Ezra sat in the rear compartment of the Ghost’s auxiliary craft, the Phantom, as it detached from its mother ship. In the fold-out seats around him, Zeb checked his bo-rifle, Sabine put on her helmet, and Kanan stared forward at nothing.

“Going in quiet. Hang on,” Hera said from the cockpit.

The Phantom descended through the turbulent upper atmosphere of Stygeon Prime. Planetary records revealed little about the cloud-covered world, except that semi-intelligent, flat-winged creatures known as tibidees inhabited the skies. On the mountainous surface below lay the Spire, the Imperial detainment facility that held Luminara.

The Spire was supposedly impregnable, protected by blast-proof ray shields, anti-starcraft weaponry, squadrons of TIE fighters, and sensitive long-range scanners that probably would have detected the Ghost even with its stealth measures. The team had left Chopper to fly the freighter in orbit while they relied on the Phantom’s whisper-mode engines and a special jammer Sabine had rigged to stay concealed from the prison’s scanners.

“Thirty seconds,” Hera said. “Good luck.”

“Luck? We’re going to need a miracle,” Zeb said.

“Here are three,” Sabine said. She handed two thermal detonators to Zeb and one to Ezra.

Ezra turned the detonator over in his hand, careful not to touch the timer button. A thermal had the power to obliterate anything within a small radius.

“Try to stay focused,” Kanan said.

Ezra looked at Kanan. “Thought there was no try.”

Kanan frowned and looked forward again. Ezra had touched a nerve.

Hera took the Phantom on a dive and opened the rear hatch. The Spire’s searchlight broke through the clouds but missed finding the ship. All was going according to plan. Kanan took the lead and leapt out toward the prison’s sentry platform.

The plan next called for Ezra to ride piggyback on Zeb. But Ezra had made jumps like this before, like when he’d sprung onto the Ghost’s ramp with the crate of blasters and when he’d leapt from roof to roof on Garel. If Kanan didn’t believe he could make the jump, he’d show the Jedi he could.

“Kid, wait! What’re you doing…?” Zeb’s words trailed off as Ezra jumped out the hatch.

He soared through the dark clouds and saw Kanan below on the platform, looking up at him. Ezra smiled. Nothing like showing a teacher you were better than he had thought.

Ezra’s landing on the platform sure didn’t demonstrate that. The impact sent a massive jolt through his body. He staggered into the heavy blast door before collapsing on his rear.

The platform door opened briefly and four stormtroopers came out, raising their weapons at Ezra. If it hadn’t been for the others, he would have been blasted right there.

The Phantom whooshed under the platform, and Zeb hopped out, with Sabine on his back. The Lasat grabbed the platform’s edge, swung up, and smashed two stormtrooper heads together. Kanan, meanwhile, waved a hand, using the Force to hurtle the two other troopers into the door.

Ezra rose to his feet. “What just happened?” Kanan asked. “You were supposed to exit with Zeb.”

Examining the blast door’s controls, Sabine interrupted. “Door’s locked.”

“Got it.” Ezra turned to the door, took his astromech arm from his backpack, and began to pick the door lock.

The first adjustments didn’t work. Searchlights swept toward them. “Ezra…” Kanan said.

“Quiet. I’m focusing.”

Click. The blast door opened. Ezra ducked inside the corridor, followed by the others, right as the searchlight passed across the platform.

Kanan strode past Ezra into the corridor. “You’re welcome,” Ezra said.

Zeb gave Ezra a light smack that stung. “You did your job, kid. Want a medal now?”

Kanan stopped ahead. “Luminara’s here. I sense her presence. But it’s clouded....”

“First things first,” Sabine said. She plugged a decryption device into a security terminal. “I’m borrowing old footage from their datatapes so they’ll never know we’re here.”

The live feed of the corridor shown in the terminal monitor became distorted, then switched to show stormtroopers on guard.

“Nice,” Ezra said. As usual, Sabine didn’t acknowledge the compliment.

“Where’s Luminara?” Kanan asked.

Sabine fiddled with the decryptor and brought up a prison schematic on the monitor. A cell at the bottom was highlighted.

“Detention block CC01. Isolation cell 0169,” she said.

“They have isolation cells on the lower levels? We must’ve planned off outdated schematics—which means the plan changes.” Kanan waved them toward a turbolift bank. “Zeb, Sabine, you’re coming along with the kid and me.”

“Weren’t we supposed to hold our escape route here?”

Kanan pressed the lift button. “The turbolift is now our escape route. Let’s go.”

The door hissed open and they all entered. Hearing Sabine and Zeb grumble about Kanan’s plan, Ezra was glad he wasn’t the only one who questioned the Jedi’s judgment.

After a short descent, the lift doors opened. Zeb grabbed the two troopers on guard outside, yanked them into the turbolift, and knocked their helmets together. They fell unconscious onto the lift floor.

“Maintain comm silence,” Kanan said to Zeb and Sabine. “And whatever you do, hold this lift.” He walked out and Ezra followed, according to the plan.

Two more stormtroopers emerged from around the detention block corner. Kanan extended a hand and the troopers collided into the wall. They dropped and remained motionless.

“Wow. You’re not messing around tonight,” Ezra said.

Kanan ignored the comment, continuing to move down the corridor. Ezra realized he shouldn’t have expected a reply. Kanan couldn’t wait to ditch him.

A pair of stormtroopers guarded isolation cell 0169. Kanan motioned Ezra to wait in the shadows while he approached, holding up a hand. “Shouldn’t you be guarding the Jedi’s cell?” Kanan asked. “It’s on the next level.”

“It’s on the next level,” one trooper repeated.

“You better get moving,” Kanan suggested.

“We better get moving,” the second trooper said.

Ezra watched as the troopers hastened away from the cell, down the corridor. Had Kanan just used the Force to influence their minds?

“When do I get to learn that?” Ezra asked. He came forward with his astromech arm to pick the cell door lock.

“Luminara will teach you,” Kanan said. He nudged Ezra aside and ignited his lightsaber, then sliced through the door’s lock. With a gesture of his hand, he flicked the door open.

Ezra and Kanan entered the narrow cell. At the other end, a stasis field held a female Mirialan in prisoner’s fatigues who resembled the Jedi Master in the news report.

“Is it really her?” Ezra asked.

“Yes, but…” Kanan hesitated. “Something’s wrong.”

He walked closer to Luminara and reached a hand into the field. “Master?”

There was a charge of static, the stasis field dissolved, and Luminara disappeared, replaced by a skeleton floating in a sarcophagus. Kanan inhaled in shock. She had been a hologram.

“I don’t understand,” Ezra said.

“It doesn’t seem complicated,” said a sinister voice.

Ezra and Kanan whirled. A man all in black entered the cell. His face was as white as a wraith’s, offset by glowing yellow eyes. On his bald head and stark cheeks were pointed markings inked in the color of human blood.

He waved his hand as Kanan had done, and the door shut behind him. He pulled a disc off his back, shifted its shape, and ignited one end into a lightsaber.

Unlike Kanan’s, his blade was red.

“I am the Inquisitor. Welcome,” he said with a smile that wasn’t welcoming at all.