With the orange wash of light from the central hologram playing on their almost gleaming armour, Rex and his men stood immobile to attention in the briefing room of The Resolute. Rex mused that it would again be a shame that this armour would come back filthy if their mission took them down to Ryloth. The importance of a well-cleaned kit had been drilled into them by both the Kaminoan clonemasters and their non-Kaminoan drillmasters, but that didn't mean they enjoyed doing it, and fine sand was by far one of the hardest things to remove. As if mirroring his sentiments exactly, Rigs, the trooper standing to Rex's right exclaimed to no one in particular,
"Really hope we don't get stuck down there in a sandstorm, my deece still isn't right after getting battered in the last one."
Rigs was a simple trooper, currently serving in Sergeant Coric's unit, a straight talking man, sometimes at odds with the more dry and humourless sergeant. He had a penchant for saying exactly what you were thinking, which someone who didn't know that the clones were very much individuals wouldn't find surprising. Rigs, along with Jax were the only two representatives of Coric's unit. The other members that made up the team were Echo and Fives, the two troopers saved by Rex and Cody on the Rishi moon who were currently serving together under Sergeant Roe, along with Dyne, a mischievous soldier with a knack for explosives, Fi, a combat medic with a general optimistic demeanour, Risk, a hot-headed and impatient young man who preferred to let his fists do the talking and Cade a new and eager recruit with only the battle of Ryloth under his belt. The final four all served in various separate units in Torrent Company, and had only by chance been eating together.
"Not to worry trooper, this mission won't take you to the surface."
A voice exclaimed from the open door of the briefing room. All helmeted heads turned too see Wulf Yularen, in his classic hands behind his back pose striking a commanding pose in the doorway. As always the Admiral oozed authority Rex could hear Rigs wincing into his helmet, which was now hopefully not on loudspeaker. Coric seemed to share the sentiment and commed on the trooper's internal com system.
"How many times Rigs? If you're going to mouth, turn off your speaker."
An embarrassed sounding Rigs replied straight away.
"Sir, understood sir."
Rex really appreciated the internal com system of the Mark I armour, it allowed private conversations between troopers to take place in the presence of others without a single sound escaping the helmets, more importantly though it allowed orders to be clearly heard during the din of battle.
Seemingly taking no notice of Rigs' comments the admiral strode into the room. And came to a stop at the opposite end of the Holoprojector, facing the troopers. He pressed a few buttons, which made the holo-image zoom in on one of the outlying planets in the Ryloth system. An ancient giant terrestrial planet as far as Rex could tell. Stepping around the projector the admiral began,
"Troopers, one of the probes sent on patrol to the far edge of the system picked up a strange reading around Ryloth III, or Wayerth to the locals, A large rocky planet to far from the star to support life, and no significant minerals to make a mining venture profitable."
He pointed at a small object stationary at one side of Wayerth and continued.
"That's why this little ship here, a seemingly derelict Corellian mining vessel is a little suspect."
Rex's HUD transmitted a readout of the ship's schematics directly from the Holoprojector's systems. The ship did indeed seem derelict, preliminary scans showed no life, no active droids signals and no functioning life support systems, the ship's only functioning system seemed to be a quietly humming reactor. But even this seemed to be on its last legs. Clicking his back teeth to switch back to external coms Rex ventured,
"I assume you think differently sir?"
Admiral Yularen nodded curtly before continuing,
"The last recorded survey of Ryloth III was one hundred and fifty years ago, nothing was turned up then. The make of this ship, however, is quite recent, so there's no way it's been there since. I want to play it safe Captain, take a shuttle, scan the ship more thoroughly, find out what it is exactly and board it if you have to. It's not beyond the realm of possibility that it was left here by Separatists to keep an eye on the system."
Rex accepted the admiral's logic, were he in command he wouldn't leave anything to chance either. In Rex's book experience and preparation were everything. Rex saluted the admiral and replied,
"Yes sir, we'll be on our way."
With that the troopers saluted as one and marched in unison from the bridge with a clear purpose and mission in their minds.
***
Ahsoka never imagined somewhere that was filled with so many dubious characters could be so… breathtaking.
Having never been to the Nightlands of Ryloth this was turning into quite an experience for the young Padawan. Tsa'vin was as Anakin had predicted, a smuggler's haven. There was no perceivable law system, certainly no GAR presence, but still something about this place was almost magic it was so alive. Members of every species imaginable were busy milling through Tsa'vin's stall filled streets, and these stalls were everywhere. Not all, Ahsoka perceived, sold illegal goods as one would think. The vast majority of them sold what ordinary streets vendors would sell, only outside the realm of Republic taxes, and even those who sold contraband tended towards trinkets and rare creatures. Ahsoka assumed that the real dirt dealing of slaves, weapons and drugs smuggling was done underground, or at least not out in the plain open.
While these bustling, stall filled streets were certainly impressive, they were nothing truly new to the Padawan. Markets she had seen before. What she hadn't seen before was a night market built into the glowing, shimmering landscape of plants and flowers that created their own bioluminescent light to cope with the lack of sunlight. Most stalls and houses were carved from the living rock, and as such were overgrown with hundreds of plants. Some, grew like vines and clung to rock surfaces, or wound their way up pillars, and all along them crystals of bioluminescent light shimmered, alternating in every colour imaginable. Others clumped together like dense patches of wallflowers, creating an impressive powerful glow that seemed to keep in sync with the colour of all neighbouring plants, giving the impression that all plants were in some way linked together. Giant mushrooms played a dazzling display of shapes and colours on their huge heads, as if trying to tell a story through their light shows. And finally but most beautifully of all, very delicate and fragile flowers grew from patches on the ground. These flowers looked like they were made completely of precious stones and each shimmered with its own colour, no two seeming to have the same hue.
All of these visual sensations put together were becoming slightly overwhelming for the young Togrutan. Coloured lights played across her hands and robes as she held them out to examine them. She glanced up at the hooded shape of her master beside her. The lights played across him too, even illuminating his hooded face from time to time in one colour or another. Everything made this place seem so alive and magically enthralling, unlike the harsh neon lights of Coruscant's lower levels.
Coming to a pause beside a patch of glowing turquoise moss, Ahsoka touched it with her bare fingers. Ripples of colour expanded fluidly out from these points as if she had disturbed some still pond that reflected moonlight. She turned wide-eyed to her master. She could see an illuminated green smile coming from under his hood as he jested in a very light-hearted way.
"Mouth closed Ahsoka. Or do you want to catch bugs with it?"
Realising how foolish she must have looked wandering around the town gawking at all the plants with an open mouth and wide eyes, Ahsoka quickly closed her mouth and shook her head to get in control again. Looking slightly embarrassed she attempted to hide her face by pulling up the hood of her cloak, just like her master had. She tugged a little at the hood to get it to cover her still to grow montrals. The cloaks that her master had liberated from the Resolute's supplies locked had clearly not been designed with montrals, or lekku in mind. But at least Ahsoka mused, she could now gawk all she wanted and no one would be able to see her wide eyes
The cloaks were and attempt by her master to blend in a little with the crowds, so as not to draw attention, or so he had put it. It worked quite well; even Ahsoka's wide-eyed amazement wasn't drawing attention.
"I'll admit though Ahsoka, this place does look pretty sp… Whoa!"
Anakin cut his own comment short with that exclamation as they rounded a corner and took in one of the most fascinating sights they had both ever seen.
In the centre of the town stood an enormous tree, or at least it resembled a tree in shape only. What would normally be considered the trunk, looked as if they had been carved carefully from one giant diamond. Further up the tree, organic looking but still crystalline branches sprouted from the central trunk. These continued to split further and further into smaller and smaller branches, until they were as thin as needles. Each of these needle tips ended in a dazzlingly bright light that washed the rest of the tree, and the rest of the town's central square in a multitude of colours. It was as if night had been turned into day just through the glow of this tree.
While marvelling the sight of this tree, Anakin's grinning Padawan piped up at his side.
"Now whose mouth is open?"
Anakin turned and raised his eyebrow at the cheeks comment made by his grinning Padawan and commented,
"Enjoy that one Snips…"
Ahsoka smiled and giggled, almost girlishly, in a very un-Ahsokaish way. An act, if you knew Ahsoka for as long as Anakin did, was a little out of character for the usual feisty brazen teen. Once finished giggling, she questioned,
"So, did we just come here so you could impress a girl with these sights? Or are we going to do some of that training you said we would?"
Anakin couldn't help but grin himself. It was good to have his usual smart-arse of a Padawan back, even if she went a bit overboard sometimes. It showed him she was finally coping and moving on. Still, he felt as if he had to clear a few things up about the nature of the mission.
Wondering how best to approach the topic Anakin ventured,
"Snips, do you remember when you said you would help me track down and free all the slaves in the galaxy once the war was done?"
Suddenly realising the seriousness of the conversation, and appreciating how close this topic was to her master, Ahsoka quickly lost her smile and stared intensely before voicing a confident,
"Of course I do!"
Her enthusiastic response was heartening to Anakin and he continued on,
"Well then Ahsoka, we can call this training for that mission. There's supposed to be a podrace happening on this planet soon…"
Ahsoka's eyebrow rose at that comment and she cut-in before Anakin could continue,
"You're not going to make me race again, are you Skyguy?"
Just the thought of that whole adventure lightened Anakin up a bit, but he continued on seamlessly,
"Not at all Snips. Where there's podracing, there's slaves. Lets see if we cant cause a bit of a fracas and get a bunch out of there."
Ahsoka straightened her posture a little and adopted a questioning look before saying,
"Sounds good. Got a plan?"
Anakin grinned one of his lopsided grins and replied,
"Ah you know me. We'll think of something. But doing it now would be a good idea. With all the relocation the GAR is offering after the last battle it should be easy to sneak some slaves in with them and letting them disappear… Still want to help?"
Ahsoka leaned to one side and crossed her arms, as if she was pondering what her master had said. It didn't take long before she couldn't keep up the façade any longer. She smiled and held out her right arm. Anakin looked at it and saw her bracer-covered, burnt orange coloured hand extending from the voluminous sleeve that made up her cloak. She said,
"Of course I do!"
Anakin smiled, clasped her hand in his and shook firmly,
"Excellent! Good to know you're in. I'll probably need a convincing Togrutan princess slave again anyway"
Ahsoka struck a pose with her hands on her hips and simply pouted a defiant,
"Hey!"