Memories of the Past

Chapter 23

"Are you sure this is the right place? There's no sign of anyone. It's just an old building," Kanan questioned.

"Patience. Trust me," I replied as I transferred power to the old lift. It had stopped working a while ago and no one had bothered to fix it.

After a few moments, the lift rocketed upward. The lights flickered on and off and the lift jerked a bit too much for my liking. Regardless, we still made it up to the right level.

The doors to the lift opened, with some level of encouragement I might add, and we walked down the hall. It felt as if it were yesterday that I was walking down this same hall to go pay Lux a visit. I laughed thinking about all the fun things we'd done together in the same room we were going to now. It was so long ago, before the Empire, when I was still a Jedi...

I stopped in front of his door. "Are you sure this is the right place?" Sabine asked. "It's been abandoned for some time."

"Yes, I'm sure." If you only knew the amount of times I'd come to this building during the clone wars...

I punched in the code on the lock panel, and the door creaked open. It stopped halfway through the doorway, so I had to push it to get it completely open.

"This is some place," Kanan muttered as we walked inside.

I took special care to lock up the door once we were securely inside. I reached out into the force, searching for any Imperial presence in the apartment. Since Vader knew about my close friendship with Lux, he might have planted explosives somewhere or have security cameras in place. Nothing seemed to be amiss, so I continued walking.

The interior was exactly the way I remembered it, with the office on the right, sitting area in the middle, and bedroom to the left. The small Onderonian fountain had dried up long ago. I went over to the kitchenette, poured some tap water into a cup, and transferred it to the fountain. The water trickled out of the top.

Ezra, who had been silent for most of the mission so far, got the lights to work. Sabine was dusting off tables and chairs. Hera and Zeb had gone exploring in the office. Kanan just sort of stood there with an interesting facial expression. He looked sort of like a little kid forced to go grocery shopping.

"Kanan," I said to him, "May I have a word?"

He didn't say anything, just followed me. Took him into the bedroom, ans we sat down on the bed.

"What's up today?" I asked despite knowing the answer.

"You know perfectly well. I don't like being here and I'm worried for Ezra's safety. This place gives me the creeps."

"Kanan, you can't let the horrors of your past leak into the present and the future. You will never find any enjoyment out of life that way."

"But you don't know what happened to my master, what I did!"

"I was there Kanan. I saw many horrible things that day. If you hadn't ran, you would have been killed, too. Don't feel guilty, don't look back. There was a saying Master Yoda had back when I was a padawan: 'Old sins cast long shadows.' Your past can ruin your future if you let it."

He sighed. "I know. I just don't want anything like that to happen again. I don't know that I'll ever fully recover."

"I understand the way you feel. It will come with time, but you have to trust my judgement. I wouldn't ask anything of you that would put you in significant danger without asking you first."

"I know that, too. It's not easy, and probably will never be."

"But it's possible. Just give it your best effort, okay?" I said, standing up.

"Yeah," he said, following my example.

"I need to be alone for a moment. This trip has brought back many memories." He nodded, stepped out, and closed the door behind him.

I took a deep breath and pushed the bed mattress over until I could see the computer underneath. I pulled it out and brushed the debris off.

When I opened the laptop, a small piece of paper fell out. It read:
Ahsoka,
New Inquisitors. Vader is getting his hands dirty more often. Kids are going missing for some reason. There's a pattern. Be careful. Be safe.
Love you,
Lux

Kids going missing? This would have been nice to know a while ago. It's unfortunate I hadn't visited sooner. I can deal with finding the kids and figuring that out in my off time.

I turned on the holopad and entered in all the security passwords we'd set. I was able to scroll through every piece of Imperial data across the entire galaxy - protocol, shipments, ads, transports, attacks, everything.

Closing the holopad, I thought about Lux. I really missed him. It just wasn't the same, without knowing that there was someone else out there to have your back.

"I wish I could be there, too."

I whirled around and almost screamed. There stood Lux's form as a ghost.

I took a sigh of relief. "You almost gave me a heart attack."

"Sorry, I-"

"It doesn't matter now, I'm fine. I wish you were here too. It's just hard to do all of this by myself."

"You aren't by yourself ever, you know. You have Master Kenobi, Hera, Senator Organa, me..."

"I just feel alone."

"That's how Vader wants you to feel."

"I guess. I just wish you were here."

"Just think—if I were alive, we would both be in our 20's. We could've lived a long, happy life together, maybe even had kids." I raised an eyebrow, and he blushed. "What? I'm just dreamimg."

I smiled. "Yeah, that destiny sounds nice." I took a step closer to his ghost. "It's too bad. I really like you." I stood up on my toes and kissed him, taking his hands. We kissed for real this time, like on Mustafar. Except this time, we weren't splitting ways. We were together now.

Once we parted, I gave him a hug. "I do like it when you do that," Lux said affectionately. I felt my face heat up.

"The others are going to wonder what happened to me if I stay in here alome for much longer. I'll see you soon?"

"Of course," he said, fading away.

Sliding the holopad into my bag, I stood up to leave. Taking a last look at the place, I turned my back and walked out. It made me feel good to know that I am moving on from my past and into the future.

"I have the information we need," I announced to the rebels. They all turned around to look. "But I sense something, a presence of someone I haven't felt since that time when I asked....GET DOWN!" I shouted as a thermal detonater exploded.

I was too close to the bomb. I hit my head on something, and a smoke bomb went off. The only thing I saw before blacking out was a figure in green Mandalorian armor standing in the door frame.