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The Kestises’ basement wasn’t exactly a dream superhero home base, but they happened to have a perfect set up for all five adults to sit and watch the teens’ first mission. When Sabine managed to rig a camera into her helmet with a live feed, they all agreed that the mentors should all be watching on at least the first mission, and should all be in the same spot while doing so. Between the private nature of the room, the convenient size of the couch, and the proximity to the small children who still had to be watched, the basement was the clear winner.
“And you’re sure they can handle this?” Hera asked with a raised eyebrow.
“They have more training than we did,” Ahsoka pointed out. “And we were exactly their ages.”
“Right. And nothing bad ever came of that.”
“Shhhhh,” Cal stopped them. “They’re almost there.”
The tv in front of them displayed Sabine’s view of the black mist that was forming in the street. She glanced at her teammates one at a time, and commanded, “Kata, you sneak around, see if there’s, uh, anything you can sabotage.”
“Got it,” she nodded, pulling on the halloween mask she had borrowed from Ilyana.
“Ezra, do you…” Sabine paused for a moment. “Do you even know if there are any animals here?”
“Handful of rats, bugs that I have no clue what they even are, and there are a good chunk of birds nearby enough to call closer.”
“Use them as a distraction!” Kanan yelled, despite two way communications being currently off.
“Maybe just wait and see if there’s a way to use them?” Sabine suggested, trying and failing to sound confident.
“Okay…” The boy frowned. “And what are you going to be doing?”
“Confronting them.”
A chorus of “No!” came from the couch.
“What?” Ezra yelped. “Why would you do that alone?”
“Which one of us is wearing kevlar? And it’s not like I’m planning on engaging in combat,” she countered stupidly. “Just go do your weird animal shit or whatever, and let me talk to them.”
He rolled his eyes. “Fine.”
Hera paled. “She’s going to get herself killed!”
“It can’t be worse than Cal trying to talk me down while I attacked him,” Merrin commented. “Repeatedly.”
Her husband grinned. “It worked, didn’t it?”
Ahsoka grabbed her phone from the table, unmuting their end. “Sabine, you do not have enough details. Do not engage.”
“I can pick them up as I go.”
A chorus of groans came from the adults, which was completely ignored by the teen. She did a quick check on her armor and gear (which, hey, at least she did one thing right) before jumping down to street level.
“Hey!” she called out to the cloud she was walking towards. “What exactly do you think you’re doing?”
The mist dissipated, revealing a bleach blonde girl who couldn’t be older than the team. The only thing obscuring her identity was a mess of dark makeup around her wide eyes. “Fixing things,” she said, expression remaining emotionless.
She began moving her hands, conjuring the same smoke that had obscured her before. Ahsoka frantically turned the comms back on. “Sabine, get out of there right now.”
“Uh,” was her only reply.
“Did something happen to her?” Hera nervously asked. “She should be moving; why is she just staring?”
At once, three heads turned to the ginger who had gotten a sprained wrist in his first battle from gaping at their sorceress when he should have been running.
Cal winced. “Oh no.”
A moment later, Sabine got thrown back by a blast, skidding across the ground. In the basement, there was a chorus of “Oooooooo.”
“Bine!” Ezra yelled from where he was just barely in frame and surrounded by a small army of rodents.
Merrin snatched the phone off the coffee table, and brought it up to her mouth. “Sabine Wren, we do not give a fuck how pretty that woman is. You can work on attempting to ask her out when she is not actively trying to kill you. Which, if you continue acting like this, she will do.”
“I’d let her,” the teen commented, completely out of it.
Ahsoka sighed and took the phone back, switching over to the group call. “Wren is out of commission.”
Ezra's concerned voice interjected, “Is she okay?”
“Physically, she’s just fine,” Ahsoka said while rolling her eyes. “But it’s gonna be up to you two to disarm the assailant. Maybe try going for where the smoke’s coming from?”
“Sounds like a plan,” Kata affirmed from wherever she was.
From where Sabine was still trying to recover, Ezra continued weaving in and out of frame. However, the growing hoard of street animals—mostly rats and cockroaches—was very visible. They moved in closer to the epicenter of the retiring mist, climbing on top of its source.
The blonde shook off the attackers, then frowned at their commander. “What are you doing?”
Ezra smirked. “You ever seen Enchanted?”
She blinked, still batting off bugs. “No?”
“Oh.” He visibly deflated. “Well then my joke isn't funny.”
“I thought it was!” Kata chimed in.
“Thank you!”
“Who are you talking to?” Their villain asked.
“Uhhh…” Ezra fibbed slowly. “I’m on the phone with my…girlfriend…who is not here!”
Cal chuckled in contrast with Kanan’s groaning and Ahsoka’s exclamation of “They’re all hopeless!”
With a roll of her eyes, the blonde mumbled something to violently fling away her critter attackers, much to Ezra’s horror and apologies. She stalked forward, charging up another spell in her palm before casting it at the boy, who barely dodged.
“Holy shit!” he yelped. “Uh, what should I do?”
“Just get out of there,” Hera commanded. “We’ll figure something else out, but your safety is more important right now.”
Ezra nodded an affirmation, finishing just in time to dodge another blast. He bolted the whole way around the square, impressively staying unharmed until he was inexplicably knocked to the ground. Or, at least there wasn’t an explanation until Kata phased back into sight, showing that he had crashed into her and landed beneath her. Their momentary mutual panic gave their adversary enough time to conjure another spell and throw it at them.
For a moment almost everyone screamed in panic, but the duo was still there and conscious when the moment passed. There was a brief reprieve of calm, before the teens frantically tried to pull away from each other to no avail.
Merrin’s jaw dropped. “I did that once!”
“Oh don’t remind me,” Kanan frowned. “I barely survived a day stuck with Cal and he’s my best friend. How are those two supposed to survive the day it takes for the curse to wear off?”
“I can undo it much sooner than that.”
Cal looked at his wife with a betrayed look. “You could undo it the whole time?”
“I was actively trying to harm you at the time.” She raised one eyebrow. “Why would I have undone it?”
“Can we please focus on the teenagers actively in battle?” Ahsoka urged.
In the time it took for the adults to discuss their glory days, Kata had returned to being invisible, leaving Ezra looking like he was both trying not to move an inch and defying physics by not doing so. The sorceress walked back to Sabine, who was just now sitting up.
The attacker knelt in front of her. “So, what’s your power?”
“Don’t have one,” Sabine grunted.
“Then why are you here?” she asked while leaning in. A moment later, she jumped back to reveal blood dripping from where a small knife had been lodged into her palm. The adults all cheered as the villain staggered away and Sabine panted.
“Uh, Sabine,” Kata asked over the phone, “are you just letting her get away?”
“Yes we are,” Ahsoka answered. “And you three are all coming back here immediately.”
Ezra let out some kind of squeak. “How are we supposed to walk—”
“You can figure it out,” Ahsoka responded with an eyeroll. “It’ll be a good exercise in working as a coordinated team.” The trio all began to protest, but was cut off by Ahsoka ending the call and leaving the basement in silence.
Hera was the first to break it. “That…didn’t go very well.”
“To be fair,” Cal reasoned, “if Sabine doesn’t have any serious injuries, then they actually did better than we did on our first mission.”
Merrin sighed. “That is not something to be proud of.”