Unbeknownst to Flynt and Raven, the Senate hearing Eeth was supposed to attend that afternoon was adjourned because a legal issue had arisen that required clarification. On his way back to the Temple, Eeth received a call from the Council secretary that requested him to attend a brief meeting. After that was over, he made his way back to their quarters at a comparatively leisurely pace, expecting that the two padawans might be busy with their homework, or possibly the laundry. His pace quickened as he emerged from the turbolift to the sound of banging and shouting. The long corridor leading towards their quarters was empty, but the noise was definitely coming from the hallway that branched off it towards their quarters. He turned the corner into the hallway to find the two padawans in a full-fledged brawl, with the doorway to their quarters still open.
Flynt's glider was half below them and half against the wall, with one of its wings snapped in two, and the vase of flowers that was set against the wall was in acute danger of toppling over.
Eeth needed a second to take in that scene. Then he levitated the vase out of harm's way and grabbed the topmost padawan, which happened to be Raven, by her arm none too gently. He pulled her up and set her onto her feet which, for some reason, were only clad in socks. Without releasing his hold on her, he repeated the same process with Flynt. It required quite an effort to keep the two of them from going at each other's throats.
"Raven, go to your room and plant your nose in the corner until I allow you to come out," he said in a voice that was designed to cut through the noise the two were making. "Flynt, you go to my room and do the same. I do not want to see either of you move and I do not want to hear a single sound until you receive my permission."
Usually, Raven would have sensed Eeth approaching with more than enough time to desist and have both her and Flynt straightened up. That she had not, and Eeth had to pry her off Flynt physically, was a testament to how hard she had been focusing on wrangling him back into their quarters! Her eyes were wide at catching the stony glare Eeth was pointing at her. Yep, he was pissed, and Raven wasn't going to risk even attempting to explain. Thus, Raven ran for her bedroom without a word to do as he had said. Great, now they were in for it. Raven had thought that they'd have this little tiff long settled and sorted out by the time Eeth was home. Of course, neither padawan had been stupid enough to so much as bruise the other; for Raven, it had merely been a way of getting Flynt to listen to her, to snap him out of it. Perhaps attempting an apology for possibly denting his ego might have been smarter, she thought. Hindsight was twenty-twenty, she knew, and now Raven had all the time in the world to reflect on the many mistakes that had led to this clusterfuck.
Meanwhile, Flynt stood at his full height, brushed off his uniform and met his grandmaster with a supremely indignant expression. "So let me get this straight," Flynt began. "I get jumped by a mini Nexu, and I'm the one who has to put my nose into a corner?"
Eeth grabbed Flynt by the ear, bent him forward and administered a scorching swat to the seat of his pants.
"You are both putting your nose into a corner," he snapped, "because I am telling you to. The only thing that you get to have a say in is how sore your bottom is going to be while you stand there."
He swatted Flynt's bottom soundly a second time.
"Are you going quietly or do I need to use my paddle to convince you that arguing is not in your best interest?" he asked icily.
"Not. Necessary," Flynt managed to grunt out, and when Eeth released him, he strode towards the man's bedroom without further comment. Those two swats had indeed lifted him, and the last thing he wanted was to arm a swing like that with a fucking paddle. The moment Flynt had his nose in the corner, he started massaging some circulation back into his ass. How Eeth had managed to make that hurt so much, he had no idea.
Raven, on the other hand, knew exactly how Flynt was feeling. She'd felt swats like that and would agree that they were to be avoided at all costs. Now there wasn't anything to do but wait until Eeth released them. This sort of thing was tough on Raven; she didn't cope well with being idle and was soon shifting her weight and fidgeting.
Unfortunately for Raven, Eeth thought that, now that both padawans were standing in their corners, he had better leave them there for a while. They needed to cool down, and being made to stew for a bit would not hurt them either.
Without any hurry, he hung up his cloak, pulled off his boots, washed his hands and started preparing onion soup and bread. Then he brewed himself a pot of tea and sat down on the couch to review the agenda for tomorrow's Council session. In short, he did not give the impression that he was in any hurry to rescue the two padawans from their uncomfortable positions.
Raven hated this, and the longer Eeth made her wait, the more restless she became. When half an hour had passed, and it looked like there was no rescue forthcoming, she reached out through her bond with Eeth. "Master, please. It's been hours," she sent, hoping for some reprieve.
When Eeth put someone into a corner, which he rarely did unless their temper was out of control, he expected them to stay there, be quiet and refrain from complaining. Thus, he was not pleased, and it showed in his gait as he strode into Raven's room. Wordlessly, he bent her forward and applied the paddle to her bottom in a scorching swat. "You will stay here until I allow you to leave," he said icily. "Is that understood?"
"Ahhouch! YesMaster!" Raven replied through gritted teeth. That had hurt her, really fucking hurt, and she rubbed at the spot furiously. It took all her self-control not to protest or beg for a reprieve, although her eyes did fill with tears which she promptly wiped on her sleeve.
Flynt had his eyes closed. He was leaning into the corner with his forehead and currently in a light meditative trance. He had been trying to reach out to Lakhri but was pulled from that by something that sounded like a gunshot and Raven's accompanying wail. He could guess what had happened, and although he felt for her, he was glad not to have attracted further attention from his grandmaster. His ass had only just stopped burning.
Eeth made his way to the kitchen where he ate a bowl of soup and a slice of dark bread. When he was done, he headed for his room where Flynt was standing in the corner.
He sat down on his desk chair and said calmly, "Alright, Flynt, you may come out of your corner now. Sit on the bed."
When Flynt had complied, he asked, "Now what was all that about? Please tell me your version of events, completely and truthfully."
By this point, Flynt had had ample time to get his shit together. He wasn't angry, heck, he had not been angry in the first place, he had just been trying to make a point! Explaining as much to Eeth without sounding like his ego had gotten in the way, however, was going to be difficult. "I joked that, given we were unsupervised, I might fly my glider, and Raven overreacted." He shrugged, trying to sound like he wasn't finding this explanation as excruciating as it actually was. "I decided to make a point and led her to believe I was going to take my glider out for a pleasure cruise. I wasn't; I was going to the lounge, but Raven didn't know that. She jumped me from behind, and that's when the wing on my glider snapped."
Suddenly, he realised that he was about to confess to brawling in the damned hallway with the man's apprentice, and he held up both hands in a placating gesture. "I was just defending myself; I didn't hit her." To be fair, Raven had not hit him either!
"And yet," said Eeth coolly, "it looked like a fight to me. For the sake of making a point that you had no business making."
"Maybe I didn't," agreed Flynt, "but that doesn't give her the right to jump all over me about something I wasn't even planning on doing, to begin with. It was just a joke." Privately, Flynt did have to concede that after the crapshoot he'd sent them down the last time he'd brought up illicit outings to fly his glider, Raven might be a little touchy.
"You may leave it up to me to decide what right she had to do what she did," snapped Eeth. "We are talking about you, not Raven. Did you tell her it was a joke, or did you lead her to believe you were serious about flying the glider?"
"After such patronising? No, of course I didn't tell her. 'I'm the superior Jedi,'" he mimicked Raven in an unnaturally high pitch.
"She is," said Eeth. "And you gave her ample reason to pull rank on you, whether that was wise or not. I assume she did not want a repeat occurrence of what happened the last time you flew that glider without permission. And you can hardly blame her for that."
He rose from his chair and put a datapad onto his desk. "Sit and write down what you did that led the two of you to have a fight in the hallway," he said brusquely.
"Wait. Grandmaster, let's not be hasty here." Flynt stood and put a comradely hand on the man's shoulder. He did stop himself from telling Eeth to 'be reasonable about this' as that had always gone down like a tonne of bricks. "Look, what happened was just a misunderstanding. I shouldn't have goaded her on, and she shouldn't have jumped all over me. I apologise." Flynt inclined his head in what he hoped looked humble. "There is nothing more I can write than that. It won't happen again." He added the latter as he'd often heard Raven utter that phrase if the shit was hitting the fan, not just with Eeth, but with other superior Jedi. It worked most of the time.
Eeth's face darkened considerably. He grabbed Flynt's hand and removed it from his shoulder wordlessly. Then, ignoring the boy's slightly affronted expression, he turned him around, bent him over and pulled out his paddle.
"This is the second time I have given you an order that you have tried talking your way out of," he said in a low, stern voice. "And that is unacceptable."
Before Flynt had time to protest, he brought the paddle down onto his bottom at full force, and that was saying something. Flynt let out a heartfelt yowl at this, which Eeth ignored. "When I tell you to write down what you did that was wrong, that is what you do," he informed Flynt. And let another scorching swat follow.
"Am I quite clearly understood?"
Flynt couldn't help it: he straightened up so abruptly that anyone watching might have thought him on fire. "Fuck! Man! OW! YEssSS!" yelled Flynt, his hand cupping the spot Eeth had targeted as if it were a mortal wound. How could his ass feel numb yet still hurt so badly? Well, it did!
"Good," snapped Eeth. "Now let me make sure the lesson sinks in." He grabbed Flynt's shoulders and bent him forward again, then resumed applying the paddle to the boy's bottom slowly and methodically. Eeth did not take kindly to repeat offences, and it showed.
Despite recent behaviour to the contrary, Flynt knew that trying to beg or protest his way out of this would only compound the problem. Thus, he did his best to accept it, but it was not easy for Flynt, especially so as Eeth seemed determined to lift him off his feet with each whack. He yelled loudly, confident that half the Temple would think a murder was going on! It only took a few more to have Flynt unstuck, and much to his shame, he started to cry.
Eeth, however, did not stop before he had dealt out a solid ten swats. Then he released his hold on Flynt, put the paddle back into his belt and said sternly, "Now get to writing. I expect an honest and comprehensive report by the time I am back."
Flynt didn't answer; he couldn't. Instead, he nodded once and kept his head down. Eeth couldn't see him like this, not over ten swats; granted, said swats had been fucking hard! It took him a while to get his shit together, but once he'd stopped sniffling and rubbed some feeling back into his ass, he picked up the datapad Eeth had left on the desk and started writing while pacing the room. He was not sitting down.
In the meantime, Eeth made his way to Raven's room and repeated the process: He pulled out the desk chair, sat down and said, "You may leave the corner now, padawan. Sit on the bed and tell me what made the two of you have a brawl in the hallway."
"Flynt made some comment about sneaking off to fly his glider while you weren't here," Raven began. "I told him what I thought of that in no uncertain terms, and he got his back up. I," Raven paused and looked at her hands, "I should have defused it by apologising for being a bit terse, but then, I was annoyed, too, so I pulled rank." Raven looked up and wrinkled her nose, feeling embarrassed. She explained how she had ordered Flynt to stay and how he'd ignored it, and then she told him about ditching her plans to contact him and rat Flynt out. At this point, Raven looked up and met his gaze. "I didn't want you to think I couldn't handle this. I thought we could settle it ourselves. I wasn't trying to hurt him, just force him to come back inside long enough so I could talk sense into him. We might have gotten a bit carried away."
"You might," agreed Eeth. "You made an effort to do the right thing, which I appreciate, but you have not handled this as well as you might have."
He rose from the chair and, once again, placed a datapad on the desk. "Write down what you did that was wrong and what you should have done instead," he ordered. "By the time I am back, I will expect an exhaustive account."
"Yes, master," Raven replied, happy to be doing anything that did not involve going to the cupboard or staring at flooring.
Raven had no problem writing down her thoughts. She had quite a bit to say. Thus, by the time Eeth was back, Raven had compiled an essay on the ins and outs of what she did and how she could have done it better.
Flynt, on the other hand, did his best yet found little to write that he hadn't already stated. Was he sorry? Well, yes, sorry that they'd gotten into trouble! He didn't really think that defending himself was such a bad thing. Was he meant to allow Raven to drag him back into their quarters without retribution after the way she'd patronised him? Well, probably, yes, but his pride had been a little dented at the time. Flynt wrote about all of that, hoping that something in his recount would appease his grandmaster because Eeth was pissed off, and his ass was not cut out for this sort of shit.
Eeth wordlessly perused what Flynt had written. Then he laid the datapad on the desk and said, "Very well. I think we both agree that, whether it was wise of Raven to pull rank on you or not, you would have had multiple opportunities to appease her rather than escalating the situation. You could have told her it was a joke. You definitely should have done so by the time she came after you. If you had simply put the glider back into our quarters and gone to the lounge, I would not have come home to find the two of you brawling in the corridor. You need to learn to apply better judgment. Go to my cupboard and fetch me the small strap."
The small strap was far from being the harshest implement Eeth had at his disposal but it was still more than up to the task of bringing his displeasure across.
Flynt raised an eyebrow at that order, yet there was no way he was going to question Eeth's demands for a third time today; his ass still hurt from the last time. The problem was that, although he was grateful that his body had somehow stood and complied without his brain's consent, he was left with the fact that he was now heading back to Eeth carrying a strap. Flynt paused outside the door, swallowed, swiped at his forehead (Force only knew when he had actually started fucking sweating over this!), took a breath and then forced his legs to move. He didn't say a word, just held out the strap and tried to look as if he weren't about to run. That would be cowardly, among other things, but it was exactly what he felt like doing right now.
"Bare your bottom and bend over the chair," Eeth ordered curtly, accepting the strap from Flynt. He was going to have to mete out two punishments in a row and he did not feel like losing any more time over it than he could help.
Flynt looked from Eeth to the chair and back again; his ass still hurt, and, yes, he was scared. Not that he wanted to admit to being afraid! Heck, no; to allow fear a controlling hand was most un-Jedi-like. That wasn't the only issue Flynt had here, though. He didn't take pain well either, not at all. He wasn't sure if he was just more sensitive than others, but it was what it was. Swallowing, Flynt forced himself to swallow his pride; the part of him that wanted to fight Eeth's authority and make this worse on himself. Instead, he shucked his pants and bent over, all the while doing his best to keep his shit together.
"Making a fellow padawan believe you are getting them in trouble is not funny," said Eeth sternly, stepping up behind Flynt. "No matter how she behaved towards you. Nor is provoking her into a fight. We are Jedi. We do not brawl, whether anyone got hurt or not. And that is a rule you have known since you were a toddler. I do not want anything like this to happen again."
With this, he raised the strap and brought it down across Flynt's upturned bottom smartly.
As much as he didn't like it, Flynt did concede that Eeth had a point. Thus, he silently resolved to try taking this like a man! Or did he mean like a Jedi?
"OOWWW!" Nope, this fucking hurt! "AHH!" he yelped when Eeth landed that Force-awful instrument of torture for the sixth time. "Oww!" How did Raven deal with this? Flynt's thoughts scrambled, though, when another solid thwack branded itself into his undercurve, and he buckled at the knees, his eyes filling with tears. Heck, Flynt always tried to accept punishment, he just wasn't very good at it.
Eeth knew that but he had no intention of indulging Flynt. The boy had clearly provoked the fight even though that had just as clearly not been his intention. In that respect, he was quite similar to his master; Lakhri had been in situations just like this one more often than Eeth cared to remember, having tried to outwit others or making fun of them until they had ended up fighting him. Eeth had never done Lakhri the favour of treating this as "none of his fault", nor was he willing to do so with Flynt. He wielded the strap with grim determination. Eighteen licks would do just fine, he decided. This was the small strap, after all.
Suffice it to say that, by the time Eeth dealt out the final lick, Flynt was inconsolable. He'd started panicking and begging around the tenth swat, and Eeth had been forced to restrain him shortly after. Now he lay limply over the chair and cried, not only from the pain, which was considerable, but also because he was ashamed. He was ashamed that he'd gotten himself into this, that he'd handled it so badly, and that Raven would have heard the lot. He couldn't imagine what his Jedi aunt must think of him right now. Again, anger rose inside him and he gritted his teeth, quashing the unacceptable feelings. This clusterfuck wasn't Eeth's fault; it was his. Eeth wasn't doing this to torture him, as much as it felt that way! He was doing it to help him learn. Flynt knew all of this, and he silently repeated the statements to himself until he started calming down.
At this point, Eeth assumed that Flynt might be ready to accept some comfort. He rested a hand on the boy's shoulder, helped him straighten up and offered him a handkerchief.
"Meditate for half an hour," he said quietly. "I will have to talk to Raven now." He would rather have spent more time focussing on Flynt's needs but it would be unfair to let Raven wait much longer. Dealing with two padawans at once could be quite taxing.
Flynt didn't say anything as Eeth left, he just continued to hold his breath in an effort at controlling his breathing. At the moment, every other breath was catching in his chest which wasn't only embarrassing (he was eleven, for the Force's sake!); it was also becoming painful!
Meanwhile, Raven was sitting in her bedroom wondering how Flynt was getting on with Eeth. She could only imagine as there hadn't been a sound! This puzzled her as she couldn't understand how the heck Flynt managed to keep his shit together if Eeth was whaling on him, which she was pretty sure he would; they had been caught brawling, after all! Raven didn't have a lot of time to ponder that, though, as a moment later Eeth tapped on her door and she shot to her feet, a cautious expression on her face.
"Show me what you have written," said Eeth. He accepted the datapad she handed him and studied its contents.
"Alright," he finally said. "I understand that you did not want to call me and get Flynt in trouble but this would definitely have been preferable to brawling with him in the hallway. And I will give you an incentive to remember that, the next time you find yourself in a similar situation."
He pulled up her chair and set down. "Bare your bottom and get over my lap," he instructed, secretly feeling a little silly at the rate at which he was handing out punishment. But then, he was not really planning on making this excruciating for Raven. She might not have handled the situation as well as she could have but she had not been the one who had provoked the fight, and trying to stop Flynt had been the right thing to do. Eeth still felt she should have gone to more of an effort of resolving the situation peacefully, which was why he was going to spank her. However, in contrast to Flynt, none of the implements from his cupboard were going to be involved.
The look on Raven's face was that of genuine dread. She hated this, and what was worse was that Flynt had started it. Again! Huffing, Raven stomped to Eeth's side with less grace than she knew was expected of her, and shucked her pants and underwear in one motion. Then, without waiting for an invitation, or additional swats for stalling, which would be more likely, Raven lay over his lap. It wasn't comfortable, but nor was it as uncomfortable as it probably was for Flynt; her body was much smaller than his which meant that when her hands hit the floor, her feet came off the ground. There was nothing at all dignified about this, and if there were, the last shred of said dignity went out the waste hatch when Eeth shifted her around. She allowed this, of course; Raven wasn't stupid enough to complain or attempt to fight him over correction. She wasn't happy, though, and it showed in her body language.
"Padawan," Eeth said surprisingly gently. "I want you to know that I am proud of you for doing the right thing and trying to stop Flynt. When you are irritated, you become needlessly bossy, which will antagonise others. I recognize this in you because it is a problem I had myself. It is something you will need to work on because it will impede your ability to find non-violent solutions. Pulling rank will not always be an option, and even if it is, it is not always your best option. That is what this lesson is about. Nothing more, nothing less."
Eeth's words had Raven forget her precarious position, if only for a split second. Was she really like Eeth in that aspect? Did she antagonise people without realising it? Force, probably, but would she have apologised knowing it was the only way to avoid the clusterfuck that ensued? Well, right now Raven could unequivocally answer, YES, but in the heat of the moment it was much harder to think logically. Before she had time to contemplate this further, though, Eeth raised his hand and brought it down onto her bottom with less force than Raven had been anticipating. Sure, it still stung her, but it wasn't the teeth-rattling paddle swat that she'd expected for being caught brawling in the hallway with her nephew. Maybe he really was proud that she had tried to do the right thing, even if it had failed. Still, as the next few smacks landed, Raven found herself burying her face into her armpit and hissing. It stung!
While Eeth was not aiming for an effect that was remotely in the league of what Flynt had experienced, he was not in the habit of dealing out token spankings either. He continued meting out swat after solid swat until Raven's bottom was red all over and her expressions of discomfort turned into stifled sobs. That was when he decided that she had had enough.
"Alright, padawan, it is over," he said quietly, patting her back briefly.
Still sniffling, Raven drew herself up and swiped at her eyes with a sleeve. It hadn't been the worst punishment Eeth could have dealt out, not by a long shot, and Raven was grateful for that. If Flynt tried pulling any more shit while in her company, Raven vowed to do her duty and prevent it, no matter how pissed off she was. She looked at Eeth who was still seated on her desk chair and did something she didn't typically incite after punishment: she hugged him. "I'm sorry, it won't happen again," she said into his chest.
"I hope so," said Eeth quietly, returning the hug a little awkwardly. "I do know Flynt put you in a difficult situation. I hope he will settle down, at least for as long as it takes for Lakhri to return. And he will return soon. We discussed his situation at a Council meeting just now and decided that it is time for his backup team to take over. Taking into account the transition period and duration of the trip, he ought to be back at the Temple ten days from now."
"That's good. Flynt will be happy to hear that," Raven spoke into Eeth's chest. She would never admit this, but right now she felt like having their quarters to themselves again wouldn't be so bad. Sure, Flynt was practically her best friend, yet there were reasons why no master was permitted to take on more than a single padawan. Raven sighed and removed herself from Eeth's chest. She knew he would never push her away, even if he probably felt like doing so. This thought caused the corner of her lip to curl slightly as she adjusted her clothing and straightened herself up. By now, Raven had stopped sniffling and her eyes were dry. Her ass, however, hurt. She rubbed absentmindedly and then sat on her bed, a foot kicking into the base and legs dangling. "So, are you still mad?" she asked hesitantly, but what Raven really meant was to find out if Eeth was done punishing her.
"I have never been 'mad'," said Eeth matter-of-factly. "As far as I am concerned, the slate is clean. I advise you to make things up with Flynt, though. Now come and have some soup. I will release Flynt from his meditation."
Raven blew out a breath. Shouldn't it be up to Flynt to make it up with her? He had started it… Wisely, she refrained from stating as much as Eeth left her bedroom. After all, as far as Flynt was concerned she WAS the superior Jedi, she WAS in charge, and it was probably up to her to be smart about it this time. Anyway, Raven did feel a bit bad for Flynt; he was missing Lakhri. Force only knew she would be missing Eeth if he were gone. Raven thought back to the time when Lakhri had taken care of her while Eeth was on that mission to Antar. He'd almost died, too, and she could remember how hard the emotions attached to his absence had been to control. Yes, Raven would make things right with Flynt; it was the right thing to do.
Eeth set out some soup and bread for the two padawans and went to his room to fetch Flynt.
"You may stop now," he told the boy. "Wash your hands and come to have lunch. I have news for you."
News? Flynt wasn't sure if that was a good or a bad thing. Considering the state of his ass, however, he didn't interrogate Eeth and rose to do as told without questions.
When Flynt limped out of Eeth's bedroom several minutes later, both Eeth and Raven were seated at the dining room table. Eeth looked as if he'd already eaten as he had no bowl before himself, but Raven was eating. His stomach growled; Flynt was always hungry, and it was past time for lunch. He offered Raven a charming smile as he approached, hoping to let her know that he wasn't planning to continue their bickering. Then he took his bowl from the table, leant a hip into his chair and started eating. Whatever Eeth had to tell him he hoped it was going to be good because his day had sucked so far.
"I will offer some healing after you have eaten," Eeth told him. "I would do it now but you give the impression that you would rather not postpone your lunch. You are much like your master in that respect. Speaking of your master: Lakhri is going to come home soon. He managed to move the negotiations to a point where the parties are willing to talk to each other and to negotiators other than him. Lakhri is working on transferring the proceedings to his backup team as we speak. As soon as they are able to take over the negotiations, he will leave. He will be here in about ten days if nothing unforeseen happens."
Flynt's expression brightened despite the pain he was in. Yes, ten days was a long time, but at least they now had a set date for Lakhri's return, which was a lot more than they had yesterday!, he thought. "That's great. I'll be out of your hair in no time, then." Flynt winked at Raven to demonstrate that he wasn't entirely serious, not entirely, and practically inhaled his bread roll; he hoped there were more of those as they were particularly delicious when dipped in the onion soup.
And of course there were. Eeth would never let anyone in his care go hungry if he could help it. He had gone hungry too often as a small child and, after his arrival at the Temple, had never stopped being grateful for the seemingly endless availability of wholesome food.
After lunch, he did as promised and provided Flynt with some healing; not enough to take away all of the sting, but enough to make sitting possible. After all, the boy had assignments to complete! Eeth just hoped they would get through the remainder of Flynt's stay with them without further trouble.