Stopover On Jedha

Stopover On Jedha
Date of Scene:	16 March 2025
Location:
Synopsis:	The group makes a pitstop on Jedha.
Cast of Characters:	159, Pike Windu, Cayde Alexis, Navi, Annelia Belask

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Athena (159) has posed:
The trip to Jedha will be blissfully short, sweet, and uneventful, thankfully. Their guests, surprisingly, or perhaps unsurprisingly, are shockingly well behaved (despite the smaller one being rather picky about which ration bars they ate).

As for the two mysterious blue skinned males with untouchable minds and scarlet eyes, the one who had been at death's door remained unconscious for the entirety of their trip to the Holy City. Why, at this moment, will remain a question no one can answer - his vitals are stable, and physically, he seems just fine.

Now, the other, a few observations could be made about him in the several days long trip. Age and maturity wise, he must have been about Ann's age, while his companion was younger, likely around Navi's age and maturity, give or take a year or two. He was extraordinarily intelligent - within seventy two hours, he'd picked up a few phrases in Basic and seemed to understand about a quarter of their conversations, which was remarkable progress, given he couldn't speak a word of it when they'd first met him. Yet he is withdrawn as he is smart -- he seemed to wear a demure expression most of the time, unreadable as his mind, though from time to time he'd smile faintly or show weariness.

Despite his quiet demeanor, he wasn't inattentive or reclusive. His scarlet eyes seemed to observe everything, but what it all meant to him, of course, would remain a mystery for now.

When they land in the hangar at the Temple of the Kyber, he immediately ventures into the cargo hold. He returns with Cayde's bag slung over his left shoulder, and Ann's modest duffel in his right hand.

Pike Windu has posed:
    Pike is sitting with the comatose blue being when the shuttle lands.

Cayde Alexis has posed:
    For the bulk of the trip, Cayde had been mostly hiding in the cargo bay, or in the engineering bays, or somewhere away from everyone. Truthfully, he wasn't very much looking forward to coming here, as it reminded him of the entire ordeal with Tomi.

    What did they need to do here, anyway? Other than repair the ship? Hopefully, it wouldn't take very long. He goes to fetch the few things he'd brought with him on this little excursion and quickly head to wherever they'd be staying, but finds that it isn't where he'd left it.

    Frowning, he looks around and finds the blue stranger had taken both his and Ann's luggage. Almost reflexively, he tries to enter the young man's mind to discern intentions, only to find it closed off to him again. He's never going to get used to that...

Navi has posed:
"We must seem awfully dumb to him," Navi observes softly as she watches the tall alien enter the cargo hold. "I think he's learned more in a few days than I did in a whole year's worth of teaching." She had alternated her time between helping Master Windu attend to the still-slumbering blue man and assisting with accomodating the more lively one, and what she saw impressed her. "I wish I was half as smart, or as disciplined."

She smiles when he returns. "That is /so sweet/ of him! Anne, Cayde? You should be flattered. Now if he'd get /my/ bag, too, life would be perfect," she observes, giggling softly.

Annelia Belask has posed:
    "Could just be a talent for language specifically," reminds Ann, head shaking a little. She takes the duffel with a fairly neutral expression- at no point in the trip did she come to fully sit comfortably with the passengers, so much as simply accept their presence.

    With that she steps out of the ship, clicking her tongue as she looks about the hangar.

Athena (159) has posed:
After handing Anne her bag, the tall blue alien returns to the cargo bay and, yes, shoulders Pike and Navi's bags next.

But then he immediately goes to Pike's side, gazing at his younger companion for a long moment before giving the older Master an expectant look. One thing would have become abundantly clear to everyone over the past several days - he cared very much for his companion. Like clockwork, as soon as they'd left Ilum, he would check up on him every 8 hours, not a minute before, and not a minute late.

Jahni and Yvon follow Anne out of the ship, and follow her example of looking around. "Huh," Yvon says, with a note of disappointment. "Looks... busy." And it is indeed busy. It looks like several Vectors and a Longbeam have returned from... somewhere, some mission, and not in good shape, either. Technicians are rushing to and fro, trying to patch up the badly damaged starships.

"Marshal," Jahni says after a moment, "Master Yutelli says we should be just fine to stay here at least a few days. The Temple will accommodate us, and I'll need to run a diagnostic on the shuttle, take care of that special part we were looking for, and stock up on supplies."

Cayde Alexis has posed:
    Cayde turns to Navi. Oh...right. She has a point about that. He probably just wants to be of some help, after all they'd done for him. Hopefully...

    As they step out into the busy hangar, he rubs his forehead as there is a sudden onslaught of voices from the crowded port. He'd forgotten how loud these unfamiliar cities were, after having been away from them for a while.

Pike Windu has posed:
    Pike looks at the elder blue and frowns.

    "No change, I'm afraid. I'll stay here until a stretcher comes."

Navi has posed:
"Possibly. But he seems to have figured out some of the more complicated aspects of our routines aboard the ship, too. And remember, he started from the ground up on language," Navi replies to Anne. "He even figured out we were leaving the ship, at least briefly."

She gratefully accepts her bag from the tall alien, with a smile and a soft, "Thank you." She almost hugs him, but remembers his demure expressions throughout, and thinks, probably rightly, that that might be pushing it.

She pauses to check on the unconscious alien, nodding to Master Pike. "The tall one seemed to want him to sleep as much as possible. To get well, I suppose. I wonder if they're related? Maybe brothers? I wish I was more familiar with their kind... I can't tell yet if there's any family resemblance."

"Do you want anything from the Temple, Master?" she asks Pike. "I just need time to drop my stuff off in our guest quarters. It might be communal, but I wouldn't say no to private accomodations, no matter how small."

Annelia Belask has posed:
    Ann shrugs- she's likely largely biased by lack of desire to trust the alien strangers, despite having rescued them. Never quite sure where they might have come from, and all that.

    Still, she just makes her way further down the ramp for now. "Thank you, Jahni. I'm going to go see what's actually going on here," she says of the apparent recent skirmish as she approaches the workers.

Athena (159) has posed:
He sighs, and that look of weariness returns for a brief second. He nods when Navi thanks him for taking her bag, and hands it to her, just as Master Yutelli, a healer, and a couple of nurse droids arrive with a hover stretcher. "Master Windu," one of the droids intonates. "We hope your journey was smooth. We will do our best to do what we can for hostages you've rescued.

They then begin loading him onto the hover berth carefully.

The other blue alien watches, his brows furrowed slightly. He seems fascinated by the droids - as if he'd perhaps never seen one before.

Once they've situated his companion on the hover berth and begin to take him away to the infirmary, presumably, he disembarks after them. Then he jogs after Anne, coming to stand in front of her, holding up a hand, his brows furrowed. He seems to want to ask her something, but of course, at this point, he doesn't know how. He begins to search for the smaller robed alien, but that one seems to have disembarked early and disappeared to... only light knows where.

However, before Anne even needs to start problem solving, a protocol droid approaches. "Hello, Marshal," it greets her. "I've come to show you all to your quarters.."

Pike Windu has posed:
    Pike shoulders his spacebag as he watches the blue float away. Glad to be relieved of that burden, the Jedi Master disembarks with Master Yutelli.

Cayde Alexis has posed:
    Finally, the headache fades to a dull drone, although it doesn't go away completely. Cayde just waits for the droid to show them where they'd be staying. Hopefully somewhere a bit quieter..

Annelia Belask has posed:
    "And what's caused all this damage to these ships?" Ann questions as she falls in behind the droid, frowning a little. "Don't like not knowing if there's space combat in the area if we're to be flying back out."

Athena (159) has posed:
Master Yutelli falls in next to Pike. She smiles faintly at the older master. "Thank you, Master Windu. I hope the healers and the droids will be able to do something about those we rescued. Too bad we can't communicate with them." A pasue. "I was hoping to speak to you about... Cayde. I think he's still feeling rather guilty about what happened to you back on Ilum..."

The droid shakes its head at Ann. "Oh no, these were transfers from a temple in the Mid Rim. They didn't have capacity, so the Vectors and Longbeam were sent here. Believe it was some kind of criminal syndicate uprising. It's all been taken care of now, but not without losses... unfortunately."

"Anyway!" the perky protocol droid says, "this way to your quarters..." And it begins to hobble off, assuming they're following.

Since it seems that Anne is preoccupied with asking the droid about the matters in the hangar bay, the tall blue alien reaches out and places a hand on her shoulder, firmly, but gently.

Cayde Alexis has posed:
    Cayde hurries after the droid and the others, trailing behind Ann. He really doesn't prefer to hang around out here.

Pike Windu has posed:
    Pike shakes his head in frustration. "The Padawan does not seem to be progressing. At all. He must learn control."

Annelia Belask has posed:
    "Your injured friend or the little one?" asks Ann simply, nodding towards the leaving stretcher with the first and gesturing downwards with the second.

Athena (159) has posed:
Master Yutelli seems partially surprised by Pike's harsh words. "Certainly he was better than he was as a youngling," she says, "and you cannot blame the padawan. If you believe his progress to be stymied, why don't you mention it to his Master?"

"Little one," he says, but then he shakes his head. "Comm relay," he says, in a thick accent that doesn't sound like any accent Anne would have heard before.

It would appear the protocol droid is coming back now, though, noticing that Anne and the tall blue humanoid seem to have stopped following him momenarily. It toddles over. "Is everything alright, Marshal?" it asks. Oh, right. The droid could translate. That would make things easier.

Pike Windu has posed:
    Pike shakes his head again. "I do not fault Cayde. My disagreement is with the Order. I will take your for it that he is better now than before. But I do not see any progress now. He can't be a Padawan forever. And I fear he will be knighted for the same reasons he was made an apprentice."

Cayde Alexis has posed:
    Pike's words fall like a hammer, and the Master's frustration is palpable. It was true, wasn't it? Cayde hadn't gotten much better over the past year. At least not compared to the progress he'd made before. He stares at the ground, then rubs his head again as he feels the headache coming back again.

    ...Maybe he should wait for everyone outside the port. He starts toward an exit.

Annelia Belask has posed:
    "Speak your languge to the droid," says Ann, glancing over. "See if it's in the databanks."

    She reaches out, steering Cayde back into the group. "Hold on now. At least get your things squared away. We're here a few days, there'll be time to catch a breather."

Navi has posed:
Navi had fallen in more or less behind Anne and the taller of the two aliens that were up and about. "Come to think of it, did anyone see where the little one got off to? He was with us when we came down the ramp, I think, but after that I didn't see where he went," she inquires softly, looking around for the small alien.

She notes Anne corralling Cayde and sighs an inward sigh of relief. One missing person is quite enough for one day.

Cayde Alexis has posed:
    [Yes Master...sorry...] Cayde signs when Ann steers him back, his gaze still directed downward. He tries to ignore the splitting headache, going to slump onto a bench nearby.

Athena (159) has posed:
Master Yutelli seems to be in disbelief. "You don't believe they should have ..." But she trails off, shaking her head. "No. Annelia might not have been a perfect match, but she's better suited than most." She shakes her head.

The tall blue alien's confusion is visible and mild, but the droid at least, seems to have gotten the gist. It tries Pantoran first, and when that fails to seem to clear the fog, it tries Meese Caulf, which seems to strike a chord. After a moment of conversing, the droid hobbles back over the Annelia, just as she's corralling Cayde. "Oh my," the droid says, "your friend is, ah, rather exotic. Where did you find him? He speaks Meese Caulf fluently, but I do not think that's his native tongue." A pause. "He's wondering about using the comm relay here at the Temple to reach his contacts and send them a data packet through an encrypted frequency. A tall order, and luckily, the comm relay here is the only one that I know of that does long range encrypted, high data volume transmissions. However, he will need to borrow your access codes or be supervised, as we do not allow just anyone to use the comm relay."

Navi won't find the small alien anywhere in sight. However, she may sense or suspect that they're actually just not in the Temple anymore, and hadn't been since they'd disembarked much earlier than everyone else.

When Cayde slumps onto a nearby bench, the tall blue humanoid's attention is diverted. He glances over at Anne, then watches the young padawan for a moment before sliding onto the next to him. He offers the young padawan a faint smile and takes out the datapad they'd used that first time he'd tried to communicate with Cayde. He holds it in front of the young padawan, showing him that he'd saved the images that Cayde had drawn. "Thank you," he says softly, in that strange accent of his.

Pike Windu has posed:
    Pike shrugs his shoulders. "When I brought my concerns before the the High Council some time ago, the best reason I was given for Cayde's apprenticeship was that he had been cooped up in the Temple for too long. What am I supposed to believe?"

Navi has posed:
"The same Council that was pondering shipping Cayde off to the Outer Rim when political pressure was being put on the Order to allow tours of the Temple and other strange and unreasonable concessions," Navi points out, keeping her tone level, but not low.

"With all due respect and more besides, Master Yutelli, I may not be a Jedi, but I know a pattern of shaky decisions when I see it. Cayde can't be kept locked away in the Temple all his life, but I do wish he wasn't so impulsive. And there must be some way he can learn how to insulate his mind from everyone around him. He can't learn anything if he's surrounded by half the intrusive thoughts in the galaxy."

Catching Cayde moving to a bench behind her out of the corner of her eye, she watches the tall blue alien seat himself beside Cayde, smiling faintly as he speaks to Cayde in his heavily-accented broken Basic. "Maybe they're good for each other," she muses.

Annelia Belask has posed:
    "... There are two Masters not ten meters away, in a temple full of higher ranking members of the order, and you're asking me?" Ann questions of the droid incredulously. "It's not my comm relay. I swear, the way people behave sometimes you'd think I'd been made master and nobody told me. Windu knows he is one, right?"

    With that she turns back to Cayde- only to pause, giving the pair a nod to carry on as they might for the moment.

Cayde Alexis has posed:
    Oh...he'd kept the drawings, it seems. Cayde's brows go up in surprise, then flushes a bit when he shows them to him. Really, they weren't all that good. He tries to ignore the fact that once again, others are arguing about him. This sort of thing happened all the time, shouldn't he be used to it by now?

    [You are welcome] he signs back to the words of gratitude, although he still doesn't look happy at all. The padawan slumps forward, resting his head on his hands.

Athena (159) has posed:
"She's right," Yutelli agrees, nodding quickly. "Give it time, Master Windu. I understand your frustration, and concern, and honestly, share it. But he's only been on the frontier for a few weeks, we cannot expect him to improve so quickly. I'm sure we'll see some progress... a year from now."

The droid seems dumbstruck. "Why, Marshal, you're absolutely right! My apologies. You are the Marshal of the Tenoo colony, therefore I assumed..." but then it trails off, as the blue alien is asking for the droid to translate for him again.

The droid then turns to the group, hesitating. "Your friend would like it to be made known that he believes Cayde's ah... emotional well being is a priority for the moment, and since there's no need to rush to see the accommodations. He's wondering if--" And then it hobbles to turn to Cayde. "You would like to show him the Jedi archives here, for he'd like very much to learn everything he can about the history of the Jedi. And he'd be pleased if all of you joined, as well." A beat. "He'd also like to add that you may call him Thaarin. It's a... a nickname of sorts."

Pike Windu has posed:
    "Master, you wished to speak of Cayde and his well-being. I apologize that I took the opportunity to ... vent."

Annelia Belask has posed:
    "This is an unknown alien species which, while peaceful so far, I think warrants some go-aheads for higher-up people than me. We're not on Tenoo, and more than just the jedi use this world's comms and such. Not my decision to make unilaterally."

    Ann sighs slightly, then turns back to Thaarin and Cayde. "Yeah, sure- let's stop by the archives. That part should be relatively harmless and open for a stranger. Jedi history is fairly public knowledge."

Navi has posed:
"We all need to sometimes, Master. Even Jedi Masters," Navi replies sympathetically to Master Windu, trying to keep an eye on Cayde and the tall blue alien and on Masters Windu and Yutelli at more or less the same time. "I seem to need to more than most, but that's a personal problem. I'll get a grip on it someday. Maybe."

She smiles faintly as the droid speaks up for, "Thaarin? Thaarin... it's good to finally know his name. Thanks, Mr. Droid. I hope you'll come with us. I'd love to be able to talk to Thaarin without so much arm-waving and head-shaking."

Cayde Alexis has posed:
    Thaarin...well, that kind of sounded like the impossibly long name he'd given earlier. Sort of? Cayde frowns pensively, trying to guess at how this might be spelled with Basic letters. T..h...a..r...e? ...n? Something like that?

Athena (159) has posed:
Oona seems tired, but not angry with Pike. "It's alright," she says, "I admit, I lost control of my own emotions just now, as well, and became angry with you. The young padawan is a ... complicated matter," she says softly. "But we must have patience. The Force will reveal all things in time."

The droid chuckles nervously. "Ah... right, then," it says, "I'll ah, go about inquiring the right parties for, uh, the correct permissions..." The protocol droid could translate, but it doesn't seem to be good for much else...

"Of course," the droid says to Navi, "... I don't think it'd be advisable for this charming young man to go anywhere without me..."

Once the group starts heading in the general direction of the archives, Thaarin falls in step with Annelia, motioning the droid over. A moment later, it begins to translate, "He has noticed that your padawan, Cayde, is it? Has been quite reclusive and in a dour mood for the entire week he's known him. He's curious if you could shed any insight as to why?"

Thaarin is watching Cayde sign to himself, his expression still demure but there's sincerity and mild amusement there. He does seem to care about the young padawan, perhaps in a way similiar to how he'd cared for his injured companion they'd sent to the infirmary.

Pike Windu has posed:
    Pike is still troubled. "I should not complain if I cannot master myself first. If you will excuse me, I must be alone with my thoughts."

Annelia Belask has posed:
    Annelia exhales slowly, shaking her head. "That, Thaarin, is likely a conversation for more private climes. I think Cayde's had thoroughly enough of having his personal matters broadcasted for the galaxy to see for one lifetime. We all deserve a little privacy, right?"

    A faint smile, with that, and a nod to Cayde.

Cayde Alexis has posed:
    Ann will feel a measure of appreciation wash over her, and immediately be able to sense that Cayde was grateful that she'd been aware of that plight of his. <Thank you Master>

    He notces Thaarin watching him, and flushes a bit as he is unsure if it's correct. But then again, how would the young man know himself, since he doesn't really know Basic very well anyway. So perhaps it doesn't matter.

Navi has posed:
"If that's how you feel, Master," Navi replies softly to Pike's back. "May the Force be with you." She looks back to the droid, and also Thaarin and Cayde, blushing faintly at Thaarin's translated question.

"Cayde is a complicated subject, since he's a complicated person," she explains softly. "And Anne is right. We should talk about that in private. Let's just say that he's troubled at times, at least for now. Thank you for staying with him. I hope he's helped you in adjusting to life aboard the ship. He tries to be helpful, and usually succeeds."

She slides her hand into her pants pocket at that last, crossing her fingers as subtly as she can...

Athena (159) has posed:
Master Yutelli nods softly, and tells Master Windu softly. "May the Force be with you. Hopefully we'll see you at the archives later," she says.

Thaarin, for the first time, seems mildly shocked and incredulous. His brows furrow deeply, and he suddenly seems quite concerned for Cayde. "Yes," he says, in his accented Basic, and the tone in which he says it heavily denotes the seriousness and sincerity of his reply.

Thaarin offers a faint smile at Cayde, and noticing his embarrassment, says, "It's alright." A pause as he carefully considers his next words, "Thank you. For trying."