Nar Shaddaa

Arali makes her way into Yae's, for the meeting with Asra and Master Thun. Plus, Yae deserves an apology in person, since she's gonna miss another book club meeting. Too much going on. She orders her caf and a muffin, and waits to lead Master Thun and Asra to the back room when they arrive.

Asra is the next to arrive, smiling at Arali when she sees her and waving. It takes her a moment to get her caf - nothing to eat for her - before she joins her. "Hey there."

Arali returns the wave, wearing her own dopey smile. Oh, she's got it bad. "Hey there, yourself," her lekku twist and curl behind her back, but she tries and get a hold of herself. Badly.

"Um... Master Thun should be here in just a bit."

"Sounds good." Asra doesn't miss her behavior. She giggles and grins a little herself, leaning in and giving her a quick peck on the lips before leaning back to keep and eye out for the third expected person. Sure, it wasn't a date this time, but who could reasonably ignore such adorable body language?

Arali slips her hand in Asra's, the cool of human skin refreshing against her hot twi'lek blood, and presses her forehead against Asra's. Her people's kiss. But it only lasts a moment, before she has to pull herself away. "Maybe... we should hold off on that for just a bit? Jedi can be a bit... strange about attachments."

Noth that they'd have a chance of hiding anything from Thun.

"That's fine. I wasn't planning on doing anything else," she reassures before letting go. "Not that different from how I've been living until now."

"Indeed we are, so why don't we start at the beginning, dearie. This aims to be a good and interesting conversation," the old Jedi says as she enters and takes a seat with a heavy sigh.

"These kinds of meetings rarely head in good directions, so surprise me."

She sits as well once the old Jedi does. Taking a deep, calming breath, she says. "I don't doubt it." Whether she could surprise her or not remained to be seen, but the only thing she could do was start. It would happen or it wouldn't. "I'm Asra Nakahti. I learned yesterday that I'm force-sensitive." She glanced toward Arali and back. "Though I think there might have been hints before then. Because I am serving the Empire right now, the normal thing would be sending me straight to the Academy."

"I don't want to become one of the Sith, but I don't want to be a danger to myself or others though a complete lack of training, either. Well... either of those would qualify as me being a danger. Anyway, I'm trying to determine what my realistic options are. Arali said you might be able to help."

She looks down a little. "Thank you for coming out, by the way. I know you must be busy."

"Typically the Sith kill adult force users, so you may have made a good choice," the Jedi responds warmly.

When Thun speaks up, Arali nearly jumps out of her skin, and assures the master the topic isn't quite what it looks like, before leading the way to the back meeting room. Thankfully, Asra isn't so rattled.

She sips her caf as Asra sums the situation up succinctly, and also makes a mental note to remember her last name. Hopefully Asra doesn't take Master Thun's words as dramatics. But this isn't her decision to make. She sits back and looks to Asra, choosing not to interfere.

Fortunately, she tended to take people at their word.

"I had to make one eventually," she replies with a half smile. "My goal is boosting that tally for now. I can get out of the Empire without much difficulty, so that opens options, at least. I just need help figuring out what my options are and which is best."

“So you think the life of a Jedi is a viable one for yourself or you simply want protection,” she says curiously.

“What options do you prefer?”

"Mm... Not exactly. More that I think I would be a potential danger without a better understanding of the..." she considers her words and deftly side-steps the pun. "... factors at work here."

"I think... regarding whether that life is viable, I don't have the expertise to make that call. As I understand it, the Jedi don't commonly take older trainees. Though at least I won't be murdered for identifying myself." She smiles a little, then returns to a thoughtful response. "As to protection... I don't expect anyone to step in for my sake."

"Options... In the immediate, I prefer any option that lets me get a better handle on my situation and what I have on my hands with this. Not doing that is an option, but... it doesn't really seem like the best plan in my own opinion. After that... Arali put forward the ideas of either settling in the Republic and finding a post there somewhere, or staying out here in the unaligned worlds. I'm not sure about either, but I guess that's a bridge to cross when I come to it."

“And I am sure Arali has no vested interested in where you end up,” she says casually. “The Jedi have many rules and many exceptions, but first and foremost you need education and information, they can provide that and offer you choices to choose how to live your life.”

“If you are defecting, being here or in Republic space, life will not be easy. But it would not harrowing either, it would be a journey and not even I could see how that would end.”

Asra looks a little amused. "I'm sure." She nods at the assessment. "Yes. Well... I'm certainly going to be there, at least for a while." At the very least, I need to disentangle myself. "So... yes, working on getting some education with the Jedi and... well, making further once that's proceeded some seems like a solid plan."

"We can arrange that, wouldn't be the first time," she says honestly.

She let's out a breath, not realizing she was holding it. "I'd like to do that, then. How would I go about starting?"

"How soon do you need to leave?" she asks.

"In a couple of days is the soonest." She presses her lips together. "I was asked to be on hand during the next couple of days, so I can't really go before then without drawing attention."

"Well you know your situation best," she replies.

"Once the time comes, where should I go?" She looks between them. "The Republic Compound here?"