About twenty meters away stood a massive metal building, one that threatened to pierce the heavens and occupied nearly thirty city blocks. Pinkie stared up at it from one of the several hundred external bridges that led into the building from the ground level of upper Coruscant, trying to gauge how tall it was. Ships of all sizes, shapes and classes docked inside and departed from within the monstrous hangar bay, one of the biggest in Galactic City. Ponies streamed across the many exit ramps and bridges that connected the hangar to the rest of the city, making it the effective center of that slice of Coruscant.
The Old Galactic Market.
Even after living in its shadow his whole life, Lemon was likewise enthralled with the size of the hangar. Pinkie stood beside him, mouth agape in awe, until finally he poked her with his hoof. “Ready?”
“Huh?” She snapped back to reality and blinked back at him, then smiled. “Yep! Let’s do this!”
“Lead the way, then.”
Pinkie trotted through the massive archway before them and entered into the Market hub. Ponies bustled to and fro through the complex, weaving an ever-shifting blanket of colors and noise. Pegasi construction workers zipped around the domed ceiling of the transit station, inspecting structural integrity and preparing the hangar for future expansion. Straining her neck to see over the crowd, Pinkie spotted the wing she’d parked her ship in and began pushing through the throng towards it.
Lemon followed cautiously behind her, using her bouncy pink tail as his guide through the crowd. He bumped into another pony with almost every step, making it hard to conceal the briefcase he had on his back whenever an angry pedestrian collided with him. A few minutes in and seventeen collisions later, Pinkie finally emerged from the crowd and skipped toward an elevator. Lemon caught up a moment later, grimacing and breathing heavily.
“Tired?” Pinkie asked curiously, tilting her head sideways. “I didn’t go that fast.”
“Somepony shoved me onto the ground a second ago,” Lemon clarified, swallowing a lump of saliva that had formed in his throat. “I panicked when I couldn’t find you.”
“Well, I’m right here, silly!” She poked the elevator button and the door swung open almost immediately. They both clambered inside and forced the door to shut without waiting to see if anypony else needed to use it. As the room lurched down and started its descent, Pinkie’s smile faded. “My ship’s gonna be down here... I hope. What if somepony stole it?”
“Did you have any alarms or defense systems?” Lemon asked with feigned concern. This information was relevant to his plans.
“Yeah, a couple alarms. No money to install fancy turrets or anything.”
“The ship will probably be there still, then,” he assured with an aloof hoof gesture. “Authorities would’ve investigated if the alarm was tripped. Besides, it makes much better bait to leave the ship where it is.”
“Yeah, but... but aren’t we, like, falling for it?”
“In a sense. But we’re more prepared than they anticipate. They can’t surprise us if we’re expecting to be surprised.”
“That makes sense... I think...” Pinkie faces contorted itself as she tried her hoof at thinking. When she couldn’t reach an immediate conclusion, she shook her head and grunted, eliciting a laugh from Lemon. She shot an annoyed glare at him, but it quickly dissolved into laughter of her own. They were both rolling on the floor laughing by the time the elevator door swung open.
Noticing they’d reached their stop, Lemon stood up to proceed, but Pinkie grabbed his shirt before he could step out of the elevator. He turned to see her looking at him pleadingly, her round blue eyes like sad sapphires.
“Ready or not, we’re walking into a trap, Lemony,” she whimpered. “Is this a good idea?”
“You got a better one?”
She shook her head remorsefully. Together they disembarked from the elevator towards the hangar. The room was nearly half a mile long and filled with all kinds of ships from personal starfighters to small frigates to junky freighters. The metal roof extended high above their heads and ended about four hundred meters out, held up by massive support beams that lined the edge of the hangar. They formed slots in the open end of the room, to allow ships to enter through them, similar to parking spaces.
Pinkie’s eyes widened and a smile broke across her face as she began galloping away from Lemon. He turned to see her approaching a particularly unimpressive freighter: an old Corellian XS class freighter that saw very little commercial flight anymore, despite being as popular of a model as it was. Typically associated with smugglers, this particular XS was painted a dull, faded brown with bright yellow stripes around the sides. Two defense turrets, one on top and one on the bottom, were the only visible defense systems on the vessel, though he assumed the autocannons were hidden elsewhere, and there were compartments on the outside where missile launchers were probably installed in secret.
Pinkie sat down and stared in awe at the ship. Despite having left it not even a day ago, she felt as though an eternity had passed since she’d last set hoof on its loading ramp. Tears came to her eyes at the sight of her intact freighter. She was finally home free.
Turning to Lemon, Pinkie threw herself on him and wrapped her hooves around his back. “It’s here! I’m going home!”
“Yay,” Lemon said with as much fake enthusiasm as he could muster. “Just remember to check out with the deck officer. Can’t leave until you do.”
“Oh, right! Thanks, Lemony! For... for everything.” She looked down at the ground, then back up at his face. Her smile melted his heart for a moment, bringing to surface the regrets and the hesitations he’d been feeling all day. He bit his tongue and shut his eyes in thought. She skipped away to locate the deck manager, and he looked up again with a sigh, moving toward the ship slowly. Just under the doorway access was the boarding ramp switch, and just as he pried the panel off, he stopped. For a few moments he remained frozen.
“Do I really want to do this?” he muttered to himself.
Pinkie located the deck manager on the other side of the hangar, looking busily over a datapad and trying to juggle conversations with three other ponies while he did so. She hopped next to him and poked his shoulder. “I need to check out my ship!”
“You and three other ponies!” the manager barked, not looking up from his datapad. “Wait your turn, miss.”
“Alright, geez.” Pinkie sat down on the cold metal floor and waited for a few moments. Her attention remained intently on the manager until, from nowhere, the distinct sound of her XS freighter’s alarm system resounded off the walls. She twisted her neck to see the boarding ramp closing and the ship’s thrusters engaging. “What!? No! My ship!”
She stood up and galloped toward the starship, but she was too late. As she reached the base of the vessel, it lifted off the ground and turned in midair, and a moment later it zipped out of the hangar and took off into the Coruscanti sky. Pinkie could do little more than stare helplessly at the slowly fading freighter and sob.
Once the ship had disappeared completely, she slumped to the ground and wailed, tears pouring from her eyes like a fountain. She felt a hoof on her back and assumed it was Lemon Drop, so she wrapped her hooves around the figure blindly in an attempt to get some comfort.
“Somepony stole my ship!” she wailed.
“Yes, sorry about that,” replied the figure. Pinkie looked up, wide-eyed and sobbing, to see the face of Lucky Draw, her opponent front the card game the previous night. “It’s a shame, really. You were that close to escaping me.”
-~-~-~-~-~
Lemon slumped in his chair as he piloted his newly acquired ship toward the departure lane. Leaving Coruscant was such a trivial and needlessly confusing procedure, but it mattered little at this point. He was finally leaving forever, to start a new life with his vast amount of money. Every so often, an image of Pinkie flashed across his mind, causing a pit in his stomach to form that made him queasy. He drowned the sensation with thoughts of where he’d settle down. Dantooine, maybe, for the fresh, green atmosphere. Or perhaps somewhere new and exciting, like a Jedi colony. Tython, perhaps.
Amidst his thoughts, Lemon leaned back in his pilots chair, the autopilot having kicked in when he took off. When he did, a small paper book slid off the console in front of him, ripping him from his fantasizing. He picked up the little tome and read the first page.
Pinkie’s Journal. Do Not Touch.
He flipped to the next page, ignoring the warning on the front. The entry was relatively dry, mostly her scatterbrained ramblings about her daily life and her work. As he flipped through the pages, scanning them with increasing interest, a common theme popped up in most of the later entries: Pinkie Pie was dissatisfied with something. She wrote about how endless her job seemed to be, how she would quit if the money wasn’t so good. How she wished it wasn’t so lonely in the off-season, and how the occasional murder she committed really shook her to her core. Every entry was more disturbing than the last, and with every word Lemon’s stomach pit grew.
He flipped to the last page absently, unable to keep reading after four or five entries. As he started to close the book, his eye caught a doodle on the back page, and he reopened it to investigate. It was a playing card from a Sabacc deck, and beside it was a full page about Pinkie’s plan to enter into the upcoming championship tournament. For some reason, Lemon felt compelled to actually read the entry, despite the overwhelming guilt eating his insides. His breathing quickened as he reached the last paragraph.
“Who knows? Maybe I can retire if I win. I’m sure the winnings will be enough to buy a house, somewhere away from the danger and the crime. The more I smuggle, the more I’m starting to see just how much I need to get out. I can’t dodge the bullet forever.”
A tear formed in the corner of Lemon’s eye. He had been the bullet that she couldn’t dodge.
-~-~-~-~-~
Pinkie’s shoulders heaved again as she sucked in a large breath of air, which she immediately released in a painful wail. Her eyes were forced shut and leaking a seemingly endless river of tears, and her head was buried into her forelegs. Against her head rested the barrel of a blaster rifle, the owner of whom was trying to talk to her during her hysterics, and getting frustrated.
“Please, Miss, this is getting ridiculous,” Lucky Draw. “Why are you crying like this?”
“I don’t wanna die!” she bellowed into her folded hooves.
“Is that really worth crying over, though? I mean, considering your line of work, you could have died several times over by now, or worse: imprisoned for life.”
“I... I was... Aaaaaaaaaahh...” She lifted her head long enough to produce a fountain of tears that proceeded to fall on, and then soak, Lucky Draw in salty water. Then she dropped back into her slump. “I was leaving! I was gonna retire! It was over!”
“Well, things don’t always go the way we want, yeah?” Lucky poked Pinkie with the blaster twice, eliciting a whimper from her. “So, I’m gonna do you a favor and end your suffering. Since I’m a gentlemen, I’ll grant the lady a last word before I exact my vengeance. Anything to say?”
Pinkie stopped crying almost instantly, but she didn’t move. The crack in her voice betrayed her sorrow. “...Don’t call me a lady,” she whispered.
“What was that?” Lucky inquired. “I didn’t catch that. Stop mumbling into your hooves so I can-”
“Don’t call me a lady!” Pinkie shrieked, throwing her head up to glare at Lucky. “I’m no lady.”
“Very well,” he replied, unphased. “If that’s all, we should be going. My ship is further down the block, so let’s get on board.”
Lucky waited patiently for her to move, and when she didn’t, he gently nudged her with his blaster. After nearly a minute, Pinkie stood up shakily and glared at him before trudging a few steps ahead of him. She made no attempt to escape, which pleased him.
“I do feel as though I’ve been slighted,” he said casually as they walked. “I never did get my money back.”
A loud rumbling shook the hangar as a ship began docking procedures. The ship slowly caught Lucky’s attention when he recognized it, much to his horror, as the ship that Pinkie had chased after when he had moved in to apprehend her. It was her ship. The boarding ramp was lowered, and standing in the center was Lemon Drop, holding a blaster rifle in his hooves. As the ship hovered in place, he raised the rifle and aimed it at Lucky Draw.
“I don’t know who you are,” Lemon yelled over the ship’s engines, “but you’re gonna let her go. Now.”
“And if I don’t?” Lucky replied carefully, trying not to betray his fear. He put a hoof gently on Pinkie’s shoulder and drew her close to himself. He kept the gun against her head.
“You will. Because I have an offer you can’t refuse.”
“Oh?”
“Let her go, and the money is yours. Don’t let her go, and I shoot you both.”
Lucky froze. He almost wanted to shoot Lemon, but feared that, if he missed, the counterattack would be fatal. Instead he slowly let go of Pinkie but kept the blaster pointed at her. “I accept. Revenge isn’t worth dying for.”
“Let her go first.”
“Give me the money first.”
Lemon fired. The blaster shot connected with Lucky’s pistol, causing him to drop it in shock. The weapon fell to the metal floor and smoldered, melted and unusable.
“Pinkie, come here,” he said evenly, still holding his aim. Pinkie galloped toward her ship and leaped into the air, landing on the end of the boarding ramp. She walked past Lemon without even a passing glance and disappeared into her ship. Then, when she was out of sight, he kicked a briefcase onto the ground. “If I ever see you again, you die. Are we clear?”
“Clear as crystal,” Lucky replied with a nod.
Lemon returned the gesture, lowered his rifle, and retreated into the ship. The boarding ramp closed behind him and the ship turned in place before it blasted away toward the traffic lane. Lucky waited until the vessel was gone and away before he cautiously approached the briefcase and picked it up. Inside he found every last credit of the winnings from the night before, much to his surprise. He looked up toward the long gone freighter and nodded again, as though he appreciated the honesty of a thief and a smuggler.
-~-~-~-~-~
Lemon trotted up the boarding ramp and found Pinkie Pie standing there, staring at a small leather book that had somehow found its way to the floor nearby. It was open to the last page, and she was reading it intently.
“You alright?” Lemon asked.
She looked up at him and frowned. “Yes. But... I can’t figure this out! Why’d you steal my ship?”
“Because I wanted to start over somewhere else. Live a good, fulfilling life by myself, with no more illegal activity and no more danger.”
“Then... then why’d you come back?”
“Because I made a Pinkie promise.”
Pinkie smiled. “Yeah, you did. Thank you!”
“Well, it cost me all that money you won,” Lemon replied with a twinge of pain in his voice. He looked away in shame. “I didn’t want to incur his vengeance, too, so I threw him the case. All those credits, gone.”
“It doesn’t matter.” Pinkie walked up to Lemon and threw her hooves around his neck. “I owe you my life...”
“I guess we’re even then, huh?” he said. Pinkie didn’t reply, so Lemon tapped her on the shoulder. “So, can I ask a favor?”
“I... what do you want?” she asked innocently, her large, rapidly blinking eyes drilling into him. His gaze was cold, almost inspired, and eyes were aquamarine in color.
“I want you to forget I stole your ship,” he said. “I also want transport off of Coruscant. Then, after that... and no offense by this, but I want to be dropped off and I never want to see you again.”
“W-what?” Pinkie choked, her eyes still moist from her earlier ordeal. “Why?”
“You trusted of me, and I broke that trust. I just don’t want to push my luck with you anymore. You understand, right?”
“Nope,” she replied, shaking her head rapidly. “I really don’t. In fact... I don’t want you to leave!”
“But I have to!”
“No you don’t! You can... I don’t know... You can work with me!” Her eyes lit up at the thought. “Yeah! We need to make a lot of money before we can retire like we wanna, so let’s help each other! We can travel around the galaxy doing the same work we’ve been doing, and we can get paid lots and lots of credits for it!”
Lemon’s lip twitched. “You want to... hire me? After I just tried to steal your ship?”
“Yes, Lemony.” Pinkie smiled warmly at him, tilting her head slightly. “You could’ve stolen my ship and been on your way, but instead you saved my life. Again! I forgive you for whatever wrong you think you’ve done me. No hard feelings, I promise. I want to thank you for all the help you’ve been to me, though. So will you join me?”
“Me? A smuggler?” Lemon didn’t want to admit it, but he liked the idea. It was a step up from stealing out of garbage bins in the sewer levels of Coruscant for every meal. “I mean, what, do we split all our profits fifty-fifty?”
“I figure we can just have a community pool of credits,” Pinkie replied. “You know, to buy nice things if we want.”
“But we’d need to budget that money, for repairs and equipment and food—”
“Don’t worry about it too much. We’ll talk about it later. For now...” Pinkie extended her hoof towards Lemon. “...will you join my crew?”
Lemon bit his lip, waited a few seconds, then smiled and grabbed her hoof to shake it. “How could I not? After everything that’s happened, I owe you a lot more than just my life.”
-~-~-~-~-~
“And we’ve been traveling together ever since,” Pinkie finished. She took a sip from her glass and set it down on a plate nearby. Rainbow Dash and Twilight Sparkle were still sitting in their makeshift chairs, absorbing the story with enthralled silence. When Pinkie finished, Dash shook her head and nodded thoughtfully.
“Wow, you go way back,” she said. “He was just a thief living in the sewer, and you hired him as your partner?”
“That’s right! And after that day, we gallivanted around the galaxy doing odd jobs and making lots of money. We didn’t have any work lined up after the Ord Mantell job, but we aren’t far off from making all the money we lost that day back again.”
“If I could prove you did any of that, I’d have you in cuffs right now,” Twilight said slowly. Pinkie gasped and put her hooves to her mouth in shock, but Twilight smiled back at her. “Since I can’t, all I can do is say that was a very riveting story. Well told, if not a little cliche.”
“Heh. Yeah, well, thanks, I guess.” Pinkie looked around nervously, as though she was still afraid that Twilight might arrest her. “It’s my story, and I love to tell it.”
“I trust you two won’t make any trouble if I retire to the guest quarters for the remainder of the flight?” Twilight asked, looking at Rainbow Dash. “I can’t imagine we have that long of a trip left.”
“Oh! I totally forgot! I need to go see if we’re landing soon!” Dash stood up and bolted out of the room in a full gallop, nearly toppling Lemon Drop as he was coming back into the room. He had a perplexed expression on his face, no doubt startled by the sudden exit of the Sergeant. Twilight, after witnessing the momentary spectacle, stood up much slower than her comrade had and walked out of the room, nodding to Lemon as she departed.
He stood in the doorway and waited. Pinkie Pie was staring at him, but he didn’t notice right away. When he finally did, his face lifted into a smile. “Hey there.”
“Hi.”
“Did the troopers enjoy story time with Pinkie Pie?”
“Oh yeah,” she replied, smiling. “I think I might have a future in storytelling.”
“Yeah?” Lemon opened his mouth to say something, most likely a joke or some snide remark about Pinkie’s lack of ability to sit still long enough to tell a story, but he stopped short. His smile faded and his eyes grew distant, but they didn’t look away from her eyes. “Pinkie?”
“Mmhmm?”
“Are you... alright?”
“Yep! Never better! Why?”
“Because I feel like... like we should be more than friends, and we’re not... and... and we can’t... and... do you know what I mean?”
“Well, duh! Of course we’re more than friends!” She leaped from her chair and trotted up to Lemon, embracing him in a hug. “We’re partners in crime!”
“Sure, but... Listen, Pinkie. Remember on Ord Mantell, when you told me you loved me? And I said we couldn’t be together because of our work?”
“Yeah?”
“I feel like... like I may have been wrong. Like that doesn’t apply any longer.”
Pinkie stared up at him, her gaze lingering and curious. Lemon felt like she was probing his thoughts. She probably was, too, knowing her. When she finally blinked after what felt like several minutes, a smile crept onto her face. “Okay. What are you thinking?”
“Lunch,” Lemon said plainly. “When we dock at Cowlick Station. You and me.”
“And then?”
“And then we’ll discuss this further.”
“So careful... Always the gentlecolt.” Pinkie closed her eyes and pushed her lips into his cheek. She lingered there for a moment, feeling the warmth rush to his face, before she giggled and leaned into him. “You always have been.”
“I... I never truly forgave myself for what I did to you that day.”
“If you had actually wronged me, you’d have a reason to be upset. But as it is, you’re just being silly.”
“Y-you’re right, of course.” Lemon was blushing profusely by this point. “Can you let go of me, please?”
“Nope.”
“Why not?”
“If you’re gonna try and court me, you need to own up to being my coltfriend. Hug me back.”
Lemon hesitated for a moment, but reluctantly he slung one hoof onto her back and pressed himself closer to her. The other one came a moment later. Despite his reservations, he found that he was enjoying himself.
Pinkie caught on to the fact, and she playfully drove her hoof into his side and started wiggling it around. He busted out laughing as an all-out tickle war began in the cargo hold.
-~-~-~-~-~
Cowlick Station loomed into view as the little, indiscriminate freighter burst out of hyperspace. Docking procedures took very little time, once the passengers clarified that they were Republic officers and not Separatist spies. When the freighter docked and the four ponies on board shuffled onto the station, they were greeted at the door by the dock officials, who had taken the liberty of forming an guarded escort to see them to the elevator.
Pinkie’s eyes were wide with excitement. Along with the escort, balloons, streamers and confetti were liberally dispersed throughout the hangar. They were being honored as the heroes of Ord Mantell, and the Republic. Twilight and Dash shook hooves with the admiring troopers that had formed to meet them, while Lemon and Pinkie reveled in the festivities of the moment.
A few minutes after her arrival, the dock officials approached Pinkie while she was demonstrating the proper technique for holding spoons on one’s nose.
“Ma’am? Is this ship yours?” he asked her.
“Yep!” she replied happily, placing another spoon on top of the first. A couple of the soldiers nearby applauded her talent.
“Well, see, we received word from Command that this ship was a Separatist vessel. As such, we need to investigate the claim and, if it’s true, we will need to confiscate it.”
Pinkie’s eyes locked onto the official, the spoons flying off her nose and clinking to the metal floor. “What?!”
“Yes, it’s procedure to have all the equipment and contraband check before we release it again. It’s a hassle, I know, but we’ll be sure to recommend the ship to you when we finish.”
“How long?”
“Probably a week, maybe less if we’re quick.”
Pinkie grimaced. Lemon, who had overheard most of the conversation, put a hoof on her shoulder and shook her gently, smiling at the dock official. “That’ll be fine. We don’t want any trouble. Isn’t that right, Pinkie?”
“Yessiree...” she muttered.
Rainbow Dash and Twilight Sparkle finished their debriefing with the troops nearby and headed towards the elevator. Lemon Drop and Pinkie Pie hopped in just before the doors started to shut, and together, the four of them ascended into Cowlick Station’s primary ring. When they opened again, the sheer vastness of the proceeding chamber nearly floored all of them. The ceiling extended forever upward, and near the top was a spire where an aerial cantina rested. Lights, strobes and loud music emanated from above, and Pinkie Pie was enthralled with the idea of a nonstop party that she wasn’t a part of yet.
To the left and right the circle continued, where merchant quarters and equipment requisitions were stationed. Twilight and Dash could see some troopers looking over weapon racks nearby. Dash’s tongue fell out of her mouth and the thought of getting an upgrade for her rifle, while Twilight tried to peer beyond to see if there was a library or something similar beyond.
Lemon was the only one that seemed to notice the young earth pony stallion in front of the door of the elevator. He was obviously rich, being draped in white robes that covered his entire body, and had a thick band over his eyes that seemed to tighten around his head. His mane was jet black and fell around his ears. Even though Lemon couldn’t see his eyes, the stallion was visibly pissed off.
“You!” he called out to Lemon and Pinkie, pointing a hoof between them.
“Me?” Lemon replied, his facial expression contorted into shock. Pinkie turned to look at the stallion and gasped, causing Lemon to shift his attention to her. “What is it, Pink?”
“This stallion...” Pinkie whispered. “We know him.”
“Who is this guy?” Rainbow Dash said, almost shouted. She glared at him for a minute before raising her rifle towards him slowly. “Should we be concerned?”
“My name is Atuna Davinari Lemep,” the stallion announced. A lightsaber flew off his belt and hovered in mid air beside him. It ignited into a beautiful viridian blade about a meter long. “And in the name of the Jedi Order, you are under arrest for grand theft auto and the destruction of Order property. Drop your weapons. Now.”