Chapter 14: The First Missions

Settling into our new life was done more swiftly than I'd expected. Surely enough we used the first months on settling in and I went alone for a couple of undercover trips to trade some of the valuables we'd saved from the Temple vaults into more anonymous credits, but those trips were quite uneventful. I chose planets close enough to the core that collectors would be interested in the items and far enough from Coruscant that I'd avoid unwanted attention.

As any good scout I held my mouth shut (Skyguy would have declared it a miracle) and my ears open. I soon learned that the mysterious dark clad beings were called inquisitors and they seemed to create a great deal of fear in the population. It was on my second trip I heard the rumours about their leader, the man-machine called Lord Vader that also was considered the Emperors's right hand, an even more feared being that was said to be able to kill with a glance. My heard twisted in pain when I heard that rumour. More han once I had been on the receiving side of Master Anakin's killing glares but the rumours I heard now were more sinister and more frightening than anything I ever would have expected. I was never in doubt that "Lord Vader" in reality was my forlorn master and the stories I heard made me more determined to fight whatever Vader promoted and whatever Anakin had despised with all my powers.

Sadly, my powers would not stand a chance in direct combat with the Empire…

So, I had to keep myself under the radar and be the one which none knew, hardly anyone had seen and few had heard about.

Master Obi-Wan had given me the codename 'Fulcrum', but it might just as well have been 'Ghost'.

I managed fairly well for a long period of time. The first crisis came when I had been on a simple mission to search for a rumoured force sensitive child on Lenniera. Somehow 'Seabird' managed to keep track on such rumors and during our calls he forwarded it to me. So far I had been able to pick up 3 additions to our little group being in grave danger of being discovered by the inquisitors. This would be the fourth. Or would have been, had it not been a false rumour. There was a child, so far the rumour was true, but anyone with just the tiniest bit of force sensitivity could feel that this child was about as force sensitive as a tuber. Hopefully the inquisitors would notice too, if they ever came in search for her.

So even without making myself known to the child's parents I snook out of the narrow alley where their house was located - and dumped almost into the broad chest of a clone trooper in disguise. Well, actually it was not that much of a disguise but at least it was not the full clone armour. I don't know who was the most shattered by the encounter but I believe I won with a tiny fraction of an ounce.

"I'm sorr…."

"My apologies…"

I had almost expected to be taken into custody at once or killed on the spot, but no such thing happened. Instead the trooper seemed about as eager as I to get away. With the cowl of my cloak almost covering my face I fervently hoped that he would accept that I was out in a fully legitime errand.

We departed in opposite directions.

And my brain started working again. There had been something about that voice, a familiarity that had grown upon me in the wake of more missions than I was willing to count. Though the clones were genetically almost like one individual they had surely developed as single individuals, at least for those of us who knew them well. And the voice that had uttered those few words had a vary strong resemblance with the one of my old friend and 'big brother in arms', Rex.

I was tempted to turn on my heel and try to find him, but then my common sense won. If it had been he, and if he were here on a clandestine mission he would surely not be happy to see me. Those times were long gone, and it would probably end with a blaster shot through my midriff, -an experience I was not too eager to have.

But why had he been there without his armour? I really didn't believe that the Empire gave their troopers that much freedom. Could it be that some troopers somehow had resisted the command to kill jedi? If so, how many? And could they be persuaded into joining our rebellion to be?

I surely had a lot to think about, and I surely would - when eventually the tears stopped flowing down my face.