A.N: This is set midway in Season 1, with Ezra aged about fourteen, before he gains his lightsaber. I have drawn from the Kanan comics (or rather, summaries of the first couple, since I still need to rectify not owning them!) and a little bit from A New Dawn. Caleb is mentioned as being thirteen when he's tapped as Depa Billaba's padawan, five months before the fall of the Temple on Coruscant, and fourteen during Order 66, deployed on General Billaba's Kaller campaign.

….

Chapter 1, hyperspace.

The Phantom sped through hyperspace, the twisting matter outside the shuttle's windows casting a silvery grey glow into the cockpit. Inside, most unusually for this particular point in galactic history, two Jedi sat. At least, one Jedi and his still fairly new padawan.

Ezra Bridger inspected the two holocrons he was holding once again. While not so long ago, he would have spent the trip staring out of the window as the ship rapidly traversed impossible distances, but the past few months in space had allowed the novelty to wear off. Besides, there was still some novelty in mulling over the mystery of the second holocron.

Unlike Kanan's long-kept relic from the last days of the Jedi Order, this one had been out in the elements for a while and despite assiduous polishing from the young padawan, remained cracked and dusty. A corner was chipped off and ground in particles of dirt speckled the surface and clung to the fine engravings. This one had been found on Lothal itself, perhaps from a lost or hidden Jedi temple, perhaps just a last remainder of a lost Jedi. It had found its way to the pair through a friendly trader who blandly insisted on calling it "fine art from a lost age". Kanan had commented on the way back that it was one of the nicer euphemisms for "highly illegal subversive contraband" (the description the Empire would have for it) that he'd heard.

After fifteen years, and given Jedi holocrons were hardly common outside very specific situations, it wasn't surprising that most people didn't know what they were looking at anymore. Such holocrons, along with other items associated with the Jedi, had been destroyed whenever they were found. There probably weren't that many left at all now. What made this one particularly interesting, however, was that it contained a star map.

Ezra turned the holocron over in his hands again and then took a deep breath and released it, focussing intently on it. Kanan glanced over and tried not to smile at Ezra's absorbed squint. Still fairly small and slight for his age with blue-black hair flopping loosely and blue eyes that his face hadn't entirely grown into yet, the ferocious squint of concentration gave him the look of every student throughout the ages confronted with a task that they knew they could do but still weren't exactly sure how. He turned his focus back to the path ahead, even if once in hyperspace, the ship was doing all the work, and let his own breathing settle into a slower and deeper rhythm, as if to meditate himself. The subliminal prompt gradually worked as Ezra unconsciously picked up the same rhythm and started to relax. That Ezra was inclined to push didn't worry Kanan much at the moment. It was what Padawans did. Whether due to enthusiasm or impatience, it took time to reach acceptance of the Force rather than trying to push it.

It took some time, mostly for Ezra to fully settle, before Kanan heard the faint clicks of the holocron opening. Actually, they were rather louder and more grinding than his own, grains of dust and sand grating between the pieces. The star-map shimmered blue above the aperture, the glow of hyperspace giving it an eerie added brightness. Ezra scanned over it again, finding the one that Kanan had felt was out of place.

"Is this the only one?" he asked suddenly, glancing over. This was continuing an earlier conversation, so Kanan wasn't thrown by the apparent non-sequitor.

"I think so. It's been a long time since I saw – or had to draw – a star map of the temples. That one doesn't appear on any of the usual charts. Or any chart I ever saw. But there is a planet there."

Ezra eyed over the expanse of pinpricks through the holographic representation of the galaxy. He wasn't convinced Kanan could possibly remember all of them by now. On the other hand, he wouldn't bet against it either. And of the Ghost's crew, and despite his reputation for unlikely (albeit usually mostly effective) plans, he was one of the more conservative when it came to running off over the galaxy on potential wild bantha chases. So while Ezra had been all for exploring a lost Jedi temple, that Kanan had seemed equally interested was the less expected result.

As it happened, Kanan had a few reasons for being interested in this trip. Firstly, there was the possibility, however remote, that there really was a lost Jedi temple on this Outer Rim planet. If so, it had been lost for eons, as there had been no settlement on Belior II since the heyday of the Old Republic. If that was the case, there might still be something there. What, Kanan wasn't so sure. Jedi lore and wisdom he hoped. He could use it if so. Anything to help him teach Ezra. He knew Ezra was talented and had high potential. He also knew that this was as much a curse as a blessing with an inexperienced teacher with no back-up. And, of course, the ever-looming threat of the Empire. The more powerful and more to the point, the more of a Jedi Ezra became, the more of a target he would be for the Imperials.

It was a fine balance between teaching him what he needed to know to be a Jedi and training him in what he'd need to stay alive. Especially in this war against the Empire.

Kanan frowned, and without noticing, his breathing left the soothing pattern. Hera, he knew, thought of it more as a war. He'd preferred to think of it as strikes against the Empire. Skirting around the edges, dealing stings. Not a war, squaring up to the Empire head-on.

….

"Well, my little strategist, your wish is about to be granted," said Depa Billaba, surprising her young padawan out of his meditative state. She gave him a look that would have been disapproving had it not been for the amused glimmer in her eyes at his lack of focus. Caleb ran through the potential next few moments of light-hearted protest and counter-protest and decided he was more curious about what she meant. He looked at her questioningly, straightening up. "Master Billaba?"

She knelt down beside him, adopting the meditative stance with unconscious ease. "We two are deploying to the Republic forces retaking the Outer Rim planets from the Separatist hold-outs."

Caleb was stunned for a moment. He knew that Master Billaba could be redeployed to the front lines again – she was now fully recovered from the injury that had kept her on Coruscant. But he had been all too aware that at fourteen this month, he probably wasn't going to get to see much of the war. The Separatists were on the back foot and being pushed to the edges of the galaxy. His eyes brightened as he realised he was finally going to get to take part in what he'd mostly studied and analysed so far.

….

Kanan blinked, realising Ezra had spoken. He spared a moment to tell the receding image of the boy that he had an eye-opener coming before trying to remember what Ezra had said.

"Sorry Ezra, I was parsecs away. What was that?"

"I was asking when Empire Day was. I know it's around now." He had let the holocron close again and Kanan belatedly wondered how long he had been wandering the past. Although that was the thing, wasn't it. While a far less important reason, it had certainly factored into his interest in going now that the Ghost was making a delivery on a heavily populated planet the day before Empire Day and that was a combination Kanan could do without. Hera hadn't put up any argument at all. It was a routine job and she was aware from long experience that Kanan didn't deal well with Empire Day. While his drinking hadn't been a problem for several years now, she was fine with him not being on a planet full of cantinas for it. Zeb had not been a particularly calming influence on those occasions, but particularly after Sabine joined the crew, he had taken more to retreating to his cabin for those couple of days.

"Tomorrow." Actually, Hera was wrong. It wasn't Empire Day that had set off his need to drown demons and braincells in alcohol. It was the day before, the last day of the Separatist conflict. He exhaled and sternly told himself to get back to the present. It was a small shuttle. Dark moods spread easily. And-

"You're fifteen tomorrow. Empire Day?" He glanced over again, remembering now that Ezra had been born the day the Empire was declared. Ezra perked up.

"Tomorrow? Wasn't sure if I'd missed it and had been fifteen already."

Kanan's lip quirked in a smile. "Hera wouldn't let you miss it. Although you might not be on the Ghost for it."

Ezra grinned. "But in the meantime, we're finding a lost, ancient Jedi temple, so that's a pretty good birthday."

When he put it like that… Kanan grinned in response, pushing away the thoughts that even he had to admit were bordering on moping. He glanced down at the console.

"Exiting hyperspace in five minutes," he informed him and Ezra strapped his harness securely in preparation for the drop back into what Ezra was still inclined to think of as "the real galaxy", thousands of parsecs from where they'd been when they started. He tucked the holocrons away. This moment still had novelty too.

….

Ghost

The ship seemed both quieter and emptier without two of the crew on board. Although, Hera thought, looking down into Ghost's cargo bay with a sigh for the cleaning that would be needed, the ship was definitely quieter and emptier without the herd of incredibly smelly nerfs that they'd delivered to a friendly settlement; a large farming community in urgent need of a replacement herd.

"I'm vetoing any more livestock," came a grumpy voice behind her and to the right. She looked over to where Zeb was standing with a shovel, glaring disconsolately at the mess below.

"They could have warned me that nerfs don't deal well with dropping out of hyperspace," she responded with resigned indignation. They'd certainly smelled the results as what appeared to be the entire herd had copiously baptised the cargo bay in unison as the Ghost had exited to normal space near the planet's outer ring. Opening the cargo bay door when they landed had resulted in a waterfall that neither Zeb nor Sabine had escaped.

Now there was a sloshing mulch of trampled bedding left to deal with, mixed with matted fur and liquidated dung.

"No wonder Kanan and Ezra took their Jedi mission," grumbled Zeb, placing a hand on the railing to vault over and landing with a squelch in the mess. Hera sighed and followed. It was going to take hours to clear all this up. And the stench was impregnating the entire ship, all the way up to the cockpit.

….

As it happened, there wasn't much time for sightseeing, or even doing more than a basic supply run to the nearest city. The cargo bay took several hours to get it presentable and it was another hour or so again until the smell inside Ghost was bearable for a spaceflight. Hera, Zeb and Sabine slumped into their seats when they finally took them again after turns in the refresher.

"Never again," sighed Hera.

"Agreed," seconded Sabine, flicking a few strands of damp lilac hair out of her eyes. Zeb grunted, making it unanimous. Or nearly so, as a few whistles in binary made it clear that Chopper had found it all very amusing.

"I think I can still smell it," mumbled Sabine, resting her elbows on her knees and dropping her face into her palms. "It's implanted in my nose."

Chopper indicated that what the organics' sensory arrays were detecting and improperly interpreting was merely damp Lasat, which was considered an unpleasant smell in forty three systems and an aphrodisiac in exactly one. Chopper could sometimes be inclined to go to great lengths for an insult. It said something for Zeb's general lack of interest in moving that Chopper only suffered a growl and a side-eye that would have intimidated anything that wasn't a psychotic droid.

"On the bright side, we got the herd to Pelosia. And these ones are inoculated against the tseng fever," Hera pointed out, sitting up more in her seat. "I'm not doing it again without good reason but…this was good reason."

Sabine smiled in agreement. She was usually willing to be brought around by the knowledge they'd made things a bit better. Zeb just grunted, but Hera was willing to bet he wasn't entirely disgruntled about the situation.

Ghost lifted from Perosia's surface with a puff of brown dust that blew out in wide circles from the vents, encouraging people to keep some distance, and then shot upwards and forwards, rising through the clouds towards the upper atmosphere. Leaving nerf herds far behind, where they would always remain if Hera had anything to say about it.

As she soared through the atmosphere, Hera was content and awake again, taking her last look at the planet below. She likely wouldn't be back. Pelosia was an odd little world. Barely bigger than a large moon, some collision eons before had smashed debris and rock from it out into the atmosphere where it had joined an eddy of similar debris circling the planet. The atmospheric rock armour made the planet uninviting to casual passers-by. It also made it uninviting to trade routes, and when a sickness had run through the Pelosian herd, getting a replacement had been paramount to the deeply-independent community. And it needed a ship large enough to transport them in the hands of a pilot skilled enough to make the run. The distance between having to drop out of hyperspace and actually getting to the planet through the tortuous route added on hours. In this case, that had meant hours of noisome cattle.

"No wonder Kanan and Ezra went off chasing Jedi stuff. I wonder if they saw this coming in their meditations," grumbled Sabine. Hera banked Ghost around a slowly spinning rock easily the size of an Imperial compound and then made another adjustment to avoid the small debris being sucked along in its wake.

"Yeah, that's what I was thinking. Could have used them. Although the kid's still so short he'd have drowned in the cargo bay," pointed out Zeb. Chopper beeped again from his post at one of the interface units.

"Be nice, Chop," Hera told him absently as she focussed on her task.

It was clearing ahead. She was through the worst of the first cluster. She nosed Ghost out into the void and breathed a sigh of relief. Clear for a few minutes and then the second cluster. She laid in a course based on the known safe route. But she'd need to stay at the helm for manual adjustments. The asteroids didn't exactly stay in one place.

Despite what would have been a hairy journey to most people, neither Sabine nor Zeb were remotely concerned about the flying rocks, some of which could have engulfed Ghost wholesale. Both were strongly of the opinion that Hera was probably the best pilot in the galaxy and she'd backed up their faith in her skills more times than either could easily remember.

"Still think it's very convenient that a lost Jedi holocron just happened to end up with a friendly trader with links to a rebel group that contains two Jedi," said Zeb, leaning back in his chair and folding his arms across his chest.

"It could just be co-incidence. Kora-hee's never been a problem to us before. He certainly wouldn't deliberately have passed on something dangerous without a warning."

"Mhrr…well, he might be, but we don't know anything about it from before that." Zeb was unwilling to let it go. He didn't really trust the weird stuff that tended to happen when the Force stirred itself around the two Jedi. Who, of course, attracted that weird stuff from parsecs away.

"Kanan didn't seem too concerned," Hera pointed out. "He didn't get any alarms or sirens from it." Not that she was entirely sure as to how that worked. She was still getting accustomed to Kanan openly being a Jedi again. She was aware he was too.

Hera couldn't have explained how she felt something was suddenly wrong. Those instincts had developed in flight and battle over years. Ghost was giving no alerts. There was nothing on the screen. But just as she, for no apparent reason, suddenly banked the ship and corkscrewed between two stray asteroids rather than go around, a laser spat out and struck the one to her left. Ghost squeezed out from between them as the impact span the two asteroids together, rock grinding against rock, but fortunately not against metal. There were two surprised yelps and some binary swearing.

"Chopper, shields!" she said sharply. "Sabine, Zeb, turrets. We have company and I don't think they want to buy nerfs."

Now she could see it, a blip on the screen. Damn them, whoever it was, they had been cloaked and waiting for her exit. Who in the kriffing hells…

An Imperial TIE-fighter streaked towards them, its dark colouring and silvery glints giving good camouflage against the depths of space. Hera turned sharply and set her course towards the Tie, but on a lower plane, aiming to dart under him and gain enough time and distance to get her speed up. The TIE raked past the Ghost with laser-fire, but the shields held firm. Now her own turrets were spitting blasts back at the Tie, colourful flashes speeding towards the black fighter that dodged them with casual ease. Hera frowned. This wasn't an ordinary Imperial pilot. Not on his own. Not in that – and she could see now that this wasn't an ordinary run-of-the-mill TIE either. And not when he could dodge like that.

The TIE shot forward again, and Hera found herself in a dogfight with it. Both ships danced around each other, trying to get a shot lined up without being left vulnerable to a faster counter. None of the shots were hitting now, both pilots superb evasive fliers.

I'll get you yet, thought Hera, lost in a flying trance where nothing existed but her ship and what it was telling her, and the enemy ship. She broke off and shot for the asteroid belt. The TIE was nimble and straight-for-straight, probably faster than Ghost. But she'd just flown this belt twice.

"Chop, magnetise the outer hull."

Chopper beeped in alarm, but in a measure to his general trust of Hera, he connected to the interface outlet again and started making the adjustments, pointing out in a low grumbling commentary that this wasn't exactly a sensible idea when flying through this sort of rock forest.

Plenty of ships had met their fate in the asteroid belt. It was a known smugglers' run, or had been once before smugglers had mostly decided that the higher risk of Empire on other planets might still outweigh the strong likelihood of being crushed to atoms getting to this one. As Hera looped Ghost around the asteroids, the magnetic pull drew in debris, bits of long-dead vessels sluggishly shifted after her. She had to be careful with this. The last thing she wanted to do was destabilise the asteroid belt and cut off one of the few safe routes through it.

::"Spectre 5 to Spectre 2, not sighting the Tie," reported Sabine as the firing from above stopped.

::"He's waiting out there. We're bringing him a present," replied Hera with a grim smile. Ghost weaved through the rock, and as she neared the edge of the belt, she saw him.

::"Get his attention up there," she warned into the comm., holding the ship steady in her path as she waited for the TIE to spot her. Ghost flirted with the smaller ship, luring him in with a – well-placed laser shot to the wing, she noted.

::"Good job, his wing's hit," she said, hands ghosting over the controls as she waited for his turn. He turned on the spot – it had been a good hit, but it hadn't done much damage, she saw. Now the TIE was screaming towards her and she saw her opening. She gunned it, Ghost shooting out of the belt's leading edge, trailing debris behind her. It looked like the pair were going to collide to the destruction of both, lasers spitting around each other. But Hera was an old hand at space chicken and kept her course until the last possible moment. The TIE didn't lose its nerve either and it might well be down to chance as to whether they both banked the same direction or not. Seconds before collision, Hera span the ship almost broadside to his right, a move that must have looked suicidal before she barked. "Chopper, release the magnetic field!"

Chopper shut it down, the magnetic currents fizzling away from the hull. Hera's proximity had caught the smaller TIE and slowed it as it fought against the steady pull to twist left out of their path. Suddenly loosed again, it shot forward – right into the debris that span past Hera's ship, released from its bonds and following the momentum her sharp bank had given it.

Hera could have sworn that no pilot could have escaped that in the tiny bubble ship. Well, just maybe she could have. But definitely no buckethead. Still, that was what the tiny fighter was doing, ducking and dodging between the debris as sharp metal span around him. Sabine and Zeb were focussing fire, but he was somehow dodging that as well.

"This isn't some Imperial," said Hera grimly into the comm as she completed her manoeuvre and turned back to fire on the TIE too from the helm. "I think we're dealing with an Inquisitor."

And that was when the second TIE whistled out of the darkness, bearing down on Ghost with its lasers firing an almost constant beam of energy. Hera dodged, hoping that just maybe he'd hit the other Tie. He didn't, but at least Ghost was unscored too.

::"We can't take them both. Going back into the belt, we'll have to wait them out or find another route," crackled from the comms in the turrets. ::"Keep us covered."

Lasers flashed around them, Sabine and Zeb doing their best to get a shot on either Tie. Another two seconds, one second… they were into the asteroid belt, and Hera slipped into the swarm of rocks and dust, keeping Ghost moving with them rather than against them.

::"Powering down," she informed the turrets, flicking switches on the console. While it left them vulnerable, there was nothing she had dealt with that had been able to find Ghost when she didn't want it found.

They waited, moving as softly and lazily through space as the tumbling asteroids around them. They didn't have long to wait as the intership communication panel lit up. She glanced at it, eyes narrowed.

::"Excellent flying, Captain Syndulla, your reputation is deserved. I must admit I thought it exaggeration. I wouldn't have expected such skill from a non Force-sensitive." A courteous tone, although with a low edge of malice to it that Hera noted far more than the words. She didn't respond. She wasn't in the mood for inter-ship battle banter and she wasn't certain if this was a trick to keep them in one place while his friend slipped in.

::"Not going to chat? Oh well. We could stay here and play with you some more, you are cornered in there. But so little time available and you're not the ones we want anyway."

Hera's eyes narrowed. On the one hand that was not surprising; the Inquisitors would absolutely and gleefully murder the entire crew of Ghost with no qualms, but they were primarily focussed on the Jedi pair. On the other, entirely surprising that he knew they weren't there. She needed to get a warning to Kanan and Ezra. Which she couldn't do from here.

::"I will be sure to pass on my regards when we find your friends on Belior II. I am afraid you won't be joining us."

Hera had just time to start powering the engines again, reinforcing the shields, before the two TIEs fired torpedos into the asteroid belt. They struck and exploded, sending shards of rock spinning unpredictably around Ghost. The lazy natural pace of the asteroids changed with the explosion's impulse and Hera had to make quick adjustments almost from standstill to keep her ship untouched. She didn't entirely succeed and Ghost shuddered as an asteroid scraped along her underbelly. She felt an engine go before the console started warning her.

"Come on, my girl, we can get through this," she mumbled encouragingly to the ship, and Ghost responded under her hands, even with one engine out, nimbly twisting between whirling debris.

::"Farewell," came the mocking voice over the ship's comm., and then it shut off.

::"Hera, the Tie-fighters are breaking off."

::"One TIE jumping to hyperspace," reported Zeb at the same moment, the two Spectres speaking over each other.

The other swiftly followed and Sabine let her hands drop from the gun.

::"They've knocked out an engine." Hera's voice faded from the comms as she directed Chopper behind her before turning back. ::"They're after the Phantom. They know where Kanan and Ezra are going."

::"Kriffin' knew it," grumped Zeb. "Told you it was too good to be true."

Hera's lips twisted wryly as she acknowledged it. ::"Guess it was. But you can tell it to Kanan when we find them. Engine's down, Chopper's on it. Zeb, need you down here to give him a hand."

Chopper made an insulted sound. Hera ignored it until she had cleared the unpredictable asteroids again and slipped out of the leading edge of the belt. She straightened up, reading the ship's protests and damage alerts. It was mostly superficial, as long as the engine wasn't badly damaged. "Time's of the essence, Chop. They have a head start on us and Phantom doesn't know they're coming." Not to mention that Phantom couldn't pull half of what Ghost could. And while Kanan was a good pilot – an excellent pilot by normal standards – if Hera couldn't deal with two Inquisitorial Tie-fighters in her highly modified ship, expecting him to in the shuttle was an unreasonable ask. She hoped the damaged wing on one of the TIEs would slow them down a bit. Long enough for Ghost to get on their trail.

….

Updated Notes: Think I sorted the formatting. And the misspelling of TIE.

Oddly enough, this was not the story I set up this account to post. But it seems to be the one flowing most freely.

I would very much like to use "pufferpig" or some variant thereof for "space chicken", but I figured it would be a bit obscure.

Seantoneill7 – Thanks for the feedback – and you're absolutely right, it was Wings in S2. I had that debate the other night with my partner and alas, he convinced me it was repaired in that ep rather than installed. Cough. Continuity error. Given how much rewriting the correction would take at this point, I hope it can be taken as a hiccup :D