The Jedi's Final Stand

New Friends, New Enemies

“Remember; do not let your emotions get in the way. Passion, anger, fear, hatred. They do help, but you do not know how to control them. You will learn that in time,” Scorch explains to me.

 I’m just in one of my usual meditation sessions with Scorch. Bella started watching them too because she says she finds them interesting, but I think it’s because there is nothing else to do.  The Rebels, as we like to be called, have been setting up base here for weeks.  Every day, out of boredom, I would be asking for an assignment. Finally, after a lot of persuasion, Bella and I can finally go on a recon mission. They want us to check out an old building to make sure it’s secure, so we can further expand our operations. Better than sitting around doing nothing.

“Wait Atarah! Here, put this on,” Boggs says as he hands me a commando uniform, “You’re the most wanted person in the entire galaxy. Everyone here knows how you walk, talk, and your favorite color. For safety reasons, you must always have a disguise. This helmet has a voice disguiser so you will not be suspected as yourself.”

“Why? And this is a dude’s uniform!” I say.

“Great, then no one will suspect your you!”

What ever. I punch Bella as she laughs at the sight of my hideous uniform. Before we leave, we get our weapons.  I get a blaster rifle and two pistols. Bella gets a crossbow. I’ve been teaching her how to use modern weapons instead of bows and arrows, to her disliking. Well, at least there is one advantage about my uniform, it has a built in jetpack.

We walk out of the base from the back entrance. I load my rifle, in case anyone is watching us. I do sense something disturbing in the Force, but I decide to ignore it.  We walk through the back ally ways, crouching down as we approach the abandoned building. I use the Force to open the doors, and Bella and I both slip in.

“Let’s split up. You take the lower levels, I go to the top. Meet back here in a half an hour,” Bella says.

“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” I say. Wow, my voice sounds so weird. But before I can stop Bella, she leaves.

I walk around the lower levels, all clear. Occasionally, I would hear a creak or unknown sound. I come back to the entrance way, expecting to see Bella, but she is not there. I hear more sounds, but I ignore them. After fifteen minutes I make up my mind to go to the top level.

As I approach the top floor, I expect Bella to come out and admit to the joke she is playing on me. But instead, I get the complete opposite. I shriek as I see Bella unconscious on the floor, with blood on her face and on the floor. I quickly reload my blaster riffle. “Who’s there? Show yourself you cowards!” After a deadly, pulse pounding silence, I get pushed to the ground by an unknown attacker.

“Surprise,” he says. He is about to punch me when I swing my rifle at him as hard as I can, knocking him completely out of it. I stand up, and blast the next attacker. I swing around and repeatedly punch another, until he falls to the ground. As I turn around, I see another one, with a bomb in his hand, grinning. I run towards him as he presses the button on the top. It is exploding, but I use all my power of the Force to try to contain it. I try as hard as I can to hold in the energy, but it is simply too much for me to handle, it explodes, setting a blaze the entire top level of the building. Disoriented, I wake myself up, and slowly look around the room.

Everyone appears dead, but I wasn’t going to take that chance with Bella. I try to channel all my strength as I pick her up. I ignite my jetpack, sending the building even more a blaze. I run towards the windows and jump from the building. “I’m defiantly going to feel this in the morning,” I say. I fly outside, spotting the building next to me; I try to direct the jetpack towards the top. I roughly skid to a landing on the top of another building.

I turn to Bella, checking her pulse. She has a steady heartbeat, thank goodness. I turn to the burning building and sigh. Looks like we aren’t going to use that as a base. I pick up Bella and ignite my jetpack on low, so I can hover safely to the ground. “Ground Force, I need a pickup,” I say to my comlink. Just then, I hear some people approaching. I turn around, to see three people behind me, wide eyed. They all look about sixteen years old. There are two boys, and one girl.

“You’re a Rebel. Who’s your friend? Is she okay?”

I gently, but quickly set Bella to the ground. And aim my rifle right at my, “attackers”. Although they do seem friendly, I am not going to make any mistakes this time.

“Who are you?” I say.

“Don’t shoot! We want to help! We are the Freedom Fighters. Don’t worry, we are just like you. We don’t believe in that whole “empire is the only path to strength business.  I’m Janson, and this is my sisterDeliah, and my friend Dack.

I nod. They must be some young rebel group without a purpose. I bet Boggs will let me take them under my wing. “Well then, Freedom Fighters. Today is your lucky day! Welcome to the Rebels.” I take off my helmet, my long black hair flowing out. Blood trickling down my cheek. I give the sign of Rebellion.  They just stare at me, in awe.

“You’re Atarah Starkiller! We knew we would see you some day!” Dack says.

“The one and only. Now come, let’s get out of here.” We wait a couple of minutes until finally my transport arrives. The medic takes a look at Bella while Deliah asks me questions about my past.

“So you really set the capital building on fire three times?”

I grin, remembering my terrible behavior back here. “You can count on it.”

I turn towards Bella, who seems to be waking up. She wasn’t hurt bad, a few cuts and minor burns is all. Me, I just got scraped up a little bit. But I’m okay.

“What happened?” she asks.

“You failed to follow my orders, again, and you almost got yourself killed. You’re lucky I went to check on you. Do you realize what could of happened if I…”

She gives me a big hug, and then punches me in the gut. I just blink in disbelief.

I punch her back in the arm, and then introduce her to the Freedom Fighters. She seems to get along with everyone, but pays a lot of attention particularly to Janson. I must take note of this and question her about it later.

As we arrive back at the base, Carth runs up to me and also gives me a hug. To my delight, we’ve been seeing each other more often now that most of us are stationed here. He questions me about my new friends. “I’ll tell you later,” I say. Thankfully, Scorch respects that I want to get some rest. I do have to talk to him about the villains we encountered tonight. The important thing is, we may have an advantage to the war effort, now that we have some insiders accompanying us. Or, we may have three spies in our midst. Or, we may just have some useless teenagers eating our food and using our supplies. Either way, my thoughts are once again, pushed away as I get some well-deserved sleep.