“It’s not you Rex...it’s just...I just need more time…” Sabine scolded the clone then quickly withdrew into herself as she crossed her arms in front of her. She dropped her gaze toward the ships yoke as she pushed hard against the back of the pilot’s seat, “...it’s like Kanan all over again….”
Rex knew it wasn’t the time to interject fully and rotated his co-pilot’s seat back to its forward-facing view, folding his hands in his lap as he stared through the ship’s canopy. He was anxious to get back to Lothal but felt the same pangs the Mandalorian did and understood without another word spoken the parallel she had referenced. “...we will always be here for each other Sabine, always know that…”
She breathed a hearty sigh, choking back the sorrow yet again that would take her voice from her, “...don’t make promises like that Rex. Kanan, Ezra...Ani….they all made them too..”
“I know kid, I know…” There was nothing else he could say though he wished there were far more. ‘Sometimes knowing what not to say is better than saying the wrong thing at all.’ He could hear Anakin’s words recite themselves through time within his memory. So many times, he had been within earshot of the General and his padawan, soaking in all that he was supposed to have never heard, ordered to forget, or programmed to. It never would have mattered to the stoic Jedi Knight in any case, and Rex knew that. The current matter only required his presence, and sometimes that was all that was truly needed.
CZ monitored the exchange from a suitable distance in the rear of the cockpit as the Morai sped through hyperspace for home, pliantly tinkering with various knobs and switches that had been manually disabled. Asserting that the two would remain where they were for a time, he silently extricated himself from the cockpit and covered the distance to the steps through the main cabin. He rotated his head one hundred eighty degrees to confirm his assessment before quickly descending the steps and hovering out into the cargo bay, taking note of the silent slumber of the Thebasken in the blue pod. CZ could hear the sobs of silent weeping and took his time to approach the lamenting Togruta, turning his head to see her’s lying on the delicately wrapped body that remained within the med bay alcove.
“I don’t mean to intrude Miss Tano….” CZ said quietly as he hovered in closer to her silently.
“You’re never intruding CZ…” Ahsoka said lifting her head slowly, along with her arms to wipe the tears out of her deep blue eyes before she turned to him fully, “what is it?”
“Well, a message to be frank, confided in me by Miss Ani before we had reached Ciutric.” CZ was blunt. Quiet with his hushed tones, but blunt. “It is meant only for you.”
“She said that?” Ahsoka turned back toward the wrapped body, the tears streaming freely.
“Quite emphatically.” CZ continued in his own version of a whisper.
“Well, I suppose no time like the present.” Ahsoka said, wiping the tears from her cheek once again.
“I would agree.” CZ stated, rotating his torso to expose a small holoprojector. The mechanisms within whirred to life as Kowani knelt down into view. Ahsoka was assailed immediately by the wellspring of emotion once again as it tore a new seam through the sorrow she had already shed.
“I would not have sought to present this….so soon, but its contents are rather important and may be quite relevant in the very near future.” CZ said lightly, making sure to convey the importance of his own understanding without interrupting the gravity of the image nor the message itself.
“Ahsoka, if you’re seeing this...well, you know the cliché. Don’t shed a tear for me, please. You have given me what I had always lacked, and until recently, what I never thought existed. So many truths and not enough time to delve into all of them I suppose just the ones that we needed to.” Kowani began, her face pulled tight into an almost forced smile, Ahsoka noting the depth of her message, the traits and tells within the woman’s facial expressions more than enough to confide in her the importance of what was to come. “You gave me a family, one I felt, at times, that I didn’t deserve. But a family, nonetheless. It is to that family that I refer now, Sabine in particular. I did what you told me through those months after Mustafar, and your suspicions were right, although she is too stubborn to see. The Force calls to her, surrounds her and embraces her. Finite tendrils and threads of its ebbing flow course and wind around her like a tempest at times or calm current at others. The important thing to note is that it is always present, and it is always moving. She is a Mandalorian, that works against her, as you well know, and although she can sense the Force around her it is interpreted in the only way she knows. Aggressiveness, conflict, her pristine stubbornness...they are all factors that will work against her without the means to break through walls both self-imposed and inherited. I have tried to guide her toward that understanding but we always seem to fall short.”
The tears in Ahsoka’s eyes began to dry themselves as she smiled through her pride, the admissions through the projected message welling deep within her chest, a warming wave of humbleness. As if the woman in the feed felt the same sensations, she had paused herself to clear her throat, or to reset the device that warbled her voice attached to it, Ahsoka was unsure. The woman’s eyes were somewhat hazy, a milky white film of sorts distorting the black pupils beneath it somewhat. Kowani continued once again, drawing Ahsoka’s complete attention.
“You know the dangers of which I speak and why I wouldn’t push any harder than I have. I’ve been around you long enough to understand the powers of the Dark despite perceiving the Force through a balance. She cannot hope to consider that if the Dark is drawn to her so naturally...and why she must not go to Mandalore.”
“Pause CZ.” Ahsoka said with a whisper, the droid acquiescing immediately, ‘she is prone to confiding in her anger before anything else, that is without question….but Mandalore?’ She was more than intrigued at the prominent mention of the people she herself had so closely fought beside in the past. “Continue CZ.”
“I have seen it Ahsoka. Repeated visions of Imperial bombardment meant to annihilate and nothing more. It is unlike the recordings you had provided, or that Hera made us watch concerning Imperial protocols. These visions, Ahsoka, disregard occupation altogether. The bombardments are not all….they will methodically hunt the wounded and leave not a trace of the people to carry on family lines. That is what is at stake. This brings me to my current thoughts, and why I seek out Ciutric. Much like Nara had beseeched Zannah’s spirit, Bane has done the same with me. Through him I will have a choice….I only hope that you can understand whatever that choice might be.” Kowani finished with her patented smile, the face stretching into the expressions Ahsoka knew so well. The face in the image moved toward her quickly then the image faded completely, CZ’s small projector fading to black with it as its whirring mechanism wound to complete silence.
Ahsoka lifted a finger and thumb to her chin in thought, working through the message through her mind over and over. ‘She had obviously felt it too, saw it more to the point.’ The thought was unavoidable while concentrating on the source. It was one thing for them both to sense the Force reaching out toward Sabine, but another matter entirely for the Mirialan to utilize her gift and actually see it. Ahsoka knew she would need to proceed with caution, noting her own recent lapses in control, but Kowani had proven that her days of passive instruction were behind her. She must reach out to Sabine and find a way to guide her forward. Because there was no one else. “CZ can you relay a message to this ships current OS please, direct, nonverbal.”
“Of course, Miss Tano…” CZ stated, “...her name is Chams. What is the message?”
“Under no circumstances is this ship to approach the Mandalore system.” Ahsoka said with a measure of authority. Inserting her own will into the words that would never be conveyed through digital means.
“Understood.” CZ confided.
✦
“The vessels termination is settled Nara. It is meant to rendezvous within the Chorlian Sector, Zygerrian system specifically, to deliver its payload. I did not alter the destination.” N’dali said through the warbling vocater of the nearest 11-3k Viper droid, the tones too high pitched for Nara’s ears as she clapped hands over them, “apologies, these were not intended for personal communications. I will work to rectify the issue.” She continued, reeling in the pitch substantially but losing some range through hard consonant iteration.
“We are definitely going to have to find that Thrumble for you,” Nara said politely, the ringing in her ears subsiding for the moment as she turned from one of the pods toward the aggressive looking droid, “but this is better than echoing sentiments through the hangar PA.”
“It would come with a very high element of appreciation if we could do that sooner rather than later.” N’dali responded, the top portion of the Viper’s head swiveling one hundred eighty degrees toward the magnetic shielding of the hangar bay, “we will be exiting hyperspace shortly, where precisely on Ambria should I guide us?”
Nara was quick with the answer as she supplied the coordinates, “33.543, 9.967.”
“That is incredibly precise.” N’dali whirled the bug like head back to face the Mirialan.
“Home should be.” Nara replied, smiling lightly before turning her attention back to the young Nautolon female within the pod beneath her open palm, the girls many slim head tails splayed widely, framing her head within the liquid suspension.
Nara didn’t move a muscle as the ship lurched briefly, the entirety of her focus on the young woman within the pod. She could sense the Nautolons subconscious through such close proximity, her mind dreaming away through the false memories Aborah had given her. Nara could see images of the girl’s aquatic home, vast stalks of deep green and purple plants wavering in between shimmering fragments of glittering sunlight as it penetrated the depths of a peaceful, tranquil sea. Colorful fish, those boasting orange and yellow stripes over cream mingled with angelic Coada, their own fins wavering with blues and purples as they danced through the stalks of vegetation as if swaying to a silent melody only they could hear. Nara opened her eyes, deciding without progressing any further, that this Nautolon would be one of the first she would awaken.
“Nara..” N’dali said quietly, Nara appreciative of the Thebaskens efforts with the obnoxious vocater turned to face the droid once again. “We are here.”
Nara looked out through the enormous hangar bay door, the blue lining denoting the magnetic shielding gone from its edges. Remaining droids and pods alike silently floated through the opening into the wash of bright light beyond. She lowered her hands to her sides, moving with increasing speed toward the opening, letting the natural progression of Ambria’s sun return her vision to her. The home she had left in ruins, war torn and battered, crumbling, and dying through its purge, had become something else entirely in the brief time she had been away. As her eyes shifted to the brightness from the depths of the vast hangar, her ears tingled with the sounds that had greeted her when she had first arrived so long ago. She rubbed at her ears vigorously, making sure the simple chirp of a distant bird wasn’t an after effect of the high-pitched warble. An answering call, equally distant, verified she wasn’t dreaming.
N’dali had canted the vessel slightly to allow for a simple egress from the massive ship, Nara simply stepped from the cold unforgiving durasteel flooring out onto the soft ground of Ambria’s surface. What were dried beds of cracked and baked mud were small streams of rushing water, fed from numerous falls on the Southern cliffs. Ankle high grasses of light green and yellow lining each edge of the meandering streams, drinking in the life-giving fluids as they rebuilt their own life sustaining root networks, the results of which were already manifest in the budding of new grasses and saplings that had lay dormant for decades if not longer. Bulbous tubers sat at ground level, spherical bulges of deep purple and blue that promised larger than life displays of radiant color upon maturity.
Nara’s pace increased, from a slow disbelief into an accepting run, shooting out beyond the procession of droids and pods. Each footfall sinking slightly into fertile soils, kicking at tiny orange wildflowers no larger than her fingernail and promoting the deep scents of hearty, rich, and fecund terra which she breathed in deeply. She felt like she was upon Eerie’s strong back again, riding faster than a 74-Z through the promises of abundancy and freedom, the sounds which had pierced the ringing in her ears and rushed in with the force of her memory. It wasn’t just one or two avians but innumerable chirps, warbles, and calls as Nara saw the movement of flight just over the top of Ambria’s new growth, through flashes of vibrant color as plumage reflected the bright sunlight from above.
The thunder of the Star Destroyer’s engaged repulsors tore through the tranquility she had immediately immersed herself in as she dived to her knees at the closest streams edge, the waters of which already uncovering pebbles that had been buried for centuries under protective layers of baked muds and silt. She didn’t even bother turning to assure herself the vessel was indeed leaving as she cupped both hands into the clear water and greedily brought it to her lips. Hair that had been disheveled flowed with the pressures of forced air in long tangled strands beyond her face, the thunder of the departing vessel already beginning to fade as the bird calls returned once again from their cautious silence.
Nara looked beyond the cup of her hands, water sluicing through the gaps in her fingers to see that she was not alone. A small, remarkably familiar head, pushed through the light green and yellow grasses on the opposing bank, startled only briefly when its eyes caught hers. The tiny muzzle bristled slightly as its eyes focused on her, its nose pulling up as it breathed in her scent. Nara could see the pupils dilate somewhat, through surprise, or recognition, she did not know, but was quickly at ease as the tiny muzzle relaxed and the adolescent Thumper dipped its mouth in to drink. She watched with amusement as the grasses behind the juvenile waved with the gentle swooshes of an incredibly happy tail. His head was no bigger than hers, Nara wagered as the Thumper pulled it from the water, drips emanating from streams over its lips and black nose. The animal quickly tilted its head to the left, Nara following course with her gaze as she remained unmoving. The grasses beside the small mammal began to stir as another familiar head emerged, its small mouth open wide in a dramatic yawn that exposed fangs from both jaws and rows of small but sharp teeth. The cat extended his own tongue out into the water as it bobbed its head downward and drank from the waters as well.
‘Home.’ Nara thought to herself, lifting her head as she pushed herself up to her feet, the pair on the opposing bank only lifting their own heads in curiosity before diving back in for more. She had avoided looking centrally over the plains, the shadow of wreckage was hard to confront, but forced herself to see, nonetheless. The Star Destroyer that had plummeted to its own incendiary demise protruded prominently from what had been Lake Naath, its super structure twisted and mangled, but laced with greenery from the ground, through various vacancies of outward panels to the point of its portside Ion engine as she viewed it from the backside.
“Kind of an eyesore.” N’dali spoke through the droid Nara hadn’t even heard approach, the speech normalized significantly. Nara swiveled her gaze quickly to eye the departing Star Destroyer as it pushed through a light cloud cover in near silence. It appeared again as a distant muted gray before blending in completely with the sky above. She turned back to survey the wreckage, “for the time being perhaps, but it is an opportunity to start anew.”
“I am sure you are not wrong Nara, but it is only you and I for now. There is little we can do beyond providing care.” N’dali said, the droid’s head silently spanning the plains before them both.
“Ambria will provide N’dali, so long as we provide for Ambria. I will take the Nautolon first. We will then proceed with another five.” Nara responded, remaining on topic with a shared focus.
“Training will take years Nara…”
“I’ve no intention to train N’dali, that is not why we are here. I will show them the truth and nothing more. What they decide to do with it will be their choice alone.” Nara smiled as she turned her head to the highest point of the wreckage once again, “it is all we can do for them.”
The droid swiveled its head audibly, Nara turning back quickly toward N’dali, sensing the shift in focus and the whirring of the droid’s servos, “what is it?”
“Incoming transmission. Small vessel, possibly a shuttle, just outside Ambrian space.” N’dali said quickly. Nara tensed immediately, “I thought we were scrambled in transit N’dali?” The question was almost lethal as it shot from her mouth.
“We were Nara, this isn’t Imperial. It is a simple message asking for you…” N’dali conveyed, the droids top side antennae protruding somewhat.
“Relay it I suppose…” Nara was skeptical at best, already working within the Force to confound and conceal.
The droids holoprojector whirred to life within its torso, casting a faint blue image of a mustached clone that could have been Rex. “Greetings!” The man began excitedly, his voice Rex’s for all Nara could decipher, “If Rex was right, then you are Nara.”
“I am.” Nara said hesitantly.
“Then we are in the right place!” The clone responded, “you can call me Tank.” He continued with a boisterous enthusiasm.
“We?” Nara didn’t miss the pronoun.
“If you’ve need for farmers, engineers, steel workers, fabricators, builders, and doctors...and aren’t opposed to company, then yes, we.” Tank replied earnestly, the smile across his face the same Rex would have worn.
N’dali turned the top side photoreceptor toward Nara who had already turned to face her. “Rex sent you?” Nara asked.
“Sent isn’t quite the right way to phrase it...let me see...it was something more along the lines of, ‘I know a very special Mirialan that could use as much help as your willing to provide under the condition that you stand down,’” Tank responded, “conditions we have all accepted I might add.” The man in the image paused for a moment, the smile evaporating into a look of seriousness, “On a personal note, it would be an honor to lay down blasters in favor of plowshares for once. Create instead of destroy if you know what I mean.”
Nara shrugged slightly toward N’dali photoreceptor, “sending coordinates.” She said turning a newly formed smile into the image of the old clone. The man winked through his affirmative nod as the transmission ended. Nara casting a scanning view out over the plains once again, birds of all size fluttering and soaring amidst the bellowing moans and roars of native mammals. “It is a brave new world, isn’t it N’dali.”
“Nothing but Nara, nothing but.” N’dali warbled, propelling herself through the droid shell out over to the transmitted coordinates.
✦
“This isn’t going to be easy.” Rex whispered to Ahsoka as the Morai spun on it maneuvering jets to come to a gentle landing on Capital City’s port tarmac adjacent Hera’s own Ghost.
“It never is Rex, it never is.” Ahsoka replied somberly as she tasked the anti grav sled to move Kowani’s body down the aft ramp toward a conglomeration of familiar faces. Rex remained at her side as Zeb took the sled silently from Ahsoka’s control, Sabine, her face turned toward her shuffling feet, following them both at a slow-paced distance. Hera watched her every move as she reached the edge of the ramp and continued shuffling in the opposing direction, distancing herself further from the group that loaded the sled onto the back of a hover truck, each of them filing in the spacious bed on either side of the conveyance that would take them to the city’s medical center.
Hera remained behind, unsure who needed her most, despite the sleeping child in a bundle strapped across her chest. As he followed Sabine’s path toward the motor pool and watched the Mandalorian straddle her own AvA, Ahsoka retraced her steps to come up beside her, “she needs space right now, time with her own thoughts.”
“I think of all we’ve been through over the years Ahsoka, how it has affected each of us, but I can’t help wonder if everything has affected Sabine more than anyone else.” Hera said, her eyes on the woman as she fired up the bike and pulled slowly from the garage, “she cares more about people than anyone else I’ve ever known.” She continued, watching as the Mandalorian angled the bike for the thoroughfare that would take her toward the old comms tower far off in the distance.
“That is why I must get through to her Hera….I have no choice anymore.” Ahsoka said, her own gaze focused on the departing woman.
Hera turned slightly, cuddling the soft cries of the baby in front of her, “you mean to train her, don’t you…” There was no question within, only a statement that had been a long time coming.
“I do.” Ahsoka answered anyway, listening as the hover truck chugged away, leaving without them both.
Hera turned to face Ahsoka fully, the baby suckling on the tip of his mother’s finger, “we will keep Ani secure of course but I would like to know what you would like to do, a service perhaps?”
Ahsoka almost laughed, sure that Kowani would have done the same, “if by service you mean party, then yes. The louder the music the better….” She responded, letting a slight chuckle escape despite the containing efforts.
Hera couldn’t help herself either, giggling through her own fond memories of the clamor and head pounding clatter the Mirialan would listen to, Jacen himself smiling broadly as he too let forth an adorable chuckle that only fueled both Hera and Ahsoka further. ‘It feels good to laugh.’ Ahsoka told herself. ‘Very good.’
“I almost forgot!” Hera blurted, raising a hand to her forehead, “...he didn’t want to intrude and is waiting in high orbit for you.”
Ahsoka finished with her chuckle before the confusing message registered, “He? Who?”
“He said his name was...what was it...Huyang.” Hera responded, any form of laughter only carried on by Jacen as Hera stole the look of shock from Ahsoka’s face. The Togruta froze on the spot right in front of her, Hera bordering on concern that the woman had stopped breathing, “this is not good news?” She asked lightly, Jacen gurgling with his tongue pressed between his tiny lips. Lothal’s sun pierced through the dense cloud cover Ahsoka hadn’t even noticed, glimmering its reflected light off the top most beacon on the old comms tower kilometers away, a sudden flare of brilliant radiance that was snatched up as quickly as it had appeared. “It is very good news Hera!” Ahsoka almost shouted into the air, startling Jacen who only laughed hard through the outburst. “Very good news indeed.” She finished with a smile stretching her features wide.
“I’ll see to the others, let you to your business...I’ve got to get him in for a nap anyway or we’ll both be up all night again..” Hera smiled as she turned to leave.
“Thank you Hera, thank you!” Ahsoka said over her shoulder, assuring the Twi’lek that the Togruta was smiling as well.
✦
Sabine was torn as she slowed the bike before the doorway, eyeing the lift that would take her to her roost. She couldn’t shed the tears she had willed through the vacuum of torment that arrested her soul, emotions she didn’t want to surface being the only ones that would answer any call. Anger suffused further anger and would only rile up a need for vengeance, she knew, but shooting something felt right at the moment as she spun her legs off the AvA and walked briskly toward the lift doors of the comms tower. Sabine could still hear Kowani’s voice in her thoughts, cryptic nuances that would guide her toward the one thing she couldn’t see or feel. “What if I don’t want the Force?” She said aloud as she entered the lift and pounded the uppermost key on the access pad. “What if the Force doesn’t want me?”
The anger began to subside but only to manifest in irrational fear, ‘just something else to lose…’ She thought in reply, knowing the sentiment was juvenile but unable to distance herself from it. ‘Maybe it’s best just to remain alone..’ Again, the thoughts were irrational and nonsensical, something she knew would be better fit a ten-year-old because she knew better, didn’t she? Did Kanan not instill these sentiments as well, Ezra? The rationalization of irrational thoughts only forced her to grunt through clenched teeth as the lift doors opened to the panoramic view of expansive prairies surrounding Capital City’s southern and eastern borders, Sabine taking a moment to bask in the flashes of mid-day sun that pierced through the thick clouds of rain. She gripped the railing in front of her firmly as she reeled back and let forth a tremendous shout, startling a black bird that had begun building a nest just above the doorway to her left. It cawed and shrilled back its own response to her shout as it took to wing and shot from its perch, leaving Sabine to the silence of her choice, only a slight breeze whisking at the tear that fell, chilling her cheek beneath it.
Sabine rubbed the wetness away and reached a hand for the door’s activator, the hiss almost silent as daylight spilled into the large circular room atop the comms tower, highlighting the only change within that had occurred in her absence. There, placed carefully upon the floor three steps inside the doorway were Cordon’s effects. An open tray displaying the entirety of his Beskar armor set upon a crate that would have been Kowani’s to proudly wear at the behest of the Wren family itself. The gleaming Cuirass doubled up with back and breastplate, shown through stabbing rays of a determined sun, articles that would have saved the woman from the initial plunge of the magenta blade. A set of oversized pauldrons sat to either side as a magnificence of tears welled within Sabine’s eyes, articles that would have prevented the fatal gash and wound through the right side of her torso. The rest stood out only because it was assembled together in ceremonial arrangement, Sabine noting then that the armor itself was not Cordon’s, but his father’s, her uncle’s, which had significantly more meaning. ‘He had intent to give it to her well ahead of his own death…’ Sabine knew the truth as she fell to her knees in the pervasive silence, broken only by the distant, but distinct, cry of a tremendous wolf. It’s howls providing a certain measure of calm as she felt her heartbeat slow itself and an inner peace overtake the rage and fury she had warranted through a dramatic exhale only to be followed by a nurturing inhale of renewed ownership of the battle she waged within. She knew precisely what it was she needed to do as she rose to her feet and angled directly for her Boabab airbrush.