Chapter 134 · Mutiny Without Violence

The hyperspace charts flickered on the console—thin lines of pale light threading through a map so shattered by their last region that even the computer seemed uncertain where the galaxy began again.

Eli leaned over the display. Not standing. Not steady. Folded almost double over the console, his elbows braced against it as though the position itself were holding him together. He hadn't leaned back against the pilot's seat in over an hour. Every attempt sent a fresh bolt of pain through his back, forcing him forward again. His right arm remained wrapped beneath his ribs, fingertips digging into the fabric of his shirt as though he could hold the pain back with sheer pressure. His left hand hovered over the console switches, trembling so hard the shadow of his fingers jittered across the glass. “Just need… to align the vector…” he whispered to no one. He reached for the throttle. Missed it. His hand spasmed mid-air, pain knifing under his ribs so sharply he nearly folded. He braced himself on the console, panting. Instinctively, he drew one knee upward beneath him, curling around the pain. It helped. Only a little, but enough that he could steal another breath.

“Tee—” he galled in a gasp. But Tee was still half-active from emergency recovery mode, chirping dim diagnostics in low cycles.

Eli grabbed the console harder, trying to breathe through the wave.

It didn’t work.

Stent found him like that.

He entered the cockpit soundlessly—Chiss calm, Chiss quiet—and frozen the instant he saw Eli’s posture: hunched, shaking, one sleeve already damp from wiping sweat off his brow. “Eli,” Stent said.

Eli jolted like he’d been caught stealing. The sudden movement almost made him straighten. He stopped halfway, grimaced, and folded forward again before his back ever reached the chair. “I’m—working—” he gasped, reaching again for the navigation setting. His hand missed a second time. He let out a slow breath through clenched teeth and reached for the fastening at his waist. His belt came loose by one notch.

It wasn't enough.

He undid the top fastening of his trousers as well.

"Feels..." He swallowed. "...too tight."

Stent crossed the cockpit in two steps and caught his wrist before he could try a third. Not harsh. Not reprimanding. Just… firm. “You are in no condition to navigate.”

Through Chiss eyes, Eli's thermal pattern looked increasingly wrong.

Heat pooled beneath the lower ribs while the rest of him was cooling. Sweat glistened across his forehead despite the chill of the cockpit. His breathing had shortened into quick, shallow breaths, each one stopping abruptly before his lungs could fully expand.

“I can—” The word dissolved when another bolt of pain slammed under his ribs. Eli hissed, clutching Stent’s sleeve with his free hand to keep from collapsing.

Stent’s jaw tightened. He eased Eli’s hand away from the controls. “You will sit.”

“Stent—”

“You will sit,” Stent repeated, voice iron-flat.

Eli sagged, breath shuddering in a sharp tremor he couldn’t disguise. Stent guided him into the co-pilot's chair, lowering him with precision, supporting him until Eli's weight met the seat.

The instant his back touched the backrest, Eli sucked in a sharp breath. "Kriff—"

He lurched forward immediately, elbows dropping onto his knees, one arm wrapping instinctively around his upper abdomen. He remained folded over, breathing in short, careful breaths, making no further attempt to lean back.

Stent watched him for a moment. "You are avoiding the backrest."

Eli frowned, still concentrating on breathing. "...Am I?"

"Yes."

Eli shifted experimentally, easing himself a fraction toward the seat. The pain answered instantly. He stopped, grimaced, and folded forward again before his shoulders reached the backrest. "...Right." His eyes shone—not with tears this time, but with pain so bright it looked feverish. “I’m slowing us down,” he whispered.

“No,” Stent said. “You are simply very ill.”

The ship hummed softly, the storm long behind them.

But Eli’s body was still trapped inside its consequences.

Stent crouched beside the seat. Close enough to steady him. Close enough to see Eli’s jaw tremble as he tried to breathe past the pressure under his ribs. “You should have called for me,” he said quietly.

Eli shook his head. “I didn’t want to delay us.”

“Behaving like this, you are the delay,” Stent said—not unkindly, not cruelly. A simple fact.

Eli’s face crumpled—not into crying. Into something worse: shame. “I’m sorry,” he whispered.

Stent’s voice softened to something that belonged only here, only in this cockpit, only for Eli. “No,” he said. “You do not apologize for being in pain.”

The trembling in Eli’s hands finally stilled—not from recovery, but because he no longer had strength to fight it.

Stent rose slowly. And took control of the ship.

Stent didn’t leave the cockpit.

He stayed at the pilot’s controls, shoulders squared in a way that made the cockpit feel smaller, more anchored. His hands moved over the navigation panel in a sharp, efficient rhythm—that old Ascendancy discipline surfacing with terrifying clarity. The stars ahead were distorted, smeared by their proximity to the storm’s fringe.

But Stent found a path anyway.

Tee rolled up beside him, chirping diagnostic patterns—slow, uneven, but present again. Stent responded with crisp instructions, not glancing away from the display. “Assist in filtering the last chart update. We require the fastest return corridor.”

Tee chirped in acknowledgment and plugged into the port.

The navigation map flickered, stuttered—then snapped into a crude, jagged form. Not safe or elegant, but direct.

Eli watched from the co-pilot seat, eyes half-lidded, one hand pressed to his stomach. His breathing came in short, uneven pulls. “How… long?” he managed.

Stent didn’t soften the truth. “Three days.”

Eli swallowed hard. “Feels like… forever.”

“It is the minimum.”

Tee whirred anxiously—a high, worried pitch.

Eli leaned forward, gripping the armrest as another wave of pain radiated under his ribs and into his back. He sucked in a breath through clenched teeth, jaw trembling.

Stent turned slightly toward him. “Do not move if it worsens.”

“It’s… already worse.” The words came out before he could mask them.

Stent’s eyes narrowed. “Your condition is advancing more quickly than anticipated.”

Eli let out a weak laugh. “Not helping.”

Stent shifted the ship into a faster acceleration. “Stating fact.”

The hull vibrated under the strain.

Eli closed his eyes. He didn’t have energy to argue.

The return vector cut dangerously close to gravitational shear lines. Stent threaded through them with cold precision, hands steady on the controls. Tee beeped warnings—several, in rapid succession. “I am aware,” Stent said.

Another alarm went off—heat in the drive coils. Stent rerouted power instantly.

Eli forced one eye open. “You’re pushing her.”

“Yes.”

“She won’t like that.”

“Nor do I,” Stent said, “but she will endure it.”

The ship groaned under the acceleration—long, metallic, unhappy.

Eli exhaled sharply as pain twisted again beneath his ribs. His knuckles whitened on the armrest. “Stent…”

Stent turned fully this time, posture taut.

Eli struggled through the words. “If… if I pass out again—”

“You will not.”

“That’s not—” He winced. “Stent, listen—if I do—don’t slow down. Just—keep going.”

Stent’s expression didn’t move. “Eli,” he said quietly. “There is no scenario in which I stop.”

Eli’s breath hitched in something too close to relief.

He nodded once.

Two hours into the route, Eli couldn’t sit upright anymore.

He slumped sideways, one hand scrambling for the edge of the console. Stent caught him before he fell out of the chair, steadying him with a firm grip around the upper arm.

Eli gasped, stomach twisting, vision blurring.

Stent guided him back carefully, checking his forehead with the back of his hand— Chiss-cool fingers against fever-warm skin.

Eli flinched. Not from the touch, from the clarity it revealed.

“Your temperature is rising,” Stent said.

“Figured…” Eli whispered.

His eyes rolled heavily. Tee let out a soft, distressed beep and nudged Eli’s boot.

Eli forced a smile at the droid. “Still here, huh?”

Tee chirped, lower, worried.

Stent tightened the harness across Eli’s chest, securing him. Eli didn’t resist. Didn’t even try. His energy was going into breathing.

Stent returned to the controls, voice clipped. “Tee, maintain course corrections. Every deviation must be flagged.”

Tee chirped back—a determined little note.

The ship pitched slightly as space thinned around them, the first hint that normal routes were not far.

Eli sagged in the chair, eyes closing against a new wave of pain. “How much… longer?”

Stent scanned the display. “Still three days,” he repeated. Then, quieter— “No more delays.”

Eli didn’t make it back to the cockpit.

Halfway down the corridor he staggered, catching the bulkhead with a weak gasp. The pain under his ribs twisted so sharply his knees buckled. Stent caught him mid-fall—one arm tight around Eli’s chest, the other bracing his weight effortlessly.

“You are going to the bed,” Stent said.

Eli didn’t argue. Couldn’t.

Stent lifted him as though he weighed nothing and carried him to his quarters, settling him onto the double bed they had once used for warmth and survival. The blankets were already there from the fort—the insulation sheets, the stacked layers. Now they became something else entirely.

A sickbed.

Stent pulled the thermal blanket off.

“Try to lie on your left side,” he instructed quietly. “Does it relieve the pressure?”

Eli nodded, teeth clenched. “A little.”

Stent didn’t waste the tiny victory. He adjusted the pillows, angled Eli’s body to ease the tension in his abdomen. Eli’s breath trembled.

Stent returned with a bottle of cold water and a damp cloth. He sat on the edge of the bed—close, but composed—and pressed the cloth to Eli’s forehead.

Eli sighed in relief.

“You are feverish,” Stent murmured. “Significantly.” He loaded another charge on the injector gun and pressed it to Eli’s shoulder, giving him another dose of painkillers.

“I know,” Eli whispered. “Feels like—burning.”

Stent wet the cloth again and brushed it along Eli’s cheekbones, down his neck. He didn’t rush. Didn’t fidget. Just maintained contact until Eli’s shoulders loosened fractionally.

Then he lifted the bottle. “Drink.”

Eli grimaced. “I’ll throw up.”

“You have nothing to throw up,” Stent said. “You must hydrate or your condition will deteriorate.”

Eli managed a tiny sip. It hurt—pressure shifting under his ribs, nausea rising—but the water slid down his throat, cool and merciful.

“Good,” Stent said softly. “Again.”

Another sip. Another breath. Then Eli closed his eyes against the pain curling around his stomach.

Stent wiped the sweat along his brow. The gesture wasn’t gentle. It was careful. Measured. Resolute. Like everything he did.

“We are only one day and half away from Baros” He informed. Eli forced his eyes open a crack. “Baros? But Lothal…”

“Baros is safer and the jumps are shorter.”

Tee rolled to the doorway and stopped—silent, dome tilted, watching.

Stent acknowledged him with a tiny nod. “Monitor environmental temperature. If it drops, notify me.”

Tee chirped in low compliance.

Eli tried to smile at the droid. It came out weak, crooked. His breath hitched.

Stent adjusted the blanket again. “You are cold?”

“Chills,” Eli murmured. “Then fever… back and forth.”

Stent rested a hand lightly against Eli’s sternum. Cool Chiss skin. Steady, grounding. Eli exhaled shakily, the contact anchoring him in a world that had become pain and fog.

“Breathe,” Stent said. “Slowly.”

Eli did, though each inhale tightened something deep inside him.

“That’s it,” Stent murmured. “Good.”

Eli shut his eyes, letting the words settle like warm weight.

The ship bucked suddenly—a violent shudder through the hull. The lights dimmed. Metal groaned.

Eli winced, curling inward. “Stent—”

“I have us in a stable corridor,” Stent said. “You will remain in bed. I will not leave this room for long.”

Eli blinked the fever haze back. “You… need to be in the cockpit.”

“Tee will alert me. The route is set.”

“But—”

Stent leaned forward, his face composed but unmistakably firm.

“You are the priority.”

Eli swallowed hard. His eyes grew wet, not from emotion alone—pain, exhaustion, shame blending into something small and vulnerable.

“I don’t want to slow us down.”

“You are not slowing us down,” Stent said. “You are the reason we are returning at all.”

Eli inhaled shakily—shallow, painful. The truth landed harder than the pain.

Stent pressed the cool cloth to Eli’s forehead again. He brushed damp hair back from his face. He made sure Eli’s lips were moist, lifting the bottle for another sip. He adjusted the bedding to reduce strain on Eli’s abdomen. He kept one hand at Eli’s shoulder—not gripping, just present.

Not softness. Not sentiment. A vow.

“You will endure this,” Stent said quietly. “You will reach Baros.”

Eli’s breath trembled, another silent tear sliding toward his temple. “One day…” he whispered.

“One day,” Stent echoed. “I will get you there.”

He smoothed the blanket one last time.

“Sleep,” he said.

Eli nodded weakly.

The fever pulled him under in seconds, Stent’s cool hand still at his shoulder, Tee standing guard at the cockpit, the ship vibrating under the strain of a desperate, straight-line escape.

And all of Stent’s resolve narrowed to one command:

Keep Eli alive.

Baros II appeared on the navigation display long before it appeared in real space—a faint green mark on a star map full of red warnings and overtaxed routes. A trading moon, small, quiet, medically basic, but civilized enough to have an emergency ward.

And crucially: Less than one day away. If they didn’t lose Eli before then.

Stent angled the ship toward the coordinates, pushing the sublight engines harder than regulations allowed. The hull vibrated under the strain. Alarms chirped irritably. Tee darted between diagnostic ports, doing what little he could with half-functioning systems.

Eli lay curled on his left side, clutching a pillow against his abdomen like it held him together. His breaths came in quick, shallow pulls. Every few minutes a tremor passed through him—pain or fever or both.

Stent sat beside the bed with a bottle of water in one hand and the damp cloth in the other.

“Small sip,” Stent said.

Eli managed half of one before gagging.

“Enough,” Stent murmured. “Rest.”

Eli nodded weakly, eyes barely open.

The nausea worsened.

By the middle of the second day, Eli could no longer keep even a mouthful of water down. Every attempt ended the same way, leaving him curled tightly in the reclined co-pilot's seat, breathing in short, shallow gasps until the wave of pain subsided.

Stent had abandoned any attempt to persuade him to eat.

Instead, a field intravenous line ran from a clear fluid bag suspended above the console to Eli's forearm, taped securely in place. Isotonic fluids. Electrolytes. In a final, largely symbolic effort, Stent had added the last vial of diluted bacta from the emergency kit.

It would slow the dehydration.

Nothing more.

The co-pilot's seat had been reclined as far as it would go.

Even so, Eli never rested against it.

He remained curled on one side, knees drawn toward his chest, one arm wrapped protectively across his upper abdomen. Every instinct pushed him into the same posture, relieving the pressure beneath his ribs by the smallest imaginable amount.

Tee hovered nearby with quiet determination. Every moment the little droid approached with a damp cloth, cooling Eli's forehead before carefully moistening his lips with a few drops of water. Sometimes Eli managed a faint nod of thanks.

Sometimes he was already asleep. Or unconscious enough that there was little difference.

From the pilot's seat, Stent watched the medical display almost as often as he watched the stars ahead. Body temperature too high. Heart rate remained dangerously elevated. Respiration had become rapid and shallow, each breath stopping well before Eli's lungs were full.

None of the numbers were improving.

The only encouraging trend was that Baros II grew steadily closer.

The cockpit chimed an alert.

Stent stood immediately, but not before laying a steadying hand on Eli’s shoulder.

“That is the outer navigation net,” he said. “We are entering civilized space.”

“Already?” Eli whispered.

“You slept.”

For once, Eli didn’t argue.

Stent crossed to the cockpit. He didn’t activate the main lights—he could navigate in the dim emergency glow. He scanned the telemetry, made three sharp course corrections, then returned.

“We will arrive in seven hours.”

Eli blinked in fever-sluggish confusion. “That’s… seven?”

“Yes.”

“That’s close.”

“It is.”

The relief hit Eli so hard his breath caught. Not enough to ease the pain. Enough to make it feel bearable.

Stent sat again. He cooled the cloth. He brushed it over Eli’s face. He checked his temperature with the back of his hand—cool Chiss skin against burning human skin.

“You are hotter than before,” Stent said quietly.

Eli whispered, “I can feel it.”

Hours passed in a haze.

Eli drifted in and out of half-sleep, each waking full of pain, nausea, fever, and the dull terror of not knowing what was happening inside him.

Stent never left the room for more than minutes at a time. He rationed the water. He kept Eli on his left side to reduce the strain on the inflamed organ. He cooled his fever with the damp cloth. He adjusted the pillows so Eli wouldn’t twist and worsen the pressure. He kept a hand on Eli’s shoulder whenever Eli stirred, a steady point of contact, reassurance without words.

Eli whispered once, voice cracked: “I’m sorry.”

Stent frowned. “For what.”

“For not… being stronger.”

“You are”—Stent adjusted the blanket—“still alive. That is strength.”

Eli didn’t answer. But his breathing eased for a moment.

Two hours from Baros II, Eli deteriorated again.

The pain intensified, sharper and deeper, radiating in sickening waves that stole his breath. He curled tighter, clutching his pillow so hard his knuckles whitened.

Stent pressed a hand to his back, steady and firm. “Breathe.”

Eli couldn’t. Not properly. The pain twisted under his ribs like someone wringing a rope inside him. He gasped, sweat dripping from his hairline.

“Stent—” The word broke into a half-sob of pain.

Stent immediately slid his arm under Eli’s shoulders, supporting him upright.

“I know,” Stent said quietly. And that—more than the touch—made Eli finally cry again.

Not loud. Not dramatic.Just silent, exhausted tears rolling down a fever-flushed face as his body betrayed him completely.

Stent held him there, stabilizing his breathing until the worst passed. Then he lowered him back to the bed as carefully as if Eli were made of glass.

Stent had barely cleared the outer approach vector when Baros II ATC pinged them—routine, bored, the way small-world controllers always sounded. He answered instantly, voice clipped and sharp.

“Baros II Control, this is the Faded Glory. Declaring medical emergency.”

There was a pause—two seconds, maybe three—then the tone on the other end changed completely.

“Faded Glory, confirm medical emergency?”

“Confirmed,” Stent said. “Critical.”

A beat.

Then: “You are cleared for priority descent. Approach Lane Cresh—express corridor. No holds.”

The stars shifted on the viewport as the lane lit up—an empty, fast line straight to the landing grid, cleared by Baros II Control with something approaching the alarm. Stent took it without hesitation, one hand on the throttle, the other bracing Eli’s shoulder as the ship dipped into atmosphere.

Eli drifted in and out of consciousness on the co-pilot seat, curled on his left side, fever-bright and shaking. His breaths came shallow and tight, pain tightening his face in small, helpless winces. Stent squeezed his shoulder once—wordless reassurance—and angled the ship for maximum speed.

“Tee,” Stent said without looking back, “remain aboard and monitor systems.”

Tee chirped an anxious protest. “Remain,” Stent repeated.

The little droid dimmed his lights, obedient but miserable.

Stent set the landing gear with one decisive motion. The Faded Glory hit the pad hard enough to make the shock absorbers groan—but they were down. Down was enough.

He didn’t waste a second.

Stent rose, crossed the cabin in three long strides, and opened the sealed panel behind the navigation alcove. Inside, wrapped in cloth and hidden behind metal plating, sat a compact case of the currency he had been carrying from the Ascendancy—his quiet contingency for a moment he prayed would never come.

If not now, then never.

He took the case.

Then he lifted Eli from the seat with both arms—careful, steady, as though carrying a wounded soldier—and strode down the ramp toward the awaiting med-transport.

The ground crew met him at the base of the ramp with a hover-stretcher already unfolding itself. One of them held out a datapad, numbers glowing bright on the screen: the cost of emergency medical transport and immediate care.

“Sir, this is the required fee for an ER admission,” the attendant said. “Payment upfront.”

Stent didn’t hesitate.

He lowered Eli onto the stretcher with deliberate care, one hand supporting his neck, the other steadying his torso as Eli grimaced through another wave of pain. Only once Eli was secured did Stent reach beneath his coat.

He withdrew a compact bundle of Imperial credits, bound tightly with a worn strap. He peeled off the exact sum shown on the datapad— not a chit more, not a chit less— and placed the stack firmly into the attendant’s hands.

“Now.”

Eli gasped softly as another wave of pain caught him. Stent bent his head close.

“You will hold,” he murmured.

The med-transport doors slid open. Stent did not let go of him until the medics physically separated them inside the emergency bay.

The doctor didn’t speak immediately.

He looked between the datapad, the med-scan results, and Stent—lingering on Stent, in fact, with a mix of confusion and profession-masking-wariness familiar to anyone who had ever walked into a human-dominated facility looking thoroughly non-human.

“You’re his… partner?” the doctor began. Stopped. Revised. “You brought him in?”

“Yes.”

“And you are…?” The doctor squinted.

“Chiss.” Stent said flatly.

“We don’t receive many of—”

“Diagnosis,” Stent said, with clinical finality.

The doctor glanced at the readouts again. His brows lifted.

“It’s pancreatitis.”

Stent’s expression didn’t change. “Cause?”

“Likely gallstones,” the doctor said. “He’s been in pain for a while. The organ’s inflamed and there’s significant damage, enough that he needs intervention immediately.”

Stent didn’t look away. “He will survive.”

“Yes,” the doctor said, surprised by the certainty in his own voice. “He will. We’re preparing him for surgery now.” He tapped the datapad, bringing up a rotating scan of Eli’s abdomen. "His pancreas has sustained notable damage," the doctor said, bringing up the scan once more. "We can remove the necrotic tissue and attempt to restore endocrine function using cultured pancreatic islet cells." He hesitated before continuing. "The graft is not always successful. If sufficient function returns, he may recover with little or no long-term support. If it does not..." He let the sentence hang for a moment. "...he will require lifelong insulin replacement."

Stent's expression remained unchanged. "Probability?"

"Too early to say."

Stent didn’t look away.

The doctor continued, “The procedure is straightforward. Recovery will take time—weeks, not days—but he should make it.”

Stent exhaled—the smallest, sharpest breath, invisible to anyone who wasn’t watching closely.

“Proceed,” he said.“I will cover all costs.”

“The estimate is—”

“I will cover all costs,” Stent repeated.

The doctor hesitated, then nodded, reassured in a way he couldn’t fully name. “We’ll take him in now. You can wait in the surgical wing.”

Stent’s chin lifted a fraction.

“I will wait.”

The doctor left with the surgical team. The doors sealed.

Stent remained facing them—still, unmoving, hands clasped behind his back, posture perfect even in the fluorescent chill of a foreign ER.

Not defeated. Not shaken. Just waiting.

The mission was over. The soldier remained. And Eli Vanto would live.