The Park, Friday Afternoon

[uncertain_dume]

Kanan hadn't said a word on the way back from Coruscant. Hadn't even looked up, really. Tearing himself away from his homeworld again had been almost as difficult as arriving there in the first place, and any peace that he'd found while he had been sitting in lessons along with Padawans of a time long behind him had faded quickly on the way back here.

At least he'd spent the extra money on first-class portal fare. He hadn't been in any mood for dealing with stopovers on the way back. Particularly not with Kaidan. Right now, he still wasn't quite certain how to deal with Kaidan. He'd settle for space.

He sent a couple of texts, anyway. One to Hera, immediately, telling her that he was back and was fine and was just taking some time in the park before coming home. One to Tip, warning her that he was a little off today; it'd be a meditation day, if anything.

There was something ominous bearing down on him, something dark and ugly, and Kanan just shook his head, taking a seat on a park bench and quietly pulling himself away from the Force for a while.

Not now. Right now he just needed the quiet.

[OOC: Open park, quiet Jedi!]

Comments

[solo_sword]

Jaina had been meaning to call for a while, but it was kind of easy for her to get too busy. Today, though, she actually had a solid chunk of time free, so she dialed while she had the chance.

[uncertain_dume]

Kanan almost let that call go to voicemail. It rang once, twice. He picked up before the third without checking to see if he recognized the name on the display.

"This is Jarrus."

Could've been anybody, really. Better to answer and get it over with, whatever it was.

[solo_sword]

"Hey, it's Jaina," she greeted him. "Haven't talked to you in a while, thought I would check in, see how you are."

She did worry, and it'd be different if she was there.

[uncertain_dume]

Jaina...

"Master Solo," Kanan said, eyes widening slightly, posture improving as though worried that she could actually see him sitting there slouched in a park bench. "It's good to hear from you. I've been-"

He balked. His first impulse was to say that he'd been fine, but he wasn't about to lie to a Master any more than he figured he could actually get away with it anyway.

"I've been keeping busy. Things have been interesting."

[solo_sword]

Jaina paused, briefly. "I'm pretty sure I've never heard someone say things are interesting and mean things are good," she noted. "What's up?"

[uncertain_dume]

Kanan blew out a little breath, looking up toward the sky.

Huh. Maybe there was a storm coming in...

"Does the phrase, 'The Lost Jedi' mean anything to you?"

He had no idea how much of the archives had been recovered by her time, or if any of that knowledge was gone forever in the wake of the Empire.

[solo_sword]

"Vaguely. I don't know much in the way of details." To be fair, this was possibly because Jaina wasn't the type to look into stuff like this unless necessary. "Why?"

[uncertain_dume]

"Details aren't terribly important, anyway," Kanan sighed. "I had a long chat with one of them the other day."

That... wasn't the difficult thing that his head kept circling around. But it seemed like as good a way as any to kind of hedge his way into that conversation, all the same.

[solo_sword]

"And?"

Jaina was the type to spit it out and save time. She didn't know Kanan that well, but she could deal with some hedging for a bit.

[hernando_fuentes]

The portal office had told him that "G.I. Joe and Battlefield Barbie" had returned that day. Kaidan hadn't called and Hernando hadn't seen Kanan that day, either. He went looking for one to wring his neck and for the other to find the one whose neck he wanted to wring.

He found Kanan in the park and stopped nearby to wait until he'd come out of his rest.

[uncertain_dume]

Kanan wasn't really doing anything important at the moment. Sitting in the quiet, watching the water. Getting used to the feel of the island around him again. He wasn't uninterruptable. Just... quiet.

He glanced over at Hernando a few moments after the other man had stopped nearby, and just nodded a little.

[hernando_fuentes]

When Kanan acknowledged him, he felt able to approach. Nervously brushing the curls off his forehead, he said a very careful, "Good morning, Kanan. Did Kaidan by any chance come home with you from the trip?"

[uncertain_dume]

Kanan noticed that nervousness with a small tilt of his head and a raised eyebrow. It was hard to miss, even while trying to blot out the Force. It was like a damned puppy, nosing back in at every possible opportunity, and he was bleeding out too much to cover every crack it wanted to seep back in through.

"We came back through the same portal, yeah," he replied, lifting his chin a little, back toward the Portalocity office. "Been looking for him?"

[hernando_fuentes]

Hernando closed his eyes and took a breath that came out with a muttered prayer to Santa Maria for patience. "Yes. He promised to call when he was back. The portal people said that you were back, here you are; I haven't heard from him. Excuse me a moment please."

He hit redial and scowled when he got the voice mail again. "Kaidan, if you don't pick up the next time I call, I am coming over to your apartment with a liter of coffee and if I find you have started drinking already, I will hold you down and pour it right down your throat. You know how terrible my coffee is! I will do this, I swear, if you do not call me back right away." He hit 'end'.

[uncertain_dume]

Kanan watched and listened as Hernando left a message somewhere on the aggressive side of desperate, and raised an eyebrow.

"Hernando, we only got back about an hour ago. He spent half the week in a dusty library, he's probably showering or something. What's up?"

Because that wasn't your typical 'hey, heard you were back in town' voicemail, right there.

[hernando_fuentes]

"He was to call me immediately," Hernando said with a voice tight and worried. "He has not been doing well, of late. He has told you nothing?"

Hernando had been trying to get him to talk to Kanan for weeks by this point. Kaidan had said the day they left 'yeah I guess we're going to do some talking'. If Kanan didn't know why Hernando was worried right now then whatever they had talked about had not been this.

[uncertain_dume]

"Not nearly enough, apparently," Kanan said, frowning a little more deeply. "And not generally until it's too late to do much about it."

He was quiet for a long moment, and then he slid over on the bench and nodded to the spot beside himself.

"Better tell me what's going on, Hernando. Someone's got to keep me in the loop, here."

[futurespacemom]

Hera got the message and sighed in relief. Then she politely sent her forged credentials to the Imperial blockade and flew to the waiting portal as quickly as she could.

Once she landed, she woke up Stance from his position on Kanan's bunk and led him down to the park, stopping on the way for Cokes.

She smiled mischievously at Kanan's quiet posture, then whispered to Stance, "Go get him, boy!"

[uncertain_dume]

Kanan didn't even know what he was in for until he had a lap full of very enthusiastic dog, bowling him clean over with licks and wiggles and basically trying to inform Kanan that he was his human forever and he'd been gone forever and hi! HI. HI OH MY DOG YOU'RE BACK HI.

Kanan, now on the flat of his back on the bench, was torn somewhere between bewilderment and amusement as he only halfheartedly tried to sit himself back up again.

"Hey, buddy. Missed you too."

[futurespacemom]

Hera snickered and walked up a bit more sedately. She held out Kanan's Coke so he could see it, but wasn't handing it over until it wasn't in imminent danger of ending up all over the place.

"He's glad you're back. I terribly mistreated him the whole time you were gone, if you couldn't tell."

[uncertain_dume]

"This," Kanan said, managing to right himself again and reaching out to moosh Stance's cheeks, "is definitely the face of a dog who has never known affection, right here. I bet you only fed him at allotted mealtimes, you monster."

[futurespacemom]

"And I insisted he play a lot, often with Chopper. I took him up in the Ghost to get him used to it, too. He's doing pretty well now, actually. I didn't let him stick his head out the viewports, though."

He had seemed a little put-out. There were nose prints all over the ones he could reach now.

[uncertain_dume]

"What is with him and viewports, anyway?"

Kanan gave Stance a little nudge so that he could pull himself to his feet.

"There's no air out there buddy. It's not a great time."

[futurespacemom]

"I don't think he's convinced." Hera held out Kanan's drink for him. "But once he got over that, he mostly slept or chewed on a toy, so I think he's gotten used to space flight."

[uncertain_dume]

Kanan quirked a little smile, reaching for the drink with a nod of thanks.

"I'm glad it's working out for him," he replied. "We won't have to worry about finding dogsitters once Rey leaves, at this rate."