A/Notes:

This Fic is especially for D.B. Who has put up with more of my post hospitalization/stressful life ranting and raving than any sane fandom buddy should really have too. But without her this story would never have existed... Happy Holidays Dear One!

It is being *lightly* updated in mind December 2017 as it is recorded into podfic for some vision impaired friends of mine who requested it. Said podfic has caused a few tweaks and editions that just felt right. The next new part for the curious (including Chapter 8 and an expanded chapter 7) should be up by Christmas Eve assuming that no new urgent crises arise in my neck of the woods! (Crosses Fingers hard - life in my house since October = 2 emergency hospitalizations of two fathers, major surgery for a kindly mom in law, one major case of anemia/shingles for your truly...and a broken computer router and reticent car when I try and get to the library to post... 2017 is making me ready to kick it to the curb honestly! I need to start a kriffing count down to the New Year… )

Tags/Trigger Warnings for this fic include

#Space family #Kanan Jarrus: The Daddening #InWhichHeraIsAWESOMEMom #On Ezra Bridger's Sexual Education # cw: descriptions of harm done to a minor child #cw: attempted and successful previous child molestation *limited POV (Kanan's) #Kallus is a deeply closeted culture geek #bewarevenegefulfemaletwi'lekandmandalorians #yes don'tworrytheywillinfactgettobehappy

This Fic started with this ...

I need to (not!)write a short fic some day that involves the Specter crew going out to meet a contact in a bar. And everyone but Ezra in the party gets pissed/freaked out because some random asshole also at the cantina is looking at Ezra a little too much and possibly following him around with apparent intentions that any decent parent or older sibling would find inappropriate.

And Ezra just gets ANNOYED at the situation, is like 'Can we just ignore creepy dude and finish what we came here for PLEASE.' Only to have Sabine insinuate he does not seem to grasp what said asshole is after. Clearly.

And Ezra just raises an eyebrow and drains his drink. Looks them all right in the eye and says something to the effect "Sabine, I kneed my first attempted rapist at seven and a half. My last? A couple months before you guys found me three years ago. The best thing about keeping my hair cut short like it is now? There's nothing anyone can use to try and grab or move me places I definitely don't want to be." -He sets his cup down on table "Now can we all quit kriffing around and get back to doing what we actually came here for? Cause last I checked the rebellion waits on no one..."

And then he stands to go find a fresher, shaking his head as he goes. 'Karabast! …It's not like HE even managed to actually touch me. Such a bunch of kriffing DRAMA queens!"

After that, Ezra very obviously avoids being boxed into a room with any of them. He takes on a lot of volunteer work, sleeps in the Phoenix Squadron's dorms, and is very emphatically as he tells Kanan, 'not angry'

Meanwhile during this same time period, the Ghost absent Ezra, somehow ends with a lot of shattered and imploded kitchen crockery.

(I will eventually probably get around to the official Bar-Scene story, when I can manage the idea of Ezra that pissed off without getting really depressed...)

Chapter One: Honesty Is Less Embarrassing then Bugscreen

How any times can one heart break?
It was never supposed to be this way
Look in the mirror but you find someone
You never thought you'd be.
Oh but I can still recognize
The one I love in your tear stained eyes.
I know you might not see it now...
But lift your eyes to me...

(-'When You See Wounded I See Mended')

xxxxxxx

"You do realize that you're literally hiding in a tree, yes?" Kanan leans on the broad trunk easily, not bothering to lift his head to locate his Padawan in the branches above.

"…Yes?"

"And that isn't offending…I don't know, your sense of personal dignity or anything?"

There's a long pause, then tired laugh. "It could be worse, Master. I'm not the one wearing mud that's pretending to be bugspray…"

Ezra's not wrong. The mosquito population on Yavin 4 this time of the evening is sheerly ridiculous. Hera keeps promising to find something better to keep the pests off of them the next time that she's out of system but right now the options are a spray on bug repellent that's near caustic to his sensitive scarred facial skin or the more naturally occurring if odiferous alternative some of the other bases residents and found and started using instead. "I still want to know why in kriff you never seem to get bit." Kanan informs his student a little bit grumpily.

There's another pause…this one something close to considering. "The chompers and I are sort of…buds at this point, I guess?" It's less an actual answer than it is a plausible question.

The kid is bonding with the bloodsuckers now. Of course, he is. Naturally.

"Ezra…" Kan pauses, carefully considering his next words a long, if not uncomfortable moment. "Please, get out of the tree. Come back to the Ghost with me and eat dinner with the rest of us tonight: Sabine and Hera are making your favorite. We're not going to force you to talk about what you said the other night at the bar or anything. Just, please let the others spend some time in your actual presence. You're missed and they're worried. I know you're mad as hell right now Kid, at everyone, but…."

"I'm not mad." Ezra's words cut him off. He hears the rustle of leaves shifting – much closer this time – in the space most immediately above him. Then with a soft thudding sound, a body drops down onto the ground just within arm's reach. Kanan reminds himself to go easy - to not try and reach out and touch just automatically. Even if the rest of the Specters aren't the only ones in need of a little reassurance right now that the boy in front of him is whole, despite his admissions, despite everything.

Kanan raises an eyebrow, "You wanna try that one again, Erza?"

Ezra clears his throat. "I'm not…. about what I said the other night, Kanan. I'm not angry at you guys."

"That." He tells his Padawan calmly. "Is a load of Bantha shit."

Ezra half groans, half growls in reply. "Fine. Then I'm not mad about it *right now,* Kanan. Karabast." Kanan hears his Padawan's hand raise to scratch at the back of his neck. "Honestly I'm just... Look, I'm sorry okay. I karked up the other night…losing my temper and I'm sorry..."

The teen's arm drops back down at his side now. Kanan can hear his shirt and pants fabric rustling as they brush together briefly. "Ezra…" He can't keep his hand from rising to grip a shoulder any longer. He can't fight the instinct. Luckily the kid doesn't flinch at the touch – he presses into the hold a little even, though Ezra also seems to hunch inward just a little as he searches for the words to voice the rest of what he's saying.

"Karabast." Ezra settles for murmuring again after another moment or so.

Kanan takes one more chance and tugs him forward slightly, earning a low surprised huff of air as Ezra's head collides with his own collarbone. The hug is tight but brief. Careful as he can possibly manage to be comforting but not in any way restraining. "Kid…the last…the very last thing you owe any of us for any of this? Is an apology."

"I was a jerk." Ezra's tone, contrarily enough, is just short of defiant. Though more toward himself than toward Kanan. Force …is Ezra actually guilting himself for calling them on the carpet too harshly? Because it certainly feels like he is to Kanan.

His raises one arm high enough to gently smack the back of the close shorn head affectionately. "You got pissed off Ezra. You had every right and reason to be. We were all making assumptions. If you dumped us on our asses because of that…well at least the lesson came honestly." Kanan doesn't neglect to understand how significant the brutal hammer blow of truth they'd been handed was within the larger scheme of things after all.

Ezra shifts his body just enough to rest his forehead on the center top of Kanan's sternum for a moment or so. He breathes in and out deeply several times as if maybe fighting back tears, before he draws a final controlled breath in through his nose and slowly pulls back, feet shifting further apart as Ezra straightens up deliberately.

"It's been years since…well. Since. I don't really…. I'm usually not so…" He groans. "I'm honestly pretty okay most of the time and past everything that happened, Kanan..."

This time Kanan is wise enough to only repeat the 'Banthashit' in his own head. This is definitely not the time for that particular discussion. He's old and wise enough these days to pick his battle grounds a bit more carefully than that.

"As I said, Hera's making a double batch of your favorite. I'm under orders to fetch you back. Now do you need to pick anything up from your assigned quarters in Pheonix Squadron's section before we leave?"

"Meh." Ezra half vocalizes "No. Not really. Just need to pull on my boots and we can go."

Kanan's eyebrow rises again. "Barefoot Ezra? What? Planet turning you native on me?"

Ezra's lowest tonal chuckle answers back. "No…more just simple curiosity."

"About?"

"A few Togruta from one of the other squadrons have been lauding the merits of going barefoot while on planet in the chow hall lately. They claim the planet's got a homey vibe. I guess that I just wanted to see for myself."

That's an …interesting statement. "So? Finding anything worth mentioning?"

Ezra considers "Maybe later. I'm starved and you've got enough mud to wash off right now already." A single finger raises to coast across the curve of his Master's cheek consideringly. "You know there really are easier ways to moisturize. I'm sure that Sabine could find you something less smelly if you just asked."

"Hah hah. Very funny. Move it smart ass. The bugs are swarming and you're not the only one who's hungry.".

"Yes, Master." Ezra answers back easily

The teen makes no comment or move against the hand that stays on his back nearly the whole way back to the ship.

xxxxxxxxxxxx

They get back to the ship's docking area just as the very last of the twilight's dim warmth is fading away. The climb from the docking area in living space passing unacknowledged and easy – their steps quickened by his grumbling stomachs and the fragrant rising smell of cooking meat and vegetables wafting out down the hall from out of the ship's now crowded galley.

"Del'ani?" Ezra's voice is shocked – delighted, as the smell registers, his forward motion on the metal floor halting for the merest fraction of a second even though he's been told already his favorite is on the menu tonight. The faint tinge of homesickness that Kanan can hear in his voice makes something tighten in the center of the Older Jedi's chest.

Then again how long has it been since they've been anywhere near his home planet for any length of time? Much less found an open-air market anywhere else that had the spices for this particular cuisine? Ezra's not inclined to be picky about food – even in his selection of what most would call favorites. If he does have his own variant of comfort food after all his years growing up on the street though, this is it. A curry like mix of rice, vegetable produce and whatever meat can be found and added in. The dishes main draw is no doubt its smell- a mixture of spicy sweet and pungent. The food in question somehow simultaneously clears your nose and activates your salivary glands from second that the fumes from the cooking kick in.

"Hera, how did you…?"

It must have taken her hours to find what was needed. Maybe weeks. The surprise in Ezra's voice isn't surprising at all.

"I put up a note on the message board in the central market." Hera's own voice is slightly off as Kanan hears her turn from the cooking surface. The Twi'lek doesn't sound sad or falsely cheerful or even mad… it takes him a moment to identify the mix of emotion in her tone. She's calm but also a little stunned…she apparently hadn't thought he'd be so fast – or apparently effortless -in reeling the teenager in. Now though Hera's taking in their youngest member's all too likely wrinkled clothes and still bare feet (Ezra had opted to carry his boots instead of slipped them back on) and she's trapped in an internal debate about whether it's a good idea to hug him or not.

She wants to of course. Has wanted to ever since the shock wore off in that bar and they headed off the planet, but touching Ezra is a fraught thing right now. He's always had an iffy at best relationship with physical affection. Tussling – wrestling, the occasional shoulder squeeze or hug is generally fine unless he's deliberately keeping his distance. But those were the standard rules two weeks ago. Before the rest of them had been forced to contend with the…well frankly haunting visuals that Ezra had unintendedly supplied via his impromptu verbal unleashing.

The effects of said rant are unavoidable now. None of them are going to be casually grabbing Ezra or ruffling his hair the way Zeb and Sabine used to on a regular basis anytime soon. Kriff Kana admits, it'll probably be awhile before they're careful about not bumping into him. Old behavior patterns have been altered in the last couple of days and in the gaps, there's a distinct sort of pained awkwardness.

Kanan's not the only one aware of it either, judging by the sudden, too heavy silence. "It smells great…thank you." Ezra hastens to fill the gap at the same time that another pair of footsteps approach them.

Zeb's voice is a little gruff. Uneasily gentle. "Hey, Kid." He leans forward into their space, and Kanan hears him sniff a little. "You know, you've both got leaves stuck in your hair. There's a few minutes to wash up b'fore dinner if you want t'clean up and make yourselves look a little bit more decent before we sit down an' start eating.

Ezra's retort is automatic. "Zeb, when have I ever been decent?" He pokes his Kanan's arm gently, shifting slightly to face him. "Kana,n on the other hand definitely needs a fresher. Cause right now the *both* of you stink."

And just like that, he somehow diffuses the tension, at least enough to make all the awkwardness bearable for the time being.

It strikes Kanan Jarrus while he's standing there, a little tired and a little ironic, that somewhere along the way over the past few years, Ezra Bridger has become very, very good at reading and soothing moments of emotional unrest in pretty much all of the rest of them. It's a useful skill no doubt, but right now that doesn't mean it's necessarily good a thing. The opposite is preferable really. Still. "Come on, Chucklehead. Fresher." He gently pokes at the kid.

He can feel Sabine's eyes on them from her spot at the table even as they turn to she or Ezra acknowledge the other's presence directly, though there's thankfully also no obvious bad vibes or overwhelming awkward pinging between the two of them either. They're just…orbiting cautiously for now. Allowing space in the wake of her unintended nuclear fall out of a comment.

Thank Force for small miracles, Kanan thinks.

XxxxxxxX

After they finish washing up, Ezra eats better than normal – which is to say about three-quarters of what's on his plate, before pushing it back, clearing his throat and asking just a little too casually. "So…what's on the itinerary for the next couple of weeks?"

They've been voluntarily self-grounded now for over a fortnight – Ever since getting back from Davin 7. There's been the day to day requirements of fleet life of course, but nothing else to fill the extra hours lately. None of them are saying it outright but they've basically been on unacknowledged stand -bye medical leave.

Ezra doesn't like the idleness. Really, really doesn't like the idleness. He'd basically self-adopted himself out to Rex – who Kanan knows he's going to need to speak with about this in at least some measure – as a personal aid and willing combat student after about the first four or five days.

The rest of them have been doing their best to…well… process what's just occurred basically. It's been the equivalent of a badly needed mental health week essentially. Granted that's taken different forms for each of them. Kanan has spent literal hours on his knees in only somewhat successful personal meditation. Hera with Sabine in tow has cleaned the Ghost till it literally reeks of pine cleaner. Her paperwork is now completely caught up and the ship is repaired and re-provisioned from top to bottom. Zeb and Kallus have helped with some of that as well and they have spent a lot of mornings since they got back with their bow rifles sparring.

None of them right now are mentioning the evening – well more the night – about four or five days ago when Kanan'd woken and found the rest of the crew in the middle of destroying the Ghost's old set of cooking and serving crockery. Though he's also fairly sure that after that outburst was when things had finally managed to settle for real.

He'll say this much - Hera's grasp on multiple language invectives in the face of helpless fury hasn't slipped a millimeter over the years. Though he's pretty sure it's sheer level of scope has managed to surprise even Sabine. His lover still isn't fully ready to talk about whatever it is that is in her head since Ezra's little outburst. Still at least now Hera's sleeping in her off time not just frenetically cleaning, and her arms have resumed wrapping tightly around his torso most nights when she does finally come to bed.

He wonders, a little idly, if tonight they'll both sleep better or worse than they have since they arrived back on Yavin 4, since it's starting to look at the moment like Ezra will probably be sleeping in his room on board tonight instead of returning to Pheonix Squadrons dormitory along with Zeb and Kallus like he has been recently.

Sometimes, he admits, it's a challenge balancing teenager's desire for privacy and a parent's provoked protective instincts.

"We've been asked to do a milk run if we have time…" Hera offers after a couple of moments silence. "There's some medical supplies and repair equipment available that would be useful if we're willing to go and pick it up off of Alderaan. We're smaller and easier to disguise in the system and more replaceable here in the meantime than one of the other freighters or the bigger Corvettes. I figured we'd take it." She clears her throat. "The Organa's have invited us out to their estate for dinner while we're in the system too. Something about the Senator and Princess Leia welcoming a chance at reacquaintance. Plus…." There's another long pause, and her foot starts tapping on the floor underneath the table, her mug of caf clinking softly as she sets it down. "We're all very much overdue at this point in time in terms of all our mandatory fleet physical exams. They've been after me about the paperwork for it in central command for quite awhile now, and I figure that we can all just jointly bite the bullet and all get it done at one of the clinics on the planet while we're there already."

Ezra's shield's flare alarmingly at that as the teenager stiffens to likely board straight beside him. "I…I need the fresher." He says abruptly, before rising and basically fleeing the room.

Hera sighs softly, dropping her head into her hands.

Zeb shifts in his seat, watching Ezra disappear around the corner. "Karabast.".

Sabine chuckles low in her throat, no humor at all in the sound. "Well, that went just about as badly as I warned you it would, Hera. Points for subtlety in delivery at least, Hera. Well done."

Kanan sets his mug on the table. Reaches up a hand to rub at the muscle of his right temple wearily. "Since when," He asks the silence calmly, "have any of us EVER followed fleet medical regulations?"

Hera sets down her mug, "Since that bar on Davin 7." She tells him bluntly.

Chapter 2: Digging In (Updated)

It's indicative of the kind of day they're having that literally five minutes after Ezra excuses himself from the table to go use the restroom, Kanan can feel him lose the battle not to throw up.

He sighs at the sensation, pushing back and out of his own chair.

The looming sense of nausea from Ezra has been ever present since Hera mentioned they'll all be seeing the doctors while on Alderaan, but his Padawan's been fighting a brave battle to maintain his poise – his center – even employing some light meditation. It just isn't enough on its own right now to stand against the quagmire in the younger Jedi's head. "Look we might be a while. Don't bother to come looking" He then orientates himself directly toward Hera, "Just so you know for later on Hera…I got Ezra in here tonight with the promise he wouldn't be ambushed or otherwise forced talk about what happened before he's ready to do so. I know that what just happened is my fault because I just assumed you'd be on the same page without checkingin first, but you should still know that he's probably feeling pretty betrayed by what just happened at the moment."

Hera swears softly in Ryl, then makes a low distressed sort of sound in her throat. "Karabast! Do you think…Should I be the one to go and talk to him instead…? I mean I don't want him assuming that he can't trust me."

"No. Not until I've cleared the air, anyway, Hera. He may be coding you as the bad guy right now, Hera, but that's just because of a straight miscommunication. Though," Kanan reaches up to rub an eyebrow, debating - not wanting to introduce more conflict to this situation than absolutely necessary, still...

"Hera could you maybe, oh I don't know...*warn* me in advance before dropping that kind of bombshell about the doctors on Ezra? I know that he may *seem* mostly unaffected by everything that's happened in the past two weeks but the truth of the matter is…"

Zeb snorts before he can finish his sentence. "...that's the Kid's as skittish as an unbroken mount at the moment?"

Kanan nods his head. "Pretty much yeah, exactly Zeb. He's been keeping himself together mostly out of sheer willpower, but that doesn't mean he's not embarrassed and on edge, and reluctant to expose himself any further. Given the trust that he offered all of us - even unintentionally - when he revealed so much about his past the other day, we need to be really, really careful during the next few weeks not to disrespect his sense of personal autonomy…" Just like you would, Kanan thinks sadly, for any sexual assault survivor.

Hera's voice is a little aggrieved. "Look Kanan, I take your point theoretically. But if I had given Ezra a choice about seeing someone on Alderaan, what the kriff do you think he would have said? You know Ezra understates everything, especially he's talking about his own health or past past. Skittish or not we can't just ignore our responsibility to get him any treatment he might need right now."

Kanan sighs again, pinching the bridge of his nose. "I'm not saying otherwise, all right? I agree with you Hera that he needs to see a doctor. I'm just saying that next time? You should really consider asking instead of ordering him to go Hera- even if it's more work initially to bring him around to your side. Strong arm him in painful ways too many times when Ezra's already feeling vulnerable, and you are not going to like what happens to the two of you's dynamic." There's more to be said on the subject than that certainly. Kriff he can practically feel Hera gearing up to do just that, but this isn't the time for it. He draws in a deep breath, and holds up a pausing hand. "Look, we can talk about this later, Hera, all right? But right now I need to go and check on him. Kriff, Hera the kid's throwing up right now. Again."

That seems to do it - Hera makes another unhappy sound, then shifts on her feet nodding. "Go. Take care of it. We'll finish this discussion up later." Kanan nods, heading in the direction of the nearest fresher, only pausing when he arrives to stop and listen for hints of what's happening within.

There's no more sound of active sickness anymore, thank the Force, just an unsteady pattern of ragged breathing. Sith, the kid sounds like he's just on the verge of a panic attack. Kanan raps on the door softly with his knuckles. "Ezra, may I come in?"

There's a moment's weighted pause, and then a Force flare clicks open the door lock. Ezra is sitting on the fresher floor between the bathroom cupboard and the toilet. Judging by the muffled sound of his unsteady breathing, he's most likely curled into a partial ball at the moment with his knees to his chest and his head resting atop them.

"How can I help, Kid? What is it you need from me right now?"

Ezra's voice is hoarse. "Nothing Kanan, I'm fine, really. Was probably something I'd just eaten."

'He's fine.' That word clearly doesn't mean what Ezra wants it too. Kanan drops down across from him onto the floor, folding his legs into a semi-comfortable pose, keeping his voice calm and pleasant and nonaccusing. "I know you've been trying to center yourself the past couple of hours. May I ask which of the calming meditations you've been trying?"

The teenager clears his throat again. "Just the basic ones you taught me, with candle focus when I can manage. Right now though it's not really helping."

He nods his head. "Do you want me to try and teach you something else or do you want to try and meditate jointly for awhile?" KAnan knows full well that sometimes the peace that evades someone in isolation can be achieved in greater community.

Ezra though just makes a sound of negation to both offers. "No. I'll be fine in a little while, Kanan, I promise. Right now, I just want to be still and breathe for a little bit longer." Kanan nods at that, then closes his own eyes and just offers both silence and company, projecting as much calm and safety as he can. It takes a while, but eventually, Ezra slowly uncurls and relaxes, stretching his arms up and above his head and uncurling the toes on his still bare feet. "Kriff." He mutters, stretching his legs out, and letting his head thump back against the cupboard door gently as he exhales, "This may sound contradictory, Kanan but I am so karking tired right now I may never be able to sleep again."

"Nightmares?" Kanan queries softly, stretching out his own legs as well. He wouldn't be at all surprised to find out that's the case under the circumstances. Traumatic memories tend to cycle when they're being dragged upward even in the stablest of situations. Kanan's honestly surprised the kid's remained as composed as he is for as long as he has given the state of his Padawan's psyche. It says far more about Ezra's ability to function through pain than it does about anything else, to speak frankly.

Ezra shrugs in reply and Kanan rises, after another moment's consideration, to pull them both up to their feet and fill them both a glass full of water from the tap. His Padawan swishes and spits several times then shifts to lean most of his weight back against the sink before verbally answering the question.

"I've had few. Mostly it's just been insomnia the past few nights. I keep busy all day but…." He reaches down to rub against one of his legs uneasilt, "I still end up staring at the ceiling all night most of the time. I don't know, maybe I just need more exercise. Or a decent bottle of black market rotgut before bedtime or something."

Kanan reaches out to carefully to poke Ezra in the shoulder in a mostly teasing rebuke. "I wouldn't recommend it, Kid. Yeah it might knock you out for one night or even for a couple– but then it's suddenly a habit, and ending up dependant on booze for sleep is a bad, bad position to be in, believe me."

Ezra waves a hand and takes another sip of his water, tossing the cup in the nearest trash can after he drains it before continuing. "Probably wouldn't be worth the effort of doing so anyway. It takes a lot to get me drunk enough to pass out. Something about the way that I metabolize alcohol, probably."

"…I don't want to know how you know that, do I?"

"Probably not," Ezra confirms almost cheerfully. Then he shrugs and his lips quirk up wryly before he speaks, "Kriff just as a rule I find it better to keep my trap shut about my personal history. When I do, the people around me end up far less sad, pissed off or unnecessarily twitchy."

Kanan huffs a little at that particular confession, "…Ezra, none of the above are inappropriate responses in some circumstances. You do get that right?"

"Anger rarely helps anyone in my own experience Kanan and…well…I don't need or do pity." Ezra's wipes a splash of water away from around the rim of the sink. "It completely karks up my whole personal aesthetic, for one thing."

Force, Kanan thinks with a small frown, when had this kid become so…so darkly witty for lack of a better way to describe it? And why hadn't Kanan noticed it before now? He thinks that it's a fairly new coping mechanism that Ezra's adopted as he's moved deeper into puberty, but it's *not* one Kanan's overly fond of truthfully. Not when it's just yet another way of creating more emotional distance.

He draws in a deep breath then he lets it out again, carefully considering then discarding several options for a reply. Eventually, he settles on, "Ezra, be careful that you're not mistaking people's concern for their pity, okay? Because they may look similar on the surface, but they're actually parsecs apart, Kid."

"Sure they are," Ezra mumbles, muttering something else under his breath that the older Jedi can't quite make out initially. It takes Kanan a long moment to realize he doesn't understand what the younger man just said because Ezra'd switched over to his native Lotholian unthinkingly.

"Hold up there a moment, Ezra. You mind repeating that last again in Basic this time?"

Ezra waves the request away. "Never mind, it's nothing important, just an old saying."

Kanan is unimpressed by the attempted diversion. "It's important enough to you that you both thought and said it."

"It popped into my head, that's all. " His Padawan's voice is growing increasingly tense.

"…Ezra." This time Kanan's voice is insistent. "Just spill it, already." There's something here that matters. Something that instinctively Kanan knows is worth all this continued probing.

"It means 'defective merchandise is the purview of the chump' okay?" The teenager finally snaps out.

They both fall silent after that. And Force, doesn't that just leave a bitter taste in Kanan's mouth. "Ezra," He begins again after a moment, because people aren't parts to be bought or sold. Or shouldn't be in any society that's working. Surely Ezra knows that.

The teen draws in a breath, his voice suddenly toneless and controlled. "Let's just…not have this conversation right now, okay?" 'Or ever.' Ezra doesn't acknowledge this thought aloud but he thinks it very clearly. "I'm not in the headspace for it."

Kanan draws a deep breath. Out of the frying pan right into the bonfire so to speak. Given the tension in Ezra's frame, it's probably best to regroup and come back around to this subject later. "Do me a favor, Ezra, and crash here this evening okay?" Kanan wants his Padawan close by tonight, and after he's had time to meditate and think things through a little bit longer, they can hopefully try and tackle this topic again in the morning.

Ezra grimaces. "I …really don't think that's a good idea right now, Kanan."

"Why not? Your bed's the same as it's ever been. This way if you wake up halfway through the night again, I can just put you back under." And Ezra wouldn't have to wake tomorrow with the druggy aftermath typical of sedatives. There are some distinct advantages, after all, to the judicious use of an occasional force suggestion.

"If we're going to be leaving for Alderaan than I need to go back to the dorms and pick up a couple of things beforehand. "

"…And that can't wait until tomorrow?" 'For Sith's sake kid, kriffing let someone in…' Kanan's Padawan is drowning, and they both know it, and Kanan's more than willing to help. He's eager to help. So why does Ezra always have to be so Force-cursed stubborn about accepting even the most basic sorts of personal assistance from those around him?

Ezra's voice in frustrated and weary, as he responds to the words Kanan hasn't actually even vocalized. "And this, Kanan? This is exactly why I keep this type of stuff to myself. Because talking about this kriff never helps anything, historically speaking. Everybody just winds up tired and frustrated instead. "

"...Historically speaking?" That statement brings Kanan's head up like a viper, honing in.

Ezra just shrugshis shoulders, "Just ask all the people back on Lothol who wanted me around during harvest time, yeah but never let me stay through the coldest part of the winter, no matter how hard I worked. It's my poodoo, Kana, and I have plenty of practice with shoveling it on my own, I really do. But doesn't mean that I don't get a little tired of having my face rubbed repeatedly in my own stink."

And that's just it. 'Enough. Enough already.' A heart after all can only survive being stepped on so many times before you either have to crush it underfoot or pick it up off the damn floor. He knows at this point which option he's picking. He tugs the kid forward and into another hug – this time fiercer than any previous. 'Ezra : you. are. not. defective.'

Ezra startles at the thought in his mind as well as at Kanan's sudden physical action, but makes no effort to fight the embrace, simply accepting the gesture without words for several long minutes.

"You're a total sap, you do know that right?" Ezra finally gives up and murmurs into Kanan's clavicle after several minutes. He hasn't said anything else, but he's made no attempt to escape Kanan's hold either. Mostly he just seems strangely resigned to his entire situation. Kanan decides for the moment that he'll take that as at least a little progress.

"Sometimes, yes." Kanan's pretty sure at this point in his life he's faced worse accusations.

"So are we *done* hugging now?" Ezra's next question has a clear if soft thread of amusement in it.

Kanan considers the question for a moment, noting the kid's gradually easing body language than shakes his head , "Nah. Ask me again in another couple of minutes."

A silent huff of laughter shakes the smaller frame with those words, "You know, if this whole emergent pattern of repeated hugging is going to be the price of what I told you all the other night, then I'm starting to think maybe I need to set some standard rates for all this unsolicited cuddling. Or, you know, at least demand a few hours off from standard meditation or something..."

Kanan snorts and lightly boxes the back of his Padawan's head. "How about you try just shutting it and hugging me back? How's that for an acceptable option?"

"All right." Ezra does so- a little awkwardly at first perhaps, but without further complaint. Kanan's relieved to sense that after another minute or so his Padawan's mental shielding also starts relaxing as well. Not a lot ,of course, but Kanan'll take whatever progress he can manage.

"So…we should probably think about leaving the Fresher sometime soon," Ezra murmurs after a moment, "Before, you know, the pair of stalkers that we're not supposed to know about lurking out there assume we've fallen into the toilet and *drown* during this conversation or something."

Kanan hmmms, considering the prospect for a moment. Ezra's entirely right about the watch guard outside, though Kanan also can't entirely blame Hera or Chopper for hovering right now, especially after their most recent conversation. "You up for more food, Kid? Because if you are I'm pretty sure that there's enough for another round of what we had for supper still in the kitchen."

"Does saying yes mean that mean that I'd both have to interact with other people and be civil while doing it? Because I have to be honest, Kanan, that's a high order right now for me..."

Kanan grimaces, shifting their positions just slightly.

"Ezra before we go back out there - and for the record this is probably the first thing I should have mentioned when I came in here. I'm sorry that Hera sideswiped you the way that she did about you needing to have a medical checkup. Ambushing you with the topic was never my desire or my intention. But for the record, Kid, she didn't know that we'd agreed to table the topic, and I do agree with her that you need to think about getting a medical exam done, just to be safe about things."

He feels the teenager's microflinch as Ezra pulls back from the embrace, apparently having finally hit his limit in this conversation in terms of accepting physical affection. Ezra exhales raggedly. "Kriff, Kanan…can this be another of those topics that we avoid discussing for a while longer please?"

"Considering how much this subject, in particular, is already overdue? No.- that doesn't so much work for me right now." Kanan sighs and rubs the back of his neck, "Look, I know you value your privacy, Ezra…but there's got to be a middle ground on the subject- a solution that doesn't batter your dignity into the ground and still reassures all of the rest of us that you're reasonably healthy."

"And non-contagious? Because I already paid for a basic checkup and a full course of mass spectrum antibiotics 'after,' if that's what's really the issue here, Kanan. I can already tell you, that you guys are safe - all my bloodwork came back clean. "

Kanan blinks at that, frankly left speechless by the comment.

Ezra chuckles at his flummoxed expression, "Medical care back on Lothol was never impossible to get, Kanan, just too expensive for me to bother with on what you'd call a regular basis. They wouldn't take minor children at any of the free clinics without proper documentation and parental consent, thanks to Imperial regulation. So I was always limited to treatment 'under the table' – usually meaning via gang doctors or one of the local chop shop clinics…" Ezra grimaces a little bit. "Which always got the job done, but didn't exactly meet most people's definitions of 'necessarily sanitary.'"

God, Kanan's going to be sick. Ezra really needs to have a checkup on Alderaan. Hera's right about that, and Kanan also now needs to scrub out his mind's eye after this particular conversation. Preferably with some steel wool and some very strong bleach. "Ezra? Look, I'm exhausted right now …and we've both had a long day. So I strongly suggest that unless you want to see me have a literal stroke before this conversation ends, we should table this and pick it back up tomorrow morning. Until then, if I can guarantee that you can do so in private, will you at least try to eat again?"

"I guess yeah. Probably."

"Then that's our curre t plan. We go get you some food and get you back to your room in that order. Or you can always eat in mine if Zeb's in yours. He probably won't be...he had plans after dinner with Alexandr. Now, do you have anything here on ship clean clothes-wise that will do for tomorrow?"

"No…but I can always put what I've got on now in the clothes fresher." The teen rubs the back of his neck, his voice begrudging, "Well assuming any of my old sleep stuff here actually fits me anymore, anyway. Lately, it feels like I've been growing so fast KAnan, I'm down in resupply practically every other week…"

"What can I say, Kid, that's what happens when you sprout up for the sky over the course of a single year like some kind of freakish, force touched pole bean."

Ridiculous as it is to try and picture it some days, Hera claims that Ezra's grown at least six and a half inches in the most recent months – and Kanan believes it after hugging him today. Sometimes, he has to wonder though, what exactly is getting secretly mixed into Ezra's meal portions in the commissary by the mess staff. He's seriously starting to suspect growth hormones must be involved.

"If it comes down to it Ezra, I'm fairly sure you'll only *half* swim in a pair of my old sleeping pants these days if I need to lend you a pair."

Ezra snorts at that comment, "Are you back to being bitter about the fact that I'm probably going to end up taller than you again, Kanan? Because, I have to say, Master that's just really, really, sad."

Kanan doesn't bother to hide his smirk or hold back the well-deserved shoulder shove, the comment earns Ezra "You go right on telling yourself that, if it makes you feel better. I already know that you're prone to self-delusion."

And after everything that's happened in the past couple of hours, Ezra's laugh in response as he follows his master from the bathroom toward the galley is both bright and doubly sweet.

Chapter 3: Hitting Bottom (Updated)

"Well?"

"Well?"

Hera slides into the Galley's booth across the table from where Kanan is working on his third cup off very, very strong caff. (And yes, he'd sprung his normally hoarded stash of the Spiran – he can drink what he wants. What of it?)

"I believe the two of us agreed earlier that we are due a long conversation, Kanan?"

Kanan groans at the Twi'lek's pronouncement, slumping back against the cushions on the bench, covering his face with tired hands as he literally prays for a moment for mercy. "Look Hera, this whole kriffing day has been karked up from it's beginning to its end. Can we rain check this for tomorrow evening please?"

She pokes at his drinking mug with one sharp finger. "This is your fourth in under an hour, My Love. Why bother waiting? When you're obviously not intending to sleep anyway?"

Well, she has a valid point there, Kanan acknowledges with a little sigh. "Believe me, Hera. This stuff," He gestures to the cup, "...is not what I *want* to be drinking right now, unfortunately. I'd be dumping out our emergency stash just to be on the safe side if Chopper hadn't already found and thoroughly hidden all the on ship liquor from me." Because yes it has been that bad of a past couple of weeks.

Hera's hand reaches out for his, her fingers enfolding his own and squeezing them tightly for a moment. "All the more reason, Kanan, for you to spill it. If that's where you are right now Love, then you better *get talking.*"

"I don't have the will for a fight right now Hera, and the one that's probably coming if I start this discussion right now is too karking important for me to mess up by going into it handicapped by exhaustion."

"I didn't ask for a fight, Kanan. I just asked you to be honest with me."

"About?"

"Well you're the one who's craving a bottle right now, so how about you pick the topic... What is it that's gotten you there? I'm not in your head, Kanan, so I don't know. So you start and I 'll let you know if it looks like we've slipped out of relevant and into avoidant sorts of territory."

Well that's fair enough. "My Padawan is kriffed in the head, Hera."

"…And this is news to you suddenly?" And damn it, Kanan can literally hear her perfect eyebrow raising slightly. The response is typical of Hera, in these highly charged moments, but right now it just makes him angry. He inhales, then exhales, breathing harshly. "No Hera. In this case, I really, really, don't think that you're hearing me."

Her tone softens slightly. "Then tell me again, and this time Kanan, I promise to leave out the sarcasm."

"Ezra's karking kriff'd, Hera. Damn near close to irreparably. His psyche's such a torn, ripped up mess of betrayals and violations right now that I can't really let myself dwell on the extent of the damage. Because if I do? I'm going to either start screaming or crying or hitting things. And Ezra can't afford for me to do any of those things at the moment. I'm the closest thing to a functional ally at his power level that he's got available right now. We can't both be courting full on traumatic disassociation, no matter how reasonable a response that would be. Because do you want to know the worst part of all this, Hera? What he mentioned in the bar the other night? That was essentially nothing. That was just the karking sprinkles on top of his 'buy one get three free' trauma sundae that makes up the borders of his *entire kriffing personal history.*"

Kanan pauses, inhales a sharp angry breath. "How fluent are you in native Lotholian, Hera?"

She blinks at that, a little nonplussed, a lot confused by the question, "I'm reasonably so…" He nods, then quotes back Ezra's quote from earlier. This time with its direct Basic and Rylian translations along for the ride. Hera pauses, rubs at the base of one of her Lek. "Kanan - love, I can tell that this is important just from your face, I really can, but I'm clearly missing something here in terms of the context."

Kanan snorts at that, slams back the rest of his current drink, and gets up to go rinse the mug under the faucet, his whole body gradually succumbing to increasingly angry tremors as he finally makes himself speak. "'Only chumps buy things that are obviously broken.' *That* was Ezra's direct - if completely unintentional - answer to why he avoids talking about his past when I asked him about it earlier, Hera. He thinks that he's essentially no better than merchandise, Hera, because that lesson's been reinforced to him over and over since his early childhood by an ENTIRE KARKING PLANET. And for three kriffing years I completely failed to look and actually see it."

"We." Hera's voice is one part soft, one part firm when she speaks up again.

"What?" He answers back, his tone confused, his posture tight, his frustration still rapidly rising.

"We didn't see Ezra pain, Kanan. Not just you. All the rest of us were here as well. If there's failure here to shoulder, then it's not on 'you,' it's on 'we'."

"Banthashit!" Kanan all but shouts, "Ezra is *my* Padawan. I'm the one who's responsible for his training. Not to mention that I'm the one who's tied to his head via a Force damned two-way psychic link!"

"And you think that makes him any less mine too!?" Hera shoves her hand against his chest hard. "Because I seem to remember being the one who wanted him first and fought for him first while you were still sorting through your kriff, Kanan Jarrus! You don't own the monopoly where Ezra is concerned just because he's Jedi too!" Those words cool Kanan's temper some, if only just slightly. Though Hera's own rant isn't anywhere near complete yet. "Zeb's his bloody roommate, Kanan. Sabine sees him as her best friend - even if she'd never admit it aloud to most people. We all live out of each other's back pockets ...live and fight and love and bleed. If Ezra belongs to anyone but himself at this point in his life, then it's definitely all of us now not just one single person. And as for his current psychological damage?" She draws in a ragged breath. "You're not the only one who's been kicking their own ass lately for lack of better targets! We've been here too, Love! You're not the only one who missed the forest for too long because of all the trees. "

She doesn't *understand.* "...I'm kriffing linked to his head, Hera, I'm regularly inside of his shielding. I should have …"

"What?! Seen the shape of universe in its entire complexity? I hate to break it to you Atlas, but omniscience isn't a skill set that's currently available to anyone. We all just do the best that we possibly can."

And Sith and damnation, now Kanan's crying. Or as close as he can get to that act anymore. His nails are digging into the palms of his hands, his breath is too fast in his chest - both of his temples are throbbing. "His head…his whole damn life, Hera…! Force, I'm just SO KRIFFING ANGRY!" And Kanan can't get it out. Doesn't know how to anymore, when literal days of meditation are just not working. "Right now I just want to karking destroy something!"

"I know, and I get it, Kanan. Just take a look at our damn lack of crockery at present."

"SOMEONE HAS TO STAY SANE." He repeats the internalized mantra yet again. "One of us has to keep it under control right now, if Ezra is going to survive this..."

And then Hera's in front of him, grabbing his hands where they're shaking at his sides, and leaning up on her tiptoes to literally snarl the next words into his face. "You're right, Kanan Jarrus. Someone has to stay sane. And tonight? That someone is *me!*"

She shakes his upper arms hard enough to rattle his teeth. "Damn it, let it *go*, Kanan. They've taken enough from Ezra already; don't you dare give them any more power over any of the rest of us too, not *voluntarily.*"

And that? That's just it. Something rips free in the back of Kanan's mind like a massive storm door suddenly banging open and Force Damn Them All - Kanan hadn't remembered the feel of this kind of whole body weeping. He hasn't experienced this kind of unwavering agony since the night that Depa Billaba died. But he remembers it now - he remembers this stage of grief completely.

Thank the kriffing Force, some part of Kanan notes in a distant part of his mind, that he'd managed to convince Ezra to let him knock him out for the night when he'd finally managed to wrestle the Kid into a pair of his oldest, smallest sleep pants a couple of hours ago. Because Kanan has no doubt that the poor kid would've had a full-on heart attack, had he seen his master literally imploding right now. Ezra'd have taken it as proof he was right in his policy of personal secrecy.

The floor feels cold under Kanan's palms as he crumbles down, but that's okay. He welcomes the respite from the seemingly relentless internal heat that he feels building under his skin right now. He needs at least some part of him to be numb at the moment, because it feels a lot like every bit of rage and grief he's ever felt in his life is flaring up like a massive, hungry bonfire inside of him right now.

Kanan lets the emotion go, and prays the blaze inside will go out eventually.

XXXXXXXXXXXXX

Hera, bless her soul, doesn't try to baby talk or soothe him. She doesn't tell him it's okay, or that it ever will be again. Instead she just sits down on the floor, and lays a firm hand on the center of his back. It lays there like a weighted anchor, a soothing kind of focus even as he weeps. She keeps it there until the worst of the emotional storm front passes through – leaving him both relieved and strangely empty. Until Kanan lifts his own neck enough to wipe moisture from his bare face with one of his hands, then push some of the hair that's slipped free of his ponytail up and back.

"Better?" She asks quietly.

"No." And Force - he's got snot pouring out of what feels like every facial orifice he's got at the moment, and it's completely disgusting.

Her voice holds …a little bit of a smile? "That's okay. We still have a whole box of crockery in one of the lockers downstairs if you end up needing it."

"Does it actually help?" Force does Kanan have to sound so hopeful, so utterly, brokenly pathetic at the idea?

"Never underestimate the cathartic value of a little harmless destruction of personal property..," Hera's voice is droll. "Physical outlets like that work for a reason, Love."

"I liked those dishes, you know." And Force when did he become so kriffing whiny? That's got to be the dumbest thing that's ever come out of his mouth.

"I ...didn't. Which is ironic, on so many levels. Since they were a gift from my Dad and, even if he never brought it up directly, I'm pretty sure he actually meant them to be part of a new heirloom style hope chest or something like that."

"So they weren't your mother's, then?" That somehow makes Kanan feel vaguely better about the whole situation.

"Oh KRIFF NO." Hera actually giggles, pulling back her arm slowly as Kanan gradually shifts back from his facing down crouch into a more casual seated position. "My mom was many things during her life Kanan, but she couldn't even *boil water* worth a damn! If my dad hadn't been a decent cook by the time that they met and married then all three of us would have starved long before I ever reached my majority."

"You really didn't like the dishes?" He asks her a little curiously.

"They were ugly and clunky. They looked better in pieces than they ever did whole. Kark, even Sabine agrees with me there She had an absolute ball helping with their destruction. I don't think I've seen her actually laughing at anything so genuinely since… Well since that night in the Cantina to speak frankly. Hera sighs then, tired and deep, "She's pretty torn up too right now, by the way…she keeps looking for trouble everywhere she goes. Probably because just like you, Kanan, she blames herself for everything that's happened since that night. Even though it all really comes down to Ezra's pride or his pain finally just breaking under the weight of one unintendedly insulting comment."

Kanan chuckles weakly in reply to that, "Don't worry, I promise that the next time that I see her, I'll set her straight on who's corned the useless guilt market where Ezra's concerned these days."

Hera lightly cuffs one side of his head. "Oh no, you don't, Kanan. No swan diving into that particular swamp of uselessness again. The ones – the only ones - who get to shoulder any of the blame for the past two weeks are also the ones whom actually did all of this to Ezra. The assholes, whom, for obvious reasons, better karking well pray that they remain forever anonymous. Because if they don't then they're going to end up maimed eventually."

"Ezra's not going to give us any IDs of his attackers, Hera." Kanan sighs deeply, pushing back a loose bit of hair that's flopped forward over his forehead with one of his hands again. "As I just said, he's more likely to slit his own throat right now then he is to volunteer anything further about his past voluntarily."

"Yet he seems to be talking to you just fine, Kanan." Hera's voice, no doubt meant to be encouraging, is nonetheless softly contradicting.

Kanan shrugs his shoulders a little, "Well yeah, I guess. But Hera's that's only because I'm basically practicing a rather ruthless - if admittedly benevolent - form of pursuit predation on him right now."

"Huh?" Hera blinks at him, her expression clearly questioning.

Kanan circles his head halfway around the joint at the base of his neck, hearing cervical vertebrae popping as he does so. "He's...look Ezra's so exhausted right now by everything that's happening right now that he can't *help* but keep crashing in a discernable pattern over and over again. That's just, as they'd say, the nature of his particular beast at present. Literally, all I'm doing to get him to talk, Hera, is showing up just before he crashes and hugging him when he bears his throat at me instead of attacking or abandoning him. Once I do so, he's usually so shell-shocked and vulnerable as a result that I can get a few minutes of actual conversation either into or out of him as a result. "

"Gods." Hera sounds like she wants to be sick at that confession. Kanan more than identifies with that reaction. It's not a particularly gentle strategy, he knows, but it's working a little at least, and either way it's literally all that he's got to help Ezra at the moment.

He clears his throat, then, wincing. "Do you know what he thinks about why we're dragging him to a clinic on Alderaan, Hera?" Kanan forces out a harsh laugh, "He thinks you're afraid he's *contagious or something.* That he represents a physical threat to the ship of some kind you're not willing to tolerate without further treatment. He actually gave me a whole spiel about getting himse;ftested after his 'last time' - whatever the kriff that's supposed to imply." Kanan chokes on the thought in sick disbelief, "He's the one who got attacked and traumatized several times over, Hera and yet we're the ones allowed to be reassured in the wake of it, apparently."

Hera closes her eyes tight, making a low sound of pain. "Kanan, we both know exactly what 'after his last time' probably actually implies."

Kanan sighs, dropping his head down toward his chest. "Yeah, we do, Hera. Not that I'm up to talking about it in specific anymore than Ezra is, at the moment anyway. That comment he dropped the other night about being trapped by his hair just…" He shudders hard. "I saw some pretty messed up stuff too as you well know, during my initial days on the streets after Depa first died. And probably the worst of those times..." Kanan doesn't finish explaining. He knows Hera can draw her own conclusions. He doesn't need to blend his memory of that with his mental images of of Ezra, frankly speaking.

"I suspected even before that night," Hera mutters softly. "But I convinced myself that we'd miraculously dodged that particular bullet where Ezra was concerned because he was so good at surviving by other means. I didn't want to be right, Kanan, so I closed my eyes and chose to look away. I didn't want to push him if I didn't have to. Which in the end? Was just plain cowardly on my part."

"You still did better than me, Hera." He sighs, " I mean I pretty much openly embraced willful ignorance in favor of pretending that he's actually Mr Snarky Go Lucky instead of just plays him occasionally on holovid. It wasn't even hard, Hera! Ezra holds the guise so damn well, it's easier to buy it than push him most of the time."

"I know. " Hera squeezes his hand. "Sabine said pretty much the same thing to Zeb and I just the other night. Kriff, Zeb says it's almost like it's a game that he plays with himself every bit as much as he plays it with the rest of us. Slip on the costume, avoid all mirrors and keep on going, and sooner or later you'll either die from your wounds or you just stop bleeding."

Kanan nods at the analogy, exhaling softly before moving onto the next topic, "You know, it was all I could do just to keep him on The Ghost after talking to him last night. He wanted off of the ship something awful, Hera. We're going to need to watch him...for the next few weeks at least."

"You think he's an actual flight risk, hen? How angry is he with us about the whole involuntary medical checkup?"

"He's definitely uncomfortable, Hera - with generous side orders of both numb and embarrassed. Though it's not so much that he's feeling angry as Ezra's humiliated in advance. Which really makes no sense since it's also him who went out of his way to tell me that we don't need to worry about his being contagious. I mean Ezra's apparently already paid out of pocket for an exam and a bunch of screening blood tests, so why is going through it again this embarrassing for him?"

Unless of course, Kanan knows, there's something more involved that he and Hera aren't yet seeing.

"He couldn't go to one of the free clinics on Lothol to get that done after?" Hera sounds more than a little appalled at this new information. But then again that's hardly surprising. They'd both seen how skinny Ezra had been when he'd initially come aboard The Ghost. How a kid that starved had managed to afford expensive private lab-work on his hand to mouth budget was another highly uncomfortable question, mostly involving the internal mental calculation of how many days it had meant that Ezra almost inevitably didn't get to eat as a result.

"They apparently don't treat minor children without both ID and parental consent on Lothol - even in the charity clinics. Ezra implied that it had something to do with Imperially mandated regulations, which I can pretty much believe. It makes sense they'd do so, Hera, if only for census related reasons." Kanan draws in a deep breath. "Hera – speaking of such, are we going to end up running into the same problem if we try and get him checked over while we're in Alderaan's capital city when he go there? Because remember, Dev Morgan's in the Imperial system now as Ezra Bridger. His old cover is completely compromised at this point. And we don't have any other ID for Ezra …at least not in terms of paperwork that can stand up to close prolonged scrutiny."

Nor Kanan knows, do they have anything that names either of them as either Ezra's parent or his guardian. To be fair, there's really never been the need before now for it. There's rarely been any point in concerning themselves with such details out here on The Rim - especially not in terms of formalized legal or medical documentation. Their healthcare after all, has always involved the triaging of various illnesses and injuries as they occurred on the spot, occasionally getting assistance from the fleet for higher level treatments or issues, like when Kanan had suddenly been blinded.

Unfortunately those kind of piecemeal arrangements are going to count for nothing on a planet like Alderaan in one of its larger clinics. Especially if said clinic followed mandatory rules of reporting when faced with suspected child abuse victims. All it would really take was one overzealous person making the wrong call and things could rapidly descend to real threat instead of simple annoyance. Without the right paperwork - without the right cover identity - any check Ezra had that turned up proof of previous abuse could get him automatically flagged in Alderaan's imperially regulated medical system. Which could place them all under further scrutiny and cause a formal medical investigation.

Because after all, no matter how little Ezra's reaching his majority actually matters to either Kanan or Hera or the Imperials (albeit for completely opposite reasons) Ezra still has another nine months and eight days until he officially turns eighteen. Which means as far as Alderaan's social services are concerned, anyway that Ezra would be seen as displaced, orphaned minor with absolutely no claimable ties to any of them.

A displaced orphaned minor already smack dab in the 'highly vulnerable' category.

Chapter Management: Too Much and Too Little Honesty (Updated): Too Much and Too Little Honesty (Updated)

Chapter 4: Too Much and Too Little Honesty (Updated)

"It isn't a problem."

"Ezra."

"It *isn't* going to be a problem, Kanan."

"…Ezra."

"It *really* isn't going to be a probl…"

"Ezra…"

"Oh for Force Sake's, Kanan, will you just let me finish please?!" The teenager's voice is aggravated and weary, and they're not even through their breakfast yet. "For once in my entire kirffing life may I be allowed to relieve instead of create someone's anxiety?!"

Silence. 'Well all right then.' Kanan thinks to himself drawing in a deep breath, holding it, then exhaling it out through his nose. "All right, Kid, you're right. I'm sorry and I'm listening. For now anyway."

Ezra relaxes, at least a little. "It isn't a problem Kanan. Not the 'Alderaan situation' and not Imperial medical regulations. Though well okay maybe those might still be annoying in the short term at the clinic. But it's not like we'll be returning for any kind of treatment after one appointment though. What I'm trying to say right now is that you and Hera don't have to worry about the paperwork issues. Because well yes it's true that yes, Dev Morgan's cover is blown beyond any hope of usefulness at this point: Surprise Master! I already have new and *great* fake ID!"

Kanan pauses at that announcement- completely still - for the space of a couple of seconds, blinking. Then he recovers, puts his cup of tea down on the Ghost's circular table and crosses his arms over his chest. "Define 'great.' He commands a little suspiciously.

"Present from Hondo." Ezra responds back equally bluntly.

"*Ezra!*" This time it's less a word than it is a kriffing growl. Ezra just shifts on the bench, lifting his hands up in the air defensively.

"Hey it's not like I *asked* him to do it, Kanan. He just kept insisting that he owed me!"

"For what?!"

Ezra waffles "…I probably shouldn't answer that?"

"For what reason?"

"Plausible deniability."

"*EZRA BRIDGER!*" Kanan honestly doesn't know at this point if he actually has enough sanity left for this kriffing conversation.

"Look…just...it happened a long time ago and has been completely resolved, collaterally speaking. Let's just say that Hondo and I 'bonded,' back during one of our mutual little adventures, and if he wants to dote on me occasionally as a result, then I'm not going to try and stop him. He's all but alone, real family wise, now, Kanan. And I see no good reason to deliberately hurt his feelings."

Kanan sighs and drops his forehead down onto the table between them with dull thunk, "Because of course," He mutters very dryly, "Ethically questionable Space Pirates deserve kindness and empathy, clearly."

"Life is all about making connections, Kanan. And being willing to open up yourself to other living beings."

Kanan lifts his head from the table, glaring a little at his Padawan. "Seriously? You're seriously gonna try to use that one right now? On me!?"

Ezra shrugs, "If the shoe fits, Master..."

"Then wear the karking boots instead!" Kanan snaps back automatically.

Ezra simply snorts back at that reply. And okay but seriously - when did Kanan lose control of this conversation?!

Ezra shrugs his shoulders again and then sighs and picks back up his cooling cup of caf, taking a long drink before continuing "Besides," the younger Jedi mutters into the rim of his stone mug, "Do you have *any* idea at all of the price that you'd actually have to pay out of pocket for something like….I don't know about you Kanan, but I *enjoy* having savings."

Kanan does know as a matter of fact. Not that that is something that they are going to be discussing at this particular time. He would at least like to pretend in this subject that he has some actual high ground. This kid is enough of tiger-that-he's-grasping-by-the-tail already.

"I'm just saying, I don't know…maybe you could take it as a good sign, Kanan? For once in our lives... a problem shared and a problem solved all in a little under two minutes. Force, you could even call it a blessing!"

"I'll call it a trap." Kanan responds back to him more than a little bit darkly.

"Cynic," Ezra frowns, and then the younger man shifts, and speaks again a little bit more patiently. "Look Kanan, I'll be the first to admit to you that sometimes Hondo's, well… a little bit shady…"

"A little? A *little* shady he says.."

"But he genuinely, for reasons I don't fully understand, Master, has a soft spot for Jedi in general, and for yours truly in particular. Do you honestly think he's going to somehow betray me to the empire like this, Kanan, when he's still trying actively to recruit me…?"

Kanan sighs heavily, conceding defeat for the time being. "So how long exactly have you been in possession of this, and I quote, 'really really good ID?'"

"It was only one 'great,' Master. And since my last birthday, Kanan."

"…And the age listed on said ID is?"

"Uhm …Either nineteen or twenty?"

Kanan rolls his eyes, "Of course it is. Because I couldn't clearly see *that* one coming…"

Ezra only shrugs completely unapologetically, "It only makes sense, Kanan! I'll be eighteen in less than a year now. Kriff with my hair cut short these days, like it is I'm pretty effective at passing as over majority age already. Sure I have to make a couple of jokes about my damn baby face occasionally, but whatever, it works."

Kanan groans "Kid, must you really just keep digging yourself in deeper and deeper here?!"

Ezra responds to *that* comment by rolling his eyes heavenward. "What - are *you* really going to try and lecture *me* about the ethical implications of operating under personas, Kanan? Cause one - I don't know about you, Master, but I like being able to get antibiotics and other things like that when I need them from reputable places now instead of the alternative. And two? I'm pretty sure that your whining about my having a fake ID at this point in my life is sorta like the wolf cussing out the lion when it catches it stalking the sheep!"

Kanan shuts his mouth. Then he opens it once more. Then shuts it again. Wisely. "All right, all right – on this topic I'll cede." At least temporarily anyway. But if Ezra thinks that he's going to win this argument entirely in the long run then he's clearly delusional, because… well, Kriff It, because Kanan just *gets to win* some of the arguments like these.

"Good. See I was right, Kanan, and it wasn't even all that difficult or painful to acknowledge it in this particular case." Ezra sighs a little. "Now, that we've established that fact, Kanan could you maybe try and look a little less conflicted about the entire situation? As opposed to, I don't know, me having to watch you sit there looking like I just did something nasty to your baby..."

Kanan's scowl is markedly dour, 'Kid in case you missed the memo, you technically *are* what passes for my 'baby'…he thinks to himself, 'And you're running circles around me right now. Which no, doesn't do much for 'lowering my kriffing anxiety.'

Ezra isn't done speaking himself yet, though, "Hey – it's not like I'm buying Death Sticks or Spice or gorging on alcohol or anything, Kanan! Kriff, I've never even used the thing to buy *porn* – there are frankly better ways to spend you money. Which according to the rest of Pheonix squadron is *totally* unnatural and freakish of me.'' The teenager shrugs his shoulders.

Well, if the kid is going to give him *that* big of an opening, then karking right he's taking it. Even if it hadn't exactly been on the morning's original itinerary. With Ezra, Kanan has learned, you played your cards as you got them because you never knew when you'll have a better chance again.

Which is why Kanan uncrosses his arms, drops his voice an octave or two and regards the teen seriously and sympathetically for a long moment before speaking. "There's nothing wrong with taking your time with stuff like that, Ezra." He replies, "Buying…pictures and holovids and stuff, it doesn't provide the same kick for everybody. Some people just need more connection than that. And no, despite what your buddies in Pheonix squadron might have implied that doesn't actually make you a freak. Especially given your particular history."

Ezra stares at him, horrified for a moment or so, before bursting back into speech in clear protest. "Oh Karabast, Kanan…Just stop! Before you make my karking ears bleed! That last bit about the porn was a *joke,* Master - meant to knock you out of your current funk! Not to get you to try and start 'the sex talk' with me!"

"No?" Kanan raises an eyebrow in challenge, a little bemused by his Padawan's sheer level of apparent horror.

"Kark No!" Ezra echoes back emphatically. "To speak very frankly, Kanan, I'd rather live in a Sarlacc, indefinitely!"

"Yeah, well suck it up, Kid." Kanan warns, pointing his finger at him, his expression unbending, "Because I'll raincheck on the topic at present if you insist. But is definitely *going* to be happening in the very near future, Ezra. Along with a couple other 'slightly' overdue conversations." He puts the last words in air quotes deliberately. Said discussion is in fact number three on what Kanan's taken to mentally calling his 'Grow Up And Act Like A Force Damned Parent' list. Ezra is going to hate everything on said list- probably with all the passion in his adolescent soul - but Kanan's presently more than prepared to live with it. There are just too many things on said list that have already been put off too long. There is a big difference, Kanan's come to realize in the past two weeks, between benign unknowing and outright neglect.

"Kanan…" Ezra's voice stutters to a stop at what he sees on his master's face, and then the younger man's voice drops off, before he shifts uncomfortably in his seat. All right then, given the previous wild course of this whole conversation, Kanan's going to take that redirection as a necessary thing. At least now he's certain that he has Ezra's full, undivided attention.

"As I said Ezra, the timing on most of those talks is negotiable, but the discussions themselves aren't going to be. Welcome officially to Temple Course J207: Being an Adult in Actual Kriffing Reality. It only seems fair Kid under the circumstances, with your majority birthday coming up so fast, that we at least start preparing you for the inevitable."

Ezra's voice is strange when he speaks out next – not angry, or upset, simply oddly detached and restrained. Kanan can sense but not follow the flood of thoughts currently rushing through his Padawan's head behind his current shielding. "And if I point out that I've already had more of 'Adult 101' than most people my age, Kanan, thanks to my 'eclectic education' and I tell you that I'm done with talking about certain subjects at this point? What then…?"

"Then we discuss and review, anyway." Kanan cuts him off calmly, "Regarding the biggest and most important stuff under each topic at least, Ezra. Because, through no fault of your own Kid– and note I'm saying that clearly up front, I'm not exactly inclined to think said 'eclectic education' was necessarilythe kind likely to leave you with a particularly healthy or balanced view of certain topics."

Ezra's breathing jerks a little in reply that, and he turns his head away sharply. "Understood."

Then inside Ezra's head, not meant to be heard but nonetheless coming straight through down through their the link like a kriffing freight shuttle. 'Hondo's offer's looking better and better to me every day now.'

Kanan grimaces, and reinforces his own end of their link. When the kid's this upset, he thinks a little wryly, Ezra really really needs to work on his personal shielding.

Kanan considers all of this for a moment or two, while the two of them sit quietly, and then he makes another slightly grimmer decision. It may not be time for the two of them to have sex talk, but it is clearly the point at which they need to cover one of the other topics (#1) that he's got written on his list. Well there's no time as they say, quite like the present.

"Look, Ezra-" Kanan takes a deep breath, and begins, not at all unsympathetically. "I know that the past few weeks have been hard on you, Kid. I do get that. And to be honest Ezra, I don't think anyone your age likes talking about the kind of things we're going to have to tackle. Even before we consider your personal history. That said, Ezra..." He leans forward a little, "Those escape routes of yours that you've been mapping out in your head over the last couple weeks whenever you start thinking that things seem just a little too irrecoverable at the moment? Bad Idea, Kid. Very, *very* bad idea. If you honestly think that *any* of us are just going to sit here and watch you try and walk away *now*– particularly after everything that's just happened," Kanan scoffs a little at the idea, "Well, you *obviously* don't know any of us as well as you seem to think you do."

Ezra's face turns back toward him then, clearly startled. His next works are literally stuttered. "I…I h…haven't been…"

"Banthashit." Kanan cuts him off, very calmly, "In some of your darker moments, Ezra you've been chewing away at the notion almost obsessively." The older Jedi taps the side of his temple then. "And when you're stressed out, Kid, you don't always shield as well as you seem to think that you do."

Kanan knows that he's right – even without the sound of his Padawan's breathing or the flares in Ezra's force sense to confirm it. He knows because he's felt Ezra's repeated struggle with the compulsion to run. Initially as a compulsion to flee all Kanan's own, which he'd honestly been confused by at first until he'd finally traced back to where the original feeling actually sourced from.

"I won't. I wouldn't." Ezra's voice is still a little shaky as his Padawan finally speaks, but it honestly doesn't feel as if the kids is trying to lie to him outright. At least as far as Kanan can tell. Which is good as far as Kanan can tell.

But it doesn't mean they're finished yet. Not by a long shot.

"I'm glad to hear it." Kanan informs him, soberly, "Because that's not the kind of moment that we're *trying* to force you into right now. As I said there is *time,* Ezra. Literally, as much and as long as you need. We can go as slow or as fast at dealing with all of this as is required Kid, just so long as there is some measure of actual healing and movement occurring."

Ezra inhales again, this time slightly more sharply, and Kanan gets the distinct impression that his Padawan's actually fighting back tears. "All that acknowledged, and for the purpose of being explicitly clear, Ezra, if you try and bolt on me Kid, I will be coming after you. Do you hear me? I *will*. Consider that a threat, consider it a promise… Force consider it whatever the kriff you need to right now, just as long as you 'get me.' 'Out' is not an option anymore, Ezra. Some people stick around and I am one of them. You are not ditching me in favor of 'easier on the guise' – are we clear?"

"We're clear." Ezra's voice is soft, choked, just little bit phlegmy. He's definitely crying now, if softly. Not loud scared gasps or fast angry sobs or anything like that at all- something softer than that, and deeper. Something rooted in soil at least a decade or so older, or so Kanan suspects.

Kanan gives him a moment to settle in the silence. Then he speaks again, "You okay?"

"No." Ezra inhales sharply. Snuffs his nose hard. "But I will be in minute."

Kanan nods at that answer, "Do you need a hug?"

Ezra scoffs, "Not before I get an hour or two to figure out my cuddle fees first, no Kanan."

Kanan rolls his eyes at that and settles for shifting the topic of conversation completely. "So, how about you show me where you've managed to squirrel away that ID you were mentioning, Ezra? So we can get it over to Hera, and then the two of us can get to work on the rest of our usual morning training."

Ezra jerks a little at that comment, then snorts softly, still sounding rather phlemy even as he digs into his left hip satchel pocket. "I've got it on me actually…but why are we showing it to Hera, Kanan?"

"She's a better judge of detail quality these days than I am, Ezra. Though I'm betting you're probably right about its quality considering who it actually came from. Be warned though, Ezra I highly doubt when she finds out that you've had it this long that Hera'll be particularly happy."

"Hera doesn't need to be happy about it," Ezra says sounding strangely adult in his simple, straight-faced honesty. "I procured something for myself that I felt was genuinely needed to in order to protect myself out here. If Hondo hadn't come through when he did with it, Kanan, I'd have still gone looking elsewhere for the exact same kriffing thing just as soon as I had enough money saved up. Even if the process had cleared out every last bit of my personal savings. And if anyone – even you guys, doesn't approve of that fact, then that's your prerogative. You don't get a vote though on this one Kanan– you only get an opinion, because the only alternative would be me stuck living in a way that I'll never volunatarily accept living again, at least not if I have any say in the matter. And frankly I could never trust anyone fully again who asked me to do so."

And wow. When the kid doesn't pull punches, he doesn't pull punches. Still, "…Ezra." Kanan sighs out again, because there's just so much worth hearing and saying there both. So much that's unacknowledged, or newly acknowledged but otherwise largely unspoken between all of them. How anyone can be so simultaneously old and young all at once is an almost inexpressible duality as far Kanan's concerned at the moment

His Padawan meanwhile just sighs dramatically again. "Aaaaaaaand now we're back to the you repeating my name thing. Seriously, Kanan…"

Kanan cuts straight to the heart of the matter, at least from his own perspective anyway… "I want to ask you something, Ezra…why did you never come to Hera and I, if you were that uncomfortable about the lack of passible ID?" Why hadn't Ezra sought their protection in that in the same way that he'd accepted their provision in terms of things like training, food and clothing? Was it simply because they'd never actually offered it to Ezra outright as they had everything else? Or did all of this come back to Ezra's obsession with his medical privacy? And if that was the case, then what was he so damned desperate for them not to see?

Ezra meanwhile just gives a little hmmm at the question - clearly considering it seriously for awhile before he answers, "Well besides the now obvious fact that I don't like being lectured about things as if I'm too dumb to understand what's at stake? I tend to lose my temper when it happens and that almost always ends badly? I didn't bring it up to you guys before because…well, it was *my* problem, Kanan. Dev was *my* cover initially,after all. His ID was around before the rest of you were, and that made it…oh, I don't know, it just felt like that made it my responsibility to at least try and deal with it first without help. I mean I go to you guys with the *big stuff*Kanan -when I can't figure out a way on my own to handle something. Or when you or Hera have specific knowledge that I know you've offered to share. That doesn't lessen my responsibility to at least try and fix my problems on my own first. I mean it's not like I'm a kriffing baby or anything, Kanan."

"I see." Kanan nods, sighing at that, heavily.

Ezra shifts again in his chair, and then shrugs, "Hey, sorry if that's not you wanted to hear, Kanan: but let's be honest here – on a mission you guys depend on my self-sufficiency on a nearly constant basis. It doesn't really seem fair for you guys to gripe about now just because this time around it also netted me some unapproved ID instead."

'Well yes.' His Padawan is probably right about that. Every coin has two sides after all, including Ezra's stubborn independence. But Force, Kanan thinks, a little sadly, that same self-sufficiency streak also makes it incredibly hard sometimes to actually be a parent. Because in some aspects, Kanan, Hera and Ezra are completely backward in in terms of normal parent and child dynamics of dependency. After all, by Kanan's reckoning most parents do everything for their children when they're very young and wean them slowly over time into a state of greater independence as they're ready for it. Meanwhile, he and Hera are literally going to have to start figuring out ways to encourage Ezra to come to them more often for things without doing it in a way that his Padawan will also take as an insult to his intelligence.

Kanan sighs softly. Maybe he just needs to put together 'Having parents: a guide for street rats' hand out or some such thing.

"Kanan? Here..." Kanan blinks a moment, before reaching out for the outstretched ID.

He turns the small packet around in his hands several times – considering it a little bit thoughtfully. Wanting to make certain Ezra's considered all of its implications as well. "You do realize, don't you Ezra, that with an adult ID like this one on Alderaan, you'll basically be expected to through the clinic process alone when we get there. Well unless you specifically invited one of us along for company when you go back to see the doctors anyway. The staff are going to be making you fill out all the paperwork and stuff at the clinic before your examination. They'll be asking you all the history and physical stuff that'll be required for any additional testing they deem necessary."

"I know that, Kanan."

"And you're okay with that, Ezra? Prepared to deal with that?"

The younger man shrugs, "I don't see that I have much choice but to be, do I? Hera was pretty explicit, Kanan. This *has* to be done, if I want to keep flying with the rest of the fleet. Or at least I assume so anyway. And other people's lives are not worth less than my obsession with my own modesty."

Kanan's chest tightens at that admission, "Ezra…"

"I'll be fine, Kanan." Ezra repeats waving a hand, keeping his voice deliberately light. "It's not even a full work up anyway. Just a fleet physical – which is apparently far less extensive than a normal pne. I actually looked into the details of that earlier this morning. They'll want to do a basic system scan and draw some blood, yes but it won't be super…invasive or anything like that." The boy's tone remains mostly neutral as he speaks, but his breathing picks up a little which Kanan can't help but notice. "At least not really anyway. It isn't ...it isn't going to…to *hurt* like the other times did, Kanan. There's no need for them to put in stitches or go poking places or other sorts of things like that like they've had to ...well, before."

"Ezra." Force, but Kanan feels like he's got a speeder parked on his chest at the moment. This feels wrong, this *is* wrong they can't just…" What in kriff is Kanan actually right now? Because he knows what Hera had intended here and it is anything but what any of them are actually getting. Especially if Ezra's going into the clinic with an adult ID in hand instead of a Minor's one. Because then they won't have access to any of his medical records outside regular form unless Ezra literally gives them his permission or if Hera gets Sabine to hack them on their way out. Which really is just another deception, another betrayal of Ezra's trust. And if the Kid ever finds out he's about to retraumatize himself over what amounts to just a pointless lie then he'll quite likely…

Kanan *can not do this.* He simply can't.

Ezra's final question brings all the rest to a skittering to an abrupt halt in his Master head. "Hey, Kanan, I was going to ask you before we got to Alderaan... Do you mind if I list you as my emergency contact and my medical power of attorney when we get to the clinic? From what I understand they usually want to you have one and they generally prefer it to be…well, to be family."

Kriff and sithspit. This is hell now. They are literally in hell.

Kanan exhales. "Ezra. Yes, I'd be more happy to. You don't even have to *ask* me that. But now that I think about it, since that we're pretty much done with breakfast why don't you make that supply trip back to the Phoenix Dorms that we were talking about last night before we actually start in our training today okay? And also if you don't mind stop and grab some more caf beans in the central market for me. I…I have to talk to Hera about something for a few minutes okay? And I really should get it done before we start our daily sparring."

Chapter Management

Chapter 5: Arguments and Understandings (Updated)

"He already has a…"

"Yes. And a good one by the sound of it." Kanan drops down beside Hera in the co-pilot's chair. Already grateful beyond measure that he'd made the arbitrary decision to lock the door behind him upon entering the cockpit. True the rest of the Ghost's crew is all off the Ghost, on other errands right now but Kanan has no idea when they'll be back, and this is not likely to be either short or a particularly pleasant conversation. Not for either of them, though admittedly for likely very different kinds of reasons.

"He has a fake ID *already.* Ezra *owns* a fake ID." It's the fourth time that Hera's repeated the statement in the past five minutes. Which Kanan figures means one of two things. Either she's currently futilely hoping one of these times his answer will change or she's processing through what that information actually means in the its greater scope, and she's not much liking the resultant implications.

Whether either that or # 3 - the news has just fried out her processing centers completely for the moment.

Kanan's not guessing that the first is actually the culprit - Hera tends to accept news that disturbs her even if she doesn't like it fairly quickly. Probably because she's too much of a pragmatist to devote much time to denial when she can be focused on literally fixing here and now sorts of problems instead. The latter is most likely, and Kanan's latest bit of news? Well its a hard pill to swallow no matter how hard he works to cushion it first. Which is why he's opting to just approach things directly and frankly.

"Ezra bought a Fake ID?" Hera repeats the sentence one final time, then licks her lips and shakes her head a little as to knock loose her thoughts.

"No." Kanan corrects her then, because there is a clear delineation of difference. "Ezra was *gifted* fake ID, Hera. Which he revealed to me when I brought up our potential worries about lack of paperwork for him that we could use at a clinic while on Alderaan. And now I'm bringing it to you because you're a better judge of its quality these days than I am."

Kanan holds out the neatly leather enfolded bundle, noting the slight micro tremor in Hera's hands as she first pauses and then eventually takes it. "How on Yavin did he…?"

"Hondo." Kanan interrupts the question bluntly.

"Hondo?!" Hera sounds somewhere between bewildered and genuinely astonished. "Why on earth would Hondo want to…?!"

"Probably as part of his ongoing recruitment strategy with Era, Hera."

Hera blinks at that, "Wait. You mean that he's *still*…?"

"Yup. Well according to Zeb and Sabine at least. They heard him and Ezra talking at the end of their previous 'field trip.' Not that Ezra's apparently considering taking any of said offers seriously. That he'll admit to anyway." Kanan's never had any credible concerns about that before…though now after some of he and his Padawan's more recent conversations… He tries to brush the thought off for now with a quick shake of his own head.

"I won't. I wouldn't," Had been the teenagers direct quote on the subject. Under normal circumstances, Kanan would simply have opted to believe him. But everyone – teenagers especially, and traumatized street rats even more than normal adolescents, could at times make out of character decisions when they were under enough pressure or stress. Given Ezra's little mental slip in their last conversation, Kanan intends to watch the relationship between Ezra and Hondo more carefully than before, just to be on the safe side. Sith, maybe he'll even try and arrange a little one on one 'chat' with Hondo to discuss the nature of Jedi training bonds and the potential results of becoming perceived as a threat by a Padawan's master . It certainly wouldn't hurt to make the pirate more… uhm…*aware* of Kanan's personal commitments and the potential consequences of Hondo kriffing seriously with any of them.

It's not overprotective parenting, after all, Kanan reminds himself with a grim little smile, if your kid's traumatized enough at the moment that he probably needs a little extra guard dogging.

"Little Gods Kanan, this thing is…" Hera whistles softly under her breath, opening the leather bundle in her hands, gingerly. "It's at least…"

"Let me guess? Second tier quality?" He guesses.

"Top tier even, I'm guessing. This looks to be on the same level at minimum as your current ID, Kanan. And you're claiming that Hondo just gave it to him…with no strings? For free?!"

"Half for a debt owed and half, or so Hondo claims, as a belated birthday present."

"A debt? For what exactly?!" Hera chokes. "Did Ezra save his first born or something when we weren't looking? Kanan, do you have any idea what this thing must have cost these days?! As far as I can see it's probably functionally perfect. Ezra would never have been able to get his hands on something like this on his own, I'll tell you that much."

"Not quite yet no, Hera. He doesn't have the contacts yet to find someone with enough professional expertise."

"Kanan, kriff that. I'm talking about the cost of this thing *financially*."

Kanan bites his lip, thoughtful "Hera, no offense, but I think you may be underestimating Ezra's commitment to building his savings over the past eighteen months or so. I don't know a solid number of course for how much he's actualy squirreled away, but I know Ezra's been entering and wining the squadron and base wide Sabaac tournaments for months now, ever since that became a viable option for him. Plus he's got a nice little scrounge, repair and sell thing going on the side during the quieter periods that's fueled by things he salvages from the junk markets whenever we find the time to go off planet." Kanan shrugs his shoulders, "He's not a big spender, Hera, no, but he's also definitely not hurting for money right now."

"And this didn't concern you enough to bring up before now?" He can hear Hera's posture shift restlessly as she crosses her arms, "Kanan, you're the one who indicated that he might currently be a flight risk."

"Yeah but the savings thing's been going on for months now, Hera. The concern about him leaving's more recent. Basically just since…"

"Davin 7." Hera says a little grimly.

Kanan nods. "Until after that point Hera, whenever I heard the gossip about the tournaments or heard the others teasing him about being a bit of a skin flint, I just thought he was enjoying the chance to finally build up a little personal savings. After the way he grew up it's not unreasonable frankly speaking…" Not to mention, frugality in their lifestyle isn't a negative trait, generally speaking. It can at time in fact be an outright necessity. Kanan'd seen no reason to discourage the habit in Ezra. It's only now that he has to actually stop and wonder with a bit more concern where and how Ezra's been accruing all that said personal funding. And why he's been doing it in the first place as well.

Hera chews on all this information for a long couple of moments, her complete stillness the only audible sign of her distress. "How likely is he to try and take off right now, honestly? Do you even know, Kanan?"

Kanan considers he and Ezra's most recent exchange. Recalls Ezra's stunned, hoarse- voiced response to his frankly offered warning about Ezra bolting. As well as the Kid's refusal of the hug Kanan had offered him afterward, as well as Ezra's all too genuine eagerness at the suggestion of the morning's later saber training.

"I think that we can assume that I've diffused that threat pretty thoroughly, Hera, at least for the time being. Ezra may hide occasionally right now if he starts feeling particularly emotionally vulnerable, but he's not going to actually try and leave I don't think."

"All right then." Here sighs even more deeply still, reaching up to dig her hand into the taut muscle of her right clavicle. "Then on to addressing the more immediate problem. What in kark are we supposed to do *now* that we know that this thing exists, Kanan? How long exactly has he had it? And more importantly why does he think that he *needs* it?"

"Beyond the bluntly obvious reason that he lost any other kind of identifying paperwork he had as Dev Morgan while he undercover at the Academy Hera, and we never bother to replace it? Or even brought the subject up to him again?"

"Yeah but that was because we agreed that doing so - getting new ID I mean - probably wasn't worth the resources it would have required with the kind of jobs we were doing at the time!"

"Yeah, well we never bothered to share that conclusion with Ezra, now did we Hera? Despite the fact that he was actually the one who had pulled out his papers from his time on Lothol before he met us so that we wouldn't have to get new ones made up for the job. Morgan wasn't our cover initially, Hera, it was Ezra's. Which means he didn't see us as necessary to involve in securing a replacement. It wasn't *our* job to worry about it when the ID was lost."

And that statement? Makes Hera curse softly in reply. Her hands tighten as she snaps the ID closed with a sharp click. "How long has he had the thing, *exactly* Kanan? Did he even say for certain?"

"Well over a year now," Kanan chews on his own lower lip then shrugs his shoulders. "From what he said earlier, Hera, the ID was pretty much a 'slightly belated' 16th birthday gift. It was clearly also his favorite present of the bunch."

"Of course it was his favorite!" Hera scoffs, more than a little bit grimly. "What teenager in their right mind doesn't want the kind of freedom that this thing actually represents, Kanan? The access its given Ezra to purchasing…well almost anything that he wants to buy when we're not around to actively try and stop him."

"He hasn't been abusing it that way, Hera." Kanan interjects very calmly in response.

"You sound pretty sure of that." Hera scoffs at the idea, clearly disbelieving.

Kanan shrugs a little, rubbing a hand down over the front of his face before continuing. "He was very blunt when he talked about how and where he's been using it thus far, and with the bond wide open like it was I'd have known if he was lying, Hera. He outright stated to my face that he hasn't used it for the normal trifecta of teenage banthashit. No booze, no drugs, no porn – nothing like that " He snorts, "Force Hera, I almost wish he'd told me otherwise…" It'd be one less thing he has to now actively worry about.

Because seriously, Kanan'd kill for a set of 'normal' teenage' issues like drinking or sneaking out to meet a date at the moment. But no, instead he's got Childhood Abandonment and Recruiting Space Pirates and a personal sexual background so kriffing traumatic that Ezra's really not even looking at the concept of real romantic relationships as something that's feasible for him at the moment. (Which is probably, Kanan admits, is probably a wise if also very sad thing.)

"Then why bother with getting it at all, Kanan? Why bother to actually procure said ID? What other reasons could Ezra want one right now that are half as compelling when he's got no need for said ID to procure daily necessities or transport or weapons?"

Kanan steels himself for the next words. Because Hera is *not* going to like this next bit. "From what I can tell, Ezra apparently just likes knowing that he now has guaranteed access to non black market medical supplies and treatment if he happens to need them, Hera. For him, I think the thing is basically the equivalent of an emotional security blanket."

Hera growls at that, suddenly furious by the sound of her voice. "And when the Kark has that boy needed medical care since he first came aboard the Ghost that we *didn't* both know about and then and deal with it immediately, Kanan?! He doesn't *need* a fake ID for that… no matter what he apparently thinks!"

Kanan sighs, "I think you're missing the point here, Hera…probably almost completely."

"And what *is* said point exactly?" He can hear the scowl in Hera's voice.

"Look…that thing isn't about what we have or we haven't provided him up until now, Hera, it's more about him feeling like he's no longer going to be vulnerable like he was before. Like even if something happens he won't ever be left completely helpless and resourceless the way that he suddenly was back at age seven. Like he can…" Kanan runs an agitated hand back through his hair, "like he can just be reassured that he'll always have what he needs to be safe no matter what his current life situation."

And just like that, Hera's up and out of the gate again, her whole body tense, her temper rising right along with her accent. "And how in Kark is him needing and ID for *that* that not the worst possible proof of failure on our parts that you've ever heard of Kanan?! Because unless I'm understand parenthood completely wrong Love, we were the ones who were supposed to *be* that kriffing reassurance!"

"It's just *perceived* power on Ezra's part, Hera." Kanan says bluntly, sighing again, and trying to keep his own voice gentle. "It's the notion of control over his life and environment. The Kid just wants to know he'll be able to take care of himself if something bad comes up from behind that he can't see right away… He wants to feel safe, and the ID is his reassurance that he can."

"He shouldn't *have to* shoulder that job with the two of us around anymore, Kanan!" Hera literally throws the ID in her hand so great is her frustration. "I mean in case you missed the memo Kanan, he's *not* actually an adult yet - he's just barely turned 17! Keeping him safe and making sure he has what he needs is is supposed to be our job, not his! " Hera's leaning in toward him now, "Not to even mention, if you haven't already noticed this already Kanan, that he's pretty much failed at taking care of himself epically up until this point! You said yourself that his mind is in tatters – he can't even handle being told he has to go to a doctor's apartment without bolting for the bathroom to vomit. That is not the kind of behavior you'd expect to find in someone *ready* to be out on his own again!"

"And you think I don't know that, Hera?" Kanan tells, her, his voice a little bit cold. "I know that probably better than anyone! Or have you just failed to notice the several dozen times since our return from Davin 7 that I've mentioned that I'm directly tied into his mind, remember? I know more than anyone else on the whole damn planet about Ezra's mental status at the moment, and I never once claimed he is ready to be completely independent."

"Then why in the kriff *aren't* we just spacing that damned thing, Kanan?!" Hera points to where the ID lays, presumably still on the floor. "I mean what was the point of us bringing him aboard the Ghost all those years ago if nothing was actually going to *change* Love. If we're just going to leave him to twist in the wind while we watch him strangle himself to death slowly? Why the kriff is Ezra even *here* Kanan, if we're not going to at least try and be what he can't be at this point in his life?!"

"I never said that we weren't going to, Hera." Kanan snaps back, "And once again you're completely missing the point! The thing is his emotional security blanket, remember, not his life strategy or his middle finger to either of us! Let me spin a little analogy for you, Hera and then maybe you'll get the picture a little bit more clearly. This has everything to do with Ezra and almost nothing to do with you or me! You don't take away a scared, abandoned kid's stuffed loth cat, all right?Wwhen he finally lets you hold it after months of refusing to let you do so just because you're pissed off that he's been hugging it all that time instead of you! You ask him the name of the damn thing! You help him clean it up if it got dirty in the interim. And when you do finally get to cuddle with him for awhile after all that work is done, because he's grateful for the way that you've protected something he values and he's finally starting to trust you as a result? Well then you start by making enough room in that embrace for all *three* of you. You build trust until you're the one he reaches out toward intially."

Silence descends. "Kanan," Hera's voice is a little too patient, a little too condescending. "Ezra's not a baby. That ID is not a cat. He's going to be eighteen in just a little over nine months now."

"Yes. And he's been an orphan full time since he was seven years old, Hera. That's ten years for the most part that he was all but completely alone. It isn't that big of a difference, Hera- at least not for him. I don't care how smart or powerful Ezra is, okay? We we both know damn well that neglect still slows the general acquisition of both social and emotional maturity. We…look we're going to have to ease him into the reality of having competent guardians again, Hera… And we're going to have to do so gently, or he's going to panic or worse yet think that we don't trust him anymore after what he finally told us. And that's especially true right now in particular considering his previous issues with neglect, abuse and abandonment."

"So what?" Hera scowls. "You're saying we that haven't been doing that already literally ever since we first met him?"*

"No, we haven't, Hera- at least not what he's registered as explicitly. We've been doing Quid Quo Pro, okay? Ezra came on board initially because I offered to teach him about the Force, and because you made it clear that wanted him on board as a crewmate. Those are both distinct roles, and yes they each have their own specific privileges and duties, but Master and Captain are not synonymous in Ezra's personal lexicon for 'parent', okay? He's going to need someone to spell it all out for him, Hera – quite possibly explicitly. Like I – like both of us should have probably done outright from the very beginning. But I kriffed up. Because I was sacred to death myself and because hindsight as they say is always 20/20."

Kanan exhales, slowly. "In the meantime, Hera, if we're dealing with some role confusion right now - which for the record yes, we most definitely are - and it's led to Ezra feeling like he needs a fake ID to truly feel safe?" Kanan shrugs, "Then that's on us every bit as much as it's on him, Hera. Maybe even more so really, because after all we were the ones who never bothered to clarify things with him, even though *we're* supposedly the adults in the situation. Ezra's just being the exact same childhood trauma survivor that he's always been, and its not fair for us to punish him for it."

"Why, Kanan? Because you're afraid he might get mad at us for stealing his faux sense of safety and replacing it with something realer instead?" Hera snorts. "Newsflash! Teenagers are always mad at their parents and their environments, Kanan! We both were constantly angry at Ezra's age too, and guess what - we both somehow lived through it intact. As far as 'security blankets' go a stuffed animal is a lot less dangerous potentially speaking than that ID and the things that Ezra could accomplish right now with it in his hand."

"No. We're not going to destroy his ID, Hera, because Ezra as much as told me outright when he gave it to me a few minutes ago that he'd see any serious attempt to take it away from him at this point as an outright betrayal! And frankly Hera? At this point in the situation, I'd have to agree with him! What Ezra does with that thing is *not* just our call anymore, Hera! not when he's less than a year from his actual age of majority and when neither of us could afford to replace it easily when he finally does come of age if it were destroyed before that. Also, not when we send him into battle semi-regularly for the sake of our and other people's lives, Hera. We don't get to treat Ezra like he's an adult - to shove a weapon in his hand in combat situations and then call him a child everywhere else but there because it's more emotionally convenient for either of us. Not unless, of course, we really are total hypocrites about it!"

He stands from the chair, makes his way over to where he heard the item fall, feels around with his foot for a moment until he locates the rectangle of leather and scoops it up, making sure it's neatly folded with his fingers before shoving it deep into his own left pants pocket. "No, Ezra having a fake ID is not 'ideal' for any of us in a lot of ways right now, Hera, but I am not punishing him for his karking honesty and trust in telling me he actually has it." Kanan grimaces then and drops back down into his seat. "I'm especially not going to do so when he only revealed that the Force damned thing existed to me in the first place as *proof* that he's willing to submit to a physical he's terrified of but you still demanded. Your little round of emotional blackmail from last night has already had enough emotional fall out as it is."

"Emotional Blackmail, Kanan?!" Hera's voice is a full on hiss, but Kanan finds he's unable to back down, even in the face of her rising anger "And what the kark is that supposed to mean!?"

Kanan leans forward in his own chair, fully baring his own teeth in frustration before continuing. "At least have the courage to call a Bantha a Bantha, 'Captain Syndulla.' You all but implied the other night at dinner that if Ezra doesn't submit to this doctor's appointment like the rest of us are supposed to do then you're probably going to retaliate by letting them ground him from flying. And this is Ezra, Hera. What did you think he was going to do under those terms but do whatever it takes to protect those he cares about, no matter the personal cost? It was emotional blackmail, Hera, the way you ambushed him and strong armed him with this kind of choice – and both of us straight up already know it."

"I just want to know that he's physically healthy, Kanan! That he's going to be all right!" Hera explodes once again in sheer frustration "Stop making it sound so unreasonable for me to want a medical professional to assess the situation and reassure us that Ezra's…that he is going to be fine kark it...!"

Kanan literally shouts the next words at full volume. "He's a survivor of multiple sexual assaults in childhood, Hera! Of *course* he isn't kriffing just going to be 'fine' or anything anywhere near it!"

Hera flinches. Kanan sighs but pushes ahead, because like it or not this has to be said. "Ezra isn't 'fine' - he hasn't been 'fine' since the day that we first met him, Hera and he isn't going to be 'fine' for a very, very long time yet to come. Not even with every bit of support we can drudge up to help him start to mend in the interim. You're setting yourself up for a massive fall if you honestly expect anyone else to tell you anything different. Ezra is severely traumatized: he needs time to heal – to open up and finally start to deal with everything he experienced, just like every other rape survivor does as part of the healing process. But he'll only ever start that process in if he also knows he's safe and he can trust us, and that is not going to happen, Hera. I mean it, *it won't* if you stay so intent on parenting straight out of the Fundamentalist University of Cham…"

Utter silence, shocked and icy, immediately follows that sentence. Kanan groans, and drops his head for a moment. "Look I'm sorry, Hera." Because that was harsh. "I should have said that differently."

"No you're not sorry." Hera snaps back at him. "About the message at least you're not."

Ando he isn't. He isn't sorry for what he said - just the way it came out, and that he didn't phrase it better. He draws in another deep, shaky breath and reminds himself this isn't just about him and her - that they are only part of this equation and a small part at that. What's more important right now is how they can help Ezra. "Just…stop it Hera, okay? Stop making dictates from on high like you're some kind of omniscient benevolent God. It's not accomplishing anything constructive when you try to play one and the costs of cleaning up the mess that results are steadily becoming more and more crippling for the rest of us, okay?"

"Costs?" Hera's next words are no less tense but at least now she's a little more quiet. Like maybe for the first time since this conversation started Hera's finally hearing just what he's saying in fact and not just judging his words in preparation for her eventual reply.

"Yes, Hera - the costs. Like Ezra finally consenting to submit to a physical that will give us almost none of the information that you were actually seeking– and will almost inevitably end with him retraumatized, panicked or puking anyway. Costs like my having to warn Ezra earlier this morning that yes, if he tries to run at this point then I will chase his butt down across the karking universe if needed… Because I am in fact the Kid's Guardian Ad Litum and that's what a parent kriffing *does.* Never mind that that's literally the last way in the literal Universe Hera, that I wanted to introduce Ezra to the idea that yes, he has an actual parent and not just a Master again."

Kanan gains his feet one more time then, turns toward the cockpit door and makes his way out into the hallway, stopping with just one more softly spoken sentence before the door swings shut softly open in front him. "As I said earlier, Hera. *Before* you dictate to Ezra about any of this right now, you talk to me first okay? Because our usual 'improvisational' strategy of hit and run child rearing where Ezra is concerned? Is currently bleeding both me and Ezra to death. And we just can't afford any more of that kind of loss at present."

The door closes behind him then, without another sound, and Kanan leans against the wall for a moment, well aware that his whole body is shaking with both repressed anger and adrenaline.

'And that,' he acknowledges with a wry little smile, 'Had been distinctly *anything* but fun.'

xx000xxx000xxx000

Two days later, Ezra drops himself down onto a crate in the Ghost's largest cargo bay, his, breath still labored from their last round of sparring. His posture is exhausted and his face is bright red as he tries to catch his breath. "Okay – since I'm clearly paying for it in bruises today, what in Kriff is going on with you and Hera, Kanan?! Who started the fight, who needs to send the karking flowers, and while we're on the subject, when if ever are we actually leaving for the capital of Alderaan?"

"Thursday noon, Ezra. And the rest is nothing that you need to concern yourself with, Kid."

Ezra snorts openly at that statement. "It's been almost thirty hours since you two've even voluntarily been in the same room together, Kanan. Forgive a guy for worrying, okay? This isn't your norm or even your outlier." Though Ezra's tone is light, his eyes are shadowed and anxious as he speaks – his message simultaneously clear and unspoken. 'Please tell me, Master, that I'm not responsible for this.'

Kanan sighs deeply and runs a hand across his forehead, "Not everything that gets bruised or broken in the world is your fault, Kid. Sometimes couples just fight, all right." He's not even particularly lying. Yes, Ezra's technically the cause of he and Hera's ongoing argument. Still 'cause of' and 'responsible for' aren't the same thing in this particular context. Not that the teenager's current bull dog of a worry complex is necessarily going to easily accept the distinction at present.

"If you say so." Ezra turns his focus to picking at the fabric covering his left knee cap. Kanan frowns at the nervous gesture and nudges him with an elbow.

"We'll be fine, Kid. I promise. Even healthy relationships experience a blow up occasionally. That's actually normal. Don't worry so much about it."

Ezra's voice is wry and a little bit resigned, "Yeah, well being around Hera's kind of like standing on a slowly bulging volcano dome at the moment, Kanan. Forgive me for remembering that I'm rather flammable at present and prefer to keep well away from the blow back."

Kanan smirks despite himself – because as dramatic as it is, he can't even entirely dispute the analogy. "She's not mad at *you,* right now, Ezra. You'll be fine, just give her plenty of space forawhile."

Ezra snorts "Like Kriff she isn't mad at me. This was all started by the ID that I admitted to having wasn't it?"

Kanan shrugs noncommittally, "I did warn you that she wouldn't be happy about it when she found out, Ezra."

"Yeah well indignant or disappointed were to be expected, yes Kanan. I wasn't anticipating she'd end up this outright livid. Women are *weird* sometimes, Master! Their hierarchies of the unacceptable confuse the kriff out of me." Ezra admits then with a small wry smile and a scratch to the top of his head.

Kanan smiles a little at that, "The livid's not yours to take the blame for Ezra: it's mine. The ID didn't cause the real fight, just catalyzed some further needed discussion. And even the fight we that we did have while not fun was still necessary. And just for the record, I'm actually glad that you fessed up when you did about the paperwork, Ezra…because getting new stuff made would have been both expensive and taken ages longer, truthfully."

Ezra shrugs, "It needed to be done. Better to just get things over with anyway. I can't exactly say that I'm looking forward to having to visit the clinic, but I also don't see the point in unnecessarily prolonging the agony. Kark or get off the pot I think is the most pertinent current analogy."

Kanan considers that particular bit of wisdom for a moment, and then decides to follow his Padawan's own sage advice, albeit in this case in an attempt to provide some useful distraction. "I've got a question for you, Ezra…"

"That being?" Ezra's voice is in that perfect middle ground between curious and suspicious.

"When was the last time that you had a hands on, no holds barred full on medical checkup? Not triage, Ezra – just a general wellness check up on pretty much everything, I mean. Am I wrong to assume that it was sometime before the death of your parents?"

Ezra shakes his head with a small shrug. "It was just before my 7th birthday actually."

Kanan considers this too for a moment, picking his next phrasing carefully. "And would you be willing to barter on the possibility of having another on Alderaan, Ezra? If the offer on the table in exchange was sufficient?"

"Kanan…" Ezra stiffens a bit at the words, but Kanan continues on gently but relentlessly.

"I'm *asking,* Kid, not demanding for the record. I'm just…I'm worried about you okay? That's a long time to go without proper medical care for anyone under any circumstances. And it seems kind of stupid to…I don't know, basically half ass it if you are getting checked over, if you know what I mean?"

Ezra actually barks out a small laugh. "I hadn't really thought of it quite that way." He admits with a soft sigh, "but you're probably right in that context."

"Like I already said…it's a suggestion, Ezra, not any kind of order. It's your body and your choice after all, unless you're mentally or physically incapacitated and/or there's an immediate life threatening health crisis. It's just… I guess I understand the value of what I'm asking you do from your perspective? Which is why I'm offering to bargain in exchange for your agreement, Ezra. You do this for my peace of mind Ezra and I'll seriously consider nearly any reasonable kind of reciprocation in return."

"I want to go home." Ezra replies very softly.

Kanan chokes on the words, alarmed in reaction.

"No… No not like that." Ezra hurriedly clarifies, pounding on his Master's back. "I just mean that want to go back to Lothol for vacation, Kanan. Sometime nowhere near Empire day preferably. And for an actual social visit I mean, Kanan - not just as a quick flyby between places or when we need to drop in in roder to help with the latest rebellion related crisis. I want to watch a sunset, and a sunrise, Master. I want to walk out toward the tower again through the grass."

Kanan chews his lip as he processes this. "I take it that you're feeling pretty homesick lately?"

"A little bit, I guess. It's more that...look I get that my parent's house is basically nothing but rubble now, Kanan, I really do. Still we never really got a chance to go back one last time and scavenge. I know it's mostly just junk anyway there now anyway but I still…" Ezra shrugs helplessly.

Kanan puts a hand on his shoulder and squeezes. "You don't have to explain anymore than that Ezra. I'm pretty sure I understand." Sometimes the need for mementos from one's loved ones – even small ones, in times of emotional stress can be a very powerful thing.

"For that…for the chance at a couple days at home I'd be willing to…" Ezra's voice cracks then a little. "I'm pretty sure in exchange for that that I could push myself through the kind of examination you're talking about. Like I said before it won't be like last time was anyway…" The teenager swallows hard. "It's probably stupid, really, to keep getting this freaked out about it anyway."

Kanan's hand squeezes on his shoulder more tightly this time. He scans the area around them for a moment longer, grateful for their current complete lack audience before speaking up again. "Hey - you're allowed to have issues with being naked in front of people or being touched by strangers after what happened to you, Ezra. It's normal to have that kind of reaction…" Or at least it is as far as his research on the subject has informed Kanan anyway.

"It's *not* that exactly." Ezra grumbles

"Then maybe you help me understand." Kanan keeps his own tone open and patient. And Ezra's mouth opens and closes several time in apparent attempt at a real explanation.

Until, finally: "Ah Kark it, Bridger. Just kriffing grow up about it already!" Once again the words all but erupt out of Ezra's own lips - and seem to be aimed more at himself than the world at large as Ezra suddenly shifts in his seat, and Kanan hears fabric being tugged outward with a harsh set of breaths, and then there's the sound of a gear harness being unbuckled and gently laid to one side.

Then Ezra's hand is reaching out to grab Kanan's free hand with his own. "I want, I *need* to show you something, Kanan."

"Ezra you don't have to…" Kanan stumbles a little on his next words, uncertain what exactly he's about to be facing. "You don't owe me..."

"*Yes I karking do.* Not to mention that it's the only Forced damned way I'm ever going to really get past this." And then Kanan's hand is being pushed firmly against warm skin; up underneath Ezra shirt just below what Kanan's guessing is the center of his stomach. The unexpected contact is enough to make the older Jedi blink hard for a couple of seconds. The initial feel of a belly button is unmistakable and a little distracting at first, but it only takes Kanan a moment longer after that to truly process the rest of what he's feeling – the multiple criss crossing scars that he can feel scrawled across Ezra's lower abdomen. Like someone has used something sharp to karking *carve* words across the surface of his skin.

Ezra meanwhile, is now practically babbling - trying to get the words out of his mouth as fast as he possibly can. "Like I said it's *stupid* Kanan. The guy who... who grabbed me... the year that I turned thirteen. He also liked cutting as well as... as hurting and killing his victims when he finally finished with them. Though the marks I ended up weren't lethal, he just…" Ezra let his own hand raise to cover an involuntary gagging sound, "He karking marked me up like I was just a kriffing piece of meat, Kanan. And that shouldn't matter. It *doesn't* matter! I mean I'm alive for Force Sakes Master, and everyone else he got a hold of died, so really I was probably lucky, but I just can't stand the thought of strangers looking and seeing..."

Kanan rapidly shifts his hand out from under the fabric to tug Ezra into a fierce hug – one arm around Ezra's waist, the other protecting the vulnerable back of his head almost instinctively. "It matters, Kid! It's allowed to matter, okay? It's allowed to hurt!"

And for some reason that's finally enough. With that bit of permission Kanan feels something bend and then break in his Padawan's mind, and then for the first time since that night on Davin 7 Ezra Bridger weeps. Silently yes, but hard enough his knees go out, leaving Kanan to keep them both upright for the moment as the sobs literally wrack his body.

When Ezra finally speaks again minutes later, his voice is hoarse, full of tears he's fighting to keep from falling any longer. "I ...I *know* that I need to get a check up, Kanan. I do. I logically understand where you and Hera are coming from with all of this. But honestly without getting absolutely trashed first so I can stay numb, so I don't have to think about anything? I have no clue at all how I'm going to manage to endure any of it."

"Then *don't*." The words are out before Kanan can stop them. And Force but Hera's going to murder him for this. Literally. He just doesn't *care* anymore - not as he brings up both of his hands to gently shake Ezra's shoulders in order to emphasize his next point. "You are allowed to have limits, Ezra and to acknowledge them. Don't you dare let anyone tell you different!"

"But the fleet…"

"Can do without you, Ezra! Or show some karking empathy for your actual situation. You are not a cog in a machine, okay? You are a person! And given how many times we've helped save all their asses in recent years, Rebel command can Force-Damned bend their own rules occasionally." Kanan draws in a breath, growing angrier with every passing word. "And if they won't, then there are other ways that you can help other people that will have far less personal cost, Kid. Don't set yourself on fire trying to be other people's light Ezra! That kind of kriff never works in the long term for anyone."

Ezra blinks at those words a moment, and then wipes at his eyes with his sleeves. "But you and Hera both said that I need to…you've both been so..."

"Worried. Yes, we have been. We've been stressed out over the possibility that there's more damage that we missed, Ezra. And guess what we were right –" He gestures at the teenager's middle. "But you're still here, Ezra – still alive and still breathing despite that, absolutely miraculously! And it is *not* your job to be comforting *us* right now Kid, no matter what you think. It's your job to be honest about how you feel and know your limits as we try and help you. If we're really going to be compromising on the big stuff Ezra, then that means at the end of the day everybody - including you - has to win."

"…I can handle blood work just fine, Kanan. If it helps to know that." Ezra provides after a long moment of silence. "And probably a fair number of scans as well if... if nobody stands there the whole time and gawks at me while they're being done." He pauses, "I mean what else is really necessary, given how long ago it all happened, anyway? It's not like we're talking about something that occurred last week or anything."

Kanan pauses a moment. "Does anything *hurt* - in places it regularly shouldn't, Ezra? Do you ever have problems with using the restroom and then bleeding a lot afterward?"

"No."

"How about infections that just seem to keep coming back over and over anywhere?"

Ezra shakes his head, "No not that I've ever noticed physically or on previous bloodwork that isn't tied to other stuff like pre-existing allergies causing sinus infections or stuff like that."

"Well then let me talk with one of the medics just to be sure I'm not over looking anything…but honestly Ezra I can't imagine why that shouldn't be sufficient for now for diagnostic purposes. Not unless something different were to show up in the bloodwork or scans. We can probably limit you to a trip to medical imaging and then over to the laboratory for a few blood samples."

"And if you're wrong about that or if Hera hears and flips her lid when she finds out about the change?"

Kanan's grin is grim but determined. "You leave dealing with Hera to me, Ezra, I already told you that that's *not* your responsibility right now to manage."

"And what?!" Ezra asks, his laugh a little wry and a little bit grim, "I go from living on a bulging volcanic dome to standing in the middle of a crater in the meantime if she responds as badly as it looks like she's going to, Kanan? I don't want to be the one who yanks the cork outta that particular bottle , all right? It's bad enough that she's already as mad as she is!"

"Again that is not your problem right now, Kid – you handle knowing and acknowledging your own limits Ezra, and I handle any necessary clean up with Hera that results."

"While I what, Kanan?! Go hide on the other side of base for a few days and do inventory or something with Rex?!"

Kanan wrinkles his nose at that. "…Hiding's such a coarse word, Ezra. I much prefer the use of retreat."

Ezra snorts. "Hey you're the one always promoting personal honesty, Kanan."

"Jedi do not 'hide', Ezra Bridger," Kanan informs him archly then, before putting the next set of words in air quotes, "We merely perform tactical withdrawals to more defensible locations."

And *that?* Is apparently all that it takes to reduce the boy to helpless laughter, which right now Kanan is going to take as good thing. Ezra's got enough weight on his shoulders right now after all, to make Star Destroyer burn out from the sheer load of over stressing. "It's going to be all right, Ezra really I promise it will be..." He reassures the boy again, gently nudging him with one of his elbows once the younger man finally starts to calm down, the younger man resting on the box after laughing so hard that tears had literally streamed down yet again across his cheeks. "I know this knowledge may shock you given how calm we've become in our hypothetical 'dotage' Ezra, but back in the old days, Hera and I actually used to snarl at each other on a semi regular basis. Kriff most of the time, it was even kind of fun."

"Really?" Ezra stares dropped jawed at his Master after that announcement. "Why on Lothol would anyone want to fight if they can possibly avoid it?"

"There are certain…advantages, Ezra, to making up after a period of scuffling."

"Kanan!" Ezra practically whines then, his hands going up to his ears, instinctively. "There are things that I do not need to know about you guys! That will now probably be stuck in my head *indefinitely.*"

Kanan smirks in reply. Because honestly right now he can't not - it's a huge relief to have any kind of positive emotional outlet. "Well, what can I say, Kid? I have very few real pleasures in my life anymore. I'll take what I can, where and when I can."

"You are a horrible, horrible person, Kanan!" Ezra moans in reply into his hands.

The older Jedi's smirk only grows. "I'll admit it's a hobby." he acknowledges generously.

"You guys just…really didn't talk at all for days before? Really?!" Ezra valiantly tries to change the subject and Kanan decides to be merciful and let him.

"All the time, Ezra, especially after the first year or so together. When the initial newness of our relationship first wore off right along with the shiny and all those charming personal quirks really began to get annoying. We'd blow up and then stomp around for days afterward in silence. If truth, we used to drive Chopper *batty.*"

Ezra snorts softly, "I'm sorry Kanan, but I just can't picture that. I mean you two have just always seemed so steady."

"Yeah well that's the nature of the beast, Ezra. It's called a long-term relationship. You know, the kind in which the good stuff from a bunch of years worth of shared sacrifice usually beats out the occasional moments of awfulness or annoyance that can occur week to week." Kanan tilts his head a little. "I know you were young, but did your parents really never fight much when you were little? At least where you could see it I mean?"

"Not generally, no, Kanan. But then that was probably because my mom could get…er…rather salty, when she got mad." Ezra acknowledges a little sheepishly after a moment.

Kanan arches an eyebrow in response. "Really now?" Well - you learned something new every day. And here Kanan had always assumed Ezra has acquired most of his verbal blue streak as a result of all his years on the street.

Ezra snorts, "She may have also had the occasional habit of chucking things right at my Dad's head. But that was mostly only pillows as faras I recall. And to be honest from what I remember my Dad probably mostly deserved it. They were good people, but especially when off the air, my dad could get really, really sarcastic truthfully."

"Ah…then you got that trait straight out of the deep end of the gene pool then and not just randomly?" He smirks at his apprentice. In truth Kanan's actually rather impressed by the sudden pivot in topic. He thinks this is probably the most personal information about Mira and Ephraim Bridger that he's ever gotten out of his Padawan ever - at least in casual conversation.

"I am not *that* sarcastic, Kanan." Ezra objects.

Kanan merely raises an eyebrow at him.

Ezra's hands go to his hips. "Well, I'm not! I just happen to... excel at verbal misdirection when I see the immediate need for it."

Kanan chuffs in response to that claim. "I suppose that we should call it progress that you're at least admitting to that much, Ezra." He replies a little dryly.

Ezra just responds by spreading his arms, the closer bumping into Kanan gently, "Hey what can I say, Master? We all gotta use what talents we can."

Kanan pokes him gently with a finger in half amused rebuke, "Yeah well, just be careful playing that game too often, huh kid? Any skilled dueller knows after all, Ezra, that a double blade can easily cut in both directions."

"Yeah but we both have *lightsabers,* Kanan. So it's not exactly a problem. They cauterize."

"Ezra…" Kanan sighs, reaching up to rub the bridge of his nose.

His Padawan cuts him off with a small wave. "Blah Blah. Whine. Moan. Yeah, yeah I get it Kanan. I do hear you, Master."

Kanan responds to the cheeky retort with a single sharp cuff to his Padawan's right ear, and then he drops his hand to Ezra's shoulder and squeezes it gently. "I'm proud of you lately, Ezra. You do know that right?"

Ezra groans aloud, clearly aggrieved. "Oh Force, is this about to descend into repeated cuddling again, Kanan?"

Kanan's responding grin is all teeth, "If you keep running your *lip* than yes, it probably is."

Ezra shudders theatrically. "Duly noted. I'll stop, Master."

Kanan snorts and drops his hand, "I know, I know, Kid. Fates worse than death."

"Were all the Jedi at the Temple this karking snuggly?" Kanan blinks as Ezra's voice suddenly accuses him.

Kanan snorts aloud. "That would be a resounding no, Ezra. You can blame Hera and the others on The Ghost if that particular trait happens to be rubbing off on me."

Ezra scoffs. "No...I call banthashit there, Kanan. I mean you're waaaaay more touchy than I've ever seen any of the others be on even a semi-regular basis. No…no this is some kind of deep, shameful secret of the Jedi culture specifically. Which I have now apparently unearthed and can now use for blackmail purposes probably."

Kanan again reaches out one more time and flicks his Padawan's forehead gently, "Ezra, I strongly suggest that you would falter quickly in a 'who's got more embarrassing stories on whom' sort of contest. Engage in your battles more carefully, Kid, if you know what's good for you. Just because I don't often enter that particular fray does not mean that I like to *lose* or that I'm unwilling when it's needed to fight kriffing dirty."

"…A wise insight, Master." Ezra concedes, a moment later almost meekly.

Kanan smirks in reply to the point granted. "I'm glad to see that you're finally coming around to seeing things my way."

Ezra snorts at that, but any further verbal retort that he might have let loose with afterward, abruptly cuts off as the sound of multiple footsteps approach the ramp. "Hey, Rex! And oh…hey, Hera….you got back today early!" There's a little too much cheer in the teenager's sentence for the emotion to be real Kanan knows.

The clone trooper's low chuckle echoes through the docking bay nonetheless. "Ezra…good morning to you as well Kanan. I came to see if a bribe of lunch on me at the market might get you to join me for the rest of the day to help with some new inventory over in the docking bay. We just got a new shipment of spare parts from Dantooine that I'd love some help sorting through."

Ezra shifts his body toward his Master, "Kanan?" He simply asks without further extrapolation.

"Not an issue from my view, Ezra. We already finished sparring for the day anyway, and you've already done your daily meditation."

"Hera?" Ezra continues.

"Go ahead. I have a couple of things to set right around here but Kanan and I can deal with that on our own." The pilot's voice is still distinctly cool when she speaks. Not harsh per say but definitely still a clear level of distance.

Ezra swallows hard in reply, "All right then. If you're sure that you're not going to need me..."

Hera's body shifts at that, and the chill in her tone thaws slightly. Kanan just wishes in that moment that he could see both of their facial expressions - and catch more of the nonverbal subtleties. "I'm sure." Hera concedes, then still more gently, as she reaches out to squeeze Ezra's arm in her hand, "Are you going to be coming back here to sleep tonight, Ezra or are you going to be going back to the Phoenix dorms?"

"Am I supposed to be coming back here for some reason?"

"It'd be my preference, yes. But it's your call as long as you're here on time in the morning. I know it's been a few days since you've really been able to visit with your friends and you are an adult now, well mostly at least."

Kanan barely holds back the whole body exhale or relief. 'Oh thank the *heavens.* No matter what else can be said about the last couple of days, he had left a lasting impression. 'She karking heard me.'

Ezra nods again. "Then yeah, I'll be back later tonight. After I'm done helping Rex I mean." Then Ezra's being towed down the ramp, without further comment to or from anyone there, well short of Rex's quick call of farewell to Kanan as they finally leave.

Kanan waits until they're alone to speak, linking his arms together behind his back. "Hera," he acknowledges simply.

"Kanan," she responds.

"Thanks… for what you just said to Ezra." He says completely genuinely.

That seems to soften her up a little. She raises a hand to scratch at the base of one of her lek. "Yeah. No worries."

He lets his arms fall to his side, more passive. "So - are you ready to do this then? Or can I go take a shower first before you really lay into me?"

There's more silence for a moment, and then a soft sigh from Hera. "Go – get yourself cleaned up. We have a while, and truthfully I need a meal, something for this headache and probably a short nap before we start talking about anything."

All right then. He nods. "You know where you can usually find me Hera, whenever you decide that you're ready to talk."

"Are you going to be in the meditation room or galley, more likely later on today?"

"Depends on the time, really. I promised Ezra that I'd make some Wa'suki tonight during training. It's always best to let it simmer as you know but you also have to keep close and stir it often in order to keep the bottom from scorching."

Hera's stomach rumbles at that. They both smile at the sound almost involuntarily. "Sounds good." She concedes, after another moment or so. "By the way, Zeb and Sabine are both going to be gone at least until tomorrow morning as far as I know. Sabine said something about them all going stargazing overnight to see if they can spot any meteor shower through a good spot in the canopy..."

"Well then we've definitely got plenty of time. Because I guarantee Ezra won't be coming back before sunset if he can help it."

Hera tilts her head to the side, Lek thumping softly as she does so. "Uhm, Kanan - Rex said that it wasn't all that big of a shipment. They'll run out of work eventually."

"Yeah well, Ezra isn't too hot right now with the idea of living on a bulging volcano slope, as he put it so charmingly to me earlier today."

Hera snorts despite herself in response. "And was he referring to you there or me, Kanan, as the magma chamber in that particular analogy?"

Kanan smirks a little bit, tapping his forehead as if ceding a point, "Far be it for me to steal that title from a particularly deserving lady."

Hera snorts yet again, this time as close as he's heard her in two days to naturally. Then she pokes him in the chest sharply with one accusing finger. "I'm still pissed at you for the record, Kanan. Which means you don't just get to kriffing smile like that and then charm me back into a good mood."

He spread his hands to the side, as if in surrender, "Force forbid, Hera. As I said, when you're actually ready to talk Hera, you know where you can come and find me." And then he turns to make his way back to the ladder.

"Shameless flirt." she snorts in reply even as he turns to go.

He smirks, "Grumpy hussy." At least at this point, he figures, both names are actually being exchanged affectionately. Progress is progress no matter how small.

Kanan pauses one more time at the foot of the ladder, tilts his head to one side, "Would a backrub help at all with you headache, Hera?"

"Yeah probably." The confession is soft.

"Do you want one?"

"…Maybe."

Which is yes - at least in this particular circumstance anyway. Kanan nods and reaches for the first ladder rung, "Then just let me finish up my shower Hera, and then *I'll* come find you."

"...Or I could just simply join you." She replies instead.

Kanan comes to a stop again. Turns to face her. The two of them regard each other for a long moment. silently and consideringly. All else aside, it's been a long and *lonely* past three-plus weeks. With sex previously nowhere on the menu emotionally speaking for either of them.

And yes, Kanan knows, historically speaking unresolved horniness only makes it worse when the two of them are actively fighting.

Hera finally snorts softly, and then walks forward, stepping into the curve of his body with a slow rocking motion of her hips – and then she pokes him with a sharp finger into his chest even as she goes up on her tiptoes. "For the record I'm still yelling at you when we're finished with this, Kanan Jarrus."

Kanan lowers his mouth to hers with a simple. "Agreed." He'd been absolutely truthful earlier today when he'd told Ezra that there are certain advantages to making up with Hera after a prolonged period of concentrated fighting. That doesn't always mean though, that the two of them actually *make* it till 'after.'

And all things considered, Kanan's pretty karking sure that they're both fine with that at the moment.