Star Wars: Ahsoka

That was a surprise. Vartan had never mentioned it, and Kaeden had never considered it. It was somehow reassuring to know he thought well of her, even though it did her no good whatsoever at the moment.

“More recently, however, your prospects have dimmed somewhat,” the man continued. “Larceny, vandalism, conspiracy, murder, and treason. That will probably put a stop to your upward career mobility.”

She wished she had something clever to say, like a character in a holonovel, but her tongue was too heavy and her brain too slow. Also, she was too scared.

“The only decision you have remaining is how you wish your sentence to be carried out.” He pulled his hat up, and Kaeden was struck by the pitiless look in his eyes. “You’ll die for your crimes, of course, but if you were to cooperate with us, we would make sure you left this mortal coil with, shall we say, no worries on your chest.”

Kaeden flinched so severely that she wrenched her arms sideways in their straps. Her shoulder joints scraped agonizingly, but before she could fully register the pain, the chair toppled over. Her arm had moved just enough that it was crushed under the metal chair, and it was that pain, real and concrete, that finally broke through the fog in her brain. Two stormtroopers rushed into the cell to pick her up and set her right.

“I see we understand each other,” he said, as though nothing had happened. “I need you to tell me two things, Kaeden, two little things, and you’ll die with a single blaster bolt to the heart. Where are your friends hiding? We know they ran off and left you to get captured, but you must know where they went. Tell me.”

She tried to answer him but only croaked.

“And what is the Jedi’s name?” This time, the look in his eyes was demonic. He didn’t want to capture or torture Ahsoka. He wanted to kill her—for a promotion or for power or for the opportunity to say that he, personally, had killed a Jedi. He wanted Ahsoka dead.

Kaeden croaked louder this time. If he thought she legitimately couldn’t talk, it might buy her a little time.

“Your lack of cooperation is unfortunate.” He clicked his tongue at her. “But not altogether surprising. Consider carefully, Kaeden Larte, and I will be back when the sun comes up. Or perhaps one of my colleagues will come instead.”

Kaeden managed to control the flinch a bit better this time. The ache in her arm helped, giving her something else to focus on. It was definitely broken.

They left her strapped to the chair.

* * *

Ahsoka perched on the roof of the Imperial admin building. Climbing up had been easy. Now that she was no longer being careful to hide her true self, she had managed it in two jumps. The hardest part was waiting for a break in the patrols and finding the best spot to make her ascent. The rear of the compound was still underprotected.

Her examination of the prefab building yielded some interesting results. Ahsoka had seen the tanks, of course, but the building itself was of the style used during the Clone Wars, which meant she could guess the layout of the inside without actually seeing it. She allowed herself a small smile at the idea that Imperial monotony was working to her advantage.

She crossed the roof to the left side, her right since she was approaching from the back, because it had suffered the most damage during the day’s attack. She ruled it out as soon as she saw it, though, because the guard had been quadrupled to compensate for the damage. There would be no easy entry that way. Ahsoka slid down the wall to the lower roofline, still at the rear of the building. If the design was consistent, the holding cells would be there anyway.

She looked over the side, down the steeply slanted walls, and saw narrow windows that she remembered being at the tops of the cells. They were included in the design for air circulation and deemed an acceptable security risk because they were thought to be too small for escape. They were, Ahsoka noted, also designed with full-grown adult humanoids in mind. That would be her way in.

One of the windows was emitting a very bright light, the sort that an interrogator might use to keep a prisoner as uncomfortable as possible. The light went out suddenly, and Ahsoka made herself count to one hundred before she lowered herself headfirst, with her toes clinging to the ledge, to check the room. There was no point getting caught because of impatience.

She peered through the dimness and felt something in her stomach uncoil. There was Kaeden, and she was alive enough to be sitting upright in a chair. Ahsoka reached into her pocket and drew out the last of Miara’s corrosive charges. She couldn’t risk the noise of blasting the window, even though this way would take longer. Upside down, the charges were difficult to install, and Ahsoka nearly burned her thumbs off, but she managed it in the end and moved to the side to wait.