Across the Stars

Chapter One


Anna could now hardly remember her own mother, the memory had faded over the past decade and now her fondest childhood memories were nothing more than a whisper of happier times. She remembered her mother's kindness, her smile and her talent for making even the worst of rations taste decent. In rare instances that Anna caught a glimpse of herself, she only saw her mother staring back at her… though Anna knew not all of her features were from her mother. Even as child Anna came to know better than to ask questions about her father, as her mother seemed to get sharp and frustrated at the mere question of who Anna's father was. But at night, Anna could hear her mother call him or she would catch her mother looking up at the night sky in tears. Whoever he was, he meant a great deal to her mother as far as a young Anna could tell.

But now she wasn't that young girl who idolised her mother, Anna was now close to being eighteen if her maths was correct and she had not seen her mother since she was separated from her at aged ten when the Military base they were living at came under fire from the first order. Anna was whisked away by some stranger, whose name she never found out and put on an escape ship. By all accounts, Anna thought that someone would come for her, that she had not been so simply abandoned on a ship with a bunch of strangers.

That day never came, she had never seen anyone from home since. When the chaos died down, Anna was simply left on Coruscant by herself. There was no one she knew, no friends or family to take her in. So she took to living on the streets, the benefit of having a city that was so large and so vibrant with so many travellers was that she certainly wasn't the only child who had been separated in the midst of the First Order's regime.

By the time that Anna was twelve, she has coordinated a group of children who were like herself. The group wasn't the most law abiding, they stole money in an effort to feed the growing group. Anna had housed almost fifty children by the time she was fourteen, and every day more strays appeared needing food, shelter and clothing. So now nearly being eighteen, that number had almost spiralled out of control due to the relentless sieges and battles of the First Order picking off families leaving vulnerable children behind. Their group turned Gang was now outlawed by the First Order, who punished thieves severely if they were ever caught. The slow easy fat cats who were dumb enough to be robbed in the first place had not taken kindly to being routinely picked clean by clever hands and fast minds.

Anna knew she would soon have to leave the group, at eighteen she would be able to go find a job on a ship and start on the journey to find her mother. But that was a few months away yet, for now she had mouths to feed and rumour had it that the Supreme Leader was visiting… which meant easy pickings as people rarely paid attention to the surrounding when Kylo Ren was around.

Her plan never fails, if there was an event such as the Supreme Leader visiting she would simply give into her own personal conflicting vanity and change from her usual ragged appearance to one of the common ladies in the crowd. The usual posh ones, who would turn their nose up at Anna's kind. Over the years Anna knew she was beautiful, she heard it many times from the younglings who came into her care… children don't tend to lie about those sort of things. So Anna one day wanted to be part of the play, to dress up and distract the men with the easy pockets and so she did. Since then, she used her beauty to feed the younger ones.


The day arrived when Kylo Ren was due to arrive, stormtroopers and the rest of the military flooded the streets to rid the undesirables surrounding the Senate. They didn't want any undesirables seen or heard while the Supreme leader was in the city to discuss treaties, they wanted the streets filled with supporters and those who were in awe of the youngest sith lord.

But Anna had no care for politics, they never cared about her or the others on the street. This Kylo Ren was no different, he was just an evil man with the galaxy at his feet.

Anna was in awe of Kylo Ren's ship, that was a magnificent machine that she could honestly praise. Standing on the base of a statue of some sith who had been long since dead Anna was able to see over the crowd in front of her and see this infamous Kylo Ren for herself.

To Anna, he looked like someone who had been angry his entire life. Not an ounce of kindness or empathy to be seen, and that scar on the right side of his face just made him look more gruesome. But she did admit, that even though there was now faint silver in his hairline that Kylo Ren was indeed a handsome man, intimidating but certainly not ugly.

She saw the various children gently making their way through the crowds, the sneaky little devils would be eating quite well for the next few weeks if they pulled it off. But something seemed off, once Anna caught the eyes of another human in the crowd. This man was dark in complexion and he looked nervous, he couldn't help but look back and forward at what Anna thought was her… and Kylo Ren. But at that moment, she noticed a slot was cut out on the inside of the statue.

Anna peered inside, her instincts were telling her to run that this meant certain harm to her and the children that followed her today. It was a bomb and it was due to blow, Anna froze this was an assassination attempt that she had just stumbled into. She looked back at the dark-skinned man, who had the most apologetic face on him.

A blast from Kylo's ship took Anna by surprise, of course, this wasn't just a simple single bomb. This was the supreme leader, bombs would be undoubtedly littered everywhere. Shards of metal sent the crowd screaming as the beautiful ship was nothing more than scrap metal now.

Anna leapt from the statue spotting some of her children in the crowd, they would be no match for the panicked crowd. She managed to grab one before he came second best to someone three times his size, but at the same time in amidst the panic and the screams the bomb from the statue went off… blowing only one of the legs off tipping the statue… it was going to fall directly on them and there was nothing she could do. The panicked crowd had them trapped…

The statue fell, the screams intensified and Anna fell cradled the youngster. Closing her eyes, while putting her hand up to the statue praying that it was going to miss them.

Images of her mother flooded her mind, childhood memories Anna thought were long gone. She saw her mothers face, and a moment long ago in a forest that her mother told her that if she ever needed help… to look into her heart and let the warmth take hold. Anna just did that, she felt warm as she clutched the child with one arm and shielded him with the other.

Perhaps in death, that Anna would finally be reunited with her mother.


Not a perfect writer, i tend to babble a bit.

Nor am i a total Star Wars know it all, so if anything is wrong its because i assumed it/made it up on the spot.

Happy Reading!