Star Wars: Rebel Rising(21)

“It wasn’t—it was just—” Jyn started, but a magnetic charge collar was snapped around her neck, and it became difficult to swallow, let alone talk. In moments, her hands were cuffed and two stormtroopers with stun prods stood in front of her.

The first stormtrooper bent down, picking up the happenstance knife. He held it loosely in his palm, testing the weight, and then he turned to Jyn.

“You were going to use this as a weapon,” he accused.

Jyn shook her head frantically.

“Call the warden,” the stormtrooper said.



It was three hours into the night shift when the stormtroopers dumped Jyn’s battered body onto the floor of her prison cell. Zorahda started awake, staring as Jyn struggled to stand and make it to her bed. She did not move to help Jyn. She didn’t show sympathy or compassion. It hadn’t taken long to learn that lesson.





Jyn was never sure when it happened that Wrea became less her and Saw’s home and more of a headquarters for Saw’s cadre of partisans. Xosad left, but Jari and the others stayed. Some of Reece’s people came back, saying they’d rather take orders from someone with actual experience. Idryssa sent some new recruits. Saw took them all—if they proved themselves worthwhile. It was typical for there to be at least a half dozen or more people staying at the outpost. Some came and left quickly, and Jyn never saw them again. Others stayed.

Jyn struggled to maintain her daily regime of training as Wrea grew crowded. When Saw was home, there was always a handful of people who joined her for sparring matches and target practice. She was distinctly aware of the way they tried to show off for Saw, of the way they wanted to catch his eye.

“They never bother when you’re gone,” she grumbled to him in a rare moment of privacy as she shaved his head for him, a task she’d taken over when she proved far more adept at it than he.

Saw laughed. “Are you saying you want me gone?”

Jyn punched him in the arm. “They’re trying to impress you,” she said, exasperated.

Saw had laughed again, but Jyn didn’t think he really noticed the effect he had on others. He assumed the new recruits were hanging around Wrea because they believed in his cause; he didn’t fully understand that they just believed in him.

On the bright side, there was a lot to learn from the newcomers. She was not too proud to admit that Codo was a better fighter; whenever she could, she’d request him as a sparring partner and try to learn his moves. Maia was slender and quiet, but no one had better aim. Staven knew ballistics. Jyn followed them around, learning as she could.

Because a small part of her—a part that she wanted to keep hidden even from herself—wanted to impress Saw, too. As more and more people came to Wrea, vied for his attention, forced him into the role of both leader and mentor, Jyn longed for the days when it had been just the two of them.

Saw was changing, too, seemingly before her eyes. He left on more and more missions, and Jyn had nothing to do but stand by the comm, waiting to hear word from him, hoping the worst hadn’t happened yet. It took everything in her not to comm him when all she got was silence, but she knew her role. She kept her vigil.

He had been gone for a week when he came back from a mission with fresh wounds on his face and a badly broken leg. Jyn tried to ask him what happened, but he just grunted that the mission was a success and dismissed her worry. His leg bothered him, though, and as he was stuck at the outpost while it healed, he snapped at everyone. Including Jyn. She was actually glad when he finally left for another mission, and that feeling hollowed her out.

“What’s wrong, little one?” asked Maia, who’d been at the outpost for over four months by then.

Jyn hung her legs over the edge of the island, staring down at the little grotto where some of the boys were swimming. The sun was starting to set.

“Everything’s changing,” she said sullenly.

“Everything usually does,” Maia said.

“I don’t like it,” Jyn said.

Maia flexed her hands, and Jyn couldn’t help noticing the synthskin gloves she had taken to wearing. She’d won them in a bet against Codo, and she enjoyed showing them off whenever there was a chance he might notice. Sure enough, Codo tried to splash them with water from his position in the sea. It didn’t reach them, but Maia laughed at the shouted curses that followed.

“Saw means something special to you, doesn’t he?” Maia asked Jyn after Codo and the other boys had swum off.

Jyn shrugged. She couldn’t deny it, but she didn’t want to say it out loud, either.

“Saw means something to a lot of people,” Maia said when Jyn didn’t answer her. “I heard about him as a hero of Onderon, from my godfather, Lux. Staven’s family was saved when Saw organized a supply run past Imperial blockades to feed them. Saw fought in the Clone Wars; he’s fought in battles since then. He’s half legend.”

Jyn sniffed.

“But,” Maia added, “while Saw means something to all of us, you mean something to him.”

Jyn’s head whipped around, but she didn’t know what to say. Maia nodded knowingly.

“Don’t doubt that, little one,” she said. “Sometimes I think you’re the only one he really cares about.”

“Oy!” someone called from the ladder that descended to the sea. The boys were climbing back up from the grotto. Staven made his way over to Maia and Jyn, his blue hair dripping wet. “We’re taking a break, you want in?”