I own nothing except a few characters and the plot.
STAR WARS REBELS
The New Spectres
Christmas 2030 Part 1
PHILADELPHIA - 2030
The Holidays had come to Philadelphia and the sights were spreading throughout the city. While most everyone with the Remnant had their Holiday routines, Lucy found herself having to adjust her routine to include to additions. First, she now had Justin living with her, Darius, and Caleb. Second, the addition of Eric Schuyler to the office staff. She was under the impression that he had no family in the area or that his family had cut off communications with him and suspected the latter with the involvement of some of his former RSB colleagues. As she hung decorations around the office, she looked in on him and found him looking over a case file.
"What case is that?" She asked him.
"The 20 tons of assorted illegal treats Admiral Reige and our local air patrol forced down in Delaware. He wants to know when he can use it for target practice or drop it into a sun or something." Eric replied as Schultz dropped off his mail.
"I see you're still getting your mail delivered here."
"Just things that I don't want delivered to my place. Philly PD recently arrested somebody on my block who was stealing mail from people. The Postal Police is taking the case from there."
"I just wanted to know what you were doing for Christmas?"
"Staying by myself. My family doesn't talk to me anymore."
"Hochster, Zollet, or Schlager?" Lucy asked him.
"A combination of all three. The last straw was when Hochster screamed at my mother and slammed the phone down on her."
"Try talking to her again. Tell her you got transferred out of there. I can understand why your family didn't want to deal with those three creeps." Lucy suggested as she hung a wreath on the door to Eric's office.
"Hey." Eric called after her.
"What?"
"What happened with that guy who has a habit of evading our patrols and then claiming I plant evidence against him when he got caught?"
"Awaiting sentencing. He's looking at 25 years." She told him and went to finish hanging the decorations she was holding. She was still worried about Eric as she hung the last wreath on the kitchen door and went to her office where Schultz left some mail for her regarding open cases. A pair of Stormtroopers brought a Rodian into her office and handed Lucy an ID Card.
"What's the charge?" Lucy asked the two troopers.
"Selling a rapid fire weapon out of a bar. A Philly PD undercover made the buy."
"Put him in a cage for now. I'll question him later."
"Yes, Ma'am. Let's go Knothead." The Stormtroopers escorted the Rodian out of her office and off to a holding cell.
That evening, Lucy was still fretting the frayed relationship between Eric and his family and it showed as she picked at her dinner.
"Something bothering you?" Darius asked her.
"Eric's family wants nothing to do with him. Three guesses why."
"Wanna tell Dad about that?" Justin asked.
"Hasn't he been punished enough? A court-martial, a psych eval, being demoted, and all of it being put on his record."
"In other news, a flyer was sent home about the holiday event at Caleb's school." Justin said changing the subject.
"Whenever it is, you're going and bringing him home after it." Darius told his brother-in-law.
"Let me check my schedule."
"You have nothing else planned for that day." Lucy told him.
"I don't think there's such a thing as a Jedi Mind Trick by proxy."
"It doesn't work that way. Caleb, stop playing with the condiment bottles." Darius said noticing the bottles that were floating around the table and used The Force to make sure they didn't drop where they were and land on the floor.
"When is your school doing its Christmas thing?" Justin asked Darius as R9-D2 rolled over to the table beeping about something.
"What is it?" Lucy asked the droid who beeped a reply.
"It's the UPS man, for you." She told Justin.
"I guess I have to sign for something." Justin said and got up to see what had been delivered for him that was causing R9 to disrupt dinner any more then had already been by Caleb's playing with condiment bottles.
"When is your event?" Lucy asked Darius again.
"I haven't been told yet." He replied.
"Keisha Banks?"
"Doing fine. Baby too."
"Brad the Bum?" Justin asked as he rejoined them.
"I'll tell you after Caleb's in bed." Lucy told them. After dinner and some playing, it was bath and bed for Caleb while the three adults discussed events.
"Brad the Bum?" Darius asked this time.
"He's sitting in a cell in USP Terre Haute watching as his appeals get denied and everyone knows that President Bridger will not intervene. Which means that before Brad the Bum knows it, there's that needle with the Potassium Chloride Cocktail in it. On to new business. I'm gonna need you two and R9 to help with the tree and stuff." Lucy said.
The next morning, Lucy found Eric on the phone with somebody and entered his office.
"My Dad." Eric told her.
"I just came in for something else. Here it is." She said and took a file off his desk.
"I gotta go. Lucy's here about business." Eric hung up the phone and turned to Lucy.
"I see my weapons dealer didn't make a statement yet."
"He wasn't interrogated yet. I'm waiting to see the report from PD about the bust."
"I guess I need to see that too. Probably a few things we don't know in it. Where is your family from anyway?"
"Pittsburgh. They're going to drive in for Christmas since I told them that you'd be in New York and the General would be in Virginia somewhere. The train takes longer then driving for some reason. I have to send them one of our parking permits so the PPA doesn't impound their car and give them a new reason to not talk to me. I better take care of that now and overnight it so they get it before they leave." Eric explained as he sat up and began typing something into his computer.
"Come on R9, let's see what's waiting for us." Lucy said and went to her office followed by the droid who beeped something to her.
"Glad you reminded me about that. Schultz, where's the tree?" She called out to the Sergeant.
"I just ordered a detail to get it. The Police Department sent over the report you were waiting for on that weapons dealer too." He replied and handed her an envelope.
"Good, I'll share this with the Major before we do the interrogation." An hour later, Lucy and Eric went to interrogate the weapons dealer while Ty watched the detail that had been ordered to set up the Christmas Tree.
"Now make sure this looks nice or you'll be dealing with my wife." He told the detail.
"Yes, Sir." One of the men said as Schultz came over to him.
"Sir, I need you to sign this." He said and gave Ty a paper.
"Who are these people and what is their relationship to Major Schuyler?"
"He didn't tell me."
"I'll find out. Make sure this tree is done right or I'm getting my wife after them and you." Ty said and went to go find Eric who was watching Lucy interrogate the Rodian that the Philadelphia Police caught trying to sell a weapon.
"Relatives of yours?" He asked Eric and showed him the paper.
"My parents. I haven't seen them since Hochster screamed at my mother." Eric replied.
"I honestly believe that's something he would do. He even screamed at Caleb once. That and the incident with Colonel McKnight were the last straws for Lucy's parents." Ty said and signed the paper to issue a parking placard to Eric's parents as Lucy joined them.
"He wants a lawyer." She told them.
"Put him on the next Wagon uptown. Let him call a lawyer from there."
"Do you guys have a party or something here?" Eric asked.
"Why else would my wife be threatening to kick people in the butt when the decorations look like they were just thrown on the tree. If your parents arrive in town in time, bring them. Lucy brings her family to our office parties. Which is how Hochster was able to scream at Caleb." Ty replied.
"Don't worry. If he shows up, he won't scream around Darius. I was pregnant with Caleb when he once screamed at me and Darius did to him what Darth Vader would have done to him. My dad wanted to shoot him right then and there." Lucy told Eric.
"Being choked out by a Jedi seems to have worn off then. Maybe being demoted won't. If demotion does wear off, he can always join Schlager somewhere in Russia." Eric said with a slight chuckle.
A couple of days later, Justin attended the Holiday Event being held at Caleb's school. Caleb ran over to him followed by Mrs. Archer.
"I guess Darius wasn't able to take the time off." She said.
"I think he's involved with whatever's being planned at the High School."
"What has he or your sister told you about Keisha Banks? I had that girl in some of the classes I covered last year at his school. Caleb, I think Miss Palmer is looking for you." She asked Justin and then sent Caleb back to join the rest of the class.
"I heard about the Stooges and the stick. She's fine. Baby's progressing nicely. Brad the Bum is running out of appeals and he has no hope of getting anything from Ezra Bridger."
"Who came up with that one?"
"General Marlion first used it, but I heard the Judge at the trial also used that term for him."
"Let's go join the kids before Caleb comes bouncing back over here." She said and led Justin over to the table where Caleb and the rest of his class were sitting. Justin took an empty seat next to Caleb who was looking at the food eagerly.
"Don't even think of it." Justin told him knowing that Caleb had a habit of using The Force to take food which Lucy blamed mostly on Josh Myers. As the food went around, Justin had to make sure that Caleb didn't eat too much food.
"You have enough." Justin said as the pile of food on Caleb's plate grew. A bottle of ketchup floated over to them causing Justin to glare at Caleb as he grabbed the bottle out of the air.
"Caleb Jamal Carpenter. You do not do this in public."
"Daddy and Uncy Josh let me do it." Caleb said.
"I will talk to him later and he can talk to Josh. If Mace doesn't talk to Josh first." After the event, Justin took Caleb home and then called Chris putting it on speaker so he could work on the Christmas Tree..
"Hello?" Chris said.
"It's me. Josh around?"
"He's at Noah's getting soup. AP-5 tried to inventory Noah's pantry and now he's banned from there. Why?"
"He gave Caleb the idea that it's okay to use The Force to steal food."
"I thought Lucy already told us that."
"He did it at school today. They had their holiday lunch today and I had to go because Darius and Lucy couldn't take the time off to go themselves. Anyway, Caleb floated a bottle of ketchup around and I had to yell at him."
"Doing something you're told not to do runs in the family. Mom told Dad not to fly into that asteroid field and he ended up flying into that asteroid field."
"That had something to do with Dad thinking that if Han Solo and the Millennium Falcon could do something, he and the Pride can do it too. Lucky for us, Lucy hasn't flown her X-Wing into a nebula or something like that. Mom complained that she flew it up to Northwest Jersey recently, but I think that's like a three hour drive on back roads. She drove to that ASW crash and R9 wanted to drive home. After that, I think she started taking her ship on those kinds of jobs. Of course, Dad transferring Eric Schuyler out of RSB and sending him here to lighten her workload helped. I think she was secretly happy when General Rawlkins showed up and basically took over the ASW crash investigation."
"He has more resources at The Pentagon then she does in Philadelphia. Especially if what I heard over dinner one night about that being Hutt-related terrorism is true."
"She told me and Darius that Eli Vanto's heard the same story at least three times from three different smugglers that he caught doing Hutt-related jobs on Onyx and Hondo Ohnaka told President Bridger the same story."
"So it sounds true, the thing just didn't go off when it was supposed to or the flight was running late. I haven't heard anything about the interview that the NTSB had with the Captain of that ship. I gotta go, Josh is back. Before I do, and while Josh is yelling at AP-5. Can you keep a secret better then I can?" Chris said as Josh Myers was heard in the background scolding AP-5 about something.
"What is is?"
"I'm planning to propose to Tori on Christmas, don't tell anyone." Chris told Justin in a low voice.
"Sure. See you on Christmas then." Justin told his brother and ended the call. Darius came home as Justin finished putting ornaments on the tree.
"Hey, where's he at?" Darius asked Justin.
"Upstairs, I used his middle name when he did the floating ketchup routine at school. He said you and Josh let him do it which I can understand since Lucy said Josh did it once or twice."
"Josh did it many times. Usually when Mrs. Jacobs rest her soul was around Dad's office jumping down Jacen Syndulla's throat about something. I'll talk to him about that and then talk to Josh about the bad influence he's being on Caleb. Last thing I want to hear is that Caleb's started telling fat jokes in school or worse insulted someone about their weight. Any other news?"
"Talked to Chris for a bit. AP-5 is no longer allowed at Noah's because he walked in there and tried to inventory Noah's pantry. Mom blames Dad for Lucy showing up at that diamond thing in New Jersey with her X-Wing."
"Except R9 can fly an X-Wing better then he can drive a car." Darius said and went upstairs to talk to Caleb about his misuse of The Force.
