Movers & Shakers: It's Who You Know (Zem)

[Wyl Staedtler]

Ossus woke up. Low on the horizon, glorious and muted by an earth-clinging mist, the sun appeared as a gentle bleed of light that slowly draped itself over the canvas of sky. From the bundles of trees that surrounded the Jedi settlement, chirruping swoons of birdsong began to pick up volume and rise outward from the quiet little warbles they'd been before, almost as if granted permission by the dawn. Something clacked, sharp and in rapid succession, and a tangle of brush rattled and then went still again. In a few hours there would be none of this mottled stillness. Life could only be contained for so long.

Wyl shivered as he walked. It wasn't particularly cold but there was a chill crawling across his skin anyway, scraping against the planes of his shoulders and stitching the muscles of his neck tightly together. The weight of it felt like impatience, though the awful, apprehensive knot parading as his stomach spoke to a healthy dose of accompanying reluctance so that he was left hovering awkwardly in the closeted space between dread and determination. Twice he almost turned around to make his way back to the safety of his quarters, where silent brooding wouldn't disturb his roommate. How lovely that would be, to stew in privileged privacy and let the ease of complacency lull him into a soft routine. No one would have blamed him.

But he would have to live with that deliberate inaction and the problem was, Wyl mused as he approached the tent that housed his quarry, that he didn't know how to.

The boy stopped just outside some unspoken boundary of the camp. He squinted. There was no sign of activity but that was hardly indicative of absence. Quietly enough to be ignored if it was still to early to come calling, he called out, "Master Vymes?"

[Zem Vymes]

"You're late, Staedtler."

It came from the other room in the tent, just beyond the teenager's view.

"How long have you been deciding whether or not to come in?"

Zem pushed through the flap that led from his sleeping area in the tent, giving Wyl an expectant expression. The boy's feelings were knotted up in him, but they were also betraying him. The Jedi Master had more than an inkling as to the nature of this 'unexpected' meeting, and gestured to the seat in front of his desk. Zem moved to a side table, removing a steaming carafe from a hotplate before pouring the dark contents into two cups, one of which was placed in front of the teenager as Zem eased into his own seat.

[Wyl Staedtler]

Son of a ruskakk, old people were frustrating. Especially old people with the Force on their side. The element of surprise was always shot to kingdom come and Wyl knew that knowing expression on Zem's face all too well. The ease of it tapped merrily on the boy's nerves, prodding a resigned sigh from his lungs as he pushed aside the flap of the tent and slipped in. The light in here was still stretching it's limbs, not quite at the corners of the canvas shelter.

"Two days, give or take," Wyl confessed. A wry smile twitched at the corners of his mouth and then faded into distraction as the boy sat down and reached into the folds of his robe. He didn't wear the garment often but it was useful for taking the edge off the chill in the mornings and the inner seam was exceptionally handy for storing goods. From it's depths he pulled out an oblong package, wrapped clumsily in thin paper and giving off a broad, yeasty scent: bread, still warm from the ovens.

"I brought breakfast," he said, and set the offering down on the table. Wyl licked his thumb where a bit of melted butter had leaked through and then leaned over and sniffed the mug in front of him curiously. "Would've brought preserves, too, but I wasn't sure what you liked and then I thought that maybe it'd seem like a bribe. Hey, what is this?"

[Zem Vymes]

The sanctity of breakfast was something you appreciated when older. Young sprouts, when they could even be bothered to attend to morning rituals, managed to hork down something as an afterthought. Wyl was either the exception to his peer group, or more likely, trying to appeal to Zem's panache for breakfast done correctly. Either way suited the Jedi Master just fine, and he accepted it with a smile.

"That," Vymes gestured to the steaming cup of dark before the Padawan, "is colloquially known as caf."

What might have seemed sardonic was at once expounded upon.

"Double potency. No sugar, no cream, no spices, no fuss. It is what it is, and that's how I like it to be."

The lynchpin of the morning ritual, caf was also something of a fulcrum - a rite of passage that boys yearning to become men began to fancy. And judging from Wyl Staedlter's conflicted nature of present, the austerity that plain caf delivered just might help him get to the heart of the matter.

"What's on your mind, son?"

[Wyl Staedtler]

At a marketplace on Coruscant, far enough down the levels to attract only the really dedicated, there'd been a renowned Cerean caf seller who made bank from the back of a tiny little cart. The quality and sourcing of his product had something to do with it, or maybe it had been the way he'd used the old triple-reed brewing system, but mostly Wyl remembered waiting endlessly in a sweaty, teeming crowd so that his mother could purchase a half kilo of beans to haul home and the inevitable reward that came from his tortured patience. The dealer had called it baby caf in his loud, ringing voice that always sounded like a laugh, and it had been thick and rich with cream, dripping aromatic scents that tickled Wyl's nose and made his whole body run warm after that first blissful sip. In hindsight, it had probably only contained a scarce drop of actual caf but the exotic, adult promise of it had been more potent than any actual stimulant could have been.

In short, the last caf he'd ever had was the polar opposite to this heady presentation. Yet Wyl found this no less alluring and something about the equalizing effect of it being given him, without an offer of compromise or watering down, made the lee of his shoulders square just a fraction as he considered the glossy surface of the dark liquid.

Cupping it gently in his hand, Wyl raised his eyes. For a few seconds he just stared at Zem with a hesitant pause caught on the edges of his expression, and then he let out a spool of breath and cut straight. "I need to talk to Lok s'Ilancy."

[Zem Vymes]

He didn't beat around the bush. Zem's face was half hidden behind his own mug, and he eased it back down after a sip, taut-lipped and thoughtful.

"So does half the galaxy, or so I hear."

Still, Zem knew the boy. Knew his history, and how it twined with the s'Ilancy family like the great spreading roots of an ancient oak. He practically was family, in his own way.

"If you're gonna ask her to come back, son, I can already tell you how that'll go."

[Wyl Staedtler]

Wyl's lips thinned and his mouth twisted faintly. He wasn't sure if it was the words or the lingering smoke of the caf on his tongue that made a bitter aftertaste well up in his mouth but at least he could control one of them. Carefully, he set his mug down. Maybe it just needed time to cool down, loose some of it's ragged edge.

"Doesn't mean I shouldn't try," Wyl countered. It was a struggle not to shrug his shoulders. They itched to move, just like the rest of him wanted to shift and let loose the wriggling, slippery coil of uncertain energy that itched against his resolve. "If I did - ask her, I mean - it wouldn't be for her sake anyway."

[Zem Vymes]

It wasn't difficult to suss out the real connection Wyl had. Zem nodded, understanding beyond what was said.

"For Tak, then?"

He empathized. It wasn't right, separating them. It wasn't Zem's decision on that, unfortunately.

"You've got a good heart, son."

[Wyl Staedtler]

For Tak, then. Never a question, not when it came to her. It was just that simple and just that complicated and if Wyl tried to hard to pin down what exactly that meant, he got a slit-sharp pain just under his ribs, as if someone were trying to cut away some vital, connective cord. Mostly he did his best not to think too hard about how much real estate in his life the blonde-haired spitfire owned. Valuable things were delicate by nature, and Wyl knew how clumsy attention could be when given leeway to wander freely.

Wyl nodded. A single note (loud and ringing) of sudden outrage throbbed beneath the thin skin of his wrists and his fingers twitched instinctively, curling in on themselves protectively and leaving him with loose, selfish fists for company.

Perhaps it wasn't all for Tak.

"She can't - " the boy's jaw tightened and he swallowed with some difficulty. "None of this feels like it should be happening. It doesn't make sense."

[Zem Vymes]

Wyl was discovering another tenet of manhood. A painful one. Life wasn't fair. There ought to be a greater universal justice than the one they were dealt out. Being morally upright and doing the right thing certainly went its own distance towards making that good, but even Jedi Knights had their limits.

"We all deserve better? Maybe that's true. There's not much I'm gonna say that's gonna make the hurt go away. Sometimes things hurt because there's a lesson to learn from it all."

[Wyl Staedtler]

"It doesn't hurt," Wyl scowled. The lie was only half-born, suspended in patient forbearance because it didn't actually hurt yet. That was still only a faint promise, like the whisper of an ache that came before an unfolding bruise. Everything was too knotted up to be very successful at actually piercing through the veil of determined disbelief that the boy clutched tightly around him.

There weren't going to be answers. Somewhere inside of him Wyl knew that. Perhaps there simply weren't any answers to give but it didn't make it any less important that he ask the questions. They were there. They were real. And if Lok was going to assign this load to Tak, then she certainly wasn't going to get away without someone pinning her with those anchors of inquiry.

(Had she already asked herself the whys and the hows?)

Wyl rubbed at a persistent itch near his temple. A bug bite, probably. That was what he was telling himself. Puberty was a wretched creature.

"It's not about deserving anything, really," he said. "It's about what gets left behind. There's a proper way to do it and this isn't it."

[Zem Vymes]

It was a perfectly valid observation, and as Zem took a level off his caf while pondering Wyl's words, he found them so similar to things he'd said to her already.

"No, it's not proper at all." He admitted frankly, easing his cup down with an audible clink. The Jedi Master's eyes met Wyl's, seeing the man he was already becoming.

"None of this is. Keeping mother and child apart. It's ugly. You can do a lot of ugly things for a hope at salvaging something good. Believe me, I know."

Zem's expression turned introspective, and he looked at the steam coming off the carafe. He looked older now, maybe even more vulnerable.

"Are you serious about being a Jedi, son?"

[Wyl Staedtler]

For a moment Wyl wondered just who Zem had been talking to, before he realized that it didn't really matter. There was a sheltered sort of anonymity here, though it was hard to tell if it stemmed from the early hour or the clean, soft lines of the tent and the gentle shadows trapped within it, or if it was simply something rolling out from the man who called claim to it all. Rather than answer right away, he let the question settle lazily, soaking itself fat on the cool morning air.

When he spoke again, it was with a question of his own. Maybe that in and of itself was an answer, too.

"Is there something to be salvaged?" Wyl felt nervous, the underlying current of that discomfort only heightened by the expression on Zem's face.

[Zem Vymes]

The earnest question from Wyl was a better answer than any steadfast profession of faith to the Jedi cause. A search for answers. Wisdom. The antithesis of hubris. It was certainly the right place to start, and Zem worked to make himself a little more plain to the teenager.

"I have to believe that's so. Wyl, there's a lot at work here you don't understand. I hope you don't have cause to try. It's a long and lonely walk from the edge of the cliff that looks over the dark side. Easy to get there, and so few who do find their way back. I've seen the one who didn't. Seen the monsters they became. And if they were better people, I saw them destroy themselves rather than succumb to that evil inside."

Zem looked tired in telling the story, a weariness was newfound in his expression.

"I took a walk much like the one Lok's taking now. Took it a long time ago."

[Wyl Staedtler]

At that, Wyl's eyes raked sharply over Zem's time-marked face. He wasn't sure what he was looking for. Not a lie, certainly, because there was no reason for untruths here and no space to house them in a conversation of this make and model. Still, the boy felt a prickling uncertainty, a fine web of surprise which settled too easily into the murky thoughts that had of late littered the quiet places of his mind.

"My father did, too. Apparently." Wyl shifted in his seat, coiled energy tamped down within his muscles. His gaze burned brightly with a desperate sort of hope or youth - though really, they were the same thing. "You came back, Master Vymes. It's possible. Before it comes to an end, it's possible."