Dedicated to LiebeKlara

     "When one chooses to walk the Way of the Mand'alor, you are both hunter and prey, a woman states. "Our secrecy is our survival. Our survival is our strength."

     "I see the bond the three of you share," a man says.

     "The foundling is in your care," the woman continues. "By Creed, until it is of age or reunited with its own kind, you are as its mother and father."

     "These two are extremely gifted...and have been blessed with rare properties that have the potential to bring order back to the galaxy," the man adds.

     The hum of a lightsaber cuts through the darkness, as does the crackle of electricity, and Mandalorian Jedi Kyra Kryze-Kenobi recognizes her own voice as she whispers, "You...you have to finish this. Go kick his Imperial ass."

     "This is the Way," another man replies, his voice thick with emotion.

     Kyra abruptly sits up in bed as she recognizes the Mandalorian's voice, which has been occupying her dreams for the past four years. Kyra runs a hand over her face and reluctantly stands, knowing she will not be able to get back to sleep. Her body – worn down from twenty-eight years of near-constant warfare – creaks and groans as she stretches. Kyra sighs and takes a shower, a luxury she can afford thanks to her success as a moisture farmer. After pulling on a pair of tan pants and brown boots, Kyra stares at the scars that cover the majority of her torso, the once-red lesions now a more subtle pink. Because her battered body requires frequent medical treatment, Kyra has created a successful side business in manufacturing her own bacta.

     Sadly, making bacta was about as exciting as moisture farming, and Kyra quickly found herself yearning for the life she once had. After she and Commander Alexsandr Kallus had fled Nevarro, he brought her to Arvala-7, a desert planet similar to Tatooine and Geonosis. Since then, she has inhabited the safehouse Alex built while working as a double agent for the Rebellion, when he was known only as Fulcrum. Because the life of a moisture farmer is not suited for active people – such as herself – Kyra works every day of the week, from dawn to dusk. Every now and then, the thirty-eight-year-old is forced to take the day off and soak in the bacta tank, healing both her internal and external injuries.

     Deciding to skip breakfast, Kyra fills a thermos with caf and heads outside to check on her droids, which have already begun the day's work. She collects water from a couple of vaporators, then stops when she notices her farm is unusually quiet. Kyra holds her breath, listening for several moments before realizing that her purple and white astromech droid – A1-13 – has fallen silent. Kyra kneels in front of A1-13, who is usually the most vocal of her droids, and curses when she discovers the droid's circuits have overheated.

     "Those womp rats sold me a piece of junk," she mutters, referring to the Jawas who sold her the droid, with the assurance that it would not overheat.

     Banging her fist against the astromech's dome, Kyra salvages what she can of A1-13, planning on using the parts when another one of her droids broke down. After stowing the parts and making sure they would not be found by pirates, Kyra moves on with her day, which turns out to be the same as every other day she has spent on Arvala-7. Because Arvala-7 is located in the Outer Rim and its existence known to only a few, those who stayed were usually outrunning their pasts. For example, Kyra's neighbor and fellow moisture farmer – an Ugnaught named Kuiil – came after being freed from his time as an indentured servant of the Empire.

     In Kyra's case, she was forced into hiding after learning that Moff Gideon – who led the Imperial charge against her people during the Night of a Thousand Tears – had been searching for her over the past several years. During her time on Arvala-7, Kyra has come to wish she could escape her past as easily as she can avoid bounty hunters and Imperial warlords. That feat is easier said than done, however, and Kyra has spent many sleepless nights wondering what she could have done differently. Kyra knows that – for the sake of her own sanity – she needs to let go of her past, the details of which could get her killed if they fell into the wrong hands.

     Sometimes she wishes she could forget her past altogether, but every time she changes her mind because she would be disrespecting those who had died, whether on Coruscant, Mandalore, Alderaan, or in service of the Rebellion. When reminiscing, Kyra never lets herself drift too far because the traumatic memories greatly outnumber the handful of happy moments in her life. By that evening – despite the malfunctioning droid – Kyra and her droids are able to produce a week's worth of water for the market in town, leaving Kryze with extra time to focus on restocking her bacta supplies, which are running low.

     After deactivating her droids for the night, Kyra heads back into the house, hanging her leather jacket on the coat rack and kicking her boots off. As Kyra takes her gloves off and slips them into her pocket, she sighs, finally beginning to accept the fact that her once-steady hands are forever going to be characterized by trauma-induced tremors. Walking past the mirror in the hallway, Kyra spots movement in her peripheral vision and stops. Turning, she finds only her reflection, though the menacing chuckle does not belong to her.

     "Kenobi...I can feel your anguish. The loss, the suffering," Darth Maul whispers, laughing again when Kyra's fists clench at her side. "Your emotions betray you, Padawan. Let your anger deepen your hatred and embrace the dark side!"

     Kyra looks away from the mirror and takes several deep breaths, turning back to her reflection after a moment to find that her countenance is now sunken and pale, her eyes yellow and filled with hatred.

     "No!" she screams, punching the mirror over and over again, only stopping when she feels the warm blood dripping off her fingertips.

     Cursing, Kyra marches into the kitchen and wraps her right hand before sitting at the dining room table with the bottle of Chandrilan cider Chancellor Mon Mothma had sent a few months ago. After pouring some of the orange liquid into a glass, Kyra rolls up the sleeves of her sand-colored tunic and injects two rounds of bacta into each arm, hissing as she injects several more into her torso. When a hollow whistle emerges from the back of the house, Kyra draws one of her pistols, holding it in a two-handed grip as she cautiously tip-toes towards her bedroom. As she steps across the threshold, the whistle grows louder, and Kyra realizes what the source of the noise is.

     Holstering her blaster, Kyra crouches beside her bed and pulls the false panel out of the floor, staring at the wooden chest for a moment before leaning over and pulling it out of the ground. As her fingers wrap around the hilt of her lightsaber, several images flash through her mind:

     Kyra sees herself surrounded by a squadron of stormtroopers, a smug grin on her face as she ignites her lightsaber and deflects the blaster shots. When the vision shifts, she is lying on the ground, watching as the Mandalorian ignites her lightsaber and prepares to fight with an Imperial who wields the Darksaber. As their blades collide and sparks fly, the vision changes once more, Kyra struggling to stand as she stows her lightsaber and activates the black blade of the Darksaber.

     "You've lost everything. Mandalorians are weak once they lose their trinkets," a man growls, a stabbing pain spreading through Kyra's torso as electricity crackles.

     Darth Maul's cruel laugh causes Kyra to bolt out of bed, breathing hard, with no memory of how she had gotten there. If the empty bottle of cider sitting on the nightstand had not been enough to answer Kyra's question, the splitting headache is. Kyra groans as she smooths the wrinkles out of her pants and shirt, which she had worn to bed the previous night. Kyra glances at her calendar and swears, realizing that she had slept through not one, but two nights.

     "Damn it!" Kyra curses as she slips into her jacket and pulls on her gloves. "Damn it, damn it, damn it!"

     Angry with herself for having fallen into yet another drunken stupor, Kyra does not immediately hear the persistent beeping of her comlink. As she runs outside to make sure her droids had not been stolen, she finally notices the insistent sound coming from her communications device.

     As she pulls the comm out of her belt and answers the transmission, Kuiil says, "The blurrg have broken out of their pen. I have managed to secure two. I need you to stop the others. I have spoken."

     Because Kuiil knows she will help, Kyra does not bother to reply as she heads inside and holsters her pistols, staring at her lightsaber for a moment before leaving it on the bed. She runs back outside and hops onto the speeder bike Alexsandr Kallus had given her in return for the Phantom II, which she had insisted on returning to General Hera Syndulla.

     "This day may turn out to be more interesting than I thought," Kyra Kryze-Kenobi mutters to herself as she races towards her neighbor's farm, unaware of the adventure that awaits her when she arrives.