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First published 1994 in Imperium 4.

Woke up this morning, and wondered how the hell I ever wound up in a place like this. Could be happily sitting in my own cosy home someplace, settled with a wife and kids - instead I end up in this dump. That's life for you, isn't it? Try and do your bit for the future of the galaxy, and this is all you get. Bloody typical…

Lieutenant Devrin Garrard surveyed the hangar in his charge, frowning in gloomy despondency at the sight of this place that was his responsibility. Frowning at the walls whose surface shone with a film of ice, and at the X-wings ranked in disorganised chaos around him. At the Millenium Falcon, and at the snowspeeders. The damn, wretched, miserable snowspeeders.

If he had his way, he'd torch the snowspeeders without a second thought. But if he'd had his way in the first place he wouldn't have set up base here at all. He'd have chosen somewhere more hospitable for sure, and at least a little warmer.

Most cultures he'd come across pictured hell as some kind of raging inferno, but right now he wasn't so convinced. Right now, he had reached the conclusion that this must surely be hell. As close to hell as anyone could get, in this lousy, inexorable, permeating cold, which gripped the body, and leached the energy and the strength and the will to keep on going right out of you.

Five hours into shift, two to go. Despite the thermals and the how-many layers of warm clothing, he'd finally reached that stage of chilly misery. Lost track of how many toes were present and correct on either foot, felt his fingers getting clumsy and fumbling…

He restlessly stamped each foot in turn, trying to get some warmth back into his limbs, and he sighed, watching his moody exhalation vaporise into a visible mist before him. The com-unit he clutched in his gauntleted hand crackled into life: "Deck Officer? This is Command Centre. Do you copy?"

He lifted up the unit. "Deck Officer speaking."

"We're working out the logistics for the patrols tomorrow. Check out the snowspeeder situation and report back as soon as possible."

"Copy, General. Over and out." And thank you very much, General Rieekan. Techs'll be just brimming over with anticipation and excitement when they see me coming…

So he stirred himself into reluctant motion and stomped irritably across the hanger towards the snowspeeders. The arcs from the welders caused reflections to leap and dance, lighting up their surroundings with clean white-blue flashes and sending grotesque shadows jumping over the rime-caked walls like so many jerking puppets.
But as he approached, the welders switched off one by one. Each muffled head looked up and glared, till he had a whole bunch of technicians glowering accusingly at him as though he bore sole responsibility for all their problems.

Because nobody loves the bearer of bad tidings, and half the time it's me who's landed with that job. Took on the task of running a hanger, not acting as an arbitrator between techs and Command. Damn Command should do their own dirty work. Derlin's got nothing better to do, after all. Hangar security, huh? Security against what? Ain't no one in their right minds who'd come all the way out here to this forsaken dump… "Sergeant?" he called.

And he found one of the techs glaring at him especially hard. "This is an official visit, right?" she asked him.

He didn't have the heart to reply with an affirmative.

"Don't want to know," she retorted, with a dismissive flourish of her welder. "Just take yourself back over to the X-wings and leave us alone. Okay?"

"General Rieekan wants an update, Ysabel. They're planning the patrols for tomorrow. He wants the speeders."

"Hear that?" announced Ysabel, loudly addressing her fellow technicians. "General Rieekan wants the speeders!"

The responses to her words comprised a series of sarcastic guffaws and a few jeering catcalls from her colleagues. "If General Rieekan wants the speeders," she replied. "then he can come here and push them out the hangar himself. That's the only way he'll ever get them moving."

"It's a matter of some urgency…" He tried to sound diplomatic, but their reaction was as he'd expected.

"Yeah, we know that," Ysabel snapped. "That's why we've been sitting up here for nine hours - ten in some cases - and we're tired and we're hungry and we're damned well pissed off. We can't do any more than this. We got problems. You know that, I know that, and he should know that, too."

Devrin shrugged, listless agreement with her dissatisfaction. "I have to tell him something, Yzzi."

"I suppose so. Right, then, you can tell him this: tell him he can go stick his head up a tauntaun's ass. Okay? That's what you can tell him."

That retort seemed to rally them a little, and her companions even managed to raise a spirited cheer in agreement.

So he sighed, and he spoke into the com-unit once more. "Command Centre? This is the Deck Officer. The techs are still working on the snowspeeders, sir. They're doing their best, but I don't think you'll have them by the time the patrols go out. Over."

"Copy, Deck Officer." And Rieekan didn't sound mad, or even disappointed. Just resigned. "We'll send out the tauntauns, then. You got the tauntauns under control back there? Over."

"Uh, yes, sir. Got slight arguments over assignments and responsibilities though, sir. Over."

"I'm sure you can sort something out, Lieutenant. Over and out."

Tauntauns. Headache number three. Transportation wasn't usually a problem as far as he was concerned, and he'd quite happily take on anything: X-wings, Y-wings, whatever - except maybe snowspeeders that couldn't cope with the snow. But he drew the line at tauntauns. With their teeth and claws, and their smelly hides, and their stinking breath. Dammit, he was a deck officer, not an agricultural manager - and with those tauntauns he'd inherited a whole plethora of new roles; tauntaun vet, tauntaun nutritionist, tauntaun psychologist, tauntaun nanny… and gods, he loathed tauntauns. Could only find one use for the cantankerous brutes, and that was served up on a plate, roasted and well done, sliced thinly and piping hot with gravy…

Food. What a heartwarming thought. In this place, even the dubious wonders of messroom cooking did much to alleviate the chill and the tedium of the day.

And it's another two hours before we get to have some dinner. Aw, gods, is this shift ever going to end?

"Deck Officer? Deck Officer!" Han Solo's voice bawled out across the hangar.

Han Solo. Captain of the Millennium Falcon. Problem number four in his list of grievances, coming close behind the cold, and the snowspeeders, and the tauntauns…

"Yes, Captain Solo? What can I do for you?"

Solo glowered at him, and it was the most Devrin could do to keep himself from erupting into cynical laughter. It was the expression on the Corellian's face that provoked that kind of response from him, because he'd seen that look before, and often enough over the last day or so. On the tauntauns, of all things.

And suddenly it struck him.

Solo and the tauntauns. So similar in their attitude it was almost uncanny. Because like the tauntauns, Solo wandered around frowning with perennial displeasure, and grumbling loudly and incessantly about the situation there. Only the tauntauns, at least, didn't try and bully the groundstaff when things weren't going their way.

"Where's my techs?" demanded Solo.

"Techs, sir?"

"Look," explained Solo, speaking in a manner which was quite deliberately patronising. "Case you hadn't heard, Deck Officer, I'm having trouble with the Falcon. I need techs. The General told me he'd give me his full co-operation in trying to get that lady up and running again."

"I had heard, Captain Solo. I'm sorry, sir, but all the senior techs are busy right now. Our priority must lie with Rogue Squad. No point in having pilots on the base if there's nothing for them to fly."

Solo shook his head, barely disguised derision on his face. "Aw, do the Rebellion a favour, and what do you get? Put on hold till things are convenient… Well, it ain't convenient for me, pal. I need my ship, and I need it now. And I won't get her moving without some techs. Where are they?"

The question was rhetorical; Solo wasn't expecting any straightforward answer, and certainly wasn't expecting to be offered any techs. He just needed some way of getting rid of his frustrations. And there was no way he'd try taking out his anger on any of the tech crew. He needed their help in the future too much, maybe, but perhaps there was more to it than that. Solo knew the pressures they all faced here, probably sympathised with the techs more than he'd ever care to admit, but had to get the mounting aggression out of his system somehow. And what better way was there than to yell at the Deck Officer?

Same as damn usual. Hangar fall guy, that's me… And he wondered how he could take it without so much as a whimper of protest. It galled him, after all, when some of them had spent year after year clambering up the promotion scale, and then along comes Solo. Breezes in and acts the hero, gets the ranks and privileges of Captain, comes and goes just as he pleases, and still throws his weight around as if he owns the place. No justice there.

Justice or injustice, talking back to that cocky Corellian spacer would earn him a black mark for insubordination, so he drew a deep breath, preparing to recite the standard excuses…

But Solo raised her hand. "Don't think I want to know, Deck Officer."

"Deck Officer?"

"Yes!!?"

And, when Devrin turned to confront the individual who'd just interrupted this exchange with Solo, he found the face of one of the junior techs staring at him, framed by layers of cold-weather clothing which almost smothered him from head to foot. "I'm sorry, sir," the tech told him, earnestly. "But it's the tauntauns."

"What about the frigging tauntauns?" snapped Devrin in response, looking from the tech, to Solo, then back to the tech once more.

"Forget it!" muttered Solo, and then he stormed off in theatrical grandeur towards his ship.

"I'll see what I can do about assigning you a droid or two, sir!" Devrin called after him, offering this tiny piece of consolation in an effort to placate him.

Solo stopped and glared at him. "Last droid you offered me wasn't doing much better than the snoswpeeders."

Snowspeeders... That word again…

"About the tauntauns, sir…"

Tauntauns… That word again…

"Yes, the tauntauns. Has one dropped dead, perhaps? Or maybe they've all dropped dead? That's what you're here to tell me, isn't it? Go on, make my day!"

"No, sir. Not exactly. There's a dispute, sir. Over cleanup duty. Could you maybe try and sort something out?"

"Yeah, yeah." He sighed in dark disgust at the situation. The distress in his colleague became even clearer at that reaction, so he reached out and clapped the young man reassuringly on the shoulder, trying to indicate that it hadn't been his fault, that he wasn't the one responsible for aggravating his senior officer's tempers. "Come on, then. Let's see what we can do."

The tauntauns looked as pissed off as the rest of them. They bleated in lofty disgust at anyone who came near them, and occasionally snaked out their heads to snap at those trying to attend to their welfare. And in the tauntaun pen, a massive discussion was in progress. Derlin was there, with a brace of disgruntled ground troops in attendance, and some dejected junior techs were present, too. All gathered together - at a respectful distance - around a particularly revolting lump of tauntaun shit, which steamed gently in the freezing air.

Gods, I hate tauntauns!! He took a deep breath - quite possibly his last comfortable inhalation for the foreseeable future - and squeezed through the gate leading into the makeshift corral.

"Lieutenant," acknowledged Derlin, with a faint nod of the head.

"What exactly seems to be the problem, Major?" he asked, warily.

"This," Derlin replied, looking meaningfully down at the tauntaun's odious calling card. "We seem to have run into difficulties over who's taking responsibility for their upkeep."

"They expect us to see to it, sir," complained one of the junior techs. "And it just ain't fair. We got our work cut out with keeping this base functional, let alone getting the speeders up and running and the X-wings in working order. We were working on the Commander's ship, sir, and they went and waylaid us and told us to get on with this."

"Transportation's your department," pointed out one of the ground troops. "Hell, what's a tauntaun but a downmarket speeder!"

"But we've already got too much to do!" retorted the young technician, looking like he wanted to burst into tears where he stood. "And now they go and tell us to do this? Why can't the ground troops do it? Ain't doing nothing just now, are they? They drilled this afternoon and since then they've been sitting around on their butts admiring the scenery. Let them do some work for a change."

"Okay, okay. Just calm down a minute, would you?" He looked the young tech in the eye, fighting to downplay the situation, to keep tempers from fraying yet further. "Look, Major, these boys are meant to be taking care of Commander Skywalker's T-65. You can't just pull them away from their assigned duties like that. We can't spare the manpower. We've already got slight logistical problems here. Deployment of the tech crew is about the most crucial aspect of the successful operation of this base right now."

"Point taken, Garrard," said Derlin, huffily.

Derlin, of course, was taking the ground troops' side in all of this, as fiercely as the Deck Officer was defending his techs. He was preparing a riposte, that much was obvious, but before the major could deliver his counter-statement, Devrin stepped in and played the groundstaff's trump card. "I'm sorry, sir, but you'll really have to talk to Commander Skywalker about this. He's in charge of the wing now, so the deployment of the groundstaff is ultimately his decision. I have the assignments set down officially in writing already, and I haven't the authority to make any changes without his backing. Looks like you'll have to find some alternative manpower. Perhaps we could call him up?" He looked meaningfully at a neighbouring tech, and raised his eyebrows as a silent signal for some kind of response.

And the tech dutifully obliged him. "Uh, we thought of that, sir. He's scheduled for a command meeting right now."

"Never mind," muttered Derlin, and he scowled at the victorious group of ground crew. Then he sighed, and nodded to the accompanying soldiers. "Right, men. Get on with it. Shovels are outside."

"Aw, sir-" one began, but a sharp look from his senior silenced him.

"Yes, sir," the other muttered, and the two soldiers trailed disconsolately away.
The small collection of groundstaff had barely made it out of earshot before the junior techs erupted into gasps of relief and delight, their joy at being spared this gruesome task clearly visible upon their faces. "Thanks, sir!" one told him.

He shrugged. "Any time."

And the sound of an engine starting up resounded loud across the hangar. It wheezed its way up to full power, then gurgled into miserable silence once more.

An audible groan of collective despair came from the techs working at the other side of the ice cavern. Devrin gave a sigh of sympathetic disappointment, then decided that perhaps it might be time to check up on the lack of progress with the snowspeeders…

The scene around the snowspeeders was uncannily similar to the one he had just witnessed in the tauntaun corral. However, this time the subject of attention was one of the recalcitrant speeders, and the pervading atmosphere was quite different. There was no antagonism here, the mood being instead one of sympathetic camaraderie.

In the middle of this cluster of interested and concerned personnel, Ysabel was ranting furiously at all those within earshot, and at any others beyond, too. "Damn fuel lines! Clogging up in seconds… Tried every damn thing possible and they still don't want to damn well know!"

Most of her audience were techs, but then Devrin noticed the additional presence of Luke Skywalker, with Wedge Antilles an almost inevitable shadow at his flight leader'' side. The command briefing must have finished early then, leaving the two pilots free to come back down and check up on the proceedings.

Skywalker seemed to be in remarkably high spirits, his body language carelessly flamboyant, despite the thick quilted jacket which made him look like he'd put on an extra five kilos overnight. Beside him Antilles was hunched in miserable pathos, his shoulders obviously tensed with real or imagined cold, his gauntleted hands clenched at his sides. His dark eyes and black brows stared out in distant melancholy above the bandanna that loosely covered his nose and mouth.

In truth, Devrin found the differing attitudes of the two pilots quite surprising. It would have been more logical for Skywalker to be feeling the cold more keenly than anyone, but since when was anything that Skywalker did remotely logical? Sometimes the former farmboy from Tatooine did exactly the opposite of what anyone expected; life on Hoth was just another of these occasions. While everyone else shivered and griped about the conditions, Luke seemed to thrive on the sense of difference, embracing this entirely new set of circumstances with open-minded enthusiasm.

And his reaction to the snowspeeder fiasco was equally unpredictable. He waited patiently for the chief technician to complete her vitriolic condemnation of snowspeeders, fuel lines and sub-zero temperatures, and then he shrugged, a gesture of good-natured dismissal. "Come on, Yzzi. Don't let it get to you. Take a break from it. You've done more than enough work today. Pack it in."

"Rieekan wants the speeders," she retorted. "He wants his speeders, so we got to give him his speeders."

Luke shook his head. "To hell with the speeders! Get some rest, all of you. We'll take the tauntauns out to get the sensors in place tomorrow. It's not a problem."

The look of silent betrayal sent towards him by Antilles in response to that suggestion, however, obviously implied that in others' opinion it was a problem. A very major problem. "We got those tauntauns," continued Luke. "Might as well make good use of them."

And that utterance of down-to-earth philosophy at last provoked an outraged protest from Antilles. "Aw, Luke! Come off it, would you?"

Luke appeared surprised by Wedge's outburst. "What's the matter with you?" he asked, his tone one of injured astonishment.

"Hate tauntauns…" muttered Wedge.

"Yeah!" interrupted one of the techs. "That's just because you fell off one this morning."

That recollection seemed to alleviate the collective crisis a little, provoking some laughter at least from even the most cynical tech staff present.

Wedge glared at the offending tech from over his bandanna. "I didn't fall off. I dismounted."

"Sure, Wedge," Ysabel told him, sharply. "You fell off."

He shrugged in defensive response. "Told the damn beast to go left and it went right. Not surprising I fell off."

"Serves you right," Luke said. "First time up and you start manhandling the poor girl like she's some kind of souped-up special edition landspeeder. Ain't surprising that she ditched you."

"Face it, Wedge," added Ysabel, keeping her face poker-straight as she spoke. "Your riding leaves a lot to be desired."

And the double meaning that lurked within her comment caused the laughter to erupt once more.

"Okay, okay!" Luke interrupted, raising his voice to make himself heard above the mirth. He was smiling himself, but was making a skillful effort to turn their attention back to more pertinent matters. "Look, Yzzi, let's just try and get this settled now. How long do you think it's going to take?"

The humour faded amongst the ground crew once more, and Ysabel looked forlorn. "Don't know," she admitted. "Might be a couple of hours, might be as long as a day-cycle. We keep thinking that we're straightening things out, then something else goes on us."

This confession to her squad leader was spoken in hushed tones, as if she could not bear to concede to the fact that the techs might be responsible for holding up normal operations on the base.

"So there's a good chance it won't be finished tonight?" Luke surmised, brightly. "Okay, fine. Take yourselves out of here and off to rec now. All of you. Yes, Ysabel. You and Jace, too. Now."

"But-" argued Ysabel.

"No, Yzzi. That's an order. Get going."

"We just need five minutes to clear up…" she persisted.

"Okay. Five minutes. I'm counting."

The change in atmosphere was instantaneous, as the techs all hurried to clear aside tools and maintenance gear in readiness for the arrival of the backup crew. And Skywalker, it seemed, had just succeeded in making himself the most popular man in the entire base.

Derlin was already hurrying over towards them. As soon as he joined the Deck Office, he studied his chrono, and said, "Eighteen hundred local. Dead on. Time to close the door?"

Devrin nodded, looking towards the darkening skies which signalled the onset of the coming night's blizzards. At least when they'd shut that gloomy vista out of sight there'd be an illusion of greater warmth. "I'll just check up the entrances," he said. No need, because no personnel had been assigned outside the base since morning, but he felt that the rituals ought to be maintained in advance.

The all-clear to proceed came back soon enough, and Devrin was delighted to give the order. He bayed out the instruction with more enthusiasm than he'd shown previously that day. "Close the doors!"

The whine of the door sections closing and the resulting slam as the Hoth night was finally shut out made him feel brighter already. A cheer came up from the two pilots and their accompanying technicians, and the faces lit up even more as the door to the accommodation and rec blocks opened and in came the personnel from the second shift.

Ysabel was lingering still, snapping instructions to the alternate crew, while Luke and Wedge loitered restlessly, waiting for her to join them.

"Yzzi, come on!" Luke said. "Get out of here before you freeze up where you stand."
"I'm in rec time now," she retorted. "Can do what I want. Just wait…"

"No, I'm not waiting. Come on!" Skywalker strode towards her and grabbed her arm, and soon he was steering her towards the exit, oblivious to her protests.

The recreation unit's temperature setting was bearable, at least. It provided them with an insulated enclave of comparative warmth and comfort, where one could shed gloves, cap and thick padded jacket without shivering as a consequence.

No one spoke much over dinner. The techs were too tired by their work, while the pilots - despite their facades of good-natured flippancy - still reeled over the loss of so many comrades in Renegade Flight only a few days before. So the atmosphere inside seemed almost as chilly, in metaphorical terms at least, as the frigid night air which played host to the whirling snowstorms outside the base.

Ysabel was on her own for once. Keeping herself slightly apart from flight members and tech crew alike, she sat at a table in what seemed to be a glazed stupor. She still seemed to be fighting to think through her problems, despite the exhaustion which obviously dogged her. Her blonde head was supported by an arm, her chin cupped in one hand, and her face was gaunt and pale with fatigue.

It was only right, of course, to try and offer her some kind of moral support, so Devrin headed over to join her. He pulled back a chair and sat down opposite her.
It took a while for her to register his presence, and she gazed blankly at him for a few moments before smiling in vague greeting. Then her head sagged down into her hands once more, and she pushed back her hair, sighing in loud frustration.

"It's not going to do anyone much good if you push yourself too hard and end up having a breakdown," he reminded her.

"The whole base depends on us, Devrin," she replied. "Without those little rustbuckets our surveillance and defence systems will be zilch. Everyone's lives are at stake here. I can't exactly help worrying about that, can I?"

This defensive justification for her behaviour was hardly necessary. He knew how she was feeling, and he knew also that her sense of loyalty to her friends and to the Rebellion was making her introverted frustration even more intense. So he was quick to try and alleviate the problem as best he could. "Yzz, if you need some company tonight, I'd be happy to oblige…"

She gave him a warm smile in response, and reached across the table to take his hand. "I'm sorry, Devrin, but I'd rather not, okay? Maybe tomorrow?"

He felt it wasn't just weariness. She was acting kind of cagey, and inadvertent paranoia started up inside him. He didn't usually go out of this way to make this kind of offer, didn't normally make the first move with her for fear of receiving an indifferent response like this. And because he so rarely tried to dictate the terms, she was usually quite amenable to this kind of invitation. But not tonight, obviously…

"Yzzi, I know you're tired. I don't expect-"

"Yeah, I know. It's not that…"

So who is it, then? He felt like asking. Who's the lucky man? He knew inside that she would be otherwise engaged that night, and despite the knowledge that her antics were so predictable, it was hard not to let this rejection get to him. But just now, when he felt so grouchy, and depressed, he wondered why he had even tolerated this kind of uncertain relationship. Most of the time, after all, she'd get things just the way she wanted. Came pushing her way into his life whenever she felt like it, but when things got turned the other way around, she always played so damned hard to get.

She must have caught the accusing look, because she looked almost embarrassed. "It's not what you think, Devrin. I just need some time to work things out tonight. Me and Jace. We got things on our minds."

Lurking jealousy almost made him retaliate with a biting retort about the unfortunate Jace, but he curbed the desire to respond so unfairly; she probably meant things quite sincerely. A night with the chief technician, after all, could mean any one of numerous possibilities, ranging from exhaustive lovemaking to a pleasant night of idle conversation. With Jace looking as if he were about to collapse where he stood, and Ysabel looking only marginally better, the two close colleagues probably just needed some kind of support to fortify them for the arduous day ahead.

So Devrin shrugged, tactfully backing off from any further mention of the subject. He felt even more downcast now, because all he had left to look forward to at the end of a miserable day was a cold bed and a lonely night.

The shield doors opened, and the blazing reflected light from the snowfields came dazzling its way into the hangar. A new day was starting, and a new shift, and Devrin sighed, wondering how much more of this place he could take without losing his mind completely.

Woke up yesterday, and told myself that things couldn't get much worse. And yes, I was wrong, as usual. Woke up today, and realised that I'd completely underestimated the situation. Story of my life… He hurried past the tauntaun pen, and one of the beasts raised its head as he drew level with it. "Ma-a-a-w-w-w!!" it wailed, its dismal call reverberating from the smooth ice-hewn walls.

Yeah, baby, know exactly how you feel…

A voice hailed him loudly through the com. "Deck Officer, this is General Rieekan. Do you copy?"

"I'm reading you, General. What can I do for you?"

"Can you give me the current picture with the snowspeeders? We're due to start placing the sensors at ten hundred Standard. Over."

"I'm on my way to see the techs right now, sir. Over and out."

Techs. Damn techs. Or, to be more specific, one tech in particular. Aw, would you snap out of it. That woman ain't worth it. Come to think of it, no woman's worth it. Might be a cliché, but it's damn well true. And come on, you should have learned your lesson by now…

Yet, despite his grim desire to hang on to rationality, he couldn't help but feel slighted. He hadn't slept well the previous night; had been lying awake thinking things over, wondering how he could be so stupid as to put up with her the way he did, how he could lay himself open to such derision from his comrades because he'd just sit there and let her wander her off and do her own sweet thing and not even raise hell about it with her afterwards…

Ysabel and Jace were already hard at work on the snowspeeders, with more of their colleagues beginning to stir themselves into torpid activity.

The two seniors looked quite haggard; eyes hollow, faces bleak. And the grumpy hostility he'd been nursing all through the night and over breakfast was suddenly replaced by concern. "How long have you been out here?" he asked.

Ysabel sat back on her heels. "Came up about, oh, when was it…?"

"Five-thirty," muttered Jace. "She had an idea."

"Is it working?"

"Don't know yet," said Ysabel, rubbing her hand across her forehead in an effort to combat the weariness. "I'd say that we need another three hours minimum to work things through, then we got to have the test firing."

"Okay, so the flight's on hold and the boys'll have to take the tauntauns?"

"Reasonable conclusion," replied Ysabel.

"Fine. I'll let the general know."

Skywalker appeared later on, with some of Rogue Squad trailing along at his tail. "Heard there's no speeders," he commented.

"That's right, sir," Devrin told him, looking a little shamefaced.

"Ah well, not to worry," sighed Luke. He rubbed his hands together briskly, and ran his gaze quickly across the hangar, taking in the X-wings, and the speeders, and the tauntaun pen towards the rear of the cavern. "We'll manage okay with the tauntauns. There's enough people round here to take the patrols out. Wedge?"

"Yes?" Antilles looked warily at him.

"I want you to stay here. You and Janson and Dack and Zev. If you could maintain standby procedures, and maybe run through the X-wings with the techs sometime to make sure they're in good order."

Wedge looked incredulous. "You mean, no tauntauns?"

"No tauntauns," Luke repeated. "Come on, Wedge, d'you expect me to come out again later and look for you if you take another nosedive and end up in the snow?"
And an ear-to-ear grin manifested itself on Wedge Antilles' face. In fact, the young pilot looked markedly happier after that single piece of welcome information than he had since he'd first set foot here. "Lieutenant, I think you should make sure that Ysabel and her people don't kill themselves over those speeders," Skywalker continued.

"I'll do my best, sir," Devrin assured him.

"Good. Now, we'll need a half dozen tauntauns ready by ten hundred, and the sensors ready for assembly."

"We'll have everything waiting, sir."

"Thanks, Devrin." Skywalker smiled at him once more, then turned around and wandered off towards the Falcon.

"Not at all," replied Devrin, feeling pleasantly surprised by the squad leader's attitude. Huh, least one person's grateful round. Least there's once person making an effort to treat us like human beings for a change…

The organisation for the patrols went smoothly enough, but even so he felt profoundly relieved when he'd seen all six tauntauns dispatched from the base without mishap. Six tauntauns, carrying six riders. One of whom was the inimitable Captain Solo… Gone, for at least four hours, and hopefully five.

Devrin allowed himself to feel a sense of relief at that welcome news. He had reason to feel mildly elated, after all, with tauntaun numbers halved and no disgruntled Han Solo to deal with for most of the day. Problems three and four removed from his list of grievances simultaneously.

But that still left the snowspeeders…

When he arrived there to see how the techs were progressing, he found that their urgency had faded somewhat. While they still remained hard at work, their diligence seemed less obsessive. The grim unbroken silence they'd shared the day before had been replaced by a lighter mood, and the occasional good-natured exchange between comrades showed that morale must at last have lifted from the all-time low it had hit the previous day. He breathed an inaudible sigh of relief; the situation must surely be improving.

He paused beside the speeder that had been selected as the prototype model for the conversions. The techs noticed him, pausing very briefly from their work to acknowledge his arrival. The animosity they had shown towards him before was markedly absent this time around, and he was relieved to note that he received a flurry of greetings instead of a tirade of abuse.

They'd be even more thankful when they'd heard what he had to say to them. "The Commander left strict instructions that you weren't to work yourselves into the ground," Devrin informed them. "You've been busy all morning. Time for a break, I think."

Ysabel considered this suggestion, then suddenly smiled. "Yeah, I suppose we could manage that. Come on, everyone. Give it a rest just now."

So six tired techs and their deck officer trooped over to the hot drinks dispenser for some soup, gathering around in an amicable huddle as they took their refreshments.
"You look dead beat, Ysabel," commented Devrin, his voice full of worried sincerity. "You doing okay?"

"Reckon I'll last a while longer," she replied, with unexpected vitality on her face. "Got the adrenaline on overdrive just now. Look, Devrin, about last night…"

Her tone of voice dropped, becoming softer, almost apologetic, and similar sentiments were reflected quite clearly on her face. But he didn't allow any change of expression as he responded to this reminder of the previous night's rebuff.

"Yeah?" His reply was spoken with deliberately casual disinterest.

She took a step nearer, sidling up close, though it seemed almost ridiculous, to be making any attempt at expressing positive body language through the thick padding of the cold weather clothing. "Maybe I'd like to take you up on it tonight?" She looked up at him, brightly, waiting for his response.

He shrugged in take-it-or-leave-it disdain, trying to play her at her own game and probably failing miserably. "Sure."

Ysabel gave a satisfied nod. "Good. Tonight's a definite arrangement then. I won't forget." And she swallowed back the rest of her soup and sauntered off to the waiting snowspeeder.

It wasn't just the soup that was lifting his spirits now, giving him a feeling of warmth inside that had been completely absent before. Instead it was the knowledge that perhaps something good could be found, even here - in the midst of the cold, and the stress and the worry of getting this base up and running.

He strolled down towards the X-wings and stared out across the glittering white plains of the snowfields, sighing in profound appreciation as a sudden sense of almost breathtaking optimism took hold of him, banishing the last shadows of desolation which had lingered in his heart. Things'll settle down here, and we'll soon get the procedures running smoothly, and then maybe things'll start to look more hopeful. For us, as well as for the Rebellion…

"How's it going?"

The casual query shook him from his reverie, making Devrin start in surprise. He found Wedge Antilles standing beside him, wearing full flying-gear now and with his dark-grey helmet jammed securely on his head to keep the warmth in. Despite the sub-zero temperatures, the young pilot seemed quite well-disposed towards the world, a far cry from the sullen individual who'd glowered at everyone unfortunate enough to encounter him the day before.

"So so," replied Devrin, speaking loudly so his voice would be audible through the heavy weight of the helmet. "You on standby?"

Wedge nodded. "That's right. On call to test the snowspeeder, too. I hear they've nearly cracked it?"

"Yeah, well, nearly's still a long way to go, remember."

There was a quiet laugh from Wedge. "That's true. Least everything else is sorting itself out, though."

"Suppose so." Devrin sighed, and surveyed the ice fields. "You know, when the sun comes out this place is kind of beautiful. It makes you feel good, like things could actually work out fine once we get ourselves organised."

Antilles grinned, then shook his head in sage disagreement. "Famous last words, Deck Officer. Famous last words. Don't forget: the day you start feeling good is the day things start going wrong."

Devrin was about to reply, but when he turned to query those cautionary words, he found that his companion had already gone, trudging dutifully over to the vicinity of his snubfighter. And, as Devrin watched the orange-suited figure depart, he sighed, unwilling to admit that the youth's candid observation would quite probably turn out to be correct.

But what the hell? So what if things screw up tomorrow? Tomorrow's another day. And, well, maybe just now I'm pleased with what I've got. Take each day as it comes, that's the answer. Deal with the problems as they happen, and then we'll see… "Command Centre to Deck Officer. Command Centre to Deck Officer. Do you copy?"

Here we go again. He smiled to himself, realising that the peaceful interlude he'd just enjoyed was nearly at an end. But when he lifted the com-unit and recited the inevitable incantation, his voice was unusually cordial: "Command Centre, this is the Deck Officer. How can I help you?"