fandomhigh | Shop class open house, Tuesday, period 3

It'd been a trying several days, but if there was one thing Fandom excelled at, it was picking itself up and dusting itself off, and getting back to business as usual. For the students, that meant the last week of classes. For the shop students, it was their day to shine.

After rather a lot of cursing and yelling and beating on things that Hardison would pout at him for later, Eliot had finally managed to coax the shop into a fancy museum opening setting, with pedestals and gallery spaces for the students to set up and show off their work. There was a table of refreshments off to the side, and Eliot had on a tweed jacket over his usual button down shirt and jeans.

He'd felt like dressing all civilized-like this week, oddly enough. Even spent a bit of time putting a pair of tiny braids into the hair just behind his ears, something he hadn't bothered with since Leverage was still working out of Nate's apartment back in Boston. Honestly, he'd had a lot of time on his hands.

It wasn't like he was sleeping.

[ooc: because folks quite possibly need something they don't recognize their friends in to hit, welcome to the Evil Shop Plot post! OCD is up, post is open to any and all comers.]

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"That big, huh. All after just one guy. Movin' around a force that big takes a lot of resources. You must be a pretty important person, they willing to send all that after you. Or are they just that stupid?"

"I'm not important," Kanan sighed. "What I represent is. It's a memory, it's an idea. It's hope in a galaxy they've spent nearly a decade systematically erasing hope from. And they don't need to send the entire Empire after me to do it. They'd do just as good a job sending that Sith back."

Maybe explain that one a little better, Dume.

"The one who knows I'm here. I think right now he's using that knowledge to get leverage over one of the students."

Eliot frowned. "And you think you runnin' away is gonna stop this guy from fuckin' with this kid?"

Yeah, he was still deeply skeptical of this.

"I think if he can't prove I'm here, he's got less to work with," Kanan muttered. "Admittedly, that's... the best I have. The list of things I can do for this kid is... short."

The fact that Mara happened to be working for the Emperor was one that he was keeping to himself, for now. This whole situation was a complicated mess.

"That ain't a plan. What, you just plannin' to keep running the rest of your life?"

That was no way to live, Kanan.

"If I stop running, the other end of 'the rest of my life' could be much closer than it would be otherwise."

And Kanan had gotten very good at running.

Dammit, Kanan, stop reminding Eliot of himself. "You keep runnin', that extra life ain't gonna be worth a good goddamn." He shook his head. "Not that you're gonna bother listening to me. Kids like you gotta learn everything the hard way."

"And you think what got me into this situation in the first place wasn't 'the hard way?'" Kanan was trying not to sound incredulous here, but...

He was a very, very jaded guy.

"Sometimes I get to settle in somewhere a little longer than usual. Sometimes I get far enough I can have a month or two instead of a week or two. But I'm never going to be able to settle down. That was never going to be my life."

Please, Kanan. You're a baby.

"You know why I call you 'kid'?"

"Besides the fact that it drives me completely barvy, you mean?"

Well, it did.

"Sure, I'll bite. Why?"

"It's 'cause you sound like you're still fifteen. You talk like you're the center of the universe. Like what your life looks like now is all it's ever gonna be like. Like you already know everything there is to learn about everything. You know when someone's grown up? When they're willin' to admit they don't know jack shit. You ain't even close." Eliot tilted his head. "And 'cause it drives you up a wall, yeah."

Well. That was going to go over... well? Probably not well.

Not super well at all. Not well enough that Kanan was making a frustrated sound and forgetting himself enough to reach up and try to run his fingers through his hair. Which mostly just resulted in him messing up his ponytail.

And the worst part about this was that he couldn't think of a single thing to say that wouldn't just prove Eliot's point. So he was going to just stay quiet (and try not to seethe too much) while he pulled his hair loose and then straightened it out again.

"My Master probably would have agreed with you," he settled on, finally. That was... the least argumentative thing he could muster. And, in its own way, it was high praise. "It's funny. At fifteen, I wouldn't stop asking questions."

"Yeah?" Eliot raised a thoughtful eyebrow. "Damn. I probably woulda liked that kid." He smirked a little to show he was teasing. "S'pose you're decent enough now, too."

Another deep breath, and then a sigh, and Kanan wrestled back the last of the frustration and the fear that had bubbled up in him over the past few days. He had no right to carry either around if he was going to be wielding his lightsaber again.

What was left was just weary.

"I'm a pain in the ass now, and I was then too," he said, trying on a wry smile. "You sure you aren't going to regret trying to talk me into sticking around?"

"If I do, I'll deal with it then. Part of bein' a grown up."

"Being a grown up still sounds overrated," Kanan decided. "So, you think somebody's figured out how to get the door open, or am I going to have to carve a new one?"

Seriously, Hal, at the end of the day, this was just a room. A locked door was only as good as its ability to withstand a lightsaber.

"Worth givin' it a shot. I generally tend to try not to permanently break the fancy hologram room."

"After killer droids, I'm generally more willing to make exceptions," Kanan pointed out. "But sure, we'll try it your way, first."

Eliot tossed his golf club back into the junkyard simulation. "Fancy hologram killer droids. Which we've managed to fix." He shrugged. "Somehow."

He wasn't going to ask too many questions.

"I am really going to have to look into the school's policies on what to do when equipment malfunction leads to attempted homicide. There's got to be... insurance or something for that, at least."

If there wasn't, around here, somebody had made a terrible mistake.

"You'd think. Though I'm guessin' the video projectors in the other classrooms probably don't do it too often."

"... Don't go giving them ideas, Eliot."

Kanan had been on the island long enough now to recognize that this was a legitimate concern.

"See, now you're even talkin' like a native."

Shop class open house, Tuesday, period 3

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