The head tendrils of the young Nautolan drifted from side to side as the greenish-gray boy shifted his weight from one foot to the other, as he rested his chin on the uppermost box and continued to watch the Jedi and Jacen debate taking place on the floor of the cargo bay. The two younglings had an excellent vantage point, but there was just one problem.

"Can you hear what they're sayin'?" Zak inquired, glancing over at the black haired Anzat beside him.

"Kinda," Sor-Jan answered, giving the Nautolan an odd look. "Can't you?"

"I don't have ears like you do," Zak complained sourly, which was the first time that Sor-Jan realized he was right -- the Nautolan [i]didn't[/i] have ears, just the head tresses, several of which had a series of gill-like slits near where they joined his head. The lesson on Nautolan anatomy was diverted, however, as both boys caught a glimpse of someone new walking into the cargo bay and turned their attention to this interloper. "Hey, Master Sorni's up," Zak noted brightly. He wasn't certain of why, but seeing another Jedi walk into the cargo bay was immediately reassuring to him.

But, while the Nautolan had excellent vision, he still couldn't hear for crap in the acoustics of the cargo bay. Vibration in a gaseous atmosphere just didn't resonate the same way it did in the youngling's aquatic home environment. "What are they sayin' now?" the youngling asked.

"Master Sorni's talkin' somethin' 'bout [b]Nar Shadda[/b]," Sor-Jan answered.

"What's a [i]nar sharda[/i]?" the Nautolan youth inquired, as the answer to his question only bred more questions.

The Anzati youngling turned and gave his [b]frenemy[/b] a sour look. "It's not a [i]what[/i], it's a [i]where[/i], droyk!" Sor-Jan declared haughtily, the Corellian insult tacked on at the end immediately prompted the Nautolan to whip his head around to return the nasty look. "We learned this is seventh year cartography. It's a moon in the Y'Toub System," the Anzat stated flatly, smirking with obvious pride for demonstrating his superior knowledge.

Swinging his hip to the left, the Nautolan youngling took a side-step to the right as he swung his weight around to slam into the side of the Anzati boy, knocking the black-haired youth from off their shared perch. "Droid brain," Zak uttered, adding insult to injury as SJ tumbled onto the floor. Lifting himself up onto his toes, the Nautolan resumed watched the padawans, knights, and Master Sorni -- except now he was doing so to make sure they hadn't seen that.

A sudden sensation, like an electric pulse chasing up his spine, gave warning as the Nautolan's preternatural sense through the Force provided a millisecond of forewarning of what was coming. In that fraction of time, Zak turned and countered Sor-Jan's attempt to use the telekinetic technique known as the [i]feather push[/i] against him with one of his own. The Nautolan's Force push pressed against the Anzati's and, for a moment, it seemed as though both younglings had managed a concrete and stable effort at manifesting the Force.

This promptly blew up in both of their faces, as Zak and Sor-Jan each went flying backwards in opposite directions, smashing into the sides of their box-and-crate fort as a sound like thunder echoed loudly through the cargo bay while the children's fort collapsed in on itself in a rain of containers. And, there, standing in the middle of the commotion and rubble, were two younglings. Each of which managed to look more guilty than the other as the two boys looked over and realized that several of the Jedi were now looking at them. Sor-Jan pointed at Zak, Zak pointed at SJ, and both clearly indicated the classic non-verbal expression of youth that said: [i]He did it.[/i]

And then the Sector Ranger named Jacen waved at the two boys.

Wait, so they weren't in trouble?

The two boys looked at each other, then at the collective group across from them, then at each other again. Zak gave a slight shrug and the two younglings both waved back at the Sector Ranger-hero-dude. Then they went to the task of surveying the array of containers around them, as though divided between asking themselves how they were going to clean up the mess or contemplating how they would re-design their imaginary fortification. While Zak took the practical approach of using his own physical strength to lift and move the boxes, Sor-Jan adopted the imminently more Jedi-lazy approach of using the Force to lift and move the clutter around. Lifting a box and setting it aside and atop another, the Nautolan reached down and picked up a training lightsaber, holding it in his hands as he tried to tell by looking at it whether it was his or SJ's.

Neither of them really had a lightsaber though. Just training lightsabers, which were all constructed the same. Finally, Zak depressed the activation switch in the side of the handle, revealing the bright green blade that was most closely associated with the Consular branch of Jedi Knights. Making a face, as though disgusted by the revelation, the Nautolan promptly shut the training shoto back down and handed it over to the Anzati. 

It wasn't that Zak had anything against green. Far from it as a matter of fact, not to mention a matter of skin tone. But his favortist color was blue. Not bright blue. Not azure blue. But [b]Jedi Guardian Blue[/b], because the most awesome-ist Jedi duelists were Jedi Guardians. Those were the [i]real[/i] guardians of peace in the Republic. So Zak always picked a blue training shoto for himself when he went to saber practice. And then, one day, when he was bigger and got to build his own lightsaber, he was going to make a purple one -- like Master Windu. And he'd become a Vaapad master, like Master Windu. 

And then no clone army would ever hurt anyone again.

As the Nautolan shuffled through the ruins of Kilo Base in search of his training shoto, the young Anzat perked his head up and looked over at the adults for a moment. "They say we get our own room to share," SJ remarked, taking a break from the salvage efforts.

"Astral!" Zak cheered brightly.

"And then somethin' 'bout us being the future of the Jedi."

The Nautolan's nose wrinkled slightly as a look of confusion became visibly apparent. "What does that mean?"

"I dunno. Adults always say that stuff," SJ provided with a shrug, resuming the salvage efforts for their stuff among the rubble. "It usually means we have to clear our room or somethin'" the Anzat added.

"Clean our room," Zak whined plaintively, adopting a pained expression. "Don't we have droids for that?"