The next few days proved discouraging, to say the least. I didn't want to contact Leia and stress her out about the truth of the situation. Also, getting ahold of my sister was a perilous and risky thing—paranoia abiding. But that also left me without any resources she might be able to muster for this task. Which is how I ended up attempting to track down any former Partisan members on Jedah, unable to directly ask anyone, relying solely on the Force for clues and perceptions, and sleeping in the streets because I didn't have enough credits for food and rooms both. Probably, this was better. I couldn't be tracked.

But I was just a farmer with some Jedi training. I wasn't some super spy. I had no idea how to do this, and felt like I was just counting on pure luck most of the time. And in the first few days… that luck proved few and far between.

Firstly, I visited the old headquarters of Saw Guerra. It was a dark, dingy, depressing place; I felt pain and fear, and the echoes of the Empire. Scorch marks were on the walls. Dried old blood was on the floor. And yet—a feeling of sustained hope and determination also echoed, so very faint, as like a candle determinedly flickering against a strong wind. But it was there.

On the fourth day, I finally made progress. I managed to track down one former Partisan the Empire had failed to, and politely requested that she share with me any information she had about Jyn Erso. I didn't threaten her, but she sure seemed to take it that way. She offered a few clues, but nothing substantive, and I got the distinct sense that she was lying to me. I didn't do anything when she fled fifteen minutes after I departed.

And then, that night, I was just picking out my new alley sleep-spot when the Force whispered, Danger. A shadow emerged from the alley walls, and they slammed me up against the wall with great vigor, a blaster to my temple.

In an intense voice with a distinctly Mid-Rim accent, the man hissed, "Why are you asking about Jyn?"

Jyn. Not Jyn Erso, or just Erso. I calmly used the Force to send him skidding back from me, take the blaster in hand, and then turn it off. He'd set it to high-power kill! How rude!

The man, breathing hard, looked at me half wildly from a few feet away, his dark eyes aflame. "So. You're one of Vader's, then."

I felt myself flush; I recovered my composure in an instant. "No." I couldn't help the hint of coldness in my voice.

The man laughed. Certainly, he showed little fear in face of Force powers he couldn't explain, or the blaster I now held. He walked right up to me and got in my face. "I don't believe you."

"I'm sorry to hear it. Because I think we could work together. After all, you are here on behalf of your wife, Jyn Erso, aren't you?"

His feelings exposed him to his core. "You—"

"I am Luke Skywalker, the last Jedi. And I've come looking for Jyn Erso because her father wants to say goodbye to her. Then, I'd love both your help in rebuilding the rebellion against the Empire." After all, the man had fire in him, and great courage. Jyn had wanted to make the rebellion re-forge and fight. We'd shot her down one time. Not again.

OOO

It took several hours to explain everything, but eventually Cassian Andor, as I learned my once-attacker's name was, seemed to believe me. Probably, it helped that I handed over the blaster to him once again. (Yes, I still had my lightsaber beneath the folds of my cloak, but he didn't need to know that.) "And I guess," I concluded, "Teh'poli contacted you before she took flight."

"Right," Cassian confirmed. "You know, you aren't very subtle."

"I don't know how to be. I'm not a spy."

"I was," he said gruffly, glancing outside the alley into the dark night. No troopers had passed us in a while. "Once."

"You were with Saw."

"No. I was with the Millipedes. Before they broke up."

The Millipedes had been a Corellian offshoot of resistance, one of the largest in the galaxy prior to the Death Star's reign. Though "largest" was a relative scale, it meant the man had truly been committed to trying to resist. I felt a bit more hopeful.

"Wait…" I realized. "You came with Jyn Erso to the headquarters on Crait." An old memory—so long ago… "You wanted us to work together to try and destroy the Death Star."

"Allied, we might have done it," Cassian retorted. "But given the refusal we received, we had no choice but to disband. After all, we hardly had the strength alone."

"Even if we had formed a… rebel alliance," I said, having hunted for the word, "it wouldn't have mattered. We were all too weak."

"And you and Queen Organa are looking to change that all of a sudden?"

"Not all of a sudden. At least—not for her."

"Well," said Cassian, "don't waste your time. Rebellion is over, no matter what Erso might want." And he turned, beginning to walk away. I had to say something, quickly, to stop him, or this was all over!

"You're right." It just… came out. But I went on, "Rebellion is over, according to everyone. And that might be our greatest ally in all of this. The Empire has no idea we're coming for them anymore. They don't suspect. They won't be looking. And so, once they do realize, it'll be far too late. People are willing to fight, Andor. I know that you are, whatever you say. I am. My—benefactor Queen Leia is.

"We need to ignite the spark, and will light the fire in doing so. And that spark will also destroy the Death Star, and the whole of the Empire, if we play this right.

"I'm not saying it'll be easy. But if we don't fight, who the blazes will? And we have to fight, or else condemn the galaxy to an eternity of this… tyranny… and oppression… submission… and subservience. I'm a farmer, back on Tatooine. I know it. I see it every day, and it isn't even the worst there. And if I die trying… then I'll be glad, because I'd rather die living than live dying a little every day like I was before all of this."

And with that, I left him instead of the opposite.

OOO

About ten minutes after my dramatics, I started to think I'd made a huge mistake. Cassian hadn't followed. I know, I know, why should I have expected him to? The risks were immense, the possibilities cataclysmic. My little hope speech could hardly sway him.

But still… I had expected it to. I'd felt the level of emotion within him. And—admittedly—in every holovid I'd ever watched, after one character gave a rousing speech, people always flocked to them with support.

But life was not a holovid. And I'd been stupid to believe so for a moment there.

Given my failure, I thought I might as well go Han's route. Jedi didn't drink; it blurred their faculties. But whatever.

Plopping down on a stool in a dirty, seedy bar, I ordered a Corellian brandy with the last of my credits. "And make it a double."

Five minutes later, someone sat down on the stool next to mine. She seemed to be roughly a decade older than me, but her eyes seemed kind, and I sensed no threat from her. Would I have to tell her I wasn't interested? Oh, Force. Why were so many people sexually captivated by me lately?

The woman said with an arch of eyebrow, "So. You're the Jedi who 'has it all together' like my husband told me? Well, I'm Jyn. If you're going to escort me to see my father before he dies, I'd prefer it if you stopped drinking."