A/N: I'm still upset.

Weight

There had been a weight-room aboard Sato's ship, the Liberator. Ezra had worked out there a few times, when he'd wanted something mindless to do. It didn't hurt that lifting weights was a way of quantifying how "strong" a person was, and Ezra enjoyed that immensely, seeing how many discs he could pile on at the ends of the bar before his arms said no. (At all of this, Sabine and Hera rolled their eyes.) Kanan went with him a couple times, and, inevitably, they entered a friendly competition to see who could lift more.

Kanan won, of course; he was more muscled than Ezra to begin with, and in peak condition from so many years of physical work. But Ezra had benched a personal best that day: one hundred ninety pounds. He'd been exceptionally proud of that.

But time marched on and missions piled up and he never thought about it again until the moment he saw the world explode and he suddenly found himself having to deal with one hundred thirty pounds of pure horror and shocked grief.

It was much more difficult than bench-pressing had ever been, because the bar and weights had never been thrashing, screaming, begging to be let go.

Lifting one-ninety and then permanently holding it above his head sounded a whole lot better right now than trying to keep Hera Syndulla from literally jumping ship.

His one-handed grip on her arm turned bruising as she lurched forward, reaching for Kanan as the fire swallowed him whole. Ezra's other hand was frantically waving at Sabine—for all the good that karking did, since the cockpit was closed and she couldn't see him—as he yelled Go, go!

We have to turn around—we have to go back! Hera kept screaming. And it was a nightmare because he'd never seen her so close to hysterical before and he just needed for her to stop and to stop trying to get away from him.

His only un-muddled thought: Kanan's just going to kill me if something happens to her. It'll be absolute murder.

But she kept bucking and throwing herself against his arms, now locked tightly around her. She tried a different strategy and buckled at the knees, hitting the floor, trying to topple his center of balance and crawl free. She was fast, but he was faster and he readjusted his hold on her, spanning his hands around her waist and hauling her up. It had to have been painful—he was handling her roughly; those were ribs he was feeling beneath his fingertips—but she didn't seem to notice.

Let me go! We have to go back—don't you understand? Ezra, we have to turn around! Kanan—

Hera!

He yelled her name with more ferocity than he really meant to and she froze for a moment before she tried twisting from his grip again. Anyone else—anyone else—and he would have slapped her, shaken her, forcibly turned her head and made her look at the raging inferno behind them. But he looked in her eyes and he just—couldn't.

Those expressive eyes that Kanan loved so much—they were wide with uncomprehending shock. But they were dull, somehow, like Hera wasn't really there. The pleading tilt of her brows said that she was still hoping—

For just a second, Ezra closed his eyes and reached out with the Force and when he did, he didn't connect with the serenity and surety that was usually Hera, but a blinding, choking vortex of fear, confusion, doubt, and sluggish mental process.

Ezra gasped when he realized—Hera had been drugged and she didn't trust that she knew what was going on.

Hera. Hera. He braced his hands on either side of her neck and stroked his thumbs across her cheekbones. It was something his mother had done for him once, very long ago, comforting him in the wake of a nightmare. Hera, look at me. Right here.

Please, she begged again. She forced herself to look at him. Her voice was softer, broken. He could hardly hear her above the sound of air rushing in through the open cabin. Please—we have to go back.

Hera. Hera, there's nothing left. She put her hands around his wrists, trying to break free, but he gently held fast. She shook her head, her lekku trembling, and he saw her start to understand. He said it again, because he knew he had to, even though it ripped him wide open. There's nothing left. He's gone.

Her face crumpled and she sagged against him and he stumbled back, catching himself against the wall. He slid to the floor with his arms around her. Hera's breaths were gasping and shallow as she struggled not to cry. And Ezra—

Ezra felt like he couldn't breathe at all. The weight of her body and her grief was crushing against his own.