kaneraforeva: *sighs.*
Is there something about "love triangle crack shipping" and "I don't take requests" that people just DON'T understand.

Perhaps I should modify the pairing tags so that Kanan is involved...

When Valen Rudor woke up, he was in the middle of a field.

He could vaguely remember screaming, and fire, and falling. Lots of screaming. And falling, yeah. He'd…been hit?

Groaning as soreness began to prickle his limbs, he pushed himself up. Apparently, he'd just…fallen asleep in the ground, face down in the dry Lothal grass. Why the heck had he done that? And where was his ship?

The second question was answered first, and it so happened to answer the first one for him. Just as he turned his head (wincing at his sore neck), his eyes settled on the smoking black husk of twisted metal and shattered glass that was — or used to be — his TIE fighter. The grass was flattened and dirt upturned a quarter mile behind it…he did recall skidding quite a ways, now that he thought back on it. Upon giving it a bit more thought, he knew now why he was lying in the ground ten meters away, too…

He remembered every detail of it now — he'd been hit, his ship was on fire, he was barreling towards the surface of Lothal at an angle and speed he wasn't sure he'd survive this time. In a larger craft he'd surely have a chance, but in a craft like this, there was no doubt that he was going to die if he stayed in. So, as she was falling, and as the ground came closer, Rudor opened the hatch and jumped ship.

He could remember landing fine, but somehow his body had decided it a good idea to take a nap directly afterward. And now here he was — hazy in the head, sore as heck, and bruised in several unpleasant places.

And alone.

Immediately he reached for the radio comm at his belt, only to realize that for whatever reason, it was gone. Panicking, he began to scour the area, but it was a lost cause. The thing was so tiny, you could mistake it for a pebble if you weren't looking close enough…he might as well check his ship for all it mattered.

And so, he did. He couldn't find his comm but he did find the emergency kit, half of his helmet and a spare blaster. It wasn't much, but it was a start.

It took him a little while, and some rummaging in the emergency kit, to jog his memory of the emergency crash procedures. Of course, he'd just used them a couple months ago, but for whatever reason it took a while to remember what he'd done. Hmm…weird.

He ended up sitting in the middle of a circle of supplies, arranged by size with largest on the left and smallest on the right. This was about when a small part of him began to question his own health, especially since every time he turned his head it felt like Lothal was about to spin out of its star's gravity. Also, why was the blaster in front of the tent? The tent was a lot bigger than the blaster, especially once it got popped up. Like it is for sleeping time. Hmmm…he began to wonder if he should go to sleep again. He was getting awfully tired.

When he woke up again, it was nighttime. Overhead, stars glittered, and down below, insects crawled over his nose. Spluttering in disgust Rudor sat bolt upright and flung his arms wildly about his face to shoo the insects away or at the very least kill them before they poisoned him or gave him a sickness or something else of the vile sort — also accidentally slapping himself in the face as he did so, but not killing any bugs.

He had to find help somewhere — and fast. Since he was still here it was obvious they hadn't managed to track him down, and might not for days. Looking around at the disrupted dirt he realized, to his slightly-fatalistic half-annoyance, that something had dragged away all his food while he had been out cold again. And something else — something with teenager-sized bootprints that seemed to have been purposely driven into the dust to mock him — had stolen his blasters, his helmet and his emergency kit. And, upon second glance, most of the salvageable parts from his decimated TIE fighter.

On the horizon, he could swear he saw the faint glow of an Imperially-powered patrol station, or possibly even a city. Obviously his navi computers were no good (because someone had shuffled through and stolen 90% of the hardware) so he had no way to tell which one or how far it would take to walk there. He might spend all night walking and it might turn out to be a pirates' tribe, for all he knew — and he would be dead meat for sure.

Or…he could guarantee himself dead meat, and follow the trail of the rat who'd stolen his equipment.

Obviously, the thief's camp had to be close by — if anywhere at all. He couldn't count on it and was far from an expert tracker but, well, following something was better than following nothing. And besides, it seemed as if the thief's tracks took him in the same general direction as the patrol station/city/pirate camp. He'd be going in that direction anyway.

So, battered, bruised, and slightly concussed, the esteemed Baron Valen Rudor followed the faint path of the thief towards what he hoped would be his salvation.

The second Ezra's boot touched the floor of the Ghost, Kanan magically appeared a meter away and started yelling in his ear.

"Where were you?!" he bellowed, hands gripping dangerously around the makeshift cane that he used to a violent degree. "It's EVERY TIME, I swear. Every time — it's like the second this ship touches ground you're not able to keep yourself from bolting off into the middle of nowhere and bringing back — what even is this? Hera, please tell me that he's not carrying machinery — "

"I'm sorry to upset the poor old blind man, but unfortunately, you're right," Hera slid down the ladder and snatched the huge sack from Ezra's hands. "What even is this stuff, Ezra?"

Ezra, his cheeks red, folded his arms and let her have it. "Just some stuff I snatched off a crashed TIE a few miles out," he snapped moodily. "You're welcome."

Hera's green eyes widened slightly as she drew out what looked like the imploded insides of a tablet. "This is a prime-grade navi motherboard," she murmured, almost as if in awe. "And you took out the locator beacons, good for you. But still…look at this wiring. These haven't even hit the public markets yet. What kind of crashed TIE was this?"

"Hera!" Kanan whined, obviously not sensing any sort of punishments for the teenager's rebellion in the near future. "What — I'm trying to discipline my flighty Padawan and you're focusing on the navi motherboard?"

"Um, yes, because why not," she replied without skipping a beat. "This has to be the newest model. And, if I'm not mistaken, I just shot one of these guys down earlier today. Where exactly did you find this?"

Ezra had begun to relax, and he shrugged. "A couple miles due west. Sabine caught him on her scanners and it was too much to resist, so I went."

"Whoa." Hera turned the thing over in her hands, but then seemed to realize something and narrowed her eyes. "You…did make sure to cover your tracks on the way back this time, right?"

"Jeez, Mom," Ezra rolled his blue eyes and made the best teenager 'durr' face. "Of COURSE I did. Okay, okay, maybe I DID mock him and make them super obvious for the first like half mile or so, but it's fine. It's not, like, he'll even be able to FOLLOW me. He was out, like, completely cold. If he does follow me back here, it'll be out of pure luck."

She frowned at him, and briefly contemplated getting back into the cockpit and changing location just to be sure. However, she'd already showered and changed into her comfy sleeping clothes and for some reason, though she loved her ship more than she loved life itself, she always felt like she needed to shower again after sitting in her greasy, oil-sticky, ratty, glorious old throne. Sure, she still loved it, but flying after sleeping hours was something she hadn't done since she was a younger woman — she'd had the energy back then. Truth to be told, all she wanted now was bed.

And besides, Ezra had apparently stolen any piece of communication the pilot had had on his person and his TIE, and it wasn't like there was an imperial station anywhere near on this side of Lothal. If he did happen to find them, especially in the conditions that Ezra reported, they'd know about it.

"All right. Fine. I'll let it slide this time, Ezra," she sighed as she put her hand on Kanan's shoulder and ignored the facial expression he was trying to make in her direction. "We'll talk about this later, love. Now. I think it's time for all of us to get some rest."

"But I'm gonna have a word with you in the morning," Kanan reminded Ezra, for good measure.

Ezra was not even in the room anymore.