(A/N)- *whispers* How did Sabine spend two seasons equipped with a jetpack and never once get to catch a falling Ezra in midair? Heinous I tell you. Lol.
Disclaimer: I would have fired Kathleen Kennedy ages ago if I owned Star Wars. What is this, like, the third director she's had a spat with over "creative differences"? Lady, just let the people do their jobs.
Chapter 3
"They have a tank!" Ezra called at her in warning, moments before heavy blaster mortars from below came streaking up towards them.
Thick shots passed on either side of them, nearly clipping the metal railings of the walkway their pounding feet were running across. One blast did bounce off the building below them, the explosion rattling the plates under their feet, spraying debris, loud and cacophonous.
Sabine braced for a moment, gripping the railings with both hands, then when the shaking stopped ungrit her teeth.
"Keep moving!" she yelled. "We're almost to the extraction point!"
They ran across the bridge between the facilities, and the tank on the platform below them followed with booming shots. Sabine's hair stood up with shrieking anxiety every time she felt one pass.
A rending blast sounded behind them, and Sabine gasped as the plates fell out from underneath her.
She clutched immediately for the lefthand rail as the bridge was blown out, the sheared end swinging down. Only a few paces behind her Ezra yelped as the bridge gave way, flung forward by the blast to smack his palms and shins against the grating before sliding down, falling out into open air, only saving himself by grabbing a mangled end of broken rail.
"Sabine!" he shrieked, swinging out, dangling precariously by one hand.
Sabine craned her head down with a jerk, grimacing at how far down the ground was from this height. She hooked her legs around a support bar, letting go of the rail with one hand, leaning out and down to him, reaching.
The red glare of a blaster shot streaking straight towards them gleamed in her widening eyes and she yanked back upright, curling in to brace.
Boom!
Ezra's panicked shout horrified her. She pried her face from her arms and saw him dropping, falling straight down towards the tank on the landing platform far below.
Adrenaline surged through her as she reached back and hit the activation for her jetpack.
The boosters fired up and her torso felt buoyant and light as they idled. She let go of the railing and hovered a moment, then turned her momentum swiftly around and down.
Wind whipped her hair back, stinging in her eyes, but she kept the bright orange of his jacket in the center of her vision as she swooped down, and down.
He had stopped turning over, flailing only slightly as he plummeted, his back to the nearing ground, his face looking up towards her with anxious fear.
Sabine's teeth clenched hard inside her head as she narrowed her body, trying to cut down on drag and give herself more speed, tried to catch up to him quicker.
Closer and closer she rocketed, and shots from the tank missed them widely, too small and narrow a target for the Imperial goons to hit with any accuracy.
The ground rushed up towards them. Sabine bit the inside of her mouth as she thrust out an arm, her hand stretching as far as it could go.
From his position in perilous freefall, Ezra reached back for her.
Closer.
Her heart thumped painfully.
Closer.
She could almost touch him.
Ezra flailed up with his hand, his fingertips just barely brushing hers.
Even closer.
The landing platform was dangerously near now, approaching them rapidly.
She closed the distance and caught Ezra by the hand, immediately leveling out, angling them perpendicular from the ground and swooping high above the Stormtroopers' heads.
Ezra scrambled up, both hands clutching and grasping until he had a firm hold around her torso, arms wrapping around behind her back like a desperate embrace. Sabine squeezed him tight to her as she rocketed them up, heading for the top of the other building where the Ghost was already descending from the thick cloud cover to extract them.
"You okay?" she asked, her voice warbling a bit.
He didn't speak, but nodded firmly, pressing his face into her shoulder and clinging a little tighter as if afraid she might let go.
She squeezed him in reassurance, zooming around haphazard blaster bolts as she flew them up and up, into the waiting cargo hold of the Ghost.
The stark white light, after the overshadowed gray of the weather outside, was just a little bit hard to adjust to at first. Sabine's jetpack shut off and their feet dropped to the cargo hold floor gently.
She didn't let go, and they stood there, panting and holding each other for a long moment.
She felt his heartbeat, quick and rapid, even through her breastplate, as her chest heaved in and out, slowly calming down from the frantic fear that had overtaken her when she'd seen him falling.
Eventually, she peeled herself away. Still holding onto his sides, she drew back and looked him in the face.
He looked slightly pale, and a bit in shock, still processing that he was safe in the hold of the Ghost and not splattered on the duracrete ground of the landing platform.
She smiled, faintly, taking longer and deeper breaths as she relaxed. "So I guess we can cross 'getting shot at by an Imperial tank' off our bucket list," she offered as a joke.
It had the desired effect; Ezra untensed and chuckled shortly. "0/10, would not recommend," he quipped back.
She laughed, leaning her forehead down on his collar in relief, fingers clinging just a bit tighter to him even so.
(A/N)- You guys have no idea how hard it was to resist putting a kiss at the end there.