The Dark Academy on Korriban

"I don't punch yours, you don't flirt with mine, I can accept that bargain," she said with a grin.

"I do not miss having long hair for a moment." Kristal glanced back to Shaisha, paused for a moment in thought and then needed more information.

"How short?"

"Hmm... Maybe as short as yours?" She mused.

"Mother had long hair, I remember, and she wanted me to grow mine long too... But it's a lot of work to keep it tidy."

"Precisely why I will never miss it," she said with small laugh.

Turning on her leg where she sat, she faced Shaisha more. Picturing it for herself how Shaisha might look with hair like hers. Reaching up and brushing at about where it would fall.

"I can see it. Wear it like mine as well? Now that might be sending that same message we were trying to avoid earlier."

"The message that we're both gorgeous young women?" she chuckled teasingly.

"Can't fault a girl for wanting to be like her mother, you know. They're some of our biggest heroes."

"Certainly that is not the message to which I refer. AFTER all I am sure we are both quite content with letting that one spread," she says with a confident smirk.

"It took me till recent to realize just how much alike my mother and I are in some ways," she said with a little reminiscing quality to her tone.

"Would you tell me of your mother? Or.. at least what you remember. You've met mine before, only fair," she added with a light tease to it.

"Her name was Sheliyana. I remember her smiling often, and the scent of the perfume she'd prefer to wear... same color of eyes as me, long hair that she'd keep in a braid, though her hair was black," Shaisha smiled fondly as she spoke of her mother.

"She joined the Imperial Guard when I was very young, so she was often away, but she was in touch with me as often as she could; holo almost daily when she wasn't home. But she had her extended family looking after me; uncles, cousins. So I was never lonely, and when she was home, she would personally see to my lessons. The music lessons as well as learning to control my fledgling abilities with the Force."

The smile turned a little somber. "I just wish I could still remember her face."

With herself turned to Shaisha she brought up her hand, pulling up her chin like she had prior. Like her father had always done for her when Kristsl was feeling down about somrthing when she was young. Arden Serasai would always add something reassuring with it, a few strong words.

Kristal didn't follow that completely. Just forcing her to look to the reassuring smile she wore. Kristal's own losses were too recent to have any good advice prepared.

Shaisha's expression changed from her melancholy, to an expectang smile, and then to an amused one.

"... Don't worry, Kris. No need to push yourself," she gave her friend a small hug. "It's easier to deal with the loss after all these years, but it never goes away. I appriciate you being there, though. I think she would've liked you."

Kristal's arm fell to Shaisha's side as she was hugged. Smiling at the words.

"I hope so, or we might have had to rethink this whole friendship of ours," she said with a cold directness to it. Though brushed aside anything odd about that with the light smile that showed it as a tease just after.

She laughed lightly. "That winning Serasai-humor," Shaisha teased in return.

Not that she had high hopes that Kristal's mother would like her much these days if she knew who she was related to.

"Both parents serving the Emperor so directly, though... guess it instilled in me a good sense of patriotism from a young age. Kind of makes you think if that was what brought us so close together, the three of us; all of us having parents of that caliber, it's not surprising we shared a lot of the same ideals."

"Our parents fought to make the Empire the greatest they could. There is no surprise there that we wanted to follow in their footsteps when they proved it was possible."

"Sylvain is the only one different in our group in that respect, I suppose. As his mother never served," she pointed out for no reason in particular.

"Hm, good point, though some would consider being a military-wife a way of serving. Besides, she looked after us three, and if that's not serving, then I don't know..." she grinned as she held back a laugh. The Terrible Trio had earned their nickname, after all.

"So, in the scenario that you didn't have affinity with the Force, would you have followed your mother or your father?"

Where Shaisha grinned, Kristal smiled and nodded. Having to give her that one certainly.

"I don't know," she admitted, "For a long time I don't think I would have had to of chosen. Given either I would have started by simply serving with the Imperial Military for a time. Allowed what aptitude I had make that decision for me. Though I am sure both my Mother and my Father would claim to having the best of themselves in me."

"Or maybe you'd end up marrying some politically important soft-boy, and spend your days as a bored noble lady," Shaisha teased and did a finishing touch on Kristal's hair by ruffling the back slightly to give it some volume.

"You'd run away before the first week was over."

"Certainly chased away all the hard ones by being stronger than they were," she said as she thought back to the notable one of that lot. He was so proud right up until the moment she had placed him on his back in a ring. One of her more favorite methods of testing the potential suitors sent her way. Always worked as a deterrent.

"And no, I'd be gone before the ceremony. Or do you think they would be able to get me in that dress?"

"Aw, but you would look so darling in a big poofy cupcake-dress!" Shaisha wouldn't even want to be caught dead in that kind of outfit herself.

"Especially when you'd tower over the groom... six inch heels would be a killer for whatever pride he'd have left."

Rolling her eyes Kristal at the idea of the dress gave a little, innocent, shove of Shaisha's shoulder. Followed with a Kristal smile.

"They'd also be a killer on my feet. I'd much prefer keeping my emasculation of my suitors to the martial variety. We can get one for you though, you would look so cute," she teased. Cute being a word Kristal rarely used.

"I think the dress would swallow me whole," she shuddered but soon broke into a grin. "People would be like: where's the bride? All I see is a dress!"

She laughed a little. "But I think the funniest part about something like that is seeing the poor sucker try to ask my father for my hand in marriage."

There was a joke Kristal thought to make there, but given how events turned out.. what she'd seen. It didn't really strike her as funny as it might have. So, instead, she just laughed along with Shaisha.

"I wonder, what kind of man would it take to steal away the heart of my dear friend Shaisha."

"Preferably someone tall and handsome," she said with an amused smile. "Not going to say that I haven't met some good candidates the past weeks, but... no, it's way too soon to committ to something like that for me. Our lives are truly starting today, and I don't want to rush into something like that."

"We have far too much to accomplish to be doing anything like that soon," she agreed with an amused smile of her own. "However, that does not leave create the impossibility of having favorites. Or are there none that particularly have taken up your thoughts?"

Kristal could, when she wanted to push with that little insistence in her tone.

"Hmm... it's hard to choose," she admitted. "I've grown fond of Jo'ren, but Zeno is... well, he is becoming a good friend, at least."

"Then don't choose. Give me specifics," she said, as Shaisha had finished Kristal turned more definitively toward her.

"Certainly the great Shaisha has more to say about them than just that."

"Well, Jo'ren is handsome, charming, makes me laugh and he keeps me on my toes as he seems different everytime I meet him. He makes a fine balance in being open but also secretive to draw me in."

She wasn't really used to having this kind of talk with Kristal, or anyone really, but she appriciated the chance to talk.

"Zeno on the other hand is a good friend. I've seen him at his weakest, like he has seen me at my worst... It's created a special kind of friendship, like I've only had with you and Syl."

For Kristal, at least, she'd never thought or cared of the topic before coming here. Though it certainly wasn't the charm of Korriban that had brought it up.

"I have spoken with Zeno before, on a few occasion. There is a quality to that man that I cannot deny is impressive." Kristal brushed over her outfit in a few places, making sure she was ready but also just to do something with her hand. "Last I saw him, he was changed. We were both hurting that day so I never learned why.