Star Wars Jedi Knight IV: Sith Empire

Chapter 16: Snips

"The Sith control everything. You just don't know it yet!"

―Count Dooku

Ahsoka sat cramped in a corner on an airbus on Coruscant. It wasn't because of the lack of available seating: there was plenty of room between her and the Trandoshan sitting next to her, just the way she liked it.

The reason she wanted to sit so far away was the Trandoshan smelled like death. She wanted to be as respectful as reasonably possible, so she pretended to look out the transparisteel window as she tucked her nose in the Jedi homespun robes that Luke had given her. Due to the loose weave and porous nature of the fabric, it did precious little to mask the stench.

The Trandoshan's stink also reminded her about her being captured and frozen by Karazak slavers in the Coruscant undercity. Despite that, Tano tried to focus on studying the changes that happened on Coruscant that happened while she was in carbonite. Luckily there was no shortage of intriguing things outside. By far the biggest thing she saw was nothing. There were simply bare patches in the Coruscant cityscape with absolutely nothing. The late afternoon haze was too thick to let her see all the way down to the planet surface, but Luke told her before she left that this was, in fact, the aftermath of Abeloth.

It was one thing to hear about it second hand from Luke. It was something else entirely for Ahsoka to see the destruction with her own eyes. She wondered how many millions lost their lives in this rampage of Abeloth's on that apocalyptic day.

Buildings started coming back into view as the airbus entered a less-destroyed area. On the horizon, she could see the angles of the Jedi Temple glistening in the sun like a gem. It was almost picturesque if it weren't for obvious bare patches that still echoed the destruction the Force entity wreaked upon the planet.

The airbus continued approaching the Jedi Temple. But something felt...off. And she was fairly certain it wasn't just her stomach revolting at the smell of the Trandoshan. Ahsoka reached out in the Force, but was unable to pinpoint the disturbance. She tried to ignore it for the time being.

The airbus eventually started slowing down, and it stopped at Fellowship Plaza. A chime sounded, and a droid voice announced their arrival. Beings started filing out of the airbus. The Trandoshan simply shoved his way into the slowly moving crowd. Thank the stars he was gone. But the mass of people was too thick for Ahsoka to squeeze in. The Togruta simply resigned for the moment and sat down again where she was and rested her head against the transparisteel. She'd catch the end of the line.

Looking out into the gardens of Fellowship Plaza, Tano thought she saw flashes of light through the foliage. Her danger sense arrested her attention a split second before a dark object flew out of the trees and smacked against the transparisteel. The force of the impact dented the window Ahsoka's head had been on, and the figure, a soldier of some kind, slid down the transparent metal leaving a blood smear. Multiple screams echoed in the cabin of the airbus, and people started stampeding out, running each other over. She probed outward with the Force, and sensed lives being ripped away...and two particularly powerful Force presences. One was conflicted, fighting with itself. And the other, strong, resolute, but with a dark tinge of malice to it.

There was no way Ahsoka could exit the airbus with the rest of the people. The roof was too low for her to jump over them, and she couldn't join the crowd without getting mowed over. That left just one option. With a snap-hiss, she ignited Luke's saber that he loaned her, and slashed an X in the thin transparisteel of the airbus. Using the Force she bent the sharp metal outward and leaped out onto Fellowship Plaza.

***

Vestara had made quicker work of the GA troops than Ben originally thought. She had simply swept them all off the plaza with the Force and let them fall to their deaths. In between parries, Ben kept an eye out for any reinforcements that may come. He was hoping for something aerial, a gunship if he was lucky, but he wasn't holding his breath.