Chapter Title: The Day After

Series Title: Unlikely Brothers

Ages in this chapter: Tanner (10) Dashen (16)

POV: Dashen

Chapter Summary: The day after Tanner barely escapes capture and death by two bounty hunters, he, Dashen and Colton have a day to recover. (Takes place immediately after the events of Chapter 50 "Shopkeeper").


As mornings went, this was a weird one. The day after... The fact that I wasn't scurrying around the house last minute to get what I needed for my runs, or hurrying Tanner off to school or getting tossed out of the house by Colton. Weird.

How close it had come to being one the worst of my life. Tanner, in that bookstore, so close to being recognized as a Jedi by the bounty hunters... Had they found out...

I didn't want to think about it, but Colton was curious.

He set a plate of breakfast in front of me and essentially ordered me to eat it. Yesterday had been one of those days.

"How's the kid, still asleep?" He eventually asked.

"Yeah," I yawned, before shoving a strip of bantha bacon into my mouth. "Never seen him sleep so hard."

Colton shrugged. "Stress will do that. You know as well as I do."

I pondered the big man. Something about this whole thing confused me.

"Colt. Dec'lar Bin. The shopkeeper. You've told me you have a history. He's known you since you were young. But he risked his life to protect Tanner. Does he owe you favors or something? Because that's one hell of a favor if..."

Colton put a hand up and shook his head. "Nothing like that. We do have history. He was a good friend to my father. My father, like your brother, was an avid reader of those old paper books. He loved a good story. Dec's shop has been there forever. Survived war and fire and clones and so far, the Empire. My father would drag me with him to the shop. I wasn't a reader, but I was fascinated with the stories Dec could tell. No idea if they were true or not, but for a young kid, they were impossible and daring and adventure. It got to where I loved visiting, just to sit and talk with him. That friendship continued as I got older, and once this happened..." He gestured around him to the house, the business. "... and I had some type of power, I made certain that Dec and his shop stayed safe. As you can see, Dec is a long lived race and he's much older now, but I offer what I can to him. He only calls for dire emergencies, but Sy keeps an eye on things when he makes his sweeps through town. Dash, if you can trust one person in all of Kaolin, you can trust Dec'lar Bin. He's good people. The best people. Remember that."

No trouble there. The man saved my brother's life. A life he could have easily had snuffed out in less than a second. And who would have cared other than Colton and me?

"There's not enough good people in the galaxy."

"Indeed there is not."

From across the room, socked feet came scuffing down the stairs from the apartment. Tanner and his bed hair and wrinkled sleep clothes. Eyes half open. The kid looked a mess.

I patted the barstool next to mine, directing him to sit close. But Tanner was Tanner and he tossed his arms around my midsection to hug me tight. When he didn't release me, I set a hand on his head. "Mouse?"

The voice was muffled against my tunic, but I heard the words loud and clear. "Love you, Dash."

My worried eyes glanced over at Colton, hoping the events of yesterday hadn't broken the kid. Colton made a face and tilted a smile in my direction.

"Love you too, little brother." I returned.

With that, he released me and hurried around to the other side of the bar to next latch onto Colton. Ready and waiting, Colton accepted the small clinging form.

"Colton." Tanner said. Muffled again. "Can we go see Dec today?"

"Certainly we can, young one. He would like that. Are you sure?"

A nod against Colton's tunic. "I want to tell him thank you."

"You did that yesterday."

"I know," Tanner pushed away from Colton and moved back around the bar, hopping onto the bar stool next to me. "But he saved me and he didn't have to do that. No one has to do that for me, but they do. You and Dash. Now Dec. That makes him family."

There was a leap. For me at least. For Tanner? Eh, not so much. The kid latched on when it was right. And this time around, it as an old shopkeeper named Dec'lar Bin was the fortunate latched soul.

"We can go this morning. I'll be going with you though."

"To keep me safe." Tanner said it flat out and honest, like it was the most natural thing in the world.

To him, it was.

To his credit, Colton didn't lie and hide the fact that there was still concern about other bounty hunters. He simply told Tanner, "Yes, to keep you safe."

Tanner smiled and ate a slice of bacon. "Good."

And that was that.

Not long after, we hit the shop of Dec'lar Bin, clearly surprised to see us.

Tanner, being who he was, walked inside, was greeted with an uncertain but hopeful glance by the old man, and immediately grinned and pushed forward to hug his new friend. Dec returned the embrace and I was pretty sure I saw him tear up just a bit before Tanner backed away.

"Tannerlin, it's so good to see you."

"You saved me and you didn't have to."

"But I did. I look after my customers. Especially my best customers. And I look after my friends. All of them." I watched Dec spare a friendly expression with Colton. Old friends. New friends. We were all coming together now because of a young Jedi kid who only wished for good things for everyone he knew.

Tanner reached into a pocked and pulled out a credit chit. "Here. For the book yesterday." The book that Dec told him to take and just pay later.

I could see the look on Dec's face. He was about to refuse the money, but a light throat clearing from Colton and Dec relented, accepting the payment. It made Tanner feel good to treat his friend honestly.

"Thank you, Tannerlin. I do hope you'll be back soon to talk books with me."

"I will. I promise."

"Excellent! I look forward to it."

We left the shop to head to an early lunch at The Rathskeller - the restaurants/bar that Colton owned - and a day off for us all. Tanner wasn't a normal kid who looked forward to being away from school. Learning was his thing and he lived to fill up that needy mind and curiosity of his. But he made an exception on this day. After recent events, we all needed to take time to relax and recoup. Another a little on the rough side with a certain clientele, thanks to Colton's almost invisible but heavy security, the bar was a still a safe place for that. A good place for that. Tanner had a favorite booth. Of course, it was right next to the bar top, often enthralled with watching the server mix drinks and interact with customers. Said that his Master Ayden always encouraged him to watch closely and pay attention to everything around him, especially personal interactions. You could learn so much from just a simple exchange between strangers, he'd often told him. I found people boring. Tanner found them fascinating.

Colton's main bartender, Verahna - she had no last name, or just refused to tell anyone - Colton simply referred to her as Vera - was a typical barkeep. Serving drinks, listening, watching and soaking up information like a damn sponge. Really, she was the adult non-human female version of Tanner. She was a Nautolan - a green-skinned amphibian species that could breathe air and water. Nice trick, huh? A perfect bartender in that her large eyes were adept for low light, and the head tentacles supposedly could detect chemical signatures and allow for some reading of emotions. Not Force sensitive though; Colt would never let Tanner near this place if she was that.

First time Tanner had come here - mind you that was only a few months ago - he'd struck up a conversation with Verahna just as casual as if they were two old friends. This time was no different. I knew otherwise, but Tanner was doing his best to pretend that yesterday was in the past, trying hard to move beyond it. The effort was solid, but I could see some anxiety there still. Vera did too apparently. But she chalked it up to him still being relatively new to Terra and Kaolin. His story to her was that of orphaned nephew when his father died elsewhere. I was pretty sure Colton trusted her, but not to the extent that he held his very small yet established inner circle. She got the fake story of our lives - the brothers and uncle deal. It worked.

Anxiety or not, Tanner waved happily to her from the booth. She returned the gesture. Vera didn't smile much, but she always had one for my brother. The kid could make anyone feel good, even when he himself wasn't at his best. His visits to Dec and now Vera a day after being inches from being blaster-roasted to death at the hands of bounty hunters - yeah, his week was improving.

Verahna dropped a glass of juice for Tanner along with his favorite appetizer, some type of strange fruit covered with a puke-green cream sauce. He loved it and was probably the only person on the planet who did, so Colton made a point to keep it on the menu.

So, we ate, we drank, we had a day that we'd not expected. Simple. Comfortable. No school. No work. Just us. The three of us. I played a few games of chance with some of the afternoon regulars. Colton prattled with his employees. Tanner learned all about Vera's home planet of Glee Anslem. Of course he knew quite a bit about the place already, but the more intimate details was what he was always after. Two sponges in deep discussion. Glad it wasn't me.

By the time we called it a day, Tanner was drained. He'd had a long, emotional night the day prior and I'd been up with him through most of it. I was feeling it too. Colton, on the other hand, never seemed to tire, but he saw it in the both of us and called the day on our behalf.

"Boys, let's go home."

Tomorrow was back to our norm. I had runs to make. Tanner had class. Colton had, whatever the hell he did all day - he always kept us out of most of it - what we knew only scratched the surface of who Virgil Colton was. Fine by me. The less I knew, the lighter my load.

A fond goodbye to Vera, and Tanner hurried to my side as we moved out. Our ride was here, courtesy of Colton's security chief, and home we went. Another day in our strange lives just about over. A much better day than the previous. We'd end this one with a holo-film. Kicked back on the couch - Colton's giant couch, of course. He'd been the one to suggest the holo, which meant that Tanner and me, we'd wormed our way into his life to stay. Even he couldn't deny that now.

He would. It's how Colt was. Maybe how he'd always been, who was I to know. We were an odd trio. That's all I knew.

Tanner stretched out on the couch. Feet landing in my lap, thankfully missing by an inch, a key part of my anatomy. His head found a pillow that Colton had set next to his hip. Yup, he'd be asleep in minutes.

Our day after was just about wrapped.


END