The doctor, or maybe whoever had sent the information over, had managed to include a pretty useful map in the datapad, leading him away from the clinic, to a safe place to surface in the Upper City, and then finally to the location of the seller. Several thoughts were drifting through Seth's head as he rode the old maintenance lift up, like starships gliding soundlessly across space, viewed from a window.

Was this legit?

What if someone recognized him as a Republic soldier?

What if something else went wrong?

What if rakghouls had attacked while he was gone?

But Seth was strangely insulated from these concerns by the fact that he was mainly just focusing on two things. One: get to his destination. Two: don't freak out. Changing his clothes and having a shower had helped calm him down, but right now it felt like he was walking on very thin ice, and it could crack at literally any second, plunging him into the icy depths of madness. His actions at the rundown apartment complex had really freaked him out, more so than he had initial realized. And initially he'd thought it was pretty bad.

His hands were shaking, his head was throbbing, his mouth was dry. Oh man...what if he had caught something? Down in the Undercity? How many diseases were out there where psychosis or mood swings were a common symptom? Then again, Seth had never had particularly good control of his emotions, and he'd certainly snapped before...

The lift shuddered to a halt, settling into its metal nest, and released him, its doors parting and disappearing into their niches. Seth took a few seconds to collect himself, but the effort was lost as the doors began closing again and he had to hastily shove himself out of the lift. "Piece of crap thing," he growled, resisting the suddenly almost overwhelming impulse to turn around and punch the closed elevator doors.

He took a deep breath, let it out slowly, tried to calm himself.

If he did something stupid up here, it could get him killed a lot easier than the Lower City or the Undercity, because up here, the Sith no doubt reigned supreme. Seth looked around the area he'd come to. It was another back section, tucked away from the general population, but already he could see a massive improvement. The metal here was clean and shiny, there was no garbage anywhere, and he saw sunshine, real sunlight streaming in through a few windows and an opening to the right. Feeling drawn towards it, Seth walked forward.

And came out into a place of wonder.

The opening led to a platform of white metal, and he felt the sunshine on his skin, a cool breeze whispering across his face, moving his hair. Staring around him, Seth felt something he hadn't felt in a long time: true awe. Above him, the sky was a pure, clean blue, and he saw the spires, the towers of Taris reaching skywards, pristine and smooth, silver and pastel. They were beautiful. Ships of varying make and model zipped by overhead. And it even smelled nice up here, crisp and clear, with a faint whiff of something sweet, like fresh doughnuts from a bakery. And the people. There were so many people walking around on the platform ahead of him...

Seth caught sight of a different kind of silver, and the effect was immediately lost.

Sith. There were a good half-dozen Sith troopers, clad in their head-to-toe, high-tech silver armor, touting their blaster rifles of polished metal, swords on their hips. Bastards. He had a pistol tucked down the back of his pants, it was the only one he could bring, and it was the expensive one. He had to fight not to pull it out and start picking off Sith. It would be so easy...at first. But then they'd swarm and murder his ass.

There were always more of the bastards.

Like insects.

Despite the Sith presence, something about the Upper City had a very calming effect on him. Seth collected his thoughts and gently pushed down his emotions, submerging them for now. He could deal with the emotional fallout later...provided there was a later. But now he had to focus. Dozens of people were counting on him with their very lives. He set off, still feeling that kind of ambient wonder as he began moving along a large platform that granted access to a dozen different buildings. A few apartments, what looked like a warehouse, a bakery, a cafe, and access points to other platforms. Taris was so strangely beautiful.

Seth tried not to let himself get distracted, but after the horror of the Undercity and the filthy grittiness of the Lower City, it was hard not to become enraptured by the clean silver gleam of the Upper City. He moved off of the main platform he'd arrived on, trying to look casual as he walked across a bridge and come onto another, smaller platform. The way to where he was going, at least, wasn't all that difficult to remember, nor that far away from his current position. Despite how much he liked it out here, Seth was a little surprised to find himself actually eager to get the stuff and get back to the Undercity.

Although this place had sunshine and silver towers and clean air, it was a trick, he knew. It was just as deadly up here as it was down below, maybe more so, because the Sith could decide, at any moment, that they didn't like the way you looked, or maybe they were just in a bad mood and you were the poor bastard they decided to take their anger out on, and who would stop them? Who would help you? No one, because they didn't want to join you on your path to pain and likely death. Because if they tried to help you, who would help them?

Seth tried not to think about it and kept his head down.

He made it to the location indicated on the map ten minutes later and found himself stepping into a cool, clean lobby. There was just one woman behind the desk, a twi'lek, and she smiled an artificial smile at him.

"Hello, sir. How can I help you?"

This had been in the datapad as well, at least. Which was good, because Seth wasn't feeling too keen on his ability to bluff right now.

"I'm here to see Mister Warner," he replied.

The woman consulted a terminal in front of her, then nodded. "Very good, sir. He is expecting you. Just go into that elevator there, ride it up to the next level. His office is dead ahead, at the very end of the hallway there."

"Thank you," Seth said, and did as she instructed.

Despite how smooth this was going, he couldn't help but feel apprehension seeping slowly into his body as he boarded the elevator and rode it up. Or maybe because of how smoothly it was going. With how freaking awful his luck had been lately, this just felt suspicious. But he knew he was being paranoid, he had to be. Right now, he wasn't sure what he should be feeling. Rage? Terror? Resignation? Guilt?

All seemed somehow applicable.

Telling himself to cool it, he left the lift as it settled into place and moved down a smooth, polished, brightly lit corridor. Offices lined the walls to either side of him. He wondered what kind of business this was, or what it was supposed to be, anyway. Obviously some kind of front if a smuggler contact was located here.

He found Warner's office and hit the call button. There was a brief pause, and he had an idea that he was being scanned, then the doors opened to reveal a large office dominated by a big wooden desk. A man sat behind the desk, and he was framed by floor-to-ceiling windows behind him that showed a pristine, serenely beautiful view of the cityscape beyond.

"Hello, sir," he said. "Please, come in. I'm afraid I didn't catch your name, our...mutual acquaintance didn't think to give it."

"Callisten," Seth lied almost without thinking as he took a seat.

"Very well Mister Callisten. I'll keep this brief, you seem like a busy man."

"Thank you."

Seth studied the man, who was human, perhaps middle-aged, though with the benefit of some gene boosting or cosmetic surgery. His black hair was slicked back, his blue eyes shining with intelligence and something subtler, craftier, beneath the surface, his black suit cut expertly. He resembled a businessman, which was kind of funny. In Seth's experience, businessmen were just more experienced, subtler smugglers, thieves, or con artists.

They tended to get away with screwing you out of your credits legally.

"Now, the part you need, it was indeed rare, but I happen to have it in store at one my warehouses. I was saving it for the right buyer, and he apparently is you, as fortune would have it. Now, let's talk pricing," Warner said.

"How much?" Seth asked, feeling his gut tighten. He didn't exactly have a lot of access to more credits than he had on him now.

"I'm feeling...adventurous today. How much do you have on you?" he asked.

"Let me see," Seth replied.

He just wanted the damned part. He stood up and emptied his pockets, setting all the credits and small, valuable things he'd managed to gather up over his journey so far. They spent a bit sorting through it, and he could see Warner thinking it over.

"Okay," he murmured, "just shy of a thousand credits. And these pieces here should fetch maybe six or seven hundred credits in the right market...tell you what, give me this and the pistol you have on you and it's a deal."

Seth didn't bother asking how the man knew about the pistol. Likely it was the scan he'd sensed earlier, so he just pulled the pistol out slowly and set it carefully down on the desk beside the pile of credits and valuables.

No telling what kind of defenses the guy had hidden away around the office.

"Perfect!" Warner declared, smiling merrily. "If you have a datapad on you, I can upload a map to the warehouse where you'll find the part. One of my men will be waiting to deliver it to you."

Seth nodded and passed him the datapad, waited for him to plug it into his terminal, (no doubt his terminal swept the pad for all information and made a copy, not that there was anything worthwhile on there anyway), and then passed it back.

"Thank you, Mister Warner," Seth said.

"And thank you, Mister Callisten. Farewell and good luck."

Seth just nodded, pocketed the datapad, and left.

One step closer to freedom.

* * *

Thoughts of Nova kept creeping into his skull as he tracked down the warehouse.

He felt embarrassed and kind of frustrated, but whatever, he was alone with his thoughts right now. In a way, his attraction to Nova was his problem with relationships in a nutshell. He knew that a lot guys tended to be attracted to women who were, in some way...weaker wasn't really the right word, more like...less strong willed, than they were. Women who were more demure or submissive. And for whatever reason, he'd never gone that route. Not like he had a choice. From what he'd been able to determine, you didn't really get to choose who you were attracted to.

Seth was a stubborn idiot with a hard head, and he supposed being attracted to strong-willed, competent, capable women was as good a thing as it was bad. Probably better, actually. He felt pretty confident that he'd never be abusive, but he knew that if certain relationship dynamics were at play, he might inadvertently take over the relationship and kind of just steamroll over the other person's desires. Which was a bad relationship, and would make him a bad partner.

He was attracted to tough, no-nonsense women who tended to be more stubborn than he was.

As a result, the relationships he was in, such as they were, were often fierce and passionate...and short-lived.

They often blew up before too long.

He'd certainly gotten a lot better at recognizing some of his faults, and at least going into relationships with his eyes as open as possible. What this boiled down to was the fact that he tended to have casual flings rather than relationships.

And that had worked out at least decently for him.

And now he was extremely attracted to Nova, he was realizing. And why not? Besides being extremely attractive, she was competent, brave, intelligent. Clearly she was stubborn and determined. There was a lot to like about her.

Should he maybe...

No. He shouldn't. Not while they were still on Taris. Not as extremely tempting as it was to hope that maybe she might entertain the idea of a quick hop in bed, because Force knew they could both use the stress relief. But was she even remotely attracted to him? He really didn't know. Had she shown any signs of being into him? If she had, he'd missed them. Why would she be, anyway? Seth knew he was pretty unattractive, it was something he'd had to just accept. He shook his head in frustration at all these thoughts.

First, get off of Taris alive with the others.

Then, maybe, he could ask her out on a date or something.

"There you are," Seth whispered, seeing the warehouse he'd been heading towards for the past twenty minutes.

It sat at the end of a row of warehouses, tucked away in a back corner of a platform. This area was definitely less traveled. Seth thought through the plan as he approached the main entrance. Get the part, get back to the Undercity, then help Nova and Yex fix the vessel, then, hopefully, get the exiles to the ship and get off Taris.

Seth reached the door. He knocked on it. There was a pause, then the door slid open, giving a view into the vast area beyond. He didn't see anyone.

"Hello?" Seth asked, walking slowly into the area beyond. "I'm here to pick up-"

His words degenerated into a scream as he felt a wave of pure agony wash over him, originating from the right side of his neck.

Seth had just enough time to think That's a Bothan stunner before he was unconscious.