The land-speeder hung suspended in its maintenance cradle, its exposed undercarriage glistening with hydraulic fluid and blackened scorch marks. Addukh Nirir was buried to the shoulder in its innards, the sleeves of his white robes rolled up to reveal corded muscle. The scent of scorched circuitry and ozone clung to the air, mixing with the ever-present musk of Chogorian leather from his red kaftan. A sheen of sweat coated his sun-browned forehead as he wrestled with a stubborn fuel line connector, his reinforced gloves slipping against the greased metal.

With a frustrated grunt, he extracted one hand to push his long, black braid back over his shoulder—the leather tie at its end now streaked with engine grease. The motion left a dark smear across his cheek, unnoticed as he wiped his brow with the back of his wrist. A bead of sweat clung stubbornly to his carefully groomed mustache before dropping onto the ground below.

Around him, the hangar bay thrummed with activity—servitors droned past on grinding treads, and serfs shouted over the whine of plasma cutters. It was a cadence he had long grown used to, something that could easily be tuned out, ignored...

Unlike the sudden, looming presence of a shadow that descended upon him just as he reached for the data-slate on his hip.

"By the Khan’s left testicle," Addukh muttered without turning, his voice rough with exhaustion and irritation, "if you’ve come to ask why it’s not done, the answer hasn’t changed—your riding makes a drunken grox look graceful." The White Scar who owned this speeder had been particularly persistent in pestering him, hovering for hours, alternating between impatient questions and unsolicited advice.

Behind him, boots shifted, and the silence that followed stretched a beat too long.