━━┛ 𝐅𝐎𝐔𝐑┗━━

━━┓'𝐨𝐮𝐭𝐥𝐚𝐰' ┏━━

𝐅𝐎𝐔𝐑 𝐘𝐄𝐀𝐑𝐒 𝐋𝐀𝐓𝐄𝐑

━━ ★ ━━

. . . KEREN CITY, NABOO

The evening sun was only just beginning to set when Cora was caught.

There was a dull sound of an alarm, and it was only seconds before the door to the room slid open. A uniformed guard was looking at her, very red in the cheeks.

"I'm only gonna ask this once." He lifted a blaster pistol, wrapping a pudgy finger around the trigger. There was some relief on his face at finding her alone and not with a group of thieves. "Put your hands above your head."

She complied, side eyeing the telescopic lens that was sitting on the desk. The blindingly rich man who owned it couldn't possibly understand what he had, or how badly Cora needed it.

Through her voice modulator, she said, "Behind you."

His mustache wiggled as he smirked. "Valiant effort. I'm not falling for that."

"No?" she asked, stalling for time. The doorframe behind him was almost at the right distance for this to work. She took a small step back, and he took the same forward. "That's unfortunate. I was going to let you off the hook, too."

"There is no hook in anyone except you," he said, proud for coming up with such a comment.

In the space of a blink, she grabbed the lens off the desk and shoved it into the bag at her waist, jumping up and using the desk as a vault. Launching her body up, she kicked out into his stomach and made a mad dash for the doorway. Sure enough, there were more footsteps already thundering down the carpeted hall in her direction.

Cora glanced to the side. Through her goggles, she could see the heat signatures of an approaching group of guards. This had to be the best-guarded mansion in Keren, because not half as much effort was being put into keeping the streets free of crime.

No matter, though. Taking the past of least resistance, Cora ran until her boots thudded down a cracked marble staircase and onto the streets. The dark facade of the mansion loomed behind her until she turned down an alleyway and out of its sight.

The streets of Keren were busier now than they had been an hour prior. Emboldened without the light of day, more people took to the streets. Especially in this part of town, there were less RSF patrols after dark.

In the distance the bright lights of Kwilaan Starport glowed. Cora would be heading off there later to catch the last repulsor transport of the day back to Theed, but right now she continued down the winding narrow streets to the doors of a dimly lit garage. It was all old routine at this point; she had often thought of leaving Naboo for the worlds that awaited beyond, but still she stayed.

Breathless, she lifted her fist and knocked twice on the side door.

A small slit slid open. "We're closed."

"Even for me?" she simpered.

A pair of eyes appeared at the opening. "Especially for you."

The lock clicked at the same time as a buzzer rang and the door slid upwards. Ronan Obrim put his hands on his hips. "You're late."

Cora patted him on the chest before stepping past and through the doorway. "I'm never late."

Immediately, her lungs were flooded with engine fuel and spray paint fumes. Beneath the fluorescent lights, Arlie, Ronan's twin sister, sat working at the table. There were tools scattered everywhere, droid parts and half-assembled engines amid sawdust and metal shavings.

"Anika," Arlie greeted without looking up. "What did you break this time?"

"I didn't break anything," Cora argued.

Ronan snorted. He picked up an apple off of one of the long workbenches and took an obnoxious bite. "Don't tell me you just dropped in to say hello."

Cora pulled the electronic goggles out of her bag. "They just need a little tuning up, I didn't break them."

Arlie sighed, grabbing it up with nimble fingers and examining it in the light. "Lovely. I just fixed these last week!"

Cora put a small stack of credits down in front of her. "This should cover it."

Arlie's green eyes met hers. "Too much, Anika."

"Never for you, love," she said with a grin.

Used to this by now, she pushed aside what she was currently working on and tucked a strand of her long red hair behind her ear. "An expedited repair, then. It's only fair."

The goggles were too important to spend anything less.

Around a year into working as Cygnus, Cora started to get serious about the assignments. The helmet had always been too big for her, so her solution had been to find someone who would be able to resize it. She had wandered around Keren, still so new to the whole concept of working against the law of Imperial Naboo. The Obrim's garage looked perfect: a building in terrible condition on a street that was never busy. It had been Connell Obrim, the twin's father, who had first taken her repair request. After resizing the inner fittings on the helmet, Cora became enthralled with the technology. The goggles were what Arlie had dubbed AJ 3.0, a new attempt at lightening her load on longer assignments. Instead of a helmet, they enabled her to wear a half mask up to her eyes and a thick hood. With the goggles on, Cygnus remained anonymous.

She hadn't even given them her real name, just in case they were ever to get a little too curious about what she used the technology for. Anika Rees was a low-class slicer who took odd jobs for the merchant class who needed someone to cover their electronic tracks. It was not the first time Cora had used a fake name, but the identity of Anika was still her favorite one to disappear into. Here in Keren, she was never Cora Grené, daughter of politics and the glowing landscape of the lakes. She was Anika, a shadow on the streets of a crime-ridden city. Utterly invisible and utterly free.

Cora wandered over to the far side of the garage while Arlie worked. Ronan followed, still eating the apple. Together they stood in front of the speeder that was parked in the corner.

"Will it be ready for the next race?" Cora asked, marveling at the broken machine. "I hate to tell you this, but I think you're missing half of it."

Ronan gave a noise of distaste and ran a hand over his buzzed red hair. "No, it's gonna take me longer than I thought to finish it. Besides, I almost got busted by the RSF last weekend."

Cora snorted. At the last Keren Street Race, she had dragged Sammy with her to watch. It had been a dangerous, impulsive decision that could have blown multiple covers, but it felt like a necessary choice. "Yeah, I was there. I watched you take out that lady's bins on the corner. I've never seen so much rubbish fly into the air before."

Ronan's cheeks reddened. For his tough exterior, there was always something in him a little more wholesome than he ever let on. "I dunno what was more terrifying: the two RSF lads coming after me or that little old lady picking up her shoe and chucking it at me."

Once the repair was done, Cora set off and back into the night. She had run this route so many times, it was almost like a routine. It wasn't a glamorous double life, nothing like the spies in the holofilms that Melia had started to become obsessed with. This was all very real.

It wasn't rare that her assignments required a drop off. Lately, much of the information she was gathering came in the form of hard-copy files that needed to be brought from point A to point B without suspicion.

The lens she had stolen was not just a lens, but doubled as a holochip with a data transfer between Rebellion cells. On it was information on the last cycle of Imperial activity on Naboo's moons. It was supposed to have been in the right hands ages ago, but somewhere along the line it had been accidentally pawned off and sold as an antique in an auction. The man who had acquired it thought it to be a lovely decoration for his desk.

"The building should be on the left," AJ told her through the mask. "The drop location is just through the second set of doors."

As she approached, her sight in the googles shifted to a heat signature view, and Cora saw the outline of a person through the walls. They paced slightly, shifting with nerves.

Her footsteps were soundless as she drifted in through the dilapidated building. From the looks of it, it might have been an old Imperial factory abandoned after it was continuously attacked and vandalized by insurgents in Keren.

The man didn't jump or give any indication of surprise when they turned to face her. It was a man with graying hair, middle aged and wearing a drab outfit of graying linen. She had a suspicion that this was someone from the Rebellion; it wasn't the first time a contact had wanted to oversee the drop off themselves.

"Lovely evening for a walk," he greeted.

"A storm's on the way tomorrow," she answered.

He nodded at the code. "You keep the mask on, I presume?" His accent didn't match his outfit; it was upper class Naboo, crisp and sharp.

Cora spoke through the voice modulator. "You have to understand how dangerous this is for you to be here." Her uniform was intentionally full of loose lines that did nothing to reveal her figure. It was safer to be thought of as a bounty hunter on the streets than a young woman in a costume. "I wasn't informed I was going to be meeting anyone in person."

His expression darkened. "We can't be too careful, especially not now. Not after what happened to Leia Organa. Everything is balancing on a very precarious line."

Leia Organa was nearly the same age as Cora. She hadn't seen her since that day at the Vu's household years ago. "What happened to the Princess?"

"Captured by Imperials. Bail is sparing no expense to have her found. This isn't the first time something like this has happened, but allegedly she was carrying something very important on board her ship. Plans powerful enough to bring down the Empire. All talk, but all very true, I'd wager."

"It's dangerous to speak of such things here," Cora warned. This man was a fool. Every wall had ears.

"It's dangerous to speak of them anywhere. What is the point to all of this if we cannot speak plainly?"

A devoted fool, then. "If we're killed before we gain our freedom, then there is no point."

When he smiled, lines creased near his eyes. "You've made quite a name for yourself, Cygnus. I'm not here on behalf of anyone, but I know I speak for a large part of the Rebellion when I say your deeds haven't gone unnoticed."

Her heart seized, and her guard dropped. "Really?"

His brow furrowed, surprised to hear such an honest bid for approval. "The information you've gathered has been indispensable. I hear only second hand, but I know the assignments are not always simple. You incur a great deal of risk."

"So do we all," Cora said simply, withdrawing the lens and placing it in his waiting hand. Now it was time to go. No more delusions of what could or couldn't be done. Princess Leia was missing, and that was the end of it. An issue for someone else, someone more important.

"You have a place in the Rebellion, Cygnus," the man told her as she walked away. "Not just behind a mask, either."

When Cora turned again, he was gone.

★

...OUTSKIRTS OF THEED, NABOO

Cora wanted nothing more than to lie curled up on a very soft couch with a bowl of strawberries from the Tseng's fields, but the look on her mother's face when she walked in the door to the house told her that the day was not about to go as planned.

"Late night at work?" Lyranna asked, a little too chipper. She leaned on the counter, and in the dim light of the kitchen, she still looked timeless.

"Always," Cora answered. She could feel her eyes threatening to drop closed even as she stood there. "What's going on?"

"Nothing, nothing." She waved a gentle hand. "I have a dinner to go to tonight, and I thought it would be good for you to join me."

Now Cora was very skeptical. "Oh?"

"There's no catch, before you ask. You used to love going to these things with me."

"Yes, when I was eight." The food was always very good.

"I rarely see you anymore, Cora. If you aren't busy tonight, at the very least it's a free meal," Lyranna bargained. Her patience was beginning to fray.

There was something honest in her tone, though, and it made Cora believe that her mother wanted her to go with her. The craving for approval shot through her like a diseased vine clawing at her throat. "Alright."

After a long nap and a shower, Cora felt like herself again which wasn't exactly reassuring. The blue dress that she wore fit her perfectly, and the way the sleeves hung obscured the bruise blooming on her arm from a run-in with a wall. In the mirror, she was still the daughter of Orpheus and Lyranna. It was comfortable, easy, and everything she used to want. But it was no longer her.

The party was the same as they always were. It took place in the reception room in one of the luxurious homes that lined the streets near Theed University. This one was particularly gorgeous. The vaulted ceilings were gilded with charted stars, the marble staircase was polished to a high shine, and floral blooms filled every available surface to the point of the sweetness being almost sickening. Cora felt expensive as her shoes glided over the floors. A boy her age stared at her from across the room, and Cora winked her dark lashes. He turned immediately away, too full of decency to admit he had been gawking at her chest. It was all so predictable, so Cora let her idle thoughts drift to the best way of scaling the side of the ornate banister column.

Lyranna sighed. "The woman who owns this house must have bought out the whole florist. What a waste of good flowers."

Cora's eyes widened, surprised at her mother's honesty. She allowed an unsteady laugh to pass between her lips. "The smell almost makes me think they're trying to cover something up."

Lyranna let out a bark of genuine laughter, and Cora thought that this night might not be so bad after all.

She was corralled into a conversation with a woman she vaguely recognized as a former partner that had retired from her mother's law firm. Lyranna stood next to her, guiding the conversation with practiced ease.

Very rarely could Cora imagine her mother when she was her age. All of that work as the head of Padmé Amidala's security sounded like the life of someone else. Someone far more rebellious and maybe a little more ruthless. It was moments like these when Cora saw it seeping out of the perfectly sculpted edges of Lyranna Grené.

"And what is Cora doing now?" the woman asked brightly, speaking in the third person as if Cora weren't standing right in front of her.

Cora's lips twisted into an automatic frown. She never had been very good at hiding her emotions.

"She's working as an apprentice with a clerk," her mother answered, eyes dancing with a warning. Let me talk for you.

"I hear Addington is hiring, I'm sure there are better options out there for her," her voice warbled, unimpressed.

"The insurance firm?" Cora almost laughed.

The woman blinked as if noticing Cora for the first time. "Why yes, I'm sure they'd be more than willing to take a university student on at an entry level position–"

"I dropped out," Cora interrupted loudly.

She blinked. "Oh, well, I guess I hadn't heard."

"Do you take issue with someone who dropped out?" Cora asked, voice cutting too loud. The conversations around them fell to hushed silence. All of these people were socialite vipers, just waiting for a taste of gossip.

"Of course not," the woman laughed awkwardly. "Surely, you must understand that options for your future will be limited. But, that will mean nothing in the long run. You'll have a family of your own to worry for soon enough."

"And even if I do, who is there to say that I can't have a career?"

She laughed again, this time confused. There was a smudge of red lipstick on her teeth. "Who would care for the children?"

"I don't know," Cora sighed demurely. "Perhaps my incompetent husband, yes?"

"Cora," Lyranna warned. Gone was any of her laughter, replaced by the cold ice of her blue eyes.

"Don't worry," Cora said bitterly. "I'll excuse myself now."

She heard the conversation continue on behind her. "Melia is already doing so well in her courses, isn't she? Tell me again what it is that bright mind of hers is studying."

Fire burned in her chest until she felt ill. Cora had been a hopeful fool to think that her mother had only wanted to spend time with her daughter. No, this night was only about keeping up appearances.

She swiped another glass of blossom wine from the table and downed it on her way outside, setting the empty glass on a tray of dirty dishes about to be taken back into the kitchen. None of this would be happening if Orpheus was still alive.

He would be disappointed in you, too, the voice in the back of her mind echoed.

To be unknown to her own family was something difficult to grow accustomed to. For the last four years, Cygnus had lived in her chest. A long time ago she made a promise to Sammy that she would stop and that she could let it go, but then there was another assignment and another message waiting on the transceiver. The smart solution would have been to throw it in the pond, but the solution she chose was to answer the call. It was an addiction, just as bad as the gambling halls in Keren.

She had begun to attend Theed University much like her mother had, but the role of Cygnus had started to encroach on any time she should have spent studying. Long nights toiling in the library no longer felt worth the credits she was paying to attend such an institution, so she left after six months. Dropped out. Took up a clerical job that no one would ask about and saved her pitiful salary for these expeditions to Keren, the quiet nights creeping through Theed, the afternoons tailing the upper class through Kaadara. When she came home after long nights at the office, her mother looked at her with eyes filled with disappointment and loss.

"Twenty years old and you're still acting as a child would," Phoebe would tell Cora. "Abusing your power like this, you're just as bad as those foolish Jedi."

Still, there was some understanding that came from an all-knowing aunt. Some nights–more now than ever when Cora couldn't face her mother–Phoebe would leave the door to her cottage unlocked and Cora would sleep on the spare bed.

Melia was fifteen and already taking classes at the university. Tamis was now a ranked Commander and a pilot so well known, people stopped him on the street to thank him when he walked through Theed.

Cora was the middle daughter, and that was no longer enough.

You have a place in the Rebellion, Cygnus. It echoed against her chest with a fledgling of hope. She hadn't stopped thinking of his words since last night. It had taken a little digging, but with AJ's access to parts of the Rebel database, she found that the last known sighting of Leia Organa was on a flagship docked above Tatooine.

Cygnus had received no new assignments since, which was also strange. All signs pointed to something very big about to happen. It was just like the tide running out. Eventually, a wave was going to strike with a vengeance.

Cora could either stay here on Naboo and wait in comfort and luxury, or she could leave tonight and forgo it all. Possibly for a very long time.

The choice was not very difficult to make.

★

. . .TATOOINE, ARKANIS SECTOR

The Corellian-built passenger transport that had delivered her from Theed to Mos Espa had been cramped, but at least she knew it wasn't going to fall apart at any second. The next leg of the trip wasn't half as comfortable, which was saying something. Tatooine public transportation conditions were shoddy at best. The repulsor train to Mos Eisley was known for efficiency, but certainly not comfort. She had to keep a white-knuckle grip on the armrests to keep from falling over as they bumped along the landscape, and she now had more saddle sores than she had ever gotten from riding a gualaar.

By the time she finally got into the center of Mos Eisley, she was tired and thirsty and ultimately regretting her resolve to leave home in the first place. Still, she turned the corners of the same path she knew well until she finally reached the doorway of the cantina.

Even though the cantina was the seediest place Cora had ever set foot in, it was the safest she had felt all day.

No one turned their head as she walked in, a sure sign that she had accidentally blended into the desert. Her outfit was doused in sand and sweat, and there was no reason to think she wasn't native to this hell of a planet; even the weapons at her waist raised no alarm. She carried her slim goggles in her backpack, AJ safely stowed and out of sight.

Cora gingerly slid onto the least dusty stool at the bar and let her tense muscles relax. The bartender was on the other side of the room, and at first, he barely paid any mind to the patron that had just taken a seat. He was absently cleaning out a glass with a rag, chatting amiably with a few of the men on the other side.

As soon as he turned around, his eyes lit up.

"Is that really Cora?"

All noise stopped for a few seconds as heads turned. Cora shrank under the attention. Her plan had been to find out what she could on Tatooine under the guise of Anika Rees. "Hey Uncle Maro." She couldn't stop her lips from twisting up into a grin.

His dark hair was streaked with gray, but his weathered skin was tan with the glow of youth. He looked every bit the rebellious younger brother he had decided to be, and she was pleased to see that nothing had changed.

"How're you doin' kiddo?" he laughed, setting down the glass and standing in front of her. "Where's your mom? I'm assuming you didn't come all the way out here alone."

Cora gave an awkward laugh. "You would assume, wouldn't you."

Maro snorted, giving her mercy and asking no further questions. He poured a glass of a ruby red liquid and mixed it with something clear before setting the drink down in front of Cora. "That's no small passage to make on your own."

"Yeah, well," Cora said. Now that she had to sit down and explain her reasoning, the I came to try and save a princess because she was captured by the Empire explanation just didn't sound right. "Is this soda and--?"

"Soda water and grenadine, with a tiny bit of meiloorun juice," Maro finished with a prideful nod. He tapped his forehead. "You thought I forgot about your signature drink?"

When she was little, the times she and her family visited Maro's bar she had heaved her little body up onto a stool and demanded that she get a drink, too. Maro had only laughed and handed her what he dubbed the 'Cora drink'. It was still one of her favorites, and she had never been able to figure out exactly how he made it so perfectly each time. She hadn't been to Tatooine in years, and it tasted exactly the same.

"So tell me," Maro leaned in and his expression turned serious. "Why are you all the way out on Tatooine? Your mother isn't with you, is she?"

Cora frowned at the happy anticipation behind his eyes. Lyranna no longer thought it was worth it to visit her younger brother. To be fair, their relationship had always been strained after their parents cut Lyranna off from the Aurelia name. That was a long time ago, but Lyranna's pride never ceased. Maro hated traveling off planet, and Lyranna hated Tatooine.

"She isn't, no." Cora set the drink down after taking two long gulps to quench her dehydration. "I'm investigating a lead."

"Are you an intergalactic super spy now?"

"No," Cora sighed. "There's just something dad left behind that I want to put to rest. I thought that I would find what I needed when I got here."

Admitting defeat not even an hour after setting foot in Mos Eisley was not a good way to begin this journey.

"That's how people usually end up in this sand trap," Maro told her sagely. "Let me know if I can be of any help while you're here. You're always welcome to a room at the house."

"Ay, Maro!" A gruff voice called. "Another round!"

"That's my cue," Maro told her. "See you around?"

"See you around," Cora smiled.

She drained the rest of the glass and set it back on the counter, thinking hard about her next move. Mos Eisley was the best place to look for information, but she wasn't going to find any of it sitting inside a dimly lit bar.

Pulling a piece of paper out from her pocket and scribbling a note on it for her uncle, Cora slid back from the stool and started to walk back towards the exit. The booths were all full and crowded, except for the far one, which was occupied by a sole figure with a hooded cape. As she walked past, Cora couldn't shake the feeling of being watched.

"Cora Grené."

Cora whipped her head around to face the source of the voice. Her hand drifted to the blaster pistol that was concealed at her side, but the woman under the cape shook her head.

"Don't even try it," She said, and the corners of her mouth twitched up into a ghost of a grin. The cloak shifted and a shadowed face came into view. Pale skin against hair white as snow, there were fine lines in her face that were beginning to show from age.

"How did you know–"

"A bad question to ask."

Cora frowned, letting her arms fall to her sides. "Any question is a good one for a stranger."

Finally, the woman laughed and shook off the hood on her head to reveal a shockingly white head of hair. "Please, take a seat."

Cora, realizing that she didn't have a choice, sat down across from the woman. "What is an Echani doing on Tatooine?"

"What is the daughter of Lyranna Grené doing on Tatooine?"

"You know, not all of us appreciate having our name and family line blurted out in a crowded bar." Cora sized her up but got nothing. She looked like she could have either been in her fifties or not a day over thirty five.

The woman shrugged. "Fair enough." Her voice lilted with the remnants of a faded accent. "You answer my question first, and then I'll answer yours. Why are you here?"

"My uncle owns the cantina." Cora gestured at the bar where Maro was busily pouring another drink. "I came to visit him. My mother rarely lets us see him, always said he was a bad influence, so I came alone."

"Hm," the woman said, leaning back with languid ease. "You are a good liar, I must say."

"Something tells me you don't believe me. Why would I tell the full truth to someone I've never met before?" Cora countered. Her heart was racing. Who was this woman?

"Maro knows me," the woman said. She leaned forward and waved, catching Maro's eye from where he stood at the bar. He grinned and raised a hand in return. "There, is that better?"

"Not really, my uncle makes friends easily," Cora groused. "I don't even know your name."

"Now that is an easy question to answer," she said simply, folding her hands on the table. "I'm Wynn."

━━ ★ ━━

a/n it's here!! a new hope!!

this chapter was really interesting to work out just because its the first big characterization of Cora as an adult.  she's kind of playing the wayward daughter role here, and her time as Cygnus is going to have big implications once she meets up with the rebellion.

if the name 'wynn' means nothing to you, that is a-ok!  she's part of my star wars universe, but I've written all three books to be stand-alones, so you'll learn everything you need to know in the following chapters.  if the name wynn does mean something to you, then surprise!  I know 'green light' hasn't run its course yet so the way the plots line up might make zero sense, but just trust me on this one.

up next: the fated introduction of one luke skywalker : )

--nat <3