Archive of Our Own

All it takes is the barest graze.

It happens sometimes. His gloves usually keep it from happening, but not always. The stronger the Echo, the harder it is to stop himself from being pulled in.

Cal is on a field trip with his clan, though, and that is much less common. Not just because such trips are rare.

Most of the things he Sees within echoes are brief. Split-moment bursts seared into the memory, like the way people can sometimes envision a place they’ve been but can’t remember a single thing that happened there.

Little bursts of excitement or determination or fear as something changes. It makes it very easy to avoid getting caught in Yooli’s mischief, but isn’t nearly so helpful in not getting caught for his own.

The little things are simple, short, and easy. He can keep walking like nothing happened.

Stronger ones he has only come across a few times, but all of them have seen him waking up in the Healing Halls because someone found him unconscious.

This Echo is different, and all it takes is a graze.

Somewhere safe. She He needs somewhere safe.

There. The turbolift.

Safer than a speeder. But only if there isn’t someone waiting on the other side of the door.

He– there’s–

Something is tugging insistently at him.

Cal blinks.

Piping and machinery lines everything around him. This… is definitely not the district he’s supposed to be in.

Where is he? Where is his clan?

Something tugs again. Or– maybe it’s a poke. That sounds right.

Cal turns.

Oh.

There’s a Temple Guard kneeling beside him, unlit ‘saber held in one hand as their head is turned to keep a better watch on the crowds around them.

It feels weird seeing them outside the Temple. It’s in their name.

But– it means Cal isn’t alone.

“I,” he starts, then stops. He wants his clan, but he wants to go back to his bed in the crèche even more. He thought he’d be okay on a museum trip with his gloves on, but apparently he couldn’t even get there without triggering an Echo. “Home?”

The Guard shifts, and there isn’t a response but a sense of approval-worry-calm washes over him.

Cal will forever deny squeaking when he’s suddenly lifted off the ground. Even if the Guard is radiating amusement him, because that’s just– odd.

Honestly, Cal has never really thought much about the Temple Guard, even though he sees them all over the Temple. They’re there to protect everyone and help– he’s had to ask for directions more than once after a wrong turn– but they’re just so quiet and sometimes just… blend into their surroundings too well. And they all feel sort of the same in the Force, somehow.

He’s only ever really thought about them when it comes to getting through Gizka Clan Prank Wars without getting caught by anyone. Though he does think it was a Guard that made the Glitter-Garden Incident get so out-of-hand. It went way further than he and Ly had planned or expected.

Maybe he should think about them a little bit more.

Returning to the Temple takes longer than he expected. At least twice the time it took to even get to the museum district. He doesn’t know how far he got– he didn’t really reach the lower levels the Echo was so focused on, but he had definitely been well on his way through a shortcut.

“Thank you for finding me,” he whispers to the Guard, and tries his best to memorize the feeling of their Presence when acknowledgement filters through them again.

He will be convincing his Clan to help make something to give to them, if he can manage to find them later. Well, convince isn’t the right word. They’ll probably decide it’s happening the moment they get back.

Stars, he hopes they don’t spend their entire trip worrying about him.

“Initiate Kestis? Aren’t you supposed to be with your Clan?”

…The Guard brought him to the Healing Halls instead of the Crèche. He winces as they finally set him down to sign something at the healer.

“I, um, had a Walking Vision. Well, it was an Echo, but…”

Echoes aren’t supposed to do what happened earlier. Cal’s psychometric Focus is broader than most, so he sees more, but Echoes are memories. He isn’t supposed to– to live them like that. Strong ones– long ones– leave him frozen in place or unconscious while he processes them.

They aren’t supposed to have him trying to take the quickest shortcut to the Deep Undercity that he can find because he Knows someone is after him.

He doesn’t want to know what would have happened to him if the Temple Guard hadn’t caught up to him when they did. He knows what happens to Initiates that get lost down there.

Cin Drallig does not know what, precisely, he had expected to happen today.

He has spent the entire last week with a headache from having to put his entire Guard through remedial training because someone decided to shuffle their shifts around without telling anyone. Leading to one of his Guards being out of the Temple, in public, in full karking uniform like it isn’t a blatant dismissal of all their regulations.

Jedi aren’t technically allowed to wear armor outside the Temple. Haven’t been for about a thousand years now, lest they unnerve the public a touch too much by actually looking the part of a warrior when half the galaxy already thinks of them as the Senate’s personal attack force.

If the Temple Guard has to fill in for the typical watchers for wandering Initiates and Padawans, they’re expected to do it dressed as a civilian, or at least as a regular Knight rather than as a Guardsman.

So, yes, Cin has had something of a headache this last week because Ver decided to pawn off her shift as an emergency Watcher at the literal last moment to go on a date.

She deserves all those impromptu Soresu-practice sessions, no matter how much she loathes the form. Even her girlfriend agrees.

Cin just hadn’t precisely expected for the headache coming from that incident to continue when he came into his office today.

Because the Initiate involved with that particular incident– and, actually, quite a few other incidents now that he thinks about it– is standing in front of him.

“Initiate Kestis,” Cin greets with an upward tilt of the head. “Is there something you need?”

“I wanna become a Temple Guard!” the tiny psychometrist blurts out, before turning as red as his hair and shrinking back into himself.

Cin pauses, and sets his datapad down.

Who snitched?

His status as Chief of Security isn’t actually well-known, despite what one might think. It’s rare for someone to hold more than one position at once, and most people hear his status as Battlemaster and have no reason to look further.

The Temple Guards are anonymous. Nobody outside the Guard is supposed to know who they are. To an extent, the same goes for him as their leader. Sure, the Councils all know, as well as his Guards themselves and the Shadows, but the broader Order?

How the kriff did an Initiate figure it out?

He bites back his initial reaction to deflect and ask what makes the kid think Cin has a say in joining the Guard. That won’t help.

Initiate Kestis isn’t even nine yet, but he’s heard the Council throwing around the idea of assigning him to a Master early instead of waiting for someone who calls to him naturally.

Cin knows why– he’s the one that approved the kid for the Advanced Form I and Form IV lessons despite his age. And Cin knows that despite picking things up quick, the kid is also the one that takes it the hardest when he struggles.

“What do you plan on doing if you can’t become one?” he asks instead, curious.

Initiate Kestis blinks, startled. “Um… join the Corps? That was my original plan, anyways. Master Surra introduced us to some of his friends there. They said I’m not allowed to join the MediCorps for a while because of my psychometry, but the EduCorps sounds nice.”

Cin… does not know what to say to that, actually. Holy kriff. One of their most talented upcoming fighters in decades, and Knighthood isn’t even a thought in his mind.

He can’t wait to be able to shove this in the Council’s collective faces.

“Hmm… you’re too young to become a full member of the Guard,” Cin says, watching the kid’s shoulders slump. That just won’t do. “But, that doesn’t mean you can’t get an early introduction to training and what they do. If you’re serious about this, that is.”

“I am!”

Previously, the youngest person he had ever seen join his Guard was the very same person who brought Kestis back to the Temple the other day. A Padawan who left his apprenticeship halfway after a major injury.

With that one exception, he has never heard of anyone else younger than a full Knight joining the Guard before.

Cal Kestis might just be the youngest human in history to decide that the Temple Guard is his path.