Heist in Capital City Five years before the Battle of Yavin , a group of rebels carried out operations against the Galactic Empire on the Outer Rim planet of Lothal . One mission was contracted by crime lord Cikatro Vizago , who commissioned the rebels to mount a heist to steal blaster s from the Empire . The operation was carried out in Capital City , where the rebels attempted to steal the blasters . They were interrupted , however , by a street orphan named Ezra Bridger , who stole one of the sets of crates . This led to a chase throughout the city , with the rebels attempting to outrun the Empire , and Bridger attempting to outrun both . Their chase made its way out of the city , and the rebels fought off stormtrooper s and TIE fighters as they fled . Bridger eventually got away from the rebels , but was saved by their ship , the " Ghost " , which shot down an approaching TIE fighter . Kanan Jarrus , the leader of the rebels , offered Bridger a chance to escape as more fighters approached , and Bridger leapt onto the ship with his crate . The " Ghost " was pursued by several TIE fighters , leading to a brief firefight throughout the atmosphere and into space . The ship was able to escape into hyperspace before returning to Lothal , where it scrambled its signal so it could not be recognized . The rebels brought many of the crates , which also contained food and other supplies , to a refugee settlement called Tarkintown , where the rebels provided it for free to the refugees . Jarrus and Hera Syndulla , the crew ' s captain , delivered the blasters to Vizago , who paid them both in money and in information — specifically , the potential whereabouts of Wookiee s who had been enslaved by the Empire , leading the rebels to undertake a mission to rescue them . Bridger later joined the crew , having found an adopted family in them as a result of the heist . Prelude . In the fifth year before the Battle of Yavin a group of rebels operated on and around the Outer Rim planet of Lothal , striking out against the Galactic Empire . Occasionally , in order to fund their operations and maintain their starship , the " Ghost " , the rebels took jobs from the Devaronian crime lord Cikatro Vizago , leader of the criminal gang known as the Broken Horn Syndicate on Lothal . The rebels , not content to operate just on one planet , used information provided by Vizago to rendezvous with a ship they were told carried potential allies for their fight against the Empire . The ship , which they discovered to be a Wookiee gunship , had been raided by Trandoshan slavers before the " Ghost " arrived , and the Wookiees were taken as slaves by the Empire . Vizago told the rebels that he would look into what happened to the Wookiees , and , in the meantime , he provided them with another job : to steal Imperial supply crates in Capital City . The crates contained blaster s , which Vizago wanted , but also contained food that could be given to refugees in Tarkintown , a small settlement made out of citizens who had been displaced by Grand Moff Wilhuff Tarkin , Governor of the Outer Rim Territories . Shortly before the heist was to begin , the " Lawbringer " , an " Imperial " - class Star Destroyer , made its way towards Capital City . Seeing it fly over his his home , the abandoned LothalNet comm tower E - 272 , Ezra Bridger followed the vessel ' s route aboard a speeder . Bridger , a 14 - year - old orphan and con artist , also made his way into Capital City , where he encountered a local Gotal merchant , Yoffar , being harassed by two Imperial officers , Commandant Cumberlayne Aresko and Taskmaster Myles Grint . After Yoffar criticized the Imperial presence on Lothal , the officers intended to arrest him for treason . Bridger swiped a communicator from Aresko and tricked the officers into believing that there was an emergency in the town square , causing the officers to leave and reverse their previous decision to arrest the merchant for treason . After stealing a few jogan fruit s from the merchant , Bridger made his way to a rooftop and watched the officers in the city square , where the officers found that there was no emergency . Instead , they found another officer , Supply Master Yogar Lyste , and his troops loading supply crates onto speeders — the same crates that the rebels intended to steal . The rebels themselves were in the area , preparing to undertake their mission . The heist . As the Imperials continued loading their supplies , one of the rebels , Mandalorian explosives artist Sabine Wren , left a detonator on one of the speeder bikes , which exploded near one of the stormtrooper s . Fearing they were under siege , the Imperials evacuated with the supply crates , sending their speeders through the city . The speeders were intercepted by Kanan Jarrus , the rebel leader and a Jedi survivor of Order 66 . Together with the Lasat warrior Garazeb Orrelios , Jarrus fought off the Imperial troops in order to steal the crates . Their plan was complicated , however , when Bridger jumped from the roof and stole one of the speeders , and a set of crates along with it , before speeding off . Bridger ' s actions led to a chase throughout the city . He was first spotted by Wren , who jumped onto the crates that Bridger ' s speeder was carrying and took one of the two from him . Bridger continued to make his way through Capital City , while Jarrus and Orrelios continued their pursuit . Their chase led outside of Capital City , where they were then pursued by Imperial troops . Jarrus and Orrelios fought the stormtroopers off , with Orrelios falling back in order to come at the stormtroopers from behind . Orrelios eventually left with Jarrus ' crates , while the rebel leader continued after Bridger . Jarrus intercepted the boy , who said that he stole the crate fair and square . They were soon intercepted by a TIE / ln space superiority starfighter , which fired on their location and destroyed Jarrus ' speeder . Bridger ' s speeder was unharmed , and he continued away from the city . The TIE fighter continued to pursue Bridger as he attempted to return to his tower . The TIE fighter fired on him and destroyed the speeder , leaving Bridger defenseless — until the TIE fighter was shot down by the " Ghost " . Jarrus gave Bridger a chance to escape as four additional TIE fighters approached , a chance that Bridger took . He grabbed his crate and leaped towards the ship , unknowingly using the Force to propel his ascent , much to the former Jedi ' s surprise . Once Bridger was on board , the " Ghost " flew into space , where it continued to be pursued by the TIE fighters . Bridger learned that the crate he stole contained blasters , and he continued to lay a claim to it , wanting to sell the weapons on the black market . As he argued with the crew , the ship ' s pilot , Hera Syndulla , evaded the TIE fighters and calculated a jump into hyperspace , while Jarrus and Wren manned the ship ' s gun turrets to fire back at the TIE fighters , destroying two of them . Wren was able to shoot down the second TIE fighter and provide an opening for Syndulla , who jumped the " Ghost " into hyperspace and escaped from the Empire . Aftermath . After the chase ended , Agent Kallus of the Imperial Security Bureau , who had arrived on Lothal prior to the heist in order to investigate the rebels ' activity , discussed the situation with Aresko and Grint . Kallus explained that many other Imperial operations had been targeted by the rebels , and that the crew would need to be destroyed lest they spark a full - scale rebellion against the Empire . The " Ghost " later returned to Lothal , scrambling its signal so the Empire could not detect their return . The ship landed on the outskirts of Tarkintown , where Wren and Orrelios brought the supplies to the people . Bridger also brought supplies , though he did not yet believe in the rebel cause , instead wanting to take the weapons he stole back to his home . He nonetheless saw the impact that the supplies had on the townspeople , who were grateful to receive free food from the rebels . Jarrus and Syndulla , meanwhile , delivered the blasters to Vizago , who paid them with money as well as information . Specifically , he provided them with what they believed was the location of the enslaved Wookiees . The rebels mounted a mission to rescue the Wookiees , but they were unaware that the information was a trap laid by Agent Kallus . The crew fell into Kallus ' trap while trying to rescue the Wookiees , but they escaped and ultimately learned that the Wookiees were being taken to the spice mines on the planet Kessel . It was on Kessel that the rebels successfully rescued the prisoners and released them from Imperial captivity . After the mission , Bridger agreed to join the crew and become Jarrus ' Padawan , as the Jedi survivor had discovered Bridger ' s sensitivity to the Force . Additionally , the actions of the rebels on Lothal and on Kessel led Kallus to contact the Grand Inquisitor , who was tasked by the Empire with hunting down any surviving Jedi — and who took an interest in eliminating Jarrus , Bridger , and their crew . Behind the scenes . The heist in Capital City was featured in the opening sequences of " " , the one - hour television film premiere of " Star Wars Rebels " that aired on October 3 , 2014 . The heist was adapted into the " Spark of Rebellion " junior novelization , " The Rebellion Begins " , as well as the chapter book " Droids in Distress " , both by Michael Kogge . The first draft of " Spark of Rebellion " initially depicted a different sequence of events for the heist . In that draft , Ezra Bridger stole one of the speeder bikes and returned to his tower outside of Capital City . The sequence did not contain a speeder bike chase , but rather a chase on foot across rooftops . After Bridger returned to his tower , he opened a crate and found electronic leaflets containing propaganda from the Empire . Rather than be confronted by Kanan Jarrus immediately , the two instead met again the next day . The final draft of the script added the speeder chase to the heist sequence in order to provide more action to the first act of the film .