Well it happened. Ezra broke.
It seemed unfathomable. Kanan was convinced he had "gone dark", and never return. But the rescue mission on Ord Mantel changed everything.
The job was to drop in and smuggle a former senator from Naboo. He had run to the shady planet after the Empire took over. Word of our pesky little rebellion on backwater Lothal must have reached the right places.
And the likes of the Naboo government.
Everyone knows of their prestigious judicial and legislative courts. It's never surprising when a senator or representative from Naboo makes a ruckus within the Senate.
Jarkeen Ordon was one of those senators. A fat, balding, middle aged man who nearly stood to my shoulder. He looked anything but a high ranking Nabooian official. Obtaining him was easy, extracting him was excruciatingly difficult.
That's when all hell broke loose.
The rescue was a setup. Ezra and I were sent in to extract the senator. Once we established we had complete control of him, we were ambushed.
I was shot WAY too many times.
The amount of initial impacts I absorbed was enough to give even the highest graded Katarn armour a run for its money.
Beskar is good for protecting from blasts and shots from the outside, but in the inside, your body just gets bounced around like a holo-ping-pong ball.
To sum it all up, I fell unconscious. Right smack dab in the middle of a fire fight with a high-class vigilante in my grasp.
From what Zeb described, Ezra just flipped a switch.
Went all nuts I guess. Killed everyone. I mean everyone.
Zeb said it was messy. Lots of limbs missing.
But he broke down after.
Which is not normal whatsoever. I guess the mass loss of life in a short period of time just got to him.
But I was sooo wrong, it's much deeper than that.
Touched helped.
I could tell when I grazed his hand that his insides seemed to melt subtly despite his body tensing up.
That's when it dawned on me, Ezra's problem wasn't that he was afraid of being left behind, he was scared of others being lost.
He's so strong. But so young. Too young for the shit he's been through.
In his complex and intertwined mind, his parents weren't taken by the empire, they were lost because he wasn't strong enough to hold on to them.
To protect him.
It didn't make much sense logistically. Ezra was a kid when his parents were abducted. He couldn't have possibly changed that outcome.
But too him . . . it's his fault. HIS burden.
That's how he felt after he was captured.
He must've thought we were too. He blamed Kanan after he realized we weren't victims of Vader as well.
He's confused. Lost. And me pulling a stupid trick during the mission didn't help. My injury only worsens his condition.
That's why he checked in on me like he did. He wanted to ensure I was alright.
My stubborn ass took it as an invasion of privacy.
Letting out a soft sigh, I scoot closer to Ezra, trying to read his eyes.
What are you feeling? You must feel so betrayed. So conflicted.
How the hell did you get us out of there?
"Ezra . . ." I whisper softly.
His silent stare doesn't break.
"Hey, talk to me." I close the gap between us and lay my head on his chest. "Please?" Giving my best "loth-cat eyes" impression.
I hear a low rumble in his chest.
Fine.
"Fine I'll just head to my bunk then." I start to get up.
"No . . . stay." I feel his arm wrap around me. "Don't go." He says huskily.
His eyes look deep and sorrowful.
There's so much on his mind
"Ok" I whisper.