Chapter Text
It was a rare occasion that brought the Ghost and her crew to Base One. She tended to draw attention, even from those who didn’t know about her… special modifications. And like their ship, her crew of assorted misfits were far more than they first appeared. Still, they stood out, even among the other rebels.
But they had been recalled with the rest of the fleet, and nowadays at least, they generally went where they were told. Unless Kanan and Ezra had Jedi business to attend to.
That was the biggest secret they had left to keep. The moment she’d been informed that Phoneix Squadron would be joining up with the rest of the Alliance, Hera had made it very clear to Sato that the cooperation of the Specters, of all of the Specters, was contingent on assurances that no one else would know about their Jedi crew. So far, he seemed to have kept to his word. Not even High Command seemed aware that a pair of Jedi walked amongst them. Still, they made a point of steering clear of the more populated bases when they could help it.
This time was unavoidable, their orders notwithstanding. Old rumors had been swirling faster of late, stories of the Empire amassing scores of natural resources, about mysterious shipments, about personnel being inexplicably redirected to remote facilities… pieces of a puzzle that no one seemed to be able to piece together just yet. And yet… and yet, Kanan couldn’t help but think of the devastated wasteland that was Genosis. Or the bizarre Imperial shipment from Lothal that they had tried to intercept, only to find debris that had left him with the strangest feeling reverberating through the Force.
It hadn’t made much sense until he’d heard the newest rumors about Jedha.
Kyber crystals. The Empire was hoarding kyber crystals, researching energy production, and suddenly he’d known with utter certainty that this was the cargo that shipment had contained. They’d been mining kyber right out from under him. He felt like an idiot for not putting two and two together. And now they were saying that Jedha City had been destroyed in some kind of mining accident, that everyone on this base knew was no accident at all.
“Everyone knows, but they won’t do anything about it,” Hera had bemoaned earlier, after the Council meeting let out, “Half of them wouldn’t believe her.”
Her. This Jyn Erso, the daughter of the Imperial scientist whose information was in question. According to Hera, she’d given a rousing speech Hera's own father would have been proud of, and they’d still voted no, despite General Raddus’s unwavering support. Mothma and Organa were on board too, apparently, but even that hadn’t been enough to sway the other senators.
Kanan, meanwhile, had been making inquiries into Scariff, into the ISB facilities there. Everything she was saying, according to Hera, anyway, seemed to check out.
“You’re not thinking what I think you are?” Hera asked when she found the files, and the program he used to listen to recorded versions of them, open on his datapad.
He shrugged and offered a roguish grin. He hadn’t been able to see her, really see her, in years, but he knew Hera Syndulla; every inch of her, every smile, every movement like no one else in the galaxy. He couldn’t see, but he knew she was shaking her head, rolling her eyes and suppressing a smile, because she wanted to violate Council orders and go after those plans too.
“This was a lot easier without the Council breathing down our necks,” he commented dryly. She sighed heavily.
“Yes, it was. But what’s the point of defeating the Empire if we can’t replace it with democracy? With something better. Even if it takes a little longer to get things done.”
“Okay, point taken.”
“Guys!” the sound of Ezra’s shouting brought them both out of the living quarters, through the hallways of the ship and into the cargo bay.
“What is it, Ezra?” Hera asked.
“The whole base is going nuts. Apparently someone took off in that stolen Imperial cargo ship they brought back from Edau.”
“Scuttlebutt says it was that Erso woman, and that Imp pilot,” Zeb added, jerking a thumb back at the main pyramid, “And a bunch of guys from Rebel Intelligence.”
“What?” Hera sounded shocked. Kanan grinned.
“They’re going to Scariff anyway,” he turned abruptly and went back inside, navigating carefully through the maze of the day’s cargo.
“Which guys from Intelligence?” Hera was asking, her brow furrowed. She knew some of them, from the early days.
“The best of the worst, apparently,” Zeb drawled with a shrug, “You know. Spies. Liars. Assassins. Saboteurs.”
“You mean people like us?” Sabine asked pointedly. Zeb offered her a toothy grin.
“I wasn’t criticizing them, just relaying what I heard. Well? We gonna do something about it, Captain?”
“Like what? I don’t even know what Command has to say-”
“All clear of the engines down there?” Kanan called over the comms.
“Yes, but why-?”
The ship’s engines flared to life.
“Kanan…” Hera growled under her breath.
In the Ghost’s cockpit, Kanan had moved to a rear chair. He knew which controls prepared the ship for takeoff, could work most of the others if he had to… but even though he could still “see” in the Force, his injury had put an end to his piloting days.
He had come to terms with that, mostly. He’d had to come to terms with a lot of things he couldn’t change after Malachor.
He took a moment to meditate before the others came charging in to see what he was doing and demand explanations. He reached out with his mind, searching for any inkling of insight about Scariff, about Jyn Erso and her crew, about this Imperial death machine they were allegedly building… nothing much was coming. His mind, the galaxy, all a blank, grey field; things moved underneath, like a current stirring beneath a calm sea, but there was nothing on the horizon.
Still, he waited a moment longer. He couldn’t shake the feeling that something was coming.
And there it was, bursting over the horizon in his mind, a brilliant light that rushed towards him. It wasn’t just light, he realized dimly. Debris, sand, trees… an explosion on a beach, but an explosion unlike any he’d ever before seen. The ground seemed to have turned on itself. Figures, shadows, knelt on the beach before him, a man and a woman, clutching at one another. He couldn't make out faces, but he could sense them in the Force. They were afraid but calm, facing down their deaths because they knew they would not go alone. And they were right in more ways than they knew. Because there were others there with them too, in the Force.
To Kanan, they weren’t indecipherable shadows.
A man in an Imperial uniform, muttering to himself (I’m the pilot. I made it right.)
A hulking menace of a human with a monstrous repeating blaster, who just quirked a wry smile at the doom speeding across the horizon, like he thought it was funny (I protect them. The Force is with me.)
An Imperial enforcer droid, who really had no right to a place in the Force, but then, didn’t all sentience have that right? Kanan didn’t know. The droid was impervious to fear, but Kanan sensed sadness from him as he watched the two shadows on the beach (I tried to save you. I’m sorry I failed.)
A man who was more metal than flesh, his wild grey hair caught in a phantom breeze, stood to one side, his eyes full of a fevered sort of pain, of paranoia, of hope, all at war there (I was your father too. And you deserved better.)
A man and woman standing together, apart from the others, watching with faces full of pain and hope (We wanted better for you than this. But we are glad you aren’t alone, child.)
A man in a white and black uniform, something that looked like ISB, if it hadn’t been for the snowy cape, paced a few meters away, staring up at the sky and ignoring all the others (They took it from me. My triumph, my vision, my Death Star…).
Finally, there stood a blind man carrying a staff, smiling widely at Kanan. He nodded his head in acknowledgement.
(I am one with the Force, and the Force is with me. As it walks with you, brother.)
Another light flickered to life, around the neck of the woman, the shadow kneeling in the sand. Kanan knew without seeing what it was. Didn’t he sense his own with him every day, even all those years when it lay unused in his bag, or hidden on his ship? Didn’t he sense Ezra’s? He had learned early, even had an innate ability, to hear the songs of the kybers in all the hundreds of lightsabers he had met through the years. And this, like his own, like Ezra’s, was a song he knew in his bones; a long, laughing note that had always seemed so incongruous with its Jedi’s stern manner. But then, she’d known how to laugh too. He could almost hear her voice again. Almost see her smile.
Save them, Caleb, for without them, she will never be. And she will save us all.
Suddenly, the world was plunged into darkness. He heard a whispering voice that sent chills down his spine. Saw a distant light glinting off gleaming armor. A Stormtrooper? No… this one was different. The armor was metal, not plasteel, and a red cape slashed over one shoulder, like no trooper he’d ever seen. And then there was a tall man in black robes and a mask. A planet hung in space, a massive canyon cut through its center, emitting a red beam that cut across the core of the galaxy. Whole systems of planets were struck by its light and vaporized.
But figures appeared, and lightsabers flared to life, illuminating faces in the darkness. The green blade revealed an old man, dressed in Jedi robes, his face haggard; the amber blade (such an odd color, for a lightsaber, Kanan thought absently) illuminated a younger man, long-faced, his dark eyes full of pain and regret; and the final blade, a brilliant blue one, just like Kanan’s own, like Master Billaba’s… that one showed him a girl, her hair pulled away from her face, her eyes gleaming with a fierce determination.
Above it all, a tall, crooked figure hunched on a metal throne, its scarred, hairless face twisted in a sneer, or a smile; a cold laugh echoed through his mind.
Kanan gasped as the vision ended, and looked up to find himself surrounded by his crew. They were all staring at him in alarm.
“Kanan?” Hera asked cautiously, “Love, are you okay?”
“You had a vision,” Ezra interjected. This wasn’t a question. Kanan grinned at his apprentice.
“Yeah. We have to go to Scariff.”
“The fleet’s already been ordered there,” Hera explained. Kanan felt the vibrations of the ship and recognized the particular pattern that he’d come to associate with the hyperdrive, “We’re in route. Should arrive soon enough.”
“Good,” Kanan muttered, almost to himself, “They’re running out of time…”