Chapter Title: Of Mice and Memories
Series Title: Unlikely Brothers
Author: Obi the Kid
POV: Tannerlin (15 years old)
Summary: A series of non-chronological stories taking place in the world of my OC's Dashen and Tannerlin.
Chapter Summary: Tanner flashes back 6 years to when his life changed forever.
Rating: PG
Characters: Dashen Lesedi, Tannerlin Vai (Jedi) and Virgil Colton
"Would you please stop calling me Mouse!"
"Sorry, kid. Can't. Habit. Hey, don't expect me home tonight, okay?"
I rolled my eyes at the data screen – towards my brother on the other end. Well, technically we weren't related – but in every way other than blood, he was my brother. As in the true nature of big brothers, Dashen was an expert at being annoying even when not physically there.
Mouse. It'd gotten the nickname the day he'd found and rescued me six years ago. I was this small, skinny kid with brown hair and brown eyes who didn't talk much or make much noise – and I guess I reminded him of a rodent – funny, huh? I didn't really care then. I wasn't in my right mind. But now…well, now it was just Dash being Dash and doing his best to irritate me. Most of the time it worked, but this time I decided to let it go, and after I got past the nametag I rolled my eyes again…just because.
"Another hot date with Jayla?"
"You can tag along with us to dinner if you'd like. She has many friends."
"Thanks, but no thanks. They're all yours."
"I'm not Colton, Tanner. I am me -a one woman guy. I don't need a herd. But you're sure? It's never too late to change your ways, you know."
By 'change my ways', he meant becoming interested in the whole dating thing. And that was still a no for me. Teenage boy or not, I still held tight to my Jedi ways. Despite the slaughter of the entire Order six years ago, I still found comfort in the way I was raised and in the devotion to the Jedi. It had been my life, my every second and every breath until I was nine years old. Of course only Colton and Dash knew my true background – there still being an active Jedi bounty out there for any of us still alive - so I couldn't go around shouting my beliefs around the city, but I held them close and managed or at least tried to live by most of them. Maybe one day, I'd let go of that particular side of me and allow an intimate relationship with someone my age, but Sith's hell, I was fifteen! Even if Dash's version of normal was my normal, what was the rush? I was happy and content with who I was…despite my brother's ragging.
"Whatever, Dash. You have fun with Jayla. Tell her I said hello."
"Oh, hey, one more thing. I need you to make a run for me tomorrow. I won't be home until late, but forgot about a job I'd promised Ole Grumpy Gershek. You don't have classes tomorrow, and don't worry it's nothing illegal, just a simple movement of jewels from his place to his cousin in Loma. They don't want the rest of the family to know – someone died and left expensive crap to one but not to the other and this and that. You know how that works. Family pains."
I snorted. "Yeah, I know all about family pains."
"You'll take care of it then for me?"
"Dash, you know I hate running." I did. Hated it with a passion actually. Didn't mean I wasn't good at it though, especially with a little push here and there from the Force. Still…it was too sneaky and illegal and criminal-like for me. This specific job sounded okay – legit – as Dash would say – but the job was never me. For Dashen though… I mean, he'd practically raised me from the time he'd rescued me – we'd gone from complete strangers to inseparable brothers since that time. Part of me knew I would forever be in his debt for what he did. Of course, I'd never tell him that, and we were still drastically dissimilar people and well, he wasn't me. As much as I loved my brother, we were quite different in a lot of ways. What we had worked, because we made it work, but we clashed on occasion too.
No clashing this time, I took the job, but still hated it.
"Fine, I'll do it. You owe me though."
"Anything, Mouse. You name it."
"How about you stop calling me Mouse?"
"How about no?"
I shook my head at him as he gave me the details of the run. I committed it to memory and readied to sign off.
"I'll see you…whenever then?"
"A day or two. Behave yourself, little brother." His green eyes laughed at me. "Later, Mouse!"
"Yeah, yeah, yeah." I clicked off the data screen and set it on the table. I was tired. Too tired for my age. Bad dreams this week. Not sure why. Something had triggered it I guess, although I couldn't pinpoint what – my brain just not having that type of energy at the moment. I did know that this week I'd been remembering that day a lot. Six years ago when I was nine and in the basement of that…place…and Master Ayden shoved me into a hole in the wall, used the Force against me and told me to STAY, no matter what happened. "Don't let me down, Tannerlin," he'd said. "Please, Padawan." He'd begged. My master never begged. "This is serious. Call on all your training to stay put. I know you won't let me down. And if something happens…someone will come for you. I know they will. I know it. Trust in the Force."
Foolishly, I didn't realize it at the time, but he'd been saying goodbye to me. Death was imminent and he knew it. And in part of giving himself up, he was allowing me to survive.
Through the tiniest of peepholes, I'd watched him die over the span of days –he
and the other four in the landing party. Funny thing, I couldn't remember their names anymore. I could see faces and familiarity, but names escaped me. The details of Master Ayden's death however became sharper and more focused each time I'd dreamt it, this week especially. Most prevalent in recent days were those last few minutes before he'd died…with several clone troopers still guarded over them…my master's bloodied head fell to the side and his bruised eyes opened just enough to see the exact spot he'd forced me to hide. He could see me then, I knew he could, even through that insignificant peephole. I'd sent a tendril of the Force toward him - our bond - and in that final moment, I had tried to tell him that it was okay to let go -that I loved him and that I promised to be okay and would see him again one day.
I think he understood because his eyes closed then and he whispered away a last breath as his spirit left his physical body and passed into the Force.
And that had been that. Dashen found me ten days later; half dead from lack of food and water, in shock from trauma, and heartbroken that I'd just lost everything I'd ever known.
That was six years ago…almost to the day. And…and now I'd figured it out – there was my trigger. The date has snuck up on me. It was why these memories were coming again and so strongly. Anniversary dates aren't always celebratory. Some are wracked with pain and bad memories. Some are long running nightmares. Some just make you feel like a lost little boy again in need of someone to wrap their arms around you and tell you everything would be all right.
I flopped backwards onto the couch. The door chime sounded. It could only be one person other than Dashen, so I motioned a hand towards the keypad and used the Force to activate the lock code. I'd been teaching myself in Force exercises in these past few years. I owed it to my master to try and continue what he'd taught me. It was difficult and I didn't understand a lot of it without the wisdom of years of experience behind it, but slowly it came. Something as simple as using the Force to unlock the door took me a long months to master on my own, but even small successes were successes, right?
The door slid open and Virgil Colton came in. He was a combination, boss, fake uncle, ladies man, protector and landlord. Oh and master criminal (it's how he'd made his fortune). He was tall, broad, blonde and blue-eyed. Like one of those male models that populate those trendy romance holo novel covers. On one hand, women threw themselves at him and on the other hand, he had eyes and ears in every corner of every part of this planet. Some of those eyes and ears were probably some of those same women who threw themselves at him. Using the ladies as his spies? I put nothing past him. He was a good guy though and he cared about me and Dash – or he'd have kicked us out a long time ago. We lived in the apartment that covered a portion of the top floor of his planet-sized mansion.
"Hey ya, kid." Kid. I could handle kid. Thankfully, he never called me Mouse.
I didn't lift my head but I did return the greeting. "Hi, Colton."
"Everything okay?"
I shrugged. "I'll live."
"Dash just called me. Said you sounded a little off. Wanted to make sure you were good."
The out of control bangs of my light brown shoulder length hair, fell forward as I sat up. I pushed the strands to the side. "Nightmares again. Just a bit more intense this time." He knew I suffered from them, but I never really went into detail with Colton about things like that. I felt more comfortable just spilling my emotional beans with one person – Dashen – and leaving it at that. But Colton always knew everything, so it didn't surprise me that he knew more of the particulars about my nightmares than I would have thought.
"The years pass and the dreams get more detailed now, don't they?"
Although I didn't look at him – not knowing how he knew what he knew – I didn't disagree with his statement and offered a slight nod. But then…then he said something that truly surprised me.
"Been there, done that, kid. Still live with it. It gets easier, but it never goes away."
I stumbled. "W-what?"
"I guess I never told you that story, huh?" The cushion next to me sagged. "Yeah well, my past is my past and I like to keep it that way. The less people know about me, the less chance they can screw up my life…or find ways to kill me. So, you want the short version or long? Eh, never mind. Listen, why do you think I gave a crap about Dashen way back when after his parents and brother died?"
His parents had died when Dash was eleven. His brother, when Dash was thirteen.
"I guess I never thought about it."
"Any why would you? As I said - been there done that. You, me, Dash? Same crap, different year. I had a family once. Parents and two sisters. I was fifteen when my sisters and mother died in a passenger ship explosion. My father survived but suffered massive injuries, and was never the same or able to live under his own power. He spent most of his days after that in a rehab home. The money he'd tucked away paid for it barely. I had to figure out life for myself after he got hurt. Found out it was hard as hell surviving completely on your own at that age. Lost and alone. I knew what Dash felt when he lost that last piece of him – his brother. It's why I stepped in and offered him a place to crash now and then and tried to keep at least a partial eye on him. It's why he pulled your skinny butt out of that wall six years ago and looked after you. We're all different…but we're all the same."
I really didn't know what to say. That he'd lost family so young was the furthest idea from my mind when it came to Colton's past. It didn't really explain how he'd become a master criminal after the fact, but I figured that was a story for another day – or never at all. I didn't ask him about that, but I did ask him something else.
"Do the dreams ever stop? I mean the really bad ones?"
"Stop? No. Not completely. But they lessen and they get easier."
A strange sigh of relief crept out of me as I flopped back onto the couch again.
"Dash told me about the job tomorrow. Sounds simple enough, but you need rest." He reached over and patted me on my knee. "Sleep tonight, kid. It'll help."
I did sleep. Not sound and deep, but improved from the previous few nights. And when Dashen did finally make it home the next evening, I greeted him with a surprise hug. No explanation and it was fun to see him so confused. After I released him, I then proceeded to whack him in the back of the head for sending me on that run. It'd been quite the adventurous escapade and I have a pretty solid idea that he knew its potential ahead of time and had conned himself out of it on purpose. Or perhaps he could see that I needed to re-center my focus to something other than nightmarish memories. My brother could be quite the sneaky snake at times. It was okay though. He accepted the hug and the whack as just me being me…six years after a massive single event changed my life…and his, forever.
The End
