Star Wars: Rebel Rising(64)

There was an odd hissing, crunching sound as Jyn docked. A few port workers rushed forward, one with a fire extinguisher hose already foaming and pointing at the ship’s hull. Jyn grabbed her few belongings and headed off the ship.

“Looks like you flew through hell,” a port worker said as a droid linked into the ship’s mainframe.

“Something like that,” Jyn said. She stared at the planet hopper glumly. She’d hoped that when she, Akshaya, and Hadder remade their lives off of Skuhl, they’d be able to use the planet hopper to do smaller runs, diversify their income, or even sell it. It was worth nothing but scrap now.

“Docking fees are—” the port worker started.

“Take the ship.” Jyn hated to say it, but whatever the fees were, she knew she couldn’t pay them, and the ship wasn’t worth it. She’d long before given Akshaya the credits she’d earned from selling the ship she’d taken from Tamsye Prime. Stupid. She should have asked for some back before they’d escaped, but it hadn’t occured to her that they’d be separated.

The port worker marked something on his file. “Your comm indicated another ship was coming?”

“Yeah.” Jyn squinted at the hull of the planet hopper.

“Will that ship be scrap as well?”

She shook her head. “There was an explosion as we entered hyperspace, and we were separated, but I’m sure everything’s fine,” she said slowly. She crept closer. The extinguisher foam was dissipating, exposing a chunk of metal that had ripped into the side of her shuttle.

“Names?” the port worker asked.

“SC3000, carrying Akshaya and Hadder Ponta,” Jyn said. Her voice sounded hollow to her own ears.

The port worker noted the names. “Confirmed: no one by those identifications has docked here yet.”

Jyn stepped past the droids clustered near the damaged hull. The metal embedded in the planet hopper was clearly a part of a ship, something ripped right off the side. The explosion…it must have hit another ship. But the metal wasn’t black like the TIE fighters that had been chasing them, nor silver and yellow like the Y-wings.

The swath of burnt, shredded metal was roughly twice as big as Jyn, the steel twisted like a claw, curled into the planet hopper. And there was writing there. Half a handpainted mandala and the letters O-N-E. All that remained of the Ponta One.

“You’ll need to register at the front desk,” the port worker called to Jyn. “I’ll put a flag on the names you said so you’ll be alerted to your family’s arrival. What was your name?”

Jyn looked up blankly.

“Your name?” the port worker pressed.

“Tanith,” Jyn said absently. Saw had trained her too well to register her real name with any authority.

“Tanith Ponta,” the port worker said, recording her name. “If you’ll come this way.”

The explosion that pushed her into hyperspace. Into safety. A ship exploding just behind her.

The Ponta One .

“Miss?” the port worker called. When Jyn didn’t move, he approached. “Are you okay, Miss Ponta?”

Jyn nodded mutely.

He moved down the row, heading toward the arrival station. Jyn followed, but she didn’t hear any of his prattling. The droids walking across the metal surface of the docking port, the chatter of workers, the hiss of tools, the glugging of fuel lines. None of it reached Jyn. For her, there was nothing but the empty, gaping maw where her heart had been.





The Five Points space station was designed like a fancy top, the kind Jyn had had when she lived on Coruscant. The wide center revolved around the axis like a gyroscope, and ships docked along the center pillar. After checking in with the droid at the entrance desk, Jyn was given a hundred credits—the worth of her broken ship in scrap metal, minus docking fees.

A giant banner emblazoned with the Imperial logo hung over the main entrance hall. Smaller posters called for volunteers to join the Imperial military, with information on how to reach the recruiter on the station. Jyn stared at the image of a proud stormtrooper bringing peace to the galaxy. She tried to feel…anything. But when she thought of the Empire—when she thought of the rebellion—she just felt numb. Their battle on Skuhl hadn’t involved Akshaya and Hadder…and yet it had killed them.

Jyn wanted to hate the Empire. She could say all the words Saw had taught her, emulate all the old hates, but it was fake. She didn’t hate the Empire. All she felt was nothing . The Empire hadn’t killed Akshaya and Hadder. The Empire plus the rebels had. The damn rebels. If Xosad and his group hadn’t shown up when they had, the Empire never would have knocked on Akshaya’s door. And did it even matter whether the Empire or the rebels had fired the shot that blew up the Ponta One ? In the end, Akshaya and Hadder were still dead.

And further back—Tamsye Prime. Would the Empire have destroyed the factories and towns had Saw not gone? Yes, Lieutenant Colonel Senjax had said that the Empire was done with production there, but it attacked because she and Saw had been there, because they were spying on the Empire. It was just as Akshaya had always said. The people of Tamsye Prime had been ants, ants the giants would have ignored. But Saw had made the giant stomp.

Jyn remembered one of the science experiments her mother had given her when she was teaching Jyn on Lah’mu. Lyra had held a bowl of acid and directed Jyn to pour in a chemical base; then they had watched as it fizzed and bubbled. The Empire was the acid; the rebels were the base. Separately, they were fine. When they met, they bubbled over into chaos and destruction and death.