The Jedi From Earth: A Star Wars Story #Wattys2023

Part 194

*****Gettysburg bunker, July 2nd 2016

Johnson had spent the past few days reading over her Independence Day speech after her speechwriter made corrections she suggested. She wanted to send a message of unity and strength across the nation, and the world. Yet she also wanted to not come across as detached as some of the Democrats and members of her own party had accused her of, to which she always shrugged off their insinuations since they were not true. For her speech she wanted to remind the nation that two hundred and forty years earlier, a rag tag band of rebels led by some of the most brilliant men of their time fought a revolution for the freedom of their country from a foreign power. That once more the whole nation was fighting for its freedom, and to ensure that the ideals of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness and that all human beings are born free and equal would not stamped out without a fight. That these were values that the Empire detested, and feared.

  Though as she was reading over her speech there was a knock at the door. "Yes?" She called out and the door opened. The aide looked in and spoke, "ma'am the Secretary Of Defense needs to see you, he said it's urgent". Johnson was slightly taken aback since she hadn't arranged any meeting with Matthews that day. "Well if it's urgent then send him in" she said with a little authority in her tone while setting the speech down before Matthews walked in with the aide shutting the door behind her. "Morning James, what do you have that's urgent?" Johnson asked while Matthews sat in front of her desk and fumbled through his files. "Well, today the Empire tried to hit the Golden Gate Bridge with their bombers" Matthews said.

   Johnson mentally braced for what she knew could be bad news, "and? Did they succeed?" She asked cautiously. "Nope, I called the several of our subs in the Bay Area up and said 'you go ahead and blow those bastards out of the air'" Matthews said in a serious tone but Johnson smiled slightly, she found the way that Matthews said some things so seriously to be humorous, but she also knew him to be a man who did not mess around. "I hope that was ok, you're the boss and all" Matthews said while gesturing at Johnson with the folder he handed her. "Oh you don't have to check with me on every little decision James, if you think that whatever it is is important enough for my attention then don't hesitate to tell me, but something like that you can decide on it" Johnson replied while opening the file that had a big "Classified" in big red letters stamped on it.

Inside the file was a plain letter from Dr. Grayson at Area 51, it simply stated, "the other one (the girl) was woken up by the boy somehow, she claims to have seen Contact Zero in a vision during the duration of her comatose state". Johnson couldn't believe it, it was difficult enough to explain how the boy had somehow been brought out his sixty nine year slumber out of nowhere, but here the girl who was with him had been able to see things during then too it seemed. Johnson looked back up at Matthews, "when was this?" She asked with a perplexed tone. "Yesterday, it reached me this morning" Matthews replied, "what do you want Doctor Grayson to do in the meantime?".

    "Keep the girl there as well, I'd rather not stress her further by separating her from the boy, since they crashed her together" Johnson said while handing the file back, "but have Grayson monitor them in the meantime but don't treat them like lab rats or prisoners either, let them outside every now and then". Matthews nodded, "yes ma'am, I'll see that Doctor Grayson is told this" he replied. When he didn't immediately stand up Johnson knew that he had something else to report, "what else do you have?" She asked. Matthews sighed a little then spoke, "well I've been told that Riosovsky's niece has been assigned liaison to the Alliance, to the crew of the ship that helped push back the Empire from Buffalo".

     Johnson was slightly taken aback at that. Riosovsky was a man who while ruthless was known to care for his family very much, she knew that from intelligence reports and from personal experience, having only met his youngest son and seen how attentive Riosovsky was to him. Though she had never heard anything about his other relatives besides he had an older brother who commanded the Baltic Fleet, and his oldest nephew was in the Aerospace Forces. Now this niece of his meant that he had essentially the ultimate bug in the room, a member of his own family whom he seemed to trust greatly. "Hm, I see" Johnson said, "why don't I ask him myself about this" she continued while picking up the phone.