Ahsoka took back the datapad and looked down at the picture. Her heartbeat sped up, and she felt like all the oxygen had been sucked out through the very airlock she’d used to get into Bail’s office. There was the gray creature, his face obscured by a helmet but his lightsaber plainly visible. And there was Kaeden Larte, obviously his captive, with her broken arm bound tightly to her chest and her frizzy hair flying in all directions.
“Oh, no,” Ahsoka breathed. “I have to—”
“Stop,” Bail said sternly. She froze automatically and then glared at him. His expression softened and he came around the desk to stand close to her. “Ahsoka, you need to rest. You need to plan. They’re not going to hurt her any more. They need you to show up first. The best thing you can do is make sure you’re as prepared as possible when you do.”
She slumped back in his chair, hands falling into her lap in defeat. He reached out to put his hand on her shoulder, and they both jumped when there was a clamor outside the main door of his suite. It hissed open and Captain Antilles burst into the room with several security officers.
“Senator!” Antilles said, and then stopped. He took in the room at a glance and dismissed the security force.
“Everything is under control, Captain,” Bail said. “This is a friend of mine. She’s going to be with us for a while. We’ll need to pick up her ship before we leave, and she’ll need quarters.”
Antilles nodded sharply, and then left as quickly as he’d arrived.
“You didn’t tell him who I was,” Ahsoka said. “Are you really that vulnerable?”
“Yes,” Bail said. “But we’re getting more secure every day. Still, I don’t like to give away other people’s secrets. If you want to tell him who you are, that’s up to you.”
“Thank you,” she said. Then: “You mentioned quarters?”
Bail showed her into the suite next to his and then went down to the cargo hold to make sure her ship was being secured. Ahsoka cleaned up, stripping off the pressure suit. She’d had to leave her bag in the ship, but the little package of tech parts fit next to her skin inside the suit. She opened it now and made sure everything was still intact.
“As if you could break any more than you already have,” she said. Then she turned her attention back to getting dressed.
She debated for a moment between food and sleep, but the latter required less effort, so she lay down on the bed. She was asleep almost instantly.
Ahsoka dreamed of ice, and an urgency she hadn’t felt in years. She had to make it back to the mouth of the cave while the sun held the ice back or she’d be trapped on that frozen planet for much longer than she wanted to be stuck anywhere so cold. But where was her crystal? Master Yoda had been no more helpful than he usually was, telling her only that she would know it when she saw it. But where was it? And how would she know?
She stopped running, closed her eyes, and thought about what she did know. Master Yoda was strange, and more often than not, she didn’t understand him, but he was almost always right. She would just have to trust that he was right now, that she would find her crystal and she would know it when she did.
She opened her eyes. There, twinkling in the dark of the cave, was a light that hadn’t been there before. It called to her, and she went to it. When she got close, she saw that it was a crystal, and just like Master Yoda had said, she knew it was hers. It fell into her hands, and she turned to run back to the mouth of the cave.
It was warm in her quarters when she woke up, which is how Ahsoka knew the dream was over.
“Thank you, Master,” she whispered, though she knew that Master Yoda couldn’t possibly hear her, or help her even if he could.
Rising, she went to the low table that held her belongings and picked up the little pouch that usually rested in her pocket. She spilled out the collection of used parts and other derelict pieces she’d been carrying with her since her arrival on Raada. She could see now that several of them were useless, and she discarded them. The pieces that were left, however, might be worth something.
Lightsaber construction was a Jedi art of the highest order. Ahsoka had never done it unsupervised, as she knew she must do now. She also knew that she was missing important components, but since her vision was guiding her toward Ilum and the crystals that grew there, she would have to trust the path she was taking. The material she had would be sufficient to begin construction on the chambers. The hilts would be inelegant, but functional.
She finished after a few false starts and examined her work. She could almost hear Huyang fussing over her shoulder, but she still felt pleased with herself. She stood, stretched out her shoulders, and went in search of the senator. She found him in the mess hall, having a conversation with the captain.
“No, Captain, stay please,” she said, when Antilles would have left them alone. “I think I’m going to need your help, too.”
“What are you thinking, Ahsoka?” Bail asked.
And Ahsoka told him the plan.
THE CRYSTALS GREW.
Clear as ice and cold until they found the hands that waited for them, they added structure in an ordered way, one prism at a time. And while they grew, they waited.
From time to time, someone would arrive and call to them, like the harmony of a perfect song. Each crystal had a chosen bearer, and only that bearer would hear the music and see the glow. All others would pass by, seeing nothing but more ice.
There were larger crystals, visible to all but inert unless properly calibrated, and there were tiny ones, the size of a fingernail or smaller. Even the smallest could channel power and find a bearer. All they had to do was be patient and grow.
There was no particular pattern for where the crystals might be found. There were some planets that hosted them in countless numbers, and those places were often considered holy or special. Pilgrimages were made and lessons learned and lightsabers crafted. And thus the light crystals went about the galaxy to be put to use.
Dark crystals were made, too, but not in that holy place. They were plundered from their rightful bearers and corrupted by the hands that stole them. Even rock could be changed by the power of the Force, bleeding alterations until their color was the deepest red. The balance was finely staged between the two, light and dark, and it took very little to upset it.
When the first ships appeared in the sky over a planet where the crystals grew in number, nothing seemed amiss. Ships visited the planet all the time, and crystals were taken away, but this occasion was different. There were no young bearers to hear the songs, no attentive students to learn the lessons. There was only greed and a terrible, terrible want.
The planet was ravaged, its crystals broken by uncaring hands who thought to twist them to their own uses. No more could the planet be considered a holy place, and no longer would pilgrimages be made. Instead, those who had once gone there would avoid it and despair for the loss of the crystals that once sang to them.
But in the wideness of the galaxy, there were many planets and many places where the crystals could appear. They would be harder to find, their concentration lower, but it would not be impossible for one who sought, for one who listened—for one who had learned the first lessons and had the patience to learn more.
The crystals grew, adding structure in an ordered way, one prism at a time.
And while they grew, they waited.
BAIL OFFERED HER A SHIP, but Ahsoka turned him down. Everything in his manifest was new: sleek, fast, very obviously built on a Core world. Ahsoka elected to keep her own craft. She knew its foibles, for one thing, and she also knew it would stick out less on an Outer Rim world than any of the fancy ships in Bail’s collection. She did let Antilles’s crew fix the engine damage, though. Well, she let R2-D2 do it while she supervised.
While the droid worked, Ahsoka took the opportunity to examine Bail’s operation. He’d said that not everyone on board was fully aware of what he was attempting to organize, but it seemed like everyone at least knew that what they were
doing wasn’t entirely Empire business. She could tell from the conversations she overheard that the crew was loyal to Alderaan and to Breha and Bail themselves, which was a good start. Bail’s work was slow, as he’d said, but his foundation was strong. Of course, it helped that he had more resources than she’d had on Raada and that the people he was working with were already trained to fight and follow orders.
Sitting in the hangar bay, with R2-D2 by her side, Ahsoka began to realize that what she had accomplished on Raada was more of an achievement than she’d thought. It wasn’t like Onderon, where she’d had time and, most important, Rex to help her. She hadn’t failed on Raada, even though her people had suffered casualties. She had learned a new way to fight, too, and she needed to have as much patience with herself as she did with the people she fought alongside.
R2-D2 beeped a question at her, and Ahsoka examined his work, even though she had a feeling they both knew he didn’t require a second opinion.
“It looks great, Artoo,” she said. “I’ve missed having you around for exactly this kind of thing.”
The droid chirruped happily and made a few last adjustments to the engine. It hummed to life, and Ahsoka jumped to her feet.
“Thanks, little guy,” she said. “I don’t know if it’s ever sounded so good.”
R2-D2 made a smug sound, set the tools back in the crate, and rolled off without making any further comment. He passed Bail, who was walking in Ahsoka’s direction. The senator was off that day, as well, on a mission no less dangerous than hers. He was headed back to Coruscant to play Imperial puppet in the Senate, and he was dressed for the part.
“Are you sure you don’t want backup?” he said. “I’m sure Chardri and Tamsin don’t hold a grudge, and they’re good in tight spaces. Well, they are when they know what they’re up against.”
Ahsoka smiled as the test cycle of her engine spun down. She’d be able to leave soon.
“No, thank you,” she said. “It’ll be easier on my own.”
“Is it some mysterious Jedi thing?” Bail asked. He hadn’t pried the previous day when she had left out a few key details, but now that they were sure not to be overheard, she supposed he had a right to know the risk he was taking.
“No,” she said. “It’s just difficult to explain. I might not have a lot of time and might have to make decisions quickly that don’t make sense to outsiders. It’s nothing personal, I promise.”
“That’s all right,” Bail said. “I’ve worked with enough Jedi over the years to know when to let them go their own way.”
“I’m not really a Jedi, you know,” she said. They hadn’t talked about it before, but again, now that they were alone, it was only fair to let him know that his investment might not get the return he was counting on. “I left the Temple, turned away from the Jedi path.”
“If you’re not a Jedi, then what are you, Ahsoka Tano?” Bail asked. “Because to be honest, you still sound and act like a Jedi to me.”
“I’ll let you know when I figure it out,” she said. She patted the engine pod. “Thanks for loaning me Artoo for the repair. The engine is perfect.”
“Anytime,” Bail said, and smiled. “I should get going. But we’ll be there when you signal for us.”
“I’ll see you then,” Ahsoka said, and watched him walk to his own shuttle.
Once the senator was gone, Ahsoka made a few last modifications to her ship and started her preflight checks. She’d had to make quick decisions the previous day, and she wanted to be sure that she hadn’t put stress on anything besides the engines. She had time and security to do it now, and even though waiting galled her, she knew it would pay off.
She hadn’t thought she’d be able to sleep at all the night before, the image of Kaeden with the lightsaber to her throat burned into her memory, but she’d been so exhausted that she’d dropped off almost as soon as she’d stopped moving. When she woke up several hours later, she’d felt much better and then instantly worse: Kaeden probably hadn’t slept very well, whatever time it was on Raada.
She forced herself to clear her mind of worries. It wasn’t easy, but she knew she would do her friends no good if she let emotion cloud her judgment. She might not be a Jedi, but she needed to act like one for a little bit longer. She knew how it worked, anyway: clear your mind and see the goal. She was determined to do that for the sake of her friends.
The preflight check ended, signaling that nothing new had been detected. She stowed her gear—the bastons, her carry bag, a few useful things that Bail had given her—but kept the pouch with the hilts on her. It was bulky now, but she was reluctant to store it anywhere else.
She asked for clearance to depart and received it, along with the deck officer’s wish of good luck. She took the ship out of the hangar and then ran her calculations for the hyperdrive.
When that was ready, Ahsoka placed both hands on the controls, looked through the front viewport, and made the jump to lightspeed.
Ilum was a world of ice. Stark, cold, and beautiful as long as you didn’t have to spend too much time outside. It had been a holy place for the Jedi. Ahsoka had been there three times, once for each of her own crystals and once with a group of younglings. The first two times had been unremarkable, except for her excitement over having the tools with which to build her lightsabers. The third time had been more of an adventure, complete with pirates. Ahsoka was very much hoping this visit would be a quiet one.
She’d calculated the jump to take her out of hyperspace some distance away from the planet itself. If she remembered what was buried in Ilum’s crust, it was entirely possible that others did, too. She wasn’t sure where those from the dark side got their crystals, but she knew they had to get them somewhere, and she wasn’t about to take any risks just to cut some time from her travel schedule. When she emerged back into normal space and saw what was waiting for her, she was very glad she’d been cautious.
There were at least two Star Destroyers and a massive mining ship in orbit around the planet. The Empire definitely knew there was something it wanted beneath the surface of the icy world.
The planet itself was much worse off than she’d feared. Before, it had looked like a giant white ball from orbit—uniform in color except the brighter spots where it reflected the light of its sun. It had been as striking from up high as it was on the ground, even though the great cliffs and deep crevasses that scored the planet’s surface weren’t visible from afar. Now it almost hurt her to look at it.
Great chunks of the planet had been carved away, exposing rock and lava that boiled up from the planet’s core. With no real hope, Ahsoka scanned the usual landing site. Gone was the cliff-side entryway the Jedi had used for generations, the waterfall smashed to gain entrance to the cave beyond.
Ahsoka felt a swell of fury, which she had to work hard to pin down. They dared to invade Ilum, to spoil such a beautiful place, and for what? To carve out rock and dirt in the hopes of finding a few shards of crystal that none of them would be able to see? It was wasteful and terrible to behold, and also more than a little intimidating. Ruining the soil on a faraway moon was one thing. Destroying a planet, even piece by piece, was something else. The Empire had no sense of limitation and no respect for the order of life in the galaxy.
She was halfway through planning an attack run on the mining ship, analyzing it for weaknesses she could exploit if she was able to get past the Star Destroyers, when she remembered why she couldn’t. Raada. She needed to go back to Raada. She couldn’t die or get captured in some pointless skirmish. And it would be pointless, she reminded herself, even though it hurt to think of Ilum as expendable. No one lived there, and it wasn’t like the Jedi needed the planet anymore. She wouldn’t spend her life there, not when there were other places where it was worth more and when there were people who needed her.
She was still going to need crystals though. And she needed to get out of range of the Star Destroyers before one of them detected her. She flew to the outermost planet in the s
ystem, a nameless black rock with no air and little gravity, and set down on the surface. She powered down the engines so the ship would be more difficult to detect and then sat cross-legged on the floor of the cockpit, the pouch in her lap and her mind reaching for solutions.
It didn’t bode well that her plan had unraveled at her very first stop, but she couldn’t focus on that now. She had to focus on what came next and how she might achieve it without using Ilum as a resource.
Now that her mind was quieter, she could sense the icy planet, even though she was half a system away. The crystals there didn’t sing to her as they had the first time she’d been there. Then, when she was younger, she’d felt them as soon as the ship dropped out of hyperspace, even though she hadn’t known what she was feeling at the time. Now there was nothing—well, nothing that was intended for Ahsoka. She could still feel the crystals present beneath the planet’s surface. She just knew that none of them was for her.
So where are mine? she thought. Am I going to get another set? I could go back to Rex’s fake grave and see if my lightsabers are still there, but I doubt it. They’re worth too much, and I left them to be found.
She called up a star chart, projecting it around herself and placing Ilum close to where she was seated. Then she closed her eyes and reached for the crystals on the planet below. She followed their structure, ordered and regular, searching for other sources in the galaxy. She knew there must be more crystals somewhere. Master Yoda had never said as much, but he had certainly hinted at it. It was, after all, a very big galaxy.
There, light-years away, she heard it: the familiar song that was hers alone. She slid her awareness of it through the star chart, hoping that when she opened her eyes, she would see a map with her crystals waiting for her at the end of it.
Star Wars: Ahsoka Page 18
