Kanan sits by Ezra, patiently awaiting the sound of his new lightsaber igniting for the first time. A new hope that he can't quite explain fills him, and he can't help but feel excited.
Ezra was finally given another crystal. He finally has his own lightsaber again. They can finally move on.
Beside him,Ezra doesn't seem to be feeling much of… anything, really.
"Ready?" Kanan asks, nudging Ezra gently in the ribs with a smirk, trying to urge some excitement into him. After all, with all they have been through over the past few months, this is something he should be excited about. Ezra deserves to feel excited. Kanan knows that he would be, if it were hislightsaber.
"Yeah." Ezra releases a long, slow breath, the way Kanan had showed him how, as if to steady himself.
Then, the hiss and thrum of the lightsaber fills the air, breathes life into it in a way that Kanan misses, in a way that brings him back to his days of training back at the Jedi temple. That's another thing: they can finally start trainingagain. Things are going to be okay.
Kanan is so caught up in the moment that it takes him longer than necessary to notice that Ezra is having the opposite reaction beside him. The child's hand grabbing- clutching- his shoulder, squeezing it for dear life, finally pulls him out of his daze.
The wave of fear tumbles over Kanan not a moment later.
"Ezra?" he asks.
Silence.
"What's wrong, Ezra?"
"It…" Ezra stumbles over his words. They're simple words, but he can't seem to get them out of his mouth. They seem reluctant to roll over his tongue, like it's something he's been trained to never, ever say. "It's red, Kanan. My lightsaber isred!"
Both are still for a moment before Ezra's breathing picks up in a panic, starting slow and eventually turning into barely contained wheezes that make it sound like he's being strangled. "My lightsaber is red, Kanan!" herepeats, with more urgency this time.
"I heard you the first time," Kanan says, sitting down on a nearby table to think.
"What does this mean?!"
"I don't know." He pinches the bridge of his nose to fend off an impending headache. Things can never just be simple with this kid. There's always something. "Are you sure it's red?"
"Yes I'm sure!"
"Okay, okay!" Kanan holds up his hands in defeat. "Just turn it off and calm down, alright?"
A hiss overpowers the other noise of the room for a fraction of a second while the saber whistles closed, but it just leaves Ezra's frantic gasps for air all the louder amid the following silence.
"Kid, I mean it." Kanan reaches over to place a palm on his padawan's shoulder, fumbling around a moment before he finds it. "Calm down. Breathe how I taught you to, okay? In through your nose, and count to four."
Ezra nods, knowing that Kanan can't see, but not being able to manage words anymore. His shoulders rise with the the long breath, still coming in as a squeaky wheeze in Ezra's plight. Kanan squeezes his shoulder every so slightly, as if to say 'good job, keep trying,' and does the exercise along with him.
"And out through your mouth for four." Ezra's shoulders drop- faster than the four counts Kanan taught him to exhale for, but Kanan doesn't say anything.
"And again. Breath in for four." They repeat the process until Kanan can no longer hear any trace of distress in Ezra's breathing and he seems to have calmed down. "Better, or do we need to do it again?"
"I think I'm okay," Ezra answers, though his voice is still half choked. "But really, what does this mean? Does this mean that I'm not a light side user? Does this mean that I'll fall to the dark side? My eyes are still blue and I'm not cold, I swear!" he rambles on. "I mean, the crystal was red when Yoda gave it to me, but I somehow hoped that when I actually turned the lightsaber on- it couldn't actually-"
"Hey." Kanan squeezes Ezra's shoulder again. "Don't jump to conclusions, okay?"
"The only people who have red lightsabers are inquisitors and sith lords! How do I not jump to conclusions, master?!"
Kanan purses his lips at the tone Ezra is taking, having to remind himself that this is not the right time to discipline him. "Let's stay calm." Kanan reminds him gently, as he wracks his brain for the right words to tell his padawan. "Did you know that I once used a red lightsaber, too?"
Ezra freezes. "You?"
Kanan nods, smirking and relaxing back as Ezra focuses on picking that piece of information apart, rather than the revelation of his red lightsaber. "It wasn't too long ago, either. It was when we went to visit the jedi temple with Ahsoka, and I was knighted. Before I was knighted, though, I had to fight with another lightsaber, and it just so happened to be a red one." Kanan chooses to leave out the reason why he was fighting. Somehow, he doesn't think that telling Ezra about a ton of ancient Jedi in his vision who were out to kill him because he was doomed to fall to the dark side would do anything to diffuse the situation at hand.
"Well… what do you think that meant?"
Kanan tilts his head. "I'm not sure. I honestly didn't think much of it at the time. I needed to protect my family, and if I had to do it with a red lightsaber, then I'd do it with a red lightsaber."
"You really don't think it meant anything?" Ezra knows what Kanan is hinting at, what answer he's trying to lead him to, but he needs to hear the words outright:Ezra, it doesn't mean that you're falling to the dark side.
Kanan's eyebrows pinch together as he dives even deeper into thought. Hadthe red lightsaber been a sign of himself inching towards the dark side? He'd been very passionate about protecting Ezra, and loved his padawan: both things that could push one to the dark side, but they'd always been things that kept Kanan resolute to the light. And yes, in that moment, he had turned against the temple guards- turned against the Jedi Order, even, but he doesn't believe that he ever turned away from the light, not really. The order and the light were two separate things, after all.
"No," Kanan finally says. "I don't. I don't know why Yoda gave you a red crystal, or even how he got it, but we're going to beat the empire one way or another, and I don't see the difference in beating it with a blue lightsaber versus beating it with a red one."
"Really?"
"Really, kid. Stop beating yourself up. I wouldn't be telling you all of this if I didn't believe it."
"Oh. Well, if you're sure." Ezra's voice sounds uncertain still, but he believes his master's word well enough. The truth is, thought, Kanan's not sure- not in the slightest. But, Ezra needs a boost in confidence, and Kanan isn't about to let him panic his way over to the dark side. Besides, it's just a color, right?
Kanan is taken off guard by the sound of the saber igniting again, and this time, the emotions that roll over him aren't bad. They're not exactly good- not yet, anyway, but they're not bad, either- more mystified and curious than anything else. Peaceful, even. He zeroes in on the kid's emotions, studying them closely to give himself some closure. No. Ezra's not falling to the dark side. Not with him there.
"Red is a nice color," Ezra finally concludes.
"It is," Kanan agrees with a nod, truly wishing he could see it for himself. Red isn't the color of hate, like he had always thought. Red is the color of passion, of drive, of love: all things that the Jedi Order warned against, but if they could keep Kanan dedicated to the light, he's sure that Ezra will channel them into something good, too. Kanan likes red. It's the last color that he saw, and now it will be the last color that the empire will see, as well.
Oh Kanan- don't you know that jedi don't seek revenge? I was going for an ambiguous ending, but idk if I actually pulled that off XD.
Thank you for reading! Any reviews would mean the world. ;)