A/N: I will be honest, No one really got the guess for this chapter right. I was a little suprised, I thought I gave an obvious hint in the last chapter. I do need to give a hand though to Vanessa Master sand Rebels-lover (there response was simple and hilarious) these two got a good part of what will happen in this chapter right
I would also like to point out this is my longest chapter to date (taking up 15 pages on microsoft!)
Also I need to talk about my "malfunction', as some of you have been freaking about me not updating latley. When I am not doing this I work 2 jobs and go to college! So sometimes I cannot find the time to type up my stories. Also expect a new story of mine to be posted.
Now I am done ranting. Hope you all enjoy.
He was hungry, and it was dark in Lothal. Ezra thought he could easily take a few credits from a speeder parked outside a bar one night. He would only take a few. His timing though could not have been worse, only his 'vibe' helped him sense the knife wielding trandoshans. Ezra bolted down the ally way as fast as he could.
"Get back here brat!" shouted one of several trandoshans that joined the chase. Ezra ran as fast as he could. Luckily, Ezra knew exactly where he was and knew of a hole in the abandoned building near by. Once in the ally, Ezra quickly crawled into the tiny hole and hid in the dark building. He could see the scaly feet of the gang from his hiding spot. Ezra held his breath, and prayed they didn't hear his heart almost beating out of his chest.
"We lost him!" yelled one of the trandoshans, as another punched the wall of the building on the other side of the ally, leaving a dent into wall.
"Search the other alleys!" yelled at what had to be the leader. As the others left, the head transohan hissed at the alley and shouted, "Boy, you made a big mistake today! I will find you and you will wish you were dead!"
"Ezra, Ezra?" Sabine questioned, shaking Ezra from his thoughts,
"Hmm, what Sabine?" Ezra asked Sabine, just remembering that he and Sabine were in the middle of one of his lessons in the mandalorian's room.
"I was going over the Trandoshans species and asked you why they can only go to warmer planets?"
Ezra smiled, "Because they are one of few humanoid species that are cold blooded. If they go to planets with cooler temperatures, they could unintentionally enter hibernation and end up dying from hypothermia."
Sabine also smiled at her little pupil, "And here I thought you weren't listening."
Ezra sheepishly rubbed the back of his head, "Sorry Sabine, I was just remembering something about trandoshans."
"Well it seems a good time to end todays lesson, so why don't we-." Sabine began looking around her room and then turned to Ezra, "Kid, have you seen by spray paint?"
Ezra just shook his head no and began looking around to help Sabine.
"Where is it?" Sabine asked, beginning to sound frustrated that he last spray paint bottle was missing.
Suddenly Chopper began beeping from the doorway, and in one of his robotic arms was the missing spray paint. Chopper then suddenly sped off down the hall.
"Chopper!" Sabine cried out as she took the bait and began chasing the droid, followed by a curious Ezra, who wanted to see how this soon be fiasco would end.
In the Cargo hold, Kanan and Hera were going over the weapons they had obtained on their previous mission to exchange with Vizago. They were not only expecting credits for the blasters, but also a data disk for a possible construction base for TIE Fighters on the Endor Moon. The only issues though were the crews part of deal had not technically been met.
"You know that he knew there were two crates, but told us three so he could skimp on the money." Hera clarified to Kanan, who knew just as well as she did what the Devaronian had in mind.
"If he tries to short change us, though, we are in more need of food than information." Kanan pointed out.
Hera though tried to think of an alternative, "Maybe we could offer him to transfer the supplies to a source or…"
Hera lost her train of thought though when she heard the clatter of metal in her ships passageway along with the grunting of a certain mandalorian and lasat, followed by the beeping of Chopper. Suddenly Chopper, now covered with yellow paint, came bursting into the cargo hold with an infuriated Sabine spinning on top of his chrome.
This chaos was also followed by a grunting Zeb who had a yellow line of pain straight down his face. The matter only got more funny by Zeb's anger spread across his face. The Lasat then tackled the spinning droid and mandalorian.
Kanan and Hera only stared at the situation, bemused as what to do about the situation. Ezra then came in, smiling at the fight like it was all for sport and not spawned from an irrational problem. His smile soon faded though as Kanan gave him serious look that silently asked if Ezra knew better then to encourage the behavior.
Ezra then told Kanan, "Chopper stole Sabine's paint and sprayed Zeb with it."
Hera had heard enough, she approached the ongoing brawl, only to clear her throat to make her presence obvious to everyone I the room.
The fighting immediately stopped as the three feuding crew members looked up to Hera.
"THEY STARTED IT!" The three yelled at once (or beeped in Choppers case).
Hera though just put up her hand, "I don't care who started it, I am finishing this by sending you three to the market. We need some supplies." Hera passed her sentence calmly as she handed Sabine the data pad of supplies for the market. "You guys wash the paint off and head off to Mothal." The three went off to wash off before Hera could holler,
"And Ezra will be coming with you guys, so don't cause any fights."
Ezra stared at Hera nervously, "What did I do?" he asked, thinking he was being punished too.
"You're not bring punished kid," Kanan assured the kid as he picked up Ezra. "We just need you to keep on eye on the 'children' so they don't cause trouble."
"Like the time Zeb and Sabine paint bombed an imperial recruitment center?" Ezra asked, recalling one of Zeb's tales of his and Sabine's crazy adventures.
"Exactly," Kanan said smiling at the memory of the white base splattered in pink.
Ezra smiled back, not being fooled, "You know if you guys need to do 'grown up things' you can just tell me."
While Kanan looked at Hera, smiling at his padawan wit, while she approached the two and padded Ezra's head, "So you'll help the others with the groceries?" Hera asked kindly.
Ezra smiled and nodded at Hera.
Sabine, Zeb, and Chopper soon came back and got ready to head to the market.
"Zeb can I ride on your shoulders?" Ezra asked the Lasat eagerly.
"How about I let you once we've gotten everything?" Zeb negotiated with the kid.
Ezra smiled, "Okay."
Ezra though soon fell behind, not because he couldn't keep up, but because he had this strange feeling, like something bad was going to happen. He soon brushed it off however when Sabine yelled for him to hurry up.
Once in the market, the crew immediately began collecting their much needed supplies. But when they reached the end of the list, they found the one item that would be impossible to find.
"Meilooruns." Both Zeb and Sabine both exasperated in frustration.
"What's wrong?" Ezra asked.
"Oh, Hera does this thing," Sabine began to explain, "She will put that one thing on the list that is nearly impossible to find. Today's impossible item is-,"
"There is a meiloorun stand over there," Ezra pointed out to the two. The two looked at the stand that Ezra was pointing to.
"That was easy," Zeb pointed out, a little perplexed by their good fortune.
"I'll go get it," Ezra said as she grabbed a few of the remaining credits and hurried to the stand.
Zeb, Sabine, and Chopper had no tiff about it, the stand was in view and they needed to check to make sure they got everything.
Ezra bought the desired fruit from the merchant and made his way to the others. Ezra though, was so happy with accomplishing the task, he failed to notice a dark figure approaching behind him. The figure whom aggressively grabbed Ezra from behind, to throw him into the alley the boy was passing. Ezra hit the ground hard, but didn't have time to register what had happened cause suddenly he felt a hard punch hit him in his eye socket. As Ezra held hthe side of his pain in agonizing pain, he then heard the voice of someone he prayed he'd never hear again.
"Ezra Bridger," snarled the leader, "I knew the moment I saw your wanted poster in Capitol city that I had to be the one to turn you in."
Ezra got up from the ground, only to back up against the alley wall to get some distance from the Tandoshans leader from that night on Lothal that felt so long ago. The leader was followed by several of his kind.
Ezra wanted to scream for Zeb and Sabine, but his voice was muted by fear.
"They Empire might want you alive, but that doesn't mean you can't be a little broken." The scaled creature exclaimed as he got out a power hammer, as his followers also took out their weapons.
Ezra still remained frozen. He had no where to run to, he was trapped. The leader then ran right towards him, weapon raised to strike Ezra.
Ezra finally found his voice, only to scream as loud as he could as he held his arms over his head for some sort of defense from the beating he was about to endure.
The beating though never came. While his eyes were closed, he heard a skirmish going on in the alley. One full of painful grunts and blaster shots going off every second. It was only when the sound of pounding fist and clattering weapons die down did Ezra look up to see what had happened. What Ezra saw brought him relief.
Sabine and Zeb had found Ezra in his predicament and handled it as only they could.
"Ezra, get over here, right now." Sabine said both sternly yet calmly as she still had her blaster pointed at the groaning gang members.
Ezra did not need to be told twice. He ran towards the two, swerving his way around the now beaten up and dismayed trandoshans that littered the alley floor. Once he got to his rescuers, Zeb immediately picked up Ezra with one arm, and with another pointed his bo-rifle at the lead trandoshan, now with a bloody arm and eye, who regained consciousness.
"Lets make it very clear," growled an enraged Zeb "Come near this kid again, and your dead."
The lizard man though just laughed, "Fool. That boy is nothing more then a dirty thief and will cause you all nothing but-,"
Sabine, not in the mood, stunned the punk with her blaster.
The three humanoids and droid gathered their supplies (including the meiloorun from the ground) and left the market place as soon as they could. Once outside of the town, Zeb set Ezra on the crate of their supplies so they could look over the boy.
Zeb took a sharp intake of air as he noticed the bruise forming in the corner of Ezra's right eye.
"Karabast," Zeb could only mutter.
Sabine got out one of the frozen cartons, and placed it on Ezra's bruise.
"Ezra, are you hurt anywhere else?" Sabine asked. While Sabine was sure the bruise was the worse of the injury, another matter was bothering her. Ezra looked like he was on the verge of crying, not saying a word since the ordeal happened. Yes, he had only been silent for five minutes, but for Ezra, five minutes was far too long for him to be mute.
"Kid, talk to us." Sabine pleaded with the little guy.
Zeb came up with an what might have occurred to the kid, "You know what happened back there wasn't your fault." Zeb pointed out, "Those punks had no right to attack you."
"But you guys are mad, aren't you?" Ezra finally asked, his voice trembling with his sobs.
Sabine thought she understood what he met, "We're mad at those scaled cowards for attacking you, but we're not mad at you kid."
Ezra though just gripped the edge of the crate till his knuckles turned white before he exclaimed, "But you guys know that I stole!" Ezra then began crying again.
Zeb put a gentle hand on the kids shoulder and smiled at the kid's naïve nature, "Is that why you think we're mad, because you stole from them?"
"I don't know," Ezra responded nervously.
"Kid, we already knew about you pick-pocketing." Sabine revealed to the kid
Ezra finally looked up at Sabine, shocked that what he thought was secret wasn't.
Sabine though just smiled as she took the frozen carton of the kids face a bit, "It wasn't that hard to figure out Ezra. How else did you think we thought you survived on the streets?"
"I'm sorry." Ezra replied, still saddened.
"Kid you have nothing to be sorry for," Zeb assured the kid.
"Ezra, why did you steal when you were on the streets?" Sabine asked.
"Because I needed to eat." Ezra replied honestly.
"So you only stole because you had to, not because you wanted to." Sabine pointed out. Ezra nodded, starting to feel better that Zeb and Sabine weren't mad at him.
"But stealing is wrong though." Ezra pointed out.
Zeb took over clarification "In normal cases it is. But you stole as a last resort and not because you're a bad person."
"Besides, we steal from the Empire," Sabine pointed out, "That doesn't make us bad people, does it?"
"No," Ezra said to defend his crew's actions, "You guys steal from the bad guys to help those who need help. You guys steal…" Ezra began to trail off his train of thought, realizing what he was going to say before smiling.
"Because we have to." Zeb pointed out as he ruffled Ezra's head, knowing Ezra felt better about his past.
"Come on, lets get back. Hera and Kanan will get worried." Sabine pointed out.
Ezra hopped off the crate and began walking towards where the ghost was when Zeb pick him up and put him on his shoulders.
"Promise is a promise." Zeb reminded the kid. Ezra grinned happily.
"So do Kanan and Hera know?" Ezra asked, though he already knew the answer.
"Yeah, they figured it out the moment you told us you lived on the streets." Sabine pointed out as she pushed the crate.
"The real question is how are Kanan and Hera going to react to your black eye?" Zeb voiced his concern of the leader o the crew reaction to their bruised kid
"They are going to freak" Sabine pointed out. Chopper beeped a reply that even Zeb knew meant 'We are dead'.
It turned out though, Hera and Kanan didn't freak out like Sabine said they would. Yes, as soon as they saw Ezra had a bruise forming on his face, the two asked a million questions. While Hera got another ice pack for Ezra, Kanan heard Zeb and Sabine explain what happened at the Market.
To the Lasat's and Mandalorians surprise, there was no yelling. Only a gentle reminder from the Jedi.
"Well luckily you guys got there in time. Just next time, don't let him wonder off by himself." Kanan told them calmly. Kanan then told them, "Hera and I need to drop off the supplies to Vizago, you guys want to come?"
Zeb and Sabine just looked at each other, smiled and then in unison told Kanan, "Nah."
Kanan just chuckled at their response. Not that he was surprised, the two had made it clear they did not like Vizago, so they had no desire to willingly go see him.
"Ok, then you guys keep an eye on Ezra." Hera piped in as she turned her attention from the kid.
Ezra then asked curiously, "How come I can't come with you guys?"
Kanan and Hera looked at each other, wondering if letting Ezra come was such a good idea.
"You sure you want to come?" Kanan asked Ezra before he pointed out some facts, "It might be a long while and you've already had a busy day at the market. Also it might get a little boring, we are going to be talking a lot of business stuff with him."
"Yeah, but since I'm part of the crew now I should know how you guys do things. Doesn't that include knowing who we work with?" Ezra reasoned, almost appearing grown up (if it hadn't been for him smiling the whole time).
Kanan and Hera also smiled at each other at Ezra's reasoning.
"He has a point," Kanan indicated to Hera smiling.
"Alright," Hera stated before she gave out her orders, "grab your helmet and meet us at the speeders."
Ezra quickly got up and ran to find a helmet.
"Wait," a thought accord to Kanan, "Ezra doesn't have a helmet?"
Concern appeared on Hera's face before she told Kanan, "Get the trooper helmet."
After a while on the speeder Kanan, Hera, and Ezra finally made it to the Broken Horn Syndicate camp. They say several Devaronians in the camp giving them the stink eye.
As Kanan helped Ezra off the speeder, he could sense the boy's apprehension at all the intimidating gang members looking at them.
"Just stay close to Hera and me Ezra, and everything will be ok." Kanan assured Ezra.
Ezra smiled at Kanan's word and took his hand.
Luckily for Ezra he had Kanan and Hera by his side pushing the crates. While he knew all three of them were getting stares, he felt like they Davaronians were eyeing him in particular. The worst part was he was sure it had nothing to do with his eye.
They finally made it to Vizago's tent, where the leader of the syndicate sat at his desk.
"Ah, my favorite rebels. Bringing the good's, we talked about," Vizago asked, giving them a grin that only a con man could make that made one's skin crawl.
"We ran into a little problem with-," Hera began to explain the predicament when Vizago noticed the tiny human hiding behind the Twi'leks leg.
"Who in the galaxy is that?" Virago asked, not pleased by the unexpected member's presence.
"That is he," Hera pointed out a little annoyed
"And his name is Ezra. He's part of our ranks now." Kanan finished explaining who Ezra was, also not pleased by Vizago's negative attitude about the kid.
Vizago then smiled, "Yes the Bridger boy. He has quite the bounty on his head," he said this wickedly.
Ezra clung tighter to Hera's pant leg, not liking Vizago much already.
"We all have bounty, everyone here has a bounty over their heads," was all Kanan had to say to drop the subject.
Vizago shrugged off the matter, "Fair enough." Soon the topic of buissness continued.
"So I can see that there are only two crates for me. I believe I told you that my sources confirmed three crates contained the Ion riffles."
"We grabbed all the crates," Kanan argued, "Only two of them had the riffles."
"Our deal was though that I would give you the credits and the data disc with the intel I received on the TIE Fighter construction." Vizago said as he pointed out the data disc on his desk.
"How about this; why don't we take the riffles to your other camps in exchange for the information." Kanan offered.
How about I give you half the credits and the intel you desire." Vizago offered coldly before pointing out, "It's all about business, you know that."
"We're low on funds as it is, it's not our fault that your intel about the crates was wrong." Hera argued.
"A deal is a deal." Vizago pointed out. "Either take half the credits and intel or ditch the intel and I give you the credit amount I promised."
"What's that?" Ezra asked, suddenly appearing at the side of Vizago's desk, pointing at a holo-list of different species projected on the other side of the tent. Some of the species on the list had red marks on them.
"That there my boy is a list of anyone who has wronged the Broken Horn Syndicate." Vizago pointed out as he got up from his desk and walked towards the list.
"Why do some of them have red marks on them? Ezra asked, a little nervous at the answer he was going to hear.
"Lets just say they aren't a problem for the syndicate anymore." Vizago sad rather darkly towards kid.
That was enough information Ezra needed to hear for Hera and Kanan's liking.
Kanan approached Ezra and scooped him up, "Look just give us the credits." Kanan told Vizago.
Vizago just shrugged off Kanan's hostility and handed him the credits that were promised to the crew.
As the Ghost members were leaving, Vizago gave them a crude pointer, "How about next time you leave the midget at home. Another smack in the eye will teach him to be quiet."
Both Kanan and Hera just gave him an angry stare and took a deep breath before leaving the tent to get back to their speeders.
Once back to the Ghost, Ezra spoke first
"I don't like him." Ezra said bluntly.
"Yeah, none of us do," Hera pointed out. "But we have to deal with him if we want some form of income."
"But he didn't give you guys the intel he promised." Ezra pointed out, mad at the Broken Horn's leader.
"No but we got the credits and-," Kanan was interrupted by a disturbance in the Force. Ezra sensed it too as he looked in the direction they came from to find a dozen speeders with Devaronians on them, and all them heading towards the Ghost.
"Get inside!" Kanan shouted to Hera as he picked up Ezra and the three ran up the Ghost ramp, barley missing the blaster shots that began aiming towards them.
"Chopper, get the Ghost ready for take off!" Hera shouted into the comlink as she ran towards the cockpit, followed by Kanan and Ezra.
"What's happening?" Sabine shouted as she suddenly appeared from her room.
"We're under attack!" Kanan pointed out the obvious, "Zeb, Sabine, get to the turrets, we might need to open fire on them".
In the Cockpit, Hera got the Ghost up for take off. None of the blaster shots from the Syndicate were strong enough to damage the Ghost fortunately and soon the Ghost shot up into the sky.
Hera set the Ghost to auto pilot, relaxing in her chair. Sabine and Zeb then came bursting in.
"Karabast! What in the forces name was that all about!" Zeb yelled at the top of his lungs.
"No idea, we did our business with Vizago, and just as we got back, his gang came shooting at us." Kanan told the Lasat and Mandalorian calmly.
"Well something happened?" Sabine pointed out.
Ezra tugged Kanan's pant leg to get his attention.
Don't worry kid, we are all fine and-," Kanan finally looked down at the kid and saw why he wanted Kanan's attention. Ezra was holding a data disk, the very one that was on Vizago's desk.
The past ten minutes just made sense to Kanan.
"Ezra, why did you take this from Vizago?" Kanan asked the Ezra, revealing to the rest of the crew what happened.
"Because we were supposed to get it anyways," Ezra explained as he smiled, "and it's okay to steal if we have to. You guys needed the disk right?"
The rest of the crew looked at each other in perplexity; they knew Ezra meant well, but now they had no idea what to do.
The Holo-projector began to beeping and Chopper turned it one to reveal an infuriated Vizago.
"I should have known that brat was up to no good!" Vizago shouted, causing Ezra to cling to Kanan's leg.
"Bring back the disk, and I might consider doing business with you again." Vizago offered frustrated.
Kanan though finally lost his cool and yelled at the projector, "No, you will do business with us again because let's face it, you can't find anyone else on Lothal to do the crazy stuff you ask from us! So we will keep the disk and you are going to deal with it. 'It's just business!'" Kanan then turned off the holoprojector before Vizago could reply.
Here just smiled, she loved it when Kanan got all assertive with his leadership role.
The other crew members were no laughing hysterically at Vizago's dumbfound look when Kanan threw his own words back at him.
Kanan though gave them an authoritative glance, which silenced everyone.
Kanan then got eye level where Ezra stood.
Ezra was sure he was going to get yelled at, but Kanan just told him calmly,
"Ezra, I know why you took the disk, and we definitely can do some good with it. But you realize that if you were caught, you could have gotten seriously hurt. Those members of Vizago's group shot at us because they wanted that disk back."
Ezra hung his head in shame, "I'm sorry."
Kanan though tilted the kids head backup so Ezra could see Kanan, "Next time kid, don't take anything unless one of us is there to give you the OK and to make sure you don't hurt yourself. Understand?"
Ezra nodded and then weakly smiled. "So does that mean I'm not in trouble?"
Kanan and Hera looked at each other and silently agreed. "Not this time, but next time kid you'll be grounded till you're fourteen, sound fair?"
Ezra smiled and nodded, Earning a pat on the head from Kanan.
Kanan knew that Ezra was smart enough to steal without getting caught. Heck, Kanan didn't even notice what the kid was up too. Kanan also knew that Ezra knew the difference between stealing for the right and wrong reasons; Sabine and Zeb pointed out how guilty Ezra felt when he thought his actions on the streets weren't justified. If it helped Ezra feel part of the crew to be able to help out this way, Kanan was content to let Ezra use this talent. So long as the crew was there to help Ezra. when he needed it.
