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It was cold on Lothal. The rest of the crew didn’t notice the change in season, still complaining about Lothal’s arid and dry temperature. Ezra had to admit, even he hadn’t felt it at first. Stepping off the air-conditioned Ghost and into the heat of Lothal’s blistering sun, he could have easily mistaken it for the peak of summer, but they had been resting on Lothal for a few days now and he had acclimatised to his home-planet’s cycle around its sun.
It was cold on Lothal.
That day, he hadn’t felt like breakfast. Even when Hera called to him from the common area, her maternal cooing trying to coax him to a ‘family’ meal, he found himself turning it down. Even when Sabine playfully jibed about eating his Meeilorun if he didn’t make it to the table in five minutes. Even when Kanan passed his room on his way to the common area and poked his head into the doorway, his large eyebrow quirked in a quizzical manner – Ezra turned onto his side in his bunk, facing the wall.
There were a number of days that reminded him of his parents. His birthday and Empire day, Life Day and his mother’s birthday, which sat towards the beginning of a standard year. But this was a whole week where they lingered in the back of his mind, the slightly cooler breeze rustling through the long grass outside the Ghost bringing with it memories.
Lothal hadn’t always been like this, its long grasses were once a vibrant green and the now-yellow wilderness had once stretched into an endless moss-coloured blanket. Not that Ezra could remember it this way. He had only known it to be as it was now, dry and lifeless and yet… home.
He missed the stories his parents would tell him about old Lothal. He missed each day that sat before the one he was in because with each passing of a standard rotation, it meant he was one rotation further from his parents. One more day at risk of forgetting their faces… their voices… their stories.
The team had discussed Spectre 6’s odd behaviour at length when, each night, once the sun had set, Ezra immediately returned to his room and slept. He didn’t want to train with his Master, Kanan. He didn’t want to play holochess with Zeb or Sabine. He didn’t want to practice his flying skills with Hera and Chopper. He didn’t even want to listen to Ahsoka and Rex’s stories about life before the Empire. All things Ezra had once been eager to do, now pushed aside and forgotten.
Ahsoka and Kanan discussed how his Force felt… off... not like Ezra’s usual aura, and Sabine scoffed and said they didn’t need to be force sensitive to tell that. It drained the rest of the team, trying to figure out the source of Ezra’s lethargy without prying too much. Hera was first to try to coax it out of him on the second day after he didn’t turn up for breakfast. She tried her motherly charm, encouraging him playfully and gently, but no amount of compassionate words could bring him out. Kanan tried that evening and the next morning, taking on more of a Master role. He had lessons to learn, stances to practice, jobs to do… that didn't work either.
On the third day of Ezra’s melancholy, Sabine decided to give it a go. Hera and Kanan had asked her to try and talk to him, and Sabine had resolved to do it before he locked himself in his room or hid beneath his sheets. She joined him on the loading ramp of the Ghost as the sun set over the fields of Lothal.
The rest of the Ghost Crew, as well as Ahsoka and Rex, watched from the balcony overlooking the ship’s hold, keeping their distance but all eager to see if this time, Sabine could get something out of him.
When she sat next to him, Sabine didn’t know what to say, so she didn’t say anything. She sat very still, knees bent and arms hugging her thighs, staring out at the same sunset Ezra had fixed his gaze upon. Her objective was prominent in her mind: get answers, but the method eluded her. An urgency demanded her to be upfront and ask her crewmate what the kriff had gotten into him.
Sabine knew that wasn’t the approach she should take.
“The sunset here is always nice,” she said and scrunched up her nose at the word nice. It felt meagre, detached, noncommittal.
“Mmhmm.” Ezra’s response was nothing more than a gentle hum echoing beneath closed lips. The bare minimum he could muster at this moment. Sabine pursed her lips.
“Must have been nice growing up with them,” she added gently, trying to make her comment sound nonchalant instead of a feeble attempt for answers. Her words were met with silence from the boy sitting next to her and she held her breath. Sabine turned to look at him, waited for him to give any indication that he was going to talk, and then sighed. Ezra’s face remained stoic, eyes staring straight ahead, and his mouth remained in a closed, unmoving line.
Well, she thought, looks like I’ve blown it too.
She was about to accept defeat, stand up and leave Ezra to his moping when she was proven wrong.
“It’s harvest time,” he said, and his voice nearly made Sabine jump. She realised it was the first time in two days that she’d heard him speak. “This time of year, they cut the crops. I’m sure they’ll get to this field in the next few days.”
Sabine looked back out towards the setting sun and furrowed her brow. She thought for a second, cogs turning in her brain, and then the realisation caused her mouth to fall open into an ‘o’ and her eyes to widen.
Ezra hadn’t been watching the sunset every night. He’d been staring out at the fields.
The reason alluded her, but it was a step forward she was grateful to make.
“Before the Empire control here got really bad, we used to have a tradition,” Ezra continued, without prompt from Sabine. She let him speak without interruption, her silent presence seeming to encourage more answers from him than the others’ questioning had.
“We’d cut into the fields. Or at least… my parents did. They used to do it in the middle of the night. I’d wake up the next morning and there’d be a maze. All the kids in the city’d join in for a few days before the rest of the fields were cut,” he explained. “We tried to do it every year. It got harder and harder the more the Empire was around. I don’t think they can even do it anymore.”
The wind moved through the fields again, crops swaying gently, and Sabine thought on Ezra’s words. She tried to think of something that would comfort him, maybe a joke to cheer him up, but she didn’t really know what to say. She felt his pain, she had lost planets and loved ones herself to the Empire and he knew that. So, she tried to think of what she would want in this scenario, if it were her grieving time with loved ones instead of him, and instead of speaking, she remained silent, watching the sun set over the fields until the sky was a vibrant blue.
“Do you want to go eat?” Sabine finally asked after nearly an hour of sitting in silence, turning to Ezra. He didn’t look at her, and for a moment Sabine was sure he would get up and leave as he had done the night before and the one before that.
“Okay.”
He shocked her by looking at her and offering her a small smile. She smiled back, reached out, and patted her friend on the shoulder. Then, Sabine stood, offering him a hand up and was surprised when Ezra accepted it.
Ezra was quiet at dinner, still not his usual lively self, but nobody pressed him to be anything other than what he was in that moment. Now that the mystery behind his behaviour had been revealed, there was no desire to pester nor pry. Instead, they spoke to each other, offered him the chance to join in the conversation so as not to make him feel left out, but didn’t pressure him to speak when he didn’t respond.
Hera and Kanan watched him a little more cautiously than the others did, making sure he never felt cast aside or unwelcome. It was their maternal and paternal instincts kicking in, neither of them liking to see one of their crew so down. Ahsoka watched Ezra cautiously too. She hadn’t known her parents all that well but that didn’t mean she didn’t empathise with Ezra’s grief. She had lost family, albeit of a different kind, and she did find herself yearning for traditions shared amongst that family that she could no longer get back.
But what she and indeed, everyone else around the table, had learned was that in times such as these, with loss such as this, those traditions were not lost so long as you still had loved ones to share them with. Ahsoka looked up at Kanan and found him already looking at her, a small smile on his face. She smiled back and knew he was thinking exactly the same thing.
“A little to the left… the LEFT, Zeb.” Sabine called from her position on the balcony of Ezra’s tower.
“My left or your left?” The Lasat grumbled into his com, halting the speeder bike until he retrieved instruction from his crewmate.
“My left,” Sabine sighed, watching as Zeb did as she said. Once she was satisfied with his path through the tall grass, she moved her gaze to Kanan and Ahsoka. They were working their way through a separate path, lightsabers buzzing as they sliced through the foliage. Rex had taken to stomping, Chopper by his side spinning rapidly to sever through the wheat aggressively. All three groups were now working just as they should, each moving separate ways to create the concentric pattern Sabine had spray painted onto the field earlier.
Hera stood beside Sabine on the tower, arms crossed as she watched her crew complete their work.
“It’s looking good.” She nodded, lips curled up into a smile.
Sabine frowned.
“Ahsoka, Kanan!” She called. “Stop there, that’s gonna be a dead end. Go back a couple of metres and start a path inward.”
Ahsoka saluted up at the young Mandalorian from down on the ground and the two force-wielders did as she said, creating a new path inward to what Sabine had determined the finishing point.
“We’re getting there,” she sighed, turning to Hera. A small bubble of nerves rose in her chest and Sabine worried at her bottom lip with her teeth. “Do you think he’ll like it?”
Hera’s smile widened, into that warm and understanding smile that soothed Sabine’s anxiety instantly.
“I’m sure he will love it.”
Ezra had felt a little better after dinner with his new family, but he still wanted time alone after he had eaten. After excusing himself politely from the table, he had returned to his room and climbed onto the bed. For a while, he stared at the photo of his family Hera had retrieved for him. His old family, his real parents. He did that until he couldn’t stand it anymore, clicking off the holo and plunging himself into the darkness of his empty room.
Sleep wasn’t peaceful. It was restless and there were strange noises outside the ship he didn’t have the energy to question, but irritated him all the same. When he did sleep, it was easily disturbed, and when he heard the sound of a loth cat purring outside, signalling morning, Ezra had hardly got any sleep.
Still, he felt better this morning than he had the last. Telling Sabine the story of the mazes had relieved a weight from his chest, so he found himself getting out of bed a little easier. He also found himself hungry, in dire need of breakfast.
He wandered through the ship and into the common area, frowning when he found it empty. Zeb’s bunk had been unoccupied, so he had thought the rest of the crew were up. Instead, nobody was around. Even when he peeked his head into Sabine’s room or Hera’s or Kanan’s… nothing. No one. Not even Chopper.
He did notice, however, when he went to the hold, that the Ghost’s landing ramp was lowered. He furrowed his brow, making his way down the ladder and stepping out of the ship.
Ezra Bridger thought he was used to surprises. He thought, after his time spent with thee Ghost Crew running around the galaxy completing missions for the rebellion, that there was little more they or anyone else could do to truly shock him.
That was until he stepped a few steps down the loading ramp and saw a pathway cut into the grass, a small sign driven into the ground beside it. The sign read;
Breakfast on the other end.
Ezra didn’t realise he was smiling until he started laughing, his happiness too overwhelming to contain. He was also crying, and he furiously wiped his eyes to stop the tears from staining his cheeks. He hesitated a moment, wanting to savour this moment, before his inner child could wait no longer.
He broke off into a run, darting through the path in the crops. It was a twisting and winding maze, brilliantly executed. He met dead ends three times, each signalled with another wooden sign driven into the ground.
Not this way.
Quick turn around.
I’m eating your Meiloorun as we speak.
With each step further into the maze, his happiness grew, his heart swelling in his chest. It was just like before, and though he knew it wouldn’t be his parents waiting for him at the end of the maze, that fact didn't make him sad. How could it when he knew his other family would be waiting there for him instead?
As he ran, he held his hand out, feeling the long grass run through his fingers. With the speed he was running, sometimes the grass whipped at his palms, stinging slightly, but he didn’t mind. He relished in the feel of it, the ears tickling his fingers and reminding him of his childhood.
After a few minutes, he slowed his pace, sensing he was near the end. He ran into one more dead end, this one with a sign reading Nearly there… and then he heard them.
They were whispering, trying not to make themself known, but he could hear Zeb’s grumbling about the floor being uncomfortable. He could hear Sabine chastising him for the noise. He could hear Kanan’s soft sigh at their bickering and Ahsoka’s small chuckle.
Ezra rounded the corner and all eyes fell on him. They were sat on the ground in a large circular-ish cut-out in the grass, blankets from the Ghost strewn across the floor and fruit and breads piled up on plates in the centre. Kanan was nursing a large cup of caf, eyes dark with a lack of sleep, but all of them were smiling.
“Surprise!” They all shouted at once, Chopper whirring a similar sentiment in binary and spinning his head in excitement.
Sabine stood first, walking to him and resting her hand on his shoulder.
“Do you like it?” She asked, and Ezra could sense an anxiousness in her voice.
For a moment he wasn’t sure if he was going to be able to speak, the words catching in his throat and tears threatening to spill from his eyes again. But he managed to compose himself, take a deep breath, and smiled even wider.
“I love it.”
“We did some research and went to the market in Lothal this morning.” Hera gestured to the pastries laid out around her. “They said these were traditional.”
Ezra focused his gaze on a round, flakey pastry bun that swirled inwards, filled with sugar and a sweet spice he hadn’t had in years and he beamed. He sat down, grabbed one from the top of the pile and smiled at his family.
“Thank you, guys,” he said sincerely, and everyone’s smiles widened with joy. Kanan patted him on the back, Rex nodded his head at him and Chopper spun his metal skull round once, a pastry wedged in his claw despite his lack of a mouth.
“Traditions are important,” Ahsoka spoke up. “It’s our job to keep them alive.”
Breakfast was perhaps the best meal Ezra had ever eaten. Not only because the food was delicious, but because the company was even better. His spirits has been successfully lifted, and he was back to playfully bickering with Sabine and Zeb, joking with Kanan and Hera, begging Rex and Ahsoka for stories of the Republic.
There was no talk of the rebellion or the empire. For a moment they could all pretend neither existed. That it was just them in this whole galaxy, eating pastries on the ground amidst the tall yellow grasses of Lothal.
But it couldn’t last forever and indeed it didn’t. Eventually the food was eaten, the sun had risen high in the sky, and Hera and Kanan shared a glance that Ezra knew too well. Not to mention, he had been right about the farmers getting to this field soon. There was a distant hum of farming machinery he knew too well.
It was time to go.
The crew trudged back through the maze slowly, savouring its twists and turns one last time before they were brought back out of its entrance, faced with the loading ramp of the Ghost. They boarded the ship in waves. Kanan, Hera and Rex first, heading to the cockpit and not looking back. Chopper and Zeb next, Zeb trudging and complaining about how he had overindulged on the spiced pastries. Sabine and Ahsoka after them, glancing back at Ezra to check he was okay as he stared back out at the grass once more.
Ezra took a minute, looking. He wished he didn’t have to leave. He wished he could spend all day in the maze like he had when he was younger. He wished he could run around its paths until the sun set, hiding in the dead ends and jumping out at other kids enjoying the maze.
But it wasn’t that time anymore.
“Come on.”
Sabine’s voice made him jump slightly, and he turned to find her hesitating a few metres up the Ghost’s loading ramp, a smile on her face.
“I have something to show you.”
Sabine led Ezra through the Ghost to the gun tower as Hera started the ship’s engines. By the time they made it to the small pod, the Ghost was a good few metres off the ground, hovering over the fields.
For a moment, Ezra didn’t know what he was supposed to be looking at. It was the maze he’d just been in only from a different angle… until he saw it.
The middle area they had sat and eaten breakfast in was not, in fact, a circle, but a perfectly cut out replica of the Phoenix symbol. His old family meeting his new.
“We’ve sent word to the city that the maze is here. Other people will be coming soon to enjoy it.”
Ezra felt tears stinging his eyes again and he pressed his palm against the glass, savouring the view.
“Ahsoka was right, you know,” Sabine said and Ezra turned to look at her. “It’s up to us to keep these traditions alive.”