Slaves Of The Empire {1}

Twenty | Legacy

The applause and cheers in the square grew thunderous as Lux thanked the townspeople for their time. She wished she could've stayed to hear the end, but she had work to do. She could always listen in on the next one.

She ducked into a back alley and crouched behind a dumpster, pulling a spare tunic she'd been hiding beneath her shawl over her head. The pants on the indigo jumpsuit she'd chosen for the day's outing were unremarkable on their own, but the beading and low neckline on the bodice would draw too much attention when she needed the shawl as a cowl for potential security cams.

Thankfully, as impractical as it was, the bodice had some uses: for one, it was tight enough to hold the many bracelets and montral ornaments she'd been given to wear. She didn't have a single pocket on her, and though she'd gotten lucky this time, he wished she hadn't been so blasé the night before about choosing her outfit.

Now came the more complicated part – the one she hadn't been able to plan. She'd found a map of the town on the HoloNet, but she hadn't gone looking for more information about specific locations. She'd worked hard to subtly maneuver Lux into agreeing to bring her along yesterday, and she would not risk him catching on to her excursion with something as stupid as her search history.

Lucky for her, she'd been taught at the finest institution there was for making things up as one went along: the Skywalker School of Improvisation. Anakin's lessons wouldn't fail her. They never had.

Ahsoka dipped into the Force, splaying her senses out to feel for changes in the current. There were no Elites for a hundred klicks in any direction. Not that she'd expected to find any when she'd seen hide nor hair of them since her and Lux's abrupt departure from Kyzeron, but she still had to be mindful of the danger.

Satisfied, she twisted her shawl so the plainer side was facing outward and draped it around her head and shoulders. Then, she walked the rest of the way to the next street over – which was one of the town's main boulevards, if she was right – and turned onto it.

It was full of shops offering everything from tech repair to a quick bite to eat. The kiosks and tents of travelling peddlers, garishly colored to attract attention and jockey with their equally vibrant competitors, clustered between more monotonous prefabricated buildings.

Ahsoka grinned. This was better than she'd hoped for, in a town so small.

Leisurely she strolled down the street, trying to look like she belonged. There weren't many other people around to mimic; the only other passersby were a Twi'lek couple at the other end of the street and a group of elderly Humans examining some crates of medial supplies. The shopkeepers and peddlers, for their part, stared out at her from behind their wares with narrowed eyes.

She shivered and moved on.

Most of the shop signs were in Onde'er, and though Ahsoka had picked up a passable mastery of the spoken language, but she could only read bits and pieces of it. Thankfully, the buildings were all made with the same template, and each one had a large window at the front that showed what was for sale.

Her heart skipped a beat when she spotted secondhand tech through one of them. The featureless buildings made it hard to guess how long the village had been here, so it was a long shot, but perhaps she could find an old transmitter inside.

In her darker moments, Ahsoka held her own survivor's guilt responsible for making her wait to find a way back to the Rebellion – like her year in chains was a great trial to face with the poise and wisdom of a Jedi Knight, and she'd simply been too numb to overcome it yet. There was truth to that, but it wasn't the whole reason.

Before the GAR, Jedi, and Republic leadership had fled Coruscant, four Senators had activated Evacuation Frequency 04, or EF-4. The decades-old protocol had been designed give the Republic a comm network that couldn't be tampered with in the face of an invasion. It was sound in concept, but not in practice. Since it was off-limits to civilians, only military transmitters could access it – and the Empire knew it. Though it was beyond their power to hack EF-4, the Emperor's dogs had done everything else imaginable to make old Republic military tech scarce.