Mando Versus Jedi:

Sabine paused just before the door to the cargo hold. "We'll, that sounds ominous. What do we need to talk about?"

"Nothing terrible," Ezra was quick to elaborate, squeezing their interlocked fingers in reassurance. "Or, okay, maybe a little terrible. It's about Vader."

Sabine grimaced comically as she triggered the door to open, tugging her new boyfriend through with her. "Oh, him. You know Bo-Katan and I already talked about that."

Ezra flushed. "Right. Eavesdropping and you knew it. Ummmm, so Kanan and I talked…"

"I already guessed you and Kanan probably won't want to stay here if Vader's coming," she said quickly when he seemed to get stuck. "And I won't think less of you if you two leave."

Ezra tugged on her hand to stop her from descending the ramp. "Here's the thing…" he started as he indicated that they should sit on the ramp.

"Uh oh," Sabine said as she sat beside him, copying his pose of drawn up knees with arms wrapped around them. "I'm not going to like this, am I?"

"Probably not." Ezra tucked his chin onto his folded knees and stared off into the distance, afraid to meet her eyes. "Kanan and I both agree that staying here is a bad idea since neither of us are confident that we can beat him and we'll just be drawing death and destruction to whoever is around us."

Sabine sighed softly, her cheek resting on her knees as she watched his face. "I wish I could say that you two could totally beat that sleemo, but I remember what happened the last time I saw you fight him on Lothal and I never want to see or imagine anything like that again. I almost lost you then. I don't want to lose you now. I… I don't think I could take it."

Ezra turned his head to look at her, her despair at even the thought of his demise drawing him to be brave. "And that's the main reason why I'm not staying to help Mandalore fight their war, no matter how much it rubs me the wrong way to walk away from something that I helped start. The thing is… I won't leave you, so that means I'm asking you to come with me."

Sabine stared at his imploring and remorse filled eyes for a few tense seconds and then sighed softly. "Ezra… You know what you're asking of me goes against everything that I am, don't you?"

He dropped his forehead down to his knees and talked to his lap, which muffled his voice as he said, "I know. Kriff, do I know." He sucked in a breath and looked at her again. "You're my warrior goddess; fighting is what you do. What you were born and bred to do. But this is one war that we either both fight and maybe - probably - die in, or we both run from it. It's your choice."

She inhaled slowly and deeply. "That's one hell of a choice you're forcing me to make, Ezra Bridger."

Ezra winced and his heavy gaze fell to his knees again. "I'm sorry."

Years ago, there might have been a time when the choice for them both to stay and fight would have been an automatic one for her. But even before the revelation of her real feelings for Ezra, she knew what her answer would be, because senselessly risking his life for her own pride was something she wouldn't have been able to live with once he had become her family.

Her Mando self probably would have said they should fight anyway; that there was honour in falling in combat. But Kanan and Hera had shown her a different way of thinking; that family was more important than pride or revenge or even winning.

Generally, she liked who she was becoming, but sometimes, like situations like this where she had to choose between the honour-bound act of helping her people or preserving the life expectancy of her cyar'ika, she had to grumble just a bit.

Shab. At this rate, I'll be more Jedi than Mando by the time I hit thirty. My ancestors are probably rolling in their graves.

Amused and resigned by her thoughts, Sabine nevertheless reached over and covered one of Ezra's hands with her own. "All right, Ez, we'll both go. I won't make you stay here if that doesn't feel right to you."

Ezra lit up and the next thing she knew she was being all but smothered by a Jedi doing his best impersonation of a puppy as he pushed her down on the ramp and covered her face in kisses. At least he's not slobbery, she thought with a giggle and wrapped her arms around his neck.

"Thank you. Thank you. Thank you," Ezra all but blubbered as he worshipped her precious features. "You're the best girlfriend ever."

Catching his contagious enthusiasm, she grabbed the sides of his face to still him and planted a smacking kiss on his mouth. Then she grinned up at him and said, "Just remember you said that the next time I'm yelling at you for doing something brave but really stupid."

"Like yesterday?"

"Like yesterday."

Ezra shrugged bashfully. "I'll try to be faster next time I'm rescuing your father from a transport about to go off a cliff."

"You do that." Sabine pushed him off of her. "Now get up so we can get something to eat and break the news that we're leaving to Bo-Katan."

As his suddenly empty feeling stomach rumbled in agreement, Ezra pulled her to her feet with him and they started down the ramp. "Where we go from here is up to you. Kanan is hoping to catch a ride back to Base One with Ketsu, so that leaves us free to go anywhere."

Sabine didn't have to think very long about this one either. "Home to Krownest. If I'm not fighting here, then I have a duty to my clan to provide the leadership they expect of me. Plus, there are a couple of things that shouldn't be put off any longer than necessary."

"Like?"

Sabine steered them around a group of loitering teenagers who she just knew looked like trouble. Especially the tall one in clan Vizsla armour who looked pissed off with life in general and had an extra glare reserved for Ezra, just because. Someone was raised a Jedi hater. I know we all were, but... Yeesh, give it up already. Because of the brief distraction, it took her a few more steps longer to answer than it should have. "Like honouring my fallen clan members, including my brother and mother."

Ezra winced in sympathy even as he made a mental note to keep an eye on the blond guy who looked about his age and had a lot of dark emotions roiling off him. "Right. That's definitely important."

"And I have to officially win my place as Countess."

"Is that going to entail anything dangerous?" Ezra was afraid he already knew the answer.

Sabine gave him an incredulous raised eyebrow that was only partially in fun. "We're Mandalorians. What do you think?"

"Dangerous times ten, then," Ezra grumbled.

She grinned, bumping her shoulder into his arm. "Pretty much."

"That's what I get for falling for a Mando girl; always worried about you." He was only half joking.

And she knew it. As they entered the crowded dining area, she laced her fingers through his. "That goes both ways, you know. Some of your Jedi stunts aren't exactly an afternoon stroll through a meadow."

"True." As they wound their way to the table near the buffet that her father was seated at, Ezra wiggled his eyebrows at her. "But you have to admit that my stunts are impressive, right?"

Her fine dark purple eyebrows went up for a moment. Impressive is an understatement. But does he really need to know that?"

Nah.

Deciding to mess with him a bit, she shrugged. "Sure. I guess."

"You guess?" he practically squeaked, because he could sense that she was teasing and decided to play along. "You GUESS?!" Ezra sniffed and looked away, pulling his hand from hers as he stopped and crossed his arms over his chest. "Fine. If my tricks aren't enough to impress the almighty Warrior Goddess, than I shall simply have to give up the Force and become an artist or something to catch her attention."

Sabine snorted and shoved him nearly off his feet. "Dork. You know you can't paint worth a damn."

Ezra caught his balance after a few hopping steps and grinned at her. "I know. But there's still money to be made for art that looks like the drunken stylings of a lothmonkey, right?"

She laughed outright. "Apparently, if some of the garbage that passes as art is anything to go by."

"See. Then I'm all set. I'll take up painting and my Mando girl will finally be impressed enough to admit that I'm worth drooling over."

"Oh, is that where you were going with this? Trying to fish compliments from me?" Sabine rolled her eyes affectionately. "Fine. Your Force stunts make me hot. Happy now?"

Ezra laced their fingers together again and started them moving forward again. "Ecstatic." He beamed at her. "And for the record, all you have to do is breathe to make me hot, so it's pretty safe to say that your acrobatics and fighting skills are enough to turn me into a supernova."

Suddenly feeling a little hot herself, Sabine glanced up at him through heavy eyelids. "Hmmmm. I'll have to remember that. Maybe we could spar later."

He gulped and squeaked out for real this time, "Sure."

"Good. I'm looking forward to knocking you down to the floor repeatedly." A truly wicked smile crossed her lips as another thought popped into her head. "We might even play the strip match version where the loser has to take off something every time they get knocked off their feet."

"Oh boy." Ezra suddenly had a lot more incentive to actually win their sparring rounds.

Quite satisfied with how she'd disconcerted her Jedi, Sabine walked the last few steps to her father's table and sat across from him in a space that had just been vacated by a Kryze warrior, leaving Ezra to hover behind her as he worked on trying to banish the inappropriate-for-their-current-company images her teasing had inspired.

"See, Father," Sabine said smugly. "You didn't have to come get us."

Alrich gestured at his nearly empty plate with his fork. "Ah, but it was a close thing. Only two bites left."

"Then our timing was perfect, right Ez?" she said, turning and looking up at him and finding him still a little more flushed than normal. Shab, being the girlfriend is even more fun than being the best friend. She grinned at him.

Ezra nodded. "Right. I'll just go get us some food, kay?"

"Sounds goo…," Her voice trailed off as Sabine saw Ketsu approaching the eating area with her ass-kicking expression on and with a vaguely familiar looking male trotting to catch up to her. Drawing an imaginary line along her friend's path, Sabine's eyes widened as she saw who Ketsu was aiming for. "Kriff. Ezra, skip that. Go find Bo-Katan instead. Quickly."

Alrich spun around on his bench and saw what Sabine did. He cursed at the impending disaster. "Shab. Bo's probably in her tent with Fenn," he supplied helpfully. And hopefully not too far into the 'getting acquainted' process yet, either. Or she's going to be a mighty pissed off Mand'alor.

Not understanding what was going on, but sensing the rising tension in the air and Sabine's low-level fear, Ezra nodded and took off at an agile sprint that only he could manage through the thick crowds.

Sabine surged to her feet and rushed as fast as she could in the direction of her suicidal friend to lend whatever support she could for a situation that was guaranteed to be ugly or uglier, double checking that her blasters were set to stun and still had some charge in them on the way.