New Family
We decided to roleplay out how Shakka’tar and Yuned’rar met on Korriban! Feat. @saljamka‘s Shakka’tar (~17yo in this) and @lisipuska‘s Yuned’rar (~15yo in this).
Word count: 3559
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Despite the fact that Korriban was a desert and looked like some areas of Tatooine that Yuned’rar had been accustomed to, their similarities ended there. Where Tatooine was always hot from its two suns, Korriban was deceivingly cold to the young Twi’lek; the climate, however, wasn’t the only thing he found to be cold.
The other Acolytes, as well as Overseers, were cruel. Yuned’rar almost wished he was left in the tombs where he was sent after being sold from the Hutt’s palace instead of being dragged into the Sith Academy to study the Force; but he supposed it was his own fault for losing his temper and shocking one of the Imperial slavemasters.
His Basic was poor, he couldn’t read it nor his native Huttese, and yet he was expected to keep up with everybody else despite his, and the other former slaves’, differing challenges. Most of the other Acolytes were either Pureblooded Sith or Humans and treated aliens like himself as lessers. Some refused to regard him even as a sentient, whilst others looked at him in the only way Twi’leks are stereotypically seen.
For now, Yuned’rar was able to keep them off guard and defend himself, at least. He wasn’t very big or impressive and looked rather frail--since he was--but he was fast and exhibited a grace many of the other students seemed to lack. He was also vicious and wasn’t about to hold back using his sharp, sturdy claws or his teeth to make sure others left him alone.
Thus, there he was--alone and wandering around a fallen ruin column with a datapad, trying to force himself to learn both the odd Aurebesh alphabet and the ancient Sith hieroglyphs.
"That's a difficult one," said a small, but strongly Imperial voice behind him.
Yuned’rar jumped, accidentally throwing his datapad at the column, coiled his long, thin lekku around himself tightly, and turned around baring his teeth and grabbing for his training blade. The awkward gangly Twi’lek hissed at the dangerous newcomer.
Another small twi'lek, peach toned and almost as slight as Yuned'rar stared back, eyes wide and only just managing not to fall as she scrambled back. Instead of reaching for her own weapon she quickly lowered her head, arms tight at her side, hands clinging tightly to the hem of her shirt.
"Sorry," Shakka'tar said, quietly. "I didn't--Sorry."
“What you wants?” Yuned’rar hissed as he looked around for a quick escape route.
"You're Yuned'rar?" she asked gingerly, her head still down but her eyes flicked towards him.
“Why?”
"I'm your cousin, Shakka'tar."
Yuned’rar stepped up to the other Twi’lek cautiously, his lekku twitching nervously, and stared at her as if that would somehow give him the answer. It didn’t. It also didn’t help that he only understood two of those words. “Vhat… What ze ‘cousin’?” He tried to ask, struggling not to trip over the foreign words.
"Um, your--" She started, tensing up even further as he got closer, hardly even breathing as she looked down again at her feet. "Your father is--was my mother's brother."
“Nobata. No have one,” Yuned’rar hissed through his sharp teeth. “Just me. Mi ahwa-en.”
"You--You did have a father, and he was my mother's brother. We are related." Shakka'tar lifted her gaze again. Maybe restating the facts would let him understand. "Family." She said, pointing between them both in a very tight and careful motion.
Maybe her mother's plan for her to contact him was a bad idea. It was too late now, she had to succeed in being nice to him. The alternative wasn't an alternative. She forced a small smile towards her cousin. That might help.
Unfortunately, the male Twi’lek wasn’t having any of it. Yuned’rar smacked his training blade into the ground beside Shakka’tar in hopes of frightening her off, and then scrambled around and hopped onto the column’s side, crouching much like a frightened cat.
“Trick! Big trick!” Yuned’rar hissed and snapped his teeth at her. “You wants killing me! Such everybody here!”
She squeaked, jumping away from the blade, Things couldn't have been going worse, not unless he'd actually attacked her. She stepped away from the weapon, moving slowly as if he was a scared animal. Keeping her eyes on him, but not making eye contact, Shakka'tar unhooked her own training blade and set it down on the sand.
"I'm not trying to hurt you." She said, lightly crossing her arms. It was a bit of a risk but it was all she could think of to try to calm him.
Watching Shakka’tar closely, Yuned’rar finally relaxed--at least a little bit--when she placed her weapon down. That was unusual, to say the least, and he wasn’t entirely sure what to think of it. Perhaps she was telling the truth, though. But family? The Twi’lek considered it, his lekku twitching all the while as he tried to put the pieces together. He didn’t remember much of anything before Tatooine, though.
“Shakka’tar?” He repeated her name in question slowly and carefully, but kept his blade out for now.
"That's right." She replied, nodding. "My mother--your aunt wanted me to get to know you, I guess." Shakka'tar glanced behind her, scanning the area. "I'm not sure how I can convince you."
“Hmm.” Yuned’rar tilted his head a little and finally put his blade away. “And you no wants karking me?”
"I don't know what that word means, I'm sorry..." Shakka'tar said quietly while furrowing her brows.
“Um…” The gangly Twi’lek furrowed his brows as well and thought for a moment on how to explain it. She could still be tricking him. He hopped down from the column and then made some lewd gestures to try to get the idea across. “Nobata in Basic. Sixxing? Fuck?”
Shakka'tar gradually turned bright orange and covered her mouth, brows raising as far as they were able. "Oh m--No!" She said, shaking her head quickly. "No! You're my--we're related!"
“Good,” Yuned’rar sighs in relief and mutters something to himself as he looks around for his datapad in the red sand. “I believing you in zis tee-tocky, but wants proof. What wants you because meeting?” He picked the datapad up and blew the sand and dust off it, checked that it was still working, and then clipped it back onto his belt. His full attention was back on Shakka’tar now, although he kept a few feet of distance between them.
"What I want?" His cousin took a slow, deep breath and hugged her arms around herself. "I don't really want anything, I'm just supposed to, well, to make friends with you?" Shakka'tar said, uneasily looking around. Korriban wasn't safe at all and her weapon was still laying in the sand.
She looked down at her feet, slowly smoothing out the sand into a rough pattern while she thought. "Maybe there's something in my room that would convince you that we're family?"
“Mm.” Yuned’rar tilted his head a little, observing her, and then stepped over cautiously to kick Shakka’tar’s weapon back to her. “Okay. I follow.”
She jumped when her training blade hit her foot and quickly crouched to pick it up, frowning to herself when she stood up again. "This way..." She said, almost in a mumble, before turning her back and heading towards the academy building.
Her cousin followed after her, keeping a careful distance between them and watching their surroundings very anxiously. Yuned’rar’s hyperalertness made him more than a little jumpy, though; he hissed now and again at unseen foes and kept a hand near his training blade, especially so once they reached the academy and were in the midst of other Acolytes. Coiling his lekku around himself tighter, if that were even possible, he hops up the stairs after Shakka’tar but kept an eye out for any sort of escape should this unfold into a very strange trap.
Shakka'tar had kept her head down the entire way, her own lekku twitching subtly each time Yuned'rar hissed or jumped. She didn't even relax when they got to her room, and she paused a second before opening the door. She stared, freezing for an instant before stepping back and checking the door number. It was the right room, but now there was a second bed and a pack of things sitting on top of it.
"What...?" She asked herself, looking up and down the hallway before daring to venture inside. One lekku curled; her things had been moved. Not that there were a lot of them, but someone had been in there and moved them while she'd been away. She tried to take a deep breath, standing in the middle of the room with her back to the doorway.
Yuned’rar stopped at the door and glanced inside briefly before getting distracted by, well, just about everything else. He stared down a number of other students and watched an Overseer and what was likely a Sith Lord discussing something down the hall when he realised he wasn’t even invited into the room. Should he have been? That was the whole reason Shakka’tar, his supposed relative, had brought him up there for, wasn’t it?
The Twi’lek turned his attention back inside the room but it was hard for him to properly focus; it was noisy in the academy--both audibly noisy and emotionally so. Yuned’rar had only recently learnt that he had very perceptive empathic abilities, but learning to tune things out and focus that insight on specific subjects--that was still far off. For a couple of minutes there he wasn’t even sure whose anxiety he was feeling--his own or Shakka’tar’s. He decided it was both of theirs, but he didn’t appreciate it all culminating inside of him.
“What?” Yuned’rar snapped into the room although he, himself, stayed right outside the doorway. He held his claws at his sides defensively as if something was about ready to pounce at him, and narrowed his eyes at the smaller Twi’lek inside.
Shakka'tar jumped again, temporarily forgetting he was there. When she was finally able to take a breath, she turned in place towards the doorway.
"Someone moved my things and put someone else’s things in here with them--with me." Shakka'tar pointed around the room, listing off the things that had been moved and the things that had been added. "--And a bed, someone else is.." She looked back to him while trying to get a hold of herself. "Right. Right. It's okay. It's probably okay. I mean, you can come in."
Yuned’rar stepped into the room with extreme caution and looked around. His anger subsided temporarily as he, too, wondered why someone would be suddenly paired up to share Shakka’tar’s quarters without her knowing. They had had Acolytes shift around a few times in the dormitory where he stayed, but the students were still made aware before someone new would come in. He stepped around Shakka’tar gingerly, although not being able to keep as much distance as he’d like, to take a peek at the new bed and the stranger’s belongings.
Growling, he leapt onto the bed and crouched in the corner, rather frantically rummaging through the items there--his belongings. Who had moved them? Why were they moved there? Someone touched his stuff! Yuned’rar was far too panicked and frustrated to make any coherent mouth-sounds in Basic and just hissed and growled something nonsensible in Huttese.
Of course, Yuned'rar's growling and frantic behavior didn't help his cousin's current state. Slowly, she backed up, while not technically into a corner, it was close.
"What are you doing?" She managed to ask.
“Mine!” Along with more hissing and piling his belongings around himself, that was all Yuned’rar managed to say before glaring at Shakka’tar as if all of this was her fault.
"Yours...?" Shakka'tar asked, mostly to herself. "Those are your things? Why would--" She blinked then covered her face with her hands, groaning. "My mother. She did this."
“You mother she touches my things?” Yuned’rar stood up on his bed for a second and then knelt back down over his belongings protectively. “Unacceptable!”
"Not--No, not exactly." She shook her head. "She must have told someone to. I didn't ask her to do this." Shakka'tar glanced towards the doorway where another student had been drawn to the ruckus. "Go away, please!" She said, throwing one hand up to slam the door in their face and cringed at the noise, even though she was the one that had made it.
Yuned’rar tried to take the information in that Shakka’tar said but his mind was just too overwhelmed by everything. He curled up into a surprisingly small lekku ball in the corner of the bed, shifting from protecting his things to the things protecting him. There wasn’t anywhere to hide in the room and he couldn’t hold back the hot tears that suddenly streamed down his face.
At first, Shakka'tar was too caught up in her own worries to notice Yuned'rar. She fidgeted in place helplessly while she considered her options. "Are you alright?" She asked quietly, in the meantime.
Her cousin just stared at her for a moment and then tried to hide more behind his lekku and his arms that were wrapped around his knees. Yuned’rar expended a lot of energy on being angry and frightened and now just felt helpless, and stuck with some stranger now, too.
She rubbed at her temples and took a few deep breaths to think things through. Maybe he wasn't really so dangerous, not while curled up into a tiny ball and so upset at least, right? He looked so young, younger than her. He was most likely just really scared. Shakka'tar moved one of her lekku in front of her to gently hold for comfort.
"Do you like tea?" She asked.
“...What is?” Yuned’rar managed to mumble from his lekku ball of safety.
"What is tea?" Shakka'tar asked, staring even though she didn't mean to. "Ah, it's, well, it's a hot drink?"
“Hotsa dee leaf drink?” Her cousin asked, making a valiant effort in Basic.
Shakka'tar whispered the words back to herself, then nodded slowly. "I think so, yes."
“Yes.”
She nodded; now that she had a task to do her anxiousness subsided a little. As she went about the process of making them both some tea, she looked back to him. "I'm sorry your things were moved."
Yuned’rar huffed a little and took his training blade off himself, finally, and just dropped it on the floor beside the bed; it landed with a loud metallic thunk. He managed to peek out of his lekku ball of safety and wipe his face a little on his sleeves to watch Shakka’tar as she prepared them some hot drinks. “Touched,” he corrected.
Her lekku twitched at the clatter, standing stock still for a few short moments before breathing again. "I'm sorry your things were touched." She said, searching a small cupboard while the kettle boiled. "Mine were, too." She added, hoping to demonstrate her sympathy with his situation.
After taking a few deep breaths and listening carefully to what Shakka’tar said, Yuned’rar uncurled just a little. Both of their belongings were touched; did that make them equals in some way now? He wasn’t sure. Nor was he sure what them being possibly related had to do with anything. Was that some sort of free ticket to becoming a trusted person?
He turned his attention back to his things for a moment. They weren’t as personal as Shakka’tar’s seemed to be. Yuned’rar only had a couple of datapads, a notebook he ended up drawing in, a handful of datachits with his academic texts, and a small stack of clothes provided to him by the academy. The clothing had been folded neatly as some point, but now they had just been haphazardly tossed into a bag when they were brought into this room. He would worry about it later and put the thought aside.
“Shakka’tar,” Yuned’rar said, “how yours mother knowing who me? Or mi here?”
"She didn't bother telling me," Shakka'tar said, though a small smile grew on her face at him using her full name. Over time, a tray had been filled with a cute little tea pot, cups and sweeteners, and whatever she had that counted as food. Picking it up she slowly walked towards him.
"Oh. She did give me something to show. I must have been--I'll get it." Shakka'tar carefully set the tray down and frowned as she tried to find her where it had been moved to, moving things while she looked. She would have to spend at least the rest of the night putting everything back where it should have been.
Yuned’rar watched Shakka’tar closely, still suspicious, but saw the eatables on the tray and immediately snatched one. He opened it in a second and devoured it ravenously in about two bites, and then eyed the rest. His hand hovered over them for a few seconds when he figured he should wait, or at least see if the other Twi’lek was going to have any. Meanwhile, Yuned’rar just stared hungrily at the tray.
"No," she muttered, telling herself off for getting caught up in organising when she was meant to be searching. After another minute or so she stood up and walked back over to her cousin, carrying a small device in her hands. "I found it."
“What?” Yuned’rar just managed to pull his eyes off the tray and look at what Shakka’tar had in her hands.
Shakka'tar set the small base onto the bed in front of him and pushed a small button. An image flickered into view. Two holo-twi'leks stood facing Yunder'rar, one man and one woman, both dressed in expensive clothing. Shakka'tar placed one finger above both of the figures in turn. "My mother, and your father."
“Him?” Yuned’rar tilted his head a little as he looked at the holo, and then leaned in a little to get a better look. He supposed there was some sort of resemblance. They were both Twi’leks, and the male in the holo looked like he might’ve been pink. It didn’t otherwise trigger any recollections of memories but it was proof enough for him. “Okay,” he said quietly and stared at the food on the tray again.
She looked between him and the tray as she turned the holo off again. "You can have the rest." She said, taking just one small biscuit for herself.
Yuned’rar snatched the remainder of the food off the tray as soon as the word left Shakka’tar’s mouth and stuffed his face, likely not even having time to savour much of it.
"O-okay. Well," Shakka'tar blinked towards him, "I'll see if I have anything else, um." She stared for another second, then backed away to see if she did have any more food for this ravenous little beast who would now apparently be staying with her. She wondered if she'd ever eat again.
Her cousin watched her as he wolfed down the rest of the food. Was she getting more food? Yuned’rar’s lekku twitched a little and he reached for his cup of tea, calming down a little more now that he had food in his tummies. Perhaps this stranger wasn’t that bad after all; she was giving him food. “Tank you,” he said quietly.
"You're welcome," she replied, sighing in relief when she found the container she was after, at least it hadn't been moved or stolen while she was gone. She tightened her lips while looking down at it. Her favourite biscuits were inside, sent sporadically from her father from home. She dropped her shoulders and quickly moved to set the box in front of Yuned'rar, swapping it for her tea and moving back to her bed. She slipped off her shoes and sat with her back to the wall, knees raised with one foot covering the other.
Once Shakka’tar moved away again Yuned’rar peeked into the box and took out just a couple of the biscuits instead of all the biscuits ever and sat back, relaxing slightly, to nibble the food in a much calmer and far less ravenous manner. He watched his cousin as he did so. She wasn’t eating. Was he meant to offer her her own food?
His cousin kept quiet, staring at the contents of her cup when she wasn't sipping from it. Her brows furrowed as she lost herself in thought. Why wasn't she warned about her new roommate? If she had been she could have at least moved her own things, instead of having to live with the thought that someone unknown to her had done so while she hadn't been there to supervise. She had no idea if anything was missing yet, maybe worse, if anything had been added. She curled in on herself a little more.
Yuned’rar nibbled on the biscuit he’d had and then climbed off the bed slowly, taking the box with him. He took a couple of steps towards Shakka’tar but decided that, no, that was close enough and set the box down. He then used the Force to awkwardly slide it across the floor towards her bed. After that deed was done, he climbed back onto his bed and curled up anew in the corner to take a nap.
