down this base forever so the vial can't get out?"
"What if someone just unlocks it?" Rex pointed out. He turned a corner, spotting the containment room ahead where the vials were kept last time. "There. We're almost there."
They searched the room, trying to find the last vial of Blue Shadow Virus left in the galaxy. Kara quickly gave up and switched to trying to steal Rex's pistol without him noticing. After two unsuccessful attempts, he finally turned to scold her.
"Kara," Rex warned, finally growing frustrated with her, "stop it."
Kara stuck her tongue out at him. "You're no fun."
He sighed and turned away, continuing with what everyone else was doing. Kara's eyes lit up when his back was facing her and she snickered, grabbing his pistol now that his attention was elsewhere.
His hand caught her wrist, and the helmet dipped as he stared at her. "Kara."
"Yeah?" She tried to tug away, but his grip was stronger. 
"Stop." He squeezed her wrist in warning before stepping away.
Kara's face screwed up in a mocking imitation of him, and when he faced her again, it smoothed over into one of innocence.
"Hey!" 
They both whipped around to see who was shouting, seeing a vial roll to the ground coming from under a table.
"There it is!" Tup snatched it up. "We can get out of here now."
"That was quicker than I thought it would be." Kara followed the group as they began to exit the base, leaving the way they'd came.
When everyone suddenly stopped, she bumped into the person in front of her and let out an indignant noise.
She could barely see a figure ahead in the darkness, between the bodies of the people in front of her. They were blurry, and she couldn't make out their features.
"I believe that belongs to me," they called out, shifting weight between legs. "So toss it over and no one gets hurt."
"Leave, and we'll let you walk away!" Rex's hand went to the pistol Kara had attempted to swipe. "You filthy traitor." He glanced down at Kara who was still squinting at whoever it was. "It's Coda."