BATTLE SCARS [✓]

× Chapter Thirty Six: Dying Breath ×

"Here they are, let's do this!" Mal shouted, whipping out her lightsaber and approaching the droids. Mal swung her blade, cutting through droid heads as she did, though she felt her body slowly giving way to the virus. With every droid she was taking down, her vision started to grow blurrier and blurrier and her bones started to ache.

"Commander! You doing alright?" She heard, but before she could answer, she collapsed to the ground, blacking out. Rex was closer to Mal than the others and quickly ran up to her, his bones shuddering as he lifted the girl in his arms. "Is she okay?!" Ahsoka exclaimed while approaching him, the Captain noticing that she was growing weak, too.

"She..ah..she's unconscious. She's been exposed to too much of the virus." Ahsoka looked at her friend, seeing dark circles under her eyes and her skin growing strongly paler by the minute. "What do we do?"

"I can take her back to the safe room." Ahsoka heard Wolffe say, her eyebrows furrowing slightly. "You sure?"

"Yeah. I got it. Don't worry, kid." Wolffe assured. "Okay. Senator Amidala, maybe you should go with them." Ahsoka suggested while Padmé shook her head, holding her blaster up high. "I can handle the droids, Ahsoka. I'll be okay."

"Alright. Well, Wolffe, take a few men just in case droids come your way." Ahsoka said as Wolffe nodded. "Sinker, Dart, Ram, on me!"
-

"Ahsoka, I need your help.." Mal called through the pitch black void that she was in. She looked around, not seeing the familiar face that she's use to. Her eyebrows furrowed, her mind indicating that something was wrong. However, before she started to have a mental breakdown, she heard,

"Mal?" She turned her head, this time, she didn't see Ahsoka. This time, she saw a boy, about 14 or 15, with blue hair, tan skin with claw marks across his cheek, a brown jacket with an orange jumpsuit. Her face scrunched up in confusion, not recognizing the boy at all. "Um..who are you?"

"Oh..Ahsoka told me you might not know me because this is the past." The boy said while looking around the dark void then back at Mal. "I'm Ezra. Ezra Bridger. We met in the future when you were with Rex, Gregor, and Wolffe. After that, you disappeared, but we were still getting transmissions from you."

"Oh, yeah. Ahsoka told me about that. But anyway, where's Ahsoka? Did something happen to her?" Mal asked frantically, and from the look Ezra gave, her suspicions had been confirmed. Her eyes started to well up in tears and all she could think was that she had lost her best friend in the future.

"I have to fix this. I have to change the future right now." Mal said to herself while running her hands through her hair. "You know, Mal, if you do try to change the future, then the group that I'm with, we'll never meet. I'll never be trained by Kanan, I'll never meet Hera, whose been like a mother to me, or Sabine, who's almost like a sister, Zeb, an annoying brother, or our droid Chopper. None of this will ever happen if you try to change it." Ezra explained as Mal looked away, her mind filled with conflict. She could understand why Ezra probably wouldn't want her to change the future. He has a whole family.

People who took him in and accepted him as a lost child. Mal would want that for anybody. But Mal knew that she had to do it. Because whatever killed the Jedi must have killed Ahsoka in the future. nd she knew that couldn't happen.

"Listen..Ezra, I understand that you don't want me to do this. But, I have to..if I change it, then maybe whatever went wrong in your life, I can change it. The Jedi won't be killed by whatever killed them, this new war that Ahsoka talked about will never happen. And you will still be trained by Kanan." Mal explained as Ezra furrowed his eyebrows. "What do you mean?"

"The Jedi Council brings in force sensitive children when they're young. If you're what, 15?" Mal began as Ezra nodded. "Then in five more years, you can be trained to become a Padawan. By then, this Kanan will be a Jedi Knight and he could train you."

"Do you really think so?" Ezra asked as Mal nodded, smiling sincerely at him. "Anyway, I need your help. Is there anything that Ahsoka left me about the Blue Shadow Virus?"

"The Blue Shadow Virus? That thing's still around?" Ezra asked as Mal rolled her eyes. "I don't even want to talk about it."

"Um..yeah. She did. I'll let you look at it." Ezra said while handing her Ahsoka's staff that had appeared out of nowhere. "Okay, thanks, Ezr-" Just before Mal could finish, Erza was gone, vanished into thin air. Mal sighed, feeling a little bad about wanting to change the future but she shook her head, looking over the staff a bit to see what to do with it.

"Hey, Mal." Mal jumped a bit, turning to her side to see a slightly older Ahsoka, a bit older than the one dressed in Mandalorian clothes, standing a bit far to the side of her. "Kriffing force, Ahsoka! You scared me!"

"Heh, sorry. I heard you needed my help?" Ahsoka said while looking at the white staff in Mal's hand. "Um..yeah..how..how are you here? I thought..?"

"That I was dead? There's a thing called a Force Ghost for a reason." Ahsoka joked with a slight smirk as Mal rolled her eyes, chuckling softly. "Ha, ha. Very funny. Anyway, yes, I need your help. Is there a cure for this virus?"

"Yes, there is. And I'm sure that Anakin and Obi-Wan are on their way to get it now. It's a root from the Planet of a Thousand Moons. It's the only thing that could cure us." Ahsoka explained as Mal looked down at the ground, shaking her head. "What's wrong?"

"I don't think I'm going to make it.. I'm dying. I can feel it in my body, I can feel it everywhere. This virus is eating me from the inside out." Mal complained weakly while looking back up at Ahsoka. "You know, I thought we weren't going to make it either.."

"What made you change your mind?"

"I had faith in my Master. I thought about him coming to rescue us. To save us. And I had faith in the Force. And what happened? We made it out. So, just because you think we don't have anything left in us to fight this virus, we do. You have to have faith, Mal. Just like Master Plo told you." Mal smiled, moved by her best friend's words and her mindset quickly converting to faith in her Master and not about her final hours.

Mal went to thank Ahsoka, only to look back up and seeing that her friend was nowhere to be found.