Five standard years prior to the Battle of Yavin, Sabine Wren launched an assault on a TIE fighter landing strip situated on the Outer Rim world of Lothal. Her objective in this operation, which involved the destruction of a TIE fighter, was to create a distraction, enabling the Ghost, of whose crew Wren was a part, to take off undetected by Imperial forces stationed nearby. As a consequence of her successful operation, Wren found herself added to Lothal's most-wanted list.
Before her time with the Spectres, the Mandalorian youth Sabine Wren was an Imperial Academy trainee on Mandalore. Following a traumatic event there, Sabine made the choice to abandon the Empire and, together with her friend Ketsu Onyo, became a bounty hunter for the Black Sun criminal organization. However, Ketsu betrayed Wren, leaving her to die. Eventually, Sabine encountered a rebel group led by the Twi'lek pilot Hera Syndulla, who offered her a fresh start. This led to Sabine's involvement in the growing rebellion against the Galactic Empire.
On one occasion, the Spectres needed to depart from the planet Lothal aboard their vessel, the Ghost, without drawing the attention of the local Imperial authorities, who were familiar with their ship. To escape Capital City on Lothal, Sabine and her fellow rebels devised a strategy to initiate a diversion at a nearby TIE fighter launchpad. Executing her plan, Wren infiltrated the airfield and began applying graffiti to the exterior of a TIE fighter.
However, she was soon confronted by two stormtroopers, MB-223 and TK-626, who ordered her to surrender at blaster-point. Unfazed, Sabine boldly provoked them into firing upon her. While the stormtroopers were occupied, Wren seized the opportunity to escape. She then led her Imperial pursuers on a chaotic chase throughout the airfield, continuously taunting them. One of the stormtroopers, TK-626, quickly requested backup.
While the stormtroopers were reorganizing, Sabine used the chance to spray paint a rebel symbol, the Starbird, on the wing of a TIE fighter. Before fleeing, Wren attached a paint bomb to it. Shortly thereafter, the stormtroopers noticed the graffiti and the attached explosive, but it was too late. The resulting explosion destroyed the TIE fighter and generated sufficient noise to allow the Ghost to discreetly take to the skies. The stormtroopers survived the blast due to their armor but were covered in paint. Sabine observed the Imperials' predicament with great amusement.
As a result of her participation in the assault on the Imperial airfield, Sabine Wren was added to Lothal's most-wanted list. This attack, along with a series of other actions by the Spectres, including the Mission in Capital City, caught the attention of the Imperial Security Bureau Agent Kallus, who saw the rebel activities on Lothal as the beginning of a larger rebellion.
The Attack on a Lothal airfield was the basis of the three-minute Star Wars Rebels short "Art Attack," which debuted online and on Disney XD on August 18, 2014. This short was later adapted into a chapter in the junior chapter book Rise of the Rebels and Jennifer Heddle's young reader book Sabine's Art Attack.