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Lex

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Lex wandered the pillared halls of the of the University slowly, a hand trailing the paneling of the corridor at his left and intermittently dodging the gaggles of students passing by to his right. The crowd was dappled with rainbows beneath the light that spilled through the tall mosaic windows on the sweeping arches of the walls, and he spared a grin at the effect it had not only on the others but also himself as he walked.

Though most of the citizens passed him by without notice, a few stopped short to cast him piqued glances. Small stints in the flow of foot traffic which caused a mild but humorous collision now and then. Lex continued on as though he was oblivious for the sake of not upsetting things further, although he found some amusement in the reaction he caused. He'd never imagined himself considerable as anything worthy of distraction. Having always been surrounded by others of such similar appearance, it was hard to imagine anything which was distracting about himself. But here he was the odd one out. The novelty of it brought a soft grin to his lips.

Beyond this small bout of humor he walked for long minutes, taking in each of the sights and sounds he found so alien and wondrous.

The intricate signs overhead were illuminated with symbols and directions but Lex still found himself having a difficult time locating the lounge he was searching for. Apparently there were twenty-six of them on that level alone. He paused at the top of a grand staircase just as an overhead chime of sorts rang sudden and shrill through the passages.

The sergeant found his thoughts floundering in the silence of its wake, curious and unsure of how to react. He hadn't noticed he was alone until then and mused at the purpose of the kreen.

Alone but for one man approaching from further down the hallway, his face hidden behind a perilous stack of books teetering upon his forearms.

The man apparently didn't notice the trooper at the top of the stairs and practically bowled him over as he passed. Lex side-stepped to avoid a collision and watched the man continue in his passage, oblivious to pretty much everything else as well. The sounds of various grunts and "oomfs" resounded in his wake. A few doors down the curious man paused to fumble with a door, nudging the opening mechanism with a perilous knee. The door hissed open without incident, but the man misjudged the opening and caught the frame with an elbow, sending his arm's contents scattering across the floor with a clatter made deafening in the silence.

"Ah, twice now..." the man mumbled as he stooped to retrieve his fallen assortment.

Lex approached, still unnoticed by the strange and harried man, and knelt to scoop up some flimsi that had fled the man's arms to fan out in all directions. He gathered them neatly to his forearm before shuffling them once upon the floor and holding them out to their owner with a bemused smile.

The man seemed to notice the trooper before him for the first time as he balanced the books once more in his arms and he squinted at Lex curiously for a moment before catching sight of the stack in his hands.

Recognition lit his eyes and with a quick nod of affirmation and a brief smile of thanks, he motioned for Lex to pile them on top of the books in his arms. Lex eyed the stack which seemed bound to fall again at any moment and shook his head slowly. He gestured that he would carry what he held and follow, lest the pile go toppling again.

A brief lift of the eyebrows from the man but he nodded and led the way inside.

The room was a mess of stacked books and posters, thick with diagrams and sketches, cluttered with models and projectories of various celestial bodies. He had to sidestep quite a few sundry piles as he made his way to the large and cluttered desk to one corner of the room.

Before him the man was hopping to parse the books in his arms about the space, sorting to stacks based on a system which was indecipherable to the trooper.

Lex settled on placing the papers he held on the desk's surface and turned to go, but he couldn't keep his eyes from passing over the contents of the room in amazement as he did so. He'd never seen so many flimsi books in his life, and found himself pondering the things they might have contained. Subconciously his eyes lit on each of the ancient peculiars as he passed, the worn and tattered corners of them dancing in his vision.

He had an overwhelming urge to pluck one, any one, from its place on the teetering stacks. To feel the cool weight of the firm cover and the slip-crinkle of the pages turning beneath his fingers. They were solid and mystical things to him, even so shuffled and worn and lain haphazardly about. A whole room of the intriguing things which appeared to him much like a vault of treasures.

Certainly the information of the holo variety was far more vast and varied, but here, in these simple objects it seemed somehow so much more tangible. Words that could be felt and traced by the fingertips, stories that could be gripped in the hand with pages brushing against the palm. Held and read and kept, unchanging.

Books had always been a source of utmost fascination to him. Something revered since he'd learned of them in training back when he was two. It was a secret dream, unspoken. Sacred.

He'd snuck into an off-limits lab back on Kamino as a cadet once on the heresay that there had been flimsi manuals locked within. The effort had been fruitless and he'd been punished severely, although he'd still felt the seeking had been worth it.

One of the volumes on top of a stack at his right caught his eye as he passed and he paused mid stride to let his eyes fall upon the golden embossed lettering on its cover and linger there briefly. How much he wanted to just brush his fingers across it. But he knew how ridiculous that might appear, so he settled on a quick glance before continuing his step.

As a soldier of the GAR he was forbidden any tangible personal items which weren't proprietary to his gear or any assignment he might be given. Many brothers broke this rule to various degrees and in a variety of ways: unsanctioned videos or images on HUD's or holopads, secret food items, small trinkets. There were even some who had flimsi-zines tucked under their bunks. But those were generally not for amusement of the mental persuasion and didn't contain what Lex revered or sought from pages.

As a trooper serving on Coruscant Lex did receive a small stipend for recreational use at the local eateries or pubs like everyone else, and he'd considered saving it to purchase a book of his own. But he hadn't thus far been able to bring himself to purchase something defiant of the regs. As a sergeant he felt it was his role to do things per the rules, lest he set a bad example for his men. Force knew they needed no encouragement in that area...

With one last glance of longing at the books, Lex passed through the doorway.

"Ah, wait!"

The man called from across the room and Lex swiveled in response.

"...Yes, sir?"

A very clumsy approach encompassing a few knocked over stacks and a half- slip on some lab equipment on the floor, and the man stumbled to his side, nearly careening into the door jam. Lex caught his elbow with a hand and righted him, and they both looked over his shoulder at the mess in his wake.

"Ahem. Well." The man shook his head and straightened himself up with a habitual gesture of dusting himself off as he did so. "...I'll clean that up later."

He fixed Lex with a curious and deeply studious expression.

"Are you looking for...your class? I'm Professor Danes, by the way. Thank you for your help." He reached out and took Lex's hand before he could initiate the greeting. "I saw you looking around at the top of the stairs. Maybe I can point you in the right direction."

Lex was surprised. He hadn't thought the man noticed him at all. The helmet clipped to his belt clacked slightly against his thigh plate as he shifted with a slight discomfort under the man's scrutinizing stare. He was confounded by the question. Surely, given that the man had eyes, he'd noticed what Lex was, and how ridiculous a question it was to ask if he attended there.

Then again, maybe not. The professor looked like he had the honest desire to be helpful, and his gaze seemed to be one of curiosity rather than mocking or disdain.

"I don't attend, sir. Just...looking for someone."

"Oh. Well, whose class are they in?"

"Er...he doesn't attend either. He's just visiting as well, and supposed to be in a lobby on this level. I'm fine with directions, sir. I can radio him, I just wanted to..." Lex gave his surroundings an awed and respectful glance that wasn't lost on Professor Danes, "look around a little."

"I noticed."

Lex blinked at the now smiling man in surprise, unsure of how to respond.

"How much time do you have before you have to meet him?" There was a mischief in the man's eyes that confused Lex, and he took a half step back, suddenly eager to be going.

"Was there something you needed of me, sir? If not I'll be on my way."

"Professor Dane. Call me Professor Dane." He shook his hands in front of himself exuberantly. "And, yes I think I do need you for something. Come back in here for a moment before you go." He turned and beckoned the trooper with a wave over his shoulder.

Lex hesitated briefly at the threshold, but complied at last, picking his way across the room until he stood at the middle of it beside the strange man. He regarded the professor with a polite curiosity out of the corner of his eyes.

"What did you need, s-Professor Danes?"

Danes was squinting around the room and tapping his chin in thought.

"There was something...hm. Which one?"

He stepped over to a stack of books that marked the path to the large desk like a walkway. On top lay a particularly striking book, old and worn but large and engraved with a lacy golden ink. With the practiced grace of one who had held many, many such items in one's life, Danes plucked it up and flipped back the cover. The pages spun beneath his fingers and he walked trails with fingertips the length of several. His eyes flitted over the passages and lit with the absorption of the contents.

The look he gave Lex after a minute was mischief and approval and light.

"This is a good one." With a curt nod and a snap, the book was folded in his palm and he was traversing the room back to the trooper who was extremely confused at this point.

A confusion which grew when the man came to a stop right in front of him and held out the book to him.

"This is the one you were looking at, right? Go ahead. Have a look. Tell me what you think of it. "

Lex was at a loss for words. It was the very same tome which had caught his eye and he had marveled at earlier. But how could the man possibly have noticed something he had glanced at so briefly, amid hundreds of others? He wasn't entirely sure what the man wanted him to reveal about it either.

But he took it with unsteady hands and brought it close to his face to see the inscription on the cover better, releshing the feel of it in his hands.

Danes watched the soldier as he went through the motions of familiarity with the book, a grin finding its way and settling there. He had been correct in the admiration he had thought he'd glimpsed out of the corner of his eye and the impressions of unmasked marvel he had felt from the trooper through the force. It had been a long time since he'd been privy to such a wonderful pulling of unadulterated admiration between someone of the living force and the unliving objects he himself also revered.

He saw the young man balance it on one hand, then run gloved fingertips across the indentations on the surface, tracing each symbol as though they were sacred runes whispering the secrets of the universe. After a minute, he looked up to the professor, his eyes flitting across his face as though verifying that it was indeed ok to read further. Danes nodded and he opened the cover carefully and riddled the first crisp page at his fingertips and traced a rippling path through the words as he read the first page, then the next. And ten more after. Swiftly but deeply and with a pronounced tenderness that made Danes want to laugh out loud.

But he didn't. He dared not, for fear of disturbing the immense wonder which was unfolding before him.

After a time had passed which seemed endless but was in reality fairly brief, Lex pulled his eyes from the page he was reading long enough to pull himself back to the present and close the book. He stared at it for a minute more, before holding it back to Professor Danes. His face was gratitude and awe, and his eyes were far away. His force signature burned with passionate satisfaction.

"Thank you. I'd never held one before."

Danes hitched an eyebrow.

"Everything you imagined?"

Lex nodded. "And more."

Danes laughed finally and gave Lex a pat on the hand and shoved the book back to him with a shake of his head.

"Good. Good. Take it. It's yours."

...

Lex is my bibliophile ;)

Ok guys, this probably makes me extremely dorky, but I've been doodling a lot lately and did some sketches for this story. Just pen and pencil stuff, and nothing fancy (please don't laugh at me too much, ha... ^_^), but I uploaded them to a deviant art gallery so you can check them out if you like. The account name is Teetertott.

TGP: ;)

Cozzizzie: I like Appo ^_^

CaptainReb: I think I'm going to maintain Thorn's amazing last stand, although I might fudge the after-path. I thought he was awesome and told myself he needed a backstory! I really do like him a lot. I've had thoughts of an alternate fate for him, where he survives, but is decommissioned from service due to the severity of his injuries. Taken in by Padme and later has a hand in the raising of Leia.

I've had several requests for Cody, so I'll be doing him next!

Still cooking up something for him. Probably action-y. Let me know if you guys have any ideas or requests. :)