[right][sub]Interacting with: no-one.[/sub][/right][center][sub][h1][img]https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/701923492769169408/785286475029676042/4.png[/img]
[sup][sup][color=white]D     A     I        D     A     I        A     H     R     K     A     N[/color][/sup][/sup][/h1][/sub][/center]
[center][img]https://64.media.tumblr.com/8b2d72d5944d4586b59f50374e1aec5a/tumblr_oq1gpej9Sl1w5zrl0o6_540.gifv[/img][/center][center][sub][h1][img]https://i.imgur.com/VcNZOzF.png[/img]
[sup][sup][sup][color=white]0     1     :     1     5     a     m        1     9     B     B     Y     ,        C     o     r     u     s     c     a     n     t     ,     J     e     d     i        T     e     m     p     l     e[/color][/sup][/sup][/sup][/h1][/sub][/center]
[indent][indent][indent][indent][indent][hider=Synopsis][table][row][/row][row][cell][color=2e2c2c]xxxxxx[/color][img]https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/701923492769169408/785303706945978478/22.png[/img][/cell][cell][color=2e2c2c]x[/color]
Dai Dai escapes from the Jedi Temple and makes his way towards the underworld, but is caught out in the open with no transportation and no contacts to help him. The situation seems dire, and increasingly so when a Dug taxi driver refuses to help him for free.

Luckily, the situation turns around and Dai Dai is whisked away to safety – well, there is no such thing as safety in the undercity, but anything is better than being on the overworld, close to the Jedi Temple.

Coruscant burns tonight, but Dai Dai does not intend to go down with the flames. Now, he finds himself in a strange cantina, surrounded by strangers who barely seem to have noticed the extinction of the Jedi order. His next step will be to find a way off the planet – but with no contacts and no guidance, that might be a harder task than he originally anticipated.[/cell][/row][/table][/hider][/indent][/indent][/indent][/indent][/indent]

Coruscant had always been Dai Dai's favorite thing about returning to the temple. The way the city lit up at night was something that no other planet could hope to rival – it's beauty dazzling even the most stoic among the cities inhabitants. But tonight, the lights were different. Tonight, the sky lit up with the burning fires that razed the Jedi Temple. A place that, for a long time, Dai Dai had considered his home – as a youngling, and as a padawan. Perhaps there would be some sort of honor in it all, some sort of bravery, if they were simply bested by their foes. But that wasn’t how it happened – instead they were cut down like animals by none other than the clones they had been fighting alongside with and their hero, Anakin Skywalker. In the heat of the moment, escaping from the temple through a stroke of luck, there was not much time to ponder this. But, as he got away from the temple further and further, running as far as his feet would carry him, and then even further, the reality of the situation had caught up to Dai Dai. They weren’t defeated, they were betrayed. It stung, and if master V’raar had been here, then perhaps he would have had something clever or wise to say about it to dull the pain and explain why the force suddenly felt so.. different, before chastising Dai Dai for not knowing these things to begin with.

But master V’raar was dead. 

And his absence stung even more than the betrayal they faced at the hand of Anakin. The sting, however, made way for confusion, panic, anxiety rather quickly. Slowly Dai Dai’s footsteps came to a halt, until he completely stopped, standing in front of the edge of a platform that oversaw a deep chasm leading to the “bottom” of the overworld. As he stood there, Dai Dai couldn’t help but feel helpless. It was like he was a young initiate again, brought to the temple on his first day, unsure of what was going to happen. Except this time it didn’t seem like there’d be a happy ending. No master Yoda to explain to him what it meant to be a jedi. Just fire and death. 

Glancing back at the temple – now, nothing more than a dot of red-orange glow in the distance – Dai Dai felt something he did not often feel. Anger, frustration, fury. He knew these emotions were a path to the dark side, but what else was he meant to feel. Happiness, calm? In the face of such a tragedy? His brows furrowed inwards, his hands tightened into fists. 

His feet dragged forward, as if he was going to somehow return to the temple, and slaughter them all one by one. But, before it could come to this idiocy, he was pulled back to reality by the voice of a stranger. Dai Dai glanced around, left, right, forward, before finally looking down and seeing that he was standing right in front of a Dug – and a particularly annoyed looking one, at that.

“Are you gonna pay up, or are ya’ gonna keep standing there,” the dug asked impatiently, standing on his arms while his legs were crossed. “I got otha’ customers here.”

“Excuse me,” Dai Dai answered, “pay for what exactly?”

“For da’ taxi ofcourse!” the Dug proclaimed, throwing his legs into the air as if Dai Dai had just committed a horrible faux pas. “Swear ta’ god you younglings are getting’ worse with da’ days.”

“Oh, I’m terribly sorry,” Dai Dai responded – his words polite as ever, being reminded of master V’raar telling him a soft voice got done more than a demanding one. “I do need transport, but I am afraid I’m not carrying any credits at the moment. Any chance you could.. give me a free ride?”

“Ye’ ye’! Sure, hop in!” the Dug proclaimed, waving his legs in the direction of his Coruscant taxi, before turning and pretending to walk towards it, stopping only to continue his little play, “hey, ya’ know what! Let me give the entirety of Coruscant a free ride, yea! That’ll make my kids happy, not havin’ any food, but at least their daddy’s a stinkin’ hero ain’t he? Get lost, kid! Yer’ in the way of [i]payin’[/i] customers!”

Dai Dai looked at the Dug, a little confused on what to do now – he got away from the temple, which was where the highest concentration of clone troopers would be, that much was sure. But if he took too long to get to a degree of safety, then before long the troopers would catch up. It was time to try something new. Dai Dai sighed deeply, thinking back.. what would master V’raar have done? .. there [i]was[/i] this one trick that Dai Dai had seen master V’raar perform once.

Without any warning at all, Dai Dai lifted his hand and waved it from right to left in front of the Dug’s face. “You’ll give me a free ride to the undercity.”

The Dug looked absolutely puzzled, dumbfounded, perhaps even astonished at the sheer stupidity of this kid. It took a few seconds for him to even come up with a response to Dai Dai. Finally, he responded, “no.”

Now defeated, Dai Dai turned around, pondering where to go next. What to do next. There were no contacts in the city that he had – he’d been a cloistered pseudo-monk in the temple for most of his time on Coruscant, so there was barely any time to meet anyone, much less an actual reason to do so. Surely master V’raar would’ve had a smuggler he knew, or some sort of long-time friend with a ship. Dai Dai, however, had none of those things. And with all the jedi either dead or in hiding, there was nobody to help him. 

For the first time in 18 years, Dai Dai was [i]horribly[/i] alone. 

The sound of resounding footsteps, not from civilians, but unmistakably from troopers, echoed behind him now. Turning around rapidly, Dai Dai immediately spots them, but realizes there is nowhere to go except.. [i]down.[/i] Down over the ledge, into the great chasm that would lead to a certain death. 

The Dug, too, is caught off-guard by the clone troopers, before his eyes catch the burning temple in the skyline behind them. For a moment, the Dug contemplates simply.. leaving – saving his own skin to drive a taxi another day. But then, he turns to Dai Dai. “Ya’ had a rough night, huh kid? .. can’t believe I’m giving one of you’s scumbags a ride fer’ free, but get in.”

With no time to waste, Dai Dai stepped into the Repulsorcraft airspeeder, followed closely by the Dug. Normally, it would be prudent to wait for more passengers to fill out the taxi, but given the “tight schedule” they were currently flying under, there would be no extra passengers for [i]this[/i] ride. With a few quick movements the Dug brought the speeder to life, sputtering a little as it slowly but surely lifted itself off the ground, barely holding itself together.

“I don’t think we’re gonna make it off the platform like this!” Dai Dai tried to yell over the sound of the engine trying it’s best not to fall apart.

“Nah-nah! Been flyin’ this beauty for years, she may sound a little rough, but it’s pure powa’ unda the hood!”

Then, with a sudden jolt forwards that shook both Dai Dai and the Dug backwards and forwards, the speeder “sped” away. Only now the clone troopers caught on, rushing forward to try and stop the vehicle before it disappeared from the platform – one of them staying behind and radioing in to god knows where, “jedi refugee on the move from my location,” before following his comrades.

But they were much too late – with a twist of his control stick, the Dug sent the taxi into a nosedive, diving straight down towards the bottom of the over-city. With a maniacal laugh, the Dug yelled “the names Dongo, by the way! And, to tell ya’ the truth, I ain’t even got kids!”

Admittedly, now was not a great time for a conversation, much less when they were in what could only be described as a freefall that not even the most insane pilot would attempt. Just when it seemed like they were heading for a certain death on the long end of a multiple thousand feet fall into the chasm, the Dug straightened out the taxi and slowly brought back the speed, moving his taxi forward through the chasm of skyscrapers and platforms. As the buildings whizzed by, Dai Dai could only wonder as to the route Dongo was taking, his hands firmly grasping the edges of the taxi. He wasn’t even sure that taxi’s were legally allowed to move this fast – or even perform these type of maneuvers. 

“I-I’m Dai Dai,” he finally managed to say, “I’m a… I’m a mechanic, from.. from Iridonia.” With a hasty move, he tried to conceal the lightsaber he had under his robes a little more, not realizing that the robes were probably even more of a telltale sign than the lightsaber probably was.

“Right, kid, and I’m a cosmetics salesman, drivin’ da’ taxi is just something I do for funsies, yeah?” Dongo replied sarcastically, although he neglected to tell Dai Dai that he knew what he was, perhaps out of some sort of vague respect for the Jedi – or, perhaps, because he simply disliked the alternative to the Jedi even more.

Once they reached one of the giant ventilation shafts that lead to the underworld, Dongo veered the airspeeder downwards again, this time at a much more relaxed pace than their initial freefall. “Ey’, kid! I’m gonna drop ya’ off at the cantina I like to visit – lots of drunkies there that need rides and don’t notice when I rip em’ off with a sob story about how my kids’ are starving. You find yourself a ship that can take you outta’ here, and then get back to Iridonia so you can do some engineerin’, ya hear?”

“Yes, mister Dongo, I will. Thanks for your help tonight – I was worried that, you know, with the lack of credits—”

“Aaaaaah, don’t mention it, kid. No, really, don’t. I might just regret not askin’ ya for everything ya have. You know, doing things for free, it’s against everythin’ I stand for. Nobody should ever get anythin’ for free, ya understand me kid?”

As the speeder came to a halt, Dai Dai stepped out of the speeder, his first steps a little wobbly. Now, Dai Dai was used to rough flying, but this had been.. something else entirely. “Thanks again, Dongo.”

“Yeah, kid, see ya! Tell ya’ kids about the great taxi-Dug Dongo, best pilot on this side of Coruscant!”

Neglecting to tell Dai Dai what the “other” side of Coruscant was, Dai Dai had no choice to believe him. And given his extreme free-fall flying in a [i]taxi[/i], the Dug might just have been telling the truth.

With a sinking feeling of uncertainty Dai Dai stepped into the cantina, receiving strange looks from some of the locals for arriving in a speeder to begin with, only doubled by his strange choice of apparel. It didn’t take a social genius to realize that Dai Dai was very much out of place here.