Planet is Lothal. City is capital city. Restaurant is Old Jho's Pitstop. Ezra looks like he does in the cover photo.
"Hey!" a large and most likely drunk trandoshan growled. "Refill!"
Ezra groaned inwardly. How many times did he have to remind himself that he was getting payed for this? Ignoring the loud shouting and laughing around him, Ezra weaved his way around the many tables and customers milling around the bar to the table where the trandoshan sat with some of his species. Sighing to himself, he reached for the empty glass. Completely by accident, his arm bumped the customer's shoulder, causing it to knock over one of the full glasses of gin. A hush fell over the crowd.
A snarl on his lips, the Trandoshan rose slowly from his seat to stare at Ezra. Ezra swallowed.
"Kinda clumsy to knock over my friend's drink, wouldn't you agree?" he growled.
Ezra didn't answer. He could sense a growing anger but also a clear fog in the trandosian's mind, signaling that the creature was drunk. That was not good.
"Why did you do it?" he continued.
Ezra bit back a smart reply. In an attempt to pacify the customer, he reached for a towel to wipe up the mess. Before he could take a step, though, a large, scaly arm lashed out and knocked Ezra into a nearby wall. All the customers stopped to look at the oncoming bar fight. Some of them crowded around the two, chanting fight in various languages. This was not good, Ezra knew.
The lumbering Trandoshan stood up from his table and made his way closer to where Ezra lay, his head still spinning. The constant chant continued. The trandoshan grabbed Ezra by the back of his collar and held him only a few inches away from his face. Ezra could smell the beer in his breath. Before anyone could react, the trandoshan slapped Ezra hard, causing his nose to bleed. Satisfied, he dropped the human and turned to face him. "Come on," he taunted. "Fight like a man!"
Ezra closed his eyes, trying to hide the pain and anger threatening to overtake him.
"Too hurt to fight?" the trandoshan taunted.
Ezra felt another wave of anger wash over him, threatening to drown him. He could not let that happen.
"Aww, look," the trandoshan told his friends. "this little boy is too scared to fight back. Should I have mercy?"
A chorus of no's in different languages arouse.
"When I get done with you, you won't know which end is up," the trandoshan threatened as he took several menacing steps closer.
Ezra continued to squeeze his eyes shut, trying to fight the overwhelming darkness.
Thinking that Ezra was completely unguarded, the trandoshan started to punch him. He was surprised, thought, when a hand caught it in mid swing. Ezra looked up at the shocked faces of the crowd. His eyes were no longer a crystal blue—they were a sickening yellow. The sign of a sith.
Humiliated, the beer taking over all senses, the trandoshan snarled and tried to punch the man once more.
Ezra caught his fist with ease and, letting the Force guide him, pulled it behind his back. The trandoshan snarled in pain and signaled to his partners to give him a hand in the fight. Three large trandosian's—all identical—marched up. They tried to grab Ezra, but the human wriggled out of their grasp and behind a table. Infuriated, one of them made a dive for the other side of the table while the other grabbed their blaster and started to fire shots Ezra. The third helped his boss to his feet. Ezra easily jumped out of the way of the diving trandoshan and managed to dodge the blaster bolts. Only one clipped him on the shoulder, causing him to hiss in pain. Distracted by the burn, Ezra did not notice one of the trandosian's sneak up behind him until it was too late. The alien grabbed Ezra by the neck and lifted him off the ground. Instinctively, Ezra tried to gasp but it was cut off by a strangled choke. Just as he thought he heard the fifth bone snap in his neck, a deep rumbling sound came from the in front of Ezra.
"And you thought you could outsmart me?" the leader of the gang of trandosian's Ezra had just angered boomed.
Ezra tried to give a smart-aleck response—his specialty—but the trandoshan holding him captive tightened his grip. Ezra let out a small choked gasp.
The trandoshan laughed. "Not so powerful now, are you boy?"
Ezra could feel anger flooding his senses.
Another laugh as he watched Ezra struggle against the other trandosian's grip. Thirsty for revenge (and possibly for some more Lothalian rum) the leader made his way toward the human, slowly reaching for a dagger hidden on his belt.
Ezra felt a sudden sting on his right arm. That was all the prompt he needed. Using that pain as a power source, he jerked hard on the trandosian's arm, causing the gangster to lose his grip. Taking the alien's obvious surprise to his advantage, he reached for his lightsaber. Desperate times called for desperate measures. though he promised himself he would never use his lightsaber in public again, he would prefer to show his Jedi roots rather than die in a bar. in one swift motion, he ignited the white blade and slashed at the leader's arm, cutting in off. A gasp rippled through the crowd.
Ezra flicked off his saber and grabbed the discarded rag. "Why don't you clean up your friend's mess," he suggested as he handed the rag to one of the trandosian's. He didn't dare move.
Ezra slipped out the door and into the streets of Lothal. Settling down on a bench, he looked around to make sure there were no trandoshans, and carefully lifted up his right shirt sleeve. It took some time and hurt like crazy, but he managed to separate skin from fabric. When he did, he let out a groan. The leader trandoshan had managed to cut the lower forearm. The cut was about two inches long, who knew how deep, and bleeding like crazy. I'll survive till the next payday, Ezra thought to himself. That was pretty much all that mattered, anyway.
Very unhappy with his current predicament, he grabbed a torn piece of his clothes and tried to wrap it up. He had just barely managed to wrap it tight enough to stop the bleeding when he heard a gruff voice in front of him, asking him to move.
Ezra looked up, one of the ends of bandage in his teeth. Standing over him was a large and rather intimidating Lasat. Holding his hand was a young…space kitty (Ezra didn't exactly know what species it was. Space kitty seemed most descriptive). The "space kitty" couldn't have been older than five.
"Mind if you move? Me and my friend here was looking for a seat and," the Lasat looked around at all the park benches, "it looks like all the others are taken."
Ezra was about to tell them to get lost when the "space kitty" tugged the lasat's hand.
"I'm tired," she mewed. "Can we sit down, Uncle Zeb?"
Ezra stopped. Uncle Zeb? Zeb? Was it really…? Ezra stood up from his bench. "It's fine, really," he told them. He tucked in the end of his makeshift bandage and turned to go.
Zeb visibly relaxed. He sat down on the bench and lifted the kitten onto his lap.
Ezra couldn't help but smile as he walked into a nearby alley. He was about to sit down when he felt a scaly hand grasp his right arm.
"Going' somewhere?" a deep and rather angry voice asked.
Ezra let out a small yelp of pain as the speaker tightened his grip. "Notthatarmnotthatarmnotthatarm!" Ezra begged as the pain increased. (for those of you who can't read it, Ezra is saying "not that arm" several times)
The speaker, who Ezra quickly identified as one of the trandoshan from the bar, laughed.
Desperate, Ezra held out his other arm. "Please switch."
Seeing no harm, the trandoshan switched arms. Taking advantage, Ezra yanked his arm out of the trandosian's grasp. Angry now, the alien made a lunge for Ezra. With ease, he slipped to the right and delivered a swift kick to the back. The trandoshan growled, getting the attention of his buddies.
"Three to one," Ezra mumbled. "Just my kinda odds."
In perfect sync, the trandoshans lunged for Ezra. At the last possible moment, Ezra grabbed a nearby pole directly above him and swung out of their grasp. He swung back down just in time to see two out of the three turn around and clearly not in the best of moods. One of them punched the wall, causing it to crumble and start to fall. Not wasting a moment, Ezra flipped out of the way of a nearby chunk, jumped up onto another piece and, letting the Force guide him, proceeded to jump up onto the falling pieces. By doing this, he managed to make in to the top of a nearby building. The trandoshans, thinking that he was dead, started to search the rubble for his body.
Ezra grinned and jumped down from the building, landing on his feet. For a second, the trandoshan just stared, shocked. Taking their surprise to his advantage, Ezra delivered a swift kick to the gut of one of the trandoshans and flung the other into a wall, knocking both unconscious.
Just as the human let out a sigh, three stormtroopers noticed the ruckus and went to investigate.
"Stop!" one of them shouted when he saw Ezra.
Ezra grinned.
Before either of them could move, something grabbed one of the three soldiers. The other two looked around for their missing companion, shocked that he had just disappeared. When they did not find him, they turned their blasters toward Ezra. "Hands up!" one of them ordered.
Ezra didn't obey.
Before they could report the rebel activity, the body of the first trooper was thrown down from a building and hit one of the troopers, knocking him unconscious.
Agile and quiet, someone slipped down from the rooftops and landed by Ezra side. Her modified Death Watch armor shone in the setting sun. Two large ears rose from her light brown hair and a long tail slipped down dragging on the ground. Before the remaining trooper could react, Ezra's partner stunned him.
"I wanted to do that," Ezra mumbled as he dragged the bodies behind a dumpster.
His partner smiled. "I know. You snooze you lose."
Ezra glared. "No way I was snoozing."
His partner laughed, her long hair flying in her face temporarily. "Maybe not snoozing, but totally loosing."
Ezra shared the laugh. As the humor disappeared, his mind drifted to Zeb. Was it really Zeb? Of course, it was. He's one of the last Lasat. But what about the kitten with him? Maybe it was a new crew member. To replace me? No, of course not. How could they replace you? Zeb's probably heartbroken. Ezra glanced over at his partner. "Are you in my head?" he asked, suspicion dripping from his voice.
She smiled. "I won't lie. You needed someone to set you straight. Now go tell Zeb who you really are." She gently shoved him out into the streets, careful not to aggravate his arm.
Ezra sighed, but knew he couldn't argue with his partner. After some hesitation, he set off to find the Lasat.
Zeb looked around at the different aliens wandering the streets of capital city, suspicious of all of them. He wasn't watching where he was going and ran into a human.
"Sorry," he apologized, and started to go when the human stood in his way. "I said I'm sorry," he growled, frustrated. He tried to move the other way, but to no avail. The human blocked his way once more. "Let me through!" Zeb shouted.
Ezra didn't move out of the way. He wasn't going to let Zeb go that easy.
Zeb turned to the "space kitty" next to him. "Go back to the Ghost," he told her.
She nodded and ran into the fields.
That isn't good, Ezra thought. Before he could say anything, Zeb grabbed his neck.
"Why didn't you get out of my way?" Zeb growled.
Ezra tried to answer, but Zeb's grip tightened. This wasn't good. Thinking fast, he managed to whisper one word: "Zeb."
Zeb growled in frustration. "How do you know my name!?" he shouted.
Ezra managed to whisper one more word: "Ezra."
Zeb dropped Ezra surprised at hearing that name.
Ezra coughed, trying to recover from the Lasat's iron grasp. His arm hurt worse than before.
"How—how did you know Ezra?" Zeb asked in a quiet tone.
Another cough. "I (cough) am (cough cough) Ezra (cough)."
For a long minute, Zeb just stared, trying to comprehend what Ezra had just said. Then, without warning, he grabbed the human by his arms and pulled him up into a warm embrace.
"NOT THAT ARM!" Ezra shouted, frustration and pain taking over.
Zeb stopped and stared, shocked by the outburst.
Ezra gave a nervous laugh. "Sorry, Zeb."
Zeb laughed. "Don't worry about it. Good to have you back, ki— "he stopped and looked Ezra over. He was as tall as Zeb, his tangled blue hair pulled back and bangs hanging down on either side. "Not much of kid, are you?" Zeb realized.
Ezra looked at himself and shrugged. "I guess you could just call me Ezra."
Zeb smiled. "Good to have you back, Ezra."
Ezra smiled. "Good to be back."
Awww! (sniff) I think I'm gonna cry! That's sooo cute! Anyway, back on topic: this is just a one-shot, but I REALLY want to hear from you! PLEASE REVIEW AND TELL ME WHAT YOU WANT MY NEXT ONE-SHOT TO BE ABOUT! It can be ANYTHING Star Wars rebels related!
Please tell me!
-Spector7 out!