I DO NOT OWN STAR WARS!!!
The boy who had asked for her to be allowed to get away…his name was Gate.
The first boy who had spoken…his name was Wester.
The second boy who had spoken…his name was Whin. Pronounced like "whine".
The other two boys were twins…their names were Tem and Pite.
Her name was Teri.
"So, you see that couple walking by over there?" Gate pointed to two twi'leks walking in the middle of the street and holding hands—and probably drunk.
"Yes." Teri muttered, "I see them. I'm not blind." She ended in a growl.
"Well, I know that! It's kinda a question ya' don't answer. Ya' know'wa I mean?"
"You mean it's a rhetorical question."
After Teri had been "initiated" into the Hawk-bats last night, she'd fallen into a restless sleep. The next morning—this morning—she was learning how to steal. Gate had volunteered to teach her how. Already, Teri was beginning to see the differences between her, and these children; she knew more for one thing.
"Is dat'wa it's called?" Gate gave her a gaped-tooth smile, "Thank'fer tellin' me!" Gate's cheer was as forced as her participation.
I don't have an accent for another. "Whatever." Glowered Teri. Then she heard Gate cuss. "What?" she snarled.
"While we was talkin', the couple got away."
Teri snorted, and sarcasm dripping off her tongue she stated, "Pity."
He was usually good at reading people
But not Teri. Teri made no sense to him. She was driven not by anger, nor hatred, nor love. Yet she strove for something…greater. That was the only word he had for it. Sometimes people from the upper levels of Coruscant got stuck in the Hawk-Bats trap, but they broke quickly, and died even quicker. Teri obviously didn't come from down here, and—as it usually happened—she was broken.
But here came the difference; she had broken herself before this place could. She had let herself go out with a bang, simple and cold. What seemed to be left in her place was deaf to emotion. Not anger, but annoyance. Not joy, but amusement. Not sadness, but regret. Not strength, but pride.
She frightened him.
She was only eight years old.
He shivered, sitting in the shadows as he and the girl were. They'd let a couple of Twi'leks get away some time ago.
Gate had done it on purpose.
Gate had the unfortunate quality of wanting to protect everyone he came across. Every new initiate of the Hawk-Bats had found themselves under his wing. He sheltered them, and tried to teach them to be kind, and in the end when—if—they grew older, the life lessons planted on them; not by him would grow as well, and like a poison their cruelty would spread.
It was in this way that Gate found some salvation, some purpose, in these teachings that he attempted to pass on. And the first lesson he always taught, was even though dues were due by the end of each day, to wait for deserving victims to come by. Almost everyone he tried to teach failed that lesson. But not Teri, she seemed determined to defy the Hawk-Bats at every turn—and ignore the consequences while she was at it.
That's what terrified Gate; her defiance.
It had taken Teri awhile; but finally she understood what this Gate—what kind of a name was that?—was doing; he was letting them get away. I guess there's a lesson in all this. Some great deeper meaning or the like. Dues could matter less to Teri, whatever punishment greeted failure, it was far less worse than the mental punishment she would bring about herself from thievery. I am not a thief. So, if I am not a thief, then, what am I? The question nagged at the girl for awhile, before she easily discarded it. That doesn't matter.
Teri sat back and watched as more and more people came by, and Gate chose to let them go, with excuses like, "They won't have anything on them." And, "We'd be best to leave them alone." She thought him pathetic; if he didn't want to make victims of innocents, why not just say so? Why mince words?
Finally, she'd had enough, "Look, Gate. If you're going to let everyone go then by all things tell me! That way I just sit back and relax, and so can you!" Teri snapped, ending with the grind of her teeth.
"Oh." Came the soft reply.
Teri relented and sighed, "Look, I'm not mad, and it was really nice of you to take me under your wing and all, but just be straightforward with me. This isn't a job, it's a life. And I'll leave toying with words to the pros." Teri took the quote right from something Bane had said to her father one day—when her father was trying to be politically correct while mentioning the kind of work her Uncle's latest client partook in.
"Hmm." Gate thoughtfully narrowed his eyes, "Well alrigh'ten. A'v no intention'a muggin' no'un til'we come cross a crook."
"My friend, I do believe this is the start of a beautiful friendship."
Six Months Later… Teri and Gate's friendship has grown to a brother-sister like one. Gate is now fourteen, and Teri is nine.
The Hawk-Bats have hit hard times, but they don't reach Teri and Gate, who have adopted a different system for paying the daily dues than everyone else; cat burglary. A dangerous and often deadly practice in the undercity of Coruscant.
Teri has explored her skills in the Force. She can only do what she could do before; sense. But her skills in that area have grown to be as good as most elder Padawans. Although she can't move objects, she has found more mundane ways of "getting around".
Teri leaned against the wall with a contented smile. She was by her greatest friend, she'd lived to be nine, and they already had their dues for the day; this was as close to bliss as her life got. Then for inexplicable reasons she sat up, looked above her, and did the loudest facepalm known to sentients.
"What?" Gate followed her gaze, and his eyes registered nothing.
"Gate, we've been sitting in front of the G.W.B. for the last five hours."
"GeeDubyaBee?"
"Yes, the G.W.B." she looked over at him and raised an eyebrow, "The Galactic Wide Bank? Ring a bell?"
Gate shook his head in confusion, "No. Why'ud it?"
Teri's jaw dropped open, "Because it's the Galactic Wide Bank! The most corrupt bank in the entire galaxy! That's why!" Her father had written several ignored articles on the thing.
Gate frowned, and looked over at her, "Why'ud I need'ta know'bout some bank? I don't got no money."
Teri sighed, "Never mind." Then she rolled her eyes, "I'll just tell you, the bank is really corrupt, but they do keep credits behind the register." She beamed.
Gate gave her a weird look, "And how we gonna rob a bank?" he looked up at the sign, and blew shaggy, dirty redish hair out of his face.
"We don't have to. This one's been outofbusiness for sometime." Teri knew that outofbusiness meant that the company was no longer operational. What she didn't know was that it was three words.
"So, wu'dn't some'un have beat'us to it?" Gate squinted at the sign. "By da way, how'd you know i'twas a bank?"
Teri looked over at him, "Gate, do you know how to read?"
"Ah, no." The boy answered her, it seemed to Teri that no matter how long she'd known Gate, she would still be surprised.
"How many people do you think down here do."
"Ah, not many."
"And of those "not many", how many would go in and get the money?"
"Ah, none."
"Exactly." Teri finished triumphantly. She smiled at Gate with a bit of pity, "Remind me to teach you how to read." Then she leapt to her feet, and helped him up, "Now give me a lift to that window right there." She said pointing.
After some struggle as to what to do, Teri had her fingers firmly gripped on the ledge, it was a tiny ledge, and it wasn't really to a window—as she had originally thought—it was rather, something meant to look like a window. Security and all. Dang it, how do I get in now? That's when Teri remembered the first time she'd gone from lower Coruscant to upper Coruscant—windows were higher up.
Dangling from the ledge of the "window" however, Teri wasn't really sure how to get up. "There are windows up farther!" she called down to Gate, "But I can't reach them!" She heard some odd sounds, they ended somewhere to her left; and when she looked over, she found Gate clinging to the wall, his fingers and now barefoot toes firmly wedged in the cracks.
"Here's a way!" he grinned.
Teri gave him a look of disbelief, "How'd you do that?"
Gate shrugged, "I jus' do, ya'know?"
Teri gave him an exasperated look, "No Gate, I don't know."
"Well, jus'grab onta da cracks." Then he smiled big, "Jus'pretend dat yur a Jedi ur somethan'." Gate's expression made it out to be a joke, but it was something Teri could relate to.
"Like a Jedi, huh?" she swung sideways a bit, and clutched her right fingers into a solid groove, then started working the rest of her over until she was in a similar position to Gate. "The cracks in this wall are huge!" She laughed, and they were, the cracks were so huge, and so deep, that it was literally like climbing a ladder.
"I know!" Gate smiled, "I've never'one up too high. Never'a reason ta, you know?"
"Yah." Teri grinned, "I know. But now we've got one, so c'mon!"
It was a slow procession, and they slipped more than a few times, but the trouble only started when they'd gone higher. "Uh, Gate, we have a problem."
"I know." The boy groaned. "Da cracks'are dissapearin'!" And they were, as the two got higher up, the buildings were nicer. This was a problem.
"This stinks, just a little farther up and we'd be at a window! I don't know if it's open or not, but if it isn't, we'll open it!"
"It'll have bars on it." Gate sighed.
"I don't think we thought this plan through very well Gate."
"I think I agree with ya' Teri." They hung there for a moment, not really sure what to do next.
Then Teri had an idea, "Gate, how wide do you think that window ledge up there is?"
"Whada'ya mean?" Gate asked.
"I mean, do you think if we made it up there, you could boost me to the next window up?" If Teri remembered correctly, every story you went up, the bars on the windows got farther apart.
Gate frowned, "I think'I can, dough yu'd have ta stand on ma shulder's. I wudn't be able ta do anathang with ma hands! Have ta brace'em against da winda an'all!"
Teri smiled, "That works fine!" she called over to him.
Gate, in a feat of insanity, managed to grasp a hold of the half-foot wide ledge (so conveniently wide, I know) and pulled himself up, then, twisting around, he managed to give Teri a hand.
"Thanks Gate." Teri sucked in lungfuls of air. She then balanced her foot in one crack, and swung the other onto Gate's shoulder, an incredible feat, seeing her height and all. Then, she grabbed onto the window ledge and center herself on the boy's back, following that, she stepped on the top part of the window ledge, and shakily raised herself up higher, hands holding death grips on any miniscule crack her fingernails could wedge themselves into, until her hands were high above her head. She looked up, she was still a full foot short of grabbing the other ledge, I'll have to jump it, she reasoned, then, taking a deep breath, she bent her legs and—she couldn't do it. Old fears surfaced and wouldn't sink, she couldn't get past them. Calming herself, she used a trick that Younglings at the Temple had been taught from an early age; Jedi Flow. She calmed her mind, and imagined the Force rushing through her, loosening knots of memory until they vanished.
Then she jumped.
Gate's eyes flew open in surprise, Teri's weight was no longer on his shoulders. Oh no! She's fallen! She's died! She's— Teri looked up as if to beg the Force for mercy, and was greeted by a shoe dangling in front of his face. "Teri?" he asked the girl, who was now scrambling onto a ledge twice as wide as the one he was on.
"Yah, it's me. I'm gonna break the window, then find something to haul you up with, just gimme a click." He heard the sharp sound of broken transparisteel—the cheap kind—a couple grunts, and then some rummaging. Perhaps five minutes later, a skinny rope was produced. Begging the Force for luck, Gate tugged on the rope to find it securely tied to something. He then quickly hoisted his way up.
Looking around, he didn't see her anywhere, so he asked, "Teri?" to the dark room lit only by the eternal darkness of Coruscant.
"Over here. I think this place is an office suite of one of the executives." Teri smirked, "Nice and plush, eh?"
"Oh yah!" Gate grinned. Then he frowned, "Where'd you find da rope?"
"It's not a rope! It's for a curtain, it ties it back!" Teri exclaimed.
I just placed my life into the hands of a curtain tie. Then lights came on, and he saw Teri standing by the light-switch. The two of them laughed awhile longer, when Teri skipped around behind the desk, where a high-back chair sat.
"This is a nice big squishy chair, and I'm gonna sit in it!" she joked, then she spun the chair around to face her. Her hand dropped from the seat, which kept spinning until Gate saw its contents.
"He's dead." Was all he could say. A human skull stared at him with empty sockets. In shock, Gate walked up the desk, where he saw a small holo projector, which as he neared, flickered on, a clone showed up on holo.
"The scene you have witnessed is punishment bestowed upon those who defy the Empire, any room in this building you go to, will be the same." Then the holo flickered out. Gate and Teri swallowed, and then seemed to make a unanimous decision that there was no dead body there, and there also wasn't a chair. They began digging through holo-slots, they found a lot of accounting holos, but nothing interesting. Then Gate saw something shiny, he pulled it out.
"Hey Teri! Whad's dis?" he asked. The nine-year old looked over at him from the holo she was hacking into, and her eyes grew wide.
"It's a holocomputer." She breathed.
Gate smiled, "Correction; it's your holocomputer. Happy Whateverdayitis." He said, naming a much loved holiday in these parts; most didn't survive to see too many birthdays.
"Gate! I, I don't know what to say! Oh, no, wait, I do, Thank You!!" she squealed, she ran over quickly and gave him a hug. He handed her the holo-computer with a big grin.
"Well don't thank me too much there Teri" he laughed, "I don't even know how to use it!"
"But I do." Teri's eyes were alight with curiosity.
Teri had been thinking for awhile, of ways to change her situation. Most Hawk-Bats figured that to change things, you had to become the Boss, and to become the Boss, you had to "get rid" of the previous one. That was the mindset they'd been raised with.
Teri had been raised with a different one; first at the Temple, and then with her father; she had learned peace. The Temple had taught her, even in six years; There is no emotion, there is peace. She had learned to take emotion out of the equation.
"Hope, violence is helpless, words can play, twist, and frolic around wars. Violence remains shackled by them." From her father, Teri had learned that words were playmates, and helped make bad situations seem horrible, or nothing at all. She had learned how to set the tone of her words, with an art and a skill honed by two years of living with a journalist.
From Uncle Bane she had strategy. She had learned combat as well, but really, she had learned strategy; how to lure prey into your trap—like an arachnid—without ever leaving your hideaway.
So I suppose you could say, that Teri wanted to play.
And so it was back in the lair of the Hawk-Bats that she began to type.
The Boss will kill us if we lift one finger against him. Well, I'm lifting ten.
Teri typed and clicked, she rearranged, oriented, and played tag with her sentences, she was determined to make an impact of some sort. Then, with a resounding sigh of contentment, she summoned the interholo. She bit her lip in thought as she struggled to remember the name of the company her father had worked for. Coruscant Daily. She paused, sighed, and looked them up. From the looks of their website, she guessed they were close to bankruptcy. She smiled; that was exactly what she needed; a company that was desperate for something, anything at all. She browsed the site until she came upon the columnist section; where those who desired to get their column on the weekly holonews "Send Out" could try to be published. Taking a deep breath, she submitted her work under the pen name "Hope".
"What're you doing?" a nasal voice asked.
Teri looked up, "Oh hello slime, I mean Whin."
"Whatever." He snorted, "I said what're you doing?"
"Writing. What does it look like I'm doing you piece of poodoo?" Teri mimicked his snorting and pretended to look busy with the holocomputer.
"You can write?" Whin looked surprised.
Teri looked up, "Of course I can write! Can no one down here write?!" Teri sighed, "Do I have to hold classes or something?"
"Would you?" A second voice piped up, it was Wester.
"No!" Teri snapped. She still seethed at these two, six months was not a sufficient amount of time to cool her temper; or more accurately her annoyance.
"Oh." Wester was clearly disappointed.
Teri relented, "I suppose I could teach you the Basic alphabet some time." She waved her hand dismissively, but now she saw little faces coming out of the cracks.
"Would you?" A voice asked from beside her, Numa, who had been sitting there the entire time Teri had been writing. This was the first time Teri swore she had ever heard the little Twi'lek girl talk.
"Sure." Teri said hesitantly. She heard shuffling to her other side, and when she turned to look, she found Gate grinning at her.
"I knew'yad be a big hit round'here. What'wit ur fancy writin' skills' n'all." The fourteen-year-old plopped down beside her, "What'cha writin'?"
"A column." Teri sighed, she knew where this was going.
"Read it to us?" the soft voice of Numa asked.
"It's nothing you don't already know." Teri answered.
"Please?" Numa asked again.
Teri felt like she was doing a lot of relenting today, "Oh, fine." She took a deep breath, and began to read.
Okay, so I was pretty disapointed with myself on the last chapter. It was jumpy, discordinated, and had no character developement--aside from me killing off one of my fav characters. So I tried to do better this chapter.
The ghost is gonna show up next chapter. And do...something. Oh! And if there's a part where you don't know what Gate says--I'm not very good about writing accents--then just ask!
Teri/Hope/Rishy is going to get something sweet next chapter, and she's gonna give away something cold. Anyone who can guess what gets a metaphorical cookie!
A thanks to My Lady Vader, darkangel1994, The Name Is Unimportant, Queen, and Pirate King Elizabeth Swann for reviewing! That always means a lot to me!