Chapter 30

Ezra POV

Months of effort and a near death experience. That was what Ezra gave so that Sabine could get her father back, and looking at her now, her beautiful smile on her face as she watched her two dads meeting one another, he thought it was well worth it.

After a moment, though, his mother stepped forward to say, "As nice as this is, we need to get moving. We're too exposed out here."

Rau nodded in agreement and pulled up his comm system to contact their other team, saying, "Countess Wren, we've rescued your husband. Alrich is free."

From the other end of the connection, they heard the sounds of blaster fire and explosions, and then Ursa's voice responded, "Then we have two victories today. Saxon's forces are in retreat."

Then, over the same line, they heard Tristan's voice say, "Hold on. They're not all running. It looks like they're deploying a single Imperial walker with no support."

Frowning in confusion, Sabine walked over to Rau's comm unit and asked, "Reinforcements to cover their retreat?"

"It's moving into attack position," Tristan warned.

"Laughable," Ursa said, clearly unimpressed. "Destroy it!"

Just then, an unfamiliar humming sound was emitted from the wrist comm, causing Ezra to tilt his head as he tried to discern what the sound was.

However, Sabine seemed to recognize it, and she didn't like it, judging by the way that her face paled and she quietly said to herself, "That sound… it can't be!" She leaned down towards the wrist comm and loudly ordered, "Mother, Tristan, get out of there!"

She turned to Ezra with a pleading look in her eyes, and he didn't even hesitate as he brought up his own comm and ordered, "All units, retreat! Get in the air, now!"

From Rau's wrist comm, they heard a sudden blast of static, and then they all turned around as they saw a large blast of light in the distance, from the location that the rest of their army should be. "What is that?" Ezra asked.

Sabine just looked towards the source of the blast with horror in her eyes, and she said brokenly, "No…" She quickly pulled her helmet down over her head and launched off in the direction of where her mother should be.

Worried, Ezra pulled on his own helmet and followed after her, glad that Alrich had already given him back his jetpack.

However, when they reached the site of the battle, there was no one to be seen. Of at least a hundred Mandalorians that had been here battling hundreds of stormtroopers, no evidence of the battle remained except for destroyed Imperial walkers and blackened armor spread across the ground. As he landed a few feet from Sabine, Ezra kneeled down to examine a piece of the armor and noticed that it belonged to Mandalorians.

Sabine began to slowly walk through the wreckage, looking back and forth at the charred armor pieces in the sand and muttered to herself, "No… no…"

Behind them, Bo and Rau arrived carrying Kanan and Alrich, and as they all landed, Ezra asked, "What happened here?"

Just as confused, his mother asked, "Where are the survivors of this battle? The wounded? The victors?"

"I see only the defeated," Rau said morbidly.

Ezra held up a piece of the blackened beskar and watched as it crumbled to ash in his hands. "This is Mandalorian armor," he said. "What could do this?" Having a sudden, terrible realization, he looked over at Sabine and said, "Unless… But it can't be."

"A weapon did this," Alrich said with devastated familiarity. "A weapon created by my daughter."

As he spelled it out for them all, Sabine fell down to her hands and knees in the dust, among the ruins of her own horrible design.

Unable to let her handle this alone, Ezra walked over to her and crouched down next to her, trying to put his arms around her, but she pushed him away and said, "Don't- Don't try to help me, Ezra. I did this. I deserve to feel like this."

Frowning, Ezra told her, "Sabine, you can't blame yourself for this."

"You know what I've done, Ezra!" Sabine called angrily. "This is my work! I created the weapon that did this, and now the Empire is going to use it to turn our world into a graveyard! Because of me, all Mandalorians are going to die. Because of me, my mother and brother are-"

Just then, she was cut off by a familiar voice calling out, "Sabine!"

They all turned towards the source of the voice and saw dozens of Mandalorians approaching them from out of the smoke. Almost all of them looked wounded, including Ursa, who had called out Sabine's name and was now approaching them while being supported by Tristan, but at least they were alive.

Her eyes widening in surprise and relief, Sabine ran over to her mother and brother and embraced them tightly before saying, "Mother, Tristan! I thought I lost you…"

Ursa leaned heavily against Tristan's shoulder and explained, "We were caught at the edge of the weapon's range. Thanks to your warning and Ezra's order, most of us made it out. But we lost many, at least dozens, more than the Empire ever could've killed alone, members from every clan."

The news of their loss weighed heavily on Ezra, but he didn't have time to think about it before Rau pointed to the sky and said, "Look! The Empire's coming back to finish the job!"

Ezra followed Rau's gesture and saw several Imperial Super Commandos flying down towards them, their armor and weapons undamaged and ready to eliminate the survivors. Ezra spun around and ordered the crowd, "We need to get all wounded out of here, which looks like just about everyone! Get moving, and we'll cover your retreat. We'll regroup on the Arquitens!"

Though many of them looked unhappy about being told to retreat, no one questioned Ezra's order. As the survivors all took off into the air to get back to their cruiser, Ezra turned back to the approaching Super Commandos and once again instinctively reached behind himself for the Darksaber before remembering that he didn't have it. His eyes then followed Sabine as she drew the Darksaber from her own belt and let out a yell of rage as she ignited it and launched into the air on her jetpack, slashing at the Imperials that attempted to shoot at her or the escaping survivors of her weapon.

Ezra was still baffled by the devastating effects of her design, but he held no grudge against her for what it had done here. The blame for the deaths today fell upon the Empire only, as well as that Imperial fanatic that no doubt ordered the massacre, Tiber Saxon.

As Ezra watched Sabine fight the Imperials with an admiring eye, he made a move to join her but was stopped by Kanan grabbing his arm and asking, "Why does Sabine have the Darksaber?"

Annoyed, Ezra answered, "Because I lent it to her. I figured she might want to borrow it to handle the Imps a bit easier."

"You can't just hand someone your lightsaber, Ezra," Kanan warned. "It's a dangerous weapon, not to be used by just anyone. Like I've told you before, as the Jedi Order used to teach, 'Your lightsaber is your life.'"

Ezra pushed Kanan's hand off of him and said, "She's my life, Kanan. I'd rather give her a weapon that she can clearly handle than see her die because she didn't have it." He then held up his other lightsaber hilt and shook it, adding, "Besides, in case you forgot, I have another one." He then turned back to the Commandos and launched into the air, activating his lightsaber as he left Kanan behind.

He flew up so that he was back-to-back with Sabine and began to help her in deflecting blaster bolts that were fired at them from all directions. To his surprise, a few seconds after he arrived, Sabine didn't even look at him as she said, "I have this under control, Ezra."

Ezra deflected a shot just before it could hit her in the shoulder plate and said, "Doesn't mean I can't lend you a hand. Care to dance, Miss Wren?"

She didn't even question him as she let him take her free hand and spin her around in the air before throwing her at one of the Commandos, kicking him in the chest and knocking him to the ground. Ezra flew back to her side as the last two remaining Imperials continued to fire at them, and Sabine said, "Ezra… Aren't you mad at me? The weapon I failed to destroy permanently just killed hundreds of our people. It's my fault. Don't you hate me?"

Ezra frowned and launched forward, rocketing into one of the Commandos and tackling him in midair. The other one followed his flight path and tried to shoot at him, but Sabine slashed across his jetpack with the Darksaber as he turned, sending him to the ground. Meanwhile, the blade from Ezra's right vambrace shot out, and he used it to stab the Mandalorian he was grappling with in the shoulder, then spun him around and stabbed him with his lightsaber before throwing the body to the ground.

Then, Ezra removed his helmet and clipped both the helmet and his lightsaber to his belt before he turned back around and rocketed towards Sabine at full speed. He saw her stop in midair and question, "Ezra, what are you..?"

That was when he cut her off by grabbing her around the waist with one hand and ripping off her helmet with the other before kissing her deeply. She gasped into his mouth in surprise before she relaxed and began to kiss him back.

After a moment, Ezra pulled away from her and told her, "I could never hate you. Understand, cyar'ika?"

Still somewhat out of breath, Sabine just nodded and leaned her head against his chest, wrapping her arms around him as he slowly let them float back down to the ground.

Sabine POV

As they were floating down, Sabine snuggled closer into Ezra's chest and asked herself mentally, How did I get so lucky? She'd never imagined that she could love someone as much as she did with Ezra, but he just made it so easy. Every time she thought she couldn't love him more, he proved to her that she could.

He was just so genuinely nice, funny, caring, and a million other things that she couldn't help but appreciate, everything she could've wanted in a significant other. They had both been there for one another through the hardest times, and even now, when Sabine was self-destructing from guilt and pain, Ezra still assured her of his undying love for her. How had she ever lived without him by her side?

When they touched down, they heard her father's voice say, "So… you two seem to work well together. Quite the chemistry, from what I saw."

They both turned to face the artist, but neither of them backed away from one another. Somehow, Ezra seemed to know that Sabine still needed comforting after what her weapon had done. He held onto her tightly, making her feel warm and comfortable, safe within his arms.

They weren't done talking about what had happened. What Sabine's weapon had done was far too great for them to simply gloss over it, and her guilt was too great for her to simply move on. For now, though, Ezra made it all a little easier for her by simply continuing to be here with her. If there was any one person that she would've been most devastated to lose because of her past mistakes, it would be Ezra.

Alrich gave them a moment, then added, "And in case you didn't get it, my words had a bit of a double meaning. That midair kiss? You didn't tell me he was such a charmer, Sabine."

She just rolled her eyes at her dad in response. Then, her mother walked over next to her husband, still supported by their son, and told Alrich, "They've done far more than that to show affection for one another, Alrich. I'm sure you've noticed Sabine's hair by now, the same color as Ezra's eyes."

Surprised to see them here, Sabine chastised, "Mother, you and Tristan were supposed to go with the other wounded."

"I'm the Countess Wren," Ursa responded, like that was a good excuse. "So long as I have a single working weapon, I won't be found leaving a fight."

Just then, Rau ran over to them and said, "We've got a ship coming to pick us up, and we need to go. We have TIEs approaching."

Hearing that, Sabine finally stepped away from Ezra, though she wasn't happy about it. He held out her helmet towards her and she smiled as she took it, then gave him a kiss on the cheek and whispered to him, "Grab my father, would you?"

Ezra nodded to her in response, and she gave him one last smile before she began to walk away, both of them donning their helmets. Ezra walked over to Alrich and said, "Going up, Count Wren?"

Her father just spread his arms, preparing himself for liftoff, and said, "Yes, thank you, Ezra." Ezra grabbed her father around the waist and flew him into the air just as a Kom'rk fighter flew down to pick them up, and Ezra flew them both inside the open deployment hatch.

Meanwhile, Sabine walked over to Kanan and offered, "Need a hand?"

Kanan just held up a hand to stop her and said, "I think I've had enough of the 'Mandalorian jetpacks' experience for today. I've got this." He then demonstrated his point by using the Force to jump up into the ship all by himself. Sabine, Rau, Lady Kryze, and Ursa and Tristan then flew after him, and the hatch closed beneath them as the ship began to fly higher into the air.

However, shortly after it began to gain height, it rocked as the whole ship was shaken from being hit by an energy blast. From the cockpit, Rau, who had taken the controls, checked his systems and called out, "They knocked out our weapons! I can keep us in the air, but we can't take another hit like that!"

After securing her father in one of the seats, Ezra walked over to Sabine and grabbed her hand before pulling her to the back of the ship. She followed him unquestioningly, and realized his plan as he hit the button to lower the ramp.

Below them, they could see two TIE Fighters slowly gaining on their Gauntlet, and both Sabine and Ezra drew the lightsaber hilts they had from their belts, then jumped out the open ramp into a free fall. They activated their jetpacks in sync and each flew towards a different TIE Fighter.

Not really knowing what she was doing with the Darksaber but also not wanting to screw this up and end up as a pancake against the viewport of the TIE, Sabine dodged over the side of the central pod on the Fighter and rolled in midair, slicing one of the stabilizing wings off of the side. Immediately, the rest of the ship began to spin out of control and fall back towards the ground. Satisfied with her accomplishment, Sabine watched it fall for a moment before she looked over at Ezra.

She saw him fall straight towards the viewport of his Fighter and got concerned for a moment, but he stretched out his free hand just before hitting it and used the Force to cushion the impact, landing in a kneeling position on the viewport. Technically, he was still gravitationally upright, as the TIE was flying straight up into the atmosphere.

Ezra plunged his green lightsaber into the side of the circular viewport and used the Force to rip it out, then stabbed the blade inside the pod, and Sabine knew that he had just impaled the pilot, though she couldn't see it. He then jetpacked off of the TIE as it began to fall back to the ground and shared a nod with Sabine before they both flew back up into the Kom'rk.

Once they landed inside, Sabine grabbed Ezra's free hand and pressed the Darksaber hilt into it, saying, "Here. I keep forgetting to give this thing back, and I think I got a little violent with it earlier."

Smiling as he accepted the blade and clipped both lightsabers to his belt, Ezra said, "I thought it was good. You can stand to get a little more intense sometimes. You certainly got results."

"But that's not how I like to fight, Ezra," Sabine protested.

He turned and began to walk back to the hold, where the others were gathered, and as Sabine walked up by his side he told her, "Our enemies aren't going to stop unless we give them a reason. Sometimes we just need to teach them why they should be scared of us."

As they arrived in the hold, Sabine suddenly found herself being rushed by Lady Kryze, the blade in her right vambrace extending as she angrily made to push Sabine against the wall with her other hand. However, she was stopped before she could lay a hand on her by Ezra holding out his hand, and suddenly Bo was thrown back across the room and pressed firmly against the opposite wall, where she struggled uselessly against her invisible bonds.

"You didn't really think that would work, did you?" Ezra asked his mother, sounding genuinely curious.

Bo glared back at her son as she continued to fight his grip and said, "I gave her a chance, Ezra. Now release me!"

"Something tells me that that would be a bad idea," Ezra responded, not relaxing his hold on her.

Taking a deep breath, Sabine placed a hand on Ezra's outstretched one and shared a glance with him as she gently lowered it. Bo dropped to the ground, but didn't attempt to attack Sabine again, simply telling her, "You're a Mandalorian! How could you ever create such an abomination? That thing is the weapon of a coward!"

Flinching slightly under Bo's glare, Sabine explained, "I was young and arrogant, and it was a challenge. But when I realized that the Empire tested it and planned to actually use it, I sabotaged the prototype and destroyed all of the plans."

"That brings up an interesting point," Tristan said as he walked over to them. "You told us all that you destroyed the weapon, but now it's here and still operational."

"The Empire must've rebuilt it," Sabine said, barely able to comprehend it. Yet she had also noticed that the weapon now seemed much more limited than it had been when she'd designed it. The fact that there had been survivors meant that the Empire hadn't managed to completely fix her design. They would be after her if they knew that she could increase its range and power. If they captured her, maybe she could get close enough to turn the weapon against them, give them a taste of their own medicine as payback for what they'd done here today.

Soon, their ship docked alongside the Arquitens cruiser, and they all began to disembark the ship. As they were exiting, several Mandalorian soldiers already inside the ship turned to face them and directed their weapons at Sabine, one of them calling out accusingly, "Sabine Wren! We know you built that weapon! You're a traitor to Mandalore!"

"Oh, not this again," Ezra muttered as he drew both of his lightsabers from his belt and stood defensively in front of Sabine.

As Ursa exited the ship supported by Tristan, she glared around at the soldiers and raised her one remaining good arm to direct a pistol at them as she said, "Any attack on my daughter is an attack on Clan Wren!" The soldiers seemed to tense up at that, but none of them backed down.

Finally, Sabine couldn't stand it any more. Shaking her head, she threw down her helmet and said, "No!"

Ezra put a hand out to stop her and said, "Sabine, what are you doing? I can get them to stand down."

"I'm prepared to take responsibility for my actions," Sabine told him, then addressed the rest of the assembled crowd and said, "It's true. I designed the weapons as a student in the Imperial Academy on Mandalore. I tried to destroy it, but clearly the Empire rebuilt it. But it's only operating at a fraction of its capacity. At full power, it will destroy armies. So you have a choice to make. We can fight each other, or we can finish what I started and destroy this thing once and for all."

Even after Sabine's speech, many seemed unwilling to stand down, but then Lady Kryze told them, "I understand your anger and fear. In many ways, I feel the same. But Sabine designed this weapon, and she is our best hope at destroying it."

There was a short pause, and then the crowd all began to lower their blasters. Sabine was grateful for Bo's help. Given Ezra's relationship with her, she wasn't sure how many Mandalorians would've listened to him even if he did have the Darksaber, not when their armor was threatened, but they did listen to Lady Kryze.

Sabine turned to Bo and said, "Thank you, my Lady."

Bo just folded her arms over her chest and said, "You can thank me by fulfilling your promise and destroying that weapon. You are dangerous, Sabine Wren. But luckily for both of us, you seem to be on Mandalore's side, so I will give you a chance to make this right."

And with that, Bo walked away into the halls of the ship, followed by many of the soldiers present. Meanwhile, Sabine just lowered her head as she walked towards the bridge of the ship, thinking to herself about how she could fix this.

A/N: I hope you're all enjoying this story! Now, just so you know, this story won't be updated for another week after this, as I am going on a little trip. However, rest assured that I will never abandon my stories, and I'll be back as soon as I can. Thanks for reading!