Admiral Raddus joined in. One of the Mon Calamari, Raddus looked like a grayish fish-man. “We can’t just give in,” he pleaded.
Senator Vaspar of the Taldot sector begged to disagree. “We joined an alliance, not a suicide pact!”
“We’ve only now managed to gather our forces,” Organa pointed out.
“Gather our forces?” Senator Jebel of Uyter scoffed at the idea that they weren’t already at full strength. “General Draven’s already blown up an Imperial base!”
General Draven spoke next. As the man in charge of Rebel Intelligence, he was likely responsible for the order to kill Galen Erso, Jyn knew. She understood why he might have done that, although she didn’t think she could ever forgive him.
“A decision needed to be made!” said Draven. “By the time we finish talking, there’ll be nothing left to defend.”
“If it’s war you want, you’ll fight alone,” Pamlo promised.
“If that’s the way it’s going,” Vaspar said, “why have an alliance at all?”
Sharing Draven’s impatience, Raddus gestured toward Jyn. “If she’s telling the truth, we need to act now!”
Mon Mothma called for order. “Councilors, please!”
The hubbub fell off at that point, but the argument wasn’t over.
General Merrick, a pilot with a kind face, leaped into the relative silence. “It is simple. The Empire has the means of mass destruction. The Rebellion does not.”
Jebel tried to deny that was even the issue they should be talking about. “The Death Star…? This is nonsense!”
That was all Jyn could take. She might not have a vote on the council, but that didn’t mean she didn’t have a voice. “What reason would my father have to lie?”
She got up and stood before the others, commanding their attention. “What benefit would it bring him?”
“To lure our forces into a final battle,” Draven said. “To destroy us once and for all.”
For the head of Rebel Intelligence, it probably paid to be paranoid, but Jyn knew the man was taking it too far.
“Risk everything?” Vaspar said, equally skeptical. “Based on what? The testimony of a criminal. The dying words of her father, an Imperial scientist!”
“But don’t forget the Imperial pilot,” Jebel countered. Jyn marveled at his ability to argue both sides.
Bodhi stood to one side of the proceedings. He showed absolutely no interest in drawing any attention to himself, much less arguing that the council should take him seriously.
Jyn couldn’t believe the distrust being leveled at her. Just because she’d been a criminal didn’t mean she’d lie about something so important. “My father gave his life so that we might have a chance to defeat this!”
“So you’ve told us,” said General Dodonna.
“If the Empire has this kind of power, what chance do we have?” Pamlo protested.
Jyn had had enough. “What chance do we have? The question is, what choice? Run? Hide? Plead for mercy? Scatter your forces?”
Her tone left no room for anyone to dispute how stupid an idea she thought that was. No one interrupted her, so she forged on.
“You give way to an enemy this evil, with this much power, and you condemn the galaxy to an eternity of submission. The time to fight is now! Every moment you waste is another step closer to the ashes of Jedha!”
Someone in the back called out, “What is she proposing?”
Another voice countered, “Just let the girl speak!”
Jyn took that as permission to continue—not that she would have waited for it anyhow. “Send your best troops to Scarif. Send the rebel fleet if you have to. We need to capture the Death Star plans if there is any hope of destroying it.”
Pamlo shook her head. “You’re asking us to invade an Imperial installation based on nothing but hope.”
Jyn gave her a firm nod. “Rebellions are built on hope.”
Vaspar disagreed. “There is no hope.”
“I say we fight!” said Raddus. Jyn’s admiration for the Mon Calamari admiral shot straight up, but would his endorsement be enough?
Not for Jebel, apparently. “And I say the Rebellion is finished!”
Jyn looked to Mon Mothma for help, for some kind of resolution. Instead, she found the formidable woman throwing up her hands. “I’m sorry, Jyn,” she said. “Without the full support of the council, the odds are too great.”
Jyn stared at her in dismay, then turned to see the rest of the council in agreement with her, no matter how disappointed they might be. Disgusted with them and the entire Rebellion, she turned on her heel and stormed out of the room to let them all rot.
JYN BURST out of the conference room, and Bodhi followed in her wake. They made their way from there into the hangar, where they discovered Chirrut and Baze waiting for them.
“You don’t look happy,” said Baze.
He had no idea. She’d actually cooled down a bit since she’d left the council chambers.
“They prefer to surrender,” Jyn said, glancing back the way they’d come.
“And you?”
“She wants to fight,” Chirrut said.
“So do I,” Bodhi said. “We all do.”
Chirrut pondered this. “The Force is strong.”
Jyn looked at the others and actually considered taking them seriously. It would be madness, right? “I’m not sure the four of us is quite enough.”
Baze nodded to Bodhi. “How many do we need?”
“What are you talking about?” She’d already counted Bodhi, and the Imperial pilot didn’t have any friends in the rebel base, defector or not.
Baze pointed behind her, though, and she turned to see what he meant. More than a dozen soldiers appeared from the hangar’s deepest shadows.
They were as rough-looking a group as Jyn had ever seen, and she’d spent time in some of the worst dens of scum and villainy in the galaxy. One was the sergeant who’d led the team that broke her out of prison. He wore the uniform of a special operations soldier, as did most of the rest.
And Cassian stood there in front of them, with K-2SO just behind.
“They were never going to believe you,” he said to Jyn.
She fixed him with a cold stare. “I appreciate the support.”
“But I do.”
She narrowed her eyes at him as she let that sink in.
“I believe you,” he said. “We’d like to volunteer. Some of us”—he glanced at the others—“most of us, we’ve all done terrible things on behalf of the Rebellion. Spies. Saboteurs. Assassins.”
Jyn scanned the faces lined up to help her. Almost all of them were human, except for K-2SO and a single alien named Pao, a Drabatan from Pipada. Built like a human, he had the face and skin of a dried-out lizard.
No matter where they hailed from, though, they all seemed ready to fight.
“Everything I did, I did for the Rebellion,” Cassian explained. “And every time I walked away from something I wanted to forget, I told myself it was for a cause I believed in. A cause that was worth it.”
The soldiers behind Cassian nodded in agreement.
“Without that, we’re lost. Everything we’ve done would have been for nothing. I couldn’t face myself if I gave up now. None of us could.”
Jyn didn’t know what to say. She was flattered that Cassian, of all people, would be willing to put his faith in her, much less all the other soldiers. She’d never had so many people willing to put their lives on the line simply because they believed her. Believed in her.
But the Alliance high command had considered her demand for action, and they’d already said no. How could they do anything without the Alliance’s support? Without its weapons? Its ships?
“It won’t be comfortable,” Bodhi said to her.
She furrowed her brow a
t him, confused about what he meant.
“It’ll be a bit cramped, but we’ll all fit. We could go.”
He meant the Imperial cargo shuttle. The one he’d stolen. The one he could just as easily steal again.
Cassian wasn’t one to hesitate at any opportunity, even one as slim as this. “Okay,” he said to the others, the ones who’d lined up to follow him. “Gear up. Grab anything that’s not nailed down.”
They hesitated for a moment before they started to move. He waved at them. “Go, go, go!”
Jyn smiled, something she’d doubted she’d get to do that day. She marveled at the soldiers and how quickly they’d decided to stand up and keep fighting, no matter what the odds. Then she realized they’d all been doing that for so long already. It came naturally to them.
K-2SO, who already had everything he needed, spoke to her as the soldiers scattered. “Jyn, I’ll be there for you,” he said. “Cassian said I had to.”
She shook her head at that. Not because the robot had been so brutally honest—she was getting used to that—but at the way Cassian had marshaled support for her.
“I’m not used to people sticking around when things go bad,” she told Cassian.
He gave her a casual shrug and a warm smile, as if it was all no big deal. “Welcome home.”
Jyn thought that seemed like an odd thing to say, but when she realized she was smiling again, she understood just how perfect Cassian’s words were. It had been a long time since she’d felt like she belonged anywhere—or with anyone. Her father’s death had hammered that home.
This crew, these people, they were now more her home than any place she’d known since Saw had abandoned her. Despite how insane the mission that had brought them together might be, she discovered she liked it.
JYN AND CASSIAN made their way to the Imperial cargo shuttle, and they found the bay was packed solid. The others were already there—all the people Cassian had brought over before, plus a few more.
That included Chirrut and Baze, who looked like they’d been sitting in the ship the entire time. As Jyn had seen through the viewport, Bodhi had already climbed back in the pilot’s seat, and K-2SO had taken the copilot’s position once again.
Before she found a seat and sat down, Jyn surveyed the ragtag team of soldiers they’d thrown together—the people with whom she hoped to take down an Imperial installation and save the galaxy. She said the only thing that seemed fitting to her.
“May the Force be with us.”
When everyone was settled, Bodhi began rushing through his preflight checklist. As he did, someone in the rebel base’s comm center hailed him on the ship’s comm.
“Cargo shuttle, we have a pushback request here.”
That didn’t sound good. No one in the shuttle said a word, trusting Bodhi to handle it. He just kept working to get the starship ready for takeoff.
“Read back, please. Request denied. You are not cleared for takeoff.”
Bodhi grimaced and then steeled himself to respond. “Yes, yes we are. Affirmative.” He hesitated for a moment. “Requesting a recheck.”
Rather than waiting for a response, Bodhi fired up the shuttle’s engines. The rest of the people in the shuttle—Jyn included—belted themselves in. It was either going to be a very short trip or a very fast takeoff.
“I’m not seeing this…request here,” the person on the other side of the comm said. “What’s your call sign?”
Bodhi glanced around, panicked. He had no idea what to say. “Yes, we have it. It’s, uh…Um…”
Bodhi looked to Jyn, but she just shrugged at him. He said the first thing that came into his mind. “Rogue! Rogue One.”
“There is no ‘Rogue One,’” the person on the comm responded.
“There is now,” K-2 said.
Bodhi gunned the engines and took the shuttle into the air.
“Rogue One pulling away,” he said.
An instant later, they were gone.
MOST OF the councilors had already left the Rebellion’s high council chambers. Some of them had gone to vent their rage about the council’s decision. Others were packing up their things to head home and give their people the bad news.
Bail Organa sat there still, unsure of what he should do. What he could do. He’d tried his best to sway the council, to get them to see reason, but it had been to no avail.
He’d thought that the news Jyn Erso and Cassian Andor had brought back with them from Jedha would have moved people to courage. Instead, it had set them arguing with each other, divided on whether they could even trust a young woman with such a checkered past.
Never mind that Captain Andor—one of the best agents working for the Rebellion—had vouched for her. Never mind that everything she revealed rang true. There were some who just didn’t want to admit she might be right.
Worse, though, were those who believed her story and thought the best thing they could do was surrender. Bail understood the skepticism of some of his fellow councilors when it came to Jyn’s story, but he could not stomach the cowardice of the others.
He sat there and stewed about that until Mon Mothma approached him. As the leader of the council, she’d had many things to deal with as the council dispersed, but it seemed she’d concluded her duties. Now they could talk in private—openly and honestly.
“Despite what the others say, war is inevitable,” she said.
Bail frowned. What a depressing way to open a conversation. But he had to admit he’d already come to the same conclusion long before.
“I agree,” he said. “I must return to Alderaan to inform my people that there will be no peace.”
He shook his head. They’d worked so hard to avoid this, to come up with some way to depose the Emperor without devastating what remained of the Republic he’d seized. Now it seemed they’d failed—and badly.
“We will need every advantage,” he said.
Mon Mothma recognized what he was saying. If the high council wouldn’t agree to support them, they would have to do whatever they could without official backing.
It was more of a risk, of course, but what choice did they have?
Mon Mothma glanced around to make sure no one was listening in. While the chamber had mostly cleared out, it was not entirely empty.
“Your friend,” she said in a low voice. “The Jedi.”
She was on the same wavelength as him. Obi-Wan Kenobi had been a faithful friend long before he’d become one of the galaxy’s most hunted fugitives. Bail didn’t want to disturb the man, but things had finally become that desperate.
“He served me well during the Clone Wars and has lived in hiding since the Emperor’s purge. Yes, I will send for him.”
Would Kenobi answer the call? After so many years living alone—decades, even—would he care enough about the fate of the Republic?
Maybe. If they finally had a chance to stop the Empire? Maybe yes.
“You’ll need someone you can trust,” Mon Mothma said.
As usual, she was right. Bail couldn’t send just anyone to summon Kenobi from his exile. It would have to be someone strong, capable, and utterly committed to the Rebellion.
He could think of only one person. If he could have, he would have chosen anyone else. But it would have to be her.
Bail got to his feet and nodded at Mon Mothma once again. “I would trust her with my life.”
BODHI HATED LYING. He just wasn’t very good at it.
That was one of the reasons he’d found Saw Gerrera’s interrogation of him so laughable. He wouldn’t have been able to come up with a good set of lies on the spot if his life had depended on it.
He hadn’t needed to lie when he’d abandoned his post and tried to defect to the Rebellion on Jedha. He’d just taken a short leave there. Then he’d gone looking for Saw.
The thought of the destruction o
f Jedha City still made him ill. All the people he’d ever known growing up—all gone. Murdered by the Empire.
Betraying the Empire had been the right thing to do, but now the only people he could trust were right there in the stolen shuttle with him. And they were depending on him to lie for them.
Otherwise, they’d never land on Scarif, and their mission to find the Death Star’s plans would come to a swift and probably fatal end.
As Bodhi flew the shuttle toward Scarif, he rehearsed the lies he’d already made up in his head. He wondered if he should ask Chirrut to pray to the Force for him, but it was too late for that. He wasn’t sure if his lies were any good, but they would have to do.
“Okay,” he said to the others from the cockpit. “We’re coming in. There’s a planet-wide defensive shield with a single main entry gate. This shuttle should be equipped with an access code that allows us through.”
“Assuming the Empire hasn’t logged it as overdue,” said K-2SO.
Bodhi wanted to smack the droid, but he knew that would only hurt his hand.
“And if they have?” Jyn asked.
Bodhi shrugged. “Then they shut the gate and we’re all annihilated in the cold, dark vacuum of space.”
“Not me,” said K-2SO. “I can survive in space.”
Bodhi was so tempted….
As they neared the gate, Bodhi saw lots of other shuttles and cargo ships moving through it. With luck, they’d get in without any troubles.
There were a couple of Star Destroyers guarding the gate though. That was new. Still, they didn’t have much choice. What difference did it make if they were killed by a large ship or a small one?
“Okay, this is good,” Bodhi said, trying to rationalize some sense of optimism. “It’s not normally this busy. I think this is good.”
Maybe the gate controllers wouldn’t even notice them. A man could hope, right?
“Okay, here it goes.”
He nosed the ship toward the gate. As he went, he turned on the ship’s comm so he could speak to the gate controller. “Cargo shuttle SW-0608 requesting a landing pad.”
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