But outside the city was different. Here there was no noise. Here there were just the sun and the wind and the grass and the night sky full of stars. Here, on the rolling prairies of Lothal, there was peace.
Here Ezra could be just a kid.
He felt a sudden tingle, a nudge. He could never pinpoint where it came from, whether his head, heart, or chest. Those who knew him thought he had lightning-fast reflexes. But it was more than a reflex. It was like an instinct. And it always came without warning—or more appropriately, it was a warning…that something was about to happen. Something serious.
Ezra looked around. He didn’t feel in danger. There weren’t any predators this close to the city. But he trusted this instinct. It had saved his skin too many times for him not to.
Then there was a screaming across the sky—the sound of engines being pushed to their limits. Ezra looked up to see a diamond-shaped cargo freighter, pursued by a flat-winged TIE fighter, fly overhead. The TIE closed in and fired its cannons.
The lasers shot past, as the cargo ship had started a loop. Within a few heartbeats, it was behind the TIE, adding cannon fire of its own.
These shots hit.
The freighter passed over Ezra and rocketed off into the clouds while the smoking TIE corkscrewed downward. It barely cleared a hill before making a fiery crash. The ground shook.
That little feeling nudged Ezra again. Not to go hide, but to seek. Somehow, in some way, he was connected to this crash. Maybe he could even find something of value in the wreckage.
Ezra held on to his backpack straps and ran toward the rising smoke.
Ezra crested the hill, breathing hard. Down below burned what remained of the TIE fighter. Bits and pieces lay strewn all over the charred grass. Smoke coiled out from its cracked cockpit.
Ezra scanned the land around him. He didn’t see signs that anyone else had noticed the crash. Grass rustled as it always did for miles in every direction.
He looked back at the crashed TIE. His lips curved into a crooked grin. He’d never had an opportunity like this. The TIE’s military-grade hardware could fetch a mighty price on the black market.
Ezra hurried down the hillside toward the crash site. Soon he was climbing the TIE’s broken support and swinging toward the cracked canopy. He hadn’t seen any movement inside the cockpit, but he had to make sure. If the pilot was still alive and needed help, he might be able to get a reward.
“Mister!” he shouted.
A form shifted in the cockpit, then groaned. Ezra climbed closer for a better look inside. “Hey, you okay? You alive?”
The form shifted again, turning a black helmet toward Ezra. The pilot, it seemed, was very much alive. “Get your hands off my craft! This fighter is the property of the Empire!” he yelled.
“Guess that’s a yes,” Ezra said to himself. He backed off a step to breathe. More smoke came out of the cockpit—so much that the pilot began to cough. His helmet must be damaged if it couldn’t filter out all the fumes.
The pilot hit the emergency switch to open the canopy. It popped up a few inches, then jammed.
Ezra grabbed a free edge of the cockpit, watchful for jagged shards of transparisteel, then swung himself up behind the canopy hatch. He hated helping Imperials, especially ungrateful ones. But if he didn’t get the canopy open, the man would suffocate. And then Ezra would never get a reward.
Ezra wiggled his fingers under the canopy hatch and began to yank it upward with all his strength.
“I told you to get off this ship!” the pilot said, struggling between coughs.