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Syndulla Scrap, Saturday

It was good to have gotten off the island while that pollen had been going on, but it did mean the Ghost needed a bit of maintenance now.

So, she was puttering around, making sure it was still in top shape, and generally just enjoying working on it.

If anyone needed anything, the scrapyard was open, but they might need to get her attention.

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There was, in fact, someone who needed something! Sure, that someone was someone that Hera probably wouldn't know, but he certainly knew her. He was also kind of awkwardly clutching a small plant in his hand, because... mostly it just seemed like a nice gesture.

It was a relief when Jacen spotted the Ghost even from the street. From there, it was really just a matter of inviting himself into the junkyard and making his way over to the ship.

"Hey, mom? Are you here?"

"Sorry, kid," Hera said, her head still in a panel, "there's only -" She looked back at the kid in question, took in his face (and oh, space, those eyebrows), and realized who his parents had to be.

"This is the island playing tricks again, isn't it?" She finished. She gave him a weak wave. "Hi."

"Don't call me kid," Jacen muttered, but he raised a hand and waved, anyway. "You, uh. You look good, mom."

She looked really young. And kind of pained. Well, this day was off to a great start. He kind of clutched to the plant for a moment more, and then held it out awkwardly toward her.

Hera looked from him to the plant, then took it, still a bit awkward. "Thank you. It's lovely." It really was.

"I...uh." She gestured back to the panel. "I'm just doing a bit of work. Do you want to come in? I probably still have some melons." Oh, right. "And I should really call your father and let him know you're here."

Because that was a thing. Maybe Kanan could make this a little less awkward?

Jacen had been ready to try to blather his way out of any awkwardness by explaining that the plant was called a ghost plant-- some kind of succulent, but wasn't the name fitting? When that next bit was said, and he froze in place.

"Call my father?"

When he'd woken up thinking today was going to be interesting, this... wasn't what he'd had in mind.

He raised a hand to run through his hair, not quite certain what to do.

Hera frowned and stopped, comm in her hand. "Is there a reason I shouldn't? It is Kanan, isn't it?" She didn't think she could be wrong on that one, but she supposed there was always a possibility.

Jacen swallowed at a lump in his throat, licking his lips. They'd gone dry. If his life had gone differently, maybe he would have gotten a talking to about the effects of fear.

As it stood, he was suddenly finding himself frozen by a sort of quietly screaming terror at being offered the impossible with no warning at all.

"It is Kanan," he replied. "He is. My father is. Yeah." Great. He was babbling. "That's him."

Hera nodded. "So...is there a reason I shouldn't call him?" She sat on the Ghost's ramp and nudged...the boy whose name she still didn't know...to sit with her. "It's okay, isn't it? He hasn't gone..." Dark? Evil? "Over to the Empire or anything, has he?"

Wait, was the Empire even a thing, if she and Kanan had a kid this old?

"Nothing like that," Jacen said quickly. With a fierce conviction. "My father was a hero."

A fierce conviction and a past-tense.

Now, this was more like it! Hematemisis had been wandering around this place, thinking it was way too nice and here she'd forgotten her blowtorch. She'd fix it up real nice! But then she passed by the scrapyard on her way to find her mom and got throughly distracted.

So don't mind the little girl in scrap-piece armor and a metal bucket on her head, slipping in and shif ting through the stuff, cackling with glee each time she managed to find something particularly shin or sharp. And maybe she'd try to pry some of the nice smaller pieces of some of the bigger pieces, yes. A good gift to bring to her mom, to show off her ability to scavenge even in this dumb place.

Scavenging in basically the most obvious place, mind.

"Hey!" A boy with grass green hair and green-tinted ears was calling at the kid from across the way. "Don't steal that! That's my mom's... garbage."

...

"Okay, it kind of loses something when it gets put like that."

"...Oh." There was no missing either of those things, and it pulled Hera's heart so many different directions she didn't know where to start.

No, wait, she did. "You should definitely meet him, then," she said, gentle but firm. "I'll call him now, okay?"

Fear. There was something the Jedi said about fear.

Nobody had been around to teach that thing to Jacen. He chewed the inside of his cheek, taking that seat that Hera had gestured for him to take. And then he nodded a little.

"Okay," he said quietly. "Okay. I can do that, Mom."

He wanted to. He'd always wished he could.

It was easier to wish for something one could never have.

Edited 2018-04-07 20:46 (UTC)

Nobody might have taught Jacen about fear, but Hera could hardly let anyone sit there looking so afraid. She carefully put an arm around him. "I know you can."

She put the plant down carefully and pulled her comm back out, calling Kanan.

Kanan's day had started with a feeling. Not a good feeling, not a bad feeling. Just a feeling. It had led to some meditating, just sitting and reaching out with the Force and wondering...

When his comm went off, it was already in his hand.

"Hey, Hera. What's up?"

Because today, of all days, there very much seemed to be something up.

"Remember that time last year with...Anan?" She asked. "There's a boy here at the Ghost." She hesitated before she managed, "Our son."

Kanan sighed. Looked up at the ceiling. Wondered what kind of game the island was playing, giving them different kids two years in a row. Hinting at something? What?

"Do you need me to come over there? Bring anything?"

"Just yourself, I think," Hera said. It'd be good to know she wasn't alone in all this.

Not right now, anyway.

"Maybe burgers?" she amended.

"Myself, Mooby's for three, should I leave Stance at home?"

Anan had been kind of spooked out by the dog who looked more like a wolf last year. Kanan wanted to be sure he wasn't crossing some sort of boundary.

Jacen, who had been kind of quietly keeping his head down, trying to process the voice he was hearing on the other end of his mother's comm, glanced up at that and gave his head a little shake.

"Stance is a good boy," he murmured. "He's fine."

The dog, apparently, was going to be on security blanket duty for the boy with the wolf-and-phoenix jacket on.

"Stance is fine," Hera said more loudly. "Please bring him."

"You know about Fandom?" she asked... "Sorry, what's your name?"

Jacen was quiet just long enough to hear Kanan's, "On my way," before replying.

Right now, all things considered, was a hard time for him to have to tell his own mother his name.

"It's Jacen," he replied. "Jacen Syndulla."

Not Jacen Jarrus or Jacen Dume, he was his mother's son. His father was a collection of stories and the odd holo or painting by Sabine, but he wasn't real. Not... not tangibly so. Maybe this was one of those extra vivid dreams he sometimes had. Maybe he just hadn't snapped out of one of those, yet.

Maybe maybe maybe.

"It's...good to meet you, Jacen." Hera fiddled with her comm before putting it away. "I know that's probably weird for you, too. You...um...want to help me with this?" She gestured over her shoulder at the panel she'd been working on. "Or Chopper's working inside."

Jacen looked toward the panel, blinking at it, and then kind of whistling low as he stood and made his way over to check it out. He could say hi to Chopper later. For now?

"She's so new. How long have you had her? Wait, is that the first Phantom?"

"The first?" Hera asked. She gave him a pained look. "Do I want to know how much she's been through over the years?"

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Syndulla Scrap, Saturday

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