"Kanan! Wake up!"

He groaned, trying to lift his head off the ground and realizing it was throbbing.

"Kanan!" Zeb called again, and his purple face was staring at him, smirking. O-Mer was looking over his shoulder, trying not to laugh. "How's your face?"

"Why did you hit me?" he complained, sitting up.

"What? You had a helmet on," Zeb objected, right as Ezra was coming around.

He groaned, massaging his jaw. "Did you have to hit us so hard?"

"Hey, you wanted it to look good."

"Oh, it looked good," O-Mer assured him, offering a hand to pull Kanan to his feet. "It looked great. I think you're getting a bruise on your cheek."

He glared momentarily at his friend. "I didn't see you getting decked. You're welcome."

Laughing, O-Mer helped Ezra to his feet too. "No one tries to hit an ambassador. It's a nice change of pace from trying not to die all the time."

"Speaking of, where's Granger?" Ezra asked, looking around. "Did he make it on board?"

"In the cockpit with Hera," Zeb explained, and they all began walking to find the others.

When they got up there, Ryder was actually the one talking with Hera. Granger was walking behind the pair of them. While they were talking, Sabine caught up with Kanan, Ezra, and Zeb.

"We heard what happened," Zeb told Ezra, referring to his parents. "Sorry, kid."

"Hey, at least now you know," Sabine reminded him, trying to find some light. Hera and Ryder walked past them, and Hera made a note to talk to Ezra about it later after they dealt with their situation.

Ezra nodded, standing as tall as he could. "Yeah. I guess I just need some time." He walked off toward the turret, and Sabine and Zeb took the hint. The information had been processed, but the emotions were still working their way through his head. He hadn't quite dealt with it yet.

O-Mer, who was standing behind Kanan, watched him go, and Granger walked up to the pair of them. "Bad news?"

"He's okay. He just lost some people close to him," Kanan told them, staring after his Padawan. "It's a challenge being his age with so much responsibility."

"Well, you would know all about that, wouldn't you?" O-Mer nudged.

"So would you."

Granger crossed his arms, leaning against the wall. "His parents, right?" When Kanan nodded, he went on. "I know the feeling. Should I talk to him?"

Kanan nodded, but O-Mer stared at him. "You're volunteering to talk about emotions?"

"Emotions about parents? It's not like either of you has any experience with this," he retorted, walking off without waiting for a response.

Neither of them tried to. A moment of stunned silence followed before O-Mer muttered, "He's not wrong, but jeez."

"He needs to chill out," Kanan agreed, tossing his helmet to the side and sitting against the wall. It was nice to rest for a minute.

"I've been telling him that for years," complained O-Mer, who joined him on the floor. "Good luck."

"You seemed to play a good 'lad in distress,'" Kanan teased, elbowing him. "Wouldn't want to get those ambassador hands dirty."

O-Mer rolled his eyes, staring down at his hands. "I haven't been in a firefight in years. At least, not any more than this. I told you my lightsaber broke, right?"

"Yeah, when you were fighting the Inquisitor."

"Never really got back into it after that," he explained, looking forward. "Illum's closed off, so I can't go get a new kyber crystal. Left the pieces of my old one on Thabeska, so I can't get that back and try to repair it. I don't even know if it could be repaired anymore."

Kanan shrugged, pointing down the way Ezra had gone. "He found his in an old Jedi temple. Maybe you don't have to go to Illum."

He seemed to take the point, but he still didn't look too certain. After looking around to see if anyone else was listening, O-Mer spoke lowly. "It's not just that, I..." he trailed off, then looked at Kanan. "I don't think I'm ever going back."

Dropping his gaze, Kanan tried to think of what to say. It wasn't like he didn't understand; he had thought the same thing once upon a time. That was just it, though: look at where he was now. "You never know. Something might come along that'll change your mind."

"Is that what happened with you?"

"Yeah. I didn't pick up my lightsaber for fourteen years. Dueling, using the Force, I didn't do any of this stuff until about a year ago."

"What happened?" O-Mer asked, resting his arms on his knees. "What changed your mind?"

He didn't answer verbally right away. Kanan nodded at the door Ezra and Granger had just disappeared behind. "He did."

A somewhat forced smile came out of O-Mer. "I guess I won't be able to borrow him for a while?"

It was absurd, both of them knew that wasn't an option. Kanan didn't stop looking at his friend, though. "That wouldn't help, though, would it?"

Even if he wasn't ready to admit it out loud yet, O-Mer knew he was right. No offense to Ezra, but that wasn't what he needed if he wanted to recommit to living like a Jedi again. Shaking his head, he avoided eye contact. "I lost those kids, Caleb. I was supposed to protect them and keep them safe. I don't even know where they are anymore. If I can't do that, why-why even..."

Kanan watched him bury his face in his hands. He couldn't imagine what was running through his head...

...or could he? How many times had Kanan measured himself solely by his ability to protect the rest of the Ghost crew, especially Ezra? If O-Mer had lived with the Younglings for six years, had they not become his family just as much as the Ghost crew had become Kanan's? The Jedi Code be damned, it didn't matter anymore anyway.

"I think you should talk to Master Skywalker."

"You don't get it. He was the one who told me to protect them, Caleb. I can't just show up without them."

"But you did protect them," he argued, resting a hand on his shoulder. "You fought that Inquisitor for them, and you beat him! You took the blame for it so the Empire wouldn't go after the Younglings, and they'd go after you instead, and it worked. Maybe you don't know where they are now, but you gave them a chance to survive, which is more than anyone else can say."

O-Mer finally looked up at him, daring for the slightest moment that maybe he was right. He lost that hope quickly, though. "Kalifa would have done better. Or Jinx, or Master Plo, or anyone else."

"No one else did," Caleb insisted. "You did. And no one is asking for better. They're asking for enough. Your best won't disappoint anyone who believes in you, and I'm willing to bet every last one of those Younglings believed in you."

The weight of his words rested on O-Mer. After a moment, he asked, "Did Master Skywalker teach you that?"

He grinned. "I'm telling you, even if you don't want to get back into training, you should talk to him. Somehow, he's got this way of knowing what you need to hear, even if you don't like hearing it. It's been really good for me."

"He's probably really proud of you," O-Mer predicted, smiling. "Between everything you've been doing for the Rebellion and Ezra, I bet he's happy to see what you've been up to."

"It's been good to see him every once in a while," he remembered, "especially the first time. He was the first Jedi survivor I've seen since the Purge."

"What's he like these days? Senator Organa talks about what he's up to from time to time, but I've... well, I've avoided him."

Kanan thought back to the last few times he had seen Master Skywalker, thinking about the best parts. "It's, it's a little weird, but it's actually great. He's not trying to be my master, not like Master Depa, but he's trying to help. He's teaching Ezra and me but trying to let us do our thing at the same time. I kinda like his lessons, too. They're not what I'm used to, but I'm learning a lot."

It was clear they had become friends since they had reunited. O-Mer was glad, especially if it made Kanan happy. "I'm glad he survived. I never really got a chance to thank him for saving the Younglings and I. Everything was happening so fast."

"Maybe now's the time to tell him," suggested Kanan softly. "I'm not saying you have to talk to him again, it doesn't even have to be soon, but I don't think you'll regret it either. He'll be really happy to see you."

"He doesn't even know I'm alive," O-Mer confessed. "I asked Senator Organa not to tell him. I've been working alongside him for years, and he doesn't know."

"It won't matter," he insisted, absolutely certain. "He'll be glad just to know that you're alive and somewhat safe. If you tell him you're not interested in Jedi training anymore, I don't think he'll think any less of you for it."

O-Mer stared off into space, but he seemed a little more encouraged than before. "I'll think about it. I guess I could use a conversation, even if it's just for a few minutes."

He didn't say anything, but he doubted the conversation would only last a few minutes long. Kanan was sure that if O-Mer made the call, more and more things would come out, and Master Skywalker would be willing to listen for as long as the ex-Padawan needed. He decided he didn't need to push the idea any further. If and when he was ready, O-Mer would know how to get ahold of the Jedi Knight, and whatever needed to happen would happen. Just like with his first conversation with Master Skywalker, Kanan was sure O-Mer would hear some things he didn't even realize he needed to hear.

~

When Granger found the kid, he was sitting in a gunner seat looking at a holo-still. A couple was holding a little kid with blue hair, which he assumed to be Ezra. Those'll be his parents, then, he realized.

He crossed his arms and leaned against the hallway entrance. "How long ago did they die?"

Ezra was startled to realize that someone had joined him, but he answered nevertheless. "A few days ago. They were helping other prisoners escape. Ryder was one of them."

"And they didn't make it?"

"What do you think?"

"I think that's a pretty good way to go down," Granger told him, looking at the image again. "Better than mine."

He saw the kid hesitate. Ezra was slightly torn between not wanting to talk about his parents and being intrigued about Granger's. His curiosity won out. "What happened to yours?"

Granger smiled. It seemed he already had a grasp of this kid. At any rate, he knew how to get through to him. "They got a little too drunk one night, went on a walk. An old buddy of mine found them the morning after, dead on the side of the street. I never figured out exactly what happened to them. They called me and told me, but I was systems away. I told them to get rid of the bodies, and I never went back for them."

"You didn't even care?" Ezra asked, but Granger wasn't about to take the heat for it.

"It was mutual, kid. If anything, they deserved it for forgetting about my sister," he explained. "They didn't care about anyone other than themselves. No one misses them, myself included."

Ezra turned back around to look at the picture, clearly not comfortable enough to respond. Granger took that as a cue to keep talking. "From what I've heard from your parents, though, you don't have to live with that. Senator Organa showed O-Mer and I the Bridger Transmissions right after we heard about your message."

"Yeah, they heard it too," he told him. "But they're gone now."

Walking up behind Ezra, he rested a hand on the back of his seat. "No, my parents are gone. No one remembers them, and the people who do don't care about them. Your folks, on the other hand?" He pointed at the image. "The fact that you even care that they're dead says something. Every person they impacted with those transmissions remembers them. They are not gone, kid. As long as they still mean something to someone, somewhere, they're not gone."

He turned to look back at Granger, who nodded supportively. If he showed that he believed his words, Ezra was more likely to believe them too. Turning back around, he asked, "Do you ever wonder..."

"If this fight is worth it? All the time," he assured the Padawan. "But I have my reasons for being here. I'm going to keep fighting until my fists or my feet give out, whichever comes first. Someone's gotta do it."

"But you're a delegate," Ezra argued, looking back at him. "Even O-Mer used to be a Jedi like Kanan. You don't have to risk your life doing this."

Granger shrugged. "No one does, but I can. Not everyone can put up a fight like your parents. Some people chose not to, like mine. Like hell, I'm going to be like them."

Ezra laughed a little, even if he wasn't completely sure Granger's parents were as horrible as he claimed. Tilting his head, Granger asked, "What about you, kid?"

He looked at his family picture again, not saying anything. He didn't need to. Granger knew the answer. If he was anything like Kanan, who seemed to be a lot like O-Mer, he was in this fight for good. After a moment, he shut the image off and grabbed his cadet helmet from the side. "Let's find a way to get your ships," he suggested, walking past Granger to find the rest of his crew.

Snickering once, Granger watched him for a moment. The sharp exhale caught Ezra's attention, and he turned around. Granger grinned. "Like I said, some of the best people I've ever met."

That made him smile. He didn't say anything back (what are you supposed to say to that, anyway?), but they walked out together with a little more hope than when they walked in.