The Jedi Temple, Atton's Coruscant, Saturday

[suitably_heroic]

A week had come and gone. The Jedi and their allies had made good headway, clearing the Iridonic Horn out of the shipyards at Gyndine. And yet after that first sighting - both hopeful and troubling - there had been no sign of Atton. Having the man's friend here clearly wasn't doing much to convince Atton to come home, either, and Mical was beginning to wonder if asking Sparkle to come at all hadn't been a deeply futile act.

So it was that, exactly a week after Sparkle's arrival, that he was going to tell Sparkle to go back home. The rooms they'd provided Sparkle were rather spacious, for Jedi standards, but they were not far from Mical's office.

He had made his way over there, and now he was knocking.

[[ for sparkle. ]]

Comments

[myownface]

"Oh," said Sparkle again, vision blurring as he watched the scene unfolding. There was Mical. And there went Mical. And he wasn't sure if it was the smoke or the pain, but the world seemed to be blurring to white again, and staying awake was getting harder to do. "Okay."

This... this was probably somewhere in his top ten for 'worst days ever.'

[suitably_heroic]

There was a third, and final, sizzle. A third figure appeared in the doorway, his mask covering the lower half of his face, but not the rest of it. "Good, you got him," he said.

Theemin's eyes slid from the boy (Sparkle.) to the crumpled heap of Jedi on the floor. "Let's take the Jedi," he said. "That'll send a signal."

The woman shook her head. "No," she said. "Too much trouble."

[myownface]

There was a familiar voice on the edge of his consciousness, something about Jedi and signals. Sparkle licked his lips and opened his mouth a little, though he trailed off before he could say Atton's name. Something was wrong. He was talking to them. That wasn't how this was supposed to go. That voice was rescue, it had always been rescue. It wasn't pain and sparks in his eyes and smoke burning at his lungs and fogging his mind and making consciousness itself into a battle.

"... Oh."

Broken record.

[suitably_heroic]

Damn it.

There was no way At-- Theemin could get away with showing more concern, and arguing back wouldn't be in character. "Fine," he said. "But let the small one go before you choke him to death."

The man holding Sparkle let go of him. Abruptly.

[myownface]

And Sparkle... Sparkle tumbled to the ground, legs like butter underneath him, bonelessly.

He didn't try to get up. Whimpering on the floor seemed like a much better plan. Or maybe sleeping.

Sleeping was a better plan. He was just going... to.. go... to...

[suitably_heroic]

Theemin scooped him up off the floor. Okay, if he wasn't being watched, he might've been more careful with Sparkle instead of draping him over his shoulder, but there was only so much he could do.

At least he was the one handling Sparks, now. Best he could do.

"Let's leave," he said coolly, fixing his eyes on Nina's masked face. "There's usually at least one other Jedi in the building, and the rest of them aren't bleeding hearts. Come on."

"Fine," Nina said. "I think we've made our statement." She reached for her belt and switched her stealth field back on.