Elayne Starwind - Padawan of Ashoka

Chapter Twenty-Five

Ahsoka made me go first.

I fixed my hat and twisted my hair around my finger nervously as I boarded the starship, which I happened to conveniently remember tortured information out of people on it. I trembled at the thought.

I encountered an Imperial almost immediately. As soon as I walked through the first corridor, a man probably around his twenties approached me. "Identification, girl?"

"Erm, I'm a student," I stammered. I was almost sure the Imperial would realize I was lying as soon as I said it and call stormtroopers on me, but he just pulled out his tablet and began scrolling.

"Name?" He asked in a monotone voice.

"B-Biala Bibble," I said, feeling ridiculous just saying the words. Luckily, Sabine's tech magic seemed to have worked and he waved me away, instructing me to do well in my studies.

I looked around for some sort of map with a "You Are Here!" arrow pointing at where the heck I was on this ship, but I found none. For a while, I just had to wander, looking like I was watching people do their job. I wished I had some sort of notebook to make it look like I was writing notes. Without it, it seemed like I was staring like a dumb porg.

I was too nervous leaving the ship that I completely forgot to ask Ahsoka, Sabine, or Wolffe when they were planning on causing the distraction, which meant I would only know when to infilitrate this heavily guarded room when red lights and alarms started blaring everywhere.

I hated not knowing stuff.

Picking up my pace, I began looking for elevators or stairs or something. How did a ship this huge make finding some transportation up and down so hard? And when I did find an elevator, there were always crowds of droids and officers around it. Personally, I preferred not to be trapped in a box with a bunch of potential enemies.

I continued to speed up. When scared, moving my body helped release some of my nerves. I fidgetted with my skirt, and without paying attention, I turned at a corner of a corridor and walked straight into a boy.

It was as though the universe thought me being nervous wasn't enough and it just had to make my job more difficult. Not that being around boys made me nervous — I wouldn't know, there weren't a lot of boys my age back on Endor — it was just the fact that this boy happened to be wearing the exact same uniform as me.

Which meant, lucky me, this boy went to the same school I did.

"I— sorry!" I said quickly, twiddling my thumbs. "Wasn't... looking where I was going."

The boy rubbed the back of his head, grinning apolegetically. "Oh, no, it wasn't your fault. I should've been paying more attention. Sorry 'bout that!"

I was about to say something, but my words got tongue tied. I watched as the boy picked up the book he had dropped running into me. He had short, caramel-colored hair tucked neatly under his own IA of GS cap and gold eyes that shimmered in the light. He was also about a couple inches taller than me, so I had to look up slightly when I talked to him.

"Hey..." The boy studied my uniform and tilted his head. "You have the same uniform as me! You go to IA of GS too, I take it?"

"Y-Yeah," I stammered. I felt my face burning up. Why was it doing that? I tucked my hair behind my ears. "I-I'm on a, uh, study assignment. Studying jobs. Yeah. You know, looking for some evil job behind-the-scenes of the Empire! Go Empire!"

If the boy suspected I was lying, he didn't show it. Instead, he held out his hand and smiled. "Hey, me too! I'm Kenth Dystra."

I took Kenth's hand, hoping he wouldn't feel my shaking. "E- Biala." I couldn't bring myself to mention my embarrassing last name.

"Nice to meet you, Biala," Kenth said, shaking my hand politely. For one very brief moment, I thought I saw Kenth narrow his eyes, his gold eyes turning dull under the shadow that passed over them. It was like he was staring my true intentions out of me. But it disappeared as quickly as it had come, and I decided to assume I had just imagined it. My nerves were really taking a toll on me.

"Do you wanna study together?" Kenth asked. "I could really use a partner. Wandering these corridors without any real direction is very lonely."

"Uh..." Sweat started trickling down my spine. How do I say no? What if he thought that it was suspicious of me to deny his company and ratted me out to the Imperials? Or worse, what if I said yes? How would I be able to sneak into that room I needed to get to if he was around?

"I-I'm sorry, but I really have to focus on my studies," I lied, trying to smile. Ahsoka made smiling look so easy. "I don't focus very well around other people."

Kenth looked disappointed, which disappointed me. "Hm. I guess you're right. I really wanted someone to come with me to the second deck, though. Heard there's a lot of good jobs to shadow up there, you know?"

"S-Second deck?" I asked, my head perking up. "Where are you going up there?"

"Just looking around, you know?" Kenth shrugged. "But all the elevators seemed to be crowded so I couldn't really find my way up there."

"Y-yeah," I clutched my hands to keep them from trembling so hard my nails dug into my skin. "I... elevator!"

"Huh?" Kenth tilted his head.

I pointed past the boy. "I mean, free elevator!"

Kenth's smile lit up the whole hall, which for some reason made my face heat up. "Hey, you're right! Come on, let's go!"

Kenth grabbed my hand and pulled me to the elevator, but his expression flickered from cautious back to delighted so quickly I started to get worried about myself. I was imagining things now, I was sure of it.

We managed to get into the elevator with only one other Imperial, who was busy muttering things that sounded suspiciously like interrogation questions to himself.

"Fourth deck, please," The Imperial said absentmindedly, focusing heavily on the notepad in his hand.

"What deck are we on?" I asked Kenth as he pressed the buttons labelled "4" and "2".

"Fifth, I'm pretty sure," Kenth said, though he sounded very sure.

The elevator began to move down. I looked around, mildly amazed at this contraption. I'd been on elevators a couple of times so I knew how they generally worked, but they always fascinated me. It wasn't often I got to ride one, anyways. Like a lot of things, Endor didn't have many elevators.

Deciding to be the one to break the awkward silence (besides the Imperial's muttering), my gaze turned to Kenth's book.

"What's that?" I asked, tilting my head.

"This?" Kenth asked, holding up his book for me to read — Guide to Being an Imperial Scholar! "Don't tell me you don't even have our basic textbook!"

My cheeks flushed and I immediately began coming up with excuses. How was I that dumb? He goes to my school. Of course I should know the books they're studying from.

"I-I'm a transfer student!" I blurted, unable to come up with anything better. "I, er, just transferred. From, um, you know, another school."

"Uh huh," A smile tugged at the tips of Kenth's lips. "Okay."

As the Imperial left, I felt the need to learn more about this school while I was undercover. "Can I, um, look in there? Read a couple of pages? I kinda need to refresh my memory."

"Oh!" Kenth immediately pulled his arms around the book. "Uh, actually, I have some notes in here that you might not wanna—"

A ding! noise shook us from our conversation and the elevator doors slid open.

"After you," Kenth said, letting me walk past him.

Finally, I was able to tear my mind away from my embarrassing performance and think about why I was there in the first place. I had at least made it to the second deck. That was a good start, right?

A/N

here's a longer chapter for y'all! i would've written more cuz i forgot about the word count for a quick sec but i found a good spot to cut it for now soooo yea :D

vote, comment, and see ya later ✌️