Disclaimer: I don't own Star Wars Rebels that goes to Disney, Lucasfilm and Dave Filoni.
"Well, what have you found?" Pryce told an Imperial officer who walked over to her as they stood around the burning wreckage of the fuel depot.
"Com-scans indicate a stolen gunship escaped the blast, however, security recordings clearly show that the Jedi Kanan Jarrus has perished," the Imperial officer reported.
"The Jedi is dead," Pryce said with disbelief and shock, "Are you certain?"
"Yes, ma'am, but the fuel depot…" the Imperial officer began.
"Is not my concern at the moment," she said, interrupting him as she walked away.
"But, ma'am, with the loss of the fuel depot, production lines for the TIE defender will halt," the Imperial officer told her as he followed her.
"Who knows this, besides you and me, Lieutenant?" She asked him.
"At the moment, no one, but it won't be long before Imperial command realizes what happened," he told her, "What are we to do?"
"We throw a parade to celebrate this victory," she answered before walking away from the wreckage.
Back at the rebel camp outside the cave dwelling, Zeb walked towards the Imperial patrol transport with Chopper as it began to land near them. As the cockpit opened up Sabine removed the TIE pilot helmet she was wearing and yelled as she threw it at the ground with anger.
"Sabine? What's wrong?" Zeb asked her as she walked past him, not even answering him, "Sabine!" He then turned back around to the ship and saw Ezra and Hera walking out of the ship with Hera walking away from the Mandalorian as Chopper rolled over to Hera as Ezra walked away from her and walked over Zeb, "All right, Ezra, what's going on?"
"Kanan's gone," she answered.
"What do you mean, gone? Like captured?" He asked her.
"No! He's dead," she answered, as he embraced her in a hug as Chopper rolled over to Hera, who was staring at the sunset in the distance and grabbed her hand with his hand as she clenched her fist, as tears fell down from her eyes to her face.
"The insurgency on Lothal is over," an Imperial news anchor reported on the radio near the cave on the cliff dwelling with Jai, Ryder and Mart and rebel officer standing behind the radio as Zeb, Hera, Chopper and the twins walking towards them, "After a brazen attack on Capital City, the rebels have been crushed. Their leadership, defeated. To honor the Imperial heroes that valiantly fought to save you from these extremists, all citizens are required to attend a celebration and parade in Capital City. A new day for Lothal has begun."
"Turn it off," Sabine ordered, and with that, Mart switched the radio off.
"We have to contact rebel command. We need reinforcements," Ryder said as he approached Ezra.
"Well, as far as Yavin is concerned, this fight is over," Ezra argued, "Mon Mothma won't commit more forces to Lothal, not after this."
"General Syndulla," Ryder said to Hera and they all turned to him, "Hera, what do you think?" Hera didn't respond, only walked past them into the cave.
"She just needs time," Ezra told him.
"Well, we don't have time. We need a plan," Ryder stated.
"Well, I have a plan," Sabine spoke up, "The Empire's gonna have a parade? Good. I'm gonna go add some fireworks to their celebration."
"Count me in," Zeb told her as he walked with her out of the cliff dwelling.
"Well, what should we do?" Jai asked Ezra before she walked off, exiting the cliff dwelling as well.
"There's nothing we can do," Ryder told him, "It's over."
Ezra stood on a rock with her hair dyed back to navy blue and the top of her head red as she was wearing her armor after getting out of the TIE pilot uniform with her helmet to her side as she watched Zeb and Sabine speed off in speeder bikes before sitting down and curled her arms to her knees as she placed her helmet next to her.
"You didn't prepare me for this, Kanan," she muttered to herself, "What do I do now?" She then heard an animal snarling and turned to her side to see a loth-wolf snarling at her before she stood up as she grabbed her helmet and placed it to her side as she turned to face the wolf, "I guess you know about Kanan too, then?"
"You," the wolf said before barking as she backed away from the wolf in fear.
"Whoa! What's wrong?" She asked the wolf as she continued to back away, "There was nothing I could do!" The wolf then barked again, causing her to fall on her back on the ground as she let go of her helmet as it fell to the ground next to her as she crawled backwards as she grabbed her helmet, "I don't know what you want!" Two other Loth-wolves then appeared on opposite sides of one another, snarling as they approached her, causing her to place her helmet over her head as she began to run away with the wolves running after her and moments later, she began to get tired as she slid to a stop as the wolves ran past her and she soon looked around to see that the wolves have vanished while one hid between wheat in the wheatfield around her, growling quietly as she saw two of the wolves staring at her with the corner of her eye, snarling before she went to run away with the wolves knocking her to the ground on her stomach as she fell unconscious with the white Loth-wolf standing at her feet.
"So you lost Hera Syndulla, yet you hold a parade," a hologram of Thrawn told Pryce with confusion in her office at the Imperial complex with Rukh standing near the holo-communicator on Pryce's desk as Pryce turned to him after staring out the window, "Explain yourself, Governor Pryce."
"A celebration of our victory over the rebels, Grand Admiral," she answered as she approached him, "As for General Syndulla, I have something better."
"Ah, it's true then," he said as she showed him the lightsaber that belonged to Kanan, "But the Jedi's death came at a cost, did it not?" He went on, causing her expression to change to one that of shock and disbelief as he knew that the fuel depot was destroyed, "Did you really believe that holding a parade would hide the fact that you destroyed our entire fuel supply? In defeating Kanan Jarrus, you have accomplished what the rebels failed to, and given them a victory. The operation Lothal, my TIE defender project, has been compromised."
"Uh, Grand Admiral, I…" Pryce began with fear.
"I will deal with you when I return, Governor," Thrawn told her, "With their leader gone, the remaining rebels will flounder, the Mandalorian Jedi especially." Thrawn then turned to his assassin, "Use that against them, Rukh. Expect them to strike out recklessly. And when they do, eliminate them." With that the holo-communicator switched off with Rukh smirking as he left the room.
Hera, who got out of the Imperial prisoner clothes she was wearing and was now wearing her regular clothes as she walked towards the back of the cave near the stone table where the knife that Kanan used to cut his hair with and his mask were sitting on with a hopped standing nearby as Hera traced her hand along the painting on the cave's wall.
"Why did I wait so long to tell him?" Hera asked herself as she sat on the floor and began to cry quietly, "I just… I thought there would be more time." Chopper grunted as he rolled up to her, "You don't understand! If I had listened to Kanan, he would be alive. He said starting a war was a mistake, and he was right. He was right, and now, he's gone. And it's my fault. I was the one who was blind." Chopper grunted a response as he saw what she was holding in her hand, "The Kalikori? Kanan found it." Chopper then began grunting yet again, "You're right. No one deserves that honor more than Kanan."
"So, what did you see?" Zeb asked Sabine, who had macrobinoculars over her eyes as she was now wearing her armor instead of the TIE pilot uniform that she and her sister wore when they infiltrated the Imperial Complex with her hair dyed back to it's dark purple as they both laid on their stomachs on a cliff overlooking Capital City.
"Well, the parade has begun," she began before removing the macrobinoculars and handed them to Zeb, "But look at it, Zeb. Look how many people there are. Look how much the Empire has grown."
"Isn't that why we're here?" He asked as he removed the macrobinoculars from his eyes after looking through them, "To reduce their numbers?"
"We couldn't beat them with the help of the Rebel Alliance," Sabine scoffed, "And there are so few of us left. I mean, how can we beat them now?"
"You don't see anything strange about the city?" Zeb asked as he handed the macrobinoculars back to her.
"Uh, besides the refinery being on fire?" Sabine asked as she placed the macrobinoculars back over her eyes.
"The factories aren't belching smoke," Zeb told her, "When was the last time you saw them shut down?"
"Never, but that's probably because of the parade," she answered as she removed the macrobinoculars from her eyes.
"The Empire doesn't give days off, Sabine," Zeb reminded her.
"Huh. Now that is interesting," she told him as she got up and left the area with Zeb.
"Ah! What happened?" Ezra cried out as she woke up and saw that it was dark out and stood up, "I know you're out there! Show yourselves!" She called out to the wolves that attacked her earlier before shrugging it off as she walked away from where she was sleeping at, "I better get back to base while I can."
On a highway, a scout trooper was patrolling the area as he walked around the area with his 614-AvA speeder bike behind him and went to place a pair on electrobinoculars over his helmet's visor when he felt someone tap him on the shoulder and turned around to see Zeb who immediately punched him, knocking him unconscious as he walked backwards and fell onto the road on his back as he walked past Sabine, who had her helmet over her head.
"I needed that," Zeb said as he cracked his knuckles, chuckling as Sabine walked towards the speeder bike and pulled out a device from one of the bags on her armor and inserted it into the bike and it began to beep as she pulled out a datapad.
"Connecting to the Imperial network in three, two, one," she said as the datapad beeped as the datapad connected to the Imperial network, "I'm in."
"So?" Zeb asked.
"The TIE defender factory was shut down. It took serious damage when the fuel depot blew up," she answered before removing her helmet, "Zeb, Kanan didn't just save us. He completed the mission."
"Then why is the Empire celebrating?" Zeb asked as he crossed his arms.
"I'll bet because Pryce doesn't want anyone to know," Sabine began as she held her helmet to her side, "Instead of admitting we hurt them…"
"She sent all their workers to a parade," Zeb finished for her, "So, what's next?"
"The Empire and us, we're not even yet," Sabine answered as she pulled out a thermal detonator from one of her armor's bags.
"I was born and lived on this planet for 14 years, and I still can get lost, even though I now consider Mandalore my home planet more than Lothal," Ezra said as she wandered around the area where she woke up at as she reached a lothalian mound and sat down beneath it, "I have no idea which way to go." She placed her arms around her knees for a second before pointing up towards the sky, "Loth-rat, Loth-cat, Loth-wolf, run. Pick a path and all is done. No. Loth-rat, Loth-cat, Loth-wolf, run. Pick a path and all is done," she then soon fell back asleep.
Back on the highway, Rukh sniffed as he hovered over the scout trooper as he regained consciousness, catching the scout trooper off guard as he gasped in surprise and backed away.
"Sorry, uh, sir. I was attacked," the scout trooper told Rukh as he crawled back away from Rukh as he continued to sniff over him, "It was so fast, like a blur."
"Be silent," Rukh ordered the scout trooper.
"Sir?" The scout trooper allied out to Rukh.
"Uh, this comm has been tampered with," one of the stormtroopers in the area announced as he removed the device that Sabine placed in the speeder earlier to tap into the Imperial network and Rukh turned to him as he noticed a thermal detonator placed on the bike as it began to go off and blew up the bike as it killed the two stormtroopers around the bike.
"Hmm, that was fast," Sabine noted as she and Seb sat on their speeder bikes on a cliff near the highway, watch the explosion from the cliff.
"Well, you wanted to send a message," Zeb told her, chuckling.
"I can do better than… wait," Sabine stated as she placed the macrobinoculars over her eyes again and saw Rukh at the explosion, "What is that?"
"What is what?" Zeb asked her, "Let me see." He then took the macrobinoculars as he placed them over his eyes, "Ugh. Looks like a baby rancor."
"Wait a minute. Ezra told us about that thing," Sabine said recalling what Ezra told her and the others when they were installing the TIE defender Elite's Hyperdrive into Ryder's U-wing.
"You're right. I remember now," Zeb said as he now remembered Rukh, "When we were recovering that Hyperdrive, that thing came sniffling over to us." He then placed the macrobinoculars back over his eyes as Rukh noticed this and looked at him, scaring Zeb, "Ah! It looked right at me!"
"Did it see you?" Sabine asked him.
"I don't know!" He answered.
"Well, look and see," she told him.
"I don't want to," he replied, "It's got creepy eyes."
"Oh, give me those," Sabine said as she took the macrobinoculars from him and placed them over her eyes and saw Rukh walking towards them, "Oh, boy, it's coming this way."
"What?!" Zeb exclaimed before taking the macrobinoculars from her and placed them over his eyes, "Let me see. Ugh. You're right. And the closer it gets, the uglier it gets." He then removed the macrobinoculars from his eyes as he turned to the Mandalorian beside him, "But…"
"But what?" She asked.
"At least it's alone," he finished.
"What do you mean?" She asked.
"I mean, we can even the score. They took Kanan from us. We take something from them," he explained.
"I agree with you, only because we can't let it track us back to base," she told him, "Now, since we outnumber it, let's use that to our advantage." With that they took off in their speeders.
Back with Ezra, as she was sleeping, a Loth-wolf appeared behind her and sniffed at her shoulder, "Kanan?" She called before turning around and saw the white Loth-wolf standing behind her, surprising her as it was larger than she was as she backed away down the slope that she was sleeping on only to see another Loth-wolf, but this one was normal sized as it growled quietly at her. "Who are you?" She asked the large Loth-wolf hovering over her.
"I am Dume," the wolf answered.
Rukh, who was riding on a speeder bike approached Seb as he slid the bike to a stop, rotating it around as he got off the bike and grabbed his electro-staff from his back and swung it around as he stabbed it into the ground next to him while Zeb held his bo-rifle in his hand across from him. They then charged at one another, striking their staffs at one another with Zeb, evading Rukh's attacks while up above Sabine stood between two rock structures with her helmet placed over her head as her helmet's macrobinocular viewplate flipped down before flipping it back up as she jumped down behind Rukh as he walked towards Zeb.
"We're not in the mood for a fair fight today," Sabine told the Noghri assassin.
"Neither am I," Rukh told the Mandalorian as he placed his electro-staff on his back and pressed a button on a device on his wrist and turned invisible as he began to punch Zeb without being seen.
"I can't see him," Zeb said as Rukh continued to punch him as he wasn't being seen by anyone.
"Scanning," Sabine announced as she flipped her helmet's macrobinocular viewplate back down and through the lenses of her macrobinocular viewplate, she saw the thermal heat coming out from both Zeb and Rukh's bodies and pulled out her WESTAR-35s and fired blaster bolts from them at Rukh, who then began climbing up a wall of one of the walls of the Boulder like structures surrounding them before leaping towards her, knocking her helmet off as he went to punch Zeb again and soon placed both his arms around his neck as he began to choke him, but luckily for Zeb, Sabine went to kick Rukh only for him to grab her by the arm, bending it before pushing her towards Zeb as he left the area.
"Dume. That was my master's name," Ezra told Dume as she stood up, "What do you want from me?"
"You ran," Dume told her.
"Yeah, the wolves were chasing me!" She explained.
"Why?" Dume asked.
"I didn't mean to run, I just… I feel lost without my master. He was wise and brave. And he cared," she said as he sat down with her knees folded, "He was the only one besides my twin sister that was there for me when no one besides them were. There was so much more I needed to learn from him."
"Fear," Dume stated
"I am afraid!" She admitted, "All right? I'm afraid. Everything seems so hopeless now."
"Fight. Like the Mandalorian you are," Dume told her.
"How?" She asked.
"Together," Dume answered as one of the other Loth-wolves came up to her from behind and barked as it placed a stone plaque in front of her with hands making three different gestures.
"This stone. Where's it from?" She asked after placing her hand on it.
"Jedi Temple," Dume answered.
Sabine and Zeb stood back to back with each other as they both stood in fighting stances as Sabine pulled out a thermal Detonator as Rukh reappeared even though he was still invisible as he punched Zeb in the back and Sabine heard this and turned around to punch him, only for Rukh to knock her to the ground as he stood in front of her near the Boulder structure behind him as Sabine soon grabbed him by the neck as she stood back up and began to knee him in the stomach with her knee and soon he knocked her to the floor and turned back towards Zeb while unbeknownst to him that she planted her thermal detonator on the back of his neck as Sabine pressed a button on the device on her wrist and the detonator started beeping before exploding, causing paint from inside the detonator to appear on him.
"Can you see him now?" Sabine asked Zeb.
"Oh, yeah," Zeb answered, chuckling as he approached Rukh and picked him up before running towards one of the boulder structures nearby and slammed him into it and proceeded to punch him in the head, "This… is…"
"Zeb, stop!" Sabine ordered the Lasat as she rushed towards him.
"For Kanan!" Zeb added as he continued to punch Rukh.
"Zeb, Zeb! Stop!" Sabine ordered Zeb as she reached him.
"I thought you wanted to get even," Zeb reminded her as Rukh fell unconscious.
"I do, but this isn't how we do it," she told him.
"But what are we gonna do with him now?" He asked her.
"I've got an idea," she answered as she took out her Baobab E23 airbrush and began to spray Rukh with it.
"We accidentally led the Empire to the Jedi Temple. We escaped, but they captured it," Ezra told Dume.
"Danger," Dume told her.
"Well, then the Empire's still there!" Ezra realized.
"Secrets within," Dume added.
"Secrets? What secrets? What else is inside the temple?" She asked.
"Knowledge. Destruction," Dume answered.
"Ahsoka said we'd find knowledge in the Sith temple on Malachor. But we were wrong. That's when everything changed," Ezra told Dume.
"Restore past. Redeem future," Dume added.
"How? How do I do this?" She asked him, "Tell me." The wolves then began snarling, scaring her, "No, no." The wolves moved their heads towards her to eat her when she suddenly woke up as she realized that all that talking to Dume, the white Loth-wolf was all a vision and dream, "Kanan!" She then looked down to see the stone plaque from the Jedi Temple was sitting across from her.
"I always liked your art," Zeb told Sabine as he dragged Rukh, whose skin was painted purple and orange.
"Thanks," Sabine said as he placed Rukh onto his speeder's seat and activated the speeder, "I think this is the best message we can send to the Empire right now." He then kicked the speeder forward as Sabine turned to him, "Hey, you set the homing beacon, right?"
"Yeah. Well, I think I did," he answered.
"Zeb," she said, knowing that he was lying.
"No, I did," he told her as they walked away, "I did."
"Unbelievable," she muttered, "Did you just see how much I worked on that thing?"
"For Kanan, so he'll always be remembered as a part of my family," Hera said as she placed a piece of Kanan's holocron onto a section of her kalikori after placing it on the stone table as a hopped stood next to her, "You know, Chop, despite all his misgivings about the rebellion, he always believed we could change things." Chopper grunted a response, "That's what I'll miss the most, that when none of us could find the answer, Kanan could, and always in the most unexpected way." She then began to walk away.
"Hera? Hera?" Sabine called as she and Zeb walked towards the cliff dwelling with her helmet to her side.
"Was your mission a success?" Hera asked Sabine as she left the cave.
"No, but yours was. The TIE defender factories have shut down. We didn't fail, Hera. Kanan made sure of it," Sabine told her, "In their attempt to destroy us, the Empire blew up their own refinery."
"They have no fuel for the factories. Their entire production line has stopped," Zeb added.
"Then we have a chance. We can still beat them," Hera stated.
"And I know what our first mission is," they all heard Ezra say and turned around to see her holding the stone plaque to her side, "The Jedi Temple is in danger." She then showed them all the stone plaque, "And we're the only ones who can do anything about it."
Please favorite and review. Would you like me to continue adding the Imperial scenes or not?
