Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Luminara slowly blinked, and the child peeking out from behind Gree’s legs blinked back.

“The refugee camp was overfull,” her Commander murmured, dropping one hand to stroke the little nosaurian’s downy feathers. “Kids without families had to make do with scrap pile nests, and, well, we couldn’t just leave ‘em.”

“I see,” Luminara replied, her war-torn heart breaking a tad further. “How many foundlings have been added to our ranks?”

“Only seventeen. We commed a few other units, they’ll try to pick up more.” Because, no matter how much the troopers wished to help the orphans they came across, there was only so much they could do if the younglings didn’t trust them. Adoption only happened if both sides were willing, after all.

“And what is this lad’s name, may I ask?” Careful with her skirts, Luminara crouched, smiling slightly when the nosaurian leaned a little further out.

“Oren,” Gree replied, puffing up proudly. “We negotiated a bit, and he decided he likes ‘Vorpangaid’ for a family name, too.”

“Greenplate,” Luminara murmured, her Mando’a vocabulary greatly expanded since the war took a sharp left turn, and clones began experimenting with last as well as first names. “Very fitting.”

Little Oren grinned at that, revealing rounded baby teeth just barely poking up from his gums. Despite the feathers, nosaurians were a reptilian-based species, and with time his emerging teeth, scales and horns would look truly fearsome. In the meantime, Luminara simply thought him adorable.

“Jedi,” the boy suddenly piped up, pointing to the hilt of her lightsaber. “Like Resa’s?”

“Yes, I am a Jedi,” Luminara answered, casting a curious glance up at her commander.

Gree snorted. “General Jennir was our go-between when the nosaurians asked for help to get off New Plympto; he made friends with their militia’s commander and his family after Order 66, so now there’s a pint-sized youngling who insists people better run the camp the way she says or her Jedi uncle will come straighten them out.”

Amused, Luminara let a slight chuckle escape her. “I see. Well then, young Oren, I suppose you have a Jedi aunt in your corner now, but I better not hear about you taking advantage of that.”

Oren rapidly shook his head, still grinning. Luminara tapped one finger against the soft end of his snout, before standing with the help of Gree’s offered hand. “Now, I suppose we’d best call ahead to Forest Home and make arrangements to expand the youngling center.”

“After you, General.”

“There’s bombs that way.”

Razor flinched with a startled swear, and Stak nearly dropped the pack he’d been about to sling over his shoulders. It took a few moments of scrambling before they looked up.

The pair thought they’d found great cover to rest in and plan the next section of their route back to friendly lines, a bombed out hut made of local stone that just appeared to be another pile of rubble from any distance greater than ten steps. Not until getting right up close could one spot the shadowed opening, which led into a hollow space plenty big enough for two scouts - and one local pipsqueak, apparently.

Wedged between a broken rafter and the former roof, a dark-skinned iridonian with short white hair and tiny horn nubs peered down at them. Evidently, she’d been present the entire time they hashed out a path on the holo-map.

“What kind of bombs?” Stak managed to ask, after getting over his surprise. “And how did you get up there?”

“I climbed,” came the bland answer. “An’ there’s bombs under the ground on top of the cliffs; you can’t see ‘em ‘cause of all the blown up dirt, so you step on ‘em an’ then you get blown up.”

“Minefield,” Razor grumbled. “Yeah, we’re definitely not going that way, then.”

“There isn’t any way else to go,” Stak protested, keeping one eye on the kid perched above them. “We’ve got to warn General Windu about the tunnels they’re digging towards his position, before they start collapsing underneath our anti-aircraft weaponry.”

“Why don’t you just take the Wizard Road?”

Again, their heads jerked up to stare at the youngling. “...what road is that?”

Huffing, the kid wiggled to dislodge herself, then scooted and hopped down the pile of debris like a tooka to come stand beside them. “It’s here, but you can’t see it on your map. Most grown-ups don’t use it, ‘cause it’s a tight fit, but you two should be short enough.”

“Dunno if I should be insulted or grateful,” Razor huffed. “Is it hidden?”

“Yeah. But I can show you. Nothin’ left for me here, anyway.”

Stak grimaced underneath his bucket. “Was this your house?”

“No. Old Lasen just let me sleep in the kitchen if I helped with chores.” The kid shrugged. “She’s dead now, somewhere under here. I put a blue rock on top so the spirit guides can find her tonight.”

“That’s, uh. Good for you.” Razor gave the kid a couple of firm pats on the shoulder, before he stood. “Alright, let’s head out. Don’t want the Imps to catch us in-between here and this ‘Wizard Road’ of yours.”

“I’m glad you spoke up when you did,” Stak mentioned, as he and his brother followed their new guide out of the ruined hut. “Didn’t even see you when we came in here.”

“I’m real good at bein’ sneaky, ‘cause I’m so small.” The kid’s chest puffed out with pride. “But if anybody thinks they can mess with me, I bite ‘em real good!”

“Ha!” He grinned. “What’s your name, kid?”

“Beesyi.” Her cheerful demeanor faded somewhat. “But everybody calls me Runt or Yi’Yil.”

“What, you don’t like nicknames?” Razor asked, as they eased around what was left of the previous day’s battlefield. Scorched armor could be seen poking up out of various rubble piles, some painted with Vod’e colors, others plain Imperial White.

“Not mean ones,” Beesyi muttered back. She hopped up and over a chunk of debris, twisting on the landing to avoid a sharp edge of durasteel.

Stak’s hummed thoughtfully. “Well, we know how important names are, so we’ll use yours. Or maybe ad’ika sometimes, if that’s okay.”

Razor’s made a warning gesture over the kid’s head as she frowned. “What’s that mean?”

“S’just a way to address a kid, like how we brothers call each other vod.”

“...that’s okay, I guess.”

Stak grinned as his brother flashed him a rude sign, followed by the hand signals for query, action, which basically translated to what the hell do you think you’re doing? He made a few signs back, when the kid pulled ahead of them: child, civilian, protect, evacuate - let’s take her with us.

Plan, risk, dangerous terrain - that’s a TERRIBLE idea.

Friendly units, fall in, shinies - other vod’e have their own kids.

Razor’s swift slashing motion showed what he thought of that comparison.

“Hey! You two comin’ or not?”

The pair of scouts scrambled to catch up to their guide, who’d covered a fair bit of ground while they slowed down to hold a silent discussion. Beesyi didn’t appear to have noticed anything besides them falling behind, as she pointed to what looked like an old sewer grate half covered by debris as soon as the pair arrived. “That’s the way in, but I can’t get it open like this.”

“We’re on it, c’mon vod.”

Soon enough, Stak and Razor cleared enough rubble to slide the grate over, flicking their helmet lights on as Beesyi boldly scooted into the dark tunnel without a backwards glance. Thankfully, there didn’t appear to be any other signs of intrusion, and only a few steps further in was a cleft in the wall. Squeezing through would definitely not have been possible if the troopers were even just a touch taller or bulkier.

The twisting, jagged tunnel Beesyi led them through occasionally rose close enough to the surface for daylight to spill down through cracks in the ceiling, and at one point the trio froze when a tank rumbled overhead. Even so, a couple hours later, they made it to the end without any unforeseen complications.

And even better, General Windu’s camp was within sight of the cliff they emerged from, just a few miles further north and across a dried out riverbed.

Razor groaned as he stretched, working out the kinks and cramps from so long in such a confined space, while Stak pulled off his bucket in order to properly grin at Beesyi. She smiled back, before the expression faltered, her eyes glancing between them, the tunnel exit, and the camp in the distance.

“Well,” the kid mumbled. “Good luck, I guess.”

“You wanna come with us?” Both she and Stak whipped their heads around to stare at Razor, who also looked surprised by what he’d just said. “I mean. It’s just, it’s dangerous out here, for someone on their own.”

“...I’m used to it,” Beesyi finally shrugged. “Didn’t really like the orphanage, even before it got blown up. People pretendin’ they care when they don’t, not really.”

“Well, we still owe you for sharing a safe way back with us,” Stak said. “Can’t take off until we’ve had a chance to settle that debt, right?”

Beesyi blinked, a soft smile slowly creeping onto her face. “I guess not.”

“Great,” Razor harrumphed. “Come on, then, it’s not much further.”

The rest of the ship had long since emptied of oxygen, and even the bridge was running low by the time someone answered their distress beacon. Mizgrr roused, briefly, at the distant ker-thunk sounds of another vessel clamping onto the airlock. Standing made his head go dizzy, so instead the boy crawled over to the internal communications controls, where he hauled himself into the seat and reached for the correct switches. “H-help... bridge... please...”

He considered warning them of what they’d find in the hall outside, but just, didn’t have the strength. Mizgrr slumped back against the seat, and focused on not passing out. Even so, he lost a bit of time, rousing again at the sound of voices and beeping.

Then the bridge door slid open, releasing a wave of fresh air into the confined space. He gasped, and started to cough, organs desperate to get the oxygen they’d been lacking more and more over the past... hours? Days? He couldn’t say for sure.

Hands curled over his shoulders, and Mizgrr forced himself to pick his head up, to look at the humans he could smell.

He froze at the sight of white armor.

Hissing instinctively, the boy tried to scramble backwards, but there wasn’t anywhere for him to go, especially not once the trooper wrapped armored arms around him. Mizgrr’s claws weren’t sharp enough to get through the black undersuit, let alone hard plastoid, but he still tried. He kicked and scratched and chomped with half-grown teeth, yet the trooper just stood there. Let the boy tire himself out, until Mizgrr hung limply in his grip, panting heavily.

“You good?” An amused voice came out of the helmet. Mizgrr growled. “Not gonna hurt ya, kid. Promise. We’re Republic Alliance, not Imperials.”

“Like that-” Mizgrr coughed, the words catching in his throat. “Like that’s better?” He shifted his glare towards the other troopers in the room, who were watching, and then the ones visible through the doorway, who were- who were-

A keen escaped Mizgrr’s throat. “Papa.”

The trooper holding him stiffened, before he slowly knelt, to let Mizgrr’s hindpaws touch the floor. Suddenly released, he staggered forward, managed to make it to the door before collapsing. His father’s body didn’t react, not to him, not to the troopers carefully shifting him from his side to his back, as if the grown togorian was just asleep.

Someone new stepped up to sit beside him, slender fingers stroking down the boy’s back. “What happened, little one?”

If it had been another trooper, Mizgrr would’ve stayed silent. But the scent was twi’lek, not human, and the voice was soft and warm like his mother’s had been, and... and Mizgrr was tired.

“Pirates,” he mumbled, still staring at his father’s lifeless body. “Papa killed the ones on the ship, but- but they got the rest of the crew- and he couldn’t fix the life support. There wasn’t- there wasn’t enough- he said I’d last longer, on the bridge, and he broke the controls, so I couldn’t- I couldn’t open the door.” Mizgrr had cried for ages, as he sat with his back pressed to the wall, listening to his father’s fading gasps on the other side. He kept praying, to any gods who’d listen, to please send someone before the oxygen was completely gone, the life support system’s last meager offerings diverted solely into the bridge, to him.

They hadn’t. They’d waited, until it was just Mizgrr, until his father was gone-

The boy didn’t realize he’d started to cry again, until the twi’lek woman curled herself around him, humming as she ran her fingers through his short fur. Voices murmured over his head, but Mizgrr just flattened his ears and pressed closer to the first source of warmth he’d felt since the whole nightmare began.

When the twi’lek started to stand, he protested, grasping at the edges of her armor. She hushed him, and just scooped Mizgrr up, supporting his weight easily. “It will be alright, little one. I promise. You’ll be safe with us until we get you home.”

“This is home,” Mizgrr sniffled. “Papa said there’s- there’s no home like the starlanes.”

“Well then,” the twi’lek said, and he finally looked up to see her blue skin and gentle smile. “I suppose it is fitting we Star Clan were the ones to find you.”

Another trooper stepped up beside her, one with fancier armor than the others. “Rest of the ship is clear, Aayla, and the boys outside report all the towing cables are secure.”

“Thank you Bly. Come now, little one. Let’s get our medic to look you over, and see if we can’t change your mind over the Alliance being better than the Empire.”

Chapter Text

Wolffe barely, barely managed to bite back a groan at the sight of his buir blatantly ignoring the pint-sized pickpocket making off with his credit chit.

Again.

He tried to keep the anger from bleeding out through his steps as he approached the Kel Dor, still idling in front of a merchant’s open-faced stall, but Plo Koon’s obvious amusement as Wolffe stopped beside him probably meant he’d failed miserably.

“I could feel your stomps from across the walkway, Commander,” the Jedi murmured, his facemask twitching. “Just what is it that seems to have upset you?”

“This can’t go on, sir,” Wolffe growled.

“What can’t?”

“You, letting street urchins swipe your credits. You know they’re there, I’m sure of it, but every time-”

“Yes, Wolffe.” His buir’s unexpected shift from an amused tone to a grave one pulled the human up short. “I do know. And fifty credits here and there, from the stipend all Alliance officers now receive, Jedi or otherwise, seems the least I can do for such younglings.”

Of course. Of-kriffing-course. Wolffe did his best not to grumble about bleeding hearts as he fell into step with his buir, completing their circuit of the station’s marketplace before heading back to their ship in the hangar bays. “...you do realize, sooner or later you still have to buy that souvenir you promised Comet, which means actually spending some of your credits instead of letting them get stolen.

Plo chuckled, and reached up to ruffle Wolffe’s slightly-longer-than-regulation hair. “Of course, my son.”

Mollified, as he always ended up whenever his buir used that particular term of endearment, Wolffe nonetheless positioned himself to block any further little hands reaching to check the Jedi’s pockets. Thankfully, they managed to return to their hangar without incident.

Boost and Sinker remained out on the town far longer, though the pair did get back in time for dinner. The “mission” the four of them were assigned involved subtle recon, observing the citizens of a space station that rested at the convergence point for three separate hyperlanes. If the locals seemed amenable to the increased trade from clones on shore leave, then the Republic Alliance would adjust timetables to include the place as a valued rest stop for fueling and resupply.

If not, Plo Koon and his oldest sons still got a free vacation out of it.

“I think some of the locals have twigged to our shared faces, Buir,” Sinker commented as he passed around utensils. “At least a few looked worried, but I’m pretty sure that was more over drawing the Empire’s attention than actually having us around.”

“There are more who asked if we were gonna have relatives visiting anytime soon,” added Boost, portioning out their meal onto three bowls, plus a container with an attached straw for Plo to drink from.

“That seems promising,” the Jedi said, humming thoughtfully. “And perhaps we would gain more favor should the local pickpocket population diminish with more vod’e coming and going.”

Wolffe pulled a face, reaching to snag his serving. “Are you sure they’re the kind of ad’e we’d want our brothers adopting?”

“Now now, just because these younglings have found unsavory ways to survive in a home without natural resources of its own, doesn’t mean they cannot blossom into generous souls if given opportunity to grow.”

“Yeah, even your not-so-charming disposition gained an almost pleasant side the longer we spent with Plo-Buir,” Sinker teased, sitting down at the table. Wolffe promptly chucked a spoon at his head, beaning the white-haired clone between the eyes and causing him to collapse back out of his chair with exaggerated howls of pain. Boost practically doubled over from laughing so hard, and even Plo’s shoulders shook with mirth.

The good feelings didn’t last the night, however.

Just about the time all of them were preparing for bed, Plo about to disappear into his quarters, a soft beeping started up. “The proximity alarm?” Boost’s head popped back out of the shirt he’d been in the process of tugging off. “Here?”

“Someone must be outside the ship,” Plo murmured, already heading for the main entrance. Wolffe hurried after him without a second thought, and heard his other Packmates trailing after.

When Plo dropped the ship’s ramp to peer out into the hangar bay, a young tholothian boy nervously darted up it, hands shoving something towards the Kel Dor. Years of battle-honed instinct nearly sent Wolffe to intercept, before he belatedly realized it was his buir’s credit chit, the one stolen just earlier that day. Same kid, too.

“Please take the bad luck back,” the boy begged, offering up the money, eyes wide and mouth trembling. “I didn’t know you were a Jedi, I’m sorry, just please take it back so Avel stops getting worse!”

“Peace, youngling,” Plo murmured as he knelt, large fingers carefully wrapping around the kid’s outstretched hand. “What is wrong? Who is Avel?”

“My sister,” the boy sobbed. “She’s been sick, and Boss Mis’k hasn’t done nothin’, so I’ve been swiping extra creds to get medicine, but as soon as I got back today with yours she started coughing worse than ever and then Boss came in ranting ‘bout a Jedi seen in the market, and he mentioned the weird mask and I realized it was you and I’m sorry, Mum always said stealing from a Jedi’s bad luck but I didn’t know-!”

Before Wolffe could blink, Plo stood, still holding the kid’s hand. “Take us to your sister, little one, and I will do my best to help her.”

Gaping, it took a second for the kid to nod and start running, Plo’s longer strides eating up the distance alongside him.

Wolffe, dressed in his sleep clothes with bare feet and no blaster in sight, groaned. “Boost, guard the ship. Sinker, get a medkit and follow as quickly as you can.”

He raced after his buir and the remorseful pickpocket, ignoring his brother’s shout of “Am I allowed to get shoes first?”

Intellectually, Wolffe had known pickpockets were fast - they needed to be, in their line of work. But in practice, it honestly surprised him how much he struggled just to keep the kid and Plo in sight, as they left the main corridors of the space station behind in favor of narrow halls and service shafts. The walls went from painted to bare durasteel, doors to living spaces were set closer together, and the fans that drew air from the life support systems became significantly shabbier, some non-functioning altogether.

They finally reached a corridor that resembled a sick mirror image of the marketplace, hut-like structures formed from plating stripped off the walls and floors, leaving exposed machinery behind and walkways just barely big enough for two people to pass one another. The kid’s pace finally slowed somewhat, as he led Plo on a weaving path through the place, and Wolffe was able to catch up thanks to some careful leaps to cut corners. He kept one hand curled around his comm unit, the sole thing he’d grabbed on his way out of the ship, already broadcasting his location back to Sinker. With any luck, the other clone wouldn’t become completely lost in the bowels of the station.

When they reached a particular scrap-assembled hut, the kid didn’t hesitate to duck inside, Plo right behind him and Wolffe bringing up the rear. Any doubts about it being a trap vanished as soon as the threadbare curtain muffled some of the outside noise, and he could more clearly hear the sound of a child’s distressed wheezing.

“Avel!” The kid stumbled over to a blanket on the floor, where a younger child struggled to breathe, curled up on her side. Plo settled himself beside them, and gently eased the girl into his lap. He held her upright, one hand pressed to her chest as the other kept her head from tipping over.

“Breathe with me, youngling,” he ordered in a deceptively calm voice. With each measured rise and fall of the Jedi’s chest, the little girl sucked in what air she could, before coughing it back out.

While his buir focused on that, Wolffe caught the other kid’s attention. “How long has she been sick?”

“A- a long time,” the boy answered, eyes glued to his struggling sister. “Almost since we had to come down here, after Mum died.”

Probably the poor ventilation to blame, then, along with whatever pollutants collected from the rest of the station. “And the medicine you’ve been giving her?”

“S’from Ma’am Gelley’s shop, she says it’s good for cold’s ‘n coughs, but it never helps all that long, just a day or two.”

“What about water? Does she get enough to drink, to eat?”

The kid shot him an incredulous glance. “You look around at all this an’ think any of us get enough to eat?” Wolffe just waited, a single eyebrow raised. “...she gets too tired to chew anything solid. I trade what I can for nutri-slush, and I give her half my water ration, too.”

Outside noise briefly grew louder, before Sinker was kneeling next to Plo, medkit already open. “What do we need?”

“The smallest dose of prednisone you can manage, and an oxygen mask,” their buir replied, still leading the child through one breath after another. “Quickly, Sinker. I can feel her flickering in the Force.”

Despite only having limited experience with playing medic’s helper, the white-haired clone kept his hands steady as he pulled out the requested items, trimming the soft edges of the mask to fit and connecting it up to a mini oxy-pump, squeezing a tenth of the steroid vial’s contents into a hypo. The little girl whined when he gave her the shot, but almost immediately slumped into a boneless heap, only faint condensation inside the oxygen mask indicating her continued breathing.

Her brother practically collapsed himself, leaning against Sinker in his effort to get as close as possible. “Is she- is she gonna be okay?”

“Most likely, yes,” Plo answered, still cradling the smaller child in his lap. “We will need to get her further medical attention, but her Force-presence has stabilized for the moment. You did well in coming to find us, little one.”

“I just-” the kid sniffled, and Sinker looked alarmed, uncertain if he should nudge the boy away or wrap an arm around him. “S’bad luck, stealin’ from a Jedi. I had to fix it.”

Wolffe kept his mouth shut about sneaky Kel Dor ignoring little hands in his pockets, instead focusing on the way Plo had shifted to look consideringly at the two kids. “Buir...”

“You mentioned your mother passed away,” the Jedi said softly. “Is this, Mis’k, the one who takes care of you now?”

“He doesn't take care of nothin’,” the kid muttered, hunching his shoulders. “He only lets us sleep here ‘cause I pay him whatever I can steal, an’ then I gotta steal more for rations.” He suddenly looked up half-panicked again. “You said- she’s gonna need more med stuff, but I don’t have creds for-”

“You don’t need credits,” Plo cut him off, soothing. “You’re with us.”

Wolffe worked very hard to keep his mouth shut. He did give in to the temptation to glare at Sinker, however, seeing as the other man was grinning up at him in a distinctly unhelpful manner.

Let it be known, Quinlan Vos managed to go five years without being given a command position or getting saddled with the title of “General”, and he would’ve been quite happy to keep such a record going.

Then Wilde practically fell into his lap, with Gaslight and Hijink tumbling after.

(Aayla laughed for ten minutes straight when he finally, grudgingly, admitted to the trio of young troopers becoming his new unit. Bly, at least, managed to hide his own grin behind a well-timed cough.)

“Mission specs, boss?” Wilde asked, striding into the planning room of their ship with two cups of caf. Quinlan accepted the one offered to him, and took a moment to just breathe in the aroma. If nothing else, he kept Wilde around for the man’s ability to fix a perfect cup of caf no matter the circumstances.

“Standard info retrieval, in and out,” Quinlan eventually got around to replying, zooming out the holo-map to better display their target in its entirety. “Top boss of this cartel keeps the most sensitive data locked into servers in his private quarters, at the center of a former Separatist fortress. He’s got his own goon squad of loyalists, assorted hired muscle, and at least three dozen old B-1 battle droids salvaged from basement storage.”

Wilde nodded once, stalking around the edge of the table, his mis-matched eyes taking in every detail of the hologram projection. “But we aren’t going to be seen by any of them, are we.”

“That is the plan, yes.”

Would wonders never cease, Quinlan made full-scale plans these days. Obi-wan smirked every time he heard about them.

“Looks like the most promising entry point would be the east wall - did that damage come from a battle?”

“No, localized earthquake. It’s why the Seppies abandoned this particular base for a more stable spot further up the coastline, and that base saw a battle. But the Republic never bothered to come torch the old one, which meant it stayed intact for this charming fellow to take over.”

“Gotcha. So, over the broken parapets, circle northward to avoid these patrols, and then - third floor windows?”

Quinlan bared his teeth in a grin. “Exactly what I was thinking.”

Wilde grinned back, before draining his caf and heading back out with the empty mug. “I’ll tell Hijink and Gaslight to gear up, then. Oh, and Khaleen called, wants to know when you’re going to swing by for a visit.”

Grim anticipation for the mission drowned beneath the weight of Quinlan’s sudden rush of affection. “We’ll make some time after this. I’ll tell her to expect us in a ten-day.”

The welcome idea of seeing his sort-of-spouse and their son soon kept the Jedi in good humor through the rest of the preparations, all the way up until he needed to settle his mind on the task at hand, as the quartet of spies arrived at their target. Landing their stealth ship in the local forest and hiking the remaining distance got the adrenaline pumping, all three of his men feeling sharp and bright in the Force.

Quinlan carefully gave each one a boost in getting up to the halfway point of the broken wall, where they could use cracks and splits in the stone to finish the rest of their climb. Once on top, all four slipped over to the closest staircase, before ducking between buildings and shadows as they evaded the regular routes of patrolling thugs. Gaslight needed to use a device that emitted fog rather than smoke at one point, but other than that minor distraction, they passed completely unnoticed through the base.

The central building utilized its own independent security system, but only on the ground level entrances. Once again using the Force to lift his team up to their infiltration point, Quinlan waited until they’d gotten in through the windows to leap upwards himself.

A perfect infiltration, he felt pleased to acknowledge, sliding across the narrow sill.

Which, of course, was the moment they encountered something unforeseen.

The blur of lighter shadows moving against the far wall caught Quinlan’s attention; Hijink noticed faster. His silencer-modified blaster lifted, fired - missed. The discolored shadows moved too quickly. Wilde leapt over a low table to go for the tackle, and while his padded boots didn’t make too much of a thump upon landing, catching the blur and pinning it to the floor caused a muffled yet definitely noticeable racket.

To the left, light flickered on through a cracked door.

A few moments, a grumbling, portly individual shoved it open, scowling into the darkness with half-lidded eyes. “Boy,” he rumbled, clearly still half-asleep, “Get your scrawny backside back in here before I turn your skin darker blue than usual."

Silence.

Growling beneath his breath, the man took a step further from his bedroom door. “I said-”

Gaslight slid into the space behind him, stuck a sedative dart between folds of flesh, and let the man wobble before crashing to the floor. “Sorry, boss.”

“No problem,” Quinlan murmured, emerging from his own hiding place. “Not like he saw you, anyway.” With that, he approached the spot on the floor where Wilde still laid, a much smaller and scrawnier individual pinned in his grasp, both of them silently panicking.

Quinlan crouched, knocked a gloved knuckle against his second in command’s helmet. “Pretty sure you can let him go now, vod.”

Grateful for the instruction, Wilde relaxed and pulled back, rolling to get to his feet. The kid who’d been caught beneath him didn’t move.

Pantoran, if the pale skin and faint glimmers of gold just visible from the bedroom’s light were anything to go by. Underfed, judging by the stick-thin arms and washboard ribs. And definitely not going to be left behind, considering he only had a blanket tied around his waist for clothing.

“Hijink, go find our data,” Quinlan murmured, forcing his voice to remain calm and his body language relaxed. “Gaslight, keep watch. Wilde, gimme the smallest cloud-weave tarp in your pack, would ya?” Normally used to hide bodies until they could be disposed of, or equipment their team didn’t need anyone stumbling across, the cloud-weave was a uniquely crafted camouflage material they always kept a few rolls of onhand. Wilde rustled through his bag for a moment before emerging with a square that unfolded to six by six feet. He thankfully wasn’t foolish enough to toss it over, but also made sure to keep out of arm’s reach of the boy when he stepped around to Quinlan’s side.

As for the kid himself, he stayed absolutely silent, sitting up with wide eyes when Quinlan gestured, and accepting the cloth draped and wrapped around him. “We’ll get you someplace safe, youngling,” the Jedi murmured, securing the last fold. “Worlds better than him, anyway.”

“Data located, boss,” Hijink called softly, busy at a console on the opposite wall. “Download initiating.”

“Still all clear,” Gaslight added, by the main door.

“New orders?” Wilde asked, still standing beside Quinlan and the kid.

“We bug out as soon as the download’s complete. Data is first priority-” a nod towards the boy, “-but he’s second. Silent exit if we can, but go for rapidfire retreat if we’re spotted, speed over stealth. Call for the ship as soon as we’re clear of the walls.”

“Gotcha, boss.”

Chapter Text

“Echo- Echo, wait-”

“Can’t,” Echo bit back, hauling his concussed di’kut of a vod around a corner. “The detonators don’t have much time left on ‘em, we need to go now-”

“-the kid, Echo! That little no-name one, did someone check his nest?!”

Oh, sithing hells. No, Echo hadn’t checked, and he’d lay odds against anyone else having done so either, what with the Imperial Star Destroyer that dropped out of hyperspace practically on top of their Relief Corps cruiser and opened fire.

Arriving at the last remaining bank of escape pods, Echo chucked his idiot into one headfirst. The handful of refugees already inside reached, caught, and settled Fives as best they could, the woman at the helm already firing up their launch sequence. “Go as soon as the engines start to blow, don’t wait for me!”

Despite what he’d been saying just thirty seconds before, Fives struggled to sit up and reach for him. “Echo?!”

Ignoring the Citadel flashbacks stirring at the back of his brain, the ARC didn’t hold still long enough to repeat himself. He ran at top speed, skidded and slid around corners back towards the heart of the ship, past the cabins used by the escaped prisoners they’d been transporting, towards one electrical closet in particular.

(He’d been going through a maintenance check, not his assigned duty but a nervous tic, when he nearly stepped on the toddler curled up amidst the tubes and wires.

“Little squirt did that on our last transport, too,” one of the newly freed prisoners mentioned, standing to accept the squirming kid when Echo brought him into the common room. “Guess his parent must’ve been an engineer, or a technician or something.”

“You guess?”

“Yeah. Dunno for certain. They were one of the ones who didn’t make it out; somebody managed to scoop up the squirt during the jailbreak, and now we’re just taking turns making sure he eats and gets changed.”)

Left, second right, center of the corridor - Echo yanked open the closet door, and over the ship’s blaring alarms he nevertheless heard a toddler’s panicked wailing. Swearing, he wiggled into the mess of sparking circuits to snag a little foot and tug the baby togruta out into the open. Thankfully, the kid quieted down a bit when he saw it was Echo doing the tugging, but even so he kept on crying as the clone booked it back towards the escape pods.

The sudden addition of blaster fire did not make things easier.

His cursing going up a level in profanity, Echo dropped to slide through an intersection, below where invading stormtroopers typically aimed, and made it to the opposite side before they could adjust. Rolling to get back to his feet, the clone kept both arms curled securely around his passenger, determined to protect the kid from any stray plasma even if that meant he couldn’t shoot back. Despite being far removed from the ship’s engines and their jerry-rigged self-destruct mechanism, he could almost hear the countdown of the timers: t-minus twelve seconds...

The deck beneath his feet started to quiver just as Echo reached the pods; all but the very last were sealed and ready to launch, as per protocol. He sprinted past the one containing Fives, mentally apologizing but unwilling to risk delaying them by trying to get in. Eight, seven, six...

Someone had been good enough to get the final pod prepped, even if they didn’t wait within. All Echo had to do was seal the airlock door-

-three-

-fling himself at the control panel-

-two-

-hit the launch button-

-one-!

-and brace himself as the pod shot away into space, just in time. Shockwaves from the explosion rattled him and the kid both, eliciting a new round of wails, but Echo managed to get both of them strapped into a seat before hitting the atmosphere of the moon below. After that, he could only pray to anything that would listen: Please get us down safe, please keep Fives alive, please let that detonation have been enough of a distraction for the Imps-

A muffled snuffle at his neck preceded tiny fingers poking at Echo’s helmet. He couldn’t risk taking it off, moments before a crash landing, but he at least readjusted his own hands to let the kid grip his thumb. The pod’s shaking got worse, the transparisteel window went all different shades of burning red and orange, and then there was nothing but blue.

...

...thankfully, blue vegetation, rather than blue water. Important distinction, that. Especially since it meant they survived.

They survived.

Echo sat in the escape pod for a long time, blinking at the teal blue foliage smooshed against the window with sunlight barely sneaking through, before that fact finally settled in his head. Even then, he probably would’ve stayed put a while longer, head throbbing from getting smacked against the wall a few times... if not for the eventual, inevitable squirming of a toddler who needed to use the ‘fresher. Holding back a hiss of pain, Echo got himself and the kid disentangled, staggered over to slide open the pod’s airlock, and blearily considered how best to assist.

His passenger got tired of waiting.

“Aw, hell,” the clone muttered, helmet filters blocking the smell but not the sound of warm liquid suddenly being released. “Suppose I should be grateful you didn’t have to do the other one, at least."

The toddler in his arms giggled.

An old lecture from Ahsoka back in the old days meant Echo understood, more or less, the basic developmental process for togruta montrals (and why poking them wasn’t appreciated even when Jedi padawans were not going through growth spurts, thank you Fives). So, little no-name looked to be around one standard years old, which meant 1. Able to briefly toddle on his feet but still reliant on crawling, 2. Still having issues with things like object permanence, and 3. Could discern ambient sound, but nothing long distance yet, and not likely to try more than basic noises of his own.

Those facts led to some simple conclusions on Echo’s part: 1. Not to let the kid out of his sight in case those chubby little legs carried him into trouble, 2. Make sure he stayed in the kid’s sight so there were no breakdowns over the perception of being left alone, and 3. Swearing would not later be repeated and therefore couldn’t get him into trouble.

“This is gonna be fun, huh,” Echo muttered, after locating some emergency blankets to use as stand-in towels. “You, me, this karking huge forest, and no other escape pods in sight. Fun fun.”

“Fah-ah,” the kid agreed.

“Then again, I bet you’ll be a better conversationalist than Fives, especially considering he went and got himself a concussion without his helmet on,” the man continued. “I usually want to hit him over the head with a datapad even when he isn’t mentally handicapped.

“Habab.”

“Exactly. And he tries to tell people I’m the reckless one.” A brief memory of picking up an energy shield and running for the ship’s ramp flashed into mind. Echo firmly stamped it down before he could get caught up in what followed.

“Hssh-fuh.”

Pausing once he finished clean-up, Echo sat back on his heels to consider the toddler attempting to nom his own miniature lekku. “...we’re still going to try and find a record of you, of your name, but how ‘bout I call you Sixer for now? Since you’re doing a great job of replacing Fives at the moment and all.”

Newly dubbed Sixer squealed and tossed his hands up in the air.

“I’ll take that as a yes.”

“We got all of them?”

“Yes, Grey. Each youngling accounted for.” Depa turned a tired smile on him, and Grey responded in kind, reaching to give her shoulder a quick, reassuring squeeze. They’d feared the worst, after getting an emergency transmission that the Empire’s Inquisitors were closing in on one of the hidden Nurseries, a staging point for Force-Sensitive children and their families to be brought to safety in the heart of Alliance territory. Grey hadn’t hesitated in running alongside his Jedi for the nearest hangar bay, and commandeering the fastest ship present. Even then, they’d just barely arrived in time to cut down the first Inquisitor, seal the Nursery doors against reinforcements, and lead twenty terrified civilians out the emergency exit.

But, barely or not, they succeeded.

Eight younglings between one and five years old, accompanied by parents and siblings and in one case a grandparent, all safely stowed away in their ship as Grey flew back to Thunder Home. Where she’d dropped in the co-pilot’s seat, Depa allowed her mask to fall, fingers shaking slightly from how close a call it had been.

Grey shifted his grip from her shoulder to her hand.

After a few minutes, his Jedi’s fingers lost their tremors, and instead neatly slotted with his own.

And a few minutes after that, the cockpit door slid open, heralding the soft pitter-pat of small footsteps. Depa’s eyes opened, and she twisted to look over her shoulder, not letting go of Grey. “Ah. Hello, little Jade.”

A tiny, unimpressed hmph answered her. Grey felt his eyebrows go up, even before a wild mess of red hair appeared at his side, the youngling’s nose just barely clearing the console as she peered suspiciously out the window at hyperspace.

“...sure, make yourself at home, kid,” he couldn’t help but chuckle, when the little girl decided she needed a different angle and just- ducked to crawl under his legs, popping up in the space hemmed in by his and Depa’s linked hands.

“I’m glad to see our narrow escape hasn’t been too terribly traumatizing,” Depa murmured, not making much effort to conceal her own amusement. The girl hummed, still looking out the window. Then, she turned around, looked Grey’s Jedi up and down, and decided to crawl up into her lap.

“Gam’s no comfy,” the kid announced, as she wiggled and pulled herself up Depa’s trousers and over her knees. “Wan’ comfy.”

“Yes, she’s definitely comfy,” Grey agreed. He would know, as often as he’d fallen asleep in recent years with his head pillowed against her thigh while she meditated.

(Apparently Caleb had walked in on them like that once, squinted, declared to open air that he didn’t see anything, and walked right back out. Grey couldn’t stop chuckling when Depa later told him.)

The little girl went hmph at his unsolicited comment, before seizing Depa’s loose hanging robe and tugging it over to serve as a blanket. As for Depa herself, she waited until the child got situated, and then curled her free arm around to anchor the youngling in place. “Rest as long as you’d like, little Jade. I will inform your grandmother if she comes looking.”

Another hmph. It didn’t take long for the kid to relax, though, and soon enough she dozed off. Depa absently started running her fingers through wild red hair, gently teasing loose some of the tangles. Grey merely watched, content to just sit as the lights of hyperspace streamed by.

Chapter Text

Whisper-light clicks of hovering droids, the hum and curl of pain turned power, a rising gleam in the darkness, the hiss-snap of a bright red blade emerging, burning, the kyber screams where once it sang-

Namil flung herself upright, gasping, clutching at her throat and mouth. Phantom smoke clogged her airways, she couldn’t breathe, she couldn’t breathe-

Someone murmured beside her, and then the pads of soft-scale fingers gently pressed against Namil’s own trembling hands. Likewise, a quiet presence in the Force curled around her own, as water smoothed down rough stone. “Yousa okey-dey,” Roo-Roo mumbled, comforting even when half asleep. “Yousa be okey-dey, Nam-Nam, mesa ri’ here.”

Shaking - the dream-vision still simmered sickeningly in the back of her mind - Namil clutched back. Mirialan and gungan curled together on the sleeping pallet, faint starlight slipping through the gap in their tent’s entrance.

A couple minutes later, the gap briefly widened, letting a tall figure slip through. “Girls?” Roo-Roo had already gone back to sleep. Namil made a soft noise, slipping one arm free of her best friend to reach. Larger fingers linked with her own, darker green against lighter. “Trouble sleeping?”

“Mm-hm.” Her Master’s other hand started to stroke over Namil’s dark hair, and she let her eyes slide close with a grateful sigh. “...I had a nightmare again. A Dark one.”

The older mirialan hummed, her hand pressing a little more firmly. “Was the Darkness around you, or within?”

“I- I don’t know.” Namil shivered. “Felt like it was, everywhere. Getting stronger.”

“That is the nature of Darkness,” her Master whispered. “To shroud and loom, to intimidate with its supposed vastness. But that is also why we root ourselves in the Light, which shines forth, revealing the Dark Side to be nothing more than emptiness, devoid of anything worthwhile.”

Such reassurances were meant for younglings in the creche, not twelve year old newly-chosen padawan learners. But Namil felt comforted nonetheless, and let her Master’s steady presence in the Force soothe her back to sleep. The older mirialan stayed put, watching over the resting girls, as the stars outside turned through the sky. At one point, another shadowed figure stepped into the tent, to crouch beside them and study the scene with eyes older than their years.

“...this is why you chose her,” Ahsoka eventually murmured, when the sky outside began to lighten from the first creeping rays of dawn. “So you both can move past the dreams.”

“Mine are of the past,” answered Barriss, firmly refusing to think of the voice whispering in her ear, the nanite bombs she obtained, even if they never went towards their intended purpose. “Hers could be of the future.”

“A future. One that can be averted, so long as we trust in the Force, and in each other.” She would know, with a Master who no longer called himself a Jedi, but lived openly with a wife and three children.

And Barriss, who once risked going to her younger friend, and from there her own Master and the Jedi Council, could do nothing but agree.

Outside the tent their new padawans used, a camp sprawled between rolling hills and sparse trees, filled by young troopers fresh from training, older clones with years of campaigns under their belts, and recruits from a hundred worlds eager to stand against the lies and corruption of the Empire. Once the day began in earnest, the pair of Jedi would need to get moving, see to the distribution of dummy munitions, establish their separate base camps for combat simulation. Their shinies would be organized beneath the veterans, to learn tactics and critical thinking, to practice battle panic and reacting in real-time situations. Experience, after all, outranked everything else, no matter their test scores or natural aptitudes.

But until dawn truly arrived, Barriss and Ahsoka would remain with their students, guarding Roo-Roo and Namil’s dreams from any further incursion.

The wars never touched them.

Lothal’s meager government never actually got around to deciding who they sided with during the first Clone War, for the simple reason that no one ever showed up demanding to know. The Republic remained a far-distant thing, lauded but never truly interacted with; likewise, the Confederacy were considered daring idealists with deep pockets, but there was nothing local to catch their interest, no corruption foul enough to draw forth their promise of something better. Lothal never even went with the official “Neutral” option to label themselves; there just wasn’t any point. And the second war, at first, with its resettled lines between Empire and Alliance, didn’t appear any more interested in touching the agricultural world than its predecessor.

That didn’t stop the Force-users.

Mira clutched her blanket-bundled son, one hand over her mouth to muffle the panicked, panting gasps. Ephraim had told her to hide until he caused a distraction, and then he’d rejoin them, he would-

Voices spoke up nearby, words spit out by electronic vocoders.

They were getting closer.

Then a hum started up, grew louder and louder into a roar; a speeder engine, barreling down the road past Mira’s hiding place; she briefly saw it flash by the mouth of the alleyway, a blur of dark blue hair at the helm. There were shouts, a sudden crash - rapid footsteps, heading away, pursued by heavier plastoid boots and blasterfire. The perfect distraction.

Mira wrapped both arms around her son and ran.

She knew the shadowed city streets like the back of her hand, having played and chased through them her entire childhood. Those subconscious memories proved a blessing, as did the cover of darkness; Mira made it all the way to the edge of town without any sign of pursuit. Few roads extended into the waist-high grass of the Lothali plains, and she ignored all of them, crouching low despite the loss of speed. Infrared equipment would spot her regardless, but with any luck the Inquisitors and their handful of stormtroopers wouldn’t think to scan the grassland outside the city, they’d stay focused on the streets near her home, on the spaceport.

But Mira was Lothal born, and Lothal blessed. If she made it to the nearest mountains, there were places she could hide, supply caches she could borrow from-

An engine cut through the night. The boy in her arms squirmed. It took Mira a second too long to realize these things were connected.

The speeder flattened the grass around them as it cut to a stop directly in front of Mira, the Inquisitor who drove it hopping out almost before the vehicle completely halted. “Clever,” came an accented voice that practically oozed Core-world education. “But not clever enough. Hand over the youngling, and I will spare your life. I might even call my counterpart in time to spare your husband’s, as well.”

Mira took a deep breath, and drew the blaster from her hip. The Inquisitor laughed, raising the hilt of what could only be a lightsaber - only to pause, when Mira gently set the weapon against her son’s head.

“We won’t let you take him,” she whispered, voice trembling but hands rock-steady. “We won’t let you twist him. The galaxy is Dark enough as it is.”

“...and here I was informed parents were supposed to want what was best for their children,” the Inquisitor eventually said.

“If the alternative is enduring the same pain you’ve been put through, this is what’s best for him.” Mira specialized in communications; she’d paid attention to every Alliance broadcast, every story shared by a clone who’d lost brothers to the slave chips in their heads, stories told by Jedi who barely managed to escape Order 66, or the Emperor’s “recruitment” of those who were caught instead of killed.

Even if Lothal’s government never picked a side, the Bridger family knew where their loyalty would lay.

Face buried in the crook of Mira’s neck and shoulder, her son squirmed again, mumbled something she couldn’t quite discern. Almost in the same moment, the Inquisitor’s helmet tilted back, looking towards the city behind her.

This time, she knew the two things were connected.

When the sound of an engine once again reached her ears, she widened her stance. The Inquisitor snarled, lit their lightsaber, and lunged. Mira hurled herself to the side before that burning blade could spear through her exposed face; she rolled through the grass, cushioning her son, and came up in a crouch with the blaster turned towards their pursuer. And yet, they weren’t pursued; from the gunship above them, decorated with the painted image of a single lightsaber blocking against four others, half a dozen people in decorated armor opened fire.

The Inquisitor’s weapon moved in a blur, a spinning weave of red light too fast for Mira to follow, each movement tossing away the incoming blaster bolts. A few landed near her, too close for comfort, so the woman pushed herself upright and tried to run again. The gun ship above shifted position, drawing attention away from her, as a figure in robes dropped out the opposite side of the shooting soldiers. A blue lightsaber sprung to life, flew through the air towards her- Mira gasped, stumbling to a stop-

Blue intercepted red, a split second before the Inquisitor’s own hurled blade could take Mira’s head off. She flinched away from the point of impact, even as both weapons were yanked back to the Jedi’s outstretched hands.

In the flattened grass, the Inquisitor fell, numerous plasma-heated holes punched through black armor.

Mira sank to her knees.

She almost didn’t notice the gunship dropping to land, or her ruffled husband practically falling out of it in his haste, only to be caught by another robed figure. She kept staring at the Inquisitor’s body, at least until a remarkably young, concerned face filled her vision.

“Are you alright, ma’am?” The Jedi asked. He couldn’t have been more than sixteen standard. “Is your son hurt?”

Sucking in a shaky breath, Mira finally unwrapped the blankets, letting her toddler finally squirm his way into open air, pouting at having missed all the excitement. Short blue bangs bounced as he turned to stare at the Jedi, who blinked and stared back.

“Mira!” Ephraim staggered to a stop beside him, dropping to kneel and start patting her up and down, checking for injuries. A few soldiers gathered around, their helmets and weapons looking out across the grassland, keeping watch. The second robed figure, a human woman with golden marks upon her face, stepped up to rest a hand on the younger Jedi’s shoulder.

“Yes,” Mira whispered, as Ephraim rested his forehead against her temple, as Ezra began to babble and reach for the teenage Jedi, as the older one smiled at them in a way that promised safety. “We’re alright.”

Chapter Text

She engaged in her first battle at the age of fourteen.

...well, technically, her first first battle was on Ryloth, when she was five and newly orphaned and suddenly in possession of a handful of clones and their Jedi. (Boil always argued the “in possession of” phrase. Waxer always hushed him with a sly grin.)

But still, fourteen, many years after rejoining her two nerra and learning their ways and wearing smaller variants of their armor, when the Negotiator made landfall to unload fresh supplies and reinforcements, only to be ambushed by Imperials who’d taken over Sunset Base. Numa and the other younglings had only been allowed to come because no trouble was expected.

Her nerra should’ve known better.

“What’s the plan?” Nittu hissed, crouched at her side as the twi’lek girl peered between two supply crates. Out of the dozen other kids, he remained the calmest besides herself, fingers curled firmly but not panicked around the hilt of his vibroknife.

“We stay low,” Numa whispered back. “We can’t take them on ourselves, which means finding and freeing every prisoner we can, including any inside the base itself.”

Nittu bared his teeth in a fierce grin. He’d been living with Uncle Cody almost as long as she had with Waxer and Boil, but the human boy knew his Tatooine roots well. “We’ll need distractions, then. Maybe a fire by the fuel tanks?”

“Smoke bombs, not real flame. It wouldn’t be good to actually blow them up.” Her eyes darted between the piles of discarded blasters, the clones being forced to strip off their armor by jeering stormtroopers - the empty space around General Obi, who somehow still managed to look calm even with a blaster wound in his shoulder and a crimson lightsaber held to his neck. “There’s always two Inquisitors per mission. Where’s the second?”

A soft psst drew her attention left, where another of their cousins crouched. The cathar boy pointed, and when she leaned, Numa could just barely see the hulking figure in black armor prowling through the nearby airfield.

Good.

It only took five minutes to deliver marching orders, and then Numa was silently slipping around the unloaded crates, past the Negotiator’s massive rear bay ramp and towards the crystalline trees that surrounded Sunset Base. None of the stormies saw her or the others; just as most people didn’t think to look up, neither did they look down, and very few of Numa’s cousins yet came up past a grown vod’s waist - when they ducked down low and moved with the shadows, hardly anyone not used to them could spot the Ghost Company younglings.

It would be their best advantage.

And their only chance.

“...I beg your pardon?”

Vev grit his teeth, but very deliberately made his hands relax instead of clenching. “You’re the Alliance recruiters, I’m looking to sign up, what part of this don’t you understand?”

The wroonian in rust-red armor stared down at him, her eyes slowly blinking. “The part where you can’t be a day over twelve standard.”

“Thirteen,” Vev very nearly snarled. “And I’m Mandalorian, thirteen’s our age of adulthood. Don’t you guys have clones fighting who aren’t older than ten years yet?”

Even as he said the words, an honest to goodness clone stepped out of the tent behind the wroonian, causing Vev to snap his mouth shut. Inside his helmet, the mikkian grimaced, but he didn’t let any emotion show on the outside.

Clearly relieved to have back-up, the wroonian trooper took a step back, letting her counterpart stand directly in front of Vev to look him up and down: body glove covered in grime, armor reduced to only the pieces that would fit his smaller frame, a single pack filled with more weaponry than anything else. They could tell the helmet was obviously too large for him - they didn’t need to know it only stayed in place thanks to Vev’s mane squashed inside.

“...you alone, verd’ika?” The clone finally asked.

He didn’t bristle at the term, but it was a near thing. Little soldier. Only his buir could call him that-

Vev shut down the thought as fast as a plasma shield locking into place. “Yeah.”

“Clan?”

“Gone.”

The clone nodded slowly. “If you’re just looking for a way to support yourself, I have some contacts in the bounty hunting business I could point you towards. Probably safer than this, in all honesty.”

And that- that was tempting, but for all his attempts at brusqueness, Vev wasn’t just in this for the credits and steady meals. “My clan’s gone because of the Empire,” he said, letting just a touch of a growl slip into the words to lend them weight. “I want payback.”

Another nod, followed by the deceptively casual statement, “We don’t do narudar’e, verd’ika.”

Temporary allies. Of course not. If Vev did this, he’d be in it until he died, or the Empire did. He gave the clone a stiff nod.

“Right then,” the man sighed. “Come on. Mind the store, Lepil, I doubt I’ll be back before the end of shift.”

“Yes sir, sergeant.” The wroonian still looked uneasy, but she didn’t protest them heading deeper into the Alliance army’s temporary camp. Vev practically needed to trot to keep up with the clone, his mane’s tendrils attempting to perk up at the new sights and sounds despite their confinement.

“You got a name, verd’ika?”

“Vev. Ve'vut Cuyan.” Golden survivor. His buir thought it funny, after finding him as a baby, alone in the wreckage of a crash. Something tried to claw its way out of his throat, thinking about his lost parent, but Vev violently squashed it back into the depths of his stomach.

“Alright, Vev, I’m Sergeant Soot.” The clone suddenly ducked into a nondescript tent, Vev scrambling to follow without his helmet falling off. “This here’s my cot, you can have the other. I’ll snag a spare footlocker for you to stow your gear in - do you want to get fitted for some plastoid armor, or shall I put feelers out to find a beskar metalsmith who can reforge what you have on you?”

Vev took a deep breath. “I- plastoid. I’m not done growing yet, so. Leave the beskar reforging until it only needs to be done once.”

Soot nodded. “Alright then. We’ll start with armor, then test your weapons proficiency, and then it’ll be dinner time. We can start the aptitude tests tonight before bed or wait until morning, but by lunch tomorrow I want to know what work-study slots you’ll be best suited for.”

“Work-study?”

The clone paused, before turning and managing to look Vev directly in the eye, even through the dark tint of his helmet’s visor. “Despite the impression I gave, verd’ika, we don’t actually let kids younger than sixteen onto battlefields if we can help it.” He held up a hand before the mikkian could start yelling. “You will be giving payback to the Empire in the meantime - we need data analyzed and medics assisted just as badly as soldiers supported in a fight, and having a Mando kid stationed at Thunder Home will free up one more trooper for assignments.”

“That’s not the same,” Vev hissed.

“It isn’t,” Soot agreed mildly. “But it’s still necessary, and it still helps. Who knows, maybe you’ll even find some more allies to train with in the meantime, gain a ready-made squad when you are old enough to join the active fighting.”

Fat chance of that. His buir didn’t need anyone watching his six, and Vev didn’t either. But he took a deep breath nonetheless, and made his hands unclench. “Fine.”

Soot patted him on the shoulder. “Alright then. Put your stuff down, and let’s head to Supply for that armor. They’ve got paint, too; deep red’s traditional for this unit, but you can add other colors to it if you want.”

Vev didn’t bother to reply to that. Plastoid, no matter how well constructed, wasn’t armor one got attached to; he’d save the paint for when he eventually grew into his buir’s beskar.

He wouldn’t get attached to the clone, or any other troopers for that matter. Vev was looking to hurt the Empire, and nothing else mattered.

Nothing.

Chapter Text

The comm chimed. Jinni ignored it.

Artoo’s dome spun towards her, as he chirped curiously. “No, I don’t wanna answer,” the girl informed him. She tugged the steering controls, guiding their starfighter into a steep curve around the moon.

Another chime. Jinni huffed.

As they swung back towards Naboo, she waggled the wings and sent the fighter into a spin, closing her eyes to let the Force guide her forward. Artoo let out a sharp blat of protest. “What, have you turned into Threepio all of a sudden?”

Her friend let loose a wild tangle of whirs and beeps in protest, causing Jinni to grin. When the comm chimed a third time, she steadied their vessel and answered. “You’ve reached Freebird Three, afraid I can’t answer at the moment, please leave a message after the astromech’s signal.”

Artoo gave a chittering laugh, and Jinni grinned out the canopy at him even as her father sighed over the comm line. *Guess I deserve that.*

“Kinda. What do you want, Dad? Usually you’re fine leaving me alone until I bring the fighter back.”

*Usually, yeah. But Katooni and Luke just got home-* Jinni promptly dove for Naboo’s surface, automatically angling towards Varykino even without checking her instruments. *-and I figured, as much of a fuss as you made over the rest of us insisting you’re too young to be a padawan yet, you’d still like to see them as soon as possible.*

“Be there in ten,” the girl chirped, before hanging up. Artoo cackled all the way through atmo.

Never let it be said, for all she’d been born on Naboo and only gotten to visit Tatooine twice, that Jinni wasn’t a true Skywalker at heart. She danced through the clouds, dipped low over lakes, laughingly skirted just slightly too close to the domed rooftops of their home. If Uncle Obi were around, his voice would go up in pitch as he insisted she slow down and stop piloting even more recklessly than your father, young one!

Jinni’s face lit up in a delighted grin as she glided down to the landing pad, where a group of figures in 501st blue and 212th gold waited beside a transport that hadn’t been there when she left. Artoo cheered, and took control of the landing gear as they set down, allowing Jinni to pop the canopy and jump free a few seconds sooner. And boy did she jump, clearing ten feet with a flip thrown in before colliding with her brother’s hastily outstretched arms.

“Oof!” Luke staggered back a few steps, until gravity overruled his attempt at staying upright. Jinni cackled when the fifteen year old fell on his butt. “What the kriff, have you gotten bigger again?”

“Yep! Mom says at this rate, I’m probably gonna be as tall as Dad by the time I’m done.” Her big brother looked appropriately horrified, considering he and Leia were both sticking closer to their mother’s height, and Jinni’s grin took on an evil slant.

The tholothian woman standing over them chuckled, finally reaching to pull both Skywalkers back to their feet. “You’re getting more devious by the day, baby Sky. How was your flight?”

“Good! Artoo and I circled the moon a couple times, and we didn’t pick anything up on long-range scanners beside the usual traffic.” Katooni nodded, casting a quick glance towards the astromech as he wheeled over, whistling merrily. He waggled slightly on his supports once he noticed the attention, sunlight glinting off blue and silver plating, as well as the slightly duller paint of three miniature handprints long ago pressed to his chassis.

After Jinni disentangled herself from Luke’s gangly limbs, she made a quick circuit of the rest of the people on the landing pad; Torrents and Dragons and Floods, Ghosts and Wraiths and Spirits, all different patterns of royal blue and golden yellow with extra colors splashed throughout-

-and off to one side, a trio with the dullest brown paint Jinni had ever seen on trooper armor, with only the barest glints of copper bright edging to catch her eye. Intrigued, since she’d never seen that particular color combination before, the girl bounced over.

All three were clones, unlike the mixed ranks of the 501st and 212th, and young enough Jinni doubted they’d been on active duty longer than a few years. Two were sharing a datapad, murmuring quietly to themselves, as the third kept watch, his dark eyes sweeping across the area repeatedly.

Jinni picked him to land in front of. “Hi!”

The trooper blinked. “Uh. Hello.”

“I’m Jinni! You guys haven’t been here before, have you?” Not with one of them standing guard for the others even in friendly territory, she figured. “Do you want a tour? Are you staying long? Have you been assigned to guest quarters? What’s your unit? Is it just the three of you?”

Another, slower blink. “Uh... No, we haven’t; not right now, thanks; only until tonight, so no; and we’re part of a specialized unit that’s just us-”

“-and me,” an amused voice cut in. Jinni leaned way back, tilting her head upside down to peer at the person who’d stepped up behind her. Human, ginger-ish hair, shorter than her dad and younger than Aunt ‘Soka but older than Katooni. His expression looked deceptively placid, though she could see one corner of his mouth trying to curl into a grin, and she could feel the humor flowing off him in the Force. “Hello, youngling.”

“Hi! Nice to meet you, I’m Jinni!” She managed to spin in place and flip her upper body around, turning the backwards lean into a forwards bow.

The newcomer returned it, gloved hands kept by his sides. “Knight Kestis, at your service. That wouldn’t happen to be Jinni Skywalker, would it?”

She grinned. “Yeah, but while we’re at home our family uses Naberrie instead - it’s a Naboo tradition, when we aren’t in the public eye.”

“Of course. My squad and I are here to speak with your father, but not until this afternoon. In the meantime, would you be kind enough to direct us to wherever lunch takes place around here?”

“Sure! There’s an expanded pavilion down in the lower garden we use with big crowds, or I could show you to the kitchen and then the greenhouse if you want to eat in private.”

Knight Kestis glanced at his men, one hand flicking the battlesign for query. Jinni glanced over her shoulder, in time to see the clones exchange glances and shrugs, before one replied with the signals for group, affirmative, downtime. He then followed up, apparently as an afterthought, Jedi cadet?

Half-point affirmative, unassigned cadet, Jinni signed herself. Commanding officer unknown at present.

One of the men snorted and clapped a hand over his mouth to muffle it; his counterpart holding the datapad outright sniggered, and the third raised his eyebrows at her. “Since when do Jedi younglings learn battlesign when they don’t even have a Master yet?”

With a smirk, Jinni pointed back over her shoulder. “You see that crowd of three dozen troopers? They are just a piece of my extended family, and I guarantee I’ve pestered every single one for at least some tidbit of training ever since I started talking; signing hardly even begins to cover all the stuff I know.”

His eyes glinted, and the clone finally held out a hand. “I’m Catch. That’s Canvas, and he’s Capper. You interested in sitting with us while we eat, kid?”

The Force warmed as Jinni grasped his forearm, her smaller fingers barely spanning half his bracer. “I sure am! I still want to know what being a ‘specialized unit’ means, and you’ve got to tell me why you picked those paint colors.”

“Ah, well we blame Canvas for that one, since he’s always landing in mud anyway-”

“Hey!”

“-and we’re a Seeker Squad specifically, which means we go looking for relics and old temples before any of the Emperor’s goons can poke their noses in.”

Well that definitely made Jinni’s inner tooka-cat sit up and pay attention, because it sure sounded like treasure hunting in a race against Inquisitors. “That’s so cool.”

“Yeah, it is,” Capper piped up, tucking away his datapad as the girl led them off the landing platform and down a set of stairs towards the lower gardens. “But if we’re gonna share stories about our work, then I’m gonna demand you tell us if some of the crazy things I’ve heard about your old man are true.”

Jinni hummed. “That’s fair. Most of them probably are, though; Dad pulled a lot of stunts even before he quit the Jedi Order and just became a full-time General.”

Canvas looked a bit alarmed at that, though Capper’s expression screamed pure delight. Catch murmured something to Knight Kestis, who coughed lightly, before glancing at the crowd disappearing behind them and then back at Jinni. “Your family won’t mind you ditching them, will they?”

She laughed. “Nah. The only who’d actually be annoyed is Luke, and he’ll probably come join us anyway.”

“That’s, your brother, right? Knight Elli’s padawan?”

“Yep, him and Katooni and my 212th cousins are back for a visit with everyone else.”

Catch hummed thoughtfully. “Isn’t there supposed to be a third one of you Skywalker kids around here somewhere?”

“My sister Leia, and no, she’s still on assignment right now with her master and the Wolfpack.”

“Ah.”

“Again!”

Half a dozen young troopers groaned, most of them sagging even as they hauled themselves upright. One in particular dragged off his helmet to properly give the short teenager standing over him a dead-eyed stare. “Really, Commander?”

“Really, Ashel,” Leia growled back. “None of you are up to required reaction time yet.”

“We’re fine on the standard tests, you’re the one making up impossible goals-”

“Perfectly reasonable goals, which will go a long way to saving your sorry shebs if and when we encounter any Sith.”

The naysayer gaped in disbelief. “Are you serious? We’re part of the Aid Corps, we don’t do open battle with those Inquisitor creeps!”

Leia snorted. “And I’m a Skywalker, daughter of the first Alliance Chancellor - my family attracts trouble like summer flies to a fresh shaak carcass, and I am not inclined to get any of my squads killed because of that unfortunate fact. Which is why we’re running the drills again, and we will keep running them until I’m certain all of you are up to proper speed to avoid a red lightsaber coming for your necks.”

Well. When she put it like that.

Huffing, Ashel moved to shove his helmet back on and join the rest of their training group - only to freeze when his younger sister suddenly burst into the hall and made a beeline for them. She wore her headdress and apprentice medic’s jumpsuit rather than trooper armor, which meant everyone else nearby cleared a hasty path. Even Leia paused, which turned out to be prudent when the tholothian ran right up to her.

“Corridor twelve-besh off the engine room, now,” Avel snapped. Their Jedi didn’t even blink, and in a split second both girls were running back towards the door.

“Uh, you gonna handle that, Ashel?” Another trooper asked. Groaning in reply, he took off after his sister and the tyrant who ruled over their training periods with a durasteel fist.

Ashel caught up to both girls a couple corridors away from the one Avel mentioned, right hand carrying his helmet and the left hovering next to his holstered blaster. “Do I wanna know what this is about?”

“Something’s made a nest in the ventilation system,” his sister stated, turning a corner without breaking stride. “I thought it was a creature I could lure out with food and water, but then I caught a proper glimpse - with Ba’buir off-board, I thought Leia would be our best bet to deal with the situation.”

“What situation?”

“It’s a kid, ori’vod.”

Ashel almost tripped over thin air. “What?”

“A kid,” Avel repeated, finally slowing as she approached an open vent shaft set in the upper wall. “At first appearance they’re some sort of avian species, but then I saw a human face - ten standard at a stretch, but probably younger.”

“That’s Jinni’s age,” Leia muttered, eyes half-closing as she stretched out a hand towards the vent. Ashel knew very well why his sister had fetched their Pack’s youngest Jedi, what with the mental powers and telekinesis and whatnot, but he couldn’t help but think it would’ve been better to wait for Ba’buir Plo or General Petro - neither of whom, despite being much taller and older, looked near as intimidating as Leia. If her mix of black robes and modified armor or the lightsaber and blaster hung on either side of her belt weren’t enough, the girl’s sheer intensity in her expressions and movements did plenty to project an aura of I’m far more competent than you and not afraid to provide a demonstration.

Not exactly welcoming to a kid who’d stowed away on a Venator-class star destroyer to escape stars only knew what kind of environment.

“...I’m not sensing anyone up there,” Leia said after a long few moments. “I think our guest must have retreated further into the ventilation system - we’ll need to seal off this area and search the nearest sections.”

Avel cursed, already bringing out her personal datapad and opening a comm chat. “We don’t have clearance high enough to do that without reasonable cause; I’ll have to figure out how to frame it as a medical emergency, or-”

“-or you could just ask me,” a deceptively mild voice spoke up further down the hall. Both tholothian siblings jumped, whereas Leia just looked askance at the approaching clone over her shoulder. “Sit-rep, pups.”

Ba’vodu Wolffe’s expression didn’t change as Avel quickly explained, but that only meant he looked just as grim at the end as at the start. Ashel stood where he could keep an eye on both his sister and the open vent; Leia, in the meantime, started to slowly stalk back down the corridor, one hand out-stretched, presumably using the Force to seek out the unknown kid.

Once fully briefed, Wolffe grunted. “I’ll get the Packs down here,” he grumbled. “Stun weapons only, full cordon sweep. We can get some mouse droids to play scout, if our desert dragon doesn’t find the kid first.”

In no time at all, enough troopers for a full company arrived down in the lower corridors, stretching themselves out to cover all intersections, eyes glued to various vent grates. Leia kept on the move, eyes half-lidded, a couple of General Petro’s Akk Pack following half a step behind. Avel stayed in a central position, playing coordinator, keeping her chin lifted proudly every time an older cousin or uncle stepped up to her for marching orders.

Ashel felt a curl of pride in his gut. His baby sister had come a long way from the wheezy toddler who practically lived in Pack Home’s main medical bay.

Eventually, a familiar set of armor approached, and Ashel straightened automatically. Sinker tugged off his helmet as he approached the elder tholothian, eyebrows raised at the small crowd around Avel. “You doing alright, Ash’ika?”

“Juuust keeping an eye on things,” Ashel replied. “If you’re looking for Wolffe, I’m not sure where he went, but Leia’s three hallways up and two over.”

Humming as he glanced around, Sinker nodded absently. “So. You wanna bet this stowaway’s found a secure bolt hole to hunker down in, or that they’ve abandoned the vents for higher ground?”

Ashel frowned. “Higher ground?”

“We’re looking for someone part-bird, right? And Av’ika’s broadcasted report mentioned wings. Being in a small space like the vents is all well and good while you’re staying out of sight, but once that cover’s blown a kid’s gonna go where they feel safest. For an aerial type...”

“...that’s gonna mean up,” Ashel finished, his eyes widening. “Osik. There’s a main vent heading straight from the engines to rear hangar bays.” His buir nodded, and in moments the two of them were jogging back down the corridor. Avel and Leia needed to keep up their own search in case Sinker’s hunch was wrong, but if there was any evidence in the hangar of him being right, Ashel would be ready to summon reinforcements.

They were nearly to the right level when Sinker’s wrist comm chimed. He glanced at it with a dismissive frown - only to blink and swiftly answer. “Wolffe?”

A high-pitched yowl answered him, before the clone commander’s deeper snarl cut it off and he started barking orders. *She got out of the- kriffing- vents-! Hangar Eight- knock it OFF you little-* The unmistakable sound of snapping teeth came through loud and clear, followed by more cursing before the call cut off.

“Well,” Sinker said faintly. “Guess that’s confirmed.” Ashel was already typing out his own hasty message to send to his sister, foot tapping against the floor of their lift. When the doors slid open, he beat his buir out, taller but slimmer body proving to be an advantage for once. Sinker easily caught up and held pace as they bolted down the corridor, though, and both troopers arrived at the hangar doors at the same moment.

When those slid open, they both stumbled to a startled stop.

“-let GO!” A scrawny figure struggled to get out of Wolffe’s encircling grip, two comparatively massive grey-feathered wings beating him about the head. Thankfully, the clone commander had his helmet on, but it still looked about as painful as taking a commando droid’s fist to the face.

“Ashel,” Wolffe growled when he spotted the pair standing in the doorway. “Get me a stars-damned SEDATIVE, for Force’s sake!”

Jolted into action, Ashel dove towards them, automatically yanking around his miniature medpack, a piece of gear Avel never let him go anywhere without. Unfortunately, just as he managed to locate the correct hypospray and adjust it to a size-appropriate dosage, one of the kid’s wings shot out to knock it from his hands. Yelping, Ashel ducked to avoid a follow-up hit to his bare face, Sinker suddenly making a dive of his own to grab the rolling vial.

Wolffe growled, twisting to get an arm around one of the wildly flapping wings. Trying to pin that appendage though, meant the kid got a hand free, and delivered an upward palm strike strong enough to knock Wolffe’s helmet clear off.

Ashel’s heart leapt into his throat, because sithspit, if one of those feathered monstrosities managed to land against his uncle’s cybernetic eye, there was no telling how much pain or damage would be inflicted-

-except.

The kid froze.

Sinker managed to slap the hypospray into Ashel’s still outstretched hand, but it suddenly seemed superfluous. Wolffe glared down at the kid pinned against his chest, hesitantly easing his grip to something a little less bruising. In the paused moment, Ashel finally managed to get a good look beyond the wings.

As his sister had mentioned, aside from the feathered appendages, the kid looked remarkably human: ragged clothing made out of scrap cloth tied in place with old wires, callused hands and feet with dark talons rather than nails, a womp rat’s nest of tangled black hair dangled low around hollow cheeks. But that hair couldn’t quite hide the massive acid scar stretching across half the kid’s face, or the two wide eyes - one bright silver, the other a sightless milky grey - staring up at Wolffe’s own scar and cybernetic.

“...well,” Sinker coughed in the silence. “I’d say this just got interesting.”

Chapter Text

“Buuuuuuuuuuuuir!”

Groaning, Stak picked his head up from where it had only landed on his pillow twenty minutes earlier. “Which one of us do you think she’s calling for?”

“Don’t know, don’t care,” Razor grumbled from the other bunk. “You moved first.”

“Your eyes are still closed, how do you even know I moved?”

“Your voice isn’t muffled, and you always sleep like you’re trying to suffocate yourself; therefore, you’ve moved; doubly therefore, this gets to be your problem.”

Stak glared at his vod, and started to offer an insult dire enough to get Razor up and moving if only to physically retaliate, but the door of their bedroom slammed open before he could.

“Buir’e!” Beesyi hollered, just as loud as if she were still down the hall. Her addition of the plural made both men groan. “Buir’Stak, Buir’Razor, come on, you gotta see this!”

“See what, Bees’ika,” Stak grumbled, shifting to set his bare feet on the floor. An hour, they’d only asked her to go play quietly for one hour while they recovered from a double shift of unloading supply crates, but nope. Regular access to food in a safe environment had not only meant their dinui’ad shot up in size, her exuberance went through multiple growth spurts too.

“Niah’s on the ceiling!”

...well then.

As Beesyi went tearing back down the hall, cackling at the top of her lungs, Razor finally rolled enough to meet Stak’s wide-eyed stare with her own.

“You think this is our kid’s fault, or Neyo’s?”

“I think we’d better go address the situation, regardless.”

They both scrambled for the door.

It would’ve been one thing if they were still aboard Lightning Home, a mobile base identical in layout to every other star destroyer the men had been serving on for ten years - but the 91st just got rotated out for 2 months allotted downtime after 6 months of active duty, and adjusting to a stationary settlement on a picturesque Outer Rim moon took more than three days, alright? Perfectly understandable for a pair of veteran scouts to trip and tumble on the way out of their living quarters, slip and skid across the family-hab building, and finally stagger into their commander’s suite.

Where two year old Niah Ponds was, indeed, sitting on a hanging light fixture with her fluffy hair brushing the ceiling, and giggling up a storm.

Stak located Neyo on the floor, legs sprawled as if he’d forgotten where the chairs were and just sat, staring up at his half-theelin daughter with the expression of a man looking up the barrel of a tank and knowing he couldn’t possibly move far or fast enough to escape the imminent explosion. “You okay there, vod?” Stak asked, as Beesyi continued to chatter excitedly and Razor did his best to quiet her down.

Neyo made a wounded noise.

“I’m gonna take that as a no. Want me to find a ladder?”

Another wordless sound, slightly more strangled than wounded.

“Right, then.” Spinning an about-face, Stak started to hurry for the door-

-and pulled up short as the last person he ever expected to see in sleep pants and a single underlayer tunic came striding through the entrance.

Neyo’s next noise took on a distinctly panicked edge.

General Windu simply arched an eyebrow at the man, before tilting his head back to observe the toddler on the ceiling. Niah beamed and waved. One corner of Windu’s mouth twitched, as if he were about to smile but thought better of it.

“You seem to be enjoying yourself, young one,” he hummed. “But I think your father requires a hug at this point.”

Niah blinked, and clambered around the light fixture to get a better view of Neyo on the floor. Stak and Razor both tensed, ready to spring forward in case she fell, but the girl just babbled something in babyspeak, wiggled free, and drifted towards the floor at a gentle speed that defied gravity. When her chubby little toes touched carpet, Niah toddled forward, pink-speckled arms reaching. Neyo let out a final wheeze, and scooped her up to cuddle against his chest.

Letting out a relieved breath, Stak turned to thank his Jedi. General Windu, again, arched an eyebrow.

“I did not get her down,” he said mildly. “Niah used the Force herself, for both journeys, I expect.”

...ah. Well. That probably/definitely contributed to at least some of Neyo’s distress. He’d only just gotten back to the kid after leaving her with the community nursery for six months; stars only knew how often he’d see her if she went to live at one of the Order’s secret temples.

Windu’s gaze shifted to the pair, and softened. Everybody in the 91st knew Niah was among his favorite ik’aade, and not just because Neyo had decided to take “Ponds” as their family name.

Stak swallowed, and took a risk. “Don’t suppose you’d be willing to make an exception, sir, like the Order’s doing for those Skywalker kids?”

His general hmphed. “That exception is only in place because other Jedi are involved with raising those children and providing their education regarding the Force.”

Razor coughed. “Other Jedi. Right.” Including Skywalker’s old master with his current padawan, and the man’s own former student with her current padawan, and a few others like Aayla Secura and Quinlan Vos raising their own not-so-secret Force-sensitive children.

Narrowed eyes glanced back and forth between the two scouts. And then Beesyi piped up, drawing Windu’s attention as she stated the obvious. “You could teach Niah about the Force, Ba’vodu! And then she could still stay with Ba’vodu Neyo during the rotation breaks ‘cause you always spend them with us anyway!”

The general’s eyes got narrower.

Neyo finally picked his head up. “Please, sir?” Niah also turned to look at Windu, baby-round spikes framing her chubby face, eyes widened hopefully even though she likely had no idea what was actually being discussed - begging was taking place, and nobody begged better than a two year old ik’aad.

Windu caved in a matter of seconds.

“You wanna take over, baby?”

“Yeah!”

Hawk grinned as his little girl’s bright pink hands stretched up, and he shifted to let her grasp the ship’s steering yoke. Feather cheered, swerving them left, then right, then into a brief spin before leveling off. Another Y-wing looped around them, and the comm crackled to life with the sound of a woman’s laughter.

*Are you two having fun without me?* Ekriti teased, waggling her own starfighter.

“All the fun!” Feather yelled, as Hawk pressed the acceleration. Their ship leapt forward, and his wife gave chase.

They’d been given a rare day off, after delivering supplies to Alderaan that would be redistributed to various discreet postings within the Empire’s territory. Not that Hawk knew anything beyond that - the brave souls who operated behind enemy lines didn’t need more than the absolute bare minimum of supporters knowing who they were and where they operated. He could guess at some of their tasks - smuggling out de-chipped clones, feeding the growing number of homeless citizens who could keep up with inflated prices and rising taxes, gathering intel on military movements near the Alliance borders - but confirmation? Far beyond his paygrade, thanks.

“Satellite ahead, baby girl,” Hawk pointed out.

“I see it!” Feather didn’t alter course until they were practically on top of the communications station, at which point she hauled back on the yoke to bring them over it, and then shoved forwards to tip them into a dive on the other side. Their fighter wound up making a full loop-de-loop around the station, earning a gesture from a maintenance droid on its exterior that might have been a thumb’s up or something more rude. Hawk snickered either way, and Feather twisted in his lap to beam up at him. Her empathetic abilities weren’t nearly as strong as her fully zeltron mother, but at such close range the little girl couldn’t help but pick up on his sheer joy and pride.

Wrapping both arms around her middle for a quick hug, Hawk kissed the top of her head. “You’re gonna be the best pilot in the galaxy, baby.”

“Maybe not best ever,” Feather countered with a cheeky grin, “but I’m gonna be better than you and Mom at least!”

Ekriti laughed over their comm line. *I heard that!*

“Well she’s not wrong,” Hawk couldn’t help but point out.

*Did I say anything about her being wrong? I think not. Now, race you two back to the capital!*

“You’re on!”

Chapter Text

“Miz!”

The small mountain of brown fur rumbled, snorting, but didn’t roll over.

Ablyr shifted from one foot to the other, chancing a glance over his shoulder at the cabin door before he poked the togorian again. “Mizgrr, c’mon!”

A drawn-out disgruntled groan reached his ears, and Ablyr would’ve beamed in victory if his stomach wasn’t still swooping unhappily. “Whazzit, Ab?”

“I got a bad feeling.”

“Hmmmrph.” His big cousin finally turned, half-lidded amber eyes peering at the anxious boy. “What?”

“A bad feeling, Miz,” Ablyr insisted. “Like when Mama knows there’s bad guys on a planet before we get there. Korto’s got one too, he told me to come get you ‘n Tachin.”

A slow blink, and then Mizgrr’s eyes widened. The togorian shoved himself out of bed with a muffled curse; on the bunk above, a pale blue hand with golden swooshes emerged, half-heartedly flapping at them. “Hush up, ‘m tryin’ t’sleep here.”

“Baby Jedi’s got a bad feeling, Tach,” Mizgrr called. In a split second, the lanky pantoran teenager dropped down to join them. Ablyr couldn’t help but feel grateful; his cousins were the worst when it came to waking up to play with him, but when something was wrong they jumped to attention quicker than anyone.

“What did the di’kut on watch say, Ab’ika?” Tachin asked, hastily tugging on his dark grey armor.

“That he wants us all up front, in case we need to detach.” Most freighters with an attached shuttle kept the smaller vessel docked topside, or maybe next to their bay doors. Cloud Squad, following Mizgrr’s years-old suggestion, instead had a completely separate ship serving as their cockpit, which could unlock in emergencies and dart off into hyperspace fast as anything.

That was where Korto Vos waited, gloved fingers rapidly tapping against the steering yoke but otherwise appearing perfectly at ease. “Sorry for the rude awakening, guys,” he said as the other three piled inside. “But I figured you wouldn’t want to be left behind, no matter how cozy your bunks are.”

Tachin slipped up beside him, quieter than a shadow, while Mizgrr grunted an affirmative. “Any developments on that ‘bad feeling’?”

“No, although we have something tangible to go with it now.” Smiling grimly, Korto tossed his head towards the comm console. “Message started to come up from Dad and Aunt Aayla on the surface, but it went to static after two words.”

Mizgrr’s eyes narrowed. “Sentient-made interference?”

“I wouldn’t be surprised. Don’t think they’re in trouble, at least, or Dad would be calling for me through the Force, but they must have found something down there.”

‘Something’, which the four boys hadn’t gotten briefed on, but which required Cloud Squad’s best sneaks and a detachment from the Star Clan fleet, including their Jedi leader. Ablyr glanced from one of his cousins to the next, and absently wished he’d stayed on Starlight Home with his dad. At least then, he’d have someone to offer reassurances - so far the older boys all seemed more focused on confirming his bad feeling rather than dismissing it.

(Not strong enough with the Force to be a true Jedi, but plenty sensitive enough to know when things were about to go wrong. Blech.)

Perhaps ironically, not being as focused on the potential danger below, Ablyr was the first to notice a new indicator light up. “Um, Korto?”

The kiffar teen glanced over, and abruptly cursed with words Ablyr wasn’t supposed to know yet. “Evidently we’re the ones being jammed - ship incoming, and it’s not bothering to hail us.”

“Pirates?” Tachin asked. All of them jumped as Mizgrr growled.

“I am not losing another home to those hut’uune,” the togorian spat.

“Easy, Miz,” Korto warned. “We could get lucky and it’s just Imperials.”

“‘Just’?” Tachin muttered.

Ablyr silently agreed. At least pirates would be unlikely to have any Inquisitors with them - he watched his mom duel one once, a tall pau’an with flashing eyes and too-sharp teeth, and even though she won, it still gave him nightmares.

“Activate the booby-traps,” Mizgrr ordered, striding to a hidden compartment where they kept assorted small weapons. “And get the internal sensors running, I want to know where these bastards try to get in.”

Korto did as he ordered, though Ablyr could see the way he clenched his jaw - fear? Annoyance? He couldn’t take the time to figure it out, because the not-pressure in his mind ratcheted up another level, just before the whole ship shuddered from another clamping on.

“They’re here,” Ablyr whispered.

Mizgrr tossed a pair of DC pistols to Tachin, followed by a vibroknife. He kept a larger blaster for himself, and resettled the shard sword slung across his back, the only weapon kept from before he joined their family. Korto stood and drew his lightsaber, though he held off on igniting it just yet. “Looks like they’re being direct, and coming in our topside airlock,” the kiffar muttered. “Ablyr, you stay here.”

Wait- “What?”

“If we can’t chase these losers off, you need to get down planetside and warn the grown-ups.”

“I’m not leaving you guys!”

“Only if necessary, Ab’ika,” Tachin hushed him. The pantoran then grinned, mimicking the slightly crazed expression Uncle Wilde used to scare his opponents. “Have a little faith in us, eh? I bet we’re twice as scary as anything these shebsii’se have ever seen before.”

Ablyr took a deep breath, and focused on his surroundings, the way his mom taught him. He could feel Tachin’s thrumming energy, Korto’s steady anticipation, Mizgrr’s tightly leashed protective fury. Beyond them, faintly, he also felt a mixed group of greed and hunger, the desire to inflict terror, all shrouded in darkness - but not the sort too Dark to overcome.

The Force hummed to him.

“...okay,” he finally said, stepping back to give them room to all get to the door. “Okay. Go kick their butts.”

All three of his cousins nodded, and slipped out into the hall. Ablyr made himself settle in the pilot’s seat to wait. His bad feeling didn’t go away. But it didn’t get worse, either, and he’d take what he could get.

“...I don’t see it.”

Oren very pointedly didn’t say anything, though Namil could practically feel him roll his eyes. “Look, come here and stand behind me. Okay, now, follow where I point - see how the blue and grey alternates?”

Squinting, the mirialan tried to follow his gesturing claws, to peer past the thick layers of vines at the cliff beneath. “I still don’t-” Her friend reached back to catch the edge of Namil’s hood, and tug her down into bending a little over his shoulder. Abruptly, she could see what the nosaurian had noticed. “Oh!”

“Yeah, oh,” Oren laughed at her. “So, think you could clear those off for us?”

Namil hummed, and raised her hands in answer. The Force curled warmly around her, like an old friend’s hug, as she reached for the criss-crossing lines of life before them. It took a moment, but gradually, the vines began to shift and ease away from one another, settling at the edges of the ancient stairs carved into the mountainside.

Oren let loose a snort. “I honestly was picturing you just pulling them clean off, but that works too.”

The mirialan sniffed with disdain. “I know how to use a gentle touch, thank you very much.”

“Yeah, but after a month spent running around with Roo-Roo and Fulcrum Company, I wasn’t sure you’d be inclined to!”

That comment meant Namil took a turn rolling her eyes, before she set off up the steep staircase, Oren scrambling to grab his surveying equipment and follow after. For once, though, her longer legs weren’t quite as much of an advantage over his stocky muscle, and the young trooper caught up swiftly.

Their path curled around the mountainside, shrouded by early morning mist, periodically requiring further vine-disbursal in order to climb further. Close to an hour after leaving camp, the pair arrived at a level overlook, which offered a superb view of the entire valley, including the multiple Alliance ships resting down below.

“Buir was right,” Oren commented, as he started setting out sensors, “This is a good spot to set up a monitoring station.” Namil made an affirming noise, even as she set about nudging more plants to the boundaries of the overlook, clearing more space for her friend to work. They worked in silent tandem for a time, easily settling into the same rhythm they typically enjoyed when partnered together. For all that Namil would insist Roo was her best friend, Oren was family, and they rarely needed to speak aloud to know how best to assist one another. She could step around his equipment without looking; he would pause to give her space to move something with the Force even before she started to reach. Their monitoring and observation post went up quickly, easily, and before long the pair were standing back to admire their handiwork.

“Alright!” Oren announced, clapping his hands together. “This calls for a celebratory snack.”

Namil snorted, but didn’t refuse the iced nomel cookies he offered. “How do you always manage to have these, no matter where we are in the galaxy?”

“I make ‘em!”

“You do not.”

The nosaurian snickered, before chomping down on his own cookie. “Oo don’ know tha’.”

“I saw what happened when you tried to make Uncle Gree a cake for Life Day,” Namil protested. “That kitchen in Forest Home still has burn marks on the ceiling!”

Swallowing, Oren further teased her. “Cookies are different.”

“Not that different.”

“Sure they are.”

“No, they really aren’t-”

They could have gone on for another twenty minutes, but fortunately, the newly erected holotable chimed with an incoming transmission. Oren hopped over to answer, tucking away his last few cookies, and Namil followed, shaking her head with a smile.

Chapter Text

“SIXER!”

“Uh-oh.”

Feather cackled beside him, even as Sixer frantically tried to get her to shut up. Heavy footsteps coming down the hall, however, convinced him the effort was futile. Making an executive decision, the togruta boy abandoned both his cover and his partner in crime. He burst out of the closet and started sprinting, ducking underneath the startled Atru’s reach in a bid for freedom. The older dinui’ad cursed, but couldn’t move quick enough to snag him.

Sixer didn’t dare let himself feel relief until he’d gotten around another three corners and into the relative safety of the main hangar bay, where a dozen ships undergoing maintenance upgrades provided cover to hide behind. Quite a few aunts and uncles picked their heads up as he dashed by, surprise turning to amusement when they recognized the kid - Sixer had quite the reputation for causing trouble, after all. No one tried to stop him, at least until he ducked under an X-wing and practically collided with one of his parents.

“Whoa!” Fives yelped, catching Sixer by his coat collar. “Easy, you’re gonna cause a three way pile-up in here at that speed.”

“Dad-”

“Haven’t you heard enough of Echo’s safety speeches by now? Honestly kiddo-”

“Dad.”

“-if you’re serious about wanting to apply for the ARC course when you’re grown, it’s important to understand when and where to take risks-”

“DAD!”

Too late. Even as Fives talked, holding Sixer up off the ground with his feet kicking ineffectually like a scruffed kitten, Atru appeared before them. The young man glowered, covered head to toe in a translucent, rapidly hardening goo, Feather hoisted over one shoulder and still giggling her head off.

“We got him good, jua’vod!” The little girl called. Sixer went limp - so much for plausible deniability. Not that he ever had that, with his mostly-well-deserved reputation, but still.

Fives snerked, free hand clapping over his mouth as he saw the murderous expression on Atru’s face.

“Why,” the young man snarled.

“In my defense, that prank was meant for Uncle Rex,” Sixer grumbled, crossing his arms.

His dad’s jaw dropped, and Atru’s eyebrows near about leapt off his forehead. “Oh, you would have been so dead if it caught him.”

“But worth it!” Feather piped up, idly swiping at the still sticky goop on her captor’s back. “You didn’t even notice the camera, did you?”

“Feather, stop helping.”

Despite Sixer’s hiss, she just shot him a cheeky grin as Atru went back to looking murderous.

Sabine woke up groaning.

“Easy there,” an unfamiliar voice murmured, somewhere close by but not directly next to her. “You’ve got a bump the size of a muja fruit on the back of your head.”

She huffed, cautiously cracking her eyes open. “Yeah? Feels bigger.”

“I bet it does,” chuckled the voice. Cloth rustled against durasteel, off to Sabine’s left. Distant voices echoed slightly, probably coming down a long hall, and somewhere far off she could hear speeder traffic. Most likely a holding cell, then. Could be better. Could be worse.

A faint pair of taps drew her attention, knuckles against something hard. Carefully, the girl raised her head and turned, peering through dim light at the other figure sharing the ten by ten foot space. Older than her by at least a decade, human, brown hair pulled back in a ponytail- Aw, kriffing hells.

“You’re the shabuir who crashed my speeder,” Sabine growled.

Her fellow prisoner winced, shrugging with a sheepish expression. “Yeah, sorry about that - I needed to cause a distraction, with minimal casualties.”

“You gonna reimburse me?”

“Uhhh, probably not while I’m in this system, no.”

Muttering a curse, Sabine lowered her head back to the ground, angled to avoid putting pressure on the swollen bump at the back of her skull. The rest of her didn’t feel much better - speeders colliding with stone walls tended to do that to a person, especially when one’s armor had been left at their bolthole apartment for safekeeping. Ha.

“If it’s any consolation,” the stranger piped up, “l managed to call my partners before the authorities showed up, and they’ll be ready to bail us both out when they get here.”

Sabine glowered at him. “Bail out as in bribe the guards, or bail out as in blow up the wall for another high-speed chase?”

“Bribe, definitely. We don’t need any more excitement today.”

“Hmph. I want a lift back to my apartment block, too.”

“Sure, sure thing.”

They lapsed into silence, content to sit and wait until it came time to leave. Too sore and aching to even consider trying to sit up, Sabine studied the walls and ceiling. When that proved far too boring, she turned her attention instead to her speeder-thief-turned-jailhouse-companion. His clothes looked to be in decent if slightly worn condition, and besides the obvious (and empty) blaster holster at his hip, she could see the faint bulge in his boot for a hidden knife, and something slightly larger up his coat sleeve. Sabine squinted. Anyone unfamiliar with the numerous ways to hide weaponry when in civilian garb wouldn’t spot it, but she could pick out the rounded edges of a cylindrical shape. It couldn’t be the hilt of another blade, there wasn’t enough room inside the man’s sleeve, but it wasn’t the right shape for any type of blaster she knew of, either.

“Should I be worried?”

Sabine’s gaze flicked up to meet blue-green eyes. “What?”

“I asked if I should be worried,” he repeated, mouth quirking to one side with amusement. “You’re eyeing me like a loth-cat watching a grass mouse.”

She snorted. “I’m just trying to figure out what you’ve got hidden up your sleeve.”

It took a moment for his eyebrows to twitch upward with understanding. “Oh- you mean that literally.”

“Uh-huh.”

“Well, I hope you’ll appreciate when I say it takes a good eye to spot that, and won’t be offended when I refuse to share.”

“I could call a guard,” Sabine huffed.

“You could. And that really wouldn’t go well, for anybody.” He grimaced when she continued to stare. “Will you keep quiet if I promise to show you once we get out of here?”

After a long pause to make him sweat, Sabine nodded. “It better be a really cool weapon.”

That won a grin. “The coolest.”

They didn’t have much longer to wait after that. A couple of voices heralded footsteps coming down the hall, one significantly louder and more annoyed than the other. Soon enough, three newcomers appeared in front of the barred door.

One was a typical security guard, frazzled and hurrying to open the lock. The second was a silently grinning miraluka man, an elaborate headscarf covering most of his face and forehead. And the third, doing a lot of angry fussing, was a pale green twi’lek in spacer gear. “Unbelievable,” she hissed, stalking inside as soon as the door opened. “This is becoming a bad habit of yours, Jarrus.”

“Am I allowed to try and explain, or would you rather I jump straight to the apology?” Even so, Sabine’s cellmate was smiling as he accepted a hand up. Then both of them turned in her direction, and Sabine grimaced, knowing full well what was about to happen.

Sure enough, as soon as their hands started to ease her upright, the dizziness set it. Once her feet were under her, Sabine felt the familiar rush of nausea, and squeezed her eyes shut in the vain hope that eliminating seeing the room spin might help. The human - Jarrus - muttered something to his friend that she couldn’t quite pick up, though it apparently led to the twi’lek letting go and the miraluka guy taking her arm instead.

“Easy, kid,” he murmured, in a voice that sounded half-familiar. “Mhi hukaat’kama.”

We’re watching your back.

Well then.

Sabine kept quiet as they headed down a short hallway, through a room that sounded like datapad typing and flimsi shuffling. She heard the twi’lek exchange a few more heated words with someone, and then they passed through a security checkpoint, and the light on her face shifted from manufactured to natural.

“Alright,” she spoke up, finally willing to risk opening her eyes, despite the continued threat of vomiting. “What the kriff are a trio of Alliance agents doing on a world just inside the Imperial border?”

Her former cellmate - the man with a karking lightsaber up his sleeve, how did she not realize that earlier - practically tripped over himself, as the clone trooper disguised as a miraluka turned his laugh into a cough, and the twi’lek turned around with both hands on her hips to stare Sabine down. “Intelligence work,” the woman stated. “My turn - what’s a fourteen year old Mando doing running errands for the local crimeboss all by herself?”

Sabine glowered as best she could. “I’m not by myself, I’ve got my little brother to look after. Someone has to bring in enough credits to take care of him, and since the Empire pretty thoroughly broke up all the Clans, that means it’s my job now.”

The twi’lek and the Jedi exchanged a glance; the disguised clone, courtesy of his blindfold headscarf, could only tilt his head consideringly.

“...you still want that ride to your apartment?” The Jedi finally asked.

“Yes. I can’t exactly drive with a concussion, and I’m not wasting credits on a taxi.”

“What about a ride off-planet, after?”

Sabine, paused.

“I don’t know if errand-running for us would pay better than a crimeboss,” the twi’lek said, her tone softening just slightly. “But we’re stationed off of an Outer Rim world that’s safe, where there’s a small base that looks after kids and refugees. You and your brother wouldn’t even be the only Mandalorians there.”

That... that was tempting. Sabine and Tristan were only still living on the Imperial side of the galactic divide due to a lack of credits to pay for their smuggled passage to more neutral territory. Signing on with the Republic Alliance pretty much flew in the face of that, but... Osik. If it meant she wasn’t constantly worried about her brother getting into trouble, or someone stealing their small stockpile of weapons and family armor-

“Okay.”

“...okay,” the twi’lek repeated, looking a little taken-aback at her easy agreement. “Good. For now, I’m Juno, this is Kanan, and that’s Surefoot. We keep real names limited to my ship and Alliance territory, got it?”

“Yeah, got it. Do I need to pick out a codename too?”

“Let’s save that until we’re actually in hyperspace,” the clone rumbled. He inclined his head towards her, and Sabine suddenly noticed the detailed embroidery of his headscarf neatly hid a couple of gauze-covered eyeholes. Sneaky. “You got any hidden caches we need to empty out along with your safehouse?”

“No. We’ve been keeping everything close.”

“Alright then, let’s move out.”

Chapter Text

Chapter Order:

-Oren, nosaurian, born one year prior to the Empire, adopted at age 3 by Commander Gree Vorpangaid of the 41st (Forest Green)
-Beesyi, iridonian, born three years Pre-Empire, adopted age 8 by the Muun'bajii brothers Stak and Razor of the 91st (Lightning Red)
-Mizgrr, togorian, born two years Pre-Empure, adopted age 7 by Captain Trek Verbur of the 327th (Starlight Yellow)

-Ashel and Avel Mittel, tholothians, born six years Pre-Empire and one year after, respectively; adopted at ages 10 and 3 by the Koon brothers Sinker and Boost of the 104th (Wolfpack Grey)
-Tachin, pantoran, born one year Pre-Empire, adopted age 9 by Commando Wilde Sal'yc of the Vos Shadow Squad (Cloudweave Camo)

-Sixer, togruta, born four years after the Empire's rise, adopted age 1 by the Tra'kemii brothers Echo and Fives of the 501st (Torrent Blue)
-Mara Jade, human Jedi, born one year Post-Empire, apprenticed age 11 to Master Depa Billaba of the 705th (Thunder Red)

-Namil Volissi, mirialan Jedi, born five years Pre-Empire, apprenticed age 12 to Knight Barriss Offee of the 41st (Fern Green)
-Roo-Roo Page, gungan Jedi, born four years Pre-Empire, apprenticed age 11 to Knight Ahsoka Tano of the 501st (Fulcrum Orange)
-Ezra Bridger, human Jedi, born the same year as the Empire, apprenticed age 12 to Knight Caleb Dume of the Ghost Intel Squad (Spectre Hues)

-Numa Bril, twi'lek, born six years Pre-Empire, adopted age 6 by the Nerra brothers Waxer and Boil of the 212th (Ghost Golden)
-Nittu Windsong, human, born three years Pre-Empire, adopted age 3 by Commander Cody Kenobi of the 212th
-Vev Cuyan, mikkian, born four years Pre-Empire, "adopted" age 13 by Sergeant Soot of the 705th (Thunder Red)

-Jinni Skywalker, human Jedi, born five years Post-Empire, apprenticed age 11 to Knight Cal Kestis and his Seeker Squad (Seeker Orange)
-Luke Skywalker, human Jedi, born the same year as the Empire, apprenticed age 11 to Knight Katooni Elli of the 212th
-Leia Skywalker, human Jedi, born the same year as the Empire, apprenticed age 11 Knight Petro Vern of the 104th
-Parjai, unknown hybrid, born approximately five years Post-Empire, adopted age 10 by Commander Wolffe Koon of the 104th (Wolfpack Grey)

-Niah Ponds, human/theelin hybrid, born six years Post-Empire to Commander Neyo, apprenticed age 10 to Master Mace Windu of the 91st (Lightning Red)
-Feather Firestorm, human/zeltron hybrid, born six years Post-Empire to Hawk and Ekriti of the 501st (Torrent Blue)

-Ablyr Secura, human/twi'lek hybrid, born five years Post-Empire to Commander Bly and Aayla Secura of the 327th (Starlight Yellow)
-Korto Vos, kiffar Jedi, born the same year as the Empire, apprenticed age 12 to Aayla Secura

-Atru Suncaller, human/wroonian hybrid, born five years Pre-Empire, adopted age 5 by Captain Rex of the 501st (Torrent Blue)
-Sabine and Tristan Wren, humans, born two years Pre-Empire and the same year as, respectively, adopted ages 14 and 12 by Stance of the Ghost Intel Squad (Spectre Hues)

Or,

Clan Groupings:
212th (Plus Seeker Squad)
-Numa Bril, age 22, found on Ryloth, -Nittu Windsong, age 19, freed on Tatooine -Luke Skywalker, age 16, born on Naboo
-Jinni Skywalker, age 11, born on Naboo

104th
-Ashel and Avel Mittel, ages 22 and 15, found on Durn Station -Parjai Koon, age 11, stowed away aboard the Courageos -Leia Skywalker, age 16, born on Naboo

501st
-Atru Suncaller, age 21, freed on Tatooine -Roo-Roo Page, age 20, from the Jedi Temple on Dantooine
-Sixer Tra'kemii (Skywalker), age 10, rescued from Trellen -Feather Firestorm, born on the Resolute over Yavin IV

41st
-Namil Volissi, age 21, from the Jedi Temple on Dantooine -Oren Vorpangaid (Greenplate), age 17, born on New Plympto

91st
-Beesyi Muun'bajii (Butt-kicker), age 19, found on Iridonia -Niah Ponds, age 12, raised on Atollon

705th (plus Ghost Crew)
-Vev Cuyan (Golden Survivor), age 20, "recruited" on Ord Mantell -Mara Jade, age 15, picked up off of Onderon
-Ezra Bridger, age 16, born and raised on Lothal -Sabine and Tristan Wren, ages 18 and 16, both born on Krownest

327th (Plus Cloudweave Squad)
-Mizgrr Verbur (Honor), 18, rescued off the Triellus Trade Route -Ablyr Secura, born on Saleucami
-Tachin Sal'yc (Colorful), 17, saved on Irith -Korto Vos, 16, born on Kashyyyk

Hope this helps, guys! Expect more Thunders, Spectres, and Wolfpack members in the next chapter :)

Chapter Text

“Ez-RAAA!”

The boy bolted.

A blur of orange topped with dark blue wove around the pillars of stone, dodging the odd loth-cat, or in one case leaping clear over a kit too young to do more than freeze with surprise. In the end, however, he could only prolong the inevitable.

Another blur, this one dark brown with a wild mass of bright red hair, tackled him just before the boy could make the final dash towards a tunnel entrance. Both younglings went rolling into the nearby tall grass, until coming to a stop with the girl on top of the boy’s back, smooshing him face-first into the dirt.

“Mar-ra, get off-!”

“Not until you tell me where you put it,” Mara Jade hissed, pressing down a little harder.

Ezra Bridger turned his head as much as he was able in order to glare up at her with one eye. “...fine. I stuck it in Uncle Grey’s knapsack.” Mara’s already light skin paled even further, and she rolled off of the boy with a despairing groan. He snickered as he sat up. “I dunno what you’re upset about, he’s gonna love it.”

“He’s gonna show it to Master Billaba,” the girl whined. “And she’s gonna see it as attachment and then I’ll never get to be her Padawan!”

Ezra snorted. He grabbed a handful of loose dirt and poured it over Mara’s loose hair - which just went to show how upset she really was, as the girl didn’t react beyond scrunching up her face with annoyance. “You think one drawing is going to be enough to scare her off?”

Mara’s expression flickered back to despair. “It’s not one drawing! I’ve been making them for years, and when Master Billaba sees another one she’ll know I never stopped!”

Snorting, Ezra started to open his mouth to reply, only to stall as a familiar hum reached his ears. Both younglings twisted around in order to peer up at the sky, and sure enough, a Correllian freighter with fresh scorch marks eased around the mountains into view. In an instant, Mara and Ezra scrambled to their feet and took off running for the landing field.

The Ghost settled into its usual spot long before they got there, of course, but that just meant the kids arrived at precisely the right moment to tackle Caleb as he descended the loading ramp. He yelped, flailed, and fell over into a dramatic sprawl, the two younglings quickly arranging themselves to try and pin him in place. That backfired, however, when they left themselves open to getting scooped up by thicker arms and hefted into the air.

“Don’t worry vod’ika, I’ve got these monsters,” Stance cheerfully announced, loud enough to be heard over Ezra and Mara’s protests. Caleb huffed, before pushing himself back upright. Hera, standing on the ramp with a heap of datapads in her arms, simply rolled her eyes at the scene.

Ezra grinned and waved in her direction, but then blinked with surprise when he noticed the other two kids peering curiously around either side of the twi’lek. Suffice to say, the usual Welcome Home traditions got put aside in favor of introductions and some quick explanations.

A few minutes later saw the adults headed for the main entrance of their mostly-underground base, with the local younglings bracketing Sabine and Tristan Wren as they followed.

“We’ve got tunnels underneath most of the mountains,” Ezra explained on the way inside. “And a couple that go all the way into the city, when someone needs smuggling in or out. Sometimes the Imps run a couple of patrols past, but they never really come up from the fields, and our landing pads are all covered with cloaking tech.”

Sabine whistled when they reached the first big hall, a deployment depot with crates of supplies and weapons along the walls, chairs and tables in the middle for people waiting on others coming or going. “I thought this was supposed to be a small base.”

“It is,” Mara piped up, rolling her eyes. “We can’t hold an entire star destroyer’s worth of soldiers, or the rations to feed them, so it’s only small units and squads that get rotated through.”

“Still seems pretty big to me,” Tristan mumbled, taking a half-step closer to his sister. A few troopers shot them curious looks, but aside from some waves aimed at Ezra and Mara no one pestered the small group. Up ahead, Hera split off to go deliver her reports to the central communications hub, Stance hefted up a crate and started heading in the direction of the base’s forge, and Caleb stood in place until the kids caught up.

“Alright,” he announced, hands on hips, “We can go through the tour now, or take you straight to resident quarters until the evening meal.”

The newcomers shared a glance; Tristan tipped his head to one side with a small shrug, and Sabine nodded before looking up at the Jedi. “Tour.”

“Alright then, come on. The official armory and shooting ranges are down this way...”

“Bastard. Annoying me.”

One corner of Wolffe’s mouth twitched upwards, before he got control of himself and forced his expression back into smooth blankness. “No idea what you’re talking about.”

Parjai scowled back, feathers fluffing out even with her wings held still. “Know I don’t like meeting new.”

“We all suffer through things we don’t like to get to ones we do, sen’ika.”

“Hrmph.”

“Besides, I’ll get through this easier if I’ve got you here to entertain me.” That managed to rile her up, and his winged daughter didn’t hesitate to jump closer and snap her teeth, nearly catching Wolffe’s hand in a painful bite. He dodged it (barely) and pinned her with a headlock. The girl’s extra appendages flapped hard enough to fill the small hangar bay with wind, but they very precisely didn’t come anywhere near hitting him.

Funny how a couple years of family bonding could gentle anybody’s wildest tendencies.

Commander and scout-in-training did successfully straighten up their appearances by the time their scheduled meeting arrived, a hyper-capable shuttle sliding into the hangar with a grace that defied the sheer number of scorch marks covering the hull. Wolffe wanted to be surprised, but he knew damn well who was likely piloting the ship, which would account for the smooth landing and near-miss marks both.

Once the shields and engine powered down, five people came striding out of the shuttle. Three were young brothers, wearing brown armor edged with orange, all silently bickering at one another in not so subtle battlesign. Behind them came their unit leader, a Jedi who’d only been known to Wolffe previously through reports of Inquisitor activity. And bouncing along behind him came the real reason Wolffe brought his kid along.

Jinni Skywalker bore her father’s hair, her mother’s face, and far too much of a mischievous glint in her brown eyes for any clone commander to want to handle alone.

“Hi Wolffe!” She chirped, bouncing up and over one of the brothers in her excitement. Tellingly, he didn’t so much as flinch, unlike some younger clones Wolffe knew who still fumbled with their hands or feet when a Jedi went bounding by.

“Tra’kem’ika,” he rumbled in return, head tipping into a nod when the little Skywalker fetched up in front of him. “Been causing trouble for your new squad, I hear.”

“Only the good kind,” Jinni fired back, still grinning. She then leaned over sideways, long braid hanging towards the floor, as her glinting eyes looked over the unsurprisingly quiet girl with wings. “Hello! You must be Parjai! My big sister Leia’s told us a lot about you!”

Wolffe raised an eyebrow when his daughter didn’t respond, beyond her feathers fluffing out with muted alarm. “Gonna say anything, pel’kov?”

Oh, Parjai shot him a truly dirty look over than particular nickname, but she did shift her feet and meet Jinni’s curious gaze. “Hi.” Apparently that proved sufficient, as the other girl promptly beamed.

“Commander,” Jedi Kestis greeted, finally reaching them and placing a hand on his padawan’s shoulder. “Thank you for meeting with us on short notice. Our last mission turned out to have more serious consequences than usual, and we appreciate the offer to assist.”

Wolffe nodded with a grunt. “My officers are finishing setting up a briefing room now. Once we’ve got your recommendations for deployment, we’ll start sending response teams planetside.” Normally, Seeker Squads like the one headed by Kestis operated independently of the usual divisions, given missions that often took them close to the Empire’s blockaded borders and required extreme amounts of stealth to accomplish. (Or, in place of that, sheer, dumb, overwhelming luck, which all three Skywalker kids seemed to possess by the kriffing boatload.) Kestis got in touch with the Packs, though, because his squad’s latest altercation with a team of Inquisitors led the local stormtrooper garrison combing through multiple towns for Alliance spies, with an awful lot of destruction left in their path. More of that overwhelming luck meant the squad managed to deal some serious damage in return to the imperials, but they needed reinforcements to finish up.

Petro and Leia would lead the Akk Pack to clear out the last Inquisitor and her soldiers, while Plo and Wolffe began setting up medical stations for the wounded and camps to house those who’d lost their homes to the violence. What started out as an Imperial world that morning would become either Neutral territory or a Republic Alliance member by the end of the day cycle.

Wolffe led the way towards the briefing room they’d be using to plan deployment, Kestis and his men following in a standard action-ready formation. Jinni, however, hung back a little bit, falling into step with Parjai, who nearly always came last so she could avoid anyone bumping into her wings. The Jedi girl spoke too softly for Wolffe to hear, but when he cast a glance over his shoulder while exiting the hangar, he managed to glimpse the very distinctive bright red blush on his daughter’s face.

Hrm.

“-and that’s fine, but what about when it’s been raining for three days and the ground’s a muddy mess?”

“Well, in that case, we’d have to alter basic procedure just a tap-”

“Are they still exchanging scenarios?” Numa asked, voice full of despair, as she handed a second thermos to the mirialan sitting on a wide flat stone.

“Inexplicably, yes,” Namil replied, her gaze half-closed but locked onto the pair of boys sitting on the other side of their meager campfire. Down in the dusty valley below, orderly lines of manufactured light marked the rows of tents being used by Wraith and Fern Companies, waiting out the fourteen hour local night until they could attack at dawn. Being the only assigned Jedi Knight at the moment, Namil needed to remain on higher ground, watching over the solitary road that passed the mouth of the valley in case of enemy patrols. Oren of course refused to let her camp alone, and Wraith sent along two of their best junior officers as further assurance, the lieutenants Bril and Windsong.

Contrary to expectation, however, the two pairs did not remain in their usual configuration, but rather underwent an unexpected reassignment of conversation partners. Namely, Oren and Nittu started off posing battlefield hypotheticals to each other, and a bit of cheerful rivalry escalated into full-blown cousinly bonding.

“It’s got to be because of their fathers,” Numa muttered, after she took a long drink from her retrieved thermos. “I’ve never known any dinui’ade besides the kids adopted by commanders to talk so much.”

Namil merely hummed. Her ears listened to the twi’lek; her eyes remained on the boys. The rest of her mind focused only on the Force, the ebb and flow all around, the additional lights of living souls settled in beside their lanterns down below. Insects calling, small mammals hunting; nothing out of the ordinary. Distantly, on the other side of the mountain, she could feel the never-ending bustle of locals enslaved by the Empire, forced to toil in mines and forges, turning the abundant supply of ore into fresh weaponry meant for conquering new worlds, weaponry made as much out of pain and suffering as physical materials-

Dawn. They needed to wait for dawn, when the changing shifts would provide the best opportunity for attack. Only another six hours to go.

“...Parjai Koon doesn’t speak much,” Namil murmured. “And she’s Commander Wolffe’s daughter.”

“Give it time. I heard she made friends with the youngest Skywalker last month, and if nothing else that will provide plenty of opportunities to expand her use of swear words.”

Alright, Namil couldn’t help but snort at that. She first met the Skywalker children when they were all still proper younglings, the twins hanging from both of Roo-roo’s arms and their little sister perched upon her shoulders. Numa’s prediction probably wouldn’t be all that far off the mark, in all honesty.

“Oi, Volissi!” Nittu suddenly called out to them, turning on his seat, dark skin and golden crescent tattoo around his left eye gleaming with reflected firelight. “I know you’re doing the meditation-watch, but we need a Jedi’s opinion for this one!”

“Do you really,” Numa groaned.

“Yes we really,” Oren laughed. “Namil, come on, this’ll only take a minute! Say there’s a ravine with quicksand at the bottom...”

Chapter Text

::GoldenGhost has added WindWraith, SunCallSunFall, Sunset Jedi, Fern Jedi, and Fern Scout to the chat::

Fern Scout: Oh I demand a name change

GoldenGhost: Later. I’m drafting all of you for a new mission

Fern Jedi: ?

Sunset Jedi: I be guessin disa bein either off da books or so low prio de higher ups isa not wastin a real squad

SunCallSunFall: (Roo, do you really have to accent your typing?)

Sunset Jedi: 8D

GoldenGhost: It’s moderate priority, BUT - partially an infiltration operation. And for that I need non-clone faces, as well as some Jedi who *aren’t* incredibly well known to the Empire

WindWraith: which means most of the usual generals are out, and younger jedi are in!

SunCallSunFall: (Nittu. Capitalize. Please.)

WindWraith: (*~no~*)

Fern Jedi: Exactly what are we infiltrating, Numa?

GoldenGhost: Prison for the family members of political dissenters

Fern Scout: That... sounds like a big job. Are we going to have back-up?

GoldenGhost: Don’t worry, I’ve got more draftees in mind...

:::

GoldenGhost: If you’re interested, I’ve got a mission in the works to crack open an Imperial prison

Butt-kicker: Say no more, I’m in

GoldenGhost: Knew I could count on you, Beesyi

:::

GoldenGhost: And we could use a sniper at the lookout spot, just in case things go muja-shaped

Akk-Pack’s-Best: Question. How likely will that be? Because if I come home afterward full of holes or in a body bag, my little sister will never let me hear the end of it

GoldenGhost: Hope for the best, plan for the worst. Always a chance none of us could come back alive.

GoldenGhost: But also a decent likelihood we save a few hundred innocent civilians

Akk-Pack’s-Best: Hnnn

Akk-Pack’s-Best: Fine. One condition.

GoldenGhost: ?

Akk-Pack’s-Best: I want three more guys added to the team

::Akk-Pack’s-Best has added Grin&Growl, WildsBoy, and S.O.V. to the chat::

Akk-Pack’s-Best: Mizgrr, Tachin, Korto - the one and only Numa Bril. Numa, meet three of the biggest headaches the Empire’s ever been forced to deal with. The Alliance too, for that matter

WildsBoy: whatever’s happened, it wasn’t my fault

WildsBoy: well. Maybe. What’s happened?

GoldenGhost: What’s currently happening is mission recruitment, and Ashel just dragged you all in as his condition for joining up

S.O.V.: Oh gee thanks

Akk-Pack’s-Best: /finger guns

Grin&Growl: What mission? (Also, nice to finally meet you, Lt. Bril)

GoldenGhost: (Likewise) I’ll start from the top...

:::

Butt-kicker: VEV!!

5MinBreak: WHAT

Butt-kicker: MISSION, VEV!!!!

5MinBreak: WHAT MISSION. WHY ARE WE TYPING IN ALL UPPER CASE

Butt-kicker: Because this is EXCITING, VEV!!!! WE’RE GOING ON A MISSION!!!!!!!

5MinBreak: I’m sorry, *we*? What is this *we* you speak of

Butt-kicker: I got recruited, and then I found out one of the other cousins insisted on bringing in some more spy-types as back up, and I asked Numa if I could include someone of my own!

5MinBreak: Whoa whoa whoa, ‘Numa’? Numa BRIL? The first official Dinui’ad? THAT Numa??

5MinBreak: Please start from the beginning. WITHOUT constant the upper case usage

Butt-kicker: Spoilsport

:::

::S.O.V. has entered the chat “Shared Birthdate!”::

S.O.V.: So I have news

S.O.V.: Which might be of particular interest to you, Skywalkers One and Two

SunshineSky: ???

Dragon’sFire: It’s never a good sign when you start off a conversation like that, Vos

S.O.V.: Well I’m ONLY able to spill the tea on this at all because of your favorite sniper to pick on, Your Semi-Royal Highness

BridgeBelow: /reaches for the snack chiller

:::

::Dragon’sFire has entered the chat “GirlPackPower”::

Dragon’sFire: Avel. Your brother is hiding from me.

3MicronsOfWhoopAss: Situation Normal. What’d he do this time?

Dragon’sFire: Recruited Korto Vos into a mission Numa Bril’s putting together, which Luke and I didn’t know anything about

WingedVictory: ...should you have known about it?

3MicronsOfWhoopAss: The answer to that question, Par’ika, is always gonna be Yes

3MicronsOfWhoopAss: But I’ve got a better pair of questions - what is this mission, exactly, and do we need to involve ourselves further?

Dragon’sFire: Help me find your coward of a brother and we’ll find out

:::

JadeMade: Why did I have to find out through Ezra that you and Beesyi are going on a mission to rescue political prisoners from the Empire?

5MinBreak: HOW-?! She only dragged me into this a couple hours ago!!

JadeMade: You’ve been here for years now, Vev, don’t you know how fast our cousins gossip?

JadeMade: Just be aware that he used a three-way chat to tell me, which Niah has probably also read by now

5MinBreak: aw kriff

MandoArtist: I’m sorry, what mission is this?

:::

::Pink-pond has entered the chat “TheBabysat”::

Pink-pond: Feather? Ablyr? Have you heard...?

Firestooorm: About Numa’s mission! YEah!! Sixer and I hacked Atru’s comm for something else and found the chat logs

BlueAllThru: I know too. Mizgrr and the others are really bad at being quiet when they aren’t focusing on a job

BlueAllThru: I hate getting left behind again

Pink-pond: Well... I was thinking...

Firestooorm: /expectant eyes

Pink-pond: What if we set up our own mission? Just for those of us too young to get invited

BlueAllThru: I’m concerned but also curious. Please continue

Firestooorm: Don’t care what it is, I’m in >:3

Pink-pond: Okay, this is what I’ve got so far...

:::

789: FYI, Feather and her friends are Plotting something

789: I can hear her cackling from down the hall

SunCallSunFall: %@#$

:::

SunCallSunFall: Next time Numa needs us for something, I demand she get everyone together in person BEFORE going over the mission outline

WindWraith: agreed D’x you would *not* believe the lecture I just got from *luke* of all people about ignoring advantageous recruits

SunCallSunFall: Oh I’m sorry, did YOU babysit the Sky twins and their nightmare sister all through their formative years? No? No, that’s right, you just get to deal with the MILDEST sibling while he’s figuring out how to become a respectable Jedi

SunCallSunFall: I’ve already heard that Leia apparently CHASED the guy Numa recruited from the Packs in order to get more information from him

WindWraith: oof

SunCallSunFall: Oof is right. And I don’t even want to think about how big an entrance Jinni’s going to make once she finds out about all this...

WindWraith: i thought she’s still getting over being sick tho?

SunCallSunFall: Trust me. That will BARELY slow her down.

:::

WingedVictory: and the timetable has them mobilizing thirty-one hours from now

Freebird3: Excellent! That’s plenty of time to make our own plans. Thanks again for letting me know, Par’jai!

WingedVictory: welcome :)