A/N: I only recently started watching the Rebels series, and already I'm in love. These characters will be prominently placed in the other Star Wars stories I'm working on, but for now, I wanted a darker spin on what could have happened with Ezra's capture in the premiere. So, without further adue, I give you 'Mistaken'!
-Triscribe
"Your orders, Agent Kallus?"
"Search the boy. Take anything you find, and move him to Interrogation Room 7-B. I'll have an officer and mind probe droid waiting for you."
"Yes, sir."
-M-
"Where are the insurgents hiding?"
"I d-don't- hn -don't know!"
"What plans do they have?"
"I d-don't kn-know! I j-just met th-them! Argh!"
"You will tell us eventually. You're the one drawing this out, subjecting yourself to further pain. This ends as soon as you start answering our questions."
"P-please... I don't kn- AHH!"
-M-
"Sabine, haven't you hacked that directory yet?" Kanan didn't bother to look at the teen as he asked, instead continuing to fire at the troopers down the hall. They'd encountered resistance just as soon as he'd feared, and the secret Jedi prayed it wasn't an omen of doom for their rescue mission.
"Got it! Looks like... They've got the kid in an interrogation cell, seventh sector. That's right above us!"
"Then get going. Zeb, follow her. I'll hold the line here."
-M-
When they reached the right door, Sabine started to splice the control panel, only for Zeb to beat her to the punch. Literally. He slammed his bo-rifle into the metal panels with enough strength to bend them inwards, creating an opening on the third hit. Then the Lasat grabbed both sides and pushed them apart with his bare hands.
Inside was far worse than they'd hoped for.
Ezra was unconscious, strapped to a torture table with a gridwork of burns and lacerations stretching up his chest and upper arms. There were hypo punctures by his elbow joints, and the boy's normally chestnut skin was far too pale.
"Kharabast, kid..." As Zeb moved forward, Sabine averted her eyes, and happened to catch sight of a familiar knapsack, its contents scattered across another table. The teen busied herself for a few seconds gathering it all back in again. By the time she turned around, Zeb was carefully lifting Ezra into his arms and frowning more deeply when the boy didn't even twitch.
"Let's go."
-M-
"Well, well, well," Kallus grinned as he and his men cornered the Lasat and Mandalorian girl, both of them trying to hide their injured friend from view. "It seems the boy was wrong after all - you did come back for him."
The girl's face was, of course, hidden from view, but the way her body tensed up even further was all too obvious, along with the Lasat's sudden flicker of shame across his expression.
"Although, perhaps you almost didn't. I'll be honest, rebels, none of you have a very good chance of making it out of here intact. Even if you do survive our intensive questioning, imprisonment will follow."
"What's your point, buckethead?" The girl increased the setting on her blasters, their high-pitched whine rebounding through the hall.
"That you have lost. The only way off this ship for you now is in Imperial custody; either on a prisoner transport, or in body bags."
"That's assuming you capture us, slag-sucking Imp." Snarling, the Lasat cradled his charge with one massive arm while bringing up his weapon with the other. "Maybe I'll take your bloody head off with my first shot-"
"Maybe I'll send you all off with the wookies you love so dearly, working the spice mines of Kessel until you expire from exertion." He sneered at the boy they were still trying to protect. "How long do you think that one will last, weak as he already is?"
Bellowing, the Lasat opened fire, his companion following suit a split second later.
Those of Kallus' men that weren't struck down in an instant separated to either side of the hallway, shooting back. None of them saw the incoming attacker until after several of their number were taken down from behind.
Cursing, Kallus swung about to fire at the third rebel, but the additional opponent was enough of a distraction that the Lasat was able to flee with his charge, the others retreating shortly afterward.
"After them!"
-M-
Caught up in the flight from the troopers, Kanan didn't have a chance to look at Ezra properly until they were back on the Ghost. Zeb went in first, willingly and without being told, heading straight for the medbay. Sabine and Kanan continued firing until Chopper closed the hatch. The two humans paused for a moment to let their pulses stop racing, before they followed after their larger crewmate.
Second-degree burns, not as damaging as third, but more painful to recover from. Cuts that didn't extend too far into the muscle, but would definitely leave very visible scars. There was bloody skin, rubbed raw, where the restraints had dug in as the kid struggled. And deep bruises were already forming on both sides of his face, likely where he'd been slapped and smacked several times for mouthing off.
It was all so much better than Kanan had imagined before the rescue operation, because at least Ezra was still breathing.
And yet at the same time, it was so much worse, because a small, naive part of Kanan that still responded to the name Caleb Dume had been hoping Zeb was right, that the Imperials would leave a child alone.
After she'd gotten them into hyperspace, Hera had come down to the medbay as well, only to freeze in the doorway. She stared at Ezra for a good ten seconds, stunned and horrified. Then her mother hen mode went active, and the twi'lek was a blur as she went about retrieving and applying the proper medical materials.
Recognizing that it was his partner's way of coping, Kanan guided the subdued Zeb and silent Sabine back out into the hallway. Even Chopper was quieter than usual.
"I shouldn't have let that agent grab him," the Lasat murmured, his tone more upset than angry. "This is on my head."
"It's on the Empire's head, Zeb," Kanan responded tiredly.
"It wasn't the Empire who voted not to go get him." Sabine's voice was bitter. The teen had yet to remove her helmet, but Kanan didn't need to see her expression to know she was beating herself up over that particular decision.
"Hey. Hey." He grabbed the teen's shoulder as she started to turn away, forcing to look at him. "Sabine. You might not have been willing at first, but once Hera and I started planning, you jumped in. You didn't chose to sit this one out. And once we were in the mission, you went all out to make sure we found the kid and got him out."
She muttered something too softly for Kanan to hear.
"What?"
"Ezra. His name's Ezra."
"You're right. And we'll start calling him by it."
-M-
Waking up was... painful. And yet, not nearly much as he'd been expecting. For one thing, Ezra could tell he was lying horizontally, not at an angle. And for another, he was on a semi-comfortable surface. When the next detail filtered through that he wasn't being held in place anymore either, it was enough to cause the boy's eyes to snap open.
Plain grey ceiling, a lighter color than had been in his cell.
Glancing around, he took in the brightly lit room, guessing it to be a medical bay from the handful of equipment present. What really startled him was the presence of a very familiar twi'lek slumped over the edge of the cot, sleeping with one of her hands resting atop his own.
"Hera?" The boy whispered, stunned. Before he could try further to wake her up, the door slid open, revealing a very tired looking Kanan. It was only after taking a few steps into the little med bay that the man noticed he was being watched. His feet faltered, eyes widening as he stared at Ezra, who stared back.
"...Kid?" He asked tentatively. "You're really awake? Not just sleeping with your eyes open to creep me out?"
Ezra snorted. "I'm not that talented." Some of the tension went out of Kanan's shoulders then, and he moved closer to the cot.
"How are you feeling, Ezra?" As well as he could, the boy shrugged.
"Stiff? Sore? Not hurting as much as-" burning lines of pain across his chest, blood dripping from his wrists and ankles "- as much as I'd thought I'd be."
"Yeah, well, that's because you've still got the heavy painkillers in your system. We don't have too much of that stuff, though, so we'll need to switch to the more moderate meds in a day or two."
Ezra stared at him, perplexed. "But- but that means I'd have to stay here... Doesn't it?"
"Sure does, kid. You're stuck with us, at least until you're healed up." Kanan rubbed self-consciously at the back of his neck.
"...Why?"
"In part, as a thank you for warning us when the rescue job went bad. Also in part, as an apology, for Zeb making the call to- to bail out on you." The man sighed. "But mostly because you seem like a decent kid, who's had a tough time of it and could use someone looking out for him."
Unexpectedly, Ezra found himself blinking back a wetness in his eyes.
"Look, whether you stick around once you're better is up to you, but I'm hoping that in the meantime we can make a decent enough argument to get you to stick around." That was when he held up the cube thing Ezra had stolen from the man's room, causing a deep flush of embarrassment to spread across the teen's face. "Starting with this. I'm going to leave it with you for now, if you promise to focus on it from time to time."
"Uh, sure?"
"Good enough. Get some rest, kid - Hera's not likely to leave you alone much over the next few days, so you'll need all the energy you can get to put up with her."
"I h'rd tha' y'jerk." Both of them grinned at the sleepy twi'lek, who was just lifting her head up and blinking blearily. "'zra?"
"Hi, Hera. Guess you missed me, huh?" She smiled at him, even reached up a hand to run through his dark hair. The gesture took Ezra by surprise. He didn't flinch away, but he didn't lean into it, either.
"If you need anything, make sure to tell me, okay?" Hera looked intently into his eyes. "I'd say to ask any of the others, but somehow I think they'll be too ashamed of what happened to come in and face you for a while."
"O-okay? Thanks," he wasn't going to be able to wrap his head around that for a while, either.
The adults kept talking in soft voices for a bit, but Ezra found himself drifting off back into sleep, and didn't remember anything else that what was said.