Star Wars: The Lord in Exile

Rebel Resolves

Down a street on Lothal, an AT-ST marched forward with a combat patrol of Stormtroopers. Citizens hid along the sides or ran off at the sight of the Imperial armament. The Stormtrooper commander moved forward and directed his men to look for rebel activity.

"Pair off. I want a full sweep. Those rebels must be found." he ordered.

On the nearby rooftops, the Spectres were watching the patrol move by. Sabine made some hand signs to Ezra and Chopper who were on the opposite rooftop. The blue haired boy nodded and got ready. He and Zeb jumped over onto the walker's roof, alerting the pilots inside by the noise.

"What was that?" the lead pilot asked.

The other one got up and opened the roof hatch to investigate, only for Zeb to grab him by the head and pull him out of the walker. The lead pilot heard the commotion and turned his head.

"What the–"

"Hey." Ezra called out. "How you doin'?" he asked before shooting the guard with his stun gun.

The pilot slouched forward, causing the walker to accelerate and fire off its main gun. Zeb groaned as he tried to stay on the roof. Citizens screamed in terror as the Stormtroopers turned to see the walker wander by them. Before they could do anything, Aurelian appeared; he knocked out one with a wide swing of his spear while cutting another down. Sabine came out of hiding and provided covering fire for her boyfriend. Chopper took the opportunity to fly over and rendezvous with the walker, going inside to meet Ezra while Zeb focused on the troops.

"Plug in, Chop. We need prisoner logs of all Imperial detention facilities." Ezra requested the droid as he moved the unconscious pilot of the way.

The pilot's leg hit the steering, causing the walker to suddenly turn and circle the area, Zeb nearly fell over as he shouted his frustrations to Ezra.

"Hey! Keep it steady in there!"

Ezra lifted the pilot out of the hatch. "Here, take this!"

Zeb shouted as he threw the pilot into the Stormtrooper commander. Ezra took control of the vehicle and moved out of the firefight. Aurelian used the Force to jump onto the roof of the walker while Sabine leaped from the rooftops.

"Command. We have a rogue walker. Repeat, rogue walker in grid four."

The Mandalorian jumped into the cockpit as Chopper beeped. "No connection? That's impossible. The entire system would have to be down."

"Well, they did blow up their own comm tower." Zeb grunted.

"They must have taken down their entire data network.

"Whoever made that decision is an idiot." Aurelian commented. "I'm calling it here. Sabine, hail Hera for evac."

"Walker six-nine-three, stand down. Repeat, stand down." a Stormtrooper on comms ordered.

In the distance, more walkers appeared and opened fire, narrowly missing Zeb and causing the machine the rebels were in to jerk around.

"Whoa! Spectre-2, we need a pickup."

"I read you, Spectre-6. Rendezvous at the town's western border."

Another shot caused the walker to jolt and Sabine to yelp in surprise. "Hate to be the pessimist, Ezra, but how do we even know–"

"He's alive, Sabine. I know it."

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Inside an Imperial interrogation room, Kanan was strapped to a metal slab meditating until the door opened, revealing Tarkin and Kallus.

"Now we will discover if you are indeed the Jedi you claim to be," Tarkin said.