The Young Apprentice

Part 1E

I slow down, attempting to conceal the fact that I am sweating and wheezing at the moment from my two mile sprint. "Identification." The trooper says as he stops me by the arm. I try to act very confused hoping that this one is stupid. "Identification Ma'am?" Languages swirl around in my head and I pluck a random phrase from one hoping he doesn't have knowledge of it feeling so unprepared.

"Ch'ah am ch'ithe'umi'aco rab ch'ah k'ir nah vuct'san." I'm sorry but I don't understand. Awkwardly he stares at me and slowly looks around as if to question his peers of what to do. They all stare back at him from the white trash buckets on their heads

"Go head." He waves me on and I burst out laughing once I'm out of earshot of him.

"I can't believe that worked."

"I can't believe it either." A male voice mutters next to my ear as a blaster is pressed into my back.

"What do you want." I hiss as he leads me down an alleyway, not sketchy at all I think.

"I believe you could be useful to us." Kriff, immediately fight or flight takes over. I shove him backwards with the force reaching for my own blaster and I stun him hoping none of his buddies are around. A quick look doesn't raise any red flags as I run straight into a dark haired boy about my age I'd imagine.

"Ow, get out of my way." I quickly shove him and he stares at me in shock.

"Is something wrong Miss?"

"Yes, you're in my way." He looks behind me and quickly grabs my arm, suddenly breaking into a run. "What the heck!" I yell as I'm dragged through the street until he suddenly dives behind a shipping stand?

"You don't happen to know an angry bald dude wearing dark robes waving a blaster around like a crazy person. Do you?" I slowly peek over the ledge and sure enough see the dude from the alley.

"Umm, we've ran into each other and he wasn't too happy with how it ended..." He smirks and tells me to stay here as he goes and gets someone else before returning.

"Don't worry my Uncle will deal with it. I'm Eli."

"Verse." He nods,

"You're not from around here are you?"

"No, is it that obvious?"

"Not really, I mean not many people around here look like you but other than that until you open your mouth no one would know." I realize at this point I probably look like a horror show covered in mud, dust, and who knows what from the cell.

"Great..." This makes him laugh and we sit in a comfortable silence for a little bit as Eli's uncle deals with the nerf header from the alley.

"So where are you from?" He finally asks, breaking the silence.

"Around."

"Interesting, what brought you to Lystra."

"Ahh, I had arrangements that ended up falling through once I got here." I say carefully not meeting eye contact with him as I tug at a rip in my leggings.

"So what are your plans now?"

"I don't know... When my other arrangements fell through I had already planned for everything but that." I try to communicate that I have very little knowledge of myself and my life other than the fact that I have random flashbacks and like visions. On top of my previous arrangements were with the slavers, not too fond of going back there...

"Well, we're actually running short staffed here at Vanto Family Shipping so if you can work hard and are open to learning how to manage supply longs, move crates, etc, I can try to help you make arrangements here."

"Really, you would do that?"

"Sure."

"What's in it for you?" I ask knowing this doesn't come without a cost.

"Well my parents can't send me to the Academy until they find some people to help here at work, so pretty much you would be filling in for me."

"Is that all?"

"Yes." I lean back against the crate and close my eyes. He does the same and I drift off to sleep as I mull over the new chance I can have.

2 MONTHS LATER

I leave my room knowing that Eli is going to scream at me for being late and he can't leave until I get there. "You're late." He grumbles turning his back to me as

"Oh dear, I'm so sorry." I say in a high pitched tone and dramatic pull my newest set of braids up into a bun. "Oh what shall I do to make it up for you?" He tries to smack me as I step backwards and trip over a crate.

"Karma."

"I hate you."

"Do you know? For someone who hates me you sure spend a lot of time with me." Eli teases as he helps me to my feet. He starts to say something about how I look nice when Mrs. Vanto walks into the room looking exhausted.

"Oh Verse you're here, umm I need help with the logs today..." At this moment Eli has turned bright pink and I smirk at him which only makes him blush more. "Also Eli, when you get back I'm going to need you to help Verse with her Sy Bisti again because one of our customers wasn't too happy when she called him an overweight blurrg." His eyes narrow as I chuckle,

"I swear I didn't mean to say that, it was a simple mispronunciation."

"Hmph, sure. Of course mother, anything else?"

"No, thank you Eli." With that she leaves the room and he smacks me not so gently again before lecturing me in Sy Bisti.

"Simple mispronunciation sure, Verse you're the only one who can mess up that bad."

"At least I try you ignorant fool." When he leaves I begin working on the pile of logs in the corner trying not to die of boredom.Something catches my eye and I study the scrawled handwriting. The door clicks as it opens and I jump, dropping all of my work onto the floor.

"I'm so sorry Verse." Mr. Vanto says as he quickly begins helping me grab all the logs before they manage to disappear in between the crates.

"It's all good, but I have a quick question about something curious on one of the logs." He looks at me intrigued as I shuffle through the pile trying to find the one I was looking at when he came in. "This one, I'm unable to read the writing."

"Hmm, I think that says Chiss, yes that's what it says. I have to run now, but if you have any more questions Eli should be back in like an hour or two and he can help. We all know your Sy Bisti needs some help..." I nod and mentally file the word Chiss away as I continue working on the stack of logs. I finally finish the stack of logs I'm working on and go to turn them in.

"You're finally finished I see."

"How long were you sitting there?" He makes a show of checking his watch before answering.

"Two hours."

"Delightful."

"You seem annoyed."

"Not annoyed, but confused..."

"About what?"

"This log... It talks about Chiss. What does that word mean?" He sighs and closes his eyes as if to say leave me alone. When he stays in this position for several minutes I throw my now cold unappetizing caf on him.

"IDIOT! I'm thinking!!"

"Sure..."

"The Chiss are a race of alien creatures that people make up stories to scare their kids with. Frankly, I don't think they exist. But according to my parents they have blue skin and glowing red eyes and if I didn't do the dishes they'd come and eat me." It makes me amused that the Vanto's would threaten Eli with that. "Does that make sense?" I nod and go back to work. 

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- STARWARSNERD235