XS-LF 106 "Asuka"

[Birk Snowshadow]

An xs- light freighter that has been outfitted for Jedi specific missions. Everything about this ship screams "base model" until you step inside and pay attention to how it is equipped. Namely it's cockpit controlled duel laser cannon and missile system as well as the secure direct comms connection to the Jedi HQ.

This particular ship was confiscated by the Republic vessel Sojourn from a defunct shipping company many years ago. Recently it was upgraded under the order of Jedi Grand Master Vrook as a means of transport for Jedi during the time when Jedi were being hunted by not just the sith but the Republic as well due to Order 11-38.

The retrofit was completed shortly after the Couruscant party lead by Knight Keto had left the Soujorn. Allowing it to be transferred over to Master Vrooks padawan, Birk Snowshadow. Who was honored to name it after his mother.

CURRENT CARGO

Standard travel supplies
T7-M9 astromech droid aka t7
T3-D1 utility droid aka TD
J1-17-GE3 protocol droid aka J

[Birk Snowshadow]

Birk entered the ship for the first time. He had never been so happy to board a ship in his life. He loathed ship living but in Birks mind, this was the lesser of two evils. In a few days, Birk would be able to feel soil under his feet again.

Birk made his way around the ship, conducting a check list to ensure the ship was indeed ready to depart and familiarizing himself with it's layout. Once satisfied he made his way to the cockpit and began to start up the ship for departure...

[Stesha Lorkin]

Sneaking the last few feet onto the freighter, Stesha sees the back of Birk's head and the droid, J1, in the cockpit and the two droids prepped for launch and secure against the ship's walls. She tip-toes over to the on board work station and, painfully slowly so as not to make noise, puts the practice saber pieces and tools in a drawer. Fairly certain that Birk won't check back through the supposedly empty ship, Stesha finds a corner to secure herself in and waits for their departure. She knows she can't hide from Birk forever, but maybe if she doesn't say anything until they are ib light speed he won't turn back and leave her on the Sojourn. This was a chance to stretch her legs and see a bit more scenery than the Sojourn's bulkhead and, damn it, she was going to take it.

[Birk Snowshadow]

The time had come to get the XS-FL 106 off the steel floor of the hanger and out into the cold vasts of space. This single moment was a milestone for Birk as well as a sign on how hard the Padawan had studied the process of captaining a space ship. The young boy who once traveled by foot across Alderaan, who has no problems exclaiming his dislike for mechanical objects and up to a year ago had zero time in flight...let alone piloting... was now at the helm of a Jedi space craft ALONE. It occurred to Birk as to just how much he had grown over the course of the last year and even laughed at what his parents faces would look like if they could have seen him in the seat he is now.

"They'd be surprised J... surprised and very proud" He commented off to the protocal droid that was assigned to Birk for this mission. The droid was seated in the co-pilot seat, more or less for communication needs... and to right the ship if Birk were to mess up in flying it.

Birk could hear some rustling coming from behind him. The sound of metal against metal. Normally this would have alarmed Birk but in his mind, there was no reason to be alarmed. He was still well within the Sojourn so he wrote it off as just "Droid Noise"

"You guys keep it smooth back there ok?" He called off back to what he assumed was the droids making the noise.
"My first time here flying outside of the simulator so things might be a bit... bumpy."

Birk began to fire up the last of the switches and finally released the landing brake. With a mild shutter, the ship was now airborne and Birk began to, sloppily, taxi his way out of the hanger. Birk keyed the comm link...

"Sojourn this is xs-fl 106. Show us exiting starboard side hanger bay. We are green all around. thank you again for you're hospitality hope to catch you on the flip side..."

Birk un-keyed the comm and slid the ship fully into the vastness of black space. The feeling was almost surreal for Birk. Much different than when planted to the much larger ship Sojourn. He began his flight path away from the massive ship behind him.

"J... open comms with Master Vrook please..."

"Yes Padawan Snowshadow. right away... comms are open...

"Master Vrook... Padawan snowshadow... i am preparing to enter hyperspace now. I will conduct the mission as we spoke of for the first location... Birk, Out"

Now Birk was able to relax his shoulders a bit. Formalities were over and now the mission began. Birk flipped a few switches and turned to J

"J, set the computer to enter hyperspace with a destination of Dantooine..."

"Dantooine... Yes Padawan Snowshadow.... coordinates set

"Thank you J... and just call me Birk please... the whole formal thing could give us away when we are on planet."

Birk looked down at the hyperdrive ignition switch and waited as the astro-charts uploaded. The light for the hyper drive turned from red to green and with a bit of a smirk...

"Hold on to your butts..."

Birk flipped the switch and just like that... the ship was gone from the Sojourn and in hyper space towards Dantooine.

[Stesha Lorkin]

At "this may get a little bit bumpy", Stesha rolls her eyes and can't help but smile just a little. Birk may be about as technology savvy as a rock, but he never fails to keep his attitude up despite it. Maybe being stuck with him for this trip wouldn't be so bad.

She waits quietly until they make the jump in to hyper space then decides that it's not worth anything to wait any longer and stands quietly stretching her legs. Not wanting to give Birk a heart attack, Stesha doesn't try to keep silent as she moves back to the front of the ship. She stops at the bulkhead of the cockpit and leans against it watching him for a moment before speaking.

"So... where we going?"

[Birk Snowshadow]

Birk had effectively passed out at the controls shortly after the ship entered the jump. The galaxy was vast, The sojourn had been kept far away from just about everything and Dantooine was clear on the other side of the galaxy. Even with the hyper drive, it would take days if not week to reach the planet. Which was a good thing for Birk as he needed time to try and come up with his alter ego and reason for being on the planet if he were to run into anyone who would question him. For the moment though... sleep was in order...

By the time Stesha had come forward, Birk was mid dream though still almost cognitive of his surroundings. His spiritual connection to the force allowed him to feel it's ebb and flow even when sleeping. When he needed to, at times, he could even tell who,what,when and/or where something in his local were to change. At the moment however, he had no reason to be on alert. He was on his own ship. alone with a few droids. When Stesha spoke up. Birk was able to answer...somewhat...

"come on now Azra, keep it down till the meteor shower is over... i told you to wear my jacket it's cold up here..."
Birk was obviously very sleepy and his words were more or less mumbled. As he spoke, he began to wake up a little bit. As he grew more aware of his situation, he was able to answer the question that was asked while all at once he became fully aware that Stesha was not only the one asking the question but was on the ship and the dream was over.

"we're going to dantooIWHAT THE FORCE!"

Birk leaped from his seat and turned to face Stesha. He wasn't angry at the girl in the slightest. Truth be told he was glad to know he wouldn't be alone on this trip. Birk scratched the back of his head a moment as his eyes adjusted to the harsh lighting of the ship.

"Stesha?? just couldn't resist could ya..." commented Birk
He was now fully awake and his trademark smile was once again back onto his face.

[Stesha Lorkin]

Back to her normal, cool demeanor, Stesha lets Birk react with only a raised eyebrow in response. She shrugs and moves into the cockpit.

"Of course not. You think I'd sit on that ship when everyone else is off breathing non-recycled air and getting real sunlight?"

She pokes at the controls and hyperdrive coordinates.

"Dantooine. We're going to Dantooine? Isn't that where the Jedi where before Telos? What are you hoping to get from there?"

[Birk Snowshadow]

Birk spun his chair back to front, facing out the large windshields of the cockpit. He stretched his arms high above his head as he groaned out a "yup" response to her first question before allowing himself to slouch a bit on the chair and place his hands behind his head, gazing out at the streaks of light that were flying past the ship.

"Just about all of the different Jedi outposts have at least some form of Jedi specific and sensitive material locked away in them. The need for a quick extraction into space made it nearly impossible to collect any of the information terminals or Holocrons..." Birk smirked a bit and glanced over at Stesha.
"...course you saw that first hand."

Birk returned his gaze out to space. within the star field that was passing by the ship, Birk began to see images. It reminded him of being with Azra as a child on Alderaan, laying in the grass while watching clouds pass over head and watching as the clouds turned to animals and objects. One of the images that Birk found in the star field were in fact Azras eyes. Though they seemed to burn red in the instant that they faded...

"Regardless of how Knight Keto's mission plays out the order will need these object to survive.. and hopefully rebuild. I doubt we will be the only ones looking for these objects either... the Sith will have known about them all along... and they have had a whole year head start. So i was tasked to begin retrieving them. Dantooine is first on the list simply because it was among the largest of the outposts that is not on Coruscant and has the best chance for a large number of holocrons to have survived up to now. Coruscant and Telos have more than likely already been raided by the sith and more than likely at some point between Dantooine and Coruscant. This mission will end up running into these enemy parties..."

Birks tone changes near the end of his spiel. His demeanor, while still calm, is a bit darker than usual. Birk was a Jedi and fighting was a part of that destiny. Birk just preferred to solve things without violence yet, he knew that unlike the normal people of Alderaan, the sith would not be reasoned with. The guarantee for violence was not something Birk was looking forward too.

"You still game? or would you like a few more months of the recycled air spilled out by that steel monstrosity they call home back there?"

[Stesha Lorkin]

Stesha soaks in every word of Birk's explanation and she begins to think that sneaking on-board this journey may have been jumping into a load more than she could handle.

"Oh."

She wouldn't let fear get the best of her now, after all she had gone through to get to the Jedi and since, she was not about to let fear stand in the way of her next step forward.

"You forget that I was on a ship for over 9 months before I was dropped off on Telos, and Telos hardly counts as off ship. At this point, real air is worth it no matter what we run into."

She isn't trying to play off as tough, she likes tech and ships and droids, but the complete unchanging-ness of life on the Sojourn was beginning to get claustrophobic.

With a small smirk and cocking her head to the side, Stesha says,

"And are you sure you sure you'll trust me with holorons? Last time you found me with one, I got a half hour lecture."

[Birk Snowshadow]

Birk was happy to see that Stesha had grown to be able to loosen up a bit. He could remember back to when they first met over a year ago... when she fell out of that frigid air vent. She was so mistrusting, certainly not timid but cautious in what she said and whom she spoke to. Yet the Stesha that stood in front of Birk now was willing to crack a pun with a smirk... Perhaps birk was rubbing off on the young girl a bit. At least he hoped so. No need for the doom and gloom that Birks master seemed to preach. Life was too short for that and Birk was glad to see that Stesha seemed to act a bit more light heartend these days than perhaps she would have a year ago.

"Ohh? was my speech not riveting enough for you? i could perhaps try it again... perhaps utilizing some sort of allegory wrapped into a metaphor?"

Birk was of course joking. He spun around in his chair to monitor the autopilot controls for a moment. Unlike Stesha, Birk did not enjoy technology and had a very hard time trusting things like computer guidance, autopilots and droids.

"Lets just try to not break any of them mhm... things things could help save the Jedi one day. Would be a shame to loose them."
Birks gaze lifted up to the star field as a thought entered his head.

"Of course... holding so much value on single units of technology seems like a bad strategy in my mind. It may be beneficial to attempt to reverse engineer a duplicate or one that holds information that is documented else where..."

Birk turned back to Stesha, smirking as always.

"So you may end up getting to crack one open anyway... never say never... unless it's to the darkside of course"

[Stesha Lorkin]

Stesha reaches around Birk and flips off the console lights.

"Quite looking at it, it's not going to change or get us there any faster."

She kicks the co-pilot chair and jerks her thumb at J.

"Out. Go monitor progress from the secondary consoles."

"Yes, Miss. Stesha. I will notify you of developments or any irregularities."

The droid stands shakily and shuffles to the smaller alternate console near the rear of the ship and Stesha drops herself into the now vacant seat.

"Changed his programming a long time ago. 'Initiate Lorkin'." She scowls. "I hate that name. Anyways," she hitches a smile back up, "now that I've got permission, I can't wait to dig in to more 'histories'."

Stesha isn't sure why she's being so open and talkative at the moment, but hey, no reason not to be and she figures she may as well ride this wave of extroversion because there's no telling how long it will last or how long they're about to be on this ship together before they want to strangle each other.

[Birk Snowshadow]

Birk is surprised a bit at first when Stesha flipped off the control lights that his paranoia of all things mechanical had him fixated on. His body language was clearly indicating frustration at the sudden loss of the ability to monitor what the vessel was doing. It lasted but a moment however as Birk did recognize a change in Stesha. She had removed a droid as well as his primary distraction away from the two of them. Then proceeding to sit in the copilot chair was all the signs Birk needed to realize that, Stesha was hoping to talk about something. Though what that was, Birk did not know.

"I said maybe... can't guarentee we will even find anything worth while. The sith have a whole year jump on us remeber" Commented Birk with a smirk.

Inside Birk felt bad about Azras situation. sure she had the droids to converse with and spend time with... but there was no way that Birk would ever be convinced that a droid was an equivillent companion to that of a living being. Birk had Azra, Azra had Birk, the masters had always kinda of kept to themselves and there were no Jedi in the order right now close to steshas age that she could relate with and be friends with. The young girl must surely have lived a lonely life...

"So what's up? things going ok for you so far with the order? i know i have been impressed with what i have seen from you. The other week when we tried to work on some saber training..." Birk laughs a bit "for a moment i wished i had risen to knight so i could take you on as a padawan" Birk laughed again "Silly eh?"

[Stesha Lorkin]

Stesha gives a sly smile to Birk's discomfort at having the instrumentation turned off. She tucks one leg up underneath her while her other foot dangles down, barely touching the floor, and slowly spins her back and forth.

Nonchalantly nodding her agreement to Birk's assessment of their chances of finding anything good on Dantooine, Stesha begins to feel the Birk's emotion toward her form as they sit in silence for a few moments. She feels his eyes on her and can clearly see in her mind's eye the look on his face and the pity manifesting behind his eyes. She thought that they had gotten over that. Spinning herself back around, she listens more intently to Birk's reminiscings of their sparring match not so long ago. She was fine with people while they kept their distance, and of course at the beginning they always would, but for some reason, as soon as she got comfortable and, dare she admit it, happy in a place, the pity starts to show. Pity for her past that it takes so long for her to open up, for her aspirations that such a smart girl would be paired with such a reclusive and destructive temperament. If there was one thing in the whole of the galaxy she hated the most, it would be pity. He tried to hid his pity with humor, but that only made it worse, the enthusiasm that had been carrying her since she sneaked onto this ship had ebbed away.

It had not taken long for Stesha it realize her predicament after the hierarchy of the Jedi was explained to her. There were only so many Knights and Masters and more younglings and initiates older than Stesha to be paired with a master before she would be old enough to be accepted. Unless the rules changed, her options with the Jedi were very narrow. But the chances of the rules changing were even more narrow, so Birk's comment about taking her on as a padawan himself was only annoying wishful thinking.

"Yeah, silly. Thinks have been okay, at least they've been better since that week we sparred. And I've been thinking... what is going to happen to me when I get to the point I can be taken for a padawan and there are no Knights to take me. I know things have changed because of the Jedi's situation, but what if I reach a dead end before I even start becoming a Jedi? Should I even bother going back?"

[Birk Snowshadow]

"Just trust in the force"

Birk hadn't hesitated a moment after stesha asked her question before giving his responce. He was calm and his voice was soothing and confident because Birk genuinely believed this to be truth. The force was not just some random pool of energy that could be tapped into for parlor tricks. It was a living, breathing and sentient being. A living force that constantly worked to balance good and evil and that Birk believed in to a fault.

"I do not want to see you leave us stesha. Leaving aside the personal or emotional reality that you have become...dear... to myself. Let alone Azra. Even if you left all that out, you have such a great potential in the force. I'm not blowing smoke when i say that i can see you becoming a jedi equal to the greats we hear so much about in the stories of years past."

Birk spins his chair so he is looking at stesha and not out the window... or at the now blacked out controls which is still irritating him slightly...

"The force brought you to us for a reason... why not continue to see where it will bring you? sure, having a master or a knight take you on as a padawan is well and good... but the greatest teacher in the universe, is the force. Listen to it. take it into yourself. accept it fully and while the road may be rough at times, it will lead you to where your heart belongs."

Birk spins back to face front, taking in the flying stars as they pass.

"I trust in the force with all my heart... but i can tell you this... if it leads you away from us. It will sadden me greatly"

[Stesha Lorkin]

oy vey, the force. Trust the Force, Stesha, it will show you your path, it will lead you to your destiny. Don't get her wrong, so believed that the Force was a pseudo-tangible entity that did indeed act in the universe, but to her instead of a being she views it more as a tool to be utilized, like a compass. It doesn't change the universe, you use it to change the universe yourself.

The girl sits, still spinning slowly, as though chided and melancholy, but really she is disappointed in his response. She could not bring herself to trust wholly in the Force to lead her future, she needed to either clearly see its direction or be guiding it herself. She just didn't have it in her. One advantage of being on this adventure with only Birk is that his cynicism can only go so far if Stesha 'feels the Force leading her away...'. O well, that was a situation to deal with another day, so she speaks with genuine distress and despair.

"I'm trying to trust in the Force, I just can't make myself let go. And I really don't want to leave the Jedi, this is the first place I feel like I've been understood, I just don't want to stop learning and don't know what to do when there's no one left available to train me. And on the Sojourn, with no master and no missions, I can only stay cooped up for so long. Once I stop learning, it's hard for me to... keep positive.... That's why I had to keep changing schools on Alderaan. And I know this, and this time I want to try to stay positive, but I also know that there will come a point where I won' be able to take it any more and I will leave. No matter what."

She doesn't say that she would validate it all to herself that the Jedi had given up on her, that they didn't want her enough to reserve a master for her, and have no hard feeling about leaving and willingly would allow herself to sink to the Dark Side. She didn't want to disconcert him too much.

She reaches over and flips the main console back on.

"But back to the present, how long will this trip take?"

[Birk Snowshadow]

Birk sat back in his chair and took in what Stesha was saying to him. Growing up is a difficult thing to do, Stesha's age was particularly difficult. A time when you grow and change more in a given time period than at any other age group. Birk remembered it and his own period of doubting the force almost too well.

"A day or two... not too long now" he answered her question. His vocal tone was a hair lower than normal. He was clearly thinking about something that he was not proud of. In fact he bearly noticed that the lights had been turned back on again.

"Stesha..." He started, maintaining the same subdued vocal range as before. "we all go through times... some longer than others... that make us doubt our choices. the force... the jedi... everything." He glances over at stesha for a brief moment before he continued.

"I'm going to tell you something that i have only spoken about with Azra. As you know. Azra and i shair a history on Alderaan. we were... partnered together, lovers, even back then. We had to hide it of course. Both of my parents we're exiled Jedi and were training me in the Jedi ways. Since i can remember, it has been drilled into me. The force i mean and the code of the Jedi. My mother was tolerable...leanient in ways. My father on the other hand. An Iron fist, black and white by the book approach. Very much like good ol Grand Master Vrook."

"Despite the love my parents had for each other, they frowned, heavily, EXPECIALLY my father, on the idea of allowing me to love like they had. It was against the Jedi way and contributed to them going into self exile." Birk took a moment to swallow and ease himself a little bit. The memories of alderaan were affecting him more so than he cared to admit.

"So when they did eventually find out about Azra and i... things weren't very pretty. In the end i was forced to break all interactions with Azra. Could never see or speak with her again." Birk cracked his neck to the side in annoyance with the coming bit of the story.

"So when Azra's family was murdered... and at the time it seemed she too had been killed, i lost myself. I blamed myself, i blamed my parents, blamed the force... i mean... how could the force... THE FORCE... allow for such a thing to happen. I would scream out to my parents, if it hadn't been for the force! if it hadn't been for you they would still be alive! azra would still be alive! i would have been there and they still would be alive!"
Birk turned to stesha.

"I had given up on the jedi, the force.. me Stesha... Birk snowshadow, the great big force thumper-believe in the force- theforce will allows lead you true... Birk. Had given up on the very things that i model my life after." Birk turned back to the blinking lights of the ship.

"The important thing to remember is to take things in stride. We all go through rough times, life has it's ups and down and all those other cliche things that people talk about... but cross your bridges as they come and don't fret about which forks in the road will present themselfs later on. You can't change the past, nor predict the future. All we can do is act in the now"

[Stesha Lorkin]

She sits quietly, listening and trying to understand everything Birk is opening up to her. It was a lot to take in, how much Birk and Azra's relationship, just the fact that they could have a relationship, meant to them. There's not much she can find to say about his story After many long minutes of quiet, speeding stars, she says what she has decided she wants to be true, and may be, right now it's hard for her to tell who and what she really trusts.

"Well, I trust you, and I trust that you trust the Force with everything, and I trust in the Force enough to trust you with that. So... yeah. It's just frustrating because I still feel like I've been thrown into this life with no idea what was going on, and it's hard for me to trust that my parents were right in sending me to the Jedi. Yeah, without it, I'd be another blaster target still on Alderaan, but I keep getting the feeling that this isn't where I'm really supposed to be.

"But in the meantime, I'm here and we're on a mission and I promise to do my best for it, despite these insecurities. And I know I'll find my answers eventually."

Stesha gives Birk a small reassuring smile.

[Birk Snowshadow]

Birk smiled a bit at Steshas remark. He felt like he could understand where Steshas mind was right now. He felt like he could grasp the feeling of being almost content but feeling like where she was right now just wasn't exactly perfect for her. Whether or not Birks feeling were accurate or not, would only be discovered in time. Which is the point Birk had tried to make earlier.

"well Stesha, what ever path you take down the road, just remember that patients is a virtue. Every truth ends up getting revealed... eventually and all fogs of war or mind are dispelled with time."

Birk stretches his arms above his head and yawns a bit.

"Speaking of time... i believe it is time to rest. As much as i hate to trust an auto pilot with my life. We should be at Dantooine right around the time we wake up i rekon"

Birk stood from his seat and backed away from the controls before turning to leave and find rest in his quarters.

"It was nice to talk with you Stesha" He called back as he left "I hope we can continue to speak like this in the future. Fell free to stay up if you wish, just don't alter our track to Dantooine please" He finished with a smile before disappearing into the crew quarters.

[Stesha Lorkin]

"OK"

With a meek, tired smile, Stesha watches Birk leave the cockpit and head back into the ship. She spins back around and for a while simply watches the stars shoot by. After about twenty minutes she reaches up and checks the autopilot. They were indeed going to the Dantooine system, so she pulls up all of the information in the computer about the planet. Since the Jedi had used the planet as a base and academy, there is actually quite a bit of information on the climate and ecology since there was not an economy to speak of. Stesha skims over the screens, she'd read most of this during 'quiet study' time on the Sojourn, and nothing new catches her eye. Satisfied that she is as prepared as she could be given the circumstances, Stesha turns off the monitors and resumes watching the stars until she drifts off to sleep.

[Birk Snowshadow]

At long last, the sound of the hyper drive powering down brings a much needed calm to the interior of the vessel. Birk emerges from his slumber and enters the cockpit, which is still quite dark. A few lights flash on the controls of the ship and birk slides into his pilots chair. Before him, the planet of Dantooine lays motionless and dark. They had arrived at night, which was good for Birk. He wanted to avoid detection as much as possible on this first attempt at retrieving the Jedi Holocrons.

Birk glanced from the planet and over at his young partner in this mission. Stesha was still passed out. Birk couldn't help but smile at how peaceful she seemed as she slept. A shame that such a young girl could be so volatile but Birk was beginning to understand that the universe seemed to have a way of doing that to people. Birk leaned over and gave Stesha a shake on her shoulder,

"Hey... we're about to head to the surface."