81 Chapter 71
Ahsoka Tano wasn't having a good day.
She had been anxious for the entire journey to Ilum and hadn't been calmed by her friends nervous ranting about failing the gathering and being sent to the agricorps.
Her friend Scout didn't have much of a connection to the force and seemed to live in constant worry about being labelled as a failure and dumped into the agricorps, the jedi orders agricultural corps, made up of those who failed there jedi trials.
Ahsoka had a stronger connection to the force than her friend and had realised early in her training that she was actually quite talented, but she couldn't help but join her friend in worrying.
The gathering was supposed to be a right of passage before younglings started their trials and so it would be quite embarrassing if you were to fail before the trials had technically even started.
Ahsoka's mood hadn't improved once she had reached the temple on the planets surface either. Ilum's oppressive cold seemed to be seeping into her bones and trying to freeze her from the inside out.
She listened to master Yoda's happy speech about how their crystal would find them through the force, and grimaced at the ending about if they didn't return from the caves with their crystal before the door froze shut, they would be trapped inside. And most likely freeze to death.
She heard her friend Scout whimper quietly from beside her, no doubt expecting that she wouldn't be able to find a crystal and would end up trapped in the caves.
Ahsoka quietly reassured her but soon they had to separate as they sprinted into the caves in search of their crystals.
The search was difficult. Ahsoka had to crawl through tunnels, jump across chasms, and scale steep cliff faces.
She was cold, scraped and bruised. But after a gruelling journey she finally had it. Her crystal!
She cradled the small green gem in the palm of her hand and giggled as she gazed at it. Gently caressing its surface in admiration.
A loud crashing noise sounded from nearby and Ahsoka was suddenly ripped form her daydreaming state and brought back to reality.
She looked around and cautiously and noticed a tunnel nearby and followed it to find a boy a few years older than her laying on the ground, a massive dead animal lying on top of him.
She peered down at the boy and wondered if he was hurt. She couldn't see his face as it was covered by a scarf pulled up to cover his mouth and a thick pair of polarized goggles, but she could tell from the way he was lying that he was probably asleep, and she was worried he might have a head injury.
She decided she would ask him if he was okay and try to figure out who he was…
That had been several minutes ago, and she was no closer to finding out than when she started.
The 'boy who claimed not to be a test but definitely was a test' groaned as he struggled to lift the dead animal of himself and Ahsoka decided to give him a hand and lifted the corpse with the force enough for the boy to slip out from underneath.
She was pretty sure what the test was now.
It was getting later and the door separating the caves from the temple would be closing soon. So, the boy in front of her must be some kind of challenge.
He was probably a padawan, like the one who had accompanied them to Ilum form the temple on Coruscant, sent to see if she would risk being trapped in the caves and freezing to death or if she would abandon a person in need.
Ahsoka saw through the charade that this padawan was trying to pull. But she would play along, for now, and help him.
She was after all a jedi. Someone who was supposed to help those in need across the galaxy, how could she turn her back on this 'definitely not a test'.
Although, Ahsoka mused in the back of her mind, he was certainly a good actor. He really did look injured and in need of help.
-
Renn gave the exited young girl a weird look as she smiled at him like she was a new employee trying to empress one of her superiors.
He rose to his feet and dusted himself off, pretending to ignore the curios girl next to him.
Renn then took a moment to glance around the cave he was in and noticed a few cracks in the wall above him, from when he and the gorgodon impacted into it.
"Sooo… now we've got you up and all… we should probably head for the exit, you know?" The young jedi said, bouncing on the balls if her feet anxiously.
"Why?" Renn asked, tilting his head curiously as he looked at the girl.
"You know… so we don't freeze?" she said looking confused.
"Oooh, right." Renn said completely ignoring the jedi's concerns as he checked his equipment.
Renn grimaced as he realised the only weapons, he had on him were a pair of vibro-knives and a small metal flick knife hidden in his boot.
His blaster pistol was probably where he had dropped it up on the ice shelf above, and his rifle was who knows were. Most likely still lodged in the dead gorgodon he had killed with it, wherever that was.
He had replacements back on his ship, but that didn't mean he wasn't annoyed about loosing them. He would probably end up looking for them after he found whatever it was that the force was guiding him to on this frozen planet.
Speaking of which the pulling sensation he had been feeling was much stronger down here, which made Renn feel like he was close to whatever it was.
Renn looked back up towards the crack in the wall above him, it seemed as though there was a passage behind it and the force was directing him to go that way.
"HEY!" the Jedi yelled and Renn realised she had been trying to get his attention, but he had been ignoring her.
"Sorry, what's up?" He asked a bit sheepishly as the girl glared at him and pouted slightly.
"I said, since you're on sacred jedi grounds and since I'm a jedi... *cough* or at least soon will be *cough* … It's my responsibility to make sure you don't get lost and hurt yourself." She said.
"Oh, okay," Renn said simply, and the girl's glare increased.
"Yeaaah, sooo, if you wouldn't mind following me to the entrance before it freezes shut, we can get out of here." The jedi told him motioning for him to follow her out of the cave.
Renn nodded but made no attempt to follow her. Instead, he moved over to the cracked wall, drawing a vibro-knife as he moved.
"HEY! What are you doing?!" The girl shouted but was once again ignored by Renn.
The crack was quite high up in the so Renn was forced to jump up to reach it. When he did, he stabbed the vibro-knife into the icy wall, using it as a climbing spike.
Renn let his body hang from the vibro-knife, as he moved his free hand towards the cracked wall.
He sent a powerful shockwave of the force straight towards the crack and a crash sounded throughout the cave as fragments of ice were blown inwards revealing a small, narrow tunnel through the ice.
Renn swung himself up and into the opening of the tunnel and ignored the jedi's protest of "No wait, that's the wrong way!" and began crawling into it.
He was just able to her the girl curse under her breath and mutter, "aww common, that idiots going to get himself killed. Then I'll definitely fail whatever test this is supposed to be." Before he heard the soft clatter of her climbing into the tunnel behind him.
-
Master Yoda, Jedi high councillor and Grandmaster of the Jedi order, was worried.
He watched the huge ice door as it slowly froze shut and tried not to grimace.
The door was designed to melt when it was hit by the sunlight reflected from lenses built into the temple's walls.
It would then refreeze as the sun began to set and the entrance to the caves would be sealed.
Normally that would be fine. The younglings assembled for the gathering would rush through the caves while looking for their kyber crystals after Yoda gave them a bit of a scare about getting trapped in the caves.
The younglings would always run off nervously but would always find their crystals and make it back before the door sealed shut, and occasionally they would learn valuable lessons that would help them when they became padawans.
All but one of the of the younglings had made it back to the temple with their crystals and that was worrying Yoda.
Not that one of the younglings hadn't returned yet, it wasn't unusual for one or two younglings to leave it till the last minute to run back through the door.
But because of the sounds that some of the other younglings had heard while they were in the caves.
Some of the younglings had heard some loud crashing sounds, like the sounds of a tunnel collapsing, and Yoda was worried the missing youngling might have got herself stuck somewhere.
"W-w-we need to look for her… S-she might be in trouble." A nervous youngling named Scout stammered from beside the diminutive Jedi master.
The youngling glanced from Yoda to the rapidly freezing entrance and back again, while worriedly chewing her fingers.
"Not necessary it is, to worry young one." Yoda said although he was feeling the opposite.
"B-but master Yoda- "Scout protested.
"Guide your friend, the force will. Interfere, we need not." Yoda said sagely, while inwardly hoping that he was right and that everything would work out.
