Ezra the Storyteller
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The moment Ezra's ship entered the Coruscant space, he received the transmission with summons to the former Imperial Palace. The Chief of State herself wanted to hear his report from the Jedi Academy.
The trouble started when Leia showed up late at the conference room with a trio of children in tow. He didn't meet them before, but it wasn't hard to guess that they were Leia's. Their resemblance to her and the strong presences in the Force were uncanny.
Leia introduced her progeny: Jaina, Jacen, and Anakin, and explained that she had to bring them along because of certain circumstances. She ordered the kids to quietly do their homework at the other end of the long table, while she and Ezra talked.
Things didn't go to plan at all when only after two minutes their conversation was interrupted by the insistent beeping of Leia's commlink. It turned out she was needed somewhere else for a while.
"We can meet later, whenever you're not busy," Ezra offered amiably.
Leia shook her head. "No, this won't take long. I'll be back soon. Could you do me a favour and watch the kids?"
"Sure," he agreed.
"Thanks." Leia smiled, relieved. She turned to her children, who were now only pretending that they were doing their homework. "Listen to Uncle Ezra and behave yourselves," she told them sternly.
"Okay, Mom!" they chorused, the picture of perfect little angels.
The door barely closed behind Leia, when the kids got up and gathered around Ezra.
"You're a Jedi? How long can you withhold your breath? Can you show us your lightsaber?" the curious trio asked.
"Hey, hey, slow down," Ezra said, putting up his hands. "To answer you: yes, I'm a Jedi, 6 minutes and no, I can't."
The kids looked disappointed. "That's lame," the girl—Jaina—said.
"Boooring," her twin added.
"I just want to see if I can take it apart and then put it together, it can't be that hard, please?" the youngest, Anakin, begged.
Ezra put a hand on his lightsaber's handle protectively. He had no intention of letting a small kid mess with a dangerous weapon like this. He imagined Leia's reaction to such irresponsibility and shuddered.
"You three should listen to your mother and do your homework."
"What will we get in exchange?" Jaina asked, business-like.
"I want a story!" Anakin chimed in.
"Good idea. Tell us a story." The twins backed their little brother and all three children looked at Ezra expectantly. Under their combined pressure, he had no chance to resist.
He sighed. "Alright." He thought for a moment about any child-friendly stories he had. "So, maybe about the little bantha-"
"No!" the kids cried out.
"We're not babies!" Jacen said with a grimace.
"Tell us a real story," Jaina demanded.
"Oh, alright, er, just let me think of something." Ezra racked his brains, then a lightbulb turned on in his head and he chuckled. "So, this happened when I was a few years older than you. I was working for the Rebellion on Lothal and one day, three cruisers from Alderaan arrived with relief supplies for the citizens."
"Alderaan is mom's planet!" Anakin exclaimed. The twins shushed him, so Ezra could continue the story.
"Yes, that's right, so I and Kanan, my master, went dressed as stormies to see the new ships. The landing ramp opened and you know who was the first person that came out?"
"It was mom?" Jacen took a guess.
"Who else? Of course it was mom," Jaina said with an eyeroll.
"It could be Winter," her brother argued. "She sometimes pretended to be mom."
"It was your mother." Ezra nipped the squabble in the bud. "And the first thing she said to us was: 'Not much of a welcoming committee!' Then she told us to put on our helmets and keep our mouths shut."
The kids snorted. "That sounds just like her," Jaina said.
"How old was she?" Anakin asked.
"She's the same age as me, but she seemed older. She was very... commanding. It was a first time I met a princess, but she wasn't what I expected."
"Is that when you became friends?" Jacen asked.
Ezra smiled. "No, I was rather annoyed with her. I didn't like that she could order us around. But later, she came to talk with me when I was feeling sad. Your mother is a very kind person."
The kids nodded, looking proud.
"Anyway, her plan was for us to steal the cruisers. This way no one would suspect that Alderaan was helping the Rebellion," Ezra returned to telling the story and the children leaned in, intrigued, focusing entirely on his words. "But the Imperials put gravity locks on the ships and sent a trooper squad and two walkers to prevent us from stealing the ships."
"What did you do?" Anakin asked.
"We had to improvise. The situation changed when the rest of our crew had to pretend to kidnap Leia, Kanan and me. Together we came up with a plan and your mother played a distraction, when the others sneaked around the security to take off the gravity locks. There was a big fight, because the Imperials tried to destroy the ships."
The kids gasped. "But why? They were supposed to protect the ships!" Jaina protested hotly. She couldn't wrap her head around the idea of someone doing the opposite of what their objective was.
"They would rather have the ships destroyed then see them in our hands," Ezra explained.
"If they destroyed the ships, then they wouldn't have to worry about fighting them later," Jacen surmised.
"Yes, you've got it. That's the Imperial logic for you. Destruction was always easier for them."
"Uncle Luke told us that taking the easy way is a path to the dark side," Anakin piped up.
"Your uncle is right," Ezra said. He respected Luke who was the one that helped him finish his Jedi training years after Kanan's passing. Without Luke, Ezra would have probably never returned to being a Jedi and he was grateful to the Jedi Master.
"So, did you stop the Imperials?" Jaina asked, taking him out of his brief reminiscence.
"Yes, we all fought them. Kanan charged at the walker and cut off its legs with his lightsaber. The others shot the second walker and I used the Force to pull the blasters away from the bucketheads." Ezra omitted that part when one of the blasters smacked him in the head, but the memory must have bled through his shields because the children snickered at him.
"You hit yourself!" Anakin exclaimed, confirming Ezra's theory.
"Hey, I was still new at doing this!" Ezra defended his younger self, but the younglings kept giggling. He sighed and gave up. When they calmed down, he finished the story. "The troopers attacked us, but your mother picked up the blaster and shot them. She saved us. And when I had to escape with the rest, she pretended to try to catch me, so the Imperials wouldn't be suspicious of her."
"Did she beat you up?" Jaina asked.
"Nope. I shot her with a stunner," Ezra said, enjoying the aghast looks on the kids' faces. "And that's how the Rebels stole three cruisers right under the Empire's nose," he ended the story grandly.
"Wait... our mom let you stun her?" Jacen's voice oozed with disbelief. Anakin just looked at Ezra with wide eyes.
"She told me to, I didn't have much choice," he replied with a shrug. "She was great at fooling the Empire." He clapped. "Anyway, the story is over."
"It was too short!" Anakin complained.
"Tell us another story about mom," Jacen implored.
"Or about our grandfather," Jaina threw in her two credits.
Ezra paled. Which grandfather did she mean? He hoped Bail Organa and not who he thought.
"Oh, well, that's..."
"I think that is a story for another time," Leia said. How come he didn't sense her coming? Her shields were really remarkable. "Ezra, thank you for entertaining them. Children, go back to your homework."
"But Mom! Ezra was about to tell us a story," the twins protested in unison.
"No buts. One story is enough for now. Do your homework and I'll think about another one."
"Will Ezra come to tell it to us?" Anakin asked innocently.
"Only if he wants to," Leia said.
All three children turned to him with an identical look, their eyes somehow big and shiny like a cute animal's. Their gazes were like laser beams melting any resistance he could put up.
Ezra thought about his schedule, the trip home to Lothal, then maybe visiting Sabine... "I don't know if I can," he said.
"Uncle Ezra, please! Please, come!" the children pleaded insistently.
"Oh, alright! I'll come!" he finally relented and the kids erupted into cheers.
Ezra smiled. In the end, he didn't mind staying a few hours longer on Coruscant, if he would spend it on restoring his reputation in the children's eyes.
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AN: Thanks for reading and please review! :)