Ezra, try as he willed, could not make the idea shrivel up and die. Oh, no. Day and night; night and day it nagged him. Incessantly. Hadn't Hera said it herself? Why, he'd heard her say it with his own ears. The thought locked in. The Rebellion was losing crack pilots faster than they could be replaced. Lamentable, of course. Inevitable? Preventable? Well, there was no denying it, no two ways about it. Piloting fighters was a risky business. You sat in the seat, there was no guarantee of your coming back to rejoin the fleet. So, what to do about offsetting the current shortage of ace pilots?
That was where he thought he could come in. Do his part, if it might help any.
It wasn't just a matter of good training. Finesse, personal style, and some degree of good fortune a good pilot needed under his or her belt too.
There was where his mind kept taking him. What stopped him from filling one of those seats? He could be trained, right? Look how far he'd come with his Jedi training. Kanan kept telling him so daily. He would have the Force on his side. The more he thought about it, the more he sensed he could make a success out of becoming a skilled, useful pilot for the Rebellion. He could begin. He owed it to the Cause. Currently, aside from a lack of skill putting him off, there was the pain of separation leaving his 'family' was sure to bring. He loved, was deliriously crazy about, these cherishable souls. Kanan, Hera, Zeb, Chopper, too, and most of all he adored his beloved Sabine. Yes, she was his, and made no bones about letting him know how thoroughly he'd won her over. They hadn't shared intimacies, yet. They were saving those things for the next level, which looked as though might be postponed if he left her behind to answer a trickier call, a pursuit larger than any of them. Being with them had given him this sense of sacrifice. Raising the stakes. Answering that call.
Strategically placing the needs of many above the couple's private concerns.
Swallowing down the ticklish lump now lodged in his throat, Ezra, still on tenterhooks over whom to approach first with what he had in mind, bowed his head over his hands that were folded on the common room table. Heaving a considerable sigh, he shut his eyes, thinking. Thinking...thinking...which gradually gave way to meditating. Doing so the Jedi way. As he concentrated, beads of sweat formed across his glistening brow, bigger drops taking shape the harder he focused.
He startled upon opening his eyes when his unfocused gaze settled upon Sabine, standing squarely before him. Having struck a familiar pose, her arms crossed over her chest, her stance strong, she landed the full weight of her stare on him.
"Hey," she barked, "are you all right? If you ask me, you look like you could use some fresh air." Rambling on, she capped, "Which wouldn't be a bad idea for all of us. But, try finding some of it aboard this stuffy, stale ship. Maybe I should get to work on reconditioning those venti-"
"Sabine..." Barely above a whisper he'd spoken her name, as if it were too painful to say.
She dropped down beside him without a moment's hesitation and nudged him with her right shoulder. The effort she put into it fell somewhere between waggish and weighty. It was no surprise how well she could read him at this stage. "Whatever's on your mind, let's have it." She gave into her impulse, gliding her hand through his long, flowing locks.
"Uh...I've been...thinking."
With a humorous lilt to her kittenish voice, she replied, "Well, you have been known to do it. Surprise, surprise." She took his torso between her hands to jostle him lightly.
Her attempt at questionable wittiness only made it worse. Boy, was he going to miss her and her knavish kidding. His voice went softer. "Thinking about what Hera said about...about..."
"About what?" Sabine linked his left arm with her right while crossing her legs and leaned back further into the backrest cushion. "I'm not in the mood for another one of your Outer Rim guessing games." In other words, her take on what she considered backwards.
Through a sigh, he insisted, "No, no, nothing like that. No." He visibly drooped and sagged; his chin listed against the left portion of his collarbone. He had no idea why this area of the clavicle felt tender. Maybe some mistake during a training session accounted for it. "It's what Hera said and what I think I should do about it."
What is he trying to say this time, she thought, hating it when he beat around the bush. A big, bushy bush. "Ezra..." Sabine elbowed, with the actual joint and her inflection. "Just tell me already."
He spat it out in a swift breath with his heart up his throat. "The Rebellion needs pilots. Hera said so. I'm thinking of becoming one. It's what I think I should do!"
Stone-struck, Sabine, blood drained from her face, froze, forgetting how to breathe. Her, "What?" trickled from her mouth, sounding strangled as she scowled at him, unrelentingly. "What!" she cried a second time.
Maybe he'd said it too fast, so he repeated, "I think I should become a pilot."
Over my dead body! Ezra Bridger, you leave me now-I'll kill you!
Had she just thought that, or had she blared it out loud? The way he stared at her now, gawking with his mouth wide open, looking shocked and desperate, maybe she had.