Ask Takodana Castle Crashers

[Alienor Pom Blodau]

When Alienor Pom Blodau would look back on that day in the future, she'd still get a little bit anxious over it all.

It'd started fairly normally. A normal day in the Takodana temple, consisting of some training and then time to pursue her own hobbies and thoughts. She'd recorded a couple of messages to family back home, who she missed terribly. She'd practised some of the saber forms she'd learned from Kaedan, before going for a walk in the late afternoon, listening to an audiobook about ancient galactic legends. She walked through the meditation gardens, round the ponds and plants, weaving her way between the other padawans and the knights, milling around and meditating.

She decided to cut through the garages and landing pads to get back to the dinner hall quickly, feeling a little hungry. That was her first mistake. The place seemed pretty empty, with most of the work stopping for dinner. Brightly lit, but wide and echoey. Spooky, in all honesty. Linny took the pods out of her ears and she could hear her boots squeaking on the floor. But that wasn't all. Somewhere in the distance, it sounded like... movement?

Her ears twitched and moved, scanning for where it was coming from. Over near a corner, facing out towards the outer landing pad. Some scraping. Moving. Touching and tools moving. Linny moved over curiously, trying to see who it was.

"Hello?" she called out, hearing her voice bounce off the Jedi shuttles, fighters and freighter ships around them.

@spfinx

 

[Jett San'go]

Hotwiring the undercarriage of a fighter jet was the closest she’d felt to “home” in a hot minute.

Monastic life was an adjustment to be sure. Jett was under no illusion that going from streetrat to studded Jedi within the span of a month would be an easy transition per se, but more and more she got the sneaking suspicion that she, fundamentally, wasn’t built for this. The robes looked stupid on her, the lectures were painfully long and convoluted, and she’d yet to grasp any of the formalities unceremoniously hoisted upon her.. Not that she was trying all that hard to. The looming possibility she was getting actively brainwashed had her a bit preoccupied.

That was the narrative she’d been fed her entire life after all. That the Jedi were all just some hyper-religious whack jobs built on false promises and hypocrisies. It was proving extraordinarily hard to shake the feeling she'd been baited into the jaws of some overzealous cult, and more so not to question the judgment that brought her to casually engage in a grand theft auto as a form of stress relief.

Not that it mattered. This whole “Jedi” thing was non-committal anyway. If she felt the need, she could drop whatever shaky foundation she'd built in past months and slip back into the depths of Coruscant’s under city. She’d proven pretty good at that in the past, so why not honor tradition?

With a crackle of voltage signifying her success, the girl scooted out from the ship’s underbelly with a self-satisfied smirk. One that quickly evaporated in the wake of an untimely “hello”.

Shit.

Restraining a slew of choice words, Jett pinched the bridge of her nose, rationalizing a way out long before she turned to face the intruder. Only to see a kid, maybe a couple years younger than herself, staring back. Great.

Jett arced an eyebrow at the young noble, having fully anticipated a vetted Jedi Master to be the one staring daggers into her. Possibly with a notice in hand to ship her back to the Coruscant slums that she’d crawled out of.

But no, it was just a kid. A very apprehensive one at that.

“Hey?” The older padawan responded, trying to give the distinct impression that nothing was amiss, and that it was in fact Alienor who was somewhere she shouldn’t be. “Shouldn’t you be- like in bed or something?

She was probably grossly underestimating the age of whoever she was talking to as well as the Jedi’s policies on curfew, but Jett was more interested in ushering Alienor out as quickly as possible than making any life long friends.

@Charndley

 

[Alienor Pom Blodau]

The girl scooted out from underneath the ship and stared at her, cocking her head to the side. She didn't seem all that happy to see her. There could be many reasons for that though. Maybe she wanted privacy. Maybe she didn't like the fact that Linny was younger. Maybe she just didn't like Annfyn.

When the older girl asked if she should be in bed, she turned her head to look out of the hanger bay, as the trees and plantlife swayed under the gentle bronze of a late afternoon. "Are you serious?" she asked back, folding her arms. Linny couldn't decide if this girl was looking at her like that because she'd interrupted her doing something important... or just because she thought she was annoying.

Her large eyes flicked up to the ship that the girl had been working on. Goodness me... she thought, taking in the shape of the fighter craft. That wasn't something to mess around with. It wasn't a freighter or a shuttle like most padawans trained in. It was a serious machine, built for 'defence.' Or rather, built to kill.

"I'm... not entirely certain you should be messing around with that..." Linny ventured. She knew very little about ship repair or the suchlike, but even she knew that those kinds of crafts tended to be serviced by... well, adults. "Are you sure you're meant to be doing that? You're not going to set off the weapons, are you?"

@spfinx

 

[Jett San'go]

Alright..the kid was more gusty than expected, clearly not the least bit shaken by Jett’s admittedly half-baked attempt to scare her off. It wasn’t ideal, but who couldn’t handle a nosy kid every once in a while? She’d just bullshit her way through some maintenance checks and put whatever funny business Alienor was conjuring up to rest. Easy-peasy.

It was then she caught the glint of concern in Alienor’s eyes as she regarded Jett’s current project in full, dashing any hopes that this conversation would come to a painless end. Ah whatever.. might as well keep on working before the younger padawan sounded the alarm.

"Are you sure you're meant to be doing that?”

“Sure am.” The Coruscanti answered with total nonchalance, turning to fiddle with two exposed wires before the ship’s top hinged open. In response to the latter part of Alienor’s concerns the girl simply shrugged, “And- I don’t know- maybe if the mood strikes me.”

She was joking of course, evident by the slight grin on her face, but she wasn’t hugely concerned whether Alienor picked up on it or not. She was willing to bet she could pilot faster than Alienor could run and tattle to the nearest Jedi Master. Well maybe. The Annfyn did look pretty speedy. Those ears probably made her extra aerodynamic.

“You’re welcome to join me.” Jett continued her exploits, fully under the assumption Alienor would take offense. “You haven’t lived until you’ve flown in one of these.”

@Charndley

 

[Alienor Pom Blodau]

Linny's eyes flicked up as the hinged top popped open. Weren't they supposed to do that on instruction? Gosh, it must be fairly broken if she's having to use wires to open it up! Linny thought, pushing past the twinge of suspicion in her head. She didn't know quite what to make of the girl. Confusion was written all over her face as she stepped back, about to head back away.

When she asked Linny to join her, she froze. Staring back at Jett in horror, Linny slowly shook her head. "You've flown one of these?" Linny eventually squeaked, looking back up at the fighter craft. The sleekness. The shape. The weapons. She had to be lying, totally lying. Though judging by the mad glint in her eye...

"I really don't think you should be doing that, at all. Maybe we should just... pop that hatch back down and leave it alone?" Linny suggested, intending to sound a little more confident and assertive. Instead, she sounded like a nine year old trying to boss around younger children.

@spfinx

 

[Jett San'go]

"You've flown one of these?"

"Eh...more or less." Once again, her ambivalence was punctuated with a shrug. A clear emphasis on the less in that statement. She'd carjacked her fair share of speeders and cruisers once upon a time, but a fighter jet capable of considerable destruction if used irresponsibly? That would certainly be a first.

Jett curved an eyebrow as Alienor tried her darndest to talk her down. Not sounding unlike an exasperated schoolteacher attempting to gentle parent a rowdy toddler. That in itself probably should've been enough to get Jett to self-reflect, but to no one's surprise, introspection was not something she regularly engaged in.

"What are you so scared of?" Jett asked, sincere despite the shade of humor in her voice. "That thing-" She begun, pointing with her thumb at the ship behind her, "Is a guaranteed ticket to out there." Vaguely gesturing to the wide-open sky and tree packed horizon line beyond the hangar, Jett looked back at the younger padawan. It was hard to imagine anyone being resistant to the idea of a little delinquency in the name of the Great Outdoors. At least for the smog bound Coruscanti it was.

Besides, she needed a break from the temple.

"Do what you want, but I'd rather see what this planet really has to offer instead of some sample platter garden."

@Charndley

 

[Alienor Pom Blodau]

"Out there?"

Linny's eyes followed the gesture out towards the skyline, out towards the trees. As much as she shared the appreciation for a little more nature in things, the obvious question lingered in her mind.

"You know we are allowed to leave the Temple? There's a front door and everything," Linny asked her as she pointed towards the opening. "And there's not really much out there but forests. Pretty endless forests and a couple of villages." She'd studied the maps when she'd first arrived, only to find very little on them.

Driven by a little more curiosity, Linny took a tentative step towards the ship. Standing on her tip-toes, she looked up at the cockpit, reaching up to lift herself slightly and look inside. "It seems pretty cramped," she thought aloud, almost talking herself out of it. With a scuffle of boot on the side of the ship, she climbed a little bit further up to peer inside.

"There are actual shuttles that we're allowed to take too, we don't need to use weapon-equipped ships!" Linny explained, as if logic and reasoning was going to help things.

@spfinx