CHAPTER 17: AHSOKA TANO
Coruscant
19 BBY (16:05:14 GrS)
Knowing that the Battle of Coruscant was only days away, Ahsoka tried her best to keep her anticipation in check. In this timeline, without Ahsoka's involvement with the Mandalorians, the Republic had no plans to attack Mandalore.
The Togruta kept busy with her duties as a counselor, pretending to be ignorant of the imminent Separatist attack. In her spare time, she continued investigating the more disturbing matter of the loss of Force Sight.
She had developed a new hypothesis—the Jedi in the detention bloc have lost their Force Sight because they are lower down in the temple.
If that were true, then it would stand to reason that the aquatic Jedi living beneath the Lake Level immediately above the detention bloc, would have more weakened force sight than the Jedi Knights living above. This would imply that whatever was causing the loss in Force Sight was beneath the Jedi Temple.
On the other hand, while Ahsoka had developed a hypothesis, she had not yet thought of a way to test it. How can you operationalize the strength of Force Sight?
Sitting beneath an Uneti Tree in the Temple Courtyard, Ahsoka stared up at the polluted sky. Perhaps I could use a Likert scale… 'Lately, I have felt it more difficult to see objects with the Force. 1: strongly disagree, through 7: strongly agree.' Yes, that could work. Unconventional but—
"Ahsoka, oh wuhu Sheshli Ria Narghamana," growled a young Wookiee voice.
Ahsoka looked to her left and smiled.
Dressed in billowing bright red Lifeday robes, Gungi was carrying a tray of chocolate Wookiee Ookiees.
"I didn't realize it was Lifeday yet. Oh, you look very distinguished in those robes."
Extending his arms, Gungi thrust the tray closer to the Togruta's face.
"Why, thank you," Ahsoka said, continuing to smile as she took an ookiee. Opening her mouth, she placed the ookiee on her tongue and gasped.
Ahsoka had been hardly able to see anything from the Force in days. Seeing anything at all was a surprise, yet now in her Force Sight, she could perceive a weaselish creature standing right in front of her. The creature's presence was completely invisible to her eyes, yet she could sense it strongly.
"Gungi, do you sense anything odd?" she mumbled, mouth full of ookiee.
"Naaa," Gungi moaned, scratching the back of his head.
Standing on its hind legs, the creature suddenly stuck its head in her mouth, causing Ahsoka to wretch and cough, screaming as she backed up into the tree. A sharp pain flared up without warning in the roof of her mouth.
Seeming to react with pain too, the weasel took a step back. Turning its snout to the sky, it screamed. Like the weasel's visual presence, the Togruta could only perceive the creature's screams in her mind.
Lir Sey'les, Ahsoka thought in horror as she recognized the voice. What does this weasel have to do with that Bothan? Wait… What if a future Lir Sey'les uncovered another way to overwrite consciousness using—
"AAAAAHHH!" Ahsoka screamed, tripping sideways into the tree's roots. The pain was suddenly overwhelming. "MOVE ME!" she yelled to no one in particular, then swung helplessly at the invisible weasel, screamed "GET AWAY FROM ME! GET OUT OF HERE! YOU ARE NOT GOING TO—"
She stopped her command mid-sentence. As soon as it appeared, the weasel was gone.
"Grrrrafffffffffgrrr! Yakosh ga rirash mi Ahshoha!" ["By the Force! Something is wrong with Ahsoka!"] Gungi roared, beckoning over the training Younglings and their instructor with his free hand.
Continuing to cough, Ahsoka spat the remaining crumbs from her mouth. Kriff that was weird.
A human with dark skin, a bald head, and a greying black goatee dropped to her side. "Ahsoka! Ahsoka, are you all right?"
His face was vaguely familiar, and Ahsoka wondered if he was Kelleran Beq, but was not sure enough to assume that was his name.
"Thank you, I am—I am alright," Ahsoka slurred unconvincingly to the human who might be Kelleran Beq, wiping the drool from the side of her chin.
"MEDIC!" another voice yelled.
Gungi moaned, sobbing as he yowled away in Shyriiwook. ["My Wookiee-Ookies,"] Gungi moaned worriedly. ["My Wookiee-Ookies are so disgusting they gave Ahsoka another brain hemorrhage!"]
"No, the Ookiees were good," Ahsoka mumbled, jostled about as she was once again placed on a stretcher.
o.o.o.o.o
Lir Sey'les
The Vergence Scatter
"Ugh," Sey'les groaned, blinking up at the crowd of sentients around her.
"I think she's back," Nebhir said, looking around for reassurance. "Sey'les, are you back with us?"
"How long was I out?" Sey'les asked, sitting up straight. Whatever had happened, the worst of it was over.
"It is hard to say," growled one of the Loth-Wolves named Ito. "Time is…"
{"There is no reference for time in here,"} Morai hooted solemnly.
"Oh yeah," Sey'les sighed. "Yeah. We're between all the times… Celestials…"
The Bothan's eyes fixed on Morai. The word Celestial was no longer an insult in her vocabulary, but a civilization whose history she had seen from the perspective of their Midichlorians. A civilization so awe-inspiringly advanced and powerful they could be considered godlike if Veryk's recounting was accurate.
Then came the Jedi, the Sith, and Nebhir's treasure hunt.
Her eyes fixed again on the half-Bothan half-Squib. She was back in her adorable canine biped form with mousy ears, deceptively innocent round eyes, and no tiara-carrying tail.
Sey'les smirked, pondering how similar and yet different Bothan and Squib greed was. Like Squibs, most Bothans wanted to accumulate wealth—only Bothans wanted to accumulate social attention and personal power, while Squibs wanted to accumulate junk and shiny things.
Now Togrutas, she thought concernedly, I don't understand them. She wracked her mind, searching for Ahsoka's presence but felt nothing. She could remember though something vague—confidence that Order 66 won't work.
Good, it must just have been a temporary apparition…
{"We are in completely uncharted waters,"} Veryk chittered worriedly, standing up on his hind legs to match Sey'les's seated height. {"I now sense you feel alright, but I have no idea what the future will hold."}
"Indeed," said Lossko, nodding in agreement. The massive Mythosaur turned his reptilian head towards the portals leading to the future. "We do not have time to worry about this now. You four must continue with your journey to the Kestrel. I will continue monitoring the portals for future developments."
{"Hopefully, I will be able to fix any complications that arise from your contact with Ahsoka's essence. Sey'les. I am genuinely sorry."}
{"You should be,"} Morai hooted. {"It was very irresponsible to transform her into a Savrit Cat and drop her right in the observational center of the Force. She could—"}
"It was my fault," Sey'les interrupted with a snarl, finding herself once again jumping to her Prophet's defense. She stood up tall and towered over Morai's tiny Convor form. "I am thirty-three years old. I am not a child and can make my own decisions."
Morai stared back, unmoved by Sey'les's age.
Thirty-three… Damn that's not very old here.
For a moment, everyone stared at Sey'les, most probably thinking thirty-three made her practically an infant.
"How old am I?" Nebhir gulped, interrupting the silence. The half-Squib looked around, desperate for an answer.
That is a good question. Nebhir died at age 27 and stayed dead for the last two years. I pulled her out so she's still 27.
{"It depends on where we go, I suppose,"} Veryk explained with a completely different answer than the one Sey'les had come up with. {"Where we're traveling to next, you will be almost 30."}
Frowning, Sey'les decided to ask a question that she really needed to know the answer to. "So… What's the game plan?"
{"Rescuing Kix should remain our focus,"} Morai said. {"It was Bendu's plan to stop Order 66, and I believe it remains our best chance."}
{"I agree,"} Veryk chimed in. {"With Sey'les and Nebhir, we should be able to much more easily convince Kelia—not to mention that you can now speak to Bothans too Morai! This'll be easy. Go to the Kestrel, convince Kelia, jump to Kix's location, save Kix, jump back to Coruscant with the evidence."}
"And hope Sidious doesn't initiate Order 66 in response," Lossko muttered with an ominous nod.
"Who's Kix?" Sey'les and Nebhir both asked in unison.
Every timeless being turned their heads and looked concernedly at the two mortals.
o.o.o.o.o
Ahsoka Tano
"A weasel?" Rig Nema asked incredulously.
Ahsoka strained to listen. The vibrating sounds of the resonance imager around the Togruta's head made it difficult to hear.
"Yeah," Ahsoka sighed, staring up at the white durasteel. "Or a weasel-like thing."
"Weasel-like," Rig Nema scoffed. "That really narrows it down, Ahsoka. Do you know how many species are called 'weasels'? On how many planets?"
Conceding the point, Ahsoka fell silent and sat still, staring up at the top of the resonance imager tube. As the minutes went by, her thoughts remained focused on Sey'les, and weasels.
What was that creature and what connection does it have with Sey'les? With Bothans…
Hmmm. I wonder what weasel-like animals are on Bothawui.
At long last, the buzzing noise around Ahsoka's head stopped.
After being pulled out from the imaging tube on a stretcher, Ahsoka stared up at Rig Nema's face, blinking.
With the vibrating sounds of the resonator gone, the sound of a HoloNews broadcast caught the Togruta's attention.
"The scans did not detect anything life-threatening," Rig Nema explained. "There is an oddly firing cluster of nerves, at the roof of your mouth. If you ask me, it looks like a migraine, but the medical database has no records of anything like this ever occurring, at least not to a Togruta."
"That's weird," Ahsoka mumbled, sitting straight up and not paying attention to a word Rig Nema was saying.
On screen, a Trandoshan reporter was hissing away excitedly outside the Galactic Senate Building. It was the caption though, which caused Ahsoka's heart rate to elevate. Her jaw fell slack as she mouthed the words voicelessly in complete disbelief.
SENATE PASSES CONDITIONAL ARTICLES OF IMPEACHMENT.
