The Park, Friday Afternoon

[uncertain_dume]

So, the guy with the lightsaber in the park today was a little shorter than the usual guy. He also seemed far more confident in his swordwork, though, running through Form III patterns as though he'd only just done them yesterday. Which... well... he had.

He also appeared to have a little bit more pink in his braid than he had yesteray morning. And a blue streak in the rest of his hair. And it was possible that he was keeping his eyes closed as he worked through his forms at least in part because his braid kept swinging into view and it was just so pink. Like... bright pink. Like Caleb had a Zeltron sparring partner back at the Temple who would have been jealous of that hair.

Was it possible to have buyer's remorse on stubbornness? Caleb might have had buyer's remorse on stubbornness, because he never would have let Rosa Emily put so much color into his hair otherwise. And his Master was either going to lecture him or laugh at him or both in equal measures once she was out of the bacta and she saw this, and the hair wasn't even the strangest part of his yesterday.

He spun on his heel, bringing his lightsaber down and forward, his dog (he still wasn't convinced Stance wasn't just a super weird wolf) watching intently from where he was sitting by a bench, as he waited for Tip to arrive for her Friday sword practice, like she had said she would.

[OOC: Open Park for all your tiny lightsaber friend needs!]

Comments

[thatwaslucky]

Rey wasn't Tip, but she was curious. So she came down like usual, tried not to look too amused, and went to go say hello to Stance. Though mostly she was trying to watch without creeping out a kid.

[uncertain_dume]

While Caleb didn't know Rey in the least, it didn't take him terribly long to realize that he was being watched. Still, he had a few more steps to go before he was finished this particular pattern, and it wasn't until he was finished those that he straightened up, opened his eyes, and looked over at the girl who was greeting the dog, who was pretty happy to see her.

He tilted his head a little, curious. Another person that... the dog... knew?

"He seems to like you, huh?"

[thatwaslucky]

"Oh, he and I are friends," Rey smiled. "Hi. I'm Rey."

Oh, wow, now she could really pay attention to the hair.

[uncertain_dume]

As if the Padawan braid wasn't distracting enough without the help, right? Caleb smiled, feeling maybe a touch self-conscious, and shut off his lightsaber, clipping it whole to his belt. He was half-tempted to pull up the hood on his robe, but that would've been kind of obvious.

"I'm Caleb," he greeted. "And I'm starting to get the feeling that he knows everybody. But at least he seems to have pretty good taste in friends."

Kitty had been cool, and Hera, and... okay, Summer seemed to have some weird sticking point about his name, but he really had no clue what the whole 'Kanan' thing was about, so...

[thatwaslucky]

"There are some good people here," she said, like she knew more than about six people total. "You looked good out there."

[uncertain_dume]

"I did?" Caleb blinked, and then smiled wryly. "Those were just practice forms, but thank you. I've had some excellent teachers."

Yeah, he kind of worshipped the ground his Master walked on.

"Do you not see many Jedi around here? I know there's at least one more of us."

You know, Anakin Skywalker's significantly younger twin who was also named Anakin. That one.

[thatwaslucky]

"Not really," she admitted. "I don't know if that's somehow changed this week with, um, new people around."

How did people explain this event? Seriously.

[uncertain_dume]

"With, uh, teenagers taking the place of older versions of ourselves, you mean?"

Look, just because it sounded crazy didn't mean Caleb hadn't been able to tell that Hera was telling him the truth when she'd explained it to him.

"... That still feels really weird to say."

But it was also basically the only thing that explained most of this.

[thatwaslucky]

Did Rey look relieved? Because she looked relieved.

"Oh good, so you do know."

[intotheout]

"Hey Caleb," Tip greeted, walking up with a pair of carefully broken broomsticks sticking out of her backpack. (She didn't have a lightsaber, and she was pretty sure he wouldn't bring Kanan's metal or bamboo swords.) "I dig the hair."

[uncertain_dume]

"Tip, hi," Caleb replied, lowering his lightsaber and waving hello. "Thanks! I, uh, I think I might have gotten suckered into doing it, but I don't hate it, either..."

It had been one of the strangest experiences of his life, added to the list of strange experiences that mostly consisted of things from the past couple of days.

[intotheout]

"You got suckered into dying your hair? Isn't that, like, a whole long process?"

[uncertain_dume]

Caleb ducked his head a little and ran a hand through his hair sheepishly.

"Well, yeah..."

Look, if you had Rosa Emily insinuating that you were a chicken and you were half as stubborn as Caleb, you would've done it, too.

"But if I don't like it, I can probably just try to cover it up later, right? I mean, it looks like I've got some downtime for a while, so I won't be going into battle like this right away."

He paused again.

"... How long do you think it'll stay like this?"

He had no idea how hair dye worked.

[intotheout]

"Well, I don't know. Was it a permanent dye? Did you use bleach?"

He probably used bleach. It was much too bright a color not to have involved bleach.

[uncertain_dume]

"That's what smelled and burned a little, right?"

Yeah. They'd definitely used bleach.

[intotheout]

"Yeeeeah. How fast does your hair grow?"

[uncertain_dume]

"... Oh."

Well, that answered that, then.

"So I'm stuck with this for a while, then."

Oh no, his braid was going to be two-tone once it grew out a little. How embarrassing.

[geniuswithasmartphone]

Alec had followed Caleb home last night like a puppy and then kind of did the same this morning. It was the day after, so all his bruises managed to look even worse, but he stopped paying attention to how sore his face was as soon as the lihhtsaber came out.

"Oh wow!" he called. "Is that a real laser swor!"

[uncertain_dume]

"It's plasma, technically," Caleb called back, unable to bite back a little grin. Okay, it was neat when people were impressed by his lightsaber, he couldn't deny that. "But it's really a sword?"

He wasn't going to get through many forms this way, but he was okay with that.

[geniuswithasmartphone]

"That's so cool," he said, all admiration. "Where'd you get it?"

[uncertain_dume]

Caleb smiled and made his way over to Alec so that he could get a better look.

... Though he did shut off the blade before holding the hilt out for him to see.

"It's the traditional weapon of my Order," he explained. "Everybody who's passed their initiate trials gets one. Well. Builds one, really. It's an important rite of passage."

Besides, it'd be a pretty sad Jedi who didn't have a lightsaber.

[geniuswithasmartphone]

Awww. Alec had been kinda hoping to get to play with it! Which Caleb had likely realized, hence the shutting off. "Wait, you built this? How cool is that?!"

His admiration for Caleb was growing by the second. And it had started pretty high, what with the letting him crash over somewhere safe the night before and all.

[uncertain_dume]

Friends didn't let friends cut their own hands off.

"It was pretty neat," Caleb admitted, smiling a little. "I could take it apart sometime, if you want to see all the parts?"

None of those bits were terribly likely to make much sense. But at least the telekinesis would be neat?

[geniuswithasmartphone]

Alec might have to give some serious thought to whether losing a hand was a fair price to pay for getting to swing a plasma-sword.

So good call, Caleb.

"Heck yeah I would!" Alec declared, excited by the very prospect. And the word telekinesis hadn't even been used yet. "I like to put together computers an' stuff, but that's got nothin' on a sword!"

[uncertain_dume]

"Well then, sometime when we aren't in the park," Caleb decided, "I can show you all the parts inside. It's all pretty great," and Caleb was totally humble, honest, "but the best part is the crystal."