"Excuse me, have you seen a little girl? She's Tholothian, and she was in a purple shirt."

The lady shakes her head, keeping an eye on her own kids with one eye. Why didn't Hero do that?

"I haven't seen any kids by themselves."

"Are you sure?" She's only ten years old, I just adopted her a few months ago!"

The woman glances down at Hero's ring finger. "Look, have the management call her on the intercom. Then call your husband and ask him if he knows anywhere she might have wandered off to. Sometimes, little girls don't tell their mamas everything."

Hero nods and takes off down the aisle. As much as her instincts scream at her to, she knows in her heart she can't report Katooni missing. The management will call the police, and it'll all be over. She just has to keep looking.

No Kattoni at the bakery. No Katooni in the grocery section. Not in the makeup aisle, or the kid's clothes, the candy counter, the bathrooms.

Nobody's seen her. She's not answering her comlink, she's not here.

Hero barely makes it to the bathrooms before she gets sick.

Hutch's comlink rings and he answers it without looking.

"Hey babe, what's -?"

"I CAN'T FIND KATOONI!" Hero screams.

"W-what?"

"I can't find Katooni! We're in Super Shop and Stop and I turned around for one second and she's gone!"

Hutch swallows his panic and says "Did you try calling her?"

"Yes! And she's not in the bathroom."

"Did you try the game and book aisles?"

"Yes."

"Did you check the girls' clothing department? She needs new clothes and she knows it."

"I checked everywhere. Hutch, she's not here!"

He sits down in front of his computer again. "Hero, which Super Shop and Stop are you in?"

As Hero blubbers out the address, Lux walks in.

"Hutch, what are you doing?"

"Hero can't find Katooni in the store. I'm going to pull up the security footage and track her comlink. It should only take a few minutes."

Lux nods. "Can I help with anything?"

"Yeah, can you get everyone and ask if there's something Katooni wanted to get at the store?" Hutch asks, pressing into the store's firewalls and bringing up the security footage up on the screen.

Come on, where's Katooni? Most of the customers are humans, a Tholothian kid should stick out like a sore thumb!

But she's not on any of the monitors.

Using his comlink, he quickly activates the homing beacon for Katooni's comlink and walks out of the room. "Hero, I'm coming over to the store now. Katooni's comlink is still in the building."

Lux gets into the cockpit and we fly over to the store, fielding questions from Ahsoka.

"What's happening?"

"We're just helping Hero find Katooni. Where are Rex and Steela?"

"They're still doing the gear drop. They have to find a good place to hide it and then they can get out."

"Tell them to meet us here. We probably will still be here when they get done. Hero, where are you?"

"In the kids' clothes." Hero sniffs.

Hutch looks down at his comlink. "Meet us out front. Katooni's homing beacon is still active."

"Oh, thank God."

As they walk into the store's main entrance, Hero almost knocks her husband over.

"Thank God," she repeats, hugging him. "She's been gone for twenty minutes. I swear I only turned around for a second, and she was gone. Just gone!"

"Don't worry," he says, lifting his comlink so he can see it over her shoulder. "The homing beacon says Katooni's right down the aisle."

He look over Hero's shoulder in the direction Katooni is supposed to be.

And there's no little Tholothian girl.

"Hutch…" Ahsoka says.

"She's probably behind an endcap," he says desperately. Because there are no kids in the aisle, but there are a few endcaps and a trash can.

Hutch walks closer, with every step the knowledge balling in his stomach.

He dials Katooni's comm number, and waits, praying he won't hear the ringtone, praying that she'll answer, praying that this isn't happening, this isn't happening.

The trash can rings.

Hero's and Hutch's screams split the air.

"And the plan is?"

Rex steps just a little closer to Steela. "First rule of going undercover: when in doubt, copy someone else." He says. "In our case, that's Lux and Ahsoka."

That means she would get to eat innumerable sweets. Oh, she was starting to like this assignment more and more…

Just then, a speeder almost runs into her. Rex grabs her arm just in time.

"Hey! Lady with a baby!" he yells, shaking his fist at the driver.

Out of the corner of her eye, Steela can see some pedestrians looking at them.

"It's alright, uh, honey." she deadpans, digging her nails into Rex's arm.

He gets the message. "Let's just get in. Security is straight ahead, remember to take off your jacket."

He leaves out the part where he'll have to take off her shoes and put them back on because she can't see her feet.

Someone holds the main door for them (staring at her belly) and Rex and Steela proceed to the security checkpoint.

"Right this way," An officer says, pointing to the heat scanner.

A stroke of panic hits her in the chest. "I'm sorry, but I can't go through- ."

"Oh, don't worry Mama." The security officer says, apparently referring to me. "That's just for your husband. We have somebody to pat you down over there."

Rex unties her boots and places them in a bin. He goes into the heat scanner while a female guard pats Steela down.

"When are you due?" she asks.

A mental picture of Ahsoka in each of her months flashes by me. "Uh, about a month. Do you have kids?" Steela asks, desperate for small talk to ease the awkwardness and terror that she'll discover the belly is fake.

She nods. "Three."

Mercifully, she doesn't find the fake belly and Steela and Rex practically dance through the rest of security.

"Okay, let me hide the gear in the vent of the ladies' room." she whispers. "Then we're out of -."

"Rex, Steela, get back to the ship now!"

It's Ahsoka, not Hutch on the comm this time. Her voice leaves no room for negotiation. Steela speed-walks over to the ladies' room and locks herself in a stall, taking out her screwdriver to take off the vent covers.

"Ahsoka, what's going on?" she whispers, stuffing the gear into the vent shaft and screwing the cover back on.

"It's bad," she says. "Hero's hysterical. Hutch is trying to calm her down so I'm stuck doing his job and I don't know what I'm doing. Tandin is working with them, Mina is crying in her room, I don't even know where Saw is, and Lux pacing while writing-."

"Ahsoka! Breathe and count to ten. What happened?"

Ahsoka takes a deep breath. "It's Katooni. She's been kidnapped."

"Hero? Hero, I know this is hard, but do you remember what Katooni was wearing?" Tandin asks, glancing down at his datapad.

Hero sniffs. "A purple shirt with white polka dots, the one Hutch and I got her for Life Day," she chokes on the name of the holiday. "A-and b-blue jeans with her b-boots."

"I have her height." Hutch says numbly, hugging Hero. "It's the tallest pencil line on our door frame. We wanted to watch her grow. She's four foot eleven."

"I should have held her hand." Hero whimpers, and hugs Hutch even tighter. "I should have known that lady wasn't really looking for a lost kid!"

"Hero, the kidnappers used a ruse that any parent with a soul would fall for." Ahsoka says. "I would have done the same thing."

"What are they doing to her?" Hero bawls. "I know more stuff than her. I have more intel. Why didn't they go after me?"

Well Ahsoka knows that answer: Katooni is force-sensitive. The Empire's chomping at the bit to make her an Inquisitor.

Inquisitor Katooni. It makes her feel sick.

Tandin finishes writing down Katooni's description. "I'll send this to Senator Organa. The Rebel Alliance will keep an eye out for her."

"We have to get her out." Hero implores.

Lux stiffens. "We at least know they want her alive. Sierra, on the other hand, is going to die!"

"Lux-."

"What, Ahsoka?"

"Lux, if the Inquisition gets ahold of Katooni, then she is going to be gone forever. We have to save her before they get away."

Lux's jaw sets. "I'm not leaving."

"Lux," Steela says. "It's what Sierra would want."

Lux wheels on her, apparently getting the same sense of déjà vu as his wife.

"You might have abandoned Saw, but I am not throwing my sister to the wolves!"

Steela jumps to her feet and Saw finds it necessary to grab her arm.

"I love her too, and I'm not abandoning her." Steela shoots back. "It's called triage. Katooni's in more trouble so we have to save her first. Tor is at least going to keep Sierra in the same place."

Lux snorts and turns away, apparently wanting Steela out of his sight.

"One thing's for sure. We can't get into either place by ourselves." she says. "He knows our MO. We need new blood, allies."

"Who?" Sierra's probably close to putty in Tor's hands by now. "Tor knows who we would contact."

Rex clears his throat.

"We need someone who we haven't worked with. Who is not a friend. Who Sierra would never think to contact." He says. "And we need them now."