(A/N)- Bad Things Happen Bingo prompt again. The request for this one was "Thwarted Escape", with Ezra, and the circumstance were left for interpretation so I indulged a bit of Reluctant Inquisitor!Ezra for maximum angst potential.

Be forewarned for dismemberment, implied child abuse, and mentions of Seven being creepy. This is not a nice one.

Disclaimer: *manifesting Ezra in the Ahsoka show like my life depends on it* Sorry, what? Oh. I guess I don't own Star Wars. Or whatever.


Stolen Chance

The lights had been turned down in the hallways for about an hour before the boy moved.

Ezra Bridger, known to the others in the Fortress by the unflattering moniker "Thirteenth Brother" ("Unlucky Number Thirteen!" Fourth Sister had always laughed), raised his head from the thin mattress, his senses keening out in all directions.

Aside from the slow, ambling patrol of a lone Purge Trooper, there was no one near the tiny cell-like room he called his own.

Ezra let out a slow exhale.

Moving slowly, he uncurled from the bed, raising his torso. He pushed himself upright, checking the door with an anxious glance before he stood up on the bed and reached for the loose grate near the ceiling.

The loosened screws slid easily from their grooves, and Ezra put the grate down on the bed before inhaling slowly to steel himself and looking up at the yawning air vent opening.

It loomed like a black maw above him, shadows thick inside.

Swallowing, Ezra reached up and braced his hands against the sides of the vent in a motion practiced a thousand times, pulling himself up into the narrow metal corridor itself, fully encasing himself inside the ventilation system of the fortress.

He moved slowly, as noiselessly as he could, every tiny shuffle sounding too loud behind the pounding of his heart. It thudded in his chest, frantic and painful.

He slowly made his way through the claustrophobic narrow turns. Purge Troopers, if they heard him shuffling above them, paid no heed. The first time he'd been in the vents had been frantic and instinctual and desperate—and it hadn't worked anyway, the Grand Inquisitor had found him and pulled him forcefully down within minutes—but since then, since formulating the plan he was now anxiously putting into action, Ezra had deliberately cultivated the habit.

Now, whenever the others heard him shuffling and sliding through the metal tubes they just huffed and dismissed it. There goes Thirteenth again, avoiding one of his deserved punishments, hiding like a scared tooka, they said. He endured the humiliation of their taunting, their barbed comments about how weak he was, and unbeknownst to them had been slowly mapping out the entire infrastructure of the ventilation system.

He knew which turns to make, which fans to avoid, which vents exited where.

Including all the ones that led to the hanger levels.

He couldn't get into the hanger itself—the vents that opened into it were too high up for him to jump down safely, even with the Force. He'd tried. Broke his arm and spent the next few weeks in painful rehab, after his master had all but killed him for the stunt. He still didn't know how he'd managed to conceal his true intentions from the Grand Inquisitor, who'd practically shredded his mind trying to find out if he was lying about the reason he'd wound up in the hanger.

Ezra shivered slightly, pausing a moment in the vent. He could still feel the cold sharp fingers digging through him, rifling through his head for signs of treachery. Could still feel the broken edges scraping against his skull.

He took a deep breath. Calmed himself. Reached out to the Force, not like the Inquisitor had taught him, but with the quiet, pleading voice of a child in trouble, who just wanted to stop hurting.

When he felt a modicum more confident he continued moving.

Slowly, inch by inch, he made his way, down from the sparse living quarters, past the training rooms—he had to pause for a horribly long time as he heard Fifth and Tenth sparring in one of the dojos, masking his signature with layers of the Force—down into the hanger levels.

He exhaled slowly, a trickle of relief moving through him as he found the intended exit.

The cover detached soundlessly; Ezra carefully put it behind him in the vent and scanned with his Forces Sense before he peeked out.

The hallway was, as he'd anticipated, completely empty, the scheduled patrol not due for about a minute and a half.

Enough time for him to shimmy out of the vent and drop down.

Ezra crept carefully down the access hall, approaching the hanger's control room.

He paused outside the durasteel door and rapped twice, in quick succession.

After a tense moment the door clicked and slid open, revealing the floating ID9-7B, who chirped happily upon seeing him. Behind the seeker droid, the technician on duty was slumped at the panel, a smoking singed spot on his Imperial coat.

Ezra entered the room quickly, turning and hitting the button to seal the door again before his minute was up. The Purge Trooper that rounded the corner the next moment found nothing out of the ordinary, mechanically proceeding down the hall as his metal-booted footsteps echoed in the room.

The boy's shoulders untensed. He extended hands to 7B, who chirruped and floated closer to him, accepting his embrace with a whirr of delight. Ezra gripped the seeker droid with fervent emotion for a moment. This had been an unexpected component of the plan, but when Ezra had learned that leaving the hanger required special authorization and clearance—even for an Inquisitor—he'd seen no other way. He wasn't a skilled enough slicer to forge the authorization himself.

So he'd befriended one of Seventh's seeker droids enough to get his hands on it, reprogram it. A risky move, he knew—Seventh loved her seekers, treated them like mechanical pets, adored them—but the most logical course of action he'd seen to accomplish his goal.

Ezra let go of 7B, shuddering as he focused.

"Okay Sev-bee," he said, using his nickname for the droid. "Go ahead."

The seeker droid beeped and saluted with a proud manipulator, floating over and going to work at the console. Ezra watched the droid flicker and buzz as it plugged in, forging the authorization that would allow him to lower the shields of the hanger bay entrance and take a shuttle up, unaccosted by the planetary defenses, into orbit.

To freedom.

Ezra's nerves crawled with anticipation as the seeker droid worked.

Finally, with a cheerful series of clicks, 7B announced that it was done; Ezra had the clearance to leave Nur.

Ezra inhaled slowly, taking the news in. Hope shimmered in his heart, faint and yet growing, a sliver that pulsed through him as he imagined seeing stars again, seeing the blue tunnel of hyperspace as the Fortress disappeared behind him.

He beckoned the seeker with a warm gesture. "Come on, Sev-bee," he said. "Let's go."

The droid floated over to him, perching astutely on his shoulder.

Ezra waited for the next patrol to pass, then exited the control room, making his way down in the turbolift to the hanger itself, typing in his personal code on the keypad and feeling triumph ringing through him as the door accepted it, chunking and scraping open. Ezra found the first shuttle he could, darting across the room without a second thought, only paying a brief glance at the technicians on duty, who ignored him to continue their work.

Once in the shuttle he had to pause. His breaths were tight and unsteady. A creeping sense of foreboding was pulsing on his skull.

Before he could second-guess himself, he was shoving his way to the cockpit, an anxious throb of anxiety beginning to beat through his limbs.

No sooner had he hit the button to start the repulsorlifts than the Force flared up with a sense of icy-cold danger, sounding a warning all through his head, bouncing off the sides of his skull.

Ezra grabbed the controls for the shuttle, lifting it up to hover over the hanger floor. He pushed the yoke forward, hoping, praying, that the hack had worked and that the hanger would accept his authorization codes.

But he hadn't flown more than a few feet before his dashboard flared red, a robotic voice piping up through the speakers.

"Access revoked," the impartial female voice said. "Please descend."

"No!" Ezra cried, slamming the throttle forward.

But the hanger doors were already sealing, thick, impenetrable durasteel doors already descending over the opening, cutting off his view of the vast churning green sea beyond.

Ezra popped 7B off his shoulder, shoving its manipulator into the shuttle's console in the vain hope that it could get the doors open, but then a shudder went through the whole craft, the metal and glass creaking as an unseen force took hold of it.

Invisible hands manipulated buttons and switches inside the cockpit, shutting down the engines, bringing the shuttle back to ground. Ezra gasped with panic as he grabbed up 7B with one hand, pulling the droid from the port. He whirled around to face towards the back, through the open cockpit doors into the crew seat section, his hand straying to the lightsaber clipped to his belt.

The shuttle shuddered and groaned as it was placed on the floor. Stale artificial light flooded through the ship as the ramp was lowered and Purge Troopers filed into the compartment.

Ezra pushed forward off one foot, lunging with his saber as it ignited in fury, slicing through at least seven troopers before he made it to the ramp.

He ran down, heedless of anything except the panic ringing through him, holding 7B close as he turned towards the nearest door.

His limbs locked up before he could go three steps. His lungs expelled a gasp, heart giving a terrified jolt as he felt his body frozen in place by artificial Force power. He strained against the hold, craning his head back and seeing with a shot of cold dread the face of the Seventh Sister, standing there with a palm outstretched and holding him in place.

Her golden eyes flashed with hot fury, her other seekers hovering behind her. Out of all the Inquisitors she was his least favorite, her touch always lingering too long, too intimately, her taunts and teases always a little bit too sexually charged...

Ezra's chest clamped up with frozen horror as he struggled in her grip, watching her come slowly closer, her limbs stiff with a kind of infuriated purpose.

No... he thought desperately, crying out to the Force for help. No no no no not her, please not her! Please!

She made a yanking motion with her hand; Ezra jerked back and floated straight to her, her hand closing like a steel trap around his throat.

"Just where do you think you're going?!" she demanded.

Her hand drew back and then she slammed him against the floor, knocking his head so dizzy for a moment he saw stars, released his desperate hold on 7B as his limbs spasmed helplessly.

"I—I'm sorry!" he strained out, unable to think of anything else to say behind the blinding terror that assaulted him now, filling his head, drowning his senses.

She let go of his neck, straightening with ominous purpose. "Reprogramming one of my droids?!" she shrieked. 7B buzzed close to her, chirruping with assurances of its loyalty, but she swatted it aside with a swipe of her hand without a moment's hesitation.

Ezra cringed fearfully as he heard his ally smash into the ground somewhere behind her, broken or deactivated, he didn't know. He swallowed a hard lump in his throat, looking up into the murderous gaze of Seventh, who'd drawn her lightsaber and ignited it, her arm out stiffly.

She jabbed the red blade towards his throat. "Were you trying to run away, padawan?" she hissed, spitting the words furiously. "Did you think for a minute I wouldn't notice one of my seekers responding to different commands?!"

Terror choked his voice; he couldn't even breathe, the feeling strangling his windpipe. "I... I..." he stammered.

Seventh stepped back, icy and cruel fury on her face. "Let's make sure you can't run away again, little Thirteen,"she spat.

Her lightsaber swiped in a harsh red slash.

There was a dull thunk! as it met flesh.

Ezra sat there in shock a moment.

Then he shrieked, the pain and burning hitting him all in one moment, agonizing and sharp. He curled up, grabbing for the stump of his left knee as his brain registered that his leg was gone, she had cut off his leg, the horrible knowledge hitting his mind like a sledgehammer, knife-like and painful.

His eyes flooded with tears that blurred his vision, his mind spinning dizzyingly through the horrific pain, stabbing, throbbing, turning him to incoherent jelly.

Somewhere in the agony he sensed the cold familiar presence of his master, the vague undercurrent of anger as he stalked up to the scene.

"He is of no use to me if you maim him beyond repair," the Grand Inquisitor hissed, his footsteps loud and ominous even through Ezra's pain-dazzled senses.

"Tell him to leave my seekers alone," the Seventh Sister shot back venomously, growling, her fury like a physical weight on Ezra's psyche.

Ezra screamed and sobbed, wet trails cascading down his cheeks, the scent of burning flesh sticking in his nose and almost making him retch, his stomach in upheaval as his mind processed the grievous injury done to him.

The Grand Inquisitor watched him writhe and curl up on the floor with an impartial disdain, only leaning down and hooking his hand under Ezra's arm when the boy's blubbering became too pathetic, too embarrassing.

The Pau'an pulled Ezra upright, onto his one good foot, and Ezra choked for breath, straining and gasping as his body was manipulated by the man's harsh grip.

"I believe we have something to discuss, apprentice," the man emphasized harshly, his voice deadly and chilling, sending fresh reams of fear streaking through him.

Ezra hiccuped and capitulated in despair, letting himself be hauled up by an ungentle grip and borne away from the hanger, away from 7B and the shuttle, the cold dread closing around his heart with the knowledge that his punishment was going to hurt far worse this time than ever.

He had been so close, he thought with sinking hopelessness, as he was carried away to his inevitable fate.


(A/N)- I... I'm sorry.

...No I'm not, hurting the darlings was the point of the assignment, lol.

You can request a prompt/character over on Tumblr. See this post: h tt [#]p s: / / tari silmarwen . tu mb lr . c[#]o m / post / 673415204767465472 / im- doing- a-bad-things-happen- bingo- because (delete the spaces and the special characters in the brackets)