April 26.
After explaining her plan to free Lothal, which now included sending a Federal squadron to secure Dornea's orbit to cover the rear of the fleet, Jaral went back on the Constantinople and assisted at the beautiful sight of the hundreds of ships that crossed the wormhole. It was an incredibly quick process. Apparently, the wormhole had been stabilized by the Reapers/Guardians, and while Jaral didn't have the chance to see them, the sentient ships had basically transformed the wormhole into one of their mass relays, meaning that the ships would be dispersed only in a shorter radius when they reached the other side.
Still, the process took 10 hours, which was still less than anticipated. Even the Protector had little trouble at making the cross.
Now, though, all ships were ready and waiting.
Jaral listened into the Force and knew that the moment she had waited was coming.
She headed back into the cockpit.
"Lieutenant, any sign?" she asked, with her hands behind her back and an absolute control.
"Nothing unusual..." Rut replied, but then the sensors started bleeping. "Wait, multiple object coming out of hyperspace."
"Perfect." she said with a lopsided grin.
A few moments later, around the communication buoy that Jaral had ordered to be left, came out creatures of colors varying between purple and deep blue, with tentacles to their rear and glowing azure eyes.
The Purrgil had heard the calling.
"What are those?" Raniza, who was on the bridge as well, asked.
"You will see. Give me the Admiral."
A few moments later, the Admiral appeared on a video feed on the left of Rut.
"Marshall, any idea what those creatures are?" he asked.
"Relax, sir. Those are Purrgils. My crew and I have saved this flock a couple of years ago, and now they are going to return the favor."
The Admiral's outer mandibles opened, in a sign of confusion. "Would you be willing to elaborate?"
"The Purrgils have a deep connection to the Force, so me and my brother can communicate with them. Most importantly, however, they are natural hyperspace navigators, and they are going to show us a secret hyperspace route for Lothal."
"A secret route?" Raniza asked.
"Is that really possible?"
"The route exists. Right at this moment, there is a path, I saw it in the Force. We might not have the tools to find it and exploit before it closes again, but the Purrgils can. With that, we will be able to get Thrawn's fleet on the flank as well and engage with less risk of hitting the surface of Lothal accidentally."
Edrix hummed. "Well, you certainly know this galaxy better than us, Grand Marshall. But how will you be able to follow the Purrgils in hyperspace? Your navicomputer won't allow you to jump into an unknown trajectory."
"Simple. One of the Purrgils will drag us."
Rut, Raniza and Edrix all looked in astonishment.
"Hang on a minute." the pilot protested. "Who guarantees that they won't crush us, even if accidentally?"
"They won't Lieutenant. But I need you all to trust me." Jaral replied calmly.
The aliens looked at each other, but in the end, she was in charge, and even if psionics were a thing in the Milky Way, few could really understand the extent of their abilities, though they still respected them.
Rut sighed and removed his hands from the control panel. "Guess I'll let the giant space whales do the job."
"Admiral, link the Protector with the Constantinople's hyperdrive tracker. Once you receive the route, send a flanking force with us while you lead the frontal assault."
"Very well, Grand Marshall. Meanwhile, I'm sending the force that will attack Dornea."
"Acknowledged. See you later, sir."
As the feed disappeared, Jaral went to the center of the room, closed her eyes and extended a hand while the Purrgil were waiting not far from the Constantinople.
She let the Force guide her and established a connection with one of the bigger creatures of the flock, which started to 'swim' toward the frigate.
The singing of the creature reverberated on the ship as Raniza and Rut watched with a mixture of awe and reverence.
The creature pointed one of its eyes clearly toward Jaral.
*Purrgil art by JaiMiChi on DeviantArt
'You can help us, right?' she thought.
As answer, the Purrgil turned around and started to place its tentacles around the ships. One on the roof of the main hull, one on the bottom, to grasp the ship, and the others extended to take a hold of the ship's wings.
"Lieutenant, all power to the shields." Jaral ordered while still retaining the link with the creature.
Rut obeyed and sent the order down to the engine room, where the engineers quickly compelled.
The ship started moving, dragged by the massive creature. In the absolute emptiness of Dark Space, it was easy for the Purrgil to move the ship, and it made it with a remarkable consideration for the ship's integrity.
"You live 223 years, and you can still get surprised by space." Raniza commented.
The Purrgil reunited with the flock. The creatures turned back toward the galaxy and the Lothal sector. They started waving their tentacles, which started to glow with an azure light.
"Stand ready for the jump." Jaral announced.
A few moments later, the blue tunnel formed around them, though they could barely see it because of the tentacle obscuring much of the visual from the cockpit.
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That was the signal. Ezra could now feel Jaral again. Two days after the crazy adventure at the temple, the time for the final showdown had arrived.
Using the Ghost, Hera had left the planet to go get reinforcements for the strike team. It hadn't been easy, with the Empire now tightening its blockade again, but of course, Hera still made it, along with Rex and Kallus. Apparently they were headed on Seelos.
Ezra had retired at the entrance of the valley to meditate. His bond told him that his sister was en route with the reinforcements, but they still needed to complete their plan for a swift and painless liberation of Lothal.
Sabine was sitting next to him, making sure that no Empire patrol gunship popped out without warning, when Ezra extended a hand and touched one of hers.
"You ok?" she asked, squeezing the hand softly.
"It's time." he said. "I need to speak with Hera."
Sabine nodded and the two started to walk back toward the camp, after Sabine sent the request to contact Hera.
Now even the fearless Mandalorian started to feel the tension in the air.
"So here we are, uh?" she mumbled, searching for her husband's hand.
Ezra immediately grabbed that hand with his own and used the Force to send calming thought toward her.
"We will make it, Sabine, you'll see." he stated calmly.
"Yeah but..." she bit her lip, but in the end she finished. "Ezra, Jedi or not, I want you to still be with me when this is over."
Ezra turned on his side and hugged her tightly. She returned it with a small tear of fear coming out from her left eye.
"I will not abandon you, cyar'ika. I promise." he whispered.
"You better." she replied with a small knot in her throat. "Or I swear I will hunt you down till the afterlife, if necessary."
Ezra chuckled. "I'm sure you would, my war goddess." and he kissed her on the forehead.
Sabine wanted to do this properly and thus stretched her neck a bit to reach his lips, for one last kiss before they embarked on what seemed to be their most desperate action of all.
They shared one last embrace before they proceeded toward the camp, though they still held hands until they were near it and Vizago came forward to inform them that they managed to contact Hera.
The hologram of the Twi'lek was being projected by Chopper, around which stood Ryder, Matt, Jordan, Zeb and Jai.
The two teens neared it and Hera turned toward the young Jedi.
"Ezra, what's the emergency?"
"We need to strike now. Jaral is on the way."
"Your plan is already crazy enough, but can we actually do this?" Zeb asked.
"Look, I had a vision. Thrawn is coming back, so it's now or never."
"Ezra, we need an army to take the capital." Ryder protested. "And I still don't see an army here."
"We don't need an army. We only need one person." Ezra calmly replied, reminding him of the plan they hatched.
Ryder closed his eyes and sighed. "All right. Give me some space." he asked resigned, and everyone left him alone.
Ezra went to inspect the defenses they established on the crawlers. They had put two light cannons as turrets among small positions that had been fortified with the crates found inside the crawler. Defending it, aside from the Specters and the Legionnaires, there was the ill-trained group of the Lothal resistance fighters. While they were all armed, at least, there wasn't much room or time for the professional soldiers to train them.
Dispersed on the crawler's top, there were also the crates with the heavy weapons the Legionnaires had brought down from the Constantinople right before the ship left: two rocket launchers and a grenade launcher, along with the energy cells necessary to operate them. Those, however, were exclusive to the Legionnaires, since the rebels had still never lifted them and they couldn't afford to let them practice because of how very few explosives they had.
It wasn't much if the Empire was going to arrive with full force, but Ezra's plan didn't rely on winning right away.
Deciding that he had looked long enough, he went for a stroll along the trail carved into the mountains, followed by Sabine.
The two spent some time just watching toward the plains, though at a certain point they were drawn by a howling. The looked at one of the mountains on their side and saw the white Loth-wolf with some of its darker counterparts, watching them from a cliff.
"What is this connection you have with them?" Sabine asked. "I never understood it."
"I'm not sure I can explain it." Ezra admitted. "Sometimes is just there, other times...I'm just on my own."
The wolves walked away from the teens' sight.
"Well, whatever it is, I hope is there when you need it." she whispered while intertwining fingers down on their sides.
Ezra made a lopsided grin. "It has been until now. I'm sure it will again."
The two smiled at each other, but then, Ezra's alerted senses caught something. He heard a faint rumble coming from the distance, a sound of engines.
He turned in that direction, slipping out of Sabine's hand and materialized his armor and helmet, activating the scope.
He didn't take long to spot at least five imperial gunships, presumably loaded with stormtroopers, coming their way.
"Here they come." he said.
The two sprinted back to the camp.
"Dad, they're coming!" Ezra said with the speakers of the helmet set to the max.
"I see them." Jordan replied. "Everyone, battle stations!"
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The first troopers to drop from the gunships weren't simple stormtroopers, but rocket-troopers. These were met head-on by Sabine with her jetpack and from the allies once they flew over the crawler.
Despite being easily took down, the rocket-troopers distracted their enemies long enough for two gunships to disembark their squads of stormtroopers, while three other gunships landed on the other side of the valley, with Rukh leading that contingent.
Michalina, being the heavy weapons' expert, started to fire with the rocket launchers, and while she took down at least three gunships on her own, the imperials just kept coming.
Jordan ordered Thabo to cover the left flank, while he himself covered the right flank. Michalina kept firing the heavy weapons, giving support to the rebel gunners at the turrets. It wasn't easy with the gunships that kept firing upon them, and the allied force fought desperately for minutes on end.
Ezra kept moving, bringing his TL-50 and his double-bladed lightsaber wherever he needed, but he took the initiative when he saw the Noghri appear from the other side of the valley.
"Chopper, warn Hera that we're under attack." he ordered.
Rukh shot him with his baton's ranged mode but Ezra easily dodged it, then Force-jumped toward the new group.
Using his double-bladed saber, Ezra made short work of the platoon of stormtroopers, who whenever managed to hit him, their bolts were simply absorbed by his personal shields.
There was no sign of Rukh, however, and that was because the Noghri had jumped on the roof of the corridor and was trying to take Ezra by surprise.
Ezra noticed him and the Noghri shot what Ezra's quick reflexes recognized as an explosive dart. He deviated it with the Force, but in the rush, he sent it against the wall right next to him and not toward the open side on his left.
The explosion threw Ezra over the cliff, but there were a few steel gangplanks below it that luckily stopped him from falling to the bottom.
Rukh ignited the electric heads of his batons and jumped down toward Ezra, who managed to roll on the side and avoid the blow, instead slipping on top of one of the mountain's protrusion.
The two kept dueling on the gangplanks for a while. Then Ezra managed to Force push the Noghri away, even making him lose his staff.
Ezra had an intuition when he saw that particular. He dashed forward toward the staff, just like Rukh did, but Ezra grabbed it first and lifted it over his head. That way, Rukh landed with his arms on the weapon, but since there was no land beneath him to support his body, all Ezra had to do was to quickly drop the staff down into the abyss.
The Noghri was sent down screaming.
When Ezra rejoined the main battle, the situation was becoming dire. The sheer amount of troopers was quickly overheating the weapons of the allies and the rebels started to suffer their first losses. Not only three of the freedom fighters were mortally wounded, but the gunships also blew up one of the defensive turrets.
For a couple minutes, Zeb went on a rampage, detaching the last turrets left to the rebels and charging against a gunship that was trying to land more troops, making it blow up. However, that assault quickly depleted the battery of the cannon, so now Zeb had to get rid of it.
Thabo was also exhausting himself by using his psionic powers, hitting the imperials with special shock-waves, energy arrows and other powers, but it was still amounting to very few.
"I'm beginning to regret the day I met you, Ezra Bridger." Vizago commented as the allies were pushed into a corner of the ore crawler.
"Day is not over yet, Vizago." Ezra replied candidly as he shot with his repeater.
The battle had been going on for 10 minutes, now, and Pryce had officially lost all patience. She ordered the gunships still flying to use their concussion shots against the crawler, to make it fall down.
The first two missiles hit the flank of the crawler, but didn't do much damage. The second salvo, however, hit one of the reactor boosters, and that spelled the end of the ship.
The crawler started to incline dangerously.
"Abandon ship!" Ezra ordered.
Even the stormtroopers tried desperately to get back on their gunships before being left behind, but a couple of them still fell with the crawler.
The rebels managed to get to safety, and a big contribution was given by the Legionnaires, who used their jetpacks to lift the few rebels who couldn't jump away in time from the crawler.
However, when the last fugitives rallied, they found themselves in front of a pretty bad situation: half of the rebels, including Sabine, had been capture by Rukh and the troopers that were left on the ridge.
"Drop your weapons." the Noghri intimated Ezra as he pointed his staff to Sabine's neck.
Ezra grumbled a bit. "Do as he says." he said to his father and the Legionnaires.
They dropped their weapons to the ground and accepted to be flocked together with the other prisoners. When that happened, the gunship of Pryce finally landed on the ridge.
The Governor, wearing a battle suit, sported a triumphant grin.
"Ezra Bridger, Sabine Wren, Garazeb Orellios...and Ryder Azadi." she said as she walked in front of them. "Stand up my old friend. I thank you for helping me bring peace to Lothal."
Ryder was allowed to stand up.
"Ryder, you betrayed us?" Sabine asked in disbelief.
"It's like I said." the former Governor said sadly. "We were never gonna win without an army."
"A wise decision." Pryce added, then she looked around and her grin was replaced by a nervous expression. "Where is the girl? Where is Jaral Bridger?"
"These are all the rebels we could find, Governor." a stormtrooper replied.
Under his helmet, Ezra grinned and turned toward Ryder. "You wanna tell her or should I?"
"I've been waiting years for this." he replied while stepping forward.
Sabine gave a confused look to Ezra, who just made a very slow nod to reassure her.
"Getting you to come all the way out here was part of our plan." he said with a smug face.
Pryce scoffed. "For all the good it did to you! Your little rebellion ends here, and once I find the girl..."
"Oh, don't worry." Ezra said coolly. "You will see her very soon. But first..."
The gunship behind Pryce and his two escort troopers suddenly blew up, causing chaos among the imperial files.
Ezra and the Legionnaires were the first to react, using the powers of their omni-tools or their version of the Force to push the other troopers back and free their comrades, while the Ghost came down from the sky and hovered in front of the ridge.
As the allies grabbed their weapons again and looked for cover, the Ghost's cargo bay ramp opened.
Out of there came Rex, Wolffe, Gregor, Kallus and, to Ezra's surprise, even Nimbus.
As the men entered the battle with guns blazing, the Mirialan woman ignited her white lightsaber and gave them some protection against the incoming bolts.
As Pryce looked for cover as well, Ezra finally saw the opening he sought.
"Everyone, into the cave! Chopper, jam their transmissions!" he ordered while the Ghost flew away to face the remaining gunships in the air.
The jamming caused a deep pitch sound into the stormtroopers' helmets, causing them to lose focus for a few seconds, which were all Ezra needed to lead his group to the safety of the cavern.
As he sent the rest of the group deep into the darkness, Ezra deactivated his armor and waited with both lightsabers in his hands.
It didn't take long for Rukh to bring a group of soldiers inside the cave and find him. Clearly, Pryce had given the order to capture him alive, because they didn't fire.
"Where is your army now, Jedi?" the Noghri asked with a grin.
His answer arrived a few moments later, when two yellow, glowing eyes, appeared behind the young man, and Ezra grinned in answer.
They boy ignited his lightsabers, illuminating the cave enough to show the imperials the pack of Loth-wolves that had come rescuing Ezra.
A grimace of fear came on Rukh's face, especially when Ezra pointed the blades forward, giving the signal to the wolves.
The creatures charged, causing panic and confusion among the imperials.
The wolves' fur was thick enough to absorb the small power of the blaster rifles and what followed was pretty much a massacre. Rukh was thrown down the mountain again, and he would hopefully stay there.
Very few stormtroopers, and Pryce, survived the hunt of the pack.
Ezra led the white Loth-wolf, which was lifting Pryce between its teeth, to the central area of the camp.
"Don't let it eat me, please!" the Governor begged, right before the creature let her fall on the floor.
Ezra, who had removed his armor, smirked and handed a couple of handcuffs to Ryder.
"Would you like to do the honors? Governor to Governor." he quipped.
"Ezra, it will be my pleasure." Ryder said as he grabbed the cuffs.
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The plan had gone perfectly. Well, the losses on the rebels' part were a painful addition, but Ezra had reached his objectives: capture Pryce and have still three imperial gunships ready to be used for the next phase of the plan.
The Ghost landed at the entrance of the valley, where said gunships had been parked, so Ezra, the Specters and Jordan (who left his men to keep an eye on the prisoners) went to meet with the crew.
There they found Hera, Ketsu Onyo and finally Hondo Ohnaka and his assistant Melch.
"You did it." Hera said with pride swelling in her voice and in her expression as well. "Somehow, against all the odds...you actually did it."
"I couldn't have done it without you." Ezra replied, then took a look around him. "All of you."
Hondo stepped forward with his usual smile. "So true, my young friend." he said while removing his hat. "You're welcome." then he approached Ezra. "Well, I guess the fight is won and we can all *sniff* get paid and get home now?"
"I wish it was over," Ezra said calmly. "but it's not. My sister is inbound with the Federal fleet. While there is no way they will lose, we have still one job to do to ensure Lothal doesn't suffer too much from the incoming battle." he explained.
"Well, the plan has gone well so far," Jordan said, putting a hand on his son's shoulder. "no reason to start being pessimists right now."
"And if all goes well, by the end of this day, the capital and the planet will be free from the Empire." Ezra added. "This will be the last day of the resistance...and the first day of the war."
Those words managed to spark a little bit of hope in the rebels. At last, after years of fighting, it looked like their efforts would come to a fruition. Still, the task in front of them was not gonna be an easy one. They would need to give their absolute best and play all their cards correctly if they wanted a chance to survive.
"That's your and your sister's call, Ezra." Jordan said. "Just tell us when you are ready."
Ezra closed his eyes and focused on his bond. He didn't take long for him to find his sister. After exchanging their thoughts for a few seconds, Ezra reopened his eyes.
"We have to start now. We won't have a large time frame to get the best result."
"I'll go get the Governor and my guys. The rest of our men should stay here and guard the prisoners."
Ezra nodded an affirmative. While Jordan put a finger on the side of his helmet and called up Thabo an Michalina, the others started to encircle Ezra and looked at him with a trustful expression. They were going to follow him to hell and back, even that old, selfish pirate Hondo.
Sabine instead went to him and pecked him on the lip with a smirk. He smirked as well after that.
"When did you become so public?" he asked.
"I just couldn't resist." she whispered. "I just love this leader in you."
He chuckled and touched their foreheads together. "Come on, let's get ready."
In orbit, someone else was preparing herself for the showdown. Jaral had just brought the Constantinople out of hyperspace. After saying goodbye to the Purrgils and thanking them for the help, Rut realized that they were indeed on the flank of Lothal. The sensors could detect the imperial blockade deployed to prevent traffic coming in or out of the two known hyperspace lanes of the planet, but in front of the frigate, right now, there were no ships.
"By the jungles of Sur'Kesh." Rut mumbled. "It actually worked."
"Of course it worked." said Darvos, who had come to look at the Purrgils out of curiosity. "It was my wife's plan." he quipped.
Jaral gave him a lopsided grin, then proceeded with the orders.
"Jinx, scan the Imperial Fleet and search for the Chimaera, meanwhile open a channel with Admiral Edrix and Admiral Raddus."
The AI executed the commands. While the scanners of the Constantinople started working, two video feeds appeared on the left side of the cockpit, where Jaral was standing.
Soon enough, both the Admirals appeared.
"Admiral Edrix, have you traced our route?" she asked.
"Affirmative, our AIs have elaborated the new course. The flanking fleet will be ready very soon."
"What about the assault on Dornea?"
"The attack force is encountering very small resistance. They're preventing any imperial communication to leave the planet, but if the commanders on Lothal try to check in, they might notice."
"Trust me, my brother is giving them something more important to think about than a remote outpost." then she turned toward the Calamari. "Admiral Raddus, is the fleet in position?"
"We're waiting in an empty system right next to Kamdon." he replied. "We are waiting for your command, ma'am."
"Good." she said.
Then she took a moment to analyze Jinx's scannings.
"Looks like our guest of honor is still missing..." she closed her eyes and looked into the Force.
She really had to push Kanan's teachings to the limit. Completely emptying her mind of any thought, any prejudice, any preconception she had on how things could go according to her plans.
Finally though, she found the answer she was looking for.
"Admiral Edrix, send the main fleet. The flanking force can reach us as soon as they're ready. Admiral Raddus, make the jump to hyperspace in exactly 6 minutes."
Neither flinched. They simply nodded and started to give orders to the respective fleets.
Jaral looked at Lothal in the distance.
'Hold on, Ezra. Soon, this will be over.'