Ahsoka: Jedi Exile
Editor's Note: This is written pre-Season Seven, any contradictory information provided, if it arises, should be disregarded. I apologize, it's just a fact of life that I can't see into the future. Don't worry, I'm just as upset as you are.
Editor's Note II: If you enjoyed this, and I do hope you do, leave a review, or go check out some of my other works. Either way, just make sure to have fun! Shameless self-plug over, go enjoy an adventure among the stars.
On the icy plains of Illum, no life thrives or even survives. All that grows on the planet is hypothermia and the Force-enriched kyber crystals, the primary source of attraction to the otherwise desolate world.
Long ago, far beyond memory, a temple was etched into the ice. It stands a monument to perseverance and ingenuity, and is a rite of passage for all young padawans who dream of protecting the galaxy. The young togruta had been here once, barely a decade ago, and, like the temple, the time was far beyond memory. All she could recall was the wind, which whipped its way into her bones and cracked itself between each joint before lighting every muscle and tendon in her body aflame. Just when it seemed she would be overcome by the feeling; the cold slashed the fires away and left nothing but numbed pain.
That, however, was at the entrance, in the caves, and she was far removed from both.
On the icy plains of Illum, no life thrives but, through the Force, it can survive.
So it is here, in the barren snowdrifts on a secluded world forgotten by the galaxy but not by the Jedi, lies Ahsoka Tano- former Jedi Knight, and now another casualty of the ever more destructive Clone Wars.
She had come here seeking solitude, a place in which to meditate and escape her guilt. A place where she could be swallowed up whole in the maw of Illum's blizzards and hidden from the wreckage of her past.
Only two months prior, she had left the Jedi Order, the only life she'd ever known. They had taken her faith in their greater purposes, their supposed greater ideals, and crushed it. Nobody, aside from her master, believed she was innocent. Even Master Koon had doubted her.
The Order, she once thought, was beyond the faults the rest of the galaxy suffered from, and they never shut their arms to those who wished to learn. Apparently, give them one chance to doubt you, however, and they'd close their doors without hesitation. In one fell swoop, her entire life had been thrown upside down, and the Jedi, the great Jedi who she idolized and trained under, the Jedi who could do no wrong, revealed their true colours.
As she lay in the snow, hoping to succumb to the ice and the winds, her mind was cast back to an ancient text she had once read, about a former Jedi named Traya. In it, there was an excerpt from her multitude of reasons to leave the Jedi Order of the Old Republic:
"There must always be a Darth Traya, one that holds the knowledge of betrayal. Who has been betrayed in her heart, and will betray in turn."
In the darkest parts of her soul, Ahsoka Tano felt it speak to her now. At the time, it had frightened her, and confused her; Jedi were taught to forgive, no matter the grievance, but Traya had held the betrayal with her, and who knows how many Traya's she had spawned after her. But now, Ahsoka Tano saw the truth in her words- for in the words she saw herself.
Her grief pleaded with her for revenge, and her anger begged to betray another in order to understand why the original betrayal had occurred at all. Only her training had kept these urges from breaking free, but they existed still, and the future she saw from these actions both tempted her and weighed down her stomach with rocks.
And now she lay here, hoping the hostile environment of Illum would smother these ideas and dreams into oblivion- and her with them.
The galaxy was an infinite expanse, with endless possibilities for her buried in its stars. Yet, in her struggle to come to terms with her decision, she could see nothing but the infinite darkness before her. Whether the tunnel would ever end, she did not know, but, sitting up, she understood that it didn't end in an icy grave.
Her body ached, and her fingers had long since gone numb, but she could feel the Force surrounding her, blanketing her in its warmth.
There may have been fifty miles of wasteland in between here and her ship, but the Force would guide Ahsoka Tano and protect her. Standing up, she began the journey back, wrapping the cloak tightly around herself in order to shield against the wind.
It was only a few steps in when, out of the corner of her eye, she saw a glint of light. At first, she only believed it to be a loose kyber crystal, but the Force nudged her towards it, encouraging her to see it as something else.
Slowly turning, kicking the knee-deep snow away to free herself, Ahsoka Tano diverted towards the light, and trudged along the path of the Force.
Arriving at the end of the path, she found the remnants of a ship, long since forgotten in the icy plains. It was wrecked beyond repair, with what appeared to be scorch marks along the hull that was still above the snow, and she felt neither hum nor reverberating echo of power. From what she could see, it once had two rear engines- although one had clearly been lost in whatever last stand this ship put up. Much of the hull had been frosted over, but she could still see the maroon paint marking along the armoured plating.
Even though the memories hung heavy with pain, she recalled her time alongside her former master and could see that the ship had undergone extensive modifications and numerous repair jobs both professional and jury-rigged.
Using the extended pieces of scrap and tubing, she pulled herself up onto the roof, steadying her boots as she slowly made her away across the ice.
It appeared as though it once had a turret, but what remained of it indicated that a missile or some other projectile had scored a direct hit and removed it. However, its absence allowed her a way to access the vessel.
One precise punch from her boot shattered the ice ceiling, and Ahsoka Tano dropped inside.
The innards were not quite as destroyed, and appeared to be almost perfectly preserved despite its place of rest. The ice must've formed over quite quickly and, as she struggled to lift a fallen bed out of her way, she noted that the main room was sparser than she expected.
What she could only guess was a map projector and a small curved desk were all that populated the area. There was a storage compartment in the corner, but its door was half collapsed, and she doubted there was anything of value in it at any rate.
Continuing forward, she noted that it was a rather compact ship. Not much in the way of comfort, but likely perfect for smuggling she imagined.
An impenetrably sealed room to her right and, around the corner, what was formerly the cockpit were all that she could find this way.
The glass shielding and controls had been smashed and warped, contorted into a mess of scrap that had been done in not by combat but by the unforgiving planetary crust of Illum. The snow and wreckage were pounded so far back that there was little interest in attempting to dig through to the controls or the hyperspace memory banks, but, as her eyes scanned the room, she found that it would not be necessary.
An astromech unit, held together by wires and frozen in place by pure chance, lay half-buried in the damage. With any luck, it may contain some information on what happened to this smuggler's ship, and give Ahsoka Tano an answer as to why the Force had guided her here.
Retrieving her emergency toolkit from her belt, she set to work on it. As she sawdered and sliced, she longed for Anakin Skywalker again. With his engineering skills, this little droid could've returned with them for a proper debriefing in a Republic facility under its own power- but he was gone, left behind in a life that now felt like a dream, and Ahsoka Tano was alone.
Alone, but not helpless.
Several hours later, scavenging parts from the few other sections of the ship that had survived its final moments, she'd fashioned a pulse generator which could feed power into the astromech.
Yet, this did not finish her job.
She would have to time and strengthen each pulse without room for error. Too much power would fry the fragile circuitry. Too little would starve the generator permanently. Infrequent pulses would drain the generator and leave the droid inactive. Over-frequent pulses would fry the generator and the droid's circuits. This had to be perfect.
One-two-three, pulse.
One-two-three-four, pulse.
One-two, pulse.
One-two, pulse.
One-two-three, pulse.
One-two-three, pulse.
One-two-three, pulse.
She paused, hoping it would be enough.
Fzzt!
That was the sound of the pulse generator frying out, its ancient and now cobbled-together wiring finally giving up.
Now, more than ever, its last breaths had to be enough.
An eternity ticked by in the next ten seconds, and in that time Ahsoka Tano almost gave up hope.
The subtle whirring's and clicks, reminiscent of the old computers she'd bought to fashion into her ship's console, gave her relief and allowed her heart to beat normally again.
Its single photoreceptor slowly blinked to life, giving off a dim, blue light, and it strained its disc-shaped head around to gather info on its surroundings.
Focusing in on her, it softly, solemnly, voiced a question.
All her time with R2-D2 had given her vast experience with understanding the language of droids, and she gave it a small smile.
"My name is Ahsoka Tano. Who are you?"
It weakly warbled out its answer.
"Tee-Three Em-Four, huh? Nice to meet you, little guy. How did you end up on Illum?"
T3-M4 paused, and she heard the whirring and repetitive clicking of a droid attempting to access its memory banks, failing, and trying again. After a few moments, the clicking stopped and the whirring continued, and the droid feebly beeped and hooted, recalling how it had been attacked by Sith soldiers before escaping from a planet she'd never heard of, on the run from an armada of the Sith Empire, chased to this sector of the galaxy through lightspeed before crashing the ship so that it could not be captured, fulfilling the final wishes of its last owner. By the end of its' tale, Ahsoka Tano's eyes were wide in astonishment, and she fell back onto the deckplate, unable to believe it.
"The Sith Empire…" She whispered to herself.
It was impossible, but the proof sat all around her.
She was sitting on a ship that was almost four millennia old, talking to a droid that hadn't been manufactured since the Mandalorian Wars, and hearing the story of its escape from a faction that was only myth and legend.
It was impossible, but the proof was irrefutable.
T3-M4 softly squeaked out what would be its last message, one asking her to deliver the news of its survival to a Bastila Shan, someone who likely didn't even have a verifiable descendant, before projecting a holo-image in the space between them.
A cloaked figure smiled down at her, and Ahsoka Tano recognized their face from the Jedi Archives, but couldn't place the name.
"To whoever finds this message, know you are now the sole beholder of my knowledge. I have no holocron for which to record my teachings, but Tee-Three will do more than suffice."
The pieces slowly connected themselves in her mind as she continued to gaze upon the Jedi in the hologram.
"I have walked the paths of Jedi, Sith, and outsider, and contain the experiences only experienced by few others in the galaxy- one of which was my master, the other being my former commander in the Mandalorian Wars. What I have learned from these lifetimes is a truth that the Jedi Order may never fully grasp, if they age beyond my counsels and return themselves to the old teachings, and one that the Sith would only wish to destroy."
The puzzle began to fit together, and she began to fully realize who was speaking.
"The only truth that I wish to pass on is this: The Force has already reconciled your path for you, even if you do not believe it or wish to fight against it. My master considered this abhorrent, but I believe it holds greater meaning. Follow the Force, but stay true to yourself, your own way of thinking, and your friendships. Any one of these without the other can lead to disillusionment. Think of the Force as a hunting companion, allow it to pull you off the path when you feel it is leading you to a better place, but pull it back when you believe it has lead you astray. This is my final lesson, both to my friends on the New Jedi Order, and to you, whether you are smuggler, Sith, Jedi, or wandering exile. The Force is with me and, now, it is with you."
The Exile faded away and the last machinations of life within T3-M4 came to an end.
In the remains of the Ebon Hawk, Ahsoka Tano sat as still as stone, swallowing the last lesson of the Jedi Exile, passed down to her and her alone from almost four millennia ago.
After a time, she slowly stood and left the grave of the Ebon Hawk.
On the icy plains of Illum, no life thrives or even survives. All that grows on the planet is hypothermia and the Force-enriched kyber crystals, the only attraction to the otherwise desolate world.
Long ago, far beyond memory, a ship crashed into the ice. It stands a monument to perseverance and an era all but forgotten, and was the last home of the Jedi Exile, who once dreamt of saving a galaxy. A young togruta had been here once, not too long ago, but, unlike the ship, that time wasn't too far beyond memory. She recalled the way the Force had guided her to the ship, warming her bones and joints and keeping her muscles alive with strength. When she reached the wreckage, the Force had swept away her fatigue, filling her with enough energy to energize her soul.
That, however, was not the last time she would feel its warm embrace.
On the icy plains of Illum, nothing could thrive but, through the Force, she survived.
So it was there, inside a destroyed cockpit in a wrecked ship forgotten by the galaxy but not by the Force, that Ahsoka Tano, former Jedi Knight, found the Jedi Exile's last message.
She had come here seeking answers, to discover what lay in the ruins of an old ship.
She left with something that disproved all the theories about Illum, and allowed her to find an end to the tunnel of darkness which she'd been clawing through.
On the icy plains of Illum, Ahsoka Tano, Jedi Knight turned Jedi Exile, had found hope, and, through the Force, she would ensure it survived.