Atton's Coruscant, Saturday

[suitably_heroic]

Bright side: Atton had actually managed to get off the planet, and had subsequently even managed to catch a nap on the ship, which made him feel a lot better. Bad side: spending several hours tooling above an evil Sith artifact had not been good for him, and now he was trying desperately to remember the name of the blond guy he hated so much. It was something with an N, right?

It'd come back to him. Some things already had. The emptiness in his gut was shrinking again; it was just a matter of time and exposure now.

It was just a pain in the ass.

Anyway, Blond Guy With An N looked livid when he set the Hawk down by the Temple, but Atton had said he had an important meeting coming up (which he did) and he didn't have the time (which he didn't). At which point Blond Guy With An N had decided to invite himself along on the jaunt to go pick up, uh, what was it again? Glitter?

Damn it.

"You should not be doing this," Blond Guy told him again. "In fact, you should not have gone in the first place, but right now we should give you medical attention, perhaps some scans..."

"I'll be fine," Atton said, rolling his eyes as he pushed open the door to the Portalocity station. "It's temporary memory loss. It comes back, I know that, it's come back before. Just got to, you know--" He pulled a face, then snapped his fingers as Blond Guy let the door shut behind him. "--what's the phrase? Work itself out? No."

Blond Guy, Blond Guy, B-- Mical? Mical. Mical was right. Mical sighed. "I don't even know if you are dodging my questions or you genuinely don't remember," he said. "If there is a threat out there--"

"No threat," Atton said. "Well, there is a threat, not just from this planet. I don't know if the Sith seeded badness there just to get me killed, or they shot me down above the planet because they knew it would make things worse and I'd, you know, get my ass killed, but where I went, there's nothing left with two brain cells to rub together."

Mical rubbed at his forehead. "Can we again touch upon how utterly stupid this was and how you should be in medbay?"

"I can't spend every Saturday in medbay."

"No, but you are doing your utmost best."

And so it was an arguing set of Lost Jedi who waited in the Portalocity lounge, attracting some small amount of attention.

[[ for sparkle ]]

Comments

[suitably_heroic]

"Oh, no," Atton said, and now the actual air quotes came out, "He thinks you're a 'stabilizing influence'. Like, don't underestimate the ability of Mical to go full Jedi-I-love-all-things."

[myownface]

There was a long silence from Sparkle after that.

Yup.

Super long.

...

"What. He thinks I'm stabilizing? Has he met me? Is the guy totally cracked?"

[suitably_heroic]

"It's Mical," Atton said. "I wouldn't take it too personally."

Because. Well. Mical.

He shrugged as he wandered onto the landing pad; the Ebon Hawk was waiting up ahead.

[myownface]

"Faaair enough," Sparkle decided, following along after Atton and giving a little whistle at the ship up ahead. The speeders had been a big deal for him. This was... kind of awesome. It was going to take a bit of time to process this, too.

...

"Big."

Yes, Sparkle. You had to put people inside of it.

[suitably_heroic]

"It's a Dynamic-class freighter," Atton said, with all the pride you'd hear from a guy talking about his favorite car ever. "24 by 22.5 meters, maximum speed of eleven hundred kilometers an hour in atmosphere, dual turbolasers, dual heavy quad laser cannons, and it can fit eight people for stretches of two months."

He was gonna go up and pat the Hawk on the hull right now. He loved you, dear.

[myownface]

"Pretty," Sparkle decided, following after Atton to get a closer look. He needed to sort of pick apart what a lot of what he'd said actually meant, but it was all super impressive all the same. Maybe not even just because he was from the backwards primitive planet with limited space travel. "Like, why would anyone ever want to get off of her?"

[suitably_heroic]

"Because sometimes I need to eat or hang out with skinny idiots with bad hair," Atton said, shrugging lightly.

He ducked underneath the hull and wandered up through the loading ramp, heading through the hall and into the main hold. "Also, my apartment has a nicer fridge," he said. "Thanks for the pizza, by the way."

[myownface]

Sparkle smiled a bit at that, shrugging his shoulders a little, though he couldn't help but look around as the went. Even the hallways were fascinating, okay?

"Remember the pizza, huh?" He barely remembered it, himself. So, that was reassuring. "I guess weekend me thought it would be a good gesture, since I was there and everything..."

[suitably_heroic]

"I ate it for lunch on Monday," Atton said. He glanced over his shoulder. Figured he might as well stop here in the hold instead of dragging Sparkle around, since he was going all big-eyed. "I remember that much, because I was trying to get out of town fast--"

... okay, he had not actually wanted to bring that up, but it was coming back to him right now.

"--Anyway, it was decent pizza. So go, old you."

[myownface]

"Old me was a stupid ass. But he knew good pizza," Sparkle decided. "Glad you liked it."

Sparkle wasn't going to ask. Wasn't going to ask. Wasn't going to...

"Trying to get out of town fast to... whatever it was you did?"

Just checking. In spite of his better judgment and all.

[suitably_heroic]

"Yep," Atton said.

Helpfully.

He leaned back against the wall next to the hallway leading to the cockpit.

[myownface]

Sparkle nodded a little, and then kind of mirrored Atton's lean against the opposite wall.

"Did you, I don't know... manage to do anything you wanted while you were out there, at least?"

[suitably_heroic]

"I have no damned clue," Atton said lightly. "I can't figure out why I went. Give me a few days, it'll come back to me."

He knew it had something to do with her, he just couldn't recall what.

[myownface]

"Fair enough," Sparkle replied. And then, after a moment's pause, added, "If it turns out to be something shitty, and you, like, need a drink or whatever, call me. I don't mind taking off to hang out with you more, you know?"

This was sort of an 'any time night or day, I'm there for you.'

[suitably_heroic]

Did you just have to go and be, like, you, Sparks? Really?

Atton suddenly found it really, really important to check on one of the screens to his left, and then he eyeballed some lights on the ceiling before coughing up a, "Sure, uh, okay."

(He was fiendishly proud of himself for not tagging on the 'whatever'.)

"Anyway," he said, clearing his throat, "This way is the cockpit, where I used to spend most of my time before I took over this entire wonderful piece of scrap."

He pointed his thumb down the hall. Reciting the Ebon Hawk's layout was easy.

[myownface]

Well, who else was Sparkle going to be? Honestly, now.

Even if he did feel kind of stupid, now. Ahahaha, oops.

"Cockpit, huh? Where all the interesting stuff happens?"

... That was where the interesting stuff happened in the movies, at least.

[suitably_heroic]

Aw, don't feel stupid, Sparks. Atton was just incredibly emotionally stunted and if it wasn't for the combined weekend fuzziness and spotty memory issues he might've hugged you right now.

It was probably good for the levels of awkward on the ship that he didn't.

"If by 'interesting' you mean 'burning lines until you hit your destination' or 'keeping the ship from crashing into a rock wall', then sure," he said casually, walking through the long hallway into the cockpit area.

To the left, right behind the pilot's chair, among several consoles, there was an extensive star chart blinking with some of the major destinations, with a little icon pointing out the Ebon Hawk was currently situated on Coruscant.

[myownface]

"'Not crashing' is actually very much my definition of interesting, yes," Sparkle shared. "Plus, you know... blinky lights. Also interesting. I'm absolutely a sucker for things that light up."

He whistled, and looked around, and then grinned shamelessly.

"This is cool. This is super cool."

[suitably_heroic]

"And all these blinky lights are even functional," Atton said. He was faintly amused by the reaction, but also kind of proud.

Because yes, the Hawk was super cool.

He rattled off a couple of those functions in quick succession - talking about the Hawk was a great exercise for his minutiae-focused brain - and finished on, "And then there's the galaxy map. Also known as 'what our glorious leader would point at and go "Take us there," expecting me to find a way there without getting shot out of the sky, usually."

[myownface]

"Ooooo, map." Sparkle had pretty much never been this fascinated with a map before in his whole entire life. Ever. "So, what places are the most fun to get to? Any you want to see but haven't? Where's Nar Shaddaa from here?"

Yes, Atton, rake those brains for the answers. Sparkle was staring at a roadmap of a whole galaxy in a vehicle that was capable of traveling it, and he was kind of in awe at the whole prospect.

[suitably_heroic]

See, the joy of having that galaxy map right there meant Atton didn't have to rack his brain for the names, at least. Just the locations.

"Uh," he said, then squinted at the map. "Nar Shaddaa's a moon of... that Hutt planet. Uh. Nal Hutta. So that's... Hutt space." Hutt space was up, right?

No, no. Right. "Toydaria, then next to that, Nal Hutta. Now, we're in the Core, that's this whole area."

He was saying this mostly for his own benefit. "That's where all the quote-unquote upstanding citizens live. Never mind that Corellia's right there." Beat. "And Alderaan in between. But uh, depending on your definition of fun, you'll probably want either Mid-Rim or Outer Rim..."

[myownface]

"Well, what's the difference?"

Sparkle was paying rapt attention and even taking mental notes while Atton recited things, yes. He was actually interested in this stuff. Never knew when it would come in handy, maybe? But answering his questions seemed to be helping Atton put things in order too, so Sparks wasn't about to take it easy on the guy.

[suitably_heroic]

"Mid-Rim's still halfway civilized," Atton said. "So it's where you get the cheaper establishments, but with less chance of running into a smuggling operation." Beat. "I'm not saying 'no chance', but less. The Outer Rim is made up of, uh, poodoo and Sith and Hutts, mainly."

He squinted at the map.

"...Zeltros," he said. "Zeltros qualifies as fun, I think. It's a vacation planet. Zeltrons love partying." A pause, as some random bit of information pushed up through the surface. "You know, I think future Cade had a Zeltron girlfriend."

[myownface]

"... Party girlfriend," Sparkle observed, nodding thoughtfully. "Hey, good on him. Future Cade seemed pretty happy with the way things were turning out for him, actually. Doing his thing... still had all his original limbs. Seems like a win for Cade."

Now Sparkle was marginally less enthusiastic. Was there a way to keep the conversation on Cade until he could steer it away from last weekend entirely? Maybe?

... Without making him look desperate to do so, which would be a dead giveaway that there was something up?

[suitably_heroic]

You were overthinking it, Sparkle. That was always a bad idea around a Jedi, and now that line of thought had Atton squinting at Sparkle, instead.

"Lot of people would be happy if they could bag a Zeltron girlfriend," he agreed. "Uh, there's a bunch of different vacation planets, just don't ask me to name them right now."

Look, Atton respected the notion of Not Wanting To Talk About Something. He just had to figure out if this was a safe thing Not To Talk About, considering he didn't even know what Sparkle was Not Talking About.