(A/N)- Another chapter for you dear readers. I really had fun with this one. Sabine's just an entertaining character to get into and her "voice" comes really easily for me.

This one is set early Season Two and you'll see a couple references to that regard.

Enjoy!

Disclaimer: Rebels and related Star Wars properties are owned by Disney, I just play with them sometimes.


Chapter 4

They were being followed. She was sure of it.

Ezra rambled on next to her, relaying a story about nicking three Stormtrooper helmets from a guard post station. Normally Sabine would have been all-ears; Ezra didn't open up all that often about his life on Lothal streets before the Ghost so she savored every time he felt comfortable enough to do so.

But she'd been spotting that same silver-tipped helmet in the crowd behind them for eight blocks now and she couldn't shake the feeling that its owner was stalking them.

Kanan and Hera had warned her to be on the lookout for bounty hunters and Imperial spies. With how infamous they were getting to be around their sector of Outer Rim space, they were starting to get a lot more unsavory attention.

"What should I do if I run into one?" she'd asked.

"Improvise," Kanan had said.

"And then call one of us," Hera had added.

Right. So. How to lose their clingy friend.

Sabine tried to catch a glimpse of him without really turning around, peering out the corners of her eyes and squinting hard. His helmet looked Mandalorian. Okay, that was a problem. Mandos were belligerent and tricky enough to handle on their own without being in service to someone else—or out for a quick payday. Doubly so for her thanks to her... sensitive family matters. She didn't recognize the symbol painted on his forehead. It wasn't any family crest she knew. A bounty hunter guild perhaps?

Their stalker turned to duck behind one of the doorways and Sabine's keen eyes were able to pick out the details of the symbol better. A dot inside a radiating circle, the mark of the Black Sun crime syndicate.

Son of a nerf-herder.

Could only be after her. Ketsu had mentioned there was a price on her head. Seems someone had decided to collect.

Improvise, improvise... she repeated in her head. She had to draw him away from Ezra first. Not that she thought he'd get in the way—he'd been really improving with both blasters and his lightsaber—but he still wasn't quite skilled enough to handle this kind of opponent, and she didn't want to endanger him if she could help it.

Actually she could probably handle this guy herself and be back before Ezra realized she was gone. Now that she'd gotten a good look at him he didn't seem to be all that heavily armed. A couple side holsters with blasters, a knife in a dangling sheath, something she couldn't identify in a canister clipped to his waist, but that was about it. If he was a bounty hunter he'd come woefully unprepared. Probably an amateur.

Still, she shouldn't underestimate him.

Sabine took a quick glance aside at Ezra. Okay good, he was still talking. He tended to zone out once he really got going so he shouldn't even notice her slipping away. Sabine took a slow, nervous breath in through her teeth, tensing her limbs and readying herself.

With one more furtive glance back at their mysterious follower, she made her move, stepping quickly off to the side and darting down an alleyway, away from the main street.

The blood thumped in her ears but she didn't turn around, walking briskly, her back straight. When she'd gone a couple blocks—just far enough away from the main street to not attract attention—she made a hard left around another corner, pulling out both blasters. Using a stack of crates and a drain pipe she quickly scaled up to the roof.

She found a perch and crouched down behind the edge. Peeking over the side, she waited with baited breath for the bounty hunter to appear.

The minute stretched out. Sabine fidgeted anxiously. Had she spooked him by peeling off? Alerted him to her awareness of his presence?

She stayed put, still waiting.

She couldn't have been wrong about him following them. He'd stayed within twenty feet of their wake for over an hour. He should have been seconds behind her.

Two more minutes passed, and still their stalker was nowhere to be seen.

Maybe... I'm not his target? she thought. But that didn't make sense. A Mandalorian bounty hunter with ties to Black Sun? If he wasn't after her then who was he—?

A cold realization washed over her, gripping her heart, pooling in her stomach.

Oh no.

Sabine scrambled up from her crouch, shimmying halfway back down the drainpipe before she just dropped heavily, lurched upright, and took off running. Fear clawed at the insides of her throat.

I should never have left him I should never have left him, repeated as shrill alarm inside her head. She pumped her limbs, panting hard and praying Ezra hadn't gotten far.

-SWR-

"—almost managed to give him the slip—Sabine?" Ezra emerged from the middle of his tale to find that his audience had disappeared, and looked around in confusion. "Where'd she go?" he wondered.

He couldn't see her anywhere. How did she do that?

Also where was he?

Ezra backtracked a few steps into a quiet backyard, trying to reorient himself. He tried to picture the layout of the city in his mind.

Distracted, the familiar urgent ping of the Force came to him a fraction too late.

Someone grabbed his shoulder and yanked him backwards. Ezra barely had time to yell in surprise before an armored arm was locked around his neck, and the cold steel end of a blaster was pressing threateningly against his right temple.

"Don't move, Jedi," a filtered male voice said.

Click-click.

"Let him go," came an icy female growl.

Ezra's fear abated a bit at the sound of her voice. Sabine's own would not quell yet, not as long as that bounty hunter had hold of him. She gripped her blasters so tight her knuckles could have cracked, holding them steady behind the unknown Mando's ear.

Very slowly, his fingers loosened up on his own weapon and his grip around Ezra slackened.

"Ooooookaaaaaay..." he drawled, sounding irritatingly amused instead of afraid. "Take it easy, Sabine."

Oh you've gotta be kidding, Sabine thought incredulously. Arimae?!

She tried not to let her disgust show as she ordered, "Hands up and helmet off, Arimae. Don't even think I won't shoot you."

"Aw c'mon, is that any way to say hi after all these years?" he complained.

Sabine raised her pistols a fraction higher. "If you don't take your hands off Ezra right now—" she warned, deadly serious.

"Okay, okay," Arimae said. He released Ezra, raising his hands in mock surrender. "Don't be so trigger-happy."

Sabine breathed a little easier once Ezra was free. But only a little. Never underestimate your opponent, Kanan always told her, and Arimae was still technically armed and could quick-draw at any moment. "Ezra, get behind me," she ordered.

Ezra didn't need to be told twice, scurrying behind Sabine even as he unhooked the lightsaber from his belt. "You know this creep?" he asked.

She narrowed her eyes at the bounty hunter, watching close for any sudden moves. "We had a couple classes together at the Imperial Academy but he flunked out long before I left," she summarized briefly. "Is this really what you've been up to? Seriously?" she asked Arimae in disbelief.

He hefted his helmet off in a casual manner, shrugging. "It pays the bills."

"And Black Sun just lets you embarrass them like that?"

A brief flash of anger appeared in his eyes, but it was gone before Sabine could worry about it.

"We've gotta stop meeting your old friends like this," said Ezra, shaking his head.

No kidding, thought Sabine.

"Gotta say, was real surprised when Ketsu quit after seeing you," Arimae commented, dropping his helmet before returning his hands to raised position.

Sabine's fingers twitched on the triggers, not taking her eyes off Arimae's blaster, still too nonchalantly held in loose right fingers.

"Stirred the head wigs up pretty bad," he continued. "They called a meeting with all us bigshots to discuss the 'Wren' problem."

You? A bigshot? Ha! Sabine laughed. If you were anything more than an amateur you wouldn't have forfeited your head protection like an idiot.

Aloud she said only, "Sounds fun. So if I'm such a thorn in their side how come you're not collecting, Bigshot?" She didn't think Arimae was smart enough to have targeted Ezra just to draw her out.

Arimae shrugged again, with an irritatingly smarmy grin. "Payout for the baby Jedi's bigger," he said.

"Really?" Ezra asked, lighting up in curiosity. "How much am I worth?"

"Twenty-five thousand, give or take."

"Nice!"

"Ezra!" Sabine sputtered. This was no time to be flippant!

"So what happens now, Sabine?" asked Arimae, tilting his head, and there was a hint of something dangerous in his voice.

Sabine's scowl deepened. "We walk away," she emphasized. "And you don't follow, if you know what's good for you," she threatened.

"You don't really expect me to just give up on a prize like that, do you?" Arimae challenged, hand closing around the hilt of his blaster, ready to snap it forward.

She didn't even flinch. "You know you can't outshoot me," she told him. "Don't even try it."

He finally leveled his blaster, shooting her a cocky grin. "Sorry Sabine," he said. "You've got something I want."

The next second the blaster was shot out of his hand with a very precise shot.

Arimae yelped, clutching his hand. He didn't get a chance to recover or reach for his other pistol. Sabine ducked forward and planted an elbow in his stomach.

He doubled over, winded, and Ezra finished him off with a stun blast from his saber. He crumpled to the ground and Sabine gave him one last kick for good measure, rolling him over towards the wall.

She kept her blasters trained on him a moment or two before she was satisfied that he was down. She shuddered and exhaled heavily, and put her guns away.

She took a moment or two to collect herself, clenching and unclenching her fists.

Then she turned and punched Ezra in the arm.

"Ow!" he protested. He rubbed at the spot. "What was that for?" he whined.

"Watch your surroundings next time!" Sabine snapped. "Do you know how scared I was when I saw he had hold of you?"

Ezra seemed to startle at that. "You were scared?" he said, tilting his head at her.

Sabine bit back her frustration. Always wanting to go off-topic. She couldn't understand how his brain worked sometimes. Of course she'd been scared! "That's not the point. The point is, a greenback like Arimae never should have been able to get the drop on you!" she scolded.

He held up a finger. "In my defense, you were with me," he pointed out. "Or, well, you were until you decided to go all disappearing act on me," he corrected after a moment.

Sabine was already simmering down, her worried anger quickly being replaced by relief that Ezra was okay. "Why's that your defense?" she asked.

His soft blue eyes met hers. "I feel safe with you," he said. His hand found its way to the back of his head. "Like, whatever happens, I know you've got my back." He shrugged. "I guess it's just easy to let my guard down."

Sabine was stunned. He'd said it with such genuine sentiment. Was that really how he felt? She knew how hard it was for him to trust people. She still had trouble trusting. And yet...

I feel safe with you.

The words disarmed her, made it feel somehow... more okay, she guessed, to be open with him. That was why she liked having him around. Ezra had a way of relaxing her, of helping her be more, well... herself. She guessed he felt the same way.

She let out a breath. "Tell you a secret?" she said quietly.

Ezra listened, all ears.

Sabine smiled. "Me too." Force, he was going to make her such a softie. She straightened, brushing dust off her shoulder pauldron. "So I guess we both have some learning to do when it comes to paying attention," she joked. She punched his shoulder again, gentler and more playfully this time. "Come on. Let's get back to the ship before 'Bigshot' back there wakes up," she said, jerking her head towards Arimae's pathetic form on the ground.

Ezra grinned cheekily as he swiveled to fall into step behind her. "Should we tell 'em how you totally ditched me and left me at the mercy of a ruthless bounty hunter?" he teased.

Sabine grimaced, already imagining the conversation. "Please don't," she begged. "Kanan would kill me."


(A/N)- "Yeah we ran into some trouble along the way. Just a bounty hunter. No big. What? No of course I was with Ezra the whole time. Didn't take my eyes off him, promise."

Lol, that's about how I think I'd go down anyway.

If you enjoyed, please comment and tell me what you like!