Work Text:
38BBY
Dedra files into the dining hall of the Kinderblock with the rest of Level Two Group Three, her fists clenched, her teeth gritted. The day so far has been okay - a couple of kids in Level Three Group One got into a fight, but there hasn’t been a lockdown. One of them got sent to the medical droid, is all. She’s glad that there wasn’t a lockdown. She doesn’t know what happens to cake during a lockdown.
It is Dedra’s seventh birthday, and today, and that means cake. One piece, a perfect square, served with the usual evening meal in shiny plastic packaging in the part of the tray where the fruit puree usually goes. She’s been looking forward to it all year - sticky, sweet, and perfect. Last year she hadn’t thought to count exactly how many bites it had taken to finish. This year she won’t be so careless.
There’s just one problem - or rather, two problems. Straf Orric and Reema Kilin. Straf’s eight, and Reema’s ten, and what they say in Level Two Group Three goes, and ever since Dedra graduated to Level Two the day after her sixth birthday, they’ve decided that they hate her.
That doesn’t mean you have to give up your cake to them, though, she tells herself. At least not without a fight.
They position themselves in front of their slots. The chrono above them all reads 1659 - thirty seconds to go.
Twenty. She braces herself - she’s planned the route out in her head for weeks now. Grab the tray, but don’t pay attention to the rest of the food on it - the tray’s a weapon and a shield, today. The cake’s what’s important. Then run between the tables to the refresher, which has cubicles that lock. Once she’s there, she can count the bites she’s been practically dreaming about these last two months. There must be at least seven, she thinks. One for every year she’s been alive.
Ten seconds. She wonders what colour the icing will be this year. Five seconds. Perhaps there will be sprinkles.
Four.
Three.
Two.
One.
She hadn’t counted on Straf and Reema ignoring their own trays entirely. When she grabs her tray and turns to run, Reema is crouching right behind her, grabbing her around the waist while Straf whacks her in the face with his own tray, over and over, until Dedra accidentally creates an opening between her arms and chest, which Straf wrenches open, ripping the little package of cake from her hands.
She doesn’t even get to see what colour the icing had been.
Reema gives her a final kick to the ribs, and then the two of them slink off with her cake, sniggering to themselves.
Dedra remains curled in a ball on the floor for a little while - the rest of her food got strewn all over the place in the fight, after all. The other kids eat their meals in silence, ignoring her.
Reema turns eleven in three months - and graduates to Level Three the day after that. Curled in her ball, Dedra wonders how long Straf will last without her to back him up.
***
33BBY
Syril lies on his bed, curled up in a little ball, staring blankly out of the window - too sad to fall asleep, too sad to even cry. His three Clone Troopers watch him from his bedside table, evidently not to be joined by a fourth squad member today.
He had really, truly believed that Dad would be coming to visit him today - it is his seventh birthday, after all, and it’s been almost a year since he moved out. Right up until the last possible second. Even now, as his bedside chrono ticks over from 2349 to 2350 - and he knows that the light rail doesn’t run after 2200 and that Dad can’t afford to hire a speeder - he can’t stop himself from thinking he’s still got ten minutes left.
Ten more minutes.
Come on, Dad. You can make it.
I was so good, all day.
Please.