Saga of the Bridgers-Year 4

Chapter 6: The Occupation

Despite many efforts to find any other clue about this super-weapon, little progress was made. Jaral asked Kallus to dig into the darkest corners of his memory if he knew anything about imperial weapons projects that required kyber crystals. Kallus only recalled that the Empire had hypothesized a new type of turbolaser ran by the crystals, but the project had been discarded because of the rarity of the resource in question.

Still, it meant that the Empire was trying to weaponize the crystals, and this was bad in itself.

In the meantime, Ezra finally got promoted. The rank of Commander was still quite far from the high ranks, but now he had enough responsibilities to get a job in the Command room, basically becoming an assistant and advisor for Jaral. For the young woman, her brother was definitely a huge boost in morale. Having him around, supporting her and taking all the menial tasks out of her mind, always knowing when she needed help even for the smallest thing.

One could say that now it was Ezra the one overbearing, as he had to balance between the new job, his Jedi training (though, at this point, Kanan wasn't teaching anything anymore, because they were at a stage where they were both learning from experience) and his wife, who was busy with her own tasks anyhow.

In fact, Sabine had taken the time to change her looks again, now pointing much more on a darker tone. Her hairs had become pitch black and only one point was purple. The armor was a mixture of light purple, yellow and some orange.

April 3.

While Jaral was with Raddus, planning a new series of raids along the Perlimian Trade Route, she received an urgent communication from the Constantinople and she picked it up.

"Jari," the hologram of Jordan said. "We are receiving a transmission from Earth. I think it's time..."

Ezra was nearby and he heard that as well. The siblings exchanged an excited gaze.

"Go get the crew." Jaral said with a hint of enthusiasm.

"Yes, ma'am." Ezra replied eagerly and rushed outside.

"Dad, can you reach Ryder on Lothal?" she asked in the meantime.

"Actually, I wanted to talk about it. Remember when, on Atollon, the Empire managed to prevent even our quantum communications? It seems like they're doing the same on Lothal."

Jaral hummed, then decided who she wanted to call. She called in Darvos, so he could encrypt the call to Nimbus. The Mirialan appeared a few moments later.

"Grand Marshall Bridger." she said amicably. "What can I do for you?"

"Hope you're doing well, Nimbus. I need any intel you can sell me about Lothal."

The Mirialan quickly tapped the buttons on her own device and sent a file to Jaral's omni-tool.

"There isn't much, actually. The occupation is a complete lockdown, I myself have only a small team cooperating with the resistance, but they only managed to send short messages from time to time."

"Maybe we have something..." Darvos mumbled as he checked his datapad.

"What do you have?" Jaral asked.

"Before you called me I was unfolding a message we received from Lothal...and it looks like...yeah, it's from Ryder!" he exclaimed at the end.

Jaral barred her eyes, but recomposed immediately. "Ok, let's wait for everybody else, then we'll play the message."

That didn't come too late. Ezra was pretty much galloping into the room, followed by the others. Even Mon Mothma showed up around the holotable.

When everybody was accounted for, Jaral gave the permission to proceed.