AN: Oh my god I'm back...
HEY GUYS! A lot of you have been wondering where I've been. That's a really good question. As a matter of fact, Life Happened. Stupidly so, and it's made writing very difficult. Also, this chapter gave me hell every time I sat down to write it. Mostly because I lost this chapter with computer crashes. TWICE. I ended up with something totally different than what I had originally, but trust me, it's better than it was. Regular updates should continue from here on out, but going into the holidays, you know how things can get. The good news is that the next four chapters, I know EXACTLY what's happening, and I've been planning them out for a long time now, and I am SO excited to be writing them. I should get this baby updated weekly from now on, two weeks at the absolute max. The next chapter's easy, but the one after that is super intricate and starts to tie a lot of shit together. I don't want to post it until it's absolutely right.
Anyway, sorry about the delay! Onward with your regularly scheduled entertainment, and thank you to all those of you who were concerned. I promise you, I'm alright and not dead!
Chapter 52: The Honorable Ones
It was a greater undertaking than Lumis had anticipated. He had, naturally, been aboard several Star Destroyers, even owned a few during his earlier years, but he was quickly discovering that there was a chasm of difference between his own Liberator, the Venator class Star Destroyer he had made a second home during the Clone Wars, and the might of the Imperial II class Star Destroyer that was the Subjugator. Fifty percent bigger and more akin to a city than a ship, the Imperial Star Destroyers could house just over forty thousand Imperial officers, crew and soldiers, the ships needing a bare minimum of five thousand just to keep the massive vessel flying.
These weren't the clone soldiers he had stolen from the Republic, fervently devoted to their cause until Lumis had discovered exactly how to make them serve, the process aided by the biochip deep inside their brains that, when activated, made the act of turning them against the Republic a simple thing. No, there were people, his people, ones indoctrinated into believing in Imperial might, or seeking glory in the defense of their Empire, or simple men and woman just looking for a steady job. His people that would one day serve his Empire. Breaking their minds, destroying their will until they knew nothing but the need to serve was almost redundant. They just needed the slightest push to shit their allegiance from an absent, aloof Emperor to one that fought beside them...
The advantage Lumis found himself having, however, was his ability to lock down the entire ship, divide it up into neat, orderly sectors, and deal with a much smaller population, and if that wasn't enough, Imperial soldiers were trained and expected to obey orders, so when he had ordered one of his slaved bridge officers to command that all crew return to their quarters due to some convoluted emergency protocol, they all did as they were told. If nothing else, the Imperial system was neat and orderly, and it made his conquest not so difficult as it was tedious. The process was made even easier when K-2SO managed to slave the entire ship to his command, breaking in and coding it to the Sith Lord's preferred specifications and streamlining it in a way that matched the Umbra's interface. It was made easier still when, soon after they had arrived at their rendevous in the air above the wound in the Force that was burning, boiling Ord Mantell, the Umbra flew in to meet them, carrying a crew that was uniquely suited to the task at hand.
Now, nearly a week later and after countless, sleepless hours logged into dealing with the crew of the Subjugator, they had hit the halfway point, and Obi-Wan was taking a much needed break, lounging on the ship's command chair and drifting in and out of light sleep as Vitios and Vehemis attended to him. It was, all things considered, going rather well. He had recorded a message that was broadcast throughout the ship at regular intervals denouncing Palpatine as a corrupt, selfish relic of the ineffectual Republic who brought those same problems with him as he became Emperor, but praised the virtues of an Empire to maintain peace and order in the galaxy, and detailed his own Imperial ambitions.
By the time he reached the isolated Imperials in their sectors, the subtle influence of his presence and the dreams of a new, better Empire was enough to make most of the Imperials willing to kneel before him. Without their commanders, without the orders from up top to tell them what to do, they were lost, and in the presence of the commanding Sith Lord, the powerful would-be Emperor that would fight beside them for what he believed was his, it was easy for them to shift allegiances, still Imperial, but no longer supporting the aloof, largely absent Palpatine, but the charismatic, very present Lumis. Not all came willingly, and those that fought were forced to submit, the Sith Lord silently entering their minds and replacing the rebellious streak with mindless obedience. It made it easier for those inclined to resist to fall in line, especially with the knowledge that their commanders on the bridge had also knelt before the Sith Lord, and soon enough, sector after sector of Imperials aboard the Subjugator pledged themselves to Darth Lumis.
But the work was time consuming.
"This is taking so long..." Leia groaned from her workstation, and Lumis slowly opened his eyes, his gaze drifting lazily over the empty command deck where the twins sat with K2 and Luke's astromech, R2-D2 as they made alterations to the Imperial programs to optimize it for their use. The HK unit sat toward the back of the bridge, using a vacant console as a workbench as he optimized his blaster rifles, and at the front of the bridge stood Cody and the Chiss, the two leaning close together as they whispered and watched ten thousand Imperials on the ground of the uninhabited planet they landed on far out in the Unknown Regions, the location provided to them by Kenobi's Chiss navigator. At the viewport, the rancor stood on his stubby hind legs and slowly licked at an Imperial soldier working on the other side of the transparisteel.
They had landed the Subjugator on this uncharted, remote world to give them time away from the eyes of the Empire to fix the ship up to the Sith's exacting standards, performing what maintenance they could while updating all the systems to respond to the new coding and servicing the ship's aesthetics, which included lifting the Imperial restriction on harsh starkness and painting the hull in Lumis' black and red. It was far from finished, but allowing the crew more freedom significantly boosted morale and resulted in many Stormtroopers painting their armor with stripes and designs and symbols and a significant increase in the quality of the work the crew did. While they still adhered to the strict order the Sith Lord imposed, Imperial protocol was no longer crushing them, striking a fine balance between the order they all craved and the freedom needed for the laws of the Sith to take hold, allowing for the passion and the desires that made real progress possible.
"We are never going to get done at this rate!" Leia continued as she threw her hands up dramatically and spun in her chair. "I don't know why you're even bothering with all this, you could just wave your hand and people are compelled to obey you."
"For a short while," Lumis said with a sigh, breathing deeply as he shut his eyes and relaxed into Vehemis' touch as she rubbed his shoulders. "I don't need them for a short while, I need them forever, and to exert control of that strength would destroy their ability to act independently. They would be of little use to me."
"Like our former Grand Inquisitor," Vitios said quietly, gently kneading the wiry muscles of the Sith Lord's forearm and gently kissing his hand, a slight smirk coming to Lumis' face.
"Just so, dearest."
"Well, I'm glad that you're choosing to do it this way, Father," Luke said, leaning back in his chair and smiling at the Sith Lord as he lounged under the touch of his acolytes. "This is the right way to do things. Just like Kanan and Hera are always talking about! This is why your Empire is going to be-"
"You do know that those who don't willingly submit are made to submit, don't you, Luke?" Leia asked mockingly, a sly smirk on her face as she put her feet up on the console before her. "Submit or be enslaved. Serve or die." She grinned when Luke paled. "My, my...now that isn't much of a choice, now is it?"
"Do you have to make everything sound awful?!" Luke snapped, standing up from his seat and crossing his arms over his chest. "Father did a good thing, Leia, it's not all...darkness and pain and emptiness and cruelty and murder!"
"Correction: there were only seventeen executions over the past five days," HK-45 said from the back of the room, emitting a low, electronic hum that sounded nearly like a mournful wail. "The is just over three murders a day, and not a single one done in the open! Where everyone could see! To be made an example of!"
"It's just like Master Yoda and Qui-Gon said," Luke firmly stated with an emphatic nod of his head. "There is light in Father. It's just like we saw on Moraband!"
"Don't read too much into that, Luke..." Obi-Wan quietly warned. "I'm not a good man."
"But you saved us," the boy insisted. "You stood against an ancient Lord of the Sith and threw away the power you needed to..." Luke trailed off, unwilling to bring up how tightly they could feel the Emperor, Maul, Vader closing in on Lumis, and what it meant to have thrown away the chance to change his fate if only he had ended their lives. Ultimate power and everything he ever wanted for the murder of his children, not even children related to him by blood. "...I know what it means to do as you have done, Father," Luke whispered as he swallowed the lump in his throat. "It was not lost on me."
"Don't make this something it isn't, Luke," Leia said with a scoff, but from the soft waver in her voice, he could tell it was half-hearted. She didn't want to show it, but the things they saw on Moraband had scarred her, effected her perhaps even more than it had effected Luke, who always knew to look for the light in all things, had always seen the light within their father as separate from his encompassing dark side. Unlike Leia, who knew him as Sith, saw him as one being of passion, who saw the visions of his bleak future and saw a side of darkness she had never seen before. In that moment, she had seen the path she had chosen to walk, had seen where her own future may lead. And it frightened her.
"Do you think..." Luke said softly, his voice distant and thoughtful. "Do you think that maybe...maybe even our father has light in him?"
"Luke," Leia said with a roll of her eyes, "you just said-"
"Not that father."
The room fell silent, deathly so. Even the beeping and the whirring of the numerous consoles on the command deck seemed to stop as Luke felt all eyes on him. He bit his lip and looked up to meet Darth Lumis' eyes, knowing he couldn't bear to look at what he knew was horror and betrayal and fear in his sister's gaze.
"Luke..." Leia admonished softly, her tone tense and tight with fear and apprehension, as if saying his name could summon the man himself. "How can you even say that?! After what he did, after what he became..."
"You saw what I did on Moraband, Leia," Luke said quickly. "Our father walks the path of darkness, he has done terrible things, and there is light in him still!"
"Don't you dare compare our father to the man that sired us!" Leia snapped at her twin. "It's an insult!"
"Peace, Leia, it's alright..." Obi-Wan said quietly, leaning back in his seat in a brief moment of contemplation. "I confess that I never considered it. I...suppose it's possible, yes."
"Do you think..." Luke timidly ventured. "Do you think maybe he can be saved?"
"Don't go equating those things, Luke," Obi-Wan said firmly. "Just because there's light in someone doesn't mean they can be saved. Sometimes, the things a person does can't be forgiven, no matter how bright the light within them is. Vader cannot be saved anymore than I can be." His eyes drifted away from the twins to stare out the viewport, looking far past the Imperial forces and the forests of the planet. "There just isn't any forgiveness for people like us..."
"Great job, Luke," Leia hissed under her breath, punching her brother hard in the arm. "You've upset Father. Now he's going to sit there and stare and think about all the people he's lost and it's all your fault." She scoffed at her brother's look of indignation and crossed her arms over her chest, refusing to look away. "As if Father needs forgiveness. An Emperor takes what's his, he doesn't need to be saved!"
"He's already been saved, Leia," Luke whispered, glancing over her shoulder to look at the Sith Lord in the command chair and the two women who carefully tended to him. "You saw what happened. You saw what he could have become. He could have killed the Emperor and ruled it all, and he still chose to face the fate the Force laid out for him. He chose us, Leia."
"He's always chosen us!" she hissed back. "Vader didn't. Vader would see us slaughtered to sate his vengeance."
"Vader doesn't know us," Luke countered, and Leia looked at him with disgust.
"And I hope he never does!" she spat, her voice raising slightly before she looked over her shoulder at the Sith Lord, but he hadn't moved, lost to the Force, as he so often was, searching for answers or guidance that Leia knew he would not find. As Luke had said, Darth Lumis had made his choice. "He had his chance before we were born, and that chance was enough. If you want to betray our Father, our real father and go running to your death, than suit yourself! Just make sure you do it after the Emperor kills him, because it would break his heart to lose you!"
"Leia..." Luke said with a heavy sigh. "Look, I didn't mean..." He caught movement on the console out of the corner of his eye, his attention immediately diverted to look at the screen. There was something on the scanners, something approaching the uninhabited planet when there should have been nothing, not even by chance. "Um..." Luke muttered, looking nervously over his shoulder at the command chair and quickly back at his console. "R2, I think there's a glitch in the system, I'm getting a reading I shouldn't. Run the checks again."
A few short beeps and whistles from the R2 unit made K2 swiftly draw up from where he stood plugged into the central computer. "Oh, well, if you think I did such a bad job programming the ship, maybe you should give it a go, you walking garbage can!" the droid said indignantly, tugging his arm to free it from the access port, only to find himself firmly locked in. He bowed his head with an electronic groan. The Umbra would be completely unmanageable after this.
Luke got impatient when the droids began arguing and ran the tests himself, his eyes running over the readouts and frowning when the swiftly approaching spacecraft did not disappear as the data was corrected. "Father!" Luke called in alarm, swallowing hard as he looked at the unmoving man. "There's a ship incoming, there shouldn't be-"
"Ahsoka..." Lumis whispered, his tone impassive, distant, spoken from deep within the Force. Luke and Leia looked questioningly at their father, but the Sith said nothing more, didn't move, still lost to whatever tide he drifted upon.
"...did Ahsoka know we would be here?" Luke asked Leia, and the girl simply shrugged.
"You know how she is..." It wasn't an answer at all, but it was a good enough explanation for Luke, who knew Ahsoka Tano to be the finest tracker in the galaxy, grown only more skilled during her tenure as the Rebellion's premier Fulcrum agent. The Force had a way of bringing Ahsoka and Darth Lumis together, time and time again. That must have had something to do with it.
It wasn't until after the incoming ship had made its approach and docked in one of the Destroyer's hangars that Obi-Wan slipped out of the Force, stood from his command seat, and turned just in time to see the bridge doors slide open, allowing Ahsoka to step through, her strides long and urgent, her posture making it seem as if she owned the place. She greeted the Sith Lord with a smile that was almost warm, though it didn't reach her eyes, but flashed the twins a more friendly grin when they rushed to meet her, bombarding the Togruta with questions about how she got there, how she knew where they were, how things were going with the rebellion in their absence, what she was doing there to begin with, though they never gave the woman the chance to actually answer.
"I suppose I should congratulate you on the successful capture of this ship," Ahsoka drawled when the twins stopped talking at their father's approach, a sly smirk on her face to match the one Kenobi wore. "During the war, I never thought I'd actually appreciate your inclination to steal capital ships."
"I suspect that may be because my first theft was the ship commanded by your Master," Obi-Wan said, the unmistakable touch of sadness on his face, while Ahsoka's grin just became wider in remembrance of her Master during a time before things were turned to the grim path they ended walking. "The Liberator served me well. I considered naming this ship after her. Or Negotiator, I always loved that ship, but Subjugator just feels so...appropriate for my purposes."
"Your purpose?" Ahsoka asked, her voice lowering slightly in challenge, her eyes never leaving the Sith Lord's. "Or the rebellion's?"
"Ahsoka..." Obi-Wan gently chided, though the sharp edge in his eyes did not go unnoticed by the Togruta. "Are those things not the same? We fight the same enemy."
"A common cause doesn't mean a common goal," Ahsoka said dryly, and Obi-Wan scoffed and rolled his eyes, his arms crossing over his chest.
"I will not stand in the way of your efforts to revive the Republic," the Sith said stiffly. "You know well where I stand on the matter. Is that why you've come to me? To make certain I haven't made off with a Star Destroyer and an army of Imperial soldiers so that I might bring them to bear against the rebellion that I helped to create?"
Ahsoka sighed heavily, finally breaking eye contact with the man as she shook her head. "You know I've never doubted you, Obi-Wan, but the time is coming when we will be in open war against the Empire. We need a cause to rally behind if we are to remain strong, and I'm not so certain that our High Command knows of your Imperial ambitions." A sly smirk touched the woman's lips. "Besides, 'Restore the Republic' just sounds better than 'Overthrow the Empire and Replace it With a New One.'"
"I was thinking more along the lines of, 'The Alliance to Install Me as Emperor,' but I can be flexible on the matter."
"Just know you're going to have a fight on your hands when all the rebel cells come together," Ahsoka cautioned, not unkindly as she took a step closer to the man. "The rebellion is made up of people who want to overthrow the Empire. They will not fight for us just to remain an Empire."
"Maybe not, but Imperials will," Obi-Wan said, gesturing out the viewport to the thousands of soldiers and technicians working outside on the ship. "And I assure you, Ahsoka, there are a great many people in this galaxy who believe in the strength of the Empire, and our cause will be all the stronger if our soldiers come from the Empire itself."
"I don't disagree with you, you know that," the Togruta said quietly. "Just keep it in mind. We cannot afford to be divided now when we are so close to the end. And speaking of drawing strength from the Empire..." she said, an excited smirk crossing her face. "I have for you perhaps our most valuable Imperial resource to date." She leaned in, a wide grin on her face. "Galen Walton Erso."
"...what, the head researcher on the Empire's secret project?" Obi-Wan asked, his jaw slack as he stared stupidly at her for a moment before he found his voice again. "You have him in custody?!"
"Not exactly..." Ahsoka said with a contemplative shake of her head. "But we did some digging following a suggestion of yours a while back, and after looking at all the data and information you've collected that is even tangentially related to this project, we're starting to see a pattern in the numbers, something that would easily slip through the cracks of Imperial procedure and nearly impossible to detect, since the Empire has had to be ridiculously roundabout to keep a project of this magnitude secret. And that might slip past the Imperial bureaucracy, but it's not getting past me."
Obi-Wan was silent for a moment as he stroked the stubble on his chin, his beard still growing back, and carefully examined her face. He inhaled sharply a second later when he understood the implications of what she had said. "You think Erso is a traitor to the Empire."
"I believe he well may be. Some of the delays that have occurred in the project since he became involved are perhaps a bit too convenient. They almost look intentional."
"Acts of quiet sabotage..." Obi-Wan muttered, nodding firmly when his quick mind swiftly connected everything he had learned. "We need to get hold of this man. If he's working from the inside against the Empire, at some point, he needs to be extracted so we can know what he has done."
"Which is why I'm here," Ahsoka said triumphantly, holding up a small datacard in her hand. "My scouts have finally managed to locate Erso's kyber refinery on Eadu. I was just headed there to case the place before I send in people to infiltrate, and I need solid back-up." The golden eyes glowed as she stepped closer, a devious smirk on her face that reminded Obi-Wan so much of her Master Quinlan. "You in?"
"Do you even need to ask?"
"The Force is disturbed..." Obi-Wan muttered under his breath as he wiped his rain soaked hair away from his forehead and peered at the Imperial facility. "No..." he corrected. "More than disturbed, there's a wound here. This entire place feels...wrong."
"Can you hear the screams?" Ahsoka asked, and the Sith Lord absently nodded.
"Kyber crystals. This isn't the song being corrupted, it's being destroyed." Obi-Wan growled and rubbed at his temple. "Not even the Dark Side has use for this. I wonder if they even have any idea what they're doing."
"If they cannot feel the Force, I doubt it..."
Obi-Wan hissed in disapproval, his eye scanning the facility as he peered through a pair of macrobinoculars at the considerable defenses. "I feel like my connection to the Force is disrupted in this place. It's very dangerous here for us, Ahsoka, I can't focus. This is not a place we can trust in the Force to see us through, we may as well be wearing suppression collars."
"Well, well..." Ahsoka drawled, sending a sly gaze toward the Sith Lord. "Who would have thought that all it would take to cull the Lord of the Sith are the screams of a few kyber crystals?"
"Yes, yes, have your fun now, Fulcrum..." Obi-Wan growled through grit teeth as he shoved the macrobinoculars back to the snickering Togruta. "We'll see who's laughing when your scouts can't infiltrate the facility."
"My scouts can infiltrate the facility," Ahsoka said with a roll of her eyes. "We can't. Who ever thought that Force sensitivity could be a hindrance?"
"I wonder if this was intentionally done," Obi-Wan grumbled, leaning over the rock ledge they sat upon to look deep into the canyon below. "It's certainly an effective way to keep us out."
"Sending you in was never the intention..." Ahsoka muttered as she looked through the macrobinoculars. "In a facility like that, too much could go wrong too quickly. We'd have to make a mess, and that defeats the purpose of an infiltration. Today is for research."
"How about that over there?" Obi-Wan said, pointing at the opposite canyon wall where a barely visible ladder stretched from the ground far below up to right underneath the research facility, the Togruta nodding and making a quick note of it. "I'm not sure it can get you in, but it can certainly get you up there."
"That's quite a long climb to be left so vulnerable..." she mumbled as she rapidly took notes on the datapad, the screen slick with the heavily falling rain despite shielding the device from the worst of it. "But it may be our only option. If we can have an idea of the delivery schedules and troop movements in and out of this place, we should be able to get someone in. Might take a few weeks, though."
"We've been after this secret project for years. I think we can wait a few more weeks if it means getting hold of Galen Erso." The com on Kenobi's wrist began to chime, and cursing under his breath as he covered the device to muffle the sound, he turned the volume down, checked the number, and answered. "Spectre One. Can't get enough of me, can you?"
"You know I can't," Kanan responded, the playful tone of his voice undermined by tension. "Listen, I know you're busy with that ship, but we need your help."
"Well, aren't you popular..." Ahsoka said with a soft chuckle that earner her a glare from the Lord of the Sith.
"What seems to be the problem?" Obi-Wan asked, grabbing Ahsoka's datapad from her hands and rubbing his temple, trying to clear his mind from the sound of the Force as it screamed, but it was no good.
"We were following up a lead," Kanan said almost hesitantly, like he was doing something he shouldn't have been, and Obi-Wan frowned in anticipation. "Rebel intelligence was right. The Empire was building something over Geonosis. Something big. But it's gone now. All that's left are the construction modules."
"Big, how big?" Obi-Wan asked, his attention drawn away from the datapad as he focused on Kanan. When last he had gone to Geonosis, he found nothing but dead Geonosians, the entire race exterminated by toxic gas he knew to be the work of Grand Moff Tarkin. But he certainly didn't find any signs of construction. Whatever it was the Spectres found, it must have drifted into orbit over the past few years.
"Well, whatever it was, they were building it in orbit, so massive," Kanan said, lowering his voice enough that Obi-Wan had to turn up the volume on his comlink. "And Geonosis is already a huge planet. If whatever it is that the Empire is building can't be built on Geonosis-"
"The magnitude of this weapon is unthinkable..." Obi-Wan muttered, his eyes drifting back to the research facility. "We knew it was big, but this is beginning to sound more and more impossible. How are they hiding a project this large?! There are laborers, mechanics, technicians, scientists, the bare minimum just to build the frame, let alone research the weapon systems, to say nothing of funding the project..." Obi-Wan groaned, his fingers to his temples as he shut his eyes against the massive headache the interference with the Force was causing him. "Half the Empire must be involved in its construction, how can they have kept it such a well guarded secret?"
"A good question for another day," Ahsoka said gravely as she returned the datapad to the pouch on her belt. "The more pressing matter is the purpose of that facility."
"I think you and I are of the same mind," Obi-Wan growled. "They're trying to weaponize kyber crystals for their secret project."
"Is that even possible?" Ahsoka whispered, nervousness tightening her chest, her focus drifting back to the facility. "Kyber crystals are unstable, they can only find harmony when they're balanced just right. The bigger they are, the more unstable they become. To power a weapon for something as large as you're describing..." She shook her head. "It's impossible, isn't it?"
"I don't know..." Obi-Wan muttered. "I...can't see anything in the Force. But something strange is happening here. I don't like it. You need to get people in here as quickly as possible. Friend or foe, we must reach Galen Erso."
"I'll make sure it happens, Kenobi."
"Alright, that's disturbing as all hell," Kanan said over the com, and both Ahsoka and Obi-Wan turned their gazes to the device, having forgotten that they were connected with the Jedi. "But that isn't why I called. We went aboard the construction module so we could investigate and maybe find out what was being built, but we were ambushed by Kallus and his men. We lost Zeb."
"...you what!?" Obi-Wan hissed, his teeth grinding together as he stared at the hateful comlink on his wrist. "Lost him, what do you mean you lost him?! Is he dead? Misplaced?! Damn it, Kanan, you need to be more specific in your word choice!"
"Lost as in lost, Kenobi!" Kanan snapped back. "He got away in an escape pod, but we don't know where it landed and there's no signs of life on Geonosis! Rex thinks the chances of surviving entry into Geonosis' atmosphere are slim, but we can't give up on him. We need your help to search before Imperial reenforcements arrive."
"Can you feel him in the Force?" Obi-Wan asked, his hand wrapping around Ahsoka's arm and dragging her back to the ship.
"No..." Kanan said quietly. "I've been trying, Kenobi, but-"
"Keep trying," Obi-Wan quickly interrupted, walking up the Shadow's ramp and pointing Ahsoka toward the cockpit, the Togruta running to start powering on the ship. "Keep scanning, broaden your search parameters. I'm not too far away from Geonosis, we shouldn't be more than a few hours away. Keep your eyes open for Imperials, I don't know if I'll make it before them."
"Thanks, Kenobi..." Kanan said with a heavy sigh, and Obi-Wan cut the com as he dropped into the pilot's seat, snarling curses under his breath as he activated the stealth drive and took off up into the atmosphere.
"Did you at least get everything you needed?" the Sith asked quietly when they passed through the turbulent storm clouds that covered the planet.
"More than I expected," she said, taking out her datapad and laying it in her lap as she began sifting through the information. "Truthfully, confirming the facility's location was the only thing I hoped for. We lost a lot of people just looking for it, the coordinates were costly."
"Put what you learned to good use..." Obi-Wan said absently, running his hand through his hair as he looked at the woman next to him. "Contact the Subjugator. We need someone to head for Geonosis immediately, and this seems like a job for Luke and Leia."
It was cold. The air so frigid he could see his breath in the air, and even with his coat of fur, his hairs were standing on end, the cold penetrating through even that. Through the hole in the thick sheet of ice high above him, caused by his escape pod when he had crashed, Zeb could see the sun in the sky above, and for how cold it was during daylight, it didn't bode well for the inevitable fall of night.
It had been an ill-conceived idea to begin with, and they all knew it. He had said so. Kanan had said so, had even told Hera to keep the Ghost running and ready to go in the hangar should they be in need of a quick escape, as these situations so often needed. They all knew that it felt like a trap, but the lure of learning what the Empire was up to was far too great, and they had walked willing into it, only to be met by the ISB's Agent Kallus and his men. Zeb had stayed behind to give the others a chance to escape, but hadn't been able to make it to the Ghost himself and fled from the Imperials in an escape pod.
But not before Agent Kallus had brought their fight to him inside the escape vessel, trapping the two adversaries together as the pod was shot off course by stray Imperial fire, sending them careening toward the planet below.
With a heavy sigh, the Lasat looked over his shoulder at his unwanted companion. Agent Kallus leaned back against their wrecked escape pod, his breath coming in hard, fast puffs that frosted the air, his face flushed and sweating despite the cold, his eyes glassy with pain, and a shaking hand resting gingerly on his right thigh, his leg stretched out before him. Below the knee, even through his pants, it was obvious that the leg was hopelessly broken, an odd, sharp lump rasing from halfway down his lower leg and soaking his pants through with blood that pooled beneath his boot. Even without seeing the actual injury, it was obvious to Zeb that the bone had snapped and pierced through muscle and skin. The cold may have been helping to slow the blood flow and numb the pain, but the injury needed real medical attention if Kallus had any hope for survival.
Which he didn't. Neither of them did. Kallus may die from his injury, but the cold, or whatever predators he could hear roaring in the tunnels within this frozen waste would claim Zeb the moment night fell.
With a growl, Zeb turned from the opening above him and trudged back toward the escape pod, a quick glance at Kallus revealing that, despite the pain that glazed his eyes, the ISB Agent was following his every movement, a shaking hand reaching for the blaster on his hip that Zeb had removed just after the crash. The Lasat cast an irritated glance at the other man, his lips curling up in a snarl that exposed his long, sharp canines as he past by him and climbed into the wreckage of the escape pod. Of all the people in all the galaxy to be trapped with in this frozen hole, Zeb didn't understand why it had to be one of the men responsible for the fall of Lasan. He knew of course now that there were millions of his people living on the Lasat homeworld of Lira San out in Wild Space, but that didn't take away from the years he had believed himself to be the last of his species, all because of the Empire and men like Agent Kallus who made the bloody extermination possible.
With a growl of effort, Zeb began tearing the paneling out of the inside of the escape pod to expose the innards of the wrecked ship, his clawed hands rifling through the mess of melted wires and frayed components for something that might be of use. Like most things in the pod, the small central console was entirely destroyed, but he managed to remove the mostly undamaged transponder and a few components that hadn't melted so he could perhaps fix it. With a functioning transponder, he could get a signal out to the Ghost, and he knew they were looking for him. Hera would be here as soon as she knew where he was. It was a long shot, but there was at least some hope that he could get off this freezing rock.
Gathering up his components and the heavy survival pack that was stored in the overhead compartment of every escape pod, Zeb crawled out of the wreckage, dropped his materials on the ground as he sat upon a rock, and kept one wary eye on Kallus as he opened the emergency equipment. It was filled with the expected bare minimum equipment for survival, a basic medkit with some bandages, a cold compress, antibacterial spray and a small tube of bacta, a few breathers in case the air was toxic or unbreathable, a folding tent and a thermal blanket and a small space heater for survival in the cold.
Zeb immediately unwrapped the blanket and the tent, and growled when, almost laughably predictable, the Imperial grade supplies was wholly insufficient, the tent failing to deploy as intended and instead tearing upon opening when one of the supports broke, and the blanket little more than a flimsy shred of foil that threatened to blow away with each gust of freezing wind that tore through the tunnels. With a growl of frustration, Zeb stuffed the blanket and the tent back into the bag and powered on the space heater, breathing a sigh of relief when at least that seemed to work, though the battery life he didn't suspect would last terribly long. He set the heater between himself and Kallus, and groaning as he rose, he walked toward the injured agent, medkit in hand.
"S-stay away!" Kallus gasped, his voice slurred and thick with pain, his one good leg pushing and sliding uselessly against the icy ground in an effort to get away from the Lasat, though the escape pod at his back and the slippery conditions ensured he didn't move at all. He reached blindly to his side, his fingers brushing through the snow and ice for a weapon, but found nothing, a small, frightened whimper falling from his lips when the growling Lasat knelt before him and wrapped his large hand around the thigh of his injured leg. Kallus' struggle ended when a swift kick of his broken leg sent pain lancing through his entire body, his head swimming and his stomach flipping with nausea as he pitched sideways and vomited on the ground.
"Karabast, hold still, you idiot!" Zeb snarled, grabbing the Imperial's leg so hard the man went still, quiet groans of pain with every breath and his eyes wide and hazy as he watched the Lasat grab the agent's pant leg and carefully pull it up to reveal the man's injury. Zeb hissed as he looked upon it, jagged bits of bone breaking through skin that had turned black and purple with cold and bruising. He looked at the small tube of bacta in the medkit, and felt unbelievably foolish as he unscrewed the cap to squeeze the contents into the injury. It wasn't even close to enough. Kallus needed a medcenter, not a couple bandages and a dab of bacta.
His eyes darting briefly to look at the Imperial's face, Zeb took a deep breath, laid his large hand over the place the tubes of bone protruded from the skin, and gritting his teeth, he pressed down hard. Panicked, agonized screams echoed in the cavern and through the tunnels to amplify the horrid noise in Zeb's already sensitive ears as the shards of bone were forced back into the Imperial's leg. Resting his knee on Kallus' thigh to keep him still, he grabbed hold of the lower leg to move and manipulate it until he felt the two halves of the bone roughly line up, and he looked quickly to Kallus' face when the screaming stopped to find the man's eyes staring sightlessly into nothing. With the swift rise and fall of the agent's chest, Zeb returned to his work when he was satisfied that he wasn't dead, and he squeezed the bacta gel into the wound, pressing hard on the small tube to empty it.
When the wound was as covered as Zeb was going to get it, he reached into the medpack and removed the bandages, tightly wrapping them around the injury until he was satisfied that it was stable enough to hold the leg together, he pulled the black pant leg down, stuffed the unused equipment back into his bag, and returned to his rock to begin work on the broken transponder, briefly looking at Kallus to make certain the man was still breathing. Zeb was no medic, and he had done what he could, though he was uncertain as to why. It would have been easier to simply leave the Imperial to suffer and most certainly die from his wounds. It was the least Kallus deserved for his part in the extermination of the Lasat on Lasan.
Maybe years ago, Zeb would have done just that. Years ago, when he was bitter and angry and alone in the galaxy, the last of his kind, the Captain of Lasan's Honor Guard who had failed his people so badly just by surviving. It was no small thing to kill an Imperial when just looking at them brought the flood of memories crashing upon him of his homeworld on fire as his people screamed and died under the Empire's assault. But that was before Hera and Kanan and the Ghost, before grumpy Chopper and the eccentric Sabine, before mischievous Ezra came to be like a much younger brother to him. They killed Imperials, of course, many of them, always when necessary, though it often was. But an unarmed man too wounded to fight? They never would. They couldn't. The Empire did things like that, and they had to be better than the Empire. They were better than it.
Kallus was badly wounded and couldn't very well be considered a threat in his state. But beyond that, the situation they found themselves in was perilous, and they were almost certainly going to die. They were most likely to survive if they worked together, though if Kallus wasn't wounded, it was unlikely he would share the sentiment. No, it seemed more plausible that the Imperial would simply continue the fight, and they would both be dead. Just as they were already dead now, if Zeb couldn't repair the transponder. He was certain his friends were looking for him, but without knowing where to look, the chances of them finding him before nightfall were impossibly slim.
Zeb snapped the spare components into the transponder to replace the broken and melted parts, his shoulders hunched in concentration as he manipulated the small pieces with hands that were too large for such precise work. It made him wish Sabine was there, the skillful Mandalorian able to accomplish such a task with ease while Zeb struggled to grasp the pieces between his claws to get them into the smaller spaces. If she were here, the transponder would already be fixed and would probably have been rigged to fire explosives at oncoming threats. If Kanan and Ezra were here, those threats would already have been contained, either killed or tamed, as the Jedi were apt to do. Or if Chopper were here, the transponder would be unnecessary, as the little droid could have just contacted Hera and had her here for rescue in no time.
Zeb sighed heavily. He missed his team.
"Nobody is coming for us..." Kallus said in a thin, weak voice from where he lay upon the ground, and Zeb glared at him from where he sat, his temper quickly rising. It was easier to deal with Kallus when he was unconscious.
"Maybe nobody's coming for you," Zeb growled, "but my team is coming for me. I'm not some nameless, faceless Imperial. I can't just be replaced like you."
Kallus scoffed and gave the Lasat a dismissive shrug. "Even if they are looking for you, they'll never find you. Presumably they'd be looking for you on Geonosis, and this is clearly not Geonosis."
"Which is why I'm fixing this," Zeb snarled, holding up the transponder so Kallus could see before he growled and turned his eyes away from the agent. "If you're not going to be helpful, keep your mouth shut!" To his surprise, Kallus did shut up, but the Imperial never stopped looking at him, and with a growl, Zeb returned to his work, putting aside the smaller pieces he was struggling it and began monitoring the Imperial device, removing pieces and components that would allow the transmitted signal to be picked up by anyone instead of just the Imperial ships it was coded for. The work was far easier than the fine precision work that was actually required for fixing the device, but one way or another, Zeb would succeed. Yes, the transponder's signal may alter the Empire to their presence, but Zeb was certain that the Empire wasn't so much as looking for the missing ISB agent, and he knew that the SPectres were, without a doubt, looking for him. They would be here before the Empire. He just needed to get the signal out.
When he looked back up at his companion, Kallus' gaze was fixed out the hole above them toward the quickly darkening sky, the man closing his eyes after a moment and shifting to wipe the sweat off his pale forehead. "You can see Geonosis from here..." Kallus muttered weakly, his shaking hand pointing up toward the sky, and with a frown, Zeb leaned over to look out into the sky from Kallus' angle to see the impossibly large glowing orange of Geonosis rising in the sky. "We're on a moon," the agent continued. "Bahryn, most like. Be sure to put that in the transmission if you ever get that damn thing fixed..."
"Oh, I'll be sure to keep that in mind, sir!" Zeb snarled, his hand tightening around the transponder and the tiny components slipping between his claws to land with a tiny clack upon the ice. Zeb roared in irritation scooping up the component to try again when a tired sigh snapped him out of his rage, and he looked up to see Kallus, his hand extended out toward him, Zeb eyed him cautiously for a moment, bearing his teeth as he looked at the Imperial, before he dropped the transponder and the components into the agent's hand. Kallus quietly bent to work, his smaller fingers able to work the components better than Zeb even though his hands shook terribly with the shock and the pain. Slowly, Zeb scooted closer to the Imperial, watching as the man worked and pulling the space heater closer to them, the slightest smile on Kallus' lips with the feel of the additional warmth.
"Why did you help me?" Kallus whispered when he managed to successfully fix one of the three components to the transponder, his eyes flicking briefly to the thick lump on his leg where Zeb had tightly wrapped the bandages around the break. "You could have just as easily killed me."
"I'd rather you live and heal so you and I can have a fair fight," Zeb growled quietly, his eyes on the transponder instead of on the man he spoke to. "There's no honor in killing a wounded opponent. I'm no Imperial."
"You can't judge all Imperials the same, Lasat," Kallus said coldly as he twisted the next component into place, and Zeb scoffed beside him, a soft, warning growl in his chest.
"After what your Empire did to my people on Lasan, you damn well better believe I can!" Zeb snapped, his eyes narrowing dangerously as he glared at the unconcerned Imperial, and the lack of a rise out of Kallus quickly snuffed out Zeb's anger. "You had a bo-rifle," Zeb said, his tone hard and accusing, and Kallus slowly nodded.
"That your Shadow King stole from me, if I recall," Kallus muttered bitterly. "No doubt it found its way back into your possession."
"Where it belongs!" Zeb growled, his hand reflexively reaching for his own bo-rifle that was strapped to his back. "It doesn't belong in the hands of some Imperial like some trophy to commemorate the fall of Lasan!"
"I didn't take that weapon as a trophy," Kallus said quietly as he gently slid the final piece into place and twisted it to lock it into position. "The Guardsman I faced fought well and died honorably, and gave me the weapon before he died." With a heavy breath, Kallus pushed the repaired transponder into Zeb's hand and met the confused rebel's gaze. "It wasn't a trophy," he repeated firmly.
"The Boosahn Keeraw..." Zeb muttered absently, his attention drifting elsewhere for a moment before he looked back to Kallus, his brow furrowed with a lack of understanding. "The Lasat Warrior way," he quietly explained. "When defeated by a superior foe, he gives him his weapon. It's...a sign of respect." Zeb sighed heavily and took his own bo-rifle into his hands, the transponder resting upon his leg suddenly less important than the horror that linked the two men. "If that's in fact the way the weapon came to you, then I have no business with it."
"I was just doing my duty," Kallus said quietly into the heavy, awkward silence between them. "It wasn't anything personal."
"Yeah, well it was personal to me," Zeb growled, but the bitter anger he so often felt when he thought about that day wasn't there, the knowledge that he was not the last doing nothing to cure the pain of the memory, but soothed him enough to face it. "I will never forget what the Empire did on Lasan."
"We all have things we will never forget..." Kallus whispered, his breathing beginning to shake as his eyes slid out of focus. He could feel a cold chill creep up upon him, and he wasn't certain if it was simply the cold that came with night, or the shill of death reaching out to touch at him, the dull throb in his leg becoming sharp, searing pain with every beat of his heart. He wasn't sure if it was the recognition of his approaching death or the delirium of his shock-addled mind that loosened his tongue, but Kallus wasn't sure it mattered. This Lasat rebel wasn't the company he would have chosen, but he was likely the last company he would have, and when he glanced toward the much larger creature, Kallus found him listening intently. They may have been enemies, but they were stranded together, and in this, however temporary, they were comrades, and to Kallus, who didn't wish to die but knew his outlook was grim, that was good enough.
"My first unit was deployed to Onderon to bring peace and security to the civilians there caught in the middle of the violent actions of a seditious and dangerous rebel insurgency," Kallus quietly explained when he swallowed the pain creeping up his chest and focused. "One of your friends, perhaps. Saw Gerrera. You may have heard of him, he's been linked to the actions of the Shadow King in the past."
"I've heard the name, yeah," Zeb said quietly. "Can't say I've met him. Maybe the Shadow King has, but I'm not responsible for what he does. That guy's nuts."
"I suppose it doesn't matter..." Kallus grumbled, setting aside his instincts to dig for more information aside. "We were on a routine patrol when Gerrera's terrorists attacked and detonated a bomb in the middle of a crowded marketplace. Hundreds were caught in the blast and wounded or killed, including my patrol, but it was mostly innocent civilians." Kallus laughed uncomfortably, his arms crossing over his chest as he shivered from the horror of the memory. "I was lucky, I guess. The first explosion threw me out of range of the second. When I regained consciousness, it was chaos, and I was trapped beneath a pile of rubble and rendered immobile, and that's when I saw them," the agent said darkly. "The terrorists responsible for all that death, all that chaos, all those innocent lives destroyed. I watched them calmly walk through smoke and fire and death to finish my unit off one by one. They never had a chance."
"But you survived..." Zeb quietly interjected, the sympathy in his chest making him desperate to say something, anything at all to somehow lessen the blow of the senseless violence of these other rebels. Zeb often forgot that most who fought against the Empire weren't so principled or merciful as the Ghost and her crew. Most of them didn't have the honor of being led by people like Hera Syndulla and Kanan Jarrus.
"And every single day I wake up and ask myself why..." Kallus said, his voice distant as he slowly lost himself in his memories. A sharp and sudden pain shot through him and quickly drew him back to the present, and he tore his eyes away from the Lasat's sympathetic gaze. "This should hardly surprise you," Kallus said bitterly. "Not when your insurgency is working hand in hand with the Shadow King himself. There is no greater murderer in the entire galaxy. How many has he killed for your cause? How many innocent lives has he destroyed in his fight against the Empire? How much chaos and destruction has he brought to bear just to destabilize the peace and security that the Empire has brought to the galaxy?" Kallus scoffed in disgust. "You rebels are terrorists and murderers. Nothing more."
"How can you say that when the Empire has done so much worse?" Zeb snarled, baring his teeth at the wounded Imperial. "You leave a line of ruined worlds in your wake, entire planets and populations used for your purposes until there is nothing left! People are crushed beneath the wright of Imperial restrictions, entire species wiped out and destroyed for defying your Emperor!"
"What else do you expect us to do when we are fighting violent terrorists?" Kallus growled in return, pain and cold and frustration making his own temper begin to rise. "We impose and enforce peace and order, and you rebels attack us, disrupt the peace, and we are forced to enforce stricter rules to make seditious activities harder to carry out so the civilians can be safe!"
"What, so all the evil the Empire does is for the good of the people?" Zeb scoffed. "Is that why the Lasat were massacred? Is that why there is no more life on Geonosis?" he asked, pointing to the planet hanging large above them, and Kallus' immediate retort was caught in his throat as he stuttered, suddenly at a loss.
"I...don't know what happened on Geonosis..." Kallus muttered. "I know a few years ago, dead Geonosians fell from the sky over Coruscant. Hundreds of thousands of bodies during one of the Empire Day celebrations. Maybe you should ask your Shadow King about that," Kallus said darkly. "The attack was attributed to him."
"Anything to absolve your precious Empire, right?" Zeb mocked, a wry smirk on his face when anger flashed in the agent's eyes.
"We keep the galaxy safe, we keep the people safe," Kallus insisted. "Even if you and I die here, the Empire will continue on, and rebels like you will be brought to justice."
"And yet, every single day, more and more people become fed up with the Empire and join with the rebels you so despise." Zeb grinned widely. "Why do you think that is? If the people are fighting the Empire, just what is it that you are fighting to protect if not the people?"
Kallus didn't say anything, only leaned back against the escape pod, his eyes on dead Geonosis high above him as he listened to the Lesat fiddle with the transponder and laugh triumphantly with the high-pitched whine of the transmitting signal, his mind echoing over and over with the question the rebel had posed. He had served the Empire for so long, had done his duty, had kept the peace, had never asked questions when told not to, and now that he found himself asking, he felt a knot of apprehension and unease deep in his gut.
"It's getting colder..." Kallus muttered under his breath after a moment of silence. "The space heater is going to freeze, it's not meant for severe cold."
"Typical..." Zeb grumbled under his breath. "What's the point of a heater if it stops working when it gets cold?"
"Probably the same as a transponder that cannot transmit a signal..." Kallus said, pointing to the device in the Lesat's hand, a small red indicator lighting up when the smooth transmission signal became increasingly high-pitched with effort. Frowning, he looked up, distracted for a moment by the heaviness of the frost his breath created in the air before he squinted to look at their surroundings. "The thickness of the ice may be interfering with the signal strength."
Zeb growled and looked at the device in his hands before he began eyeballing the steep, icy slopes of the walls that made the steep climb toward the hole above them, a climb that he hadn't even considered attempting until now. "So you're saying I need to climb out of here to get this guy to the surface for a shot at a clear signal..." Zeb mused, looking back at the agent to find a look of careful consideration upon his face.
"You certainly could..." Kallus quietly admitted. "But I thought it might be safer if you just threw it up there."
"The transponder could break," Zeb said with an arch of his eyebrow, which was met by the same expression on Kallus' face.
"You could slip and die in the fall." He gestured toward his leg. "Or you could break a limb, and we no longer have the supplies to even begin treating it."
Zeb considered for a moment, shrugged, and rose to his feet, carefully gripping the ice with his feet as he walked to stand beneath the hole in the ice and rock, and threw the transponder in a wide arc, the device sailing effortlessly out of the tunnels and disappearing on the surface. "I didn't know you cared, Agent Kallus," Zeb drawled mockingly as he settled back down next to the Imperial, Kallus rolling his eyes as he did so, though a faint smirk tugged at the edge of his lips.
"I don't..." the Imperial drawled. "But our chances of survival are low enough as they are. If you're injured as well, our odds are so low we may as well be dead. I know that my survival is entirely dependent on you."
"And don't you hate that," Zeb said, exposing his fangs as he grinned. "I bet you're glad that I'm not like you."
"You're right, I am," Kallus muttered quietly. "Although I may have surprised you."
"I sincerely doubt that," Zeb scoffed. "I know how Imperial justice works."
"Do you?" Kallus asked, sighing as he leaned back against the escape pod and clutched his arms tightly around himself to keep warm. "When the Empire comes for us, if you surrender peacefully, you'll be given a fair trial. You'll see."
"Oh, I know Imperial justice for Lasat," Zeb growled softly as he leaned back and relaxed as well. "I'd rather take my chances with the cold and whatever beasts are lurking in the tunnels."
"You might just get that wish..." Kallus said, frowning as he watched the orange glow of the space heater flicker into nothing. "The heat went out."
"Perfect..." Zeb growled, his eyes darting to the Imperial, to the dead heater, to the hole high above them, and back to the Imperial. With a heavy sigh, Zeb scooted closer to Kallus, ignoring the wary glances on the agent's face as he stopped right beside him, the much smaller man's shivering body pressed against the Lasat. "If we make it out of here, and you breathe a word of this to anyone ever, I'll kill you, got it?" Chuckling softly, Kallus closed his eyes and leaned against the rebel.
"Won't say a word..."
"You need to calm down, Ezra," Luke said gently, his soft voice somehow still heard over the hum of the W-Wing, and Ezra leaned back against the seat, closed his eyes, and smiled. The entire day had been a mess with Zeb missing, and with a limit on how long they had to freely search until the Empire sent reenforcements, the crew of the Ghost was in a state of crisis as they searched for their lost teammate. That didn't mean they weren't calm. Kanan and Hera, stalwart leaders that they were, were calm as could be, putting aside their feelings in order to get to business. Sabine had been fairly collected as well, which left Ezra, and he was anything but calm.
Early searches over Geonosis yielded nothing, scans of the planet revealed no life, and the longer they searched, the more it seemed to Ezra that his roommate and friend was dead. He hadn't been calm since Zeb went missing and the longer they searched, the less calm Ezra became. When he and Sabine had returned from their second sweep in the Phantom, the young Jedi was on the brink of a panic attack which was made marginally better when he heard that Kanan had called in Kenobi. Ezra wasn't certain what the Sith Lord could do that they hadn't already done, but having extra people on the job made him feel significantly better, and the crew of Kenobi's Umbra would more than double the eyes they had looking for Zeb.
When he and Sabine returned from their third sweep, Kenobi wasn't there and had sent word that he was on the way, but may not be there before Imperial reenforcements arrived, but he had sent help ahead in the hopes that they would arrive before the Empire. Just as he and Sabine were about to go out again, that help arrived in two black X-Wings, and despite the urgency of their search, Ezra couldn't keep the grin off his face. Kenobi had sent them the Gemini Agents, and Ezra was certain that with their help, they would find Zeb. They had divided up quickly to begin their search, and never one to waste an opportunity, Ezra had volunteered to fly with Luke, and even though the X-Wing was a single-passenger starfighter, amicable Luke agreed that while it would be tight, the two of them could certainly fit, and he welcomed the company.
Calm down, Luke had said. Ezra hadn't felt so calm since this day began. Luke was just a calming, soothing influence, his presence in the Force temperate and gentle, nothing at all like the wild, fierce tempest of his sister or the cold, silent fury of his father. Luke was entrenched in the Light, an impressive thing for being surrounded by so much darkness, and in his presence, even the darkness that Ezra felt seemed to flee, his anger and restlessness subsiding, leaving him peaceful and calm and focused, even in the face of the fear he felt for Zeb and the stress of the limited time they had to find him before they had to leave.
"If you aren't calm," Luke continued, sitting as far forward in his seat as he could to give the other boy room behind him, "things aren't so clear in the Force. It makes it murky, harder to see." He bit his lip in concentration as he leaned forward, his eyes roving over Geonosis beneath them. "We can find your friend. We just need to let go and surrender ourselves to the Force..."
"I know you don't know me well yet, Luke, but this is about as calm as I get..." Ezra said s he looked over the other boy's shoulder to look at the radar display on the console, and frowned when he saw nothing. "Kenobi says the senses are sharpened by emotions."
Luke exhaled in a low hiss, his shoulders bunching into tight knots with frustration. This was a conversation he had many times before. "Father isn't wrong..." Luke said slowly. "Harnessing emotions as the Sith are taught to do can make you very powerful, but it can also lead you astray, makes it easier to misread the signs the Force gives you, or misinterpret what you sense to fit what you wish to be." Luke took a deep breath as he nodded to himself. "No, clearing your mind and calming your emotions will give you perspective you wouldn't have had before. Allows you to see a wider scope." Luke turned his head to look over his shoulder and smile brightly at the boy behind him. "Just what we need to find your friend."
"I hope so..." Ezra muttered. "Because I don't feel anything..."
"...yeah, neither do I," Luke said, frowning as he pressed a button on his display. "R2, I'm not picking up anything. Are you seeing anything I'm missing?" There were a series of sharp whistles and beeps from the astromech in the back of the starfighter, and Luke scoffed softly and rolled his eyes. "No, I know Geonosis is a dead planet, but that should make it easier for you to find something if it's there." More short, curt beeps, and Ezra quickly got the idea that, like Chopper, this astromech had an attitude. Luke frowned when the droid chirped and whistled almost cheerfully. "No, that's not how the Force works, and you know it. Just expand the search radius and let's see what we come up with."
When the droid whistled in compliance, Luke pulled back on the yoke, the nose of the X-Wing angling away from Geonosis and out into space, leaving a confused Ezra to press his face against the side of the cockpit shielding as the planet disappeared from view. He felt his stomach begin to twist into knots with the sudden spike of anxiety, swallowing hard as he looked out and scanned the space before them for the Star Destroyers that he knew were coming. A warm, gentle hand rested on his leg, and the sharp edges of his worry were smoothed, the feel of calm flooding him when Luke turned and smiled back at him.
"Sabine and Hera are searching Geonosis," Luke quietly explained, his hands back on the yoke as he directed them toward the construction modules that hung in orbit and the planet's scattered moons. "There's going to be little to this search you and I can add that hasn't already been done or isn't currently being done."
"What about Leia?" Ezra ventured, the rest of his question silenced by a definitive head shake from Luke.
"No, Leia has the same idea I do..." Luke muttered absently as he checked the readings on his display. "There's no life on Geonosis. With the way you have been searching, any activity down there would have lit up your scanners, you would have found him by now. No, if Zeb is alive, and I believe he is, he isn't on Geonosis."
"Sabine said the gravitational pull from a planet that large would practically guarantee that something like an escape pod be pulled into its atmosphere," Ezra said, his heart beating suddenly faster when a slight, restrained smile tugged at the corner of Luke's lips and his warm blue eyes gazed excitedly at him.
"Practically guarantee, Ezra, does not mean it is impossible for something otherwise to occur."
"Practically impossible," Ezra drawled, and Luke's mischievous grin grew wider.
"Exactly the sort of odds my Father favors. Impossible is nothing with the power of the Force." Luke's fingers tapped effortlessly over his console, activating the ship's transmitter, which didn't crackle with static as the one on the Ghost, but started with a smooth hum, and for the first time since Luke had slid into the cockpit to occupy the lone seat with the other teenager, Ezra took his attention away from the captivating Luke and took note of the quality of the ship he flew in. "Leia, what's your status?" Luke asked into the empty air, and was quickly met with a smooth hiss of irritation from the com speakers by his head.
"Just clearing the rings of the planet now," Leia muttered, her voice laced with annoyed focus that made Ezra's stomach uncomfortably churn with the pull of darkness, a thing that he often felt, but only now was realizing how cold it made him feel. "Geonosis has fifteen moons, only four of which are even remotely large. Since our preliminary scans didn't turn up anything, it's a good bet that he isn't on any of the smaller ones, we would have already located him if that were the case."
"So four search areas," Luke said with a nod. "That's good, much more manageable. Can you sense if he's alive?" Again, that hiss of irritation.
"I don't think I'm going to be much use to you here," Leia reluctantly muttered. "The Force here is stained with the slaughter of billions, all I can feel is death, I can't see past it. I...can't sense any life at all, from anywhere. I'm sorry, Luke. If he's alive, I won't be the one to see it. That's going to have to come from you." There was a brief moment of tense, angry silence, a swift chill through the Force that made Ezra's hair stand on end. "Father would be able to sense it," she ground out bitterly. "Father could cut through all the darkness like it was nothing and find him in an instant. He should be here instead of us."
"Father couldn't get here fast enough, and he sent you and I for a reason, Leia," Luke quietly reassured her. "You and I have what is necessary to help, or he would have sent Vitios and Vehemis. We can do this."
"But I can't-"
"Don't worry about it, Leia," Luke quickly dismissed. "If he's alive out here, Ezra and I will find him."
"Mm, I have no doubt you and your little boyfriend can get the job done..." Leia said in a slow, teasing drawl, and while Ezra could feel his face and ears begin to burn, Luke simply scoffed and rolled his eyes.
"How many times do I have to tell you, Leia, he's not my boyfriend," Luke said with a roll of his eyes, which was met with a swift, decisive bark of laughter from his twin.
"Not yet!" Leia chirped. "But I bet it's awfully cozy in there. Feeling a bit hot, Bridger?"
"H-how did you..." Ezra stammered, his face flushing further and only becoming worse when Luke put his hand on his shoulder to silence him.
"Enough, Leia, or I'll tell Father about what you were doing when we stopped on Rajtiri the other week," Luke said firmly. "That place is crawling with smugglers, and he already doesn't like your affinity for scoundrels. I don't know what he'd think..."
"Stop playing around and get to work, Luke!" Leia snapped. "Sith Hells, we have a man to save, this is no time for talk like that!" The com cut before anyone had a chance to respond, and with a satisfied smile, Luke banked the ship hard and brought them around to fly swiftly toward one the cluster of Geonosis' moons in the distance.
"She's right, isn't she?" Ezra asked quietly as they sped toward the distant moons. "Kenobi would have found him in a second."
"You're probably right," Luke said quietly. "Father's very powerful, and he has a gift for seeing things clearly in the Force." The boy stuttered for a moment, his breath hitching as his hands tightened around the yoke with distress, and Ezra reflexively reached out and laid a comforting hand on his shoulder, Luke quickly looking behind him at the other teen and smiling tightly. "Sorry..." he muttered under his breath. "Even my Father isn't infinitely powerful. He can get things wrong, and not even his foresight is perfect, especially not these days...I'll wager he sent Leia and I because he can't trust the things he sees..."
"Because of what happened on Moraband?" Ezra gently asked, watching as Luke's jaw tightened at the mention. "I don't know what happened, but you guys came back pretty shaken..."
"No, not because of Moraband..." Luke whispered, a sad, genuine smile on his lips as he turned to look at the other teen. "It's because of what you saw, Ezra."
"M-me?" Ezra stammered, the sudden crestfallen look on Luke's face distracting him from thinking of what vision he was talking about.
"On Lothal, in the Temple," Luke quietly clarified. "The one with the Sith Master and the dark shadows, the one where Father was defeated..." He sighed heavily, his fingers drifting absently over the console before him and leaning back, his back brushing against Ezra's chest. "Father has been meditating on it often, it's all he sees in the Force...he thinks it's throwing off his senses, and he thinks it's drawing closer."
"It was just a vision, right? A warning?" Ezra asked, concern suddenly tightening hard in his chest. "I mean, it doesn't have to happen."
"Father thinks it will..." Luke muttered, that forlorn smile coming to his lips again that made Ezra's chest ache. "And he thinks it will happen soon. After he finishes with the Star Destroyer, he's going back to the Temple on Lothal. It's where the vision was first seen, he thinks maybe he can learn something new if he goes there." Luke sighed softly, the smile on his lips becoming more genuine as he looked at the other boy. "Perhaps you can go with us. It would be nice to have the support."
"Y-you think he'd let me?" Ezra asked, clearing his throat when he felt his voice cracking, the feeling only getting worse when Luke seemed to light up as he chuckled softly.
"I can't imagine why not. You are the one who first had the vision." He shrugged and turned back around, brushing his feathery blond hair out of his face, his shoulders relaxed as he took hold of the yoke. "And I'd like to have you there."
Ezra sputtered, tried to find something say, anything to keep away the feel of the heat rising in his face and the realization of how cramped it was in the X-Wing's cockpit, how hot two bodies made the small space, how he was so close to the other teen that he could smell him, like sun and wind and sand. Try as he might, Ezra couldn't find his voice, and couldn't anyways find anything to say that didn't make him sound like an idiot in his mind. The silence was only broken when the moons they were heading to came within scanning range, luminous orbs in the viewport that seemed almost as if he could reach out and grasp the largest in his hand.
"We're coming up on our first search zone," Luke said quietly. "Clear your mind and reach into the Force with me. If your friend is here, we'll find him."
Taking a deep breath, Ezra closed his eyes and focused on Zeb, could feel Luke's presence warm and calm beside him and allowed the other teen to take the lead, allowing him to guide their search deep into the easy stream of light and life that surrounded them. It was overwhelming, the Force infinite in a way that Ezra hadn't experienced before, the breath of life ghosting across his skin and ruffling his hair, and he clung to Luke to make certain he wasn't lost in the depths. Slowly, he could feel Luke's calm focus narrow, taking Ezra with him as the galaxy seemed smaller, one star, not billions, one planet a black void in the Force, one moon small and cold and bright with life that called to Ezra the way life always seemed to call to him.
"There," Ezra said, pointing to a silver-white moon, one of the larger ones, but not the one they were headed towards. "There's life down there, Luke, we need to go."
"Is it your friend?" Luke asked, not waiting for the boy to answer before he banked hard to port and began flying fast toward the icy moon.
Ezra quickly shook his head. "I don't feel Zeb, just...life. It's more than I've felt since we began looking." The sharp, shrill whistles and beeps of the astromech blurted from the speakers by Ezra's head, and Luke straightened up, quickly flicked his fingers over the console, his eyes on his scanner as he pulled back hard on the acceleration, the sudden force of their rapidly gained speed sending Ezra pushing hard against the back of the seat and Luke pressing hard against him as they shot full-speed toward the moon.
"R2 agrees, he's picking up a weak signal," Luke quickly explained, his hands racing over the console. "Penumbra, Phantom, and Ghost, this is Antumbra on approach vector to Geonosis 5, Bahryn. I think we found Spectre Four."
"Copy that, Antumbra," Hera said swiftly, her voice tight with what Ezra recognized as her contained hopeful excitement. "We're locking on and on the way." Luke muttered a quick affirmative before he cut the connection and focused on flying in fast toward the moon, cutting low in the atmosphere and flying close to the ground as the droid guided them toward the source of the signal. They could feel Zeb in the Force before they arrived at his location, more dull than his usual vibrance, but still strong, beside another that Luke could not recognize, a small, faded wisp that almost seemed as though it would blow away should the wind chance to kick up.
The sharp, excited whistles from R2 announced their arrival at the signal's source, and Luke pulled back on the yoke, the X-Wing shooting up into the sky and circling around to survey the area, and they quickly located the small hole in the ice, Luke bringing the starfighter spinning downwards quickly toward the ground, leveling off when he saw the X-Wing was too big to fit through the entrance into the subterranean tunnels. Luke set the ship down upon the ice beside the wide hole and snatched his helmet from under the seat, shoved it on his head, and unlatched the cockpit shielding, and vaulted from the ship when the cockpit opened, Ezra close on his heels as they sprinted toward the hole in the ice.
They skidded to a quick stop and scrambled on their hands and knees toward the edge, Ezra's teeth chattering and looking enviously at the insulated Mandalorian armor that Luke comfortably wore. Ezra peered down inside the icy tunnel, his eyes slowly adjusting to the dim lighting until he could make out the torn and dented gray hull of an escape pod and the shape of two beings huddled closely together.
"Zeb!" Ezra cried excitedly, his voice echoing through the tunnels, and two sharp feline ears flicked up in his direction, the soft green glow of the Lasat's eyes in the low lighting peering up at him, and Ezra could see his friend grin.
"I knew you'd come..." Zeb said, groaning as he stood and padded carefully across the ice to stand beneath the opening. "What took you so long?!"
"You gave us bad directions, you told us you'd be on Geonosis!" Ezra called back, grinning like an idiot when Zeb laughed and shook his head, the smile dropping from his face when he took a look at the second stranded man. "Zeb, is that Agent Kallus?!"
"Yeah..." Zeb looked over his shoulder and scratched the back of his head. "He's badly hurt. We can't leave him."
"Uh, yes we can."
"We won't," Luke promised, rubbing his hands together as he stood. "We're going to get you two out. Hold still."
"How?!" Zeb called up at the two. "It's too dangerous to climb out, and I don't think Kallus can move!" Before Zeb had a chance to say another word, the Mandalorian had gently lifted his hand in the air, and the Lasat's feet left the ground as he began to rise upwards. With an agitated, startled snarl, Zeb began to flail, grasping for a hold on anything at all, though there was none within reach as he was lifted higher into the air. Sighing in irritation, Zeb went still as he gave up, scowling as he looked over to see a startled Kallus rising in the air beside him, his eyes wide, but still for the pain in his leg. All Zeb could do was roll his eyes and offer a quietly growled "Jedi..." as an explanation.
Zeb and Kallus were gently lowered to the ground just as the sound of ships reverberated in the frigid air, the distant shape of the Ghost and it's X-Wing escort cutting swiftly through the air right toward their location. Weariness finally settled heavy over Zeb, the Lasat shuffling toward where the Ghost was setting down before he stopped and turned to face his fellow stranded companion, the Agent wincing as he piled snow atop his wounded leg.
"You could come with us," Zeb offered with a wry smile, watching as Luke ran swiftly to his X-Wing, jumped inside, and took off, falling in beside his sister as they shot up into the sky. "We'd treat you fairly."
"I think I'd rather take my chances with the Empire..." Kallus said quietly. "I know too well the meaning of rebel justice."
"You sure your boys are even coming for you?" Zeb asked, and the Imperial crossed his arms over his chest to ward against the cold.
"I'll take my chances."
"What's the hold-up, Zeb?!" Kanan called to the other Spectre as he ran urgently from the ship, a grin on his face despite the tension in his shoulders. "Don't tell me you like this icy rock."
"I don't know, smells a whole lot better than Ezra here," Zeb growled, nudging the teenager hard enough for him to slip on the ice and snow.
"See if I ever rescue you again..." Ezra muttered as he stood and brushed himself off.
"When we were coming in, we picked up three incoming Star Destroyers," Kanan said swiftly. "Our X-Wing pilots went to cause a distraction, but we've got to go."
"Looks like you'll get your wish," Zeb muttered to Kallus. "Hope they know where to find you."
"Imperial sweeps happen to be very thorough," Kallus said, pointing across the ice bank to where the transponder they had thrown lay, it's lights beeping as it hummed with the signal it was transmitting. "I'm sure that will lead them right to me. I won't be waiting long."
Zeb nodded, gave the Imperial a final look before turning away from him, greeting Kanan with a grateful clap on the back and ruffling Ezra's hair as he bounded beside him and chatting as swiftly as he was able. Kallus watched them leave, and wondered if the Empire had even been looking for him.