Chapter 3: Home Again

*note I'm basing their sign language off of American Sign Language.

Ezra woke up that morning with someone shaking his shoulder. He startled awake and looked over to see who it was.

"Morning Kanan." Ezra said, rubbing his eyes.

Kanan returned his greeting with a smile.

"Do I get to come back?" Ezra asked. He really hoped he was using an appropriate volume.

Kanan nodded and handed Ezra a clean pair of clothes to change into. Ezra took them and started to get up and thought about where to change, before he thought for a moment. He looked around and saw that Kanan was the only other person in the med bay. He could just change there, Kanan couldn't see him. He started to change out of the medical garments and put on his clothes. It was nice to be back in his normal clothes.

"Ready?" Kanan asked. At least that's what Ezra thought he said.

"Did you ask if I was ready?" Ezra asked.

Kanan nodded with a smile.

Ezra smiled that he had successfully sort of lip read what Kanan had said. "Yeah, I'm ready."

Kanan did a 'come on' motion with his hand. Ezra ran up to him and grabbed his arm and they walked out of medical wing.

It was so weird walking through the main part of the base, seeing the hustle and bustle but not being able to hear it. He wondered what it was like for Kanan, to not to be able to see it, but be able to hear it.

Once they reached the Ghost, Ezra was greeted by Hera. She gently took the datapad that Ezra held before typing out a message and handing it back to him.

'Do you want to start learning GBSL right now? Or do you want to wait till tomorrow?'

Ezra made a confused face. "What's that?"

Hera smiled and typed out her answer. 'Galactic Basic Sign Language.'

"Oh," Ezra replied. "Okay."

Hera smiled, and gently pulled him towards the common room. Sabine was sitting there waiting as well.

Ezra smiled in greeting, but Sabine didn't return it.

Hera started up another datapad. Pictured on it was several pictures of hands with a letter underneath.

'This is the alphabet.' Hera typed on the original datapad. 'I figured it would be best start with this.'

Ezra nodded in response.

Hera started going through the alphabet slowly, Ezra coping the hand sign as she did it, as did Sabine.

'I'm going to try to spell something out now. I want you to try to figure out what.' Hera typed.

Ezra nodded.

Hera made a four signs. The first she bent her fingers halfway down towards her palm, and her thumb was bent across her palm. The second she used her index finger to draw a zig-zag in the air. The third she crossed her index and middle finger while holding the other two down with her thumb. Lastly she put all her fingers into a fist, but left her thumb along the side of her hand.

Ezra smiled, Hera had spelled out his name. He was about to reply so, but he wanted to try something. He attempted to spell out, 'my name.' He placed all his fingers down and stuck his thumb between his ring and pinky, then he put his pinky and thumb up, leaving the rest down. He lowered his hand for a moment, trying to single a new word. Then he placed all his finger down again, sticking his thumb between his ring and middle finger, then moved his thumb to rest beside his fist, afterwards he did his first sign again. Lastly he did Hera's first sign.

Hera gave him the biggest smile. 'Great job.' Hera typed on the datapad. 'I did spell out your name and you did a great job on spelling out your response.

Hera tested him by going through the crew's and other members of the rebellion's names. She also tested Sabine, and she was picking it up just as quickly.

'I think that is enough for the day.' Hera typed. 'If you want to look at some of the basic signs by yourself you can.'

Ezra nodded. He started to head towards his shared cabin.

Ezra opened the door.

Zeb turned and without thinking yelled something.

Ezra looked confused. He had absolutely no idea what his roommate could have said.

Zeb seemed to come to his senses and gave an apologetic look. Ezra offered him the datapad to type out what he had said.

'I said, 'don't you knock,' I forgot.'

"It's alright." Ezra replied. "But knocking is sort of pointless unless the person would answer the door."

Zeb smiled. Ezra climbed up on his bunk and activated the GBSL dictionary on the datapad. He turned to 'First Words.' Words like family members, eat, drink, yes, and no. He started practicing the signs. Suddenly the door opened and Hera stood in the door way. He realized she had probably knocked and Zeb told her to come in.

He glanced at the time near the top of the datapad and saw that it was around lunch time.

He turned to her and did the sign for 'eat.'

Hera looked shocked for a moment, like she hadn't expected him to look at more sign language. She then smiled and nodded, along with making a knocking motion, the sign for yes.

Ezra slid down his ladder and headed towards the common room.

When he saw Chopper he saw that a small screen had been attached to him. He leaned down and examined it. Words started to fill the screen. 'Sabine attached this to me. It translates binary into written text so you can know what I say, since your ears are broken.'

Ezra gave a light laugh at the way the droid phrased how he was now deaf. "Cool."

Ezra sat down at the table and Hera placed a bowl of pasta next to him. He responded by placing a flat hand against his lips and lowering it in an arch—the sign for 'thanks.'

Hera smiled. She started talking with Kanan. Knowing that he couldn't understand what they are saying anyways he just focused on eating.

"Is he picking it up?" Kanan asked.

"Remarkably fast. He already knows the alphabet and some basic signs like 'eat' and 'thanks' and probably some others." Hera replied. "The only question is if he will remember them. Even if you know them you can sometimes forget."

"Maybe you could teach me some." Kanan suggested. "I obviously wouldn't know what he was saying if he was signing, but it might be good to know some incase I need to talk to him."

"That might be a little hard." Hera responded.

"It can always wait." Kanan reassured. "For right now, Sato is trying to find a datapad that does voice to text for me so I can just say what I need to say and Ezra can read it."

Ezra glanced back up at Hera and Kanan. He really wished he knew what they were talking about. Some tears sprang to his eyes. He tried to remember what their voices sounded like, what was the last things he actually heard them say. Kanan had asked him where he was and Hera had warned him about the bombs going off soon. Those stupid bombs. Those stupid Imperials that forced him to go that way. Tears started running heavily down his cheeks.

He felt arms wrap around him. He tried to whip the tears away. It was stupid to cry over this. A pair of hands stopped his attempt.

The force around him was filled with care and comfort. He looked up and saw Kanan, he was moving his lips but Ezra didn't know, he couldn't know what he had said.

"I don't know what you're saying." Ezra muttered. "I don't know and it's killing me."

He felt a tap on his shoulder. He turned and saw Hera with the datapad.

'Kanan says 'it's okay to cry. You aren't week for doing so. This is a difficult time for all of us, especially you. You have to adapt to so much. It's okay if you need to cry about it.'

Ezra nodded and buried his face into Kanan's chest. Kanan offered Ezra all the comfort he needed.

"I'll always be here for you Ezra." Kanan promised, even though Ezra couldn't hear him. "Whenever you need a shoulder to cry on, I'll be there for you. We'll get through this together."