A/N: THIS CHAPTER. Y'all. Thanks for being so great about the unexpected hiatus! I had a crazy busy (but wonderful) summer, and writing fell by the wayside. But I definitely haven't abandoned this fic. I intend to see it through to its proper end-which is not yet, so don't worry about that! I've so appreciated the wonderful reviews that have been left since the last chapter got published! It's heartwarming to know how much y'all like this fic. And to the guest reviewer who said the last chapter hit close to home-I'm so glad you have an Ezra in your life. Hugs.

So, about this chapter. You can't even imagine the sheer volume of false starts, rewrites, reorganization, and reimagining it went through. Like wow. It's hardly recognizable from what it started out as, and I think that's a good thing? Lol. I'll let y'all decide what you think. A thousand heartfelt thanks to RagnarDanneskjold for beta-ing and helping me get this thing into shape. Without his comments, suggestions, and brainstorming, this would still be the same mess it was a couple months ago. As I've said before: sometimes, it takes a village to write a fic.


Special

As soon as they began preparing for their trip, Sabine realized Ezra wasn't going to tell her where they were going. He was tight-lipped about everything—even when she tried to ply those lips open with her own. After her final attempt at seduction failed, she walked away from him disgustedly, muttering about how much easier it used to be to wrap him around her little finger.

Ezra's smile was beyond smug.

Two agonizingly long weeks later, they were on their way to Sabine-didn't-know-where, sharing too-close quarters on the Gauntlet, and at the beginning stages of well and truly getting on each other's nerves. Ezra was piloting, and it had already been a very long six hours in hyperspace. Now they'd dropped to a sub-light speed so he could coordinate their next jump. Sabine could almost feel her hair turning grey.

The temptation to nag Ezra was overwhelming, so she got up and paced the ship, thinking surely, surely she could find something to do. And maybe, under any other circumstance, she'd have found something to occupy her mind. The ship had been modified years ago to suit her needs and wishes, now fitted with a good-sized 'fresher, a galley, a common area with a bench and dejarik table modeled after the Ghost's, and a small stateroom with a bunk big enough for two. In the cargo area there were two more pull-out bunks, one of them fitted to act as a med-bay. Any of those areas had something that needed attention; she'd noticed the dejarik table shorting out on one side, the water pressure in the shower wasn't quite right, and the medical supplies were in dire need of organization.

She didn't have the patience to take care of any of that today.

She shuffled to the galley, dragging her feet so that Ezra would be sure to hear, and dug through the small pantry until she found what she wanted. Her favorite sweet treat in hand, she thanked her lucky stars she hadn't picked up Hera's penchant for only stocking inexpensive-and-good-for-you rations bars for snacking. With a dramatic sigh, she turned back to the cockpit, dropping into her seat in a lazy slouch. Ezra angled his body over his controls to block her view.

She craned her neck, trying to look at anything on the computer display. Judging by the expression on Ezra's face, he was still having trouble with the next set of hyperspace coordinates. "If you'd let me help," she said tightly, "this would go a lot faster."

"I told you—I don't want you to help," he snapped back, "because then you'd know where we're headed and it'd ruin the surprise."

Never had the word surprise sounded so much like I'll kill you if you don't stop.

Sabine sat back in her seat with a huff. "And I told you—I don't like not knowing what's up."

"You agreed to this." He was trying so hard to keep his temper steady. "I said 'let's take a trip,' and you said 'sure.'"

"I did not say 'sure,' and anyway I changed my mind."

His eyes bugged. "Changed your—" He stopped, took a composing breath. "You can't just change your mind in the middle of a hyperspace lane."

She jabbed a finger at the canopy, pointing at the multitude of stars and the small planetoid looming nearby. "We're not in hyperspace," she argued, "because somebody—"

Suddenly, Ezra's face went slack and his body stiffened, his eyes fixed on some distant point beyond. "Shh," he said sharply.

"Don't shh me!" Sabine's ire was hot, but she followed his gaze. "What is it?"

He shook his head and his brows drew together. "I don't—" He jumped up. "You fly—you're better than me," he said, maneuvering her into pilot's seat. "Go, go, go!"

She was too bewildered to do anything other than move her hands over the controls, already piloting them toward the planet below, coaxing every bit of speed from the Gauntlet that she could. "What's going—"

The rest of that question was lost in a shriek when a barrage ofblasterfire shook the ship.


At first, he'd thought she was dead.

Ezra remembered the shriek of metal against earth as the ship ground its way to a stop. He remembered his hands shaking so violently he could barely undo his restraints. He remembered standing over Sabine, slumped and unconscious in her seat. Touching the side of her neck and having it come away wet with blood—that he wished he could forget.

It was like every single one of his worst nightmares playing out in front of him.

But she stirred when he touched her, eyes fluttering open for just a moment, and a deep relief flooded over Ezra. They'd been through too much for everything to just end here and now. It still could—Force knew what other injuries Sabine might have and whether or not their attackers were still pursuing them.

He wished he'd married Sabine that night on the tower roof, recited the Mando'a vows he'd committed to memory months ago and made her his wife. Darkness whispered to him, You may never have the chance now.

With fear gnawing at his heart, Ezra carried Sabine to the back of the ship and cleaned up her head wound the best he could. Wiping his eyes with his soot and blood-stained hands, he retrieved the med kit from the storage locker and set to placing the various bandages and medical devices on her battered body, not relaxing until the bio-scanner's automated voice told him Sabine was in stable condition.

In the crash, the port side of the ship had taken brunt of the impact, throwing her against her restraint harness as her head slammed into the console, rendering her unconscious immediately. She woke briefly when he'd moved her, and he took that as a good sign. He tried not to think too hard for the blood dripping from the open gash on her forehead, or how pale she looked.

She was going to be okay, though. The little vital signs reader clamped over her index finger was chirping reassuringly with every beat of her heart and the display showed a normal blood pressure reading. Her presence in the Force was bright and strong; as soon as she woke from her medicine-aided sleep, she'd be fine…ish.

He sat with her until the gash on her head stopped bleeding and then he reluctantly set to work trying to assess the Gauntlet's condition. It was slow going, his mind continually drawn back to the crash. With as much as his field-expedient medical training allowed him to do complete, Ezra placed on last gentle kiss on her forehead and backed slowly out of the room, not even bothering to close the medical kit. He made his way, halfway in a daze, back up to the cockpit to get a better handle on the situation.

Craning his neck to see through the cockpit glass, Ezra looked up at the planet's lavender-hued sky, squinting against midday sun as he tried—for all the good it was going to do—to figure out just what the kriff had happened. One minute he and Sabine had been bickering. The next—Sabine doing everything she knew how to in order to keep the Gauntlet airborne long enough to stick a rough landing instead of crashing outright into the planet's desert mountains. She'd managed to shake their pursuers, but not before the ship took a healthy dose of blasterfire that damaged a whole bunch of things they'd need if they wanted to take off again.

The attack had come out of nowhere, with only seconds to react as the Force screamed a warning. None of the ship's indicators or sensors had showed anything approaching, which meant the other vessel was highly and illegally modified. Out this far, that meant they were dealing with either pirates or slavers or a crime syndicate.

None of those things made Ezra feel warm and fuzzy.

He clenched his fists and turned back inside, anxious to check on Sabine.

Keep your mind on where you are and what you're doing, Ezra. Focus.

A familiar and comforting voice echoed in his mind. Even now, he was ever the student, and he was still teaching him from beyond. Sabine was fine—focus on the ship. Ezra shook his head; a sharp, piercing pain in his neck made him regret that immediately. But his thoughts had cleared, and he began the task of checking the damage.

Ezra's console had been shorted out and was completely nonfunctional. With a brief prayer, he pressed the button to activate Sabine's dormant controls, seeing them sputter to life as the ship's computer poured a distressingly long list of problems across her screen. He sat in the co-pilot's chair, the station he normally assumed whenever the couple was out, and felt something crinkle beneath his weight. He reached for the object and held it in his hands. It was the wrapper to one of those spiced chocolate treats from Capital City that Sabine liked so much.

"And you're always telling me to clean up after myself." His voice cracked as he placed the wrapper gently in his pocket. He didn't know why he kept it; he didn't have too much time to dwell on sentiment. He needed to see if he could get their ship space-worthy again.

Ezra was pretty sure it would fly again. He'd done what repairs he could: rebooting the central computer system after it freaked out, taking the shield generator offline so it could cool and recharge. But the ship's diagnostic was showing an issue with both the sub-light engine and the hyperdrive; things that would require Sabine's expertise. The sooner the better, too, with their attackers on the planet with them somewhere. Neither the ship's sensors nor the Force had warned of anyone approaching, but Ezra was wary. Experience told him that if they didn't leave soon, they'd run into trouble again.

"Ezra?"

It had been unnervingly quiet; he jumped when she called out to him, even as soft as her voice was. His eyes stung with tears and he choked on a sob. Sabine was conscious—the relief was overwhelming. "I'm here," he answered thickly. He wasted no time moving to the makeshift med-bay, running as fast as his own sore body would allow, but slowing to a casual jog when he reached the door, not wanting her to pick up on his anxiety. He saw that Sabine hadn't tried to sit up yet, but she gave him a wan smile.

"Hey."

"Hey yourself." Ezra tried to act like he hadn't been through the emotional wringer, but two words were about all he could manage without breaking down. He eased onto the side of the bed, taking Sabine's hand. He curled his fingers loosely around her wrist, feeling her pulse beneath his fingertips, sure and strong.

"We're not dead," she sighed. It was as much a relieved statement as it was a gentle reminder to Ezra that she was here, she was fine, and they needed to start figuring out how to improve their current situation. She cleared her throat. "How'd we pull that off?"

He frowned. "You don't remember?"

"I remember the first round of shots and I remember…" She squinted, searching her memory. "I remember thinking I could use the cloud-cover to lose whoever was on our tail." She glanced outside. "Did it work?"

"For now," he answered tightly. "But you pulled off some real Hera-style stunts when you realized we were going to crash." He cupped her cheek in his hand. "You were incredible."

Her nose scrunched. "If I was incredible, we wouldn't have—had an exciting landing." She shifted on the bunk, wincing. Her eyes were dull, denoting a substantial headache. She touched a hand to her forehead self-consciously, fingers skimming over an angry-looking gash. "I'll have to cut bangs just to cover this up," she groaned.

"I think you should leave it. Makes you look tough." She gave him a half-hearted smile and he folded his arms over his chest, studying her. "What else hurts?"

"I don't know yet. Help me sit up?" With a supporting hand on her back, Ezra eased Sabine to a sitting position. A gasp and a pained moan escaped her lips as she tried to relax. "Everything," she said, squeezing her eyes shut. "Anywhere the restraints were touching me really hurts."

Ezra swallowed panic. She'd almost certainly suffered some kind of blunt force injury. If she was bleeding internally… "I bet you have some nasty bruising." He kept his voice as even as he could. "We need to check that out."

She didn't argue. "I doubt I can lift my arms to get this shirt off," she admitted.

"Thank the Force for scissors," he retorted, deadpan. He dug in their supplies until he found some bandage scissors, and he used them to make two top-to-bottom cuts in Sabine's shirt, peeling it off her with ease. He stopped cold when he saw her torso, already stained and mottled with dark bruises. The shape of the restraint harness was clearly imprinted across her collarbones, chest and ribs. Ezra didn't do as good a job keeping the horror and concern off his face as he thought he did.

Sabine flushed and turned her head away. "Not exactly how a girl wants to be looked at," she mumbled, sounding close to tears.

"Yeah, well." Ezra cleared his throat. "You could have died. Seeing you all beat up isn't exactly a turn on."

She sighed. "Cyar'ika." They didn't say anything else as he gently prodded her, checking for signs of broken ribs and internal bleeding. When he determined that the bruises were normal, he retrieved one of his own shirts from their cabin, helping her put it on.

"Try not to get paint on this one," he teased.

She gave him a fake glare. "Jerk." He sat beside her on the bunk and she gave him a sidelong glance. "Are you okay?"

"Sore and rattled," he said, "but not hurt."

"There's one thing that's gone right about today." Sabine stood slowly, holding her ribs and waving Ezra away when he started to hover. "How's the ship? Given that we're still on the ground, I'm guessing we've got problems?"

"We've got problems," he confirmed. He let her walk on her own, but stayed as close as he could. "Sub-light engine and hyperdrive both got damaged. I think they can be fixed, but not by me."

Sabine started walking toward the engine compartment, swaying just slightly. As hard as she'd hit her head, Ezra was well able to imagine she felt like the ground was pitching and rolling beneath her feet. She stopped as she reached for the door panel, orienting herself with the controls. When the door slid open, Ezra and Sabine groaned in unison.

Lights were flickering, warning indicators going berserk, and steam and smoke were heavy in the air. Sabine swore, picking her way through the narrow room. "We'll have to do this together," she said with a frown. She crouched by the breaker box, suppressing a pained sound as she wrapped an arm around her ribs. She looked up at Ezra. "It'll be a tight squeeze, but—" She flicked her gaze away from his, gnawing on her bottom lip. "I don't think I can lift the panels or—"

He saw vulnerability and a trace of fear in her eyes. He got down beside her and carefully pulled her close. "Together," he said.


Thankfully, all that was needed to fix the sub-light engines was a system reboot. Getting the hyperdrive working properly again was a different story. It took four hours, but the repairs were nearly done now. Under Sabine's expert guidance, the hyperdrive field guides on both wings had been reset, the ion exciters replaced, and the only task remaining was to replace the shunting circuitry in three places. Two of them Sabine had been able to fix herself. It was up to Ezra to do the last.

"You should see a large grey Y-splitter connection point just ahead of you." Sabine shouted as loud as her bruised lungs allowed. Ezra was directly above her in the engineering crawlspace that divided the two wing sections of the kom'rk fighter.

"I can't—wait…no, I think I found it!" Ezra replied, his muffled voice emanating from the open panel above her. "Is it this thing with the red blinky lights?"

"'Red blinky lights?'" Sabine was astonished he'd survived five years alone in deep space with apparently a child's understanding of starship repair. "Wait, does it have any writing on it?" She pinched the bridge of her nose and fought to keep her voice even. Impatience would not speed up this process.

There was a defeated silence. "Hold on." The ceiling above creaked as he repositioned. Several more moments passed while Ezra shuffled about in the cramp tunnel. Sabine set her datapad down and took a small sip of water. Her throat was scratchy and her chest still hurt to breathe too deeply, but some mild painkillers had gone a long way toward making her feel less like she'd been in a crash.

"Hey, I think I can read something!" Ezra called triumphantly.

Thank the Force. "Well?"

"Well what?"

"Ezra, I swear—what does it say?" she shouted back, wishing for the first time in her life that it was her who got tasked with crawling through a duct while Ezra waited outside. Oh, how things had changed.

"Oh, yeah! Right...ummm...it says...MM-PRM-HPYD...SHUNT-001A02-9." Ezra said, confirming her hopes. He had found the right component.

"Alright, I'll talk you through the steps. Make sure you do this exactly as I say, got it?"

"Yes ma'am."

She closed her eyes, picturing the components. "First, flip the large switch on top and wait for the 'blinky lights' to turn off. Then connect that cable you have to the port on the front. After the lights are totally off. I can't stress that enough."

After an eternity, Ezra called down to her. "Alright...the lights are off and the cable is connected. Now what?"

"There should be two buttons on each side of the box. You have to hold all four of them down and then flip that switch on top back to where it was while still holding them all down. You'll have to use your nose or something. Keep holding both pairs of buttons down until the lights come back on. They should be green."

"Use my nose? Wait, never mind. I got it." He sounded smug.

Sabine waited. Seconds turned to minutes. She took another sip of water and began picking at the dried blood in her fingernails, the dim emergency lights her only source of illumination. At long last, she felt a deep thrum from the bowels of the ship and sensed the vibrations coming up beneath her. One by one, clear crisp white lights came to life in the hallway.

"I got it!" Ezra shouted with glee, dropping to the ground in front of her a moment later.

"And on the first try." Sabine smiled warmly, and it was only a little condescending. "We'll make an engineer out of you yet. How did you flip the switch, by the way?"

"A Jedi never reveals his secrets." Ezra winked, reaching for her canteen and taking a long drink. "You feeling well enough to help me finish up?"

"I think I'll manage. I did get you to do all the real work." She stood, taking his offered hand and leaned against him.

He kissed the top of her head and sighed, relaxing for the first time in hours. "We're almost out of this."

"Mm." Sabine didn't want to jinx the rest of their day by agreeing to eagerly. "It's going to take a few minutes for everything to boot up. When we're done, wanna sit outside for a bit? I've had enough of this recycled air."

"I'd love to."


As they put the last of the tools away, Sabine looked at Ezra, confused, and said, "You never did tell me where we were going."

He froze. "Oh." He started walking toward the back of the ship, lowering the ramp. He ducked out as soon as he could fit.

Weary to the bone and hurting, Sabine sat down at the base of the ramp as soon as it had lowered. She watched Ezra pretend to examine the ship's exterior. A smile tugged at her lips. "Ez?"

The planet's setting sun was in his eyes and he squinted as he turned to look at her. "We were...going to Naboo, to see that Alderaanian moss painting exhibit you were telling me—"

"Wait." She held up an interrupting hand. "The art you said looked like—and I quote—'moist, moldy lumps of shapeless tree fuzz?' That exhibit?"

He smiled sheepishly and his cheeks tinged pink. "Well yeah, and there was something else I—"

"Ezra—move!"

She wasn't even aware that she'd seen anyone approaching through the fringe of desert brush, but instinct overrode conscious thought and Sabine was pulling at Ezra the exact moment a blaster bolt whizzed too close to his head and he cried out either in surprise or fear or pain—she didn't know which.

But his hand found her waist and he was shoving her roughly, yelling, "Get inside!"

She didn't go. Her blasters were already in her grasp and she was back-to-back with him, firing at one of the eight dark-clad aliens rapidly closing on the Gauntlet. She heard Ezra's saber snap to life and the familiar hum flooded her with a sense of relief—and it made their attackers stop cold. The leader drew up short, his beady, reptilian eyes wide and glistening with fear. He began barking orders as they all murmured to each other in a foreign tongue. There was one word Sabine understood perfectly well:

"Jedi!"

She gripped her blasters tightly but took her index fingers off the triggers, watching, dumbstruck, as the hostile band backed up and made a show of holstering their weapons, half-bowing in a deferential gesture as they retreated.

Only when they were no longer in sight did Ezra extinguish his saber. "This thing comes in handier all the time," he said, dazed.

Sabine forced a laugh. "Yeah, good thing all that Jedi training paid off. I—" She stopped abruptly as she turned to look at him.

There was a blaster burn across the side of his neck, an angry, blistered swath of skin which was surely painful. Below it, a vein pulsing with each beat of his heart.

Millimeters.

Millimeters had come between Ezra and dying today, and what had they been doing when they were attacked the first time? Arguing. Arguing about nothing.

Not-quite-anger and not-quite-fear settled in the pit of her stomach and the sound of blood rushing in her ears was loud enough that she couldn't hear him say her name. He caught her by the elbow and she pulled out of his grasp, turning away. "I want to go home," she said stiffly.

Something sparked in Ezra's eyes and he grabbed her arm again, holding firm. "Don't do that—don't walk away like that."

Under any other circumstance, her temper would have been piqued by the sharpness of his tone. But today, Sabine looked at him with tears welling in her eyes and she holstered her blasters and she held her hands out to him. They were trembling. Her chest was tight, pain flaring, but that didn't have anything to do with why she suddenly found it hard to breathe.

Ezra's expression softened. "We're okay," he said slowly. "Right?"

"We were attacked by pirates today and you got shot," she snapped. "We're okay?"

He felt the burn on his neck, wincing. "It's just a graze. Not as bad as your concussion."

She shook her head, mouth moving silently, before words spilled out, pent up things she hadn't decided to say until she heard them. "I don't want this kind of thing anymore," she blurted. "The way things were when we were kids—fighting for our lives all the time. I've gotten used to this life—this life where I get to wake up next to you every morning and the most dangerous thing we face every day is turning the caf maker on even though we know it could short-circuit and catch fire at any moment. I—I don't want to go back to living on the edge. Those years were—" She stopped, the ghost of a smile on her lips. "They gave me you. But I don't want that life anymore."

There must have been something in the tone of her voice, because Ezra's eyes narrowed and he said, "You were having second thoughts about taking your teaching job back."

"Not anymore," she answered with a shudder. "Not after this—not after I realized how fragile our lives are and—gods, Ezra—we're a karking good team, but I never want to be in that situation with you again. I never want to stand beside you and know how easily I could lose you and—our future."

"C'mere." Ezra opened his arms and Sabine leaned in, letting him hold her. His skin was damp with sweat, his shirt sticking between his shoulder blades. "I was scared to death when you got hurt," he said roughly. She could feel his chest rumble as he spoke. "I've never been worried about you before. Not like that."

There was a heavy pause and then Sabine said, "I don't want to live the way Kanan and Hera did. Maybe if we hadn't lost so much time…but I don't want to take any chances. I want to settle down, Ezra. Right now." She pulled out of his embrace, meeting his eyes. The intensity and depth of his gaze made her mouth run dry.

"I want to settle down, too, and I—I was taking you to Naboo to ask you to marry me," he said softly. "I wanted to make it something sp—"

Sabine's breath caught in her throat. "Ask me now," she interrupted. "I don't care if it's something special. This is special—us. Just ask me."

He blinked once, twice, and then cupped her face in his hands. "Sabine," he began, voice barely a whisper. "Marry me."

"Yes." The word was mumbled, nearly unintelligible with her mouth suddenly against his. "Yes."