People are stupid. Everything revolves around eyes and abilities. Nothing else matters here on Lothal, or anywhere else in the galaxy. Maybe one day I'll fly far away in a spaceship and find somewhere that the color of your eyes doesn't matter.

But I'm stuck here, a street rat, with eyes that keep betraying me.

I kept my head down as I followed the natural flow of the afternoon shopping crowd. It was the last chance that vendors would be able to sell things before curfew set in so voices were high and tempers higher. In other words it was the perfect time to filch some dinner.

"Ezra!"

The calling voice distracted me from my target. It was a voice I recognized, and it only took me a moment of looking to spot the speaker.

"Hey, Morad, what's the deal?" I asked as I crossed to his stand. Morad Sumar was an old man, a friend of my parents before things went wrong.  We didn't talk much.

"You shouldn't be out," he warned.  "Imperials are everywhere."

I shrugged.  There were always Imperials everywhere, but it didn't take a genius to figure out what they were doing.  They were checking for force users.

Force users weren't hard to miss, actually. The closer you get to "Turning" age, the more gray your eyes become. Then one day they change. For a whole week your eyes become a totally different color depending on how you use the force. The most powerful force users, and the ones that imperials look for, have red irises. They'll also take orange, amber, or yellow. As long as you're force sensitive, that is.

Once I saw a kid's eyes turn pale green. Within a day some soldiers had come to take him away. Nobody knows why he was taken or where they went, and nobody asked. It was just the Empire protecting it's people.

Anyway, after the week of straight unusual color that followed the "Turning," a force user's eyes turned back to normal. They only became that unusual color when they used the force.

I didn't know why that was important for me to know.  I wasn't a force user.  The Imperials wouldn't want anything to do with me.

"There's always Imperials," I said as I started to walk away.

"Ezra, haven't you looked in the mirror lately?"

That stopped me.  I turned back as Morad reached under his table and retrieved a mirror. He handed it over so I could inspect my eyes.

The blue was becoming interrupted with tiny rivulets of gray.

"You need to leave before they find you," Morad warned.

"It's not going to make a difference," I replied.  "I need to eat."

I walked away before he could continue.  My mind was still buzzing but I tried not to think about the revelation.  So my eyes were turning gray.  Big deal.  There was no reason any Imperials should care.  I was way under the radar.  I was a nobody from nowhere.

Even with that thought firmly rooted in my mind I found myself keeping my head down and avoiding eye contact.  A patrol of stormtroopers was coming my way and I slipped into an alley.

Get ahold of yourself, Ezra, I thought.  Nothing has changed.  You probably imagined seeing the gray.  You can't use the force, you would know if you could.

Even so I felt too anxious to go back into the crowd.  Instead I scrambled onto one of the nearby roofs and started walking back home.  The further I got from the mirror the better I felt about the whole thing.  The mirror had been horribly smudged.  My eyes were the same as they had always been.

I glanced down at the street below.  People were walking around enjoying their lives free from freaky gray eyes or stress.  They were just normal people.

My eyes were drawn to a man who was leaning against the wall.  He seemed different from the others, but I couldn't tell why.  Or how.  His dark hair was pulled into a ponytail and his blue eyes watched the passing crowd with apparent disinterest.

What's so important about him?

I couldn't understand it.  He was just a guy watching people shop.  Maybe he was waiting for his wife somewhere.  Maybe he was just bored in the world.

Maybe he had money.

I slid down the side of the building and into an alleyway.  Whatever that guy was, he was now going to buy my dinner.  Whether he knew it or not.

I entered the flow of the crowd, careful all the while to keep my eyes down.  The last thing I needed was for somebody to see my eyes and get the wrong idea.  I also adopted my helpless orphan kid posture.  Slouch, arms hugging myself, shoulders hunched.

"Excuse me, sir," I said as soon as I was in front of the man.  I could feel his eyes turn to watch me.  "Can you spare any money?"

"I don't have anything, kid."

"How about food?  I'm just so hungry . . ."

I pretended to stumble forward.  In the same motion I swiped whatever was hanging from his belt.  Probably something to hold his money.  He caught my shoulders and pushed me back.

"I really wish I could help, but I've got nothing and I'm kind of busy right now."

"I understand.  I'll just go."

I turned away and kept whatever I'd nabbed hidden in my hands.  A clean getaway.  Works nearly every time, except for when it doesn't.  I kept my head down and moved towards the alley.

"Halt!  State your business!"

Imperial stormtroopers.  Just my luck. They were easy to fool but dangerous to try.

"If you've got nowhere to be then go home!" the stormtrooper ordered.

"Right, sir. Sorry, sir." I started to move away from them, still keeping my eyes on the ground, when I heard a shout from behind.

"Hey! You! Give that back!"

It was the man from before. He was pushing his way through the crowd towards me. His demand caught the attention of the stormtroopers, who raised their blasters. The man wasn't alone this time. He had some huge furry purple thing with him. And it looked mad.

"Hold it, kid. What's going on?"

The two stormtroopers had an officer with them. He eyed me suspiciously. Things were going downhill way too fast.

"I've got nothing to do with that, I swear," I protested as I stared him full in the face. His eyes widened.

"Sir, those are rebels!" one of the stormtroopers declared. They both pointed their blasters at the approaching man and thing.

"Forget them, get the boy!" the officer ordered. "He's a force user!"

That's when I decided it was time to run for my life.