What you leave behind (Sharkey, closed)

[Kale]

The elevated street in front of the Jedi Temple complex was choked with the typical Coruscant midday traffic. There were a lot of pedestrians at any given time; even with a network of airborne transit routes long enough to stretch to the next planetary system and back, walking had not died out as a primary way to get from here to there. Any given block had a city's worth of apartments, offices, cinemas, and fast food joints, even in official districts like the Jedi complex. So, unless you had a specific place to go ten blocks or a hundred miles over, it made sense to take a hike.

Which made it hard for someone like Kale to find some privacy.

The young Jedi padawan wove through the crowded street going nowhere in particular. He'd just wanted to get out for a while and relax away from the sterilized air inside the Jedi Temple, but it was difficult to do that in the middle of a slow drive of sentient cattle. Personal space was hard to come by on a planet that measured its population in the hundred-billions.

Usually, that sort of thing didn't bother Kale. He was used to feeling alone in the middle of a crowd. In fact, that had been an advantage for his previous line of work. He'd been a denizen of the Coruscant ghetto for four years before he ran into a Jedi in the Temple district and found his life headed in a whole new direction. He would never have guessed he had a Force connection. He just didn't have that kind of luck.

But according to the GJO, he had both. Now the Order provided his food, his shelter, and his clothes--a deal that was hard for him to pass up. He had a master now, too, Jedi Knight Oriadin, and he'd sat through a few intense lessons on using the Force. But through it all, he wasn't sure he had his feet firmly planted in this new lifestyle. He needed to find a place to get away and think on his own, and his quarters at the Order just wasn't cutting it. He needed the smells and sounds of the street to focus his mind.

Finding a gap in the crowd, Kale ducked into a dim, narrow service alley--good, the coast was clear.

Tucking his Jedi robes back, Kale reached up and caught the lowest rung of a fire escape ladder. He hauled himself up onto the nearest platform and sat down on the metal grating, then closed his eyes to think.

[Sharkeid Alharaba]

"You wanna buy some deathsticks?"

Sharkey turned to find a small, hairy alien pushing a small bundle of cheap 'sticks in his face. He pulled a face and shoved the would-be dealer aside.

"Don't make me laugh, furry," he said with a sneer, pushing the little bugger aside.

Amateurs.

Sharkeid Alharaba hiked up his overcoat to better conceal the packets of merchandise taped to the inside and marched on through the crowd. He was a seventeen-year-old human with chestnut skin and straight, black hair, and he stood a half-inch shy of six feet. He could've been handsome under the street grime on his face, but his boss hadn't hired him for his looks.

He was making a delivery through dangerous territory--an uptown section of Coruscant. He'd lived most of his seventeen years closer to ground floor, then migrated to a mid-level ghetto district when he got the job with Gucchi. And now he was moving up in the world, maybe in more ways than one.

Sharkeid's course took him down the street in front of the Jedi Temple complex. He didn't have any reason to muck with the Jedi, but they gave him the willies anyway. The teen turned off the street and down a narrow alley, hoping to find another route to lateral causeway 147-A. No sense in tempting fate.

A light clank of metal hit his senses at their flashpoint. His eyes shot up at the fire escape, and his right hand clapped against his coat pocket where he kept his switchblade warm.

All he saw was a small figure in a few yards of brown fabric. Something about him made the hair on the back of Sharkeid's neck stand on end.

"Nothin' to worry about, buddy," he said in a businesslike tone. "I'm just passin' by."

[Kale]

Kale peered down through the railgaps at the trenchcoated figure on the street level.

"Sharkey?"

The Padawan shinnied down the ladder and landed next to his old roommate, scarcely believing his eyes.

"Sharkey, what are you doin' here?"

[Sharkeid Alharaba]

Sharkeid jumped back as the stranger dropped to the ground, and he dug his switchblade out of his pocket, clenching the knife firmly in his closed fist. But after the moment of surprise passed, he realized who he was looking at.

"Kale?" he croaked incredulously. "Where the frell have you been? I haven't seen you in more than a week--and what's with the get-up?"

Sharkey didn't mind that he'd completely ignored Kale's question as he stepped forward and tugged at the hem of his younger roommate's Jedi robe. A glint of metal at Kale's hip level caught his eye, and he pulled the robe aside to find the slim, cylindrical bulk of a training lightsaber clipped to his belt.

Sharkeid's mouth dropped open, and he took a staggering step backward. "Kale... I don't..."

His shock changed to hilarity, and he clapped Kale hard on the shoulder, laughing out loud. "Oh, man, you had me going there, buddy! For a moment, with the robe and all, I thought you were a real Jedi or something. But, frell, how'd you rip off one of those laser swords?"

[Kale]

Sharkey's reaction stunned Kale for a moment, but he couldn't blame his friend for not believing it. Kale hadn't believed it himself when he first found out.

"It's not a joke, Sharkey," he said in all seriousness. "I didn't steal the saber; they gave it to me. Well, they gave it to me temporarily. I barely know how it happened myself, but I'm a Jedi now. Well, a Padawan, anyway."

[Sharkeid Alharaba]

Sharkey stared at Kale in mounting disbelief. "Okay, the joke was a good one, but I don't have time to keep playin' around. You're not a Jedi... you can't be a Jedi. What would they want with street trash like you?"

[Kale]

"Look, I ran into some Jedi about two weeks ago, and he told me I've got a connection with the Force," Kale replied testily. He usually didn't let Sharkey's jibes sting him like that, but somehow it sounded different now.

"The Jedi took me in, I don't really know why, but they did. And I don't understand half the stuff they talk about in there, but last week I... I can't really describe it. I found somethin' inside me I didn't know was there. I touched the Force somehow, whatever. Sharkey, it was the most incredible thing I ever felt. I can't deny it. I'm sorry I haven't been around, but I had to check this out. I had to see if there's really something to this whole Jedi schtick."

[Sharkeid Alharaba]

Sharkeid knew what Kale was talking about--not the Force, he'd never put much stock in that kind of muck. There wasn't any cosmic energy that directed his life, and he intended to keep it that way. What Kale was talking about was a ticket out. Out of the ghetto, out of the Coruscant streetlife, out of the plane of existence the whole rest of the galaxy would just rather ignore. Sharkey had long given up finding a ticket for himself.

"That's crazy," he said bitterly. "You mean some Force nut gave you a lecture, and now you're a born-again Jedi? It doesn't work like that! You don't just sign on the dotted line! What the frell would they want with a two-bit thief?"

Sharkey spun and took a few heated paces away. As he gripped the sides of his own trenchcoat, he felt the merchandise still safely tucked away on the inside and remembered where he was going.

Against his better judgment, he lingered a little longer. "How much are they payin' you?" he asked, not turning his head.

[Kale]

Kale stood silently as his friend ranted. He knew how Sharkey felt, but it chafed him just the same.

"That's not all that happened!" he retorted. But he thought better of it the next moment. He didn't want a shouting match. Besides, he'd probably lose.

"Nothin', at least at this level," he replied, remembering Sharkey's question. "But they do provide food and shelter. And clothes," he added, lifting at his robes for emphasis. "Though there's no accounting for taste." A small smirk came to his face, but Sharkeid didn't acknowledge the joke.

"I'm learnin' under a knight named Oriadin," Kale continued. "He's helpin' me a lot, and he says I'm doin' pretty well. You have to understand, Sharkey, I just gotta see this through. You'd do the same. Look, if we stay in touch, I might be able to help you out now and then. Jedi have connections, you know."

[Sharkeid Alharaba]

Sharkeid didn't move for a while. His head was still reeling from what Kale had told him, and he was doing his best just to stay afloat in all the implications.

Finally, he looked over his shoulder. "I'm happy for you, Kale," he said, though he sounded anything but. "You're right. You gotta take your chances in this world. But get one thing straight. If you're a Jedi, you're the law. And I can't be friends with the law."

He dug his hands in his pockets, stowing his switchblade again, then turned. "Don't worry about me," he said, giving a shade of a smile. "I got my own connections. Gucchi set me up for an interview with his employer. I'm gonna be working for the Corporation full-time now."

Slowly, Sharkey took a few measured steps back toward Kale. "I was going to suggest you to Gucchi as a replacement for me. It'd be more money than what you've been lifting, and you'd be on the fast track for the next opening. I might even have let you have the apartment."

He was making Kale an offer, and a generous one at that considering his level of influence. "Big things are comin' up, kid. There'll be a lot of openings a few months from now. You've got the instincts; we could use someone like you. Besides, how long do you think you'll last with them?"

[Kale]

Kale knew what Sharkey was offering, and he was going out on a limb even telling Kale that much. At one time, the prospect might have sounded enticing--if he'd ever managed to work through his fear of the Corporation and its like. But he had found a way out of the street grind, and he couldn't go back. Not yet.

"Maybe I'll last longer than you think," he said.

Taking a step back, Kale gripped his robe and pulled it taut. "Take care of yourself, Sharkey. Maybe I'll see you around."

[Sharkeid Alharaba]

Sharkeid nodded slowly, then tightened the belt on his trenchcoat. "You won't," he said flatly. "Not if I can help it."

He chewed on his lower lip, vasilating on whether to say something more or just to leave Kale to his calling.

"Kale," he said at last, "I hope it really does work out for you. Listen, I gotta go. For what it's worth, may the Force be with you. It sure doesn't like hangin' around with me."

[Kale]

Kale was shocked to hear Sharkey say something like that, but he heeded his former roommate's advice and took it for what it was worth.

"Good luck, Sharkey," he reciprocated. "And thanks."

Kale watched Sharkeid disappear down the opposite end of the alley before turning back toward the Jedi Temple.