The next morning, Kade was woken at seven-thirty by the sound of many sets of feet running towards the breakfast area. "Argh!" the boy complained, and rubbed at his eyes. He had figured that years of conditioning had his body trained to wake at a certain time regardless of how much he wanted to be up sooner, but apparently not.
He showered, dressed and was just leaving for breakfast when K'Mi cleared her throat behind him. Kaden turned and knelt to be at her level, "Morning, Master K'Mi," he said with a smile, "I'll be at the table in five minutes, promise."
K'Mi held up a small bag she'd hooked with the end of her tail. "Why don't you take this and share it with Master Zaryth. It is suitable for a Hrakian. Go on now," she encouraged, smiling widely as he hugged her.
"Thank you, Master, you're the best!" And with that he took off.
It wasn't much after half past eight when Kaden arrived at Drex's door.
"Good morning," Drex said, opening the door, smiling at Kade and ushering him in. "I have just finished breakfast. Have you already had some?"
"Morning," Kade replied with a small nod, and entered into the common room. "Not yet, but Master K'Mi gave me this to share. I have no idea what's in here," he explained, placing the container onto the kitchen bench; the last thing Kade was interested in at the moment was eating breakfast.
"Well, in that case, I suggest you share what's left of my tea, and I share your food, and you tell me about your thoughts," Drex said kindly, groping for the container, taking it to the dinner table and sitting down, motioning for Kade to take a seat opposite him.
Kade felt bad for forcing him to flounder for the container. Then again, it had inadvertently brought him to one of the questions he wanted to ask. He just hoped it wouldn't come across as insulting. He sat down and took a moment to peel open the lid.
"I have some questions, and some thoughts," he began, producing a fork and skewering a pancake. "I wanna know when to help and when not to. Like just now, I don't want you to think I'm an inconsiderate asswad, but at the same time I know you can take care of yourself, and me, too," the boy admitted, forking two pancakes onto each of their plates and producing some poxxa syrup; it was his favourite.
Drex smiled.
"For a start, you could tell me what this is and how best to eat it," he said.
"It's pancakes and poxxa syrup, and I think there's some genie berries in the bottom but they're a bit squashed now," Kade noted.
"Thank you," said Drex. "When to help me and when not to help me – I think this is one of the things that you are just going to find out over time. I promise you I won't feel offended if you try to help without me needing to; and if I need help that you don't volunteer, I'll simply ask you. You will find out what I can and can't do pretty quickly. I mean, obviously, I can live on my own and there's nothing that I would absolutely need your help with, strictly speaking, but your help will make some things easier for me. I take it from your question that your mind is set upon starting your padawanhood with me?"
"Yeah, I am," said Kade. "The Force means for me to be your padawan, but I knew that yesterday." That came across sounding more arrogant than he had meant it too, but he continued nonetheless. "Do you still want to train me? I think you know I'm not perfect. I get into fights with girls in lunchrooms and sometimes act without thinking, amongst other things…. But I'm a great fighter, I really want to learn and," he paused, placing the lid over the now empty container. "I know it's my destiny, I can feel it. I promise I will try not to cause you too much trouble," Kade added, trying to be truthful, not that Drex struck him as the inexperienced sort who would allow him to get away with much.
"Well, I'm certainly not taking you on because I believe you to be perfect," Drex remarked wryly. "That said, I'm not taking you on because you are such a great fighter either. I think we both know that there is more to being a Jedi than being able to wield a saber with some degree of prowess. I am glad that your feeling about the will of the Force matches mine. I will be happy to teach you, padawan."
Kade sat in silence for a long time, not quite sure if he had actually heard the word 'padawan' used to address him, or whether or not he'd finally flipped his wig and imagined it after so many years of wishful thinking.
Drex gave Kaden another smile and carefully reached for his pancake, rolling it and taking a bite, his life-long experience enabling him not to create a huge mess.
When Kaden finally spoke up he wasn't sure what to say. " Thank you. I–…." he trailed off; he had never been much of a talker, well, at least that was until he'd met Drex. He decided to shove some pancake in his mouth for now. It was an excuse not to talk and gave him more time to internalise what had just happened. For Kaden, things suddenly began to fall into place around him. He felt less hopeless, less like he was fighting for his place and more grounded than he ever had before.
"You are welcome," Drex said gently. "And I thank you, too. Are you ready to see the Council about this?"
"The Council?" he repeated through a mouthful of pancake, then paused to swallow it with some difficulty. "Oh, um, yeah, I guess we should do that. I didn't realise we had to actually go and see them, I kinda thought you'd just sent them a message or something," he admitted, swiping a sleeve across his mouth briefly; he didn't want to see the council with half his breakfast stuck to his face after all.
"As a matter of fact, I will send them a message," Drex said wryly. "But we still need to see them. It's not that they are going to object, but it is what will make our pairing official. Don't use your sleeve; there are napkins behind you. And don't rush; it's unlikely they are going to want to see us in the next five minutes."
Now how did he know that? Kade thought, inconspicuously scraping the crumbs from his sleeve onto a plate. In fact, he was still busy contemplating just that when Drex went to send the Council a message.
It turned out that their appointment was not going to take place before the early afternoon since the Council had more urgent affairs to discuss this morning.
"That means we'll have the morning to ourselves," Drex said, returning to the table. "We can make use of the zime to fetch your things from the crèche and go to the commissary to procure everything else you might need. That way, you can say goodbye to Master K'Mi while the other initiates are in class. After our return, I will take care of lunch while you get settled into your room. Does that sound alright?"
"Sure," replied Kaden. But the truth of the matter was that it sounded more than just alright to him, it sounded downright thrilling! He was trying to keep a cool head here lest his new master mistake him for a giddy teenage girl at a Zatny Zawatny concert – yeah, that wasn't going to happen. He was far too much in control of himself for that….