Way Back Home [Day 1, EE, Karath]

[Jenna Karath]

Leaning into the door, her hand sliding down the edge of it as she pushed forward until it closed. Jenna let herself breathe for a single moment before she looked around the room. Finding no one, perfect, so far at least as she checked the remainder of the apartment to assure herself she was alone for the time being.

A locked door would be suspicious, so she left it open and found herself moving about the apartment cleaning trash and clutter, needing time to think.

[Vaya Mer'darrow]

A slight delay, enough to suggest coincidence rather than waiting for you to get home. "Jenna? That you?" Vaya was dressed as she usually was, perhaps a bit more tired or sun-touched than usual.

[Jenna Karath]

Looking up with her hand on a bit of trash she froze, for a mere second, and then her eyes seemed to dim as she let out a long sigh and resigned to the inevitability of the fate coincidence had bestowed upon her. So she rose to standing, with some garbage in hand, and spoke distantly, "Yea, it's me."

[Vaya Mer'darrow]

"Yeah, Petrus normally leaves more signs of his passage." Vaya leaned against the door, not presuming an invitation like she usually did. "So, uh, busy morning at work?" she asked, three-quarters-delicately, one-quarter-sardonically. Not a demand, but definitely a nudge.

[Jenna Karath]

"Best you come in, I think," she through the room and discarded the garbage in a proper receptacle. "Morning was busy, but it wasn't work. Fixing an old problem that seems to have offered itself a chance to clear itself with..." she sighs, looks down, and puts her hands on each of her hips. "As little disturbance to the life I have now as I can manage."

[Vaya Mer'darrow]

Vaya accepted the invitation so fast that she might have been leaning forward, instead of against the doorjamb, stepping quickly to the small kitchen/dining area. There she perched on the edge of the table, facing Jenna, hands on the edge of the table.

“Does work have some contextual meaning I’m missing? ‘Cause unless you did something way different with your morning than we talked about at the Nerf, we both did a task and got paid, which sounds like work to me.” She shrugs. “Sure, I ended up net zero credits after settling some of my debts, but, that’s life.”

[Jenna Karath]

"Didn't get paid," she said, her voice was a bit irritable but the first person to notice this was Jenna, her eyes cast downward because of it and she pushed the toe of her boot into the ground. Shaking it off, she walked about the apartment, speaking as she looked around, "I don't know how to explain it," she picked up a misplaced towel and tossed it atop the nearby couch.

"I do, actually," she moved and found a shirt and shook her head, "Petrus," she mumbled to herself before continuing. "I'm just not sure I want to explain. I've had to make a lot of choices to get where I am today and some.. sacrifices have put me into debts with people I would never have worked with in the past. Here... I got a call, a chance to pay off that debt. All I am doing. So, no, it wasn't work," she said, her voice was much softer now, apologetic even.

[Vaya Mer'darrow]

"Oh... kay," said Vaya, the word spoken as an inhaled breath, a pause, and then an exhale. In between she considered Jenna thoughtfully, unoffended. "I know what it's like to look back on how you got here and wish you hadn't. Or, had followed a different path. I ever tell you how I got off Balosar? Planet's a pit, and everyone there's like a bunch of Acklays in a pit, all clawing and pulling each other down to try and get out themselves." She gave a short laugh. "I guess I didn't leave a pool of blood on the floor or anything. I just scammed my way into the spot of some maybe harder-working person for a scholarship by kicking back some of the stipends to the bursar." She looked soberer. "I guess that wasn't the worse thing I ever did, though."

At last, driven by Jenna's efforts, she got up grumbling from her perch and started tidying the kitchen, rather than just staring at her. The tidying was very slapdash. "I guess what I'm saying is, I was surprised to see you there, but I'm sure as hell not going to judge you. For doing whatever Vandil wants to settle your debts, or for whatever you did before. Petrus wouldn't either." She said the last part very casually, leaving Jenna the choice to either actively affirm that he knows, or doesn't know, or to let it pass without doing either. She continued lightly, "And hey, we can watch each others' backs. I'm not working for Vandil because she has nice legs, it's because if things go sideways I want to have the credits to get out of here. And I'm not going to ditch my ticket to enlightenment, and he'd be pretty useless for anything if he lost track of you, so we're all in this together, right?"

[Jenna Karath]

"Yea.." she responded, a somber note to hang while she inspected the rest of the little living area. Wasn't a complete pigsty, but, well she'd always had a higher caliber of what could be considered clean for a home. Weird quirk for someone who.. "We grew up on Coruscant, not sure if we ever really got to telling you that. Well, you know what happened to him, pretty young too. Which meant I was alone down there, in the underbelly of the greatest City in the galaxy. The heart of the republic," she resisted the urge to spit.

"Anyway, I climbed my way out too. Just like you.. only I did it off of not just one, but many backs of those who might have been more hardworking than I. Easier targets than the bigger names I went after later, more risk in it because they elected for security but it was more justified work. Never would have left that life but.. well, the Empire became a thing followed by," she shuddered, and paused for a moment to collect herself. "Anyway, I needed to find him, had to, and I had the contacts but.. I had to do the one thing that you're never supposed to do. Indebted myself to a Hutt and his lackey, they found my brother and I went to him. I.. I don't know what Petrus thinks happened, how he thinks we came across one another. Played it off by happenstance, life down there made me a good liar after all. Probably thinks it was the, you know, or whatever. It wasn't, just a girl making a real stupid call to get something she never thought she could have."

[Vaya Mer'darrow]

"Which meant I was alone down there, in the underbelly of the greatest City in the galaxy. The heart of the republic," she resisted the urge to spit.

At least Balosar didn’t have any galactic pretensions. Even the corp PR flacks never had anything better to say about the slums than they were ”a source of low-cost sapient potential." Vaya smirked in amusement a little at that, but didn’t interrupt.

"I.. I don't know what Petrus thinks happened, how he thinks we came across one another. Played it off by happenstance, life down there made me a good liar after all. Probably thinks it was the, you know, or whatever. It wasn't, just a girl making a real stupid call to get something she never thought she could have."

Vaya laughed, and then realized, as she often did, that she should clarify that the joke was at her own expense. “Yeah, I know all about second-guessing if anything or everything that happens in my life is the fault of the ‘you know, whatever.’ I can’t…” she shook her head, her smile fading, “I can’t say that it’s never true, anymore. Which sucks a whole sector worth of vacuum, frankly. How are you supposed to live if you can’t be sure if any random event could be,” she waved her hands, indicating the galaxy, but in a wishy washy way, “you know, whatever. No wonder so many ancient mystical texts end up sounding like they were written by someone with a brain full of mynocks.”

“Anyway,” she said, stacking the last of Petrus’ dirty dishes helpfully beside the sink (but not cleaning them) and turning to face Jenna. “I think… you could tell him.” Feeling suddenly uncomfortable speaking while actually looking at her, Vaya turned away again, and ran water over a used cup as an alibi. “Not should or shouldn’t. No judgement. But I think he would understand. I mean, maybe not fully, but he’d get there. And speaking as someone who hasn’t spent a lot of time around people I respect, it’s a lot easier to keep smiling and lying to the sleemos.” She put the dubiously clean cup back on the side with the dirty dishes. “Uh, not that you asked, I guess.”