Chapter 44

Sabine - Third Person POV

They could hear them before they could see them. The radio chatter and the marching from further down the corridor alerted Sabine and her team to their presence.

"Everybody ready!" she calls out.

The sound of blasters and firearms being loaded fills their small pocket of the hallway and within moments, the first stormtroopers appear from around the corner ahead of them.

Sabine fires the first shots and the first line of troopers fall. As more and more stormtroopers appear and return fire, the rest of Sabine's defensive line also opens fire. The hallway is filled with red and blue blaster fire, as well as the blue glow of slugs from rebel firearms.

After several minutes of constant firing, they start to get overwhelmed so Sabine orders them to fall back to their second defensive line. She provides cover fire and once all of her troopers are out of the line of fire, she rushes after them. The stormtroopers surge forward and try to shoot at her, but her own troopers take them down and suppress the others until she's safely behind cover.

"We have to hold this position!" she calls out. "We can't let them reach Ezra!"

The fighting only grows more intense until Luke shows up to join the fight.

"I don't know if it worked but I got through to Kanan. I'm hoping he can understand we need their help," he says.

"Well for now we could use a Jedi to help push them back," Sabine says, glancing expectantly at Luke.

He shakes his head. "I don't think I'm ready to deflect real blaster bolts. Not yet anyway."

"Then I guess we'll have to use a different miracle," she says, pulling a few detonators out of her pocket.

"Luke! Catch!" she yells. When he turns to her, she tosses him a couple of the detonators.

He catches them and immediately throws one out towards the Stormtroopers - the explosion kills many of them and they start to fall back. Sabine orders everyone to push ahead and sends Luke back to have the sergeant and the medic carry Ezra after them.

"Keep your eyes open for a terminal," Sabine says. "I want to know where exactly we are and if we can get out of here."

"If we can go to engineering, we should be able to found our information," one of her troopers suggests - the same one who occupied the comms in the detention level.

"Are we even close to there?" Sabine asks.

She peeks around a corner and waves everyone forward when she sees it's clear.

"I recognize a few things here and there," he replies after a moment. "We might be on the same level of it. If anything, I could go alone and find it."

"You wouldn't get far," Sabine protests.

"I could steal some stormtrooper armor," he says. "I know my way around these ships and I could sabotage the engines as well."

"Is there another terminal closer than engineering?" Sabine asks.

The rebel trooper looks around at the walls, looking at signs and symbols.

"Yes, but I can't say where. It's best if I lead you there," he says.

"Then you take point. Take us to a terminal," she says. "After that, you go to the engine room and sabotage the ship."

He nods and checks another corner before turning to the rest of the squad. Sabine waves them forward and they push forward, keeping close to the walls and training their weapons on every corner. Sabine falls in line right in front of Ezra's makeshift stretcher and makes sure the other two troopers are covering the rear.

Every minute or so they have to stop to fight and Sabine does everything she can to protect Ezra and the rest of her squad. Finally, they duck into a room where a terminal is fixed to the back wall.

"Put Ezra in that corner," Sabine says, pointing to the left corner towards the front of the room. She then turns to the squad leader. "Get on that panel and find out where we are. You..." To the lead trooper, "whenever you're ready..."

He nods. "Understood, Commander. Don't leave without me."

"We won't but there's a short window so you'll have to be fast. We won't be able to hold on forever."

He nods again and peaks out the doors for a moment before turning to two other rebels. "There's four bucket heads coming. I'm going to take their armor and use it to get to engineering. When they pass by, make a noise to draw them in."

Sabine watches them as they take positions by the door and the stormtrooper's footsteps draw close. When they're just outside the door, the comm rebel nods to the other two and one of them knocks over some supplies, making quite the racket.

"Hold it! What was that?"

"It came from in here!"

"You there! Check it out!"

A soft tapping is heard and everybody scrambles to the sides of the room as the door opens. A light shines into the room and the trooper emerges from the doorway, sweeping his light from left to right constantly. He's about to light up the rebels by the door when their arms swing up and knock the blaster away. They scuffle with the stormtrooper for a few moments before they knock him out. The other troopers outside the room call for their trooper and the comm rebel calls back, assuring them everything's fine all while he quickly changes from his rebel armor to the stormtrooper armor.

"It was just a stupid droid," he says as he leaves the room. "I didn't see it and it knocked me over."

"Maybe we should send it to the scrapper?" one of the troopers suggests.

Their voices fade as do their footsteps and Sabine turns to Ezra. The medic is still working to keep him stable, constantly checking his vitals and finding new wounds needing to be cleaned and patched.

"I'm running out of supplies," he says quietly. "I'm not going to have enough to treat more than two people."

"If there's a medical bay nearby we can see about stealing some," she says.

"Medical bays always have people in them," he says. He pulls his helmet off and sets it down next to him.

"Medical storage closets, though... We'll just have to crack through security."

"Well, better than nothing at all."

Sabine looks back to Ezra, a soft frown forming on her face. "How is he so far?"

The medic sighs. "There's not much more I can do for him except check vitals and administer the proper medication if it dips. I've used up a lot of bacta patches and bandages to cover his wounds. He's stable for now, or as stable as I can get him. It's still not looking good, though..."

Sabine's throat closes up but she manages to keep her act together. "Then we should hurry... I shouldn't have sent that trooper to the engine room. There's no time."

"He'll make it back in time. He's the best of the best," the medic reassures her.

"Commander!"

Sabine's eyes snap up to the squad leader, who is standing at the terminal. She pats Ezra's hand, muttering encouraging words to him though she isn't sure he can even hear her, before standing up and walking up to the sergeant.

"What did you find?" she asks.

"We're deep inside the ship and the nearest emergency airlock is... right here," he points to the schematics of the ship, highlighting the airlock and the route needed to get there.

"That's a long way off," Sabine frowns. "What are our chances of reaching it?"

"There's an army between us and that airlock... We'd really need to fight our way out but even if we get on our ship there's still the Executor's weapons to worry about. I hope Luke's connection with Kanan worked because we'll need help if we're going to escape."

"I really hope so... but Luke was able to escape the Death Star before. I trust he can help us get out of here, too," Sabine says.

"Does he remember how he did that?"

"He does. But... they were tracked when they escaped..."

"We were let go," Luke says. "This won't be like that time, unless Vader tries tracking our ships to find our base."

Sabine thinks about their options. The Empire is desperate to find Rebel headquarters just like they were before Yavin. Reports after Luke, Han, Chewy, and Leia came back said they questioned Leia about the whereabouts of the rebel base, but they didn't get it from her. When Han and Luke came to rescue her, the Empire placed a tracker on their ship. Now they're here trying to rescue Ezra. To their knowledge they probably never got the location of Epsilon so if they still don't know...

"If I was the Empire, I'd do it again," she says.

"What?" Luke asks.

"When you and Han rescued Leia, the Empire let you go because they placed a tracker. They never got the actual location of our base, which at the time was Yavin. My theory is, if Ezra didn't reveal the location of our base, they would try tracking us again. It's worked before so I wouldn't see why they wouldn't do it again."

"They'd make it seem like they're trying to stop us... so what's our plan of action?"

"We play their game. Act like we don't know what they're planning. Make it seem like we forgot how they found Yavin," Sabine says. "As soon as we leave the system, assuming we get that far, we'll need to make sure every ship is clear of trackers. We can't leave anything to chance so I'll want Astromech droids on the hull to locate and disable any and all foreign trackers."

"Understood," the sergeant says.

Sabine uploads the route to her armor's computer systems and she puts her helmet back on. Her HUD flashes with the updated route.

"Alright, are we ready to go?"

"Yes, commander!"

"Sergeant, I need you to stay with our medic and carry Ezra. We're going to take this slow and steady. Remember, check every corner, watch every door. Let's go!"

...

It's painfully slow, walking through the dangerous corridors towards their exfil point. They haven't contacted their ship about the plan yet, just in case the Empire listens in on the comms. They'll be on their frequency, but it's entirely possible that the Empire can still intercept it and trace it so once Sabine calls out to the ship, it will be like setting off a flare on Umbara as Rex would say. Sabine's never been to Umbara before, but the stories she hears from Rex are enough to tell her she doesn't want to go there.

Her comlink beeps in her ear and she taps the side of her helmet. "Wren here."

"Commander, what's your status?"

"We're on our way to our... rendezvous," Sabine says carefully. "What's your status?"

"I've rigged their systems and starting to make my way back to you. Where am I headed?"

"I'm initiating comm order Omega-two-four," she answers. "That will tell you everything."

"Omega-two-four, copy that. I'm on my way!"

That is the emergency tracking signal for Rebel special forces to use to mark locations of interest while they're behind enemy lines and guaranteed to have unwanted visitors listening in to our comms. It's a signal Rex helped develop with a heavy encryption. Omega-two-four is just the cover name for the real frequency code. As far as Sabine knows, the code is unknown to the Empire and, according to Rex, searching through every frequency won't help them. It would take them a really long time to find it. They won't be able to find the frequency so the only thing they should know about it is the name.

"They can't track what they can't find," Rex had said after introducing the code.

Let's just hope it works, Sabine thinks to herself. Otherwise the stormtroopers will be waiting for us. Vader would probably be with them, too.

...

After a few grueling hours of constant fighting and walking, Sabine and her team finally made it to the emergency airlock. She established a defensive line, keeping Ezra at the rear of the formation. His condition had worsened throughout the journey and the medic is working furiously to keep him stable. While they were still on the way, they stumbled across a room with supplies inside - including medical. The medic had restocked on everything and even grabbed a few more bags full of supplies, handing a few of them to the other rebel troopers. But even with the extra supplies, it still isn't enough to really help Ezra. It was barely enough to keep him stable for so long and now they're running out of time.

The sergeant approaches Sabine while she's crouched next to Ezra, her hand resting on his cold, pale cheek - her thumb is brushing over the two scars left there by the Grand Inquisitor years before. She turns her head slightly to listen to the sergeant, but she keeps her eyes on Ezra.

"It's all quiet for now. We hacked the cameras and filled it with bogus feed on a loop so it should be a while before they can find us," he reports quietly.

"Good," is all she can say.

She doesn't need to be force sensitive to sense his hesitation.

"How is he?"

"We need that ship here and fast, but we can't leave anyone behind. We're still waiting on..."

She never did get his name, but luckily for her, the sergeant knows it.

"Specialist Marius Lee," he says.

"I can't say I know anything about him," she says after a moment of silence.

"Well, it's pretty clear by now that he's an imperial defector, much like Admiral..." he pauses and glances at Sabine for a moment before continuing. "Anyway, he's been a real asset to us. He's proven himself more than I can count."

He talks about several missions he's had with the Specialist, all of them classified to everyone outside of Command and since Sabine is still a part of it, she knows what missions he's talking about even without having to hear the locations.

Sabine brushes her thumb over Ezra's cheek again and forms a sad smile, deciding to distract herself from the situation a little bit in an attempt to hold on to some hope. "Ezra and I first met on Lothal, his home planet. Kanan, Zeb, Hera, and I were all trying to steal a batch of imperial blasters for some money. You know Vizago?"

"Yeah. I'm still not sure I like him."

Sabine's smile brightens just a bit. "Anyway, we had just started taking over the speeders carrying the cargo when Ezra came out of nowhere and sped off with one of them."

"And you caught him?"

She shakes her head. "No. Zeb and I just each took one of the three crates and let Kanan deal with him. A TIE fighter got involved and destroyed Kanan's speeder so the kid got away from us. But it didn't take long for that TIE to find Ezra. Lucky for him, we got there in time to save his skin."

Her chest feels warm at the memory. Back then, things were very hard, but with everything as they are now she can't help but think of it as the good old days.

"The plan was to drop off the blasters, get our money, and move on. Vizago mentioned wookies that needed rescuing and we jumped at the chance. It was a trap and Ezra got us out of it, but in doing so ended up getting caught by the now former ISB Agent Kallus. We went back for him and were about to take him back to Lothal when he revealed that he knew where the wookies were being taken so we went to Kessel.

"It was after that when we finally took him home... Hera and Kanan knew he was different and they offered to have him stay with us. His parents were taken away long before then so up until that point, he had nobody. It was hard and annoying at first, but we got used to each other after some time."

She starts to think about all the times she'd rejected him. At the time, it was deserved and she knows Ezra doesn't blame her for it. Even with all that rejection, he never hesitated to stand by her, to help her, to protect her. She had heard Kanan tell Ezra that a Jedi's lightsaber is his life and that he should never lose it, yet he still never gave a second thought about it when he gave it to her on Mandalore to fight Gar Saxon, and again on Lothal when he took care of Thrawn and his fleet with the Purgil. She felt an overwhelming sense of joy when he returned after being feared lost along with Thrawn and his fleet, although she still punched him and scolded him for scaring everybody, which only made him laugh. That laugh sparked something in her - and that spark flared into a burning fire that fueled her desire to remain by his side no matter what they faced.

Heat rises to her cheeks and she starts feeling warm all over. She smiles at Ezra, imagining his blue eyes looking back into her brown ones.

"He'll be alright, Commander," the sergeant says. "He'll pull through. I trust that he will."

Sabine nods softly and looks at the sergeant. "Thank you. For talking with me."

"It was my pleasure," he replies with a smile.

The distant sound of blaster fire alerts Sabine and her gaze snaps towards the other end of the corridor. The sergeant calls out for a report and a corporal runs back to him.

"Specialist Lee is here, but he's being pursued by stormtroopers," he says.

"And Vader?"

He shakes his head. "It's just the stormtroopers."

"Bring the specialist here. I want him to remain by Ezra," Sabine orders. "As soon as he's within our line, call for our ship to come to our location."

"Omega-two-four?"

"I don't think that will matter," Sabine says. "Those troopers will report our location so our window is really short."

"We should call for our ship now, commander," the sergeant suggests. "That way they can be here sooner."

"Why didn't we use our code to bring the ship here?" the corporal asks.

"We didn't want to risk anybody being alerted to their presence here. They're cloaked nearby, I know that much," Sabine says. "Sergeant, you and I will join the others at the front line. Corporal, stay here with Ezra. Protect him and the medic."

"Understood, Commander," the corporal says.

He settles down next to Ezra's makeshift cot, keeping his blaster rifle ready in case anybody gets through. Sabine and the squad leader rush to the front line just as the specialist appears around the corner. Sure enough, he's being pursued by troopers. He throws himself around a section of the wall, using it as cover as the stormtroopers continue firing at him.

"Front line, COVER FIRE!" Sabine shouts. Immediately, her troopers fire at the stormtroopers, killing several of them and forcing the remaining troopers to find cover. They don't pull back so there's an intense firefight.

Marius takes advantage of the covering fire to make one final dash to the relative safety of his allies.

"Specialist Lee!" Sabine calls out over the noise.

"Commander! Is our ride here?"

"Not yet. Get to the rear of the formation. Protect Ezra!"

"I want to fight here, Commander!" he protests.

"That is an order, Specialist!" the sergeant shouts. "You've done enough for now! If we need help, we'll call you up!"

"U-Understood, sir!"

He peaks around his cover and blasts a couple stormtroopers before heading to the rear. Sabine presses herself to the wall next to her and presses a finger to the side of her helmet to call their ship to their location.

"Get here fast! We're under heavy fire!" she says.

"Coordinates received. We're on our way, ETA two minutes!"

...

Those two minutes felt like an eternity. Through all the blaster fire, mixed in with the occasional deafening crack of a slugthrower, the shouts for more ammunition and the cries of wounded rebels fill Sabine's ears. Through that eternity, the familiar shudder of a ship docking throws everyone off balance for a moment before the airlock doors open and fresh soldiers join the fight.

"Commander! They're here!" the sergeant shouts.

"Everyone fall back to the ship! Let's go!" she orders. She peaks around her cover and starts providing cover fire as her squad starts to fall back. Fresh rebel troopers step up and help and after a few moments, Sabine herself is pulled into the stealth ship and the doors shut.

"We're all aboard! Get us out of here!" the sergeant cries into his comm to the captain.

Sabine looks around and notices Ezra and the medic aren't there. "Are they-"

"As soon as the doors opened, a team of medics took him to the medical bay," Marius says. "Commander Skywalker is with them."

"Sergeant, take over from here," Sabine says. "I need to see Ezra."

"Commander, you're needed in the cockpit," a rebel trooper says. "Captain's orders. He needs you."

The sound of laser cannons firing and the faint screech of TIE fighter engines fills her ears. She wants to protest and head to medical anyway, but she blinks a few times and clenches her fist. She has to keep herself together as a commander. She has to get everyone out safely.

"Alright. Specialist Lee, with me!"

"Yes, Commander!"

"Sergeant, check up on your men and assume battle stations," she adds as she looks to the squad leader. He nods and starts barking out orders as she heads for the cockpit.

When she gets there, the first thing she sees is a swarm of TIEs flying towards them. She hears the captain call and order to cloak, but the ship shakes violently and a report comes that the cloaking device is disabled.

"Captain!" Sabine calls out.

"Commander Wren, we're in trouble. They're coming at us in full force. It would seem they're not going to let us leave like you thought!"

"Do you think we can get out of here?" she asks.

"Even if we jump, they'll know where we're going. They could send something to pursue," the captain says.

"I've rigged the Executor's engines to detonate," Marius says. "Shall I blow them up?"

"It would make for a distraction," Sabine says. "Do it."

He pulls out a remote and presses a button. A flash of light reflects off the surrounding star destroyers. An officer monitoring their surroundings reads a new report and turns to the captain.

"Captain, the dreadnought's engines are critically damaged. If anything can chase us it won't be that, but the other ships are still cutting off our escape!"

The ship shakes again and the helm reports engines are damaged. They won't be able to jump to hyperspace until they're repaired.

"Did we send a call for help?" Sabine asks.

"Triggering the SOS now!" the comm officer reports.

"Dispatch damage control teams to engineering, NOW!" the captain shouts.

"Sir, we're being hailed!"

Sabine looks at the officer, then at the holotable just as a hologram of an Imperial officer appears.

"Attention Rebel vessel! Surrender your vessel and prepare to be boarded!"

"As if we'd let you," Sabine says.

"Your rebellion is nothing but a nuisance. It will fail just as it had before. Now, this is your final warning, surrender or be destroyed."

He doesn't wait for a response. The call ends and Sabine turns to the captain.

"What are your orders, Commander?" he asks.

She starts thinking about their options. If they keep trying to flee, they'll be destroyed. If they surrender, they'll be killed. Either way, they'll all be killed...

"I say we go down fighting!" one officer declares.

A cry of agreement sounds throughout the cockpit.

"We are with you, Commander! For the Rebellion!" the helmsman says.

"To the death!" says the tactical officer.

Sabine smiles. "Either way, we'll be killed. Might as well go down fighting. Captain, by us some time. Keep the Imperials talking! Make it seem like we're going to surrender."

"What is your plan?"

"Our damage control teams need to get our cloak reactivated. Don't worry about the engines. Without our cloak, we're dead. We can still maneuver with the engines we have left," she explains.

"Understood," the captain says.

"I'll go down and see what I can do to help," she says, pausing for a moment. "It's been an honor."

...

"Commander, they're firing on us!"

The ship shakes again, this time several sections of the ship flash red, indicating hull breaches.

"What are your orders?"

"Full evasive. I want our laser cannons to shoot down any fighters and ordnance that get too close!" Sabine says.

She had just reached the engineering deck when she was called back up to the cockpit. The captain tried to stall as long as he could but, unsurprisingly, the imperials weren't interested in talking terms.

They tried fighting off their assault, but there were too many TIEs. Sabine looked out the front viewport to see a TIE interceptor flying right at them to finish them off. Right as she thought they were done for, it suddenly explodes, the debris peppering the front of their corvette.

"Was that us?" the captain asks the tactical officer.

"Negative. We didn't shoot at it!"

"Then who-"

He was interrupted by a voice crackling over the comms.

"We've got your back, Sabine. All fighters, attack speed! Let's go to work!"

"Wedge?"

"At your service, Commander. We got your message. Or I should say, Kanan did."

"Commander, we've got incoming out of hyperspace!" the nav officer reports.

"How many?"

Her question was answered when a fleet that rivals the Imperial's appears from hyperspace. They had Rebel signatures, but she noticed several of the warships were not of their design - yet also familiar to the old rebellion.