(From the perspective of Reva'la Tereen)
Pain brought her back.
Everything hurt. Her right lek was pinned beneath a twisted panel, and the cockpit stank of fried electronics and smoke. A distant whining hum told her the cooling coils were still venting—barely.
She blinked through the cracked visor of her helmet. Sunlight poured through the shattered canopy—two blazing orbs in a sky too clear for mercy.
Tatooine.
She groaned and pulled free, leaving blood on the console.
No signal. No backup.
Her X-wing was a ruin—half-buried in the sand, its S-foils scorched and buckled. Her mission had been simple: patrol the edge of a covert Rebel supply corridor. Imperial patrols had grown more aggressive. High Command needed eyes.
They got lasers instead.
A TIE patrol wing came out of nowhere—new model, fast, precise. She took one out. The others took her down.
---
By mid-afternoon, she'd scavenged what was left: a small sidearm, one flare, a cracked medkit, and her scout macros. Everything else was slag.
Climbing a nearby ridge felt like marching through gravity molasses. But when she reached the top, she froze.
Below, nestled in a natural valley of the dunes, was a structure.
Not a moisture farm. Not a Jawa camp. Something... else.
Sleek, sharp, glowing with blue and gold — like starships turned inside out and planted into the sand. Pylons hummed with radiant energy. Strange, almost musical resonance filled the air.
And then she saw her.
Tall. Humanoid. Silver-white hair that shimmered in the twin sunlight. Clad in armor that pulsed like a reactor core. She moved with precision—no wasted motion.
Reva'la's throat tightened.
Definitely not Imperial. But definitely not local.
An unknown.
Worse: a controlled unknown.
---
She dropped back behind the dune.
From what she saw, the tall figure commanded machines — buildings that grew from the ground, powered by energy she didn't recognize. The Jawas around her didn't seem afraid. More like… reverent.
New tech? Secret faction? Another Imperial experiment gone rogue?
The Rebellion had whispers of things like this — dark science divisions, Sith relic hunts, black ops research cells.
She checked her blaster.
If this was Imperial? She'd sabotage it.
If it wasn't?
Then someone in the Alliance had to know what was happening out here.
She looked back toward the smoke rising from her wrecked ship.
No backup. No signal. But still breathing.
That counted.