Ok, so this was an idea that came about via drinking and deep thought while watching the Last Airbender review by the Nostalgia Critic, you know the one, the one by M. Night Shyamalan. The one Avatar adaptation that we say doesn't exist, but yet does. Now I will state that there is a promising SW/Avatar crossover already here, but I wanted to throw my hat in and see what I could do with a pilot.
Now, in terms of timeline placement, I've decided to place the arrival of my OC shortly after the battles of Scarriff and Yavin. The reasoning makes sense as there is a 4-year gap between Episodes 4 and 5 making this optimal timeline exploration. This also opens an opportunity later, should I continue this fic into a full-fledged series, for exploration into the Korra series where the Avatar world is even more advanced than it was less than 100 years prior. Now I have this starting during Book 2: Earth of Avatar as that seems to be the optimal time for me as it allows me to explore things after certain characters had been introduced.
Rating: T to T+ for some violence and language.
Disclaimer: I own only my laptop and my copy of MS Word. Star Wars belongs to Disney; Avatar: The Last Airbender belongs to Viacom, Michael Dante DiMartino, and Bryan Konietzko. See the Foreword for the rest of the disclaimer.
XxXxXxX
"Talking."
'Thinking.'
XxXxXxX
Far above a blue-green marble in some little pocket of space in the galaxy where a moon gently orbits a planet that has no knowledge of the greater galaxy and its troubles and struggles of the citizens under a tyrannical Empire, an eyeball-shaped craft with three w-shaped wings extending outwards drops back into real-space. Its engines screeched as it flew uncontrollably towards the planet.
In the interior of the craft, a single occupant in a fight suit and helmet struggled to keep marginal control as warning alarms and klaxons blared, "Warning, hyperdrive offline. Maneuverability: limited. Recommendation: land and perform repairs."
"No shit," the occupant replied, banking to get the fighter in position to enter the planet's atmosphere. "Yeah, great idea Shan. Steal a shiny TIE Defender, they SURE aren't going to shoot at you."
The ship rattled and shook as it entered the atmosphere. "Warning: shields depleting at an increased rate."
"Fierfek."
Down below on the surface people on every continent and landmass looked up as a small meteor crossed the sky at a speed that baffled even the most learned scholars while screaming. There was even a small skirmish that stopped just to gaze at the strange astrological event.
The burning craft was over a desert screaming past an iron filled mountain. Warning sirens sounded as the numbers on the altimeter quickly decreased into the low dozens of meters. "Recommendation: bail out. Crash imminent," the onboard computer warned.
Shan watched in horror as his ejection seat refused to respond despite his futile pulling the lever manually. Shan saw the ground rapidly approaching and braced himself for impact, and possible death. He felt himself jerk forward and fell immediately into unconsciousness.
The next time Shan opened his eyes he had a super massive headache, his ribs hurt, and it was night out. 'Who am I?' he asked himself. 'Right, Theron Shan.'
Theron had been named after his great (and then some) grandfather also named Theron who had been one of the Republic's best spies during the long Cold War between the Empire and Republic. Theron was honored to be named after such an important historical figure. Theron had even followed in his ancestor's footsteps as when he turned seventeen he left Corellia to join the Rebel Alliance. For two years he worked under Phoenix squadron operating near Lothal and transferred to the Alliance's deep cover division and waited for his next operation. He was given the task of stealing a new model of TIE designated as Defender which proved to be a very difficult fighter to defeat in dogfights. He was to bring one back, along with a squadron's worth if possible, for R&D to figure out how to both counter its systems and for Intelligence to figure out how to defeat it in battle.
Well… the operation went horribly wrong. He was to infiltrate the Sienar factory and steal a fighter off the assembly line after inspection when a team of Rebels would cause a diversion to allow him to escape in the chaos.
It did not go according to plan at all.
The small task force arrived on time, but they were pushed back by superior numbers on the station. Therefore, they were not able to deactivate the AA defenses and one of the solar panels responsible for proper power to the hyperdrive was hit causing some damage, but not enough to scrub the mission. It was only once he entered hyperspace that the problem was made known to the system and him. It forced him out of hyperspace around the orbit of this planet.
Theron looked around the small cockpit and the release for his crash webbing. Seeing as the catch would not release him, he cut himself free with the knife he kept on him. Once free he braced himself as he fell onto the hatch of the fighter, strongly implying that the TIE was upside down on the ground. He unsealed the hatch, but it only opened a few centimeters before stopping. Looking out he saw that the dorsal wing was missing which is why it was closer to the ground than it should be if the wing was still there. Looking out of the viewport it was a clear shot out of the fighter; he drew his K-16 Bryar pistol and fired a charged bolt into the viewport blowing it out. He crawled out of the wreckage and took a look at his surroundings; there were sand dunes everywhere. This planet, or at least this specific section gave Tatooine a run for its money.
One thing was certain as he looked at the fighter, it wasn't going to fly again. He placed his hands on his head and sighed in exasperation, the only option would be to repair the fighter. But there was one slight, tiny problem. He couldn't repair shit. He went back to the fighter and checked the small cargo bay which was supposed to hold forty-five kilos of cargo plus a week's worth of consumables.
Theron had to pry the cargo bay open and to his dismay, all he found inside was the prototype astromech droid model he had reprogrammed to help him with his task. "And no food. Isn't that just great?" Theron said aloud in the most sarcastic way he could, throwing the bay door away. He pulled the droid out with a grunt. "Well aren't you light?" he said with a strained huff. He carried the droid down carefully as he used one of the still attached wings as a step, but dropped it in the sand dune. Theron jumped from the fighter's side and landed in the dune as well. He opened a panel on the domed head of the droid and flicked a switch.
Within seconds the Imperial colored droid lit up and came to life. The droid immediately extended a shock prod at him. "Hey! Is that any way to treat the guy that saved your metal ass?" Theron asked.
"You dropped me!" it beeped angrily in droid binary.
"I did not! That was the crash!" Theron lied.
"Did too! I was secured before I powered off!"
The two stared at each other in a staring contest to see who would relent first. Theron was doomed from the start as droids don't blink. Finally, Theron turned away. "Fine! I dropped you while taking you out of an overturned fighter. Happy?"
"Very. So where are we?"
Theron looked at the sky. "None of the constellations look familiar and there hasn't been a search party sent by the planet's governing authority so I'm going to guess we're on some backwater planet. And in a desert."
"A desert? That can't be good for you, you know, someone who needs water to survive."
"Then I suggest we look at our options. I can tell you one thing, that fighter isn't going to fly, BB" Theron said with a thumb pointed towards the TIE.
BB-1 looked at the damaged, crashed TIE for a moment, leaning to see behind Theron. "Turn on the emergency beacon?" he suggested.
"It's still configured with the standard Imperial channel. If we turn that on and they discover we're not Imps, well me anyway, I'll be interrogated and/or executed. You? They'll just give you a memory wipe before putting you back into service. Us squishy biological lifeforms don't have that luxury," Theron replied sarcastically. He sighed, "Besides, the beacon in there is tamper-proof and we wouldn't be able to adjust the signal to a Rebel one."
"Find civilization and wait for them to find us?" BB suggested.
"Even if I did make it alive it could take a while, if not ever show up."
"Well aren't you just a bucket full of sunshine?" BB quipped.
Theron shrugged, "I'm just being realistic here." He leaned against the hull of the fighter and sighed, "There's no food or water in the cargo hold that would have been left there post-production but I stole it before it could get those provisions."
"A little bit of a lack of foresight, don't you think?"
"Hey! It's not my fault, they give out provisions at where ever they're stationed at."
"I'm just trying to inject some kind of humor into this very dire situation for you."
"For me? What about you, hmm?"
"I run on electricity, duh. I can just use one of those TIE solar panels to keep myself operational."
Theron looked at the sole remaining, undamaged solar panel and got an idea. "Do you think we could make an improvised speeder with the panel, some of the repulsorlift engines, and a rudimentary control stick?"
The droid stood still as it began to run calculations and other processes. "It would be possible."
"Well, let's get started then. It'll be easier to work in the cool of the night rather than the heat of the day."
For the next eight hours with minimal rest, the human-droid duo cut loose the remaining panel and pylon and set it flat on the dune so that the pylon was sticking in the air. Next, they scavenged the repulsorlift engines from the fighter's chassis and mounted them on the underside of the panel; positioning them so that one was in front and two on the left and right sides of the wing pointed straight down while the last was positioned at the rear to provide thrust forward. Theron then ripped the flight chair from the fighter and placed it flush against where the pylon was once connected. The next few hours after that were spent getting the control yoke wiring lined up with both the repulsorlift engines and the twin laser cannons that worked in theory. BB spent most of his time soldering and testing wires as well as fine-tuning the engines so they worked efficiently with the levels of power provided. The only way to turn the thing was to lean to either side as there weren't any fine-tuned controls and could precisely control the engines. They were rudimentary, and that was an understatement. It pretty much only did start, forward, stop, and fire; everything else was manual.
The sun had just been rising behind the horizon when they finished. Theron attached a power meter to one of the panel's leads that would have connected to the fighter and saw promising levels being generated. Of course, these were just preliminary numbers as this was from scattered rays and not direct sunlight.
The numbers began to climb. "Yes. Yes!" Theron chanted in hope as the repulsorlift engines started to hum. Then the power levels immediately plummeted and the engines stopped. "No! Motherkriffer Force damn it!" he yelled as he threw the power monitor off into the distance.
BB gave a bleep the equivalent of an annoyed sigh and rolled up to the improvised speeder and started soldering more wires to each other that they somehow missed before. Theron raged before finally noticing that the TIE speeder was floating. "Are you done raging?" BB asked.
Theron could only blink comically for a minute before responding, "Yes, I am."
Theron jumped up on the craft and tested the controls, which were responsive but slightly sluggish. In the desert, this wouldn't be that much of an issue. He let loose one single burst of the blaster cannons and the power fluctuated as the repulsorlift engines lowered in altitude.
"Ok, so I'll try not to use them unless absolutely needed," Theron muttered. "Then again I don't have anything to use for targeting."
He hopped off and scavenged for whatever else he could find in the wreckage including the stolen E-11 and DLT-19X he got from the factory's Stormtrooper armory. He removed the sole proton torpedo from the launcher and deactivated it so it couldn't be accidentally fired or triggered to explode. He set it
gently behind the improvised pilot seat and secured it in place. He removed his rucksack and checked what he had managed to keep on him through his assignment and mission.
The first of the items was a small cube, the Holocron of Bastila Shan, his great and then some grandmother that had been handed down from generation to generation to each Shan family head to use and learn from. When the Ruusan Reformation occurred a thousand years ago the Shan family changed their names and went into hiding while in plain sight. Some hid among the Mandalorians, creating their own clans inside of houses that they politically identified with. Some hid on Corellia, like Theron's family did, and became well-respected members of society in the political sphere as well as the military world. They hadn't been heard from in a long time but there was supposedly some of the Shan clan on Coruscant.
The second item was a lightsaber that he had constructed out of high-quality parts you could buy anywhere, which considering the family's wealth on Corellia was quite easy, and a kaiburr crystal that he had gotten deep in the Corellian mountain range that the Force led him to. That was one wild Force-induced trip, that was for certain.
The third item was an ascension gun with two canisters of liquid cable, monofilament rope and an attachable belt for ascension or descending while using the clip attached to the belt as an extra safety measure.
The last thing that he checked was his set of extra clothes that consisted of a shirt, cargo pants, combat boots, fingerless leather gloves, and a nerf hide jacket. Seeing as the TIE pilot armor was much better choice of equipment for a desert as the attached life support system would keep the rest of the suit cool in the heat as well as having a barrier against the whipping sands even if the helmet not being connected to any systems didn't allow for full functionality like a HUD with full sensor readouts. He slung the bag over the seat and secured it in place.
[ Ghost Recon: Wildlands – Broken Bolivia. Alain Johannes ]
Theron hopped onto 'Ugly' and hauled BB between his legs to hold him in place. He then turned on the repulsorlift engines and gave it a good test, using the weight that the craft was now loaded with as it was much more than just him now. It was once again sluggish to respond, but it was still working properly. Seeing as though the sun was rising in the west and was going to reach its apex soon, and given the fact that this desert couldn't go on forever (right?), he chose to allow the Force to guide him, and it was pulling him east.
The Ugly sped away, leaving nothing but a scavenged fighter and dust behind. BB beeped as sand whipped around them. They traveled until the sun had passed the afternoon mark. "Do you even know where we're going?" BB beeped.
"No clue," Theron replied.
"What?!" BB's dome swiveled towards him.
"Hey! We have no idea which way civilization is, my gut is telling me to go this way."
"Oh sure, your gut. Isn't that the same gut that told you to seal a Defender with no supplies in it?" BB snarked.
"Do you want me to ditch you out here? You can certainly roll the rest of the way," Theron shot back.
"Hey! What's that?" BB asked while turning his dome towards something that was just in the distance.
Theron slowed the Ugly down and looked towards where BB was pointed. What he saw sort of surprised him. It was a tower right in the middle of nowhere that looked like it extended down well below the sand. "Well, would you look at that?" Theron muttered as he turned the speeder towards the tower. A minute later he parked and deactivated the repulsorlift engines. He took off his helmet and set it on the seat and gave a long whistle as he saw how far the tower went up. "So, what do you think?"
"It looks like a ruin in the middle of nowhere," BB replied.
"I'm going to go check it out," Theron replied as he took off the helmet and grabbed his rucksack. He dug through the shifted contents until he found his ascension gun and attached the clip to his stolen TIE armor and made sure to grab the two extra canisters of liquid cable as well. He took the comlink out of the helmet and made sure it was secured on his head. He slung his recently acquired E-11 over his shoulder, as well as the rest of the rezipped rucksack, and aimed inside the exposed window at the top of the tower and fired. The metal spike shot out faster than most could react and stuck itself in the roof of the tower where the wall met the tower at. Theron closed the distance and planted his feet against the wall and tested the line to ensure it was in there deep enough for him to rappel inside. Once he confirmed this he activated the line to ascend and zipped up to the window and climbed half inside and shouted back to BB, "Call me on the comlink if anything happens." He then looked down into three building and saw that it was a lot deeper underground than the tower appeared to be. "Well, that's different," he muttered.
He swung himself into the tower and slowly descended into the abyss, making sure to keep an eye on the holographic projection on the side of the gun showing how many meters, with a tenths of a meter as a decimal at the end, was remaining. He reached the bottom, and by bottom see the highest bridge at the top of the entire building, but it seemed to go much deeper. He whistled and it echoed for quite a long while. He looked around as he disconnected himself from the ascension gun and swung his E-11 to bear as well as turning on the flashlight. "I haven't seen architecture like this since dad brought me along on that business trip to Alderaan," Theron remarked.
He felt a tickle at the back of his neck and turned to see what looked like a nocturnal raptor, but massive. "You're human," it remarked in a semi-echoey voice. And it could talk.
"And you're a giant avian," Theron remarked in turn, his rifle ready to be raised at any time.
"You are most unusual."
"I could say the same about you, we don't have hyper-intelligent, giant birds in my neck of the woods."
"And where is this 'neck of the woods'?"
"Far from here."
"Then I advise you human from far from here that humans are no longer permitted in my study. Leave the way you came," it demanded.
"Study? What do you study?" Theron asked rife in curiosity.
"I am Wan Shi Tong, he who knows ten thousand things."
"Seems a bit finite to me. By the way, what's your beef with humans? It's obvious you don't hold them in high regard."
"Humans only bother learning things to gain the upper hand on other humans. Just like that firebender who came to this place a few years ago looking to destroy his enemy. So the question becomes, who are you trying to destroy?" it asked as it got in real close to an uncomfortable extent.
"No one. Except for the Galactic Empire. And even then I haven't seen a single Star Destroyer or TIE flying around. But that's not what brought me here."
"Oh?"
"I was drawn here, by something. But for what purpose, I do not know."
"What is it that you want?"
"To go home, back to my brothers and sisters in arms." Theron then got an idea as he felt a malice rising from the avian. "How about a little quid pro quo. I give you something in return for something I know?"
"And what you would you want?"
"Star charts," Theron answered truthfully.
"And you would use these charts for?"
"To find where I am in the galaxy. If I know where I am then I can figure out a way home. You give me the charts, or allow me to copy them, I give you something in return that you can add to your... study, then I'll leave. How does that sound?"
"That is most reasonable. However, an addendum. You will not tell another soul of this place."
"If that is what you wish."
Theron could see that the avian was eying his armor. "How about in exchange for the northern hemisphere of the planet's star charts I give you my armor to both study and display," he negotiated.
"I have never seen such a thing before," Tong replied. "Very well, the northern hemisphere of the night's sky for your armor."
Theron stripped out of the armor and under suit and retrieved his jacket from his rucksack and put it on, the clothing he was wearing before the theft still being worn, well besides the jacket of course. Theron shouldered his rucksack over his shoulder and rifle held with one hand by the pistol grip. "There you go, one suit of exoatmospheric armor."
The avian reached out with a wing and took the armor with an interested hum. "Very impressive. It's made of a material I've never seen before. It's quite the interesting piece."
"And our deal?" Theron asked.
"What do you offer for the southern hemisphere?"
Theron thought deeply. The only other things he had on him were his blaster, lightsaber, Holocron, and a hologram transmitter. The first three were non-negotiable as he had no idea what the political climate nor what the natives were like; and the Holocron was priceless as it had centuries of information inside it. The last he could live without, but it would be irritating. "Would an oral lesson suffice?"
"That would depend on the content being significant."
'Let's hope this works,' Theron thought. He pulled out his emitter and started to recite as the hologram of the galaxy appeared, "The known galaxy is split up into eight sectors at this time: the deep core, the core, the colonies, the expansion region, the mid-rim, the outer rim, wild space, and the unknown regions. The closer you are to the core the more political and governed it becomes whereas the further you get the less more it becomes lawless, with some notable exceptions. There have been multiple governments that have ruled the galaxy for the twenty-five thousand years interstellar travel has existed ranging from the Celestials to the more recent Empire."
"The humans you wish to destroy," Tong noted.
"Trust me, you think you've seen cruelty, the Empire has it mastered to a science that horrifies all who know the truth about them. You said a firebender came here to destroy his enemies? Imagine that, but with a government that can eradicate an entire planet from galactic history. I met a man who was by the side of a man who felt it as it was destroyed. He said that it was like a million souls cried out in terror and were immediately silenced." Theron changed the image from the galaxy map to an image of Alderaan before it was destroyed. "It was a beautiful world, I was there once years ago with my father. If Coruscant was the heart of the Old Republic, Alderaan was its soul. Lush with life and natural beauty you'd be hard pressed to find anywhere else. A people so kind and welcoming that you'd think that there was nothing wrong in the galaxy at all. But now?" He switched the image to what an Alliance ship had collected less than a year after the Battle of Yavin. "It's nothing more than dust and echoes. A wound in the Force itself. It was only thanks to hundreds of brave souls that went into the howling abyss and never returned was the reason the weapon that caused this destruction was itself destroyed."
"Then you see that humanity is only out to save itself, and only those that ally themselves with them."
Theron shook his head, "My great grandfather once said that all sentient life has the capacity to commit the vilest of deeds, but they are also capable of the most selfless of acts and greatest of good deeds. We're not perfect and never will be. We just coast along in this big, wide galaxy trying to do the best we can."
The avian could only hum in thought. "You truly are an interesting human. But no matter, we had a deal." A desert fox walked up to Theron's side. "This knowledge seeker will assist you in the information you seek."
Theron looked down and saw that in the fox's eyes held an intelligence well above common beasts. When he looked back up the avian had already taken off and was gliding down into the depths of the library. "I guess it's just you and me," Theron joked. "So, you know where to go?" he asked. The fox shot off towards a bookshelf of old, yet well taken care of books and stopped at the end to look at him. "I suppose you do."
Theron followed the fox until it reached a somewhat large cul de sac that had several tomes on display that were surrounded by bookshelves on both sides. Theron walked over to where the fox stood at. He looked over and saw a chart of stars. The sides of the map were marked with a writing system that Theron didn't recognize at all. He took out a camera and recorded an image of the star map. He then tapped the side of the headset. "BB I'm sending you an image of half of a star chart, start running it through your databanks against the star charts of all known systems, I'll send the other half in just a moment."
"Why not send it at the same time?" BB asked.
"Don't be a smartass, it's in two parts for the north and south hemispheres," Theron rolled his eyes. He pulled up his coat sleeve and tapped a few buttons on a small gauntlet under his coat. A holographic display showed a percentage that rapidly went from zero to a hundred.
"Received," BB reported.
Theron turned his attention to the fox, "Where's the other one?" It scurried on over to another pedestal to which Theron followed. He took another image of the new star chart and sent it to BB.
"Received. I will start to-. Incoming unknowns," BB reported.
"What do you mean?"
"Five humans and some sort of small mammalian flying on the back of a large six-legged mammal."
"Stay out of sight, we have no idea how the locals will react to an advanced machine like yourself."
"Roger."
Theron looked around for anything else that he could use as a way to get home. He looked to the fox, "You wouldn't happen to have anything on advanced engineering and spaceflight, particularly hyperdrives or superluminal travel, would you?" he asked. The fox only tilted its head at him in confusion and Theron only sighed. "Well, it was worth a try."
"Heads up, they're coming down the tower now," BB warned.
"Well that's just great," Theron muttered. "Keep me posted on any changes," he ordered BB. He then turned to the fox as he closed the frequency, "Have a written language Codex or something around here?"
The fox cocked its head as if to say, 'We're a library, what do you think?' The fox then ran off like it did before and Theron followed it. After many twists and turns, they arrived back at the main central chamber at the place where Theron rappelled down earlier. He could hear voices coming from a second rope, and weirdly enough they spoke Basic.
"And look at those beautiful buttresses!" an older male remarked, to which two that were younger snickered to. "What's funny?" he asked.
"We, uh… really like architecture," one replied.
To which the older man replied, "As do I."
Theron watched from behind a bookshelf that provided a lot of cover should he get into a firefight. He examined each of the newcomers with a critical eye. The first down the new line was an older male, probably middle aged from his vocal range, and he wore what looked like earthy colored clothing meant to trek throughout the desert. The second was a yellow and orange ensemble kid whose clothing resembled something akin to robes of some kind; the big key feature that he had was that he was both bald and had an arrow tattoo on his head and hands. He also carried a staff of some kind. The third that came down the line, a teenage boy, was dressed in a dark blue set of clothing that was similar in general style to the first, however, it didn't look like something someone would wear in a desert willingly. Although it did seem he possessed some common sense as at least he had the sense to be sleeveless. It looked like he had a sword, but Theron couldn't quite see it. The last one who came down the line was a teenage girl wearing the same color scheme as the previous boy but her clothing was in a more feminine style. She appeared to have no weapons on her.
"Doesn't anyone find it a bit odd that there's another rope here?" the girl asked.
"Don't be silly, Katara. Those strands are much too small to be used as rope," the blue-clad boy replied.
"And the metal spike they're attached to at the top of the tower, Sokka?" the girl asked in turn.
"Maybe it was left by a past explorer and a spider attached its webbing to it?" the arrow headed boy asked.
The girl placed her hand to her chin in thought. "I don't know Aang. Professor, are there any desert spiders that could create a web like this long and black?"
The desert clothed older man took a long look at the cable that Theron came down on. "I don't believe that this is spider webbing," he replied. "It looks like a braided rope of some kind, only extremely thin and braised on a small scale."
The blue-clad boy, Sokka, noticed the ascension gun was attached to the cabling. "What's this?" he asked, poking at it. "This is definitely not a spider."
"It looks like some kind of handheld device," Katara remarked.
"My word! The exquisite mosaic handiwork of this tiled rendered avian symbol is-." The Professor paused as his companions gave him a look of 'short version, please'. "Nice owl." They heard something and Theron sensed a familiar presence that he had met not too long ago, to which they hid behind one of the pillars on the opposite side of him, the Professor needing to be pulled away by the Aang kid.
A few moments later the Tong owl-guy walked right to where the ascension gun still was and now a newly added rope next to it, it's talons scraping against the ground. It twisted its head a hundred-eighty degrees in a disturbing fashion so it looked directly at the newcomers regardless of their fruitless hiding. "I know you're back there," Tong declared knowingly.
The desert clad professor walked out fearlessly, and stupidly, towards Tong and introduced himself, "I am Professor Zei, head of anthropology at Ba Sing Se University."
Tong look unamused, "You should leave the way you came. Unless you want to become a STUFFED head of anthropology."
The professor looked over to where Tong looked and saw several beheaded and stuffed creatures; he gulped and rubbed his neck as if imagining himself losing his head over this trip and encounter. Sokka, the blue-clothed boy, walked forward and asked, "Are you the spirit that brought this library to the physical world?"
"Indeed, I am Wan Shi Tong, he who knows ten thousand things. And you are obviously humans; which, by the way, are no longer allowed in my study."
"What do you have against humans?" Aang asked.
"Hmph, humans only bother learning things in order to gain the edge on other humans. Like that firebender who came to this place a few years ago looking to destroy his enemy. So..." Tong craned his neck and got in the face of Sokka, more than likely creating a most uncomfortable, if not pants wetting, experience, "who are you trying to destroy?"
"What?!" Sokka waved his arms innocently. "No, no destroying. We're not into that."
"Then why have you come here?" Tong asked, staring into the boy's eyes as if he were staring into his soul.
"Umm..." he paused to think too long, "knowledge for knowledge's sake?"
"If you're going to lie to an all-knowing spirit being, you should at least put some effort into it," Tong replied unamused, which amused Theron to an extent.
"I'm not lying. I'm with the Avatar and he's the bridge between our worlds, he'll vouch for me."
Sokka elbowed Aang in the back. "Ow. Uh yeah... I'll vouch. We will not abuse the knowledge in this library, good spirit. You have my word," Aang stated with a bow, to which the others did as well.
"Hmm... I'll let you peruse my vast collection on one condition. In order to prove your worth as scholars, you have to contribute some worthwhile knowledge," Tong declared.
The professor was the first to approach the massive owl with a first edition book. The girl was the second who handed over some kind of 'waterbending' scroll. Next was this... Avatar who gave a wanted poster; Theron knew the format as he had seen many of Rebels and Rebel sympathizers alike in the past: an image, description, and monetary amount of information and/or capture of the fugitive. Last was the boy who, on the spot, tied a hastily tied knot. Theron agreed with the owl that the boy wasn't very bright, well in the knowledge sense at least.
As they did all this, Theron mulled over this new information he learned. First, that this library was brought to the physical world, hinting that there was another; such as the Netherworld of the Force. Second, was that Wan Shi Tong was a spirit of some kind and a fairly powerful one at that based on the amount of respect that their so-called bridge between worlds had for him; that, or he just had respect for them in general. Third, was the aforementioned Avatar, this... bridge between this spirit world and physical world. How was he, a kid, a bridge? Theron reached out with the Force and probed at the kid; to which he was immediately floored metaphorically at the sheer amount of power that he held. He had only felt that kind of power once, and that was when he had a brush with the Emperor in a parade on Corellia years ago; although, that presence was beyond dark and hungry while this was light.
'Note to self, don't piss off the kid,' Theron mentally noted.
After the knot was taken Tong declared, "Enjoy the library," before flying off similarly to how had before in his encounter with Theron.
"Bright enough to fool you," Sokka said menacingly, and just loud enough for Theron to just barely hear. And Theron? He didn't quite like the sound of that. It totally didn't sound like that would come back to bite everyone in their ass soon.
'What is your agenda?' Theron asked mentally.
The fox nudged Theron and started walking once more. They walked for a short while until it stopped and pawed at a stone sculpture that had several languages on it. At the top was the flowing script that the scrolls that he had imaged have written on them. Below that was a second one that was more like Aurebesh but it was definitely a different language. Below that was another stylized script-like language similar to the first. And the final one surprised him: Notron Cant. Notron Cant was an old human language used well over sixteen thousand years ago before the first precursor of Basic, Old Galactic Basic. The only reason he knew of its name was because his ancestor's Holocron had mentioned it in passing and had a single instance of the alphabet used. After all, it was a dead language.
Theron took out his holoimager and tapped his comm headset. "BB, another image incoming."
"What do you want now? Can't you see I'm not only running those maps through my databanks but also keeping an eye on the two remaining companions outside the tower," BB replied with annoyance.
"Just store it for now, I'll look at it later when we have time," Theron replied as he took the image of the entire stone tablet.
"Fine... Sure, make me waste more space for your touristy images."
Theron only rolled his eyes as he initiated the data transfer and closed the audio channel. That droid was a wonderful asset and traveling companion, regardless of how short they had been together, but he could be a real pain at times. 'Maybe my reprogramming software did more than I was led on to believe,' Theron pondered.
He turned to the fox once more. "So this Avatar guy, have a condensed version of what he is?" he asked.
The fox nodded and started to walk towards another part of the library and Theron followed. A few minutes later they came to a section of books and Theron started to hear voices, obviously the kids from earlier. "Sokka, where are you going?" Aang asked.
"I want to know what happened to the Fire Nation on their darkest day," Sokka replied. "This could be promising," he said as he ran off, the rest of his companions following close behind him.
Once they left Theron walked into the aisle carrying his blaster in a relaxed but ready carry. The fox led him to a scroll on a shelf that was pretty small that was stacked next to a lot of books that were hundreds of pages thick. He set the scroll on the ground and unrolled it to see that it was a fairly short document. He took an image of it and sent it to BB immediately for backup storage. He then placed the scroll where it belonged on the shelf.
A few moments later the library started to rumble and shake. "What's going on?" Theron turned to ask the fox that had been by him, only to find that the fox had scurried off. Sand started to pour slowly into the library. "What in the Nine Hells is going on!?" he shouted.
Every fiber of his being and the Force was screaming at him to get out. And listen he did. He started to run towards the top center of the library, using the Force to jump up the stairs to skip as many as he could to cut time. Sand crawled in from the lower levels and swiftly rose up before stopping suddenly, starting, then stopping once more. Theron continued to run up the stairs until he was met with the girl, Katara, who was standing off against Tong.
"Your waterbending won't do you much good here. I've studied southern water style, northern water style, even foggy swamp style," Tong attempted to intimidate the girl.
Theron reached inside his bag and grabbed his lightsaber. He was currently in the mindset of 'the enemy of my enemy is my ally'. Before he could activate it, the boy, Sokka, came falling from the Aang kid's glider brandishing a book and slammed it into the oversized owl. "That's called Sokka style, learn it!" Sokka taunted.
Theron took the chance and ran over to the ascension gun and clipped it to his belt as well as his lightsaber. "Wait, who are you?" Katara asked.
"Escape from death now, questions later," Theron said as he initiated the ascension gun and immediately zipped up the line faster than anyone could manually climb. When he reached the top he unclipped his lightsaber, activated it and sliced off the cable from the wall, and pushed against the wall leaping out the window at the top all within a second. He landed and rolled in the sand, feeling the grains sand in his shirt, coat, and pants. "Well, that's going to irritate me for a good while," he muttered.
As he took inventory of his person, feeling that nothing was missing from what he brought in, besides the armor, he willingly gave over. Not one moment after he dusted himself off and picked up his blaster did the kids, flying on a glider no less, fly out of the tower window. Aang landed with a landing that would have put a Loth-cat to shame while the other two fell onto the sand in a heap. The girl that had somehow missed Theron's attention released whatever hold she was keeping on the tower and said tower sank into the sand faster than you could say 'hello'.
Sand was kicked up with the sudden sinking of the library tower. When the kicked up sand cleared there was a good three-meter deep crater where the tower once stood. "We got it! There's a solar eclipse coming. The Fire Nation's in trouble now," Sokka said as he and Katara hugged.
Theron tapped his headset, "BB group up on me."
"Need help!" BB shouted over the comms.
"BB, where are you?" Theron demanded.
"Coming towards you!"
Theron dropped his rucksack and raised his rifle towards where he heard what sounded like whipping winds and a BB unit shrieking. "What are you doing?" Sokka asked him as he approached.
"You might want to stand a few more feet to your right," Theron said without looking at Sokka as he was aiming down the scope towards a dune. Sokka heeded his advice and took a few steps to his right.
A few tense seconds later BB came flying over the hill and sped right past Theron before turning around to hide behind his leg. "They're right behind me!" he shrieked.
"What's that?" Sokka yelled in surprise as he pointed at BB.
Before anyone could ask another question about him or BB, a sand surfing boat flew over the dune and for some reason, Theron thought it would be oddly appropriate if music was playing. Specifically, music played out of a ground vehicle named after a feline with red armored soldiers driving it. Said sand surfing boat had a small tornado contained by a sail that was being controlled by two individuals.
Theron fired once with his blaster hitting the driver of the vessel in the chest, killing him immediately. The surfer lost control and jumped over the rim of where the tower once was. As it was in the air the remaining passenger jumped out, flailing as he flew through the air almost comically. Theron Force Pulled the passenger to him. Both the group of kids as well as the passenger were surprised at this sudden gesture from him. As the passenger flew towards Theron he closelined the figure, knocking him out instantly. The surfer crashed into the small cliff and shattered into splinters.
Theron turned to BB, "You alright, you bucket of bolts?"
"No thanks to you," he beeped back.
"Ungrateful little droid. Maybe I shouldn't have taken you with me," he prodded.
As Theron said this the kids approached him. "Who are you?" Katara asked.
Theron raised an eyebrow and looked to his mechanical companion. "I'm Theron Shan and this is my companion BB-1," he replied.
"What is that thing?" Sokka asked.
BB let out the digital rendition of s scoff as if he were offended. "He's a droid. A mechanical construct with a personality all his own, much to my dismay on the latter."
"Hey!" BB shouted.
"So, uh... what's your whole deal?" Theron asked, waving one hand among the group.
"We're a group of travelers looking for information on stopping the Fire Nation," Sokka replied.
Theron only raised an eyebrow. "I don't need to be an 'all-seeing' owl to see that you're telling me a half-truth. So is that kid," Theron pointed to Aang, "actually some kind of bridge between the physical and beyond or were you talking out of your ass?"
"That's Aang and he's-."
"The Avatar?" Theron interrupted.
Sokka instantly deflated and his hand reached for his weapon but didn't draw it. "What do you want with him?"
"Nothing, really. Curiosity and all that," he dismissed with a hand casually.
"Speaking of which, where is Appa, Aang?" Katara asked.
Aang approached the girl still squatting in the sand looking sad. "Toph, where is Appa?" Aang asked fearfully. She only shook her head slowly, mournfully. Aang then released a few tears that streamed down his face.
The wind started to kick up that blew sand all around them in the start of a sandstorm. Everyone stood in silence and looked around to see if there was any trail of the individuals that took this 'Appa'. Theron also found that his cobbled together speeder was also gone, his DLT-19X had fallen off of the speeder when those thieves had taken both Appa and the speeder, he swung that over his shoulder. The one thing that Theron was most fearful about that was unaccounted for was the proton torpedoes.
"How could you let them take Appa, why didn't you stop them?" Aang shouted angrily at Toph.
'The girl's name is Toph and she is blind,' Theron noted.
"I couldn't! The library was sinking and you guys were still inside-," Toph replied.
"You could have come to get us, I could have saved him," Aang yelled once more.
She turned towards him slightly. "I can hardly feel any vibrations out here! The sandbenders snuck up on me and there wasn't time for-."
"You just didn't care! You never liked Appa! You wanted him gone!" Aang accused the girl.
'Real mature kid, blaming the blind girl,' Theron thought.
Katara approached Aang and placed a hand on his shoulder. "Stop it, Aang. You know she did everything she could to stop them. She saved our lives," Katara tried to comfort him.
"Who's going to save us?" Sokka asked in reply. "We'll never make it out of here."
"That's all you guys care about, yourselves!" Aang exclaimed in anger; already skipping past denial and straight to anger.
"Give me five minutes with sleeping beauty here and I can get all the answers we need," Theron interrupted while pointing at the now identified sandbender.
"What do you mean?"
Theron was very elusive, "Let's just say I have skills that can get him to open up."
"Can you get him to tell us where he took Appa?" Aang asked hopefully.
"If he knows, I'll find out. Plus, I can get a general direction on where we need to go to at least reach civilization."
"Do it," Sokka replied, superseding any objections.
Theron nodded and walked over to the groggy sandbender that was just waking up. Theron squatted over the sandbender and held his lightsaber in his hand. "Wake up, numbnuts," he said as he prodded the bender. He immediately tried to fight back but before he could do anything Theron punched him in the jaw swiftly. "Now that wasn't very nice. You see, we're short on time and I want to play a little game with you."
"A game?" the bender groaned.
"Yes. In this game, you're going to tell me what I want to know. And if you don't, I start cutting things off," Theron replied as he activated his lightsaber, the brilliant green glow filling the general area. He then immediately stabbed it into the sand near the bender's head, allowing him to see the place it was stabbed into the ground. Theron removed it a second later leaving a molten glass scar in the sand. "You see, that's what this can do to just sand. Imagine what it'll do to you once I start with your toes or fingers. Searing pain that will make you wish you could die; and I'll make sure to do it slowly," Theron said with a demented grin.
The bender's eyes shot from Theron to the blade and then back to Theron. He could see in his eyes that he was scared shitless. "I-I'll tell you anything you want!" the bender replied.
"That's great! Now," Theron moved the blade to hover just over the man's kneecap, "which way leads out of the desert or to the nearest settlement?"
He pointed east. "It's a day's walk that way."
"Excellent! Now, see that kid over there?" The bender nodded. "You see, it seems like you have taken something of his, his friend Appa was taken from this place not too long ago. You wouldn't happen to know where he went, would you?"
The bender looked extremely unsettled and didn't respond. Theron lowered his lightsaber towards his genitals and raised an eyebrow in a challenge; almost daring him to do something stupid or to tell a lie. "Our leader told us to take it," he reluctantly spat out.
"Where and why?" Theron demanded.
Theron didn't need to look and see that Aang was pissed. "Where did you-?!" Aang yelled but Theron held up a hand to tell him that he had everything under control.
"Don't mind him, our conversation is between you and me. You can tell me," Theron said with false assurance, "I'm a nice guy."
He looked to the kid then back to Theron. "Sky Bisons are rare, almost extinct; in fact, we thought they were until he saw it back at the spring earlier today. Our leader thought that we could get a lot of gold for selling it to help our village. We've been suffering as of late, the Fire Nation raiding patrols have been taking more 'taxes' each week makes it more difficult to feed our people," he tried to excuse.
"That doesn't give you the right to-!" Aang interjected angrily.
"Kid, I've had it up to here with you! Shut it and let me work!" Theron shot back, effectively shutting Aang up. "Ok, you had your reasons," Theron felt a disturbance in the Force coming from Aang, "no matter how misguided they were. Now you have yourself a pristine Sky Bison ready to sell, where would you take it to do that?"
"There's a town to the west of the desert that's a neutral town. If you know the right people you can sell anything to anyone. We planned on taking it to one of the many fences, from there they will resell it to a seller of their choosing."
"How far away is it?"
"Days on foot but hours on a sand-sailer."
"And if we were to walk there right now?"
"The fence my leader usually uses works fast. Even if you were to get there in the next day, the Sky Bison will be gone."
"Do you think I could have a word with this fence of yours?" Theron asked. "Think I could find out who the buyer is?"
"He keeps everything anonymous. Buyers wear masks to keep themselves unknown. A lot of... things go through his store." Theron didn't like the way he paused on 'things'.
"What kind of things?" Theron hostilely whispered.
His eyes widened in fear. "Anything! Anything you want! If you want it, you go to him!"
"Anything? Nothing is off limits?"
"If you want it and you have the coin for it then you can buy it from him!"
Theron narrowed his eyes at the bender. He then whispered very softly, "Have you sold any items that some may consider questionable?"
"No! We may be desperate, but not that desperate!"
Theron still looked at him with a critical eye. "Hmm..." Theron could see that he was scaring the bender even more. Theron then extinguished his lightsaber gaining a sigh of relief from the bender and Katara. Theron then surprised everyone by striking the bender in the temple with the pommel of his lightsaber, knocking him out instantly. "And that will make things easier for us."
"How?" Katara asked, still slightly in shock at his action.
"Do you really want to be dragging this guy's sorry behind with us? Before you get all up on your altruist horse, remember that we only have so much water and food to spare before we either starve or start getting severely dehydrated. One more person means less for everyone else." Theron could already see that Aang was on his side, based on that this Appa sky bison thing was his friend, if his reactions were anything to go by, it wouldn't take much to sway him. "Think of it this way: this guy's people knows the desert better than anyone and survived for centuries out here, he can survive if he has the moxie to do it."
"I don't like it, but you do make sense," Katara relented with a sigh. She then saw Aang open his glider. "Where are you going?" she asked him.
"To find Appa," Aang replied. He then shot off into the air towards the general direction that the bender had pointed.
Theron shook his head, "That was foolish of him."
"What do you mean 'foolish'?" Katara asked. "He's worried about his friend."
"And he is commendable for caring about his friend, but if numbnuts back there was even a few degrees off then he'll be many kilometers off."
"We better start walking," Katara remarked, "we're the only ones that know about the solar eclipse. We have to get that information to Ba Sing Se."
"Great, we're on a planet that's primitive," BB remarked morosely.
"And now you too know my pain, my mechanical friend," Theron replied with a tone that said 'screw you too'.
They started to walk away from the crater and knocked out sandbender. Sokka then remarked, "Do you think if we dig up the giant owl he'll give us a ride?"
Theron could only shake his head and roll his eyes at that statement. They started walking towards where the sandbender had pointed to where the closest town was. They didn't have a glider or anything to help propel them faster than walking speed. Well, sprinting was an option but they wouldn't last very long by sprinting. And so began their long and slow trek through the desert.
A few hours later the sandstorm had died down and the sun started to really beat down on the group. Theron didn't need expert survivalist training, to which he was still training in, to see that they all had started to get heat stroke. It didn't take long before they started to turn on each other. All it took was for Toph to stop in front of Sokka and him running into her to set them off.
"Come on guys, we have to stick together," Katara encouraged.
The next event amused Theron as he saw them literally stick together. "If I sweat anymore I don't think sticking together is going to be a problem," Sokka replied as he pried himself from Toph.
Toph pushed Sokka aside and asked, "Katara, can I have some water?"
"Ok, but we have to try and conserve it," she replied as she did what Theron thought to be unthinkable. She did that bending thing. Theron could feel a small tremor in the Force when she did it. It was as if the Force itself was surrounding the water she was 'bending' and around her herself. She then 'bent' a portion of water for everyone.
"We're drinking your bending water?" Sokka asked. He smacked his lips trying to figure out the... distinct taste. It was something that Theron noticed but shook it off as he had much worse during survival training. "You used this on the swamp guy!" he exclaimed as he spat out what remnants hadn't already gone down his gullet.
"It does taste swampy," Toph remarked.
"I've had worse," Theron shrugged.
"I'm sorry, it's all we have," Katara replied apologetically.
"What do you mean, 'you've had worse'?" Toph asked Theron.
"During survival training, I had to drink raw, unfiltered pisswater," Theron replied. Everyone shivered at the thought of that, hoping that it wouldn't come to that.
Sokka spotted something in the distance, "Not anymore! Look!" There were some desert plants that looked like they could contain water. He walked over and drew his sword and sliced the plant open and started to drink the contents of it.
Katara grabbed Toph and yelled, "Sokka, you shouldn't be eating strange plants!" Theron followed slightly behind them, shifting his slung blasters slightly.
Sokka sliced open another of the bulbous planet's... bulbs and started to drink more. "There's water trapped inside!" he replied as he presented the plant-like a bowl to his sister.
"I don't know," Katara replied hesitantly.
"Suit yourself, it's very thirst quenching, though." Theron saw his pupils dilate to an absurd degree. "Drink cactus juice, it'll quench ya." Theron watched in amusement as the kid then did the worm. "Nothing's quenchier! It's the quenchiest!"
"Ok, I think you've had enough," Katara said as she grabbed the cactus half and started to drain it but Theron stopped her.
He took a small sip himself and noted, "Yeah, definitely a hallucinogen."
"Hallucinogen?"
"Oh yeah, he's going to be seeing things for hours."
Confirming his notation, Sokka walked over to Toph and remarked, "Who lit Toph on fire?"
"See?" And to even further his point the flying monkey, Momo, flew in circles above them in a speed that increased per rotation until it lost control and face planted into the sand.
"Can I get some of that water?" Toph asked.
"I don't think that's a good idea," Katara said and grabbed Momo and led Toph off saying, "Come on, we need to find Aang." She started to walk but had to go back for her brother, which amused Theron who could already feel the hallucinations starting to come on.
Sokka then asked, "How did we get out here in the middle of the ocean?"
They walked on for the next hour or so until Katara asked, "How are you not like Sokka and Momo are?"
"Oh, trust me, I am. I'm tripping balls. I just know how to handle myself," Theron replied.
"How?"
"I learned this technique from my great (and then some) grandmother that supercharges the filtering of toxins at an expedited rate."
They continued on walking until there was a flare in the Force behind them followed immediately by an explosion and a dust wave that reached them. "What was that?" Katara asked.
"What, what is what?" Toph asked.
Theron looked through the scope of his DLT-19X and saw a mushroom cloud. "It's a giant mushroom," Sokka replied with religious reverence. "Maybe it's friendly!"
"It looks like an explosion. But of what, I don't know. There are no telltale signs of black smoke that signify that it's a chemical one. And given the fact that we're neither blind nor burning alive tells me that it's not a nuclear one," Theron replied.
"Let's just keep moving," Katara remarked.
"Agreed, I do not want to meet whatever made that." They all started to walk off but Sokka stayed for another moment.
"I hope Aang's ok."
"Giant mushroom! Mushy giant friend!" Sokka yelled as he waved his arms like a man possessed.
The walk they went on was long and arduous with the sun beating down on them. Theron lasting as long as he did thanks to training for extreme situations, but the kids weren't doing so well. Even he had to admit he was starting to feel it too. The heat of the day had passed and the sweet cool of night was just starting to come on. It was sunset by the time that they felt a shadow pass over them. Aang landed in a perfect three-point landing with some kicked up dust. Katara walked over to him. "I'm sorry, Aang. I know it's hard for you right now but we need to focus on getting out of here," Katara tried fruitlessly to comfort him.
"What's the point, we won't survive out here without Appa," Aang said in surrender. "We all know it."
"Come on, Aang. We can do this if we work together," Katara tried to reassure him. "Right, Toph?"
"As far as I can feel, we're trapped in a giant bowl of sand pudding. I got nothing," Toph reported.
"Sokka, any ideas how to find Ba Sing Se?"
"Why don't we ask the circle birds?" Sokka replied as he pointed to four circling vultures that had... stingers?
'Ok, I have no idea if that is the cactus juice causing that, the heat, or if that's really there,' Theron thought.
"You know, if you're hungry, and have no aversion to eating... whatever in the Nine Hells those are, I could shoot them down," Theron offered, taking aim at one.
She saw that everyone was tired, even Theron who was hiding it remarkably well all things considering. And he was the one wearing a coat meant for colder weather. Katara gathered whatever leadership strength she had left and announced, "We are getting out of this desert, and we are doing it together. Aang, get up. Everyone, hold hands." She grabbed Aang's staff which he held, Toph grabbed Aang, she held on to Sokka, and Theron followed right behind the drugged out Sokka. "We have to."
Hours of walking passed and many dunes were crossed. Eventually, Katara announced, "Everyone, let's stop here for the night."
Everyone groaned in relief and fell down in exhaustion. Toph asked, "Katara is there any water left?"
"This is the last of it, everyone can have a little drink," she replied as she split it amongst them.
However, Momo jumped through the bent water causing it to scatter, to which Sokka despaired, "Momo, no! You've killed us all!"
"No, he hasn't," she said as she pulled the water back up from the sand, all without the sand particles in it.
"Right, bending," drugged out Sokka stated as the water was returned to the water skin and was handed to Toph.
"Sokka, let me see the things you got from the library."
Sokka recoiled as if he had been accused of murder, holding the bag he had been carrying the entire time as if he was hiding a grand secret. "What!? I didn't steal anything. Who told you that?" He then pointed and accused Momo, of all people, and accused, "It was you! You ratted me out!"
Playing the part of the straight man Katara responded with, "Sokka, I was there." She then took the satchel of scrolls away from him and walked to the end of the dune.
"It doesn't matter," Aang despaired once again. "None of those will tell us where Appa is."
"No, but we can figure out which way Ba Sing Se is," Katara replied. "We can use the stars to guide us. That way we can travel by night when it is cool and rest during the day. Just... try and get some sleep. We'll start again in a few hours."
Everyone started to hunker down for the night and Theron turned to BB and instructed, "Tune your sensors to look out for any hostile creatures."
BB nodded and took the position of watchdog on the top of the dune. Theron then removed his bag and took out the Holocron that he had hidden inside. He picked it up and sat cross-legged on the sand. He levitated it with the Force and Katara noticed that. "What's that?" she asked as she got ready to sleep.
"An old Jedi Holocron," he replied as he unlocked it like he had been shown long ago. He saw her confusion and continued, "They're mass repositories of knowledge, some of which are very old. This one is well over three thousand years old and belongs to one of my ancestors."
The gatekeeper appeared and Katara remarked in amazement, "I've never seen such a thing before."
"I doubt you have. They're highly protected and kept away from prying eyes. Even then you have to know how to unlock them and the gatekeeper has to find you worthy of the knowledge inside."
"Worthy?"
"Yes. Some of them are particularly picky on who accesses the information and what level of it they can access."
"How are you floating that, by the way?"
"I'm using the Force."
"The Force?"
"Yes, the Force. It's been known by many names over the millennia. It's primarily divided between two sides, the Light, and the Dark; once also known as the Ashla and Bogan. Many references call it the Force, the binds the universe together and helps keep the delicate balance of chaos and harmony in check. There are those that are sensitive to this field and can manipulate it. These people are called Force-sensitives. For as long as many can remember they've been around, old legends say around fifty thousand years or so when they lived on Tython, a planet whose very existence was kept in check by the Force-sensitive beings on it by they themselves keeping an inner balance."
"Wait, planet?" she asked in realization.
"That's right, I'm not from this planet. How did you think my mechanical friend over there was built? I have strange weapons and powers that you can't really explain that don't belong here."
"That's just the cactus juice talking."
"That stuff wore off hours ago. Eliminate the impossible and only the possible remains." She seemed to think quite deeply about it. "Get some sleep, I have something I need to do first."
She nodded and went off to sleep. Theron didn't need the Force to tell him that Aang was still awake, but he didn't care. He needed guidance. "Grandmaster, I need your advice once more," he said to the gatekeeper.
The gatekeeper responded, "What is the knowledge you seek?"
"I wish to learn the art of Battle Meditation."
"Battle Meditation is a dangerous art to learn. Why do you need to learn it?"
"My current traveling companions and I are in a bit of a precarious situation. We're in the middle of a desert, almost like Tatooine, and we're on the last of our water. If I can use Battle Meditation to get us out of the desert we can part ways, but until then I am but a stranger to this world."
"I understand that the situation you're in is rather dire, but a clear and prepared mind are needed in order to learn Battle Meditation without feeling the temptation to fall to the Dark Side."
"Then what do I do, Grandmaster?"
"Meditate. Let the Force lead you to your answers."
Theron sighed but replied. "Thank you, Grandmaster Shan."
"Listen to the Force, my descendant," the gatekeeper replied before deactivating the Holocron, which landed in Theron's outstretched hand. He placed the Holocron back in his bag and sat cross-legged in the sand and began to meditate.
He reached out to the Force and felt the creatures around them. Most kept their distance but some bolder ones were scared off by BB emitting some sparks from his welding tool. The Force seemed to be pulling him to the east, just south of where the sandbender had pointed earlier in the day. He did feel the Force give him a slight boost of well-needed energy before he disconnected himself and stopped, feeling as though he did need some sleep as the last sleep he got was being passed out in a cockpit of a fighter. He bundled up his jacket to use as a makeshift pillow and drifted off to sleep for a power nap as he had done many times in the cockpit of a fighter or freighter before.
He woke up to the sound of Katara waking Sokka and Toph up. "Yesterday my mouth tasted like mud, now it just tastes like sand. I never thought I would miss the taste of mud so much," Toph commented.
Katara walked over to wake Aang but he interjected before she could touch him. "I'm awake. I couldn't sleep," he stated with almost no emotion.
"Well, we need to get moving if we want to get out of this sand pit," said Katara.
Aang sat up and his attitude immediately changed from borderline depressed to excessively happy and shouted, "Appa!"
"Appa?" Sokka asked. "But why would Princess Yue need him? She's the moon, she flies by herself." That was by far the most bizarre thing that Theron had heard all day.
"It's just a cloud," Katara revealed, crushing Aang. "Wait, a cloud!" She held out her water skin to Aang. "Here, fly up and bend the water in that cloud into my pouch."
Aang snatched the water skin with attitude and opened his glider before flying up into the air. "He's not a morning person, is he?" Theron asked in an attempt to brighten the mood. It failed miserably.
Aang flew through the air and made two passes at the cloud before landing once more and handed the skin over, once again with attitude. "Wow, there's hardly any in here," Katara observed.
Aang exploded, "I'm sorry, ok!? It's a desert cloud! I did all I could. What's everyone else doing?" He pointed his staff at Katara, "What are you doing?!"
She sighed and replied, "Trying to keep everyone together." She opened her star map and continued, just wanting to get out of this mess, "Let's just get moving. We need to head in this direction." She started to walk and the rest of the group followed.
The cool of the night helped with the heat as it allowed them to walk a longer distance than in the day without being as exhausted. Theron kept towards the back with BB and Aang, more or less to pick up the rear. As they walked Theron decided that he had enough of Aang's attitude towards his friends.
"You should cherish the time you have with your friends," Theron said to him. "The next thing you know, they could be gone and you'll be left with regrets that you'll never be able to take back."
"What do you know about friends?" Aang spat.
"For a while, I was stationed at a base with my squadron. We were so close were like my brothers and sisters. One day, a routine mission went horribly wrong. I lost all eleven of my squadron members that day to elite fighter pilots. I had an argument with my best friend and I had planned on reconciling with him after the mission, that never happened. About two years ago I was in the middle of a call with a good friend of mine who lived on a planet called Alderaan. Mid transmission it cut out as I was talking to her. It was later that week I found out that the entire planet was destroyed by the Empire." Remembering lost friends brought up a sadness he had kept capped for a while. "Cherish your friends. Reconcile with them while you still can. It's better to live with no regrets than with them."
"Whatever," Aang resigned.
Theron sighed, 'He'll learn one day. Hopefully, before it's too late.'
They continued to walk for the next while, Theron had no idea if it was for a half-hour or a few hours as the sun was still behind the horizon until Toph toppled over. "Ugh! I'm so sick and tired of not seeing where I'm going! And what idiot buried a boat in the middle of the desert!?" Toph yelled in understandable pain.
"A boat?" Katara asked as she ran over to the wood jutting out of the sand.
"Believe me, I kicked it hard enough to feel plenty of vibrations," she replied as she rubbed her foot.
Aang let loose and unleashed a slash of air which kicked up a bunch of sand in a cloud. When it cleared, and Theron lowered his arm, one of the sandbender sailers that Theron had inadvertently destroyed was shown to be completely undamaged before them. Katara confirmed that as much as she examined it.
"Look, it's got some kind of compass on it!" she remarked. "I bet it can point us out of here! Aang, you can bend us a breeze and we can sail it. We're going to make it." Sokka, still drugged out of his mind, was giggling inanely as he showed his 'handiwork' of burying Momo in the sand.
It didn't take long to get Sokka on the glider as well as everyone else. Although, Theron had to hold BB in place to keep him from falling off. They eventually came across a rock which definitely wasn't north, but the magnetic center of the desert. Toph was ecstatic, primarily because she would be finally able to see again. They had decided to climb to the top of the rock to get a better layout of the land and to see if they could see the edge of the desert, but if it was the center all the would be able to see would be sand, sand, and yet more sand. BB elected to stay at the bottom of the rock with the glider as he wouldn't be able to climb the rock.
The climb took longer than anyone would have liked as the sun was already starting to rise. As everyone was looking at the horizon and rising sun. Theron unslung his 19X and used the scope to look out into the distance to see what he could. Toph had showed her joy in the new development of solid ground by doing a stone angel. You know, like a snow angel but with stone instead, because she could bend earth.
"Ahhh, solid ground," she elicited with glee.
"Bad news, I can't see anything that we haven't been seeing for the last day. Loads of sand," Theron reported.
The kids started to walk towards the caves that looked like they had been forcibly carved into the rock face. He slung his rifle back on his back but drew a deactivated lightsaber into his hand, feeling as though it was more appropriate for something. There was a small tickle... no buzz in the Force eliciting danger.
"I think my head is starting to clear out the cactus juice," Sokka stated, more than likely his first coming down from a high. "And look!" he said right before eating something that looked like honey but smelled like rotten eggs. To which he had the appropriate response of spitting it out. "It tastes like rotten penguin meat! Ugh, I feel woozy."
"You've been hallucinating on cactus juice all day, and then you just lick something you find stuck to the wall of a cave?" Katara angrily asked her brother, understandably so.
"I have a natural curiosity."
"I don't think this is a normal cave," Toph said with her hand on the wall. "This was carved by something."
"Yeah, look at the shape," Aang added.
"There's something buzzing in here," Toph continued her report. "Something that's coming for us!"
Immediately, they started to run for the exit to where Theron was already ready with his lightsaber. He ignited it with the signature sound of a snap-hiss that many around the galaxy had now associated with the Sith and the Empire. He immediately sliced a buzzard-wasp in half vertically, the two halves landing in two heaps behind him.
More came at him and he gave them the same treatment as the one he had sliced before. They learned to stay away from him quite quickly and started to go for his companions. One grabbed Momo and started to fly away and Aang lost it, heading right after it on his glider.
"Come on, we're going down," Katara ordered.
"No argument with you there, sister," Theron agreed.
They made their way down the mountain, killing or knocking more of the beasts away. They made it to the base of the rock and Theron had switched from his lightsaber to his E-11, picking off the beasts with pinpoint accuracy, allowing the Force to guide his shots; even managing to hit one without looking off to his side. More and more came and Theron, and the group knew that they were outnumbered. Theron was just about to dive into the Dark Side to summon a storm of Force Lightning when the ground erupted in fountains of sand, surrounding the beasts, forcing them back to their nests.
When the dust cleared there were three more sand gliders on the other side as well as a small militia sized group of sandbenders if the attire was anything to go by. And the sand fountains. There was veritable silence until Aang landed, looking ready to kill; something that Theron was ready to do in self-defense but Aang was of the murderous sort of look.
"What are you doing on our land with a sandbender sailer?" the bearded leader asked. "From the looks of it, you stole it from the Hummee tribe."
"We found the sailer abandoned in the desert," Katara replied. "We're traveling with the Avatar. Our bison was stolen and we have to get to Ba Sing Se."
"You dare accuse our people of theft while you ride in on a stolen sand-sailer?" A younger man accused.
"Funny how to jump to theft yourself, pal," Theron yelled.
"Quiet, Gashuin. No one accused our people of anything. If what they say is true, we must give them hospitality," the leader stated to the younger man.
"Sorry, father," the son relented.
"I recognize the son's voice," Toph stated quietly. "He's the one that stole Appa."
"Are you sure?" Katara asked.
"He did seem to jump immediately to accuse us of theft when he heard the word bison," Theron added.
"I'm sure, I never forget a voice," Toph concluded.
Aang stormed forward and accused, primarily pointing to the son, "You stole Appa! Where is he? What did you do to him?"
"They're lying, they're thieves!" the son accused back.
"Funny, once again how you're the only one arguing for us stealing anything," Theron prodded. "Have something to hide?"
Aang lashed out and let loose a wave of air that completely decimated one of the sandbenders' sailers. "Where is my bison?" he asked in a no holds barred tone. "You tell me where he is, now!" He let loose another slash of air that decimated the second of three sailers.
"What did you do?" the leader asked, turning to the son.
"It wasn't me," the son tried to defend himself, quite unconvincingly.
"You said to put a muzzle on him!" Toph added.
"Not helping our situation," Theron hissed to the girl.
"You muzzled Appa!" Aang yelled as his blue arrow tattoos and eyes started to glow white. He decimated the last of the three sailers with another air slash.
The pieces landed in splinters of wood. "I'm sorry, I didn't know it belonged to the Avatar," the son groveled.
"Tell me where Appa is!" Aang yelled in a tone that sounded like a man possessed by otherworldly beings.
"I traded him to some merchants! He's probably in Ba Sing Se by now. They were going to sell him there. Please, we'll escort you out of the desert. We'll help however we can!"
A sand tornado started to whip around Aang as Theron felt a rush in the Force, the same rush he had felt when probing Aang with the Force back in the library. "We need to get out of here," Sokka stated as even Theron's survival instincts were telling him to get out of there. Katara remained though right behind Aang while everyone ran to what they considered a safe distance. Even BB-1 joined Theron at his side not wanting to be anywhere near that.
Theron took aim with his blaster and set it to stun. But before he could fire, Katara did the gutsiest thing that Theron saw on this entire crazy planet. She walked right into the storm and took Aang's arm and embraced him in a tender hug, something that he desperately needed. The sand finally died down to show him crying in the arms of his friend.
BB rolled up to him and beeped softly, "I've decoded the star maps you transmitted to me. I have an idea where we are."
Theron turned to his recent friend and replied, "Show me."
To be continued...?
XxXxXxX
And there we go. Another pilot done. Now, this has to be one of my longest pilots due to the fact I had to pretty much transcribe two episodes of Avatar, a series that has a lot of dialogue and well-told exposition. I've decided to forgo my normal endnotes as this was one long pilot and I want to get to my reasons as to why it's here instead of being broken up into several chapters for a chaptered story. Also, cliffhangers, gotta love them in these pilots.
The reason for the pilot is because I want to just get it out there. I would need to really plan out the changes that Theron's appearance would make on this planet, that being he is from space and of a higher technological civilization. How would he cope with the only advanced being with him being a droid that's really annoying at times like I can be in real life. I sort of went self-aware there, if you didn't notice. The other reason is I am unsure how I would want a pairing to end up. Obviously, I want Katara and Aang to end up as well as Suki to be with Sokka and Mai with Zuko. Who would I pair Theron with that wouldn't make it awkward? Do I choose an SW girl OC or someone from the Avatar universe near his age? I don't know.
Things I want to explore in this: possible romance with an enemy within the Fire Nation. How much does a Force-sensitive with a Holocron containing millennia of knowledge make a difference in the war? None? A lot? I don't know. Will he make it back to the Alliance? Will the Empire find him first? All of this and more if I decide to continue this.
That's all I have for now. Stay tuned for whatever I have next.
See you next time!