By the time you see this, I will be (hopefully) done with this chapter of the story. Enough with all this ado about nothing(get it? get it? no? okay...) So, with no further ado, here we go.

Lothal

"Kanan! Hera's picked me up. Wha's your ETA?"

Kanan dived behind a wall as several lasers filleted the space he had just abdicated. He plucked his comlink off his belt, fired blindly around the wall, and yelled into the device.

"Ran into a little trouble! Got a plan. Tell Hera to meet us west and up of the rendezvous point!"

"How are you getting up? There aren't any-"

Zeb's voice fizzled out as Kanan shut off his comlink. Reaching around the wall, he fired blindly again, then waved in Ezra's direction, whilst Sabine covered the two from behind the hovering cargo pallet. Kanan's apprentice yelled something. Kanan yelled back over the laser fire.

"I can't hear you!"

Ezra shrugged, then ducked as several blasts slammed into the crate he had taken cover behind.

Kanan sighed, leaned around the wall, pegged the offending stormtrooper, came back around, and reached through the Force.

The water towers either side of this alley, between us and the stormtroopers. Got it?

Ezra grinned across the battlefield, fingering his lightsaber. Kanan made an 'oh no you don't' expression, then signaled with his right hand.

Three.

Sabine pegged two stormtroopers, leaving twelve remaining.

Two.

Ezra closed his eyes and summoned the Force.

One

Sabine tossed a miracle, whilst Kanan and Ezra focused on their respective water towers, and pulled.

Half of the stormtroopers saw it coming. The others took an unconscious bath, as the lucky ones ran. Or, rather, unlucky, as these were caught in the blessed area of effect of Sabine's miracle. As the dust cleared, Ezra took a flying leap up the west water tower, helped Sabine, and looked at Kanan.

Kanan yelled to Ezra. "The cargo! Help me!" He saw Ezra's look of realization, then he lost the view as their eyes closed while they concentrated. When they opened their visual organs, the cargo was up on the roof, and Sabine was programming the autopilot. As Kanan joined the others on the roof, Ezra popped his obligatory 'I'm awesome' comment.

"I did that pretty well, right?" Was the teenager-esque comment.

"You did okay. Let's move." Came the obligatory, tired of this teenage ego response.

That was a mistake, as Sabine heard the tone and jumped in.

"Great, glad you two are bonding. Can we go?"

Without further ado, the three ran across the rooftops, the conveniently levitating cargo moving at a slightly faster pace with it's untiring repulsors and machinery making the only noise in the Lothal night. As the trio neared the extract point, Kanan felt a disturbance in the Force, halted the party, and looked at Ezra. "Did you feel that?"

Ezra nodded, all teenage attitude gone. "Yeah, what was that?"

"Might be us, rebels."

All three readied weapons at the unknown voice that seemed to appear from nowhere.

A figure sprang out of the night's darkness. The figure rolled onto the rooftop, came up standing with the skill of a long practiced martial arts master. Wearing armor and a mask, but no visible weapons, the only defining feature was the neon red hair.

"You were supposed to wait and ambush, Red."

Another figure seemingly appearing next to the one called Red. Again armor and mask, but armed with nothing, this one's only defining feature was his dark green hair, seeming nearly black in the lightless conditions.

"Ahh, you know I don't wait for my prey to come to me."

The rebels inched forward, intent on surprising their adversaries during their byplay, when yet another voice out of nowhere came.

"This mission ends here. Just walk away."

A figure stepped out from the darkness behind the rebels, causing the three to spin. A man in full Mandalorian armor was revealed from the shadows. The red trimmed armor and various weapons on his person marked him as a bounty hunter and the leader of the three. The mask was oddly familiar to Kanan. Then he realized with a tingle of fear, that this man was one of the Mandalorians trained to take down Jedi, and this fight would not be easy.

Ezra, full of confidence as always, stepped forward and yelled at the Mando. "You just walk away. Don't want to get hurt, do ya?"

Kanan shook his head, remembering to reprimand his padawan later, when the man responded. "I'm not worried at all. In fact, now that you've been insolent with me, I am going to hurt you. Got that, squirt?"

Kanan stopped Ezra with a hand before the teenager could tick off the Mando more. He tried to be diplomatic. "Look, we want this cargo. So we could avoid a fight at all, if you just stepped out of the way."

The Mandalorian laughed. "Well, if you must know, the mission is not specifically to take you down. It's to stop you from getting that cargo. So I'll cut you a deal. Move. I detonate the cargo and me and my group get paid and we go our separate ways. How about it?"

Kanan considered the deal, then looked at the unnamed man. "Sorry, that isn't gonna cut it. We could take the cargo out and you could blow up the crates, but not the cargo. How does that work out?"

The Mando shook his head. "Well, it looks like a compromise is not going to be reached. We're gonna fight. HEP!" His sentence was accentuated by a grunt as he flipped acrobatically over the rebels. Landing in front of his group facing the rebels, he spoke. "Let's do this. I'm getting hungry."

Kanan, Ezra and Sabine spread to match their enemies. Ezra against Red, Sabine against Green, and Kanan against the Jedi Hunter. Then Kanan spoke two words. "Ezra, lightsabers." Ezra grinned.

"Finally." His bright blue blade sprang to life, illuminating the dark rooftop. Kanan's activated a second later, his longer, thinner blade blazing into existence.

The three bounty hunters considered their opponents, then moved. Raven drew two swords, tossing one of them to Red, and charged. Ezra and Red did the same, while Sabine fired at Green, who dodged every shot while working his way ever closer. The four melee combatants met in the middle. The exchange Kanan had with the Mando confirmed his fear. The way the man in armor deflected, attacked, and dodged in perfect counters to Kanan's own Soresu confirmed that the man was, in fact, trained to hunt Jedi. They both sprang back, panting, even from such a short exchange of even skill. Ezra's encounter had been less than even, not in his favor. The man with the red hair had accelerated just before the two clashed, swiping with the short sword, but even then Ezra barely managed to dodge. Then he realized he hadn't dodged, and the front of his shirt was slashed horizontally, with a graze on his skin. Ezra looked up at the bounty hunter to speak, then realized he wasn't there. His Force senses warned above.

"Whoa!" Ezra rolled forward as the red haired hunter drove down with the sword, right where Ezra's head would have been. Seemingly content now that the first bout was over, the man moved away from the rebels to the left, and readied his stance.

Meanwhile, Kanan and the Mando were engaged in battle. The two leapt, struck, and blocked, neither able to touch the other. Then the Mando made a mistake. He dove forward bent double with his sword in front of him. Kanan struck with his lightsaber, right at the man's head, and connected, a killing strike. Until the cerulean blade bounced off the mask. Left with nowhere to go, Kanan jumped straight up. He thought he'd gotten away, until a wrist launcher cord wrapped around his boot, and pulled him into the ground, where it let go of him.

Whilst the four melee fighters were doing their things, Sabine was busy keeping Green away from her. The only reason she'd succeeded so far was because of her skill at leading her target. Still, Green advanced closer and closer. Somehow Sabine knew that if he reached her it would be over. Out of options, she threw one of her two last miracles. Then, impossibly, it was no longer a miracle, but a grenade with the pin pulled flying back at her. Her reverse helmet cam showed her that if she threw herself backwards, she would go over the side of the roof with the grenade, and that it would explode before she got out of the blast range anyway. So she did the only thing she could. She dove, rolled, and leapt forward, colliding and grappling with Green. She punched at him as they rolled, then she felt him grab her arms. The only thing Sabine could do was grunt as Green kicked her off of him and backwards. She landed on the roof next to her friends. Then as the bounty hunters regrouped, the rebels realized what had happened. They had switched sides. The hunters had the side with the cargo. Then their leader spoke.

"Sorry, but we win this round today." And Green held up a grenade. Then Sabine realized that during their scuffle, he had stolen it. They had all been manipulated. They had lost. Then Sabine had an idea.

She held up her detonator and said, "Actually, I have remote detonator. SEE YOU!" And she pressed it.

And unluckily for her, it did not explode. Green spoke.

"Sorry, but I disarmed it. We win."

Sabine grinned under her helmet.

"If you disarmed it, it won't explode. So you can't do anything with it."

The Mando spoke. "Well, about that..." And as Green tossed it backwards, the Mando unholstered his blaster and shot it as it landed next to the cargo. After a deafening explosion, the Rebels stood up. The only thing that remained of the hunters was a note, saying 'Told you the mission was only to keep you from getting it. And no, we are not dead."

Pissed off and out of control, Ezra strode into the common room after the rebels. A few seconds after they had thrown themselves onto the couches, Hera walked in.

"What even happened out there? It was going fine, as far as I could tell. Then, you don't show up, I get worried and go get you, and all three of you are nearly unconscious with scorch marks all over the rooftops, and the cargo in bits! What the kriff happened?"

Sabine leaned her head back against the wall.

"Bounty hunters. There was a Mandalorian there. They outmaneuvered us and blew it up. I didn't really see more than that. I was trying not to die."

Kanan coughed.

"That Mandalorian was a Jedi Hunter. They originated from the Death Watch, trained by to hunt Jedi. They kind of went out of business after the Jedi were eradicated. This one obviously went rogue."

Ezra had been fuming this whole time.

"Well how the karabast do we fight him?! He isn't a Jedi! So we can fight him!"

Kanan shook his head.

"No, we can't. The only way to take him down is to outlast him, in that armor. And the armor reads your nerves, so even if you are tired, it will move for you. It's also beskar, meaning that we can't cut through it. Even hitting it with an EMP won't work. It's electronics and tech make it as heavy as it is. If we disable all that, it will lighten, and while he can't use any of his tools, he can move even faster. Sabine, give me your helmet. I want to see something."

Sabine handed Kanan her helmet. Kanan plugged it up to the holoplayer, and turned it on. He cycled to the camera which had recorded Kanan and his adversary's fight, and hit play. The fight went on, just as it had before, until Kanan made his deadly stroke to the head. And it bounced off. Kanan shut down the holoplayer.

"He is next to invincible in that armor. All we can do is pummel him until he falls unconscious. That is the only way to fight him."

Zeb spoke up.

"Well, it was on'y one job, righ? Maybe he moved on."

"No. If he really is trained to hunt Jedi, then the Empire will keep him around. That's just the way they do things."

Imperial HQ, Lothal

Raven, Red, and Green stood before Tarkin and the Inquisitor. Red and Green had removed their masks, revealing their youthful faces. All three were seventeen. Raven, Tarkin noticed, had not removed his helmet, nor any of his armor, despite the heat. Tarkin realized they had been standing there for a good thirty seconds, so he spoke.

"You did manage to stop the rebels getting the cargo, but you blew it up. I'm considering holding payment on that fact."

Red started to speak, but was silenced has Green swung his hand up over Red's mouth. Raven, seeming not to notice, responded to Tarkin.

"Actually, we stole the cargo. It's out back in an extra garbage container. Sanitized and perfectly clean, I assure you. The cargo boxes the rebels stole were filled with junk. I think in the terms of our contract that deserves a bonus. However, I am willing to waive that bonus and just take our original payment on a few terms."

Tarkin stood, dumbfounded. Not only had the bounty hunters deflected the technicality where Tarkin could withhold payment, they had also managed to secure a bonus for doing something beneficial to the employer relating to the job. Then Raven had said something about terms.

"Speak, bounty hunter. Tell me your… terms."

"I'd like to stay on Lothal for awhile. It's been a long time since I've hunted a Jedi able to match me in the short combat we had. I'd like to fight him, one on one, each with the sole intention of killing each other. Of course, your pet Pau'an and Stormtrooper will be on hand in the case I fail, of course. Which I won't. But a smart hunter takes precautions. Be twenty five hundred credits for that job, Governor. I'll come back and see if you've got any more information tomorrow. Fall out, hunters.

Thank you everybody so much for reading, and I'll take my own advice and not write when I want to have the next chapter out. Glory to Revan, peace out.