Charon Station, Outside the Command Center…
The door of the command center appeared to have been welded shut like the barricade she had cut through back in the living area of Charon Station, but here, the blast doors had been forced inwards somehow. That was startling. The doors to the command center were five centimeter thick durasteel, yet they had still been bent inward.
The door was also pitted and marred by corrosion damage. Portions of it had been melted away. What had happened here?
Ahsoka didn't know the answer to that. To be honest, she was scared to find out what had done this. She pulled herself through the gap to find a scene of chaos.
Cups and mugs had been overturned, their contents long since evaporated in the vacuum the command center now was. Papers had been strewn everywhere. Some were crumpled, others pristine. Some were speckled with blood. The windows appeared to have been blown out from the inside, carbon scoring and scorch marks were everywhere. There were holes everywhere in the floor with the same kind of corrosion damage she had seen on the blast doors.
Ahsoka moved forward, keeping her lightsabers ignited and ready. She doubted anything would still be here, but she had yet to locate those life forms she had sensed from the cockpit of her A-Wing. They were somewhere below her and… she turned to face where the signals were coming from: over by where the medbay would be according to her schematics.
Ahsoka made a mental note to head there after she finished up at the command center.
As Ahsoka expected, there was no power in the terminals. And since she had anticipated that situation, she had brought a portable battery pack with her. Ahsoka would never pretend to be as good with technology as her old master was, but she knew enough to power up a terminal and slice into it.
Finding the command options, Ahsoka pulled up the most recent logs. The last one was from… four weeks ago, shortly before the distress signal had been sent. Scrolling through, she noticed something odd.
The latest logs had been made every one to two days or so, while all the ones before then had been made weekly. She also noticed that the person who had submitted the logs was different, changing once the logs became more frequent.
On a hunch, Ahsoka selected the last weekly log, and a female voice played from the speakers in her helmet.
"Charon Station Log 1138. Captain Lucy Barnes. We just received a transmission from the surface. Apparently, one of the mining crews clearing the new level just discovered some kind of… actually, we don't really know what to make of it.
"Hunter said it was something alien. Not just to humans like her and myself, but completely alien. But whatever it was she found, it doesn't belong there. They claimed it was organic, not rock like the walls of the mine and the cavern it was in. All we know right now is that it's a structure of some kind.
"Regardless, we'll be investigating it for sure. If it is completely alien, it might be evidence of some unknown civilization. You know, I always dreamed of things like this. When I was young, I dreamed of exploring the Unknown Regions and making first contact with alien civilizations. I thought I had missed that chance, but now? Who knows what could be learned from the ruins?"
Interesting. Ahsoka knew who Lucy Barnes was from the files Bail had given her. Barnes was the rebel officer in command here on Charon Station. She was well-qualified. A former separatist, she never gave up in her fight against the Republic, even when it changed into the Empire.
So, the mining teams had found alien ruins in the mines of Tartarus. That didn't explain, however, why the station was falling apart. Perhaps the other logs would explain more. She queued up the next log, but this time the voice was male.
"Charon Station Log. Captain Barnes is dead along with Security Chief Fazio. Something went wrong, terribly wrong down there. We lost contact with the surface a day ago. Then, a few hours ago, we detected two shuttles leaving the surface. The visual and audio feeds from them were… they were horrible. The miners looked like they had been shot and those… those things…
"Captain Barnes and Fazio went down to the docking bays along with a few other security personnel, but dropship CS-02 lost control and crashed into the station. They all died, vented into space. Somehow, CS-01 managed to dock safely, but it won't do anything to help those on it. We can't let them on board, not with those things onboard.
"That isn't the worst part. Those things on CS-02… a couple got loose on the station. Hunter was right, there is something down there incredibly alien to all of us. But instead of showing us Barnes' wish, unknown secrets of the universe, all it's showing us is how we may die. Die in the form of claws, tails, and teeth. So many damn teeth."
That would certainly explain the wreckage and most of the damage that Ahsoka had seen. The miners must have discovered the aliens when they were investigating the wreckage of the ship, and the aliens must have reacted violently to them. The log mentioned that a few miners appeared to have been shot in the chest, but then again, it also said that death had come to them in claws and teeth.
The next few logs chronicled the fall of Charon Station. Apparently, the alien creatures from the surface of Tartarus had grown and started abducting the survivors. Any person who could hold a blaster, including the wounded that were recuperating in the medbay, went hunting for the aliens, killing them where they could, but were steadily being worn down. She also learned why they hadn't been able to call for help until the end: their transmission system had been destroyed in the dropship crash.
It got to the point where the survivors clustered in two areas: the command center and the medbay. The holds that had at one point been used to refine the thorilide were vented to keep the aliens away from the medbay. The survivors in the command center steadily flushed the xenomorphs towards themselves by venting whole sections of the station with mining explosives, drawing the aliens away from the survivors in the medbay who were mainly civilians.
She finally came to the final log. It painted a grim tale about what had happened in the command center.
"This will most likely be the last log of Charon Station. We managed to set up a small transmitter and are recording a distress signal currently. There are seventeen of us left, eight in the medbay and nine of us here. The aliens have nowhere else to go to other than here. All other portions of the station are vented and I'm pretty sure they can't last long in vacuum.
"[Pounding on the blast doors can be heard] They're here at last. Chances are none of us will escape this fight alive, but if we can take out the aliens, it will be worth it. The others will survive, the doctor was involved in a revolt against the Empire some time ago. She knows how to ration and manage food and keep morale from decaying. They should be okay. [Squealing of the blast doors being bent and shredded is heard] At least there will be some form of record. Here we go.
"[Sound of blasterfire, explosions, survivors shouting, aliens screeching, some kind of sizzling like acid on metal] Get them all in here! Lure them in! [Screams are heard as humans and nikto are mauled by the aliens] Only one more option. [Blasterfire and shattering glass, rushing of winds] [Silence]…"
The log continued to run in silence until most likely power to the terminal had finally died. Ahsoka sat back in her chair, exhaling a breath she didn't know she was holding. They had all died, but they had taken out the aliens with them.
She knew she would have to go to the medbay now and evacuate the survivors, but her orders from Bail still stood. She pulled out a datapad and connected it to the terminal. She had to copy over any and all files that placed the Rebellion at Charon Station and then delete them. It only took her a few minutes to do so and she paused to check the level of air her suit had left. She had about an hour and 45 minutes of air left. It would take her A-Wing maybe 15 minutes or so to get close enough for her to evacuate.
That wasn't necessarily a problem. Jedi had the ability to go into a trance, a coma-like state, where she could conserve air for a longer time than a normal person. And while she wasn't a Jedi anymore, that didn't stop her from using old Jedi abilities. The only problem was she would be defenseless during that time.
The transfer and deletion of files took about five more minutes and Ahsoka unplugged her datapad and the powerpack. She stood and stretched then turned to exit the blast door she had entered.
She halted in her tracks, reaching out with the Force. There was a life form in this section of the station… and it was coming her way.
Ahsoka flattened herself against the wall next to the destroyed blast door and held her lightsabers extinguished, but at the ready in case she needed them. She was hoping that this life form was one of the survivors holed up in the medbay, but it could be one of the hostile aliens.
The life form was coming closer and closer and she breathed out, centering herself in the Force and calming her nerves. She felt the life form halt near the door and approach carefully. It slowly moved sideways in a manner that Ahsoka recognized.
The life form was "slicing the pie", a tactic used by soldiers when they were clearing a room. It was suicide to barge blindly through a door, which would place the soldier in the so-called "fatal funnel". Instead, the tactic had the soldier move sideways from one wall of the doorframe with their weapon held up and as little of their body presented as a target as they slowly peered into the room one step at a time.
This meant that whoever was next to her had military training. Was it one of the survivors? Or was it a scavenger picking the carcass of the dead space station?
The life form finally moved into her field of view and she identified it as a human male. The human's eyes widened in shock at her presence and instinct took over. The human jerked his blaster pistol at her and fired a couple of shots.
The twin white blades extended from their hilts in an instant and Ahsoka soundlessly swatted the blaster bolts away from both of them into the ceiling or the floor of the command center. The human's eyes widened even further and he took off running.
Ahsoka deftly slid through the mangled wreckage of the door and spotted the human retreating. Outstretching a hand, the human was lifted off the ground. He flailed as he realized he was not running on the floor and she spun him so they were looking directly at each other. Ahsoka used the Force and pulled his blaster out of his hand to hers.
She deactivated her blades and slowly lowered him to the ground as she walked towards him. Ahsoka pulled his helmet up against hers-since they were in vacuum, sound wouldn't travel between them unless it had a medium to travel through. By bringing their helmets together, the sound of Ahsoka's voice would travel through the air in her helmet, between the glass of their faceplates, and the air in the human's helmet. They would be able to hear each other, so Ahsoka asked: "Who are you? What's your name?"
The man swallowed and responded. "Henry. Joseph Henry. Who are you?"
"Fulcrum," Ahsoka responded. "I'm Rebel Intelligence, sent to investigate a distress signal."
"They received it?" Henry's eyes lit up with hope, but it quickly dimmed. Hope was a dangerous thing, and after being stranded on this dying station for weeks, hope could be deadly.
"How many are alive?" Ahsoka asked.
"Myself and seven others, we've been holed up in the medbay for weeks," was Henry's response. "Let me call them, and tell them we've been found."
He stepped back, reached up, and toggled the radio in his helmet. He spoke for maybe about a minute, before walking back over to Ahsoka. Bringing their helmets back together, he spoke. "The doctor will have the medbay airlock doors open for us. But, we'll have to go outside and EVA." Ahsoka nodded and Henry gave her a frequency so they could communicate in vacuum without having to bring their helmets together.
Ahsoka gave him his blaster back and they ventured outside through the shattered windows of the command center. They had made it about halfway there when Henry asked Ahsoka a question. "Are you a Jedi? I thought they'd all been wiped out by the Empire."
Ahsoka sighed. She should have expected this sooner or later. One of the drawbacks of using a lightsaber was that people always connected them with the Jedi. "I was once. A long time ago. Not anymore."
"Why not? The Empire?"
"Not entirely," Ahsoka said. Force, why were they having this conversation of all things? "The Jedi and I had a bit of a troubled history. I'd rather not talk about it."
"Fair enough," Henry responded, sounding somewhat disappointed. "I never met a Jedi, you know? I was a child when the Clone Wars ended and was always taught that the Jedi were these evil, warmongering warrior monks who tried to overthrow the Republic, but my father said otherwise. He told me that the Jedi were kind and compassionate. That they used their powers selflessly for the good of others. I wanted to be a Jedi back then. The dreams of a rebellious child, I guess?
"What were the Jedi really like?"
Fine, Ahsoka thought. "Each Jedi was about as different as each person. Some were healers, some were warriors. Some were philosophers and others were teachers. There were some who were really loyal and who wanted to help everyone, while the war corrupted others."
"I wish I could have met one before the Empire wiped them out. Tell me about the Force."
Great, now you've opened a can of worms, Ahsoka. Ahsoka shrugged off the insult her inner monologue threw at her. It was obvious that Henry would keep asking questions about the Force and the Jedi. She wasn't surprised though, the Jedi were always seen as larger than life even when there were over 10,000 of them. To people who couldn't feel the Force, it was an enigma how the Jedi got their powers.
"The Force is basically an energy field created by life. It surrounds us and binds the universe together. Some people naturally have a connection to it and some have a stronger connection than others. The number of people who can interact and manipulate the Force is small, hence why there were so few Jedi compared to the galactic population."
Henry seemed to pick up on the frustration in her tone and he wisely dropped the subject. "Hey, sorry to pry. I've just always been fascinated with the Jedi. I learned their code, some of their history, and then you showed up with a pair of lightsabers, so I thought you were one."
"Let's just drop it for now," Ahsoka said as they approached the medbay airlock.
Henry gave her a thumbs up. "If you wouldn't mind though, I'd love to learn more about them later."
"Possibly. We'll see."
He entered a code into a pad next to the door and it slid open to allow them in. Ahsoka had seen special airlocks like this before. It was mainly used for emergency medevacs where the patient couldn't be moved through the station for some reason or other. It was large enough to accommodate multiple medical capsules.
They floated inside and Henry shut the door with another command pad on the inside. Gravity returned and there was a hiss, muted at first, but then louder and louder as air was bled into the vacuum they occupied to equalize the pressure. Henry gave her a signal and they both removed their helmets.
Henry smiled at her as they were scanned for contaminants. "The doctor will be glad to see you. We were beginning to wonder if anyone would ever find us out here."
"Who is 'The Doctor'?" Ahsoka asked.
"Oh, she's amazing. You'll love her. Used to be a part of a rebellion on a small farming moon and they had to hide out in the hills for weeks rationing supplies. She's kept us alive, I don't know what would've happened if she wasn't here."
The door hissed open and Ahsoka immediately took stock of her surroundings. The medical bay was clean, but also cluttered with supplies. Four humans and a twi'lek immediately turned to look at her and Henry and their faces lit up as well. They were all human with a variety of skin tones and hairstyles. There were three men and two women, one of which was the twi'lek, present, but there were also two others unaccounted for, if there really were eight survivors.
One of them, a blonde haired, light skinned human female, started cheering and the others joined in and rushed over to Ahsoka with shouts of "We're saved!" or "We'll live!"
Thankfully, a calm, but firm female voice cut through. "Relax people. Give our newcomer some space."
Ahsoka was thankful for that, she was feeling a bit overwhelmed there. That voice sounded familiar though, as if she had heard it before. She felt a familiar presence in the Force… no! Wait! There were two familiar presences she felt. One was the individual striding towards the cluster of survivors. Ahsoka assumed she was the 'Doctor' Henry had spoken about.
"So you're Fulcrum? I kind of thought you were multiple people, seeing how critical you are to the Rebellion. Also kind of hard to imagine you'd be all the way out here."
The speaker finally broke through the other survivors and Ahsoka got her first good view of the 'Doctor'. The woman before her had darkish skin, lighter than Master Windu's but darker than the clones she used to command, and long braided hair. It clicked immediately who the 'Doctor' was.
Images flew through Ahsoka's mind: Raada, the disastrous raid on the Imperial Compound and subsequent jailbreak, the duel between herself and the Inquisitor that gave her the two lightsabers currently clipped to her belt, and the awkward moment in the Imperial Compound following the second jailbreak she had pulled.
The 'Doctor's' face showed that she had recognized Ahsoka just as Ahsoka had recognized her. They spoke at the same time, their voices a similar shocked tone.
"Kaeden?" "Ahsoka?"
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