MERCY DAY.....Qui-Gon--Obi-Wan

[Ani-Chay Pinn]

MERCY DAY
by Anne Davenport


“We would prefer a transport today.” Qui-Gon Jinn stated, his breath puffing white clouds in the chill air.

“Can’t” The space pilot wiped her hands off on a large greasy rag, black grime still filled in the crevices in her tough, pebbly skin. Qui-Gon sighed. It was the last ship in the space port with anyone around. Everything else was gone or shut down. “Port control’s down for the holiday already. And we’re staying for it anyway.” Qui-Gon looked surprised.

“It isn’t until tomorrow.”

The pilot shrugged her broad shoulders and tossed the rag on a work bench next to the wall of the docking bay. “People like to start early.”

“We have a prisoner.” Now the pilot looked surprised. Her co-pilot, a tall, skinny youth with a more yellowish tinge to his green hide lifted his head from the workbench and looked at them as well, his thin tail switching with curiosity. Beyond Qui-Gon, his young apprentice, Obi-Wan Kenobi, waited, seated on an anti-grav truck. The pilot walked over and looked at the enormous block of ice on the flatbed. Its edges were smooth as if they’d been melted and re-frozen, its interior clouded. Inside was a perfectly preserved humanoid. He was fully clothed in a cold survival suit and superficially male, its tough, leathery skin gone pale gray. Some tubes and cables connected the being to equipment that the pilot didn’t recognize, but a few indicator lights glowed yellow and blue inside the ice. A life sign sensor resting on top of the block displayed affirmative squiggles and lines and text.

“Well, he’s not going anywhere.”

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Obi-Wan followed his master on the narrow path. All the transports had been engaged, so they had to walk to their destination by a path of rough, worn ice roughened with sand for traction, but kept wary of slippery patches. The air was cool and fresh, well below the freezing point of water as it always was on this frozen world, Bovad. The path was cut deep in the ice pack and all he could see ahead was the back of his master’s dark brown hood and robe. Ahead of him were the pilot and co-pilot, Lazmat Urm and her nephew Edi Urm. The colony city, Nebo-Sun, had limited accommodations for stranded travelers and what they had were already engaged. But apparently a tradition of the holiday was that ‘No one goes wanting,’ according to Captain Urm. So, they followed the two spacefarers to the clan compound where they were staying.

It had taken them two hours to first find the local sheriff and then make arrangements for their prisoner, Nule Radeel. He’d used an ingenious way to hide. He’d covered his tracks well, and no lifesign sensor would have picked his frozen body out in the middle of the Bovadi tundra. And after enough time had passed his droid would have revived him from stasis to escape justice. But the Force flowed from all life, and with it, plus a few physical clues, they’d found his hideout. Then the weakness in his scheme had worked for them; once discovered, he was ridiculously easy to capture.

They continued down the deep snow path in silence. They passed a few faint speeder and generator sounds on the way, but were otherwise isolated in a continuous canyon of ice and snow. Obi-Wan might have wondered if the Urms had gotten lost, but there had been no branching paths for a kilometer. Both Jedi kept their robes closed about them, their hoods on against the chill. They wore gloves from the cold weather gear they’d used on the tundra and now stowed in their packs. The Urms were wrapped in insulated, hooded body suits, their tails tucked away into pant legs. The Urms were Zolets, a species very similar to the Zonim colonists on Bovad and apparently they had some distant relations in the clan they were staying with. They shared the same general bipedal type with long bodies and short legs and arms. While their eyes and wide mouths were in approximately the same place as most Humanoids, their small, pointed ears were fairly high, back on their heads and their faces sloped into forward snouts, their nostrils concealed under its bulge. The major differences between the two species seemed to be that Zolets had mostly green skin tones compared to the Zonim’s more blue hues and Zonims had no tails.

One more turn and the path finally opened out into a huge snow field ringed with the short, craggy trees native to Bovad. Crowds of people ran about sliding on hills, throwing snowballs, carving elaborate snow sculptures. Beyond the field lay the cluster of mismatched buildings of the clan compound. Edi perked up immediately, scanning the landscape for familiar faces. With a chuckle his aunt sent him scampering off.

“We just have to find the Tilplens, tell them they’ve got two more,” Lazmat assured them. She led them along the walkway that curved around the edge of the open field. It was cleared of snow and ice and their boots crunched on its loose pebbles, rough but good footing in a world of mostly white, slippery ground. They passed several clumps of people, either watching the games in the field or taking warm food and drink from white servitor droids sheltered under yellow and red tents. Finally, when they’d circled around nearly to the compound itself Lazmat recognized a tall Zonim in long, green robes.

“Papa-High!” Lazmat waved and the other turned his small, blue eyes toward them.

“Hah! Urm, you get that ship of yours locked down finally?” He waved them over. Papa-High Tilplens was of average height for a Zonim, a little shorter than Obi-Wan.

“It’s all tucked in. Hey, I’ve got a couple of stragglers from the spaceport. Thought you could take them in for Gyseer.” Lazmat moved closer and spoke in a low tone that he might have assumed that his two guests couldn’t hear, “We’re taking them to Ildan Colony the day after and they’re willing to pay in full in advance.” Papa-High Tilplens nodded.

“Of course. Everyone’s welcome for Gyseer. You hardly need to ask.” He sized up the two newcomers and rubbed his dark, blue-green chin. “There will be plenty of your type for the Gyseer-Eve feast tonight anyway. And we can work out what to do with the droids for tomorrow. Otherwise you can stay with Lazmat and Edi. There’s plenty of room.” He motioned them toward the compound.

They went together through multiple doors and a wide entryway. Huge plasti-steel columns ringed the cream and gray patterned floor of the entrance hall. Colorful banners hung between the column over tables set with candles and spinning, shiny sculptures and food around which people gathered and chatted.

“Mama-Low!” A very tall, thin older Zonim broke off from her group and came to them. She wore a long, pink dress with yellow underdress and scarf tied about her head, pale blue with age and a few wrinkles. “Lazmat’s brought a couple of his fares for the Gyseer.”

“Oh, you two got stuck at the spaceport, eh?”

Qui-Gon took off the hood of his robe and nodded his head to her. “It would seem so.” He introduced himself and Obi-Wan who slid his hood back of his head as well.

“We’ve got to get some off worlders to staff that spaceport during Gyseer,” she told Papa-High.

“Why are you telling me?” he pressed his hand to his chest in innocence.

“You’re in the Assembly, remember?”

“Mmm. Well I can bring it up.”

Mama-Low waved her hand. “That’s what you always say.” She turned back to her new guests. “Well, in the meantime, I think we can put you up with Lazmat here. You’ve got Edi with you, right?”

“Of course,” the space pilot affirmed. “He’s just gone off with another bunch of kids. Probably won’t find him again til dinner.”

Lazmat and Mama-Low apparently had known Edi since he was “a hatchling” and they reminisced a bit over some of his more naive attempts at portraying himself as a seasoned space traveler. Them Mam-Low sent Lazmat and Papa-High off to find other members of the clan.

She appraised the two Human guests and summoned a droid to take Qui-Gon and Obi-Wans’ packs and they left the entrance hall. They easily kept pace with her quick steps. The older one who was very tall, hardly needed to hurry, with his long legs to carry him. The younger one did hurry; Mama-Low thought that he looked younger than Edi Urm, possibly fifteen or sixteen.

She escorted them through the wide and narrow passages of the compound, past rooms and corridors, white light streaming in through the windows high up on the walls. They passed groups of Zonim who greeted Mama-Low warmly and they paused a few times to exchange information about that night’s dinner and the holiday the next day. They finally ascended some stairs to an upper level.

“Now, this one is a little small.” She took them down a narrow hallway to a single-room lavatory with a standing sink, disposal and raised bathing tub. “But I’m pretty sure it’ll work with your species. You use the same things Twi’leks use, right?” Qui-Gon nodded. “Lazmat and Edi will use the closer one around the corner anyway. Oh...” She paused, her small, round, green eyes resting on the tops of their heads. Zonims and Zolets had no hair. “Oh, I’m sure the droids can take care of it.”

She led them back down the hall to a door at the top of the stairs. The droid, a sturdy gray domestic protocol model, waited for them there with the packs. Mama-Low opened the door and entered.

It was a corner room with large, square windows on the two walls facing out toward the tundra. Flat, bright sunlight shone in a bare room with pale blue walls and a dark gray floor. There was one table by the door and a huge, square sleeping platform piled high with rugs, plush blankets and pillows. There was hardly room for anything else. The droid laid their packs on the table and backed out of the room.

“Ah,” Mama-Low exclaimed, pulling a basket out from under the table. “You should put your clothes here for Zee-Vee-Twelve here to pick up.” The droid silently acknowledged the instruction with a nod of its Zonim-styled head. “She’ll bring it back early so, we can have everything clean for tomorrow. The droid caller is just there by the door when you’re ready.” Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan thanked her for their hospitality and Mama-Low beamed.

“Well, the transports to the city leave in a couple of hours for the big dinner. So, I’ll just leave you two to freshen up. Just call if you need anything.” Mama-Low waved to them as she left, taking the droid with her. Qui-Gon looked mildly after her as she retreated down the stairs. Then he glanced at his Padawan. And then he went down the hall to the lavatory. Obi-Wan waited for his turn.

“This room will be drafty at night,” Qui-Gon observed when they returned to their room. Obi-Wan prodded the pile of pillows, rugs and comforters on the sleeping platform. They knew that Zonim or Zolets commonly slept as many as six to a bed, so they would abide by the local customs. Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan had shared close quarters with far more troublesome companions than the pilot and her nephew, including each other. But the Jedi had traveled together for long enough to be quite aware of each other’s annoying habits and how to ignore them. Obi-Wan lifted a thick, woven rug, dislodging a few pillows, while Qui-Gon gazed out at the bright tundra through the windows. This would simply be a similar challenge.

* * * * * * *

“Ho! Mama-Low!” A short, pale green Zonim with a rounded face called from a room full of others enjoying card game. He rushed after her, matching Mama-Low Tilplens’s longer stride.

“Did you lose our new guests?”

“I showed them their room and told them where to go for dinner. They don’t need me fussing over them.” She waved the matter off.

“Um, you did notice that they were Jedi?” the other noted dramatically.

“Yes, Pimas, I did saw the lightsabers,” she replied firmly. “Even more reason to expect that they can manage on their own.” They entered a kitchen area where she accepted a small data screen from the chief droid before she instructed it to account for two Human guests for the Gyseer feast.

“And you wouldn’t know why are there?” Pimas persisted as they continued through a the huge dining area.

“They’re fares for Lazmat after Gyseer. And I’m sure it isn’t anybody else’s business what they’re up to.”

Pimas accepted her advice as they turned a corner. “I suppose you’re right. But it seems a bit odd to me to just cut them loose.”

“I’m not ‘cutting them loose’, they’re sharing with Lazmat and Edi.”

Pimas’s mouth opened in surprise. “Oh that will be great when Edi cuddles up to them in his sleep,” he exclaimed with a touch of sarcasm. “They’re as hot-blooded as any of the humanoids we’ve got in the city. You can practically see their body glow in daylight.”

“Pimas, they’ve probably been to a hundred times more worlds than you and I combined. I think they can work things out for themselves, including Edi. But since you seem so concerned,” she stopped, raising her hand, “you are free to offer yourself as their host and escort. If you can manage to think of something to say to them.” Mama-Low found Pimas to be a bit of a gossip and busybody, but even with those faults was a good host and an excellent conversationalist.

“I’ll be happy to,” he offered gallantly.

* * * * * * *

Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan made their way across an open field in the midst of the jumble of compound buildings. They still had some time before people began gathering for dinner, so they enjoyed a pleasant stroll on the grounds. Obi-Wan breathed in the cold air. It smelled fresh and....alive. He didn’t quite know what to make of this impression. But it was a living world animals and predators that the Jedi had needed to be wary of when they had gone into the wastelands after their fugitive. Bovad was far from desolate. But it had no seasons, with no axis tilt or off-center orbit to alter its endless winter.

Obi-Wan suddenly stepped aside at the same time Qui-Gon stopped, his master’s hand going up and catching the snowball that would have hit his shoulder. A second snowball flew past, just missing Obi-Wan’s head. They both turned to their left.

Two Zonim children, nearly danced with anticipation, a pile of fat snowballs between them. Obi-Wan looked at his master who dropped the snowball he’d caught and raised both hands to decline the offer. They’d seen the game played as they walked about the field. It was just a variant of many similar such children’s games played on many worlds. Players on either side of a line scored points by either hitting their opponents or forcing them to step out of their lane. This version was played by pairs of players with snowballs in marked out lanes in the snow. The snowballs were thrown first by one team, then the other. But they had to be thrown simultaneously so that the pair dodging the snowballs couldn’t be sure of who they were aimed at.

The Jedi had seen the empty lanes and had been crossing them to get to another walkway. Apparently simply entering the field of play was enough to initiate a challenge. The two children wore snow suits, one brown, the other purple, and they ignored Qui-Gon’s gestures and picked up more snowballs from their pile, inviting the Jedi to take their turn. A large group of children of varying ages watched from behind their lane.

Obi-Wan grinned as he saw his master sigh. They looked down at the large pile of snowballs in their lane and each picked one. The Jedi exchanged a look, turned and threw.

The two children nearly ran into each other trying to duck the snowballs. Each succeeded in dodging the snowball aimed at them, but were caught by the other one.

‘Whoa!” They took their loss with great excitement, sprang up and before the Jedi could politely move on, two more, slightly older children took their place. A line was forming among the crowd.

In every bout the children missed them, but the Jedi would hit both their opponents, except for one young boy who threw himself under Qui-Gon’s snowball and out of his lane, which still counted as a score for the Jedi. Obi-Wan enjoyed the activity and even Qui-Gon looked amused after the first few bouts. The children threw their snowballs and took their hits with equal enthusiasm. No one seemed to be keeping score.

Then two older teenagers, about Obi-Wan’s age, took their turn. They bent over the now much smaller pile of snowballs and threw.

Obi-Wan ducked, his hand shot out and he caught this one. It made a firm smack in his gloved palm. He straightened and looked down at it and then at the one that Qui-Gon had also caught and now held up.

These snowballs had not come from the pile. They were hard and heavy and icy, and from the expression on the other children’s faces as they saw them, clearly against the rules. Qui-Gon cooly looked at the teenagers, who must have been hiding the ice balls in their pockets.

Everyone tensed.

Then Qui-Gon’s expression lightened as he glanced to his left, drawing everyone else’s attention. A small child, no more than two or three years old and well bundled up against the cold, waddled out from the crowd of children and into the field of play. All eyes followed her progress (it was impossible to tell what gender she was, but Qui-Gon sensed that she was female). She carried an enormous, fluffy snowball, half as wide as she was.

Completely ignoring the lanes, she happily made steady progress, crossing through the teenagers’ area and then over to the Jedi. With a wide, open-mouthed grin on her dark, blue-green face, she looked up at Qui-Gon as she approached, having settled on him as her target. Coming right up to him she stopped and plopped her snowball right on the end of his boot. Then she looked up, still grinning, looking for approval.

“Well, I see I am defeated,” Qui-Gon declared mildly. The teenagers had disappeared from the lane. The crowd of children started to disperse.

The toddler squealed with delight and then lifted her arms up in the universally understood pick-me-up gesture of all bipedal two-year olds.

“Ho!” A cheerful man came half running toward them. He wore a long, fuzzy blue coat and matching hat tied closely over his head. Distracted, the child turned and he scooped her up. “You shameless thing.” He tickled her and she squealed with delight and hugged him. The newcomer introduced himself as Pimas, a fourth cousin to the Tilplens. The Jedi bowed in greeting and he offered to show them around. After he found an older sibling to take the child, he led them around the compound.

[Ani-Chay Pinn]

Pimas told them about the colony and the clans as they walked about the grounds. He put a lot of flair into his anecdotes about the family and residents; he prided himself on being able to make any story good. The sun went down and a few small, exterior lights came on. Pimas privately berated himself for not thinking to bring a daylight lantern so he spoke loudly and kept to only wide and unobstructed paths. Humans generally had poor heat-sight, if any, and since the Tilplens Compound had no off-worlder residents, it wasn’t lit for them.

His worst fears were confirmed when the call chime sounded to announce the transport to dinner and the last of the day-glow faded from the sky. Pimas turned to face his guests to show them the quickest way and from their unfocused gazes he could tell that they were nearly blind. They had no heat-sight at all and couldn’t possibly tell which way he was pointing. But their higher body temperatures made their faces shine out like beacons to him.

And yet...Qui-Gon Jinn nodded back to him and he and Obi-Wan Kenobi both proceeded that way. Did Jedi have other ways of seeing? He stayed close, but they never missed a step all the way to the transport platforms.

Obi-Wan looked at the small fleet of closed-cabin hover cars. Their orange and green lights blinked in the gloom and their engines hummed amidst the sounds of voices and people boarding. They got in line with Pimas and soon were seated with more than twenty others. As soon as the cabin was full it left for one of the city centers of Nebo-Sun.

It wasn’t very far to Nebo-Sun, but because every other transport in that part of the city was going the same way there was plenty of time for Pimas to tell them more about the holiday. Bovad’s ‘year’ was a snowy constant, with no yearly seasons, so the holiday, Gyseer, simply came every two-hundred days on the calendar. The essence of it was a day of cleaning out the clan home of old things and of ordering personal lives with a solemn ritual called the Gyseer, which literally meant mercy. Any member of the gathering could go to any other member and confess anything. They may or may not ask for something as well. The person receiving the petition did not need to agree or grant any favors, but they were required to be utterly dispassionate about it and to never, ever hold it against the person who had come to them for Gyseer.

According to Pimas, most of the petitions ran from the trivial confessions of a child for stealing up to admissions of infidelity and requests for divorce. Pimas was telling a few tales about some more amusing requests (there were no rules against gossiping about Gyseer afterwards) when their car arrived and they disembarked.

They went with the crowds into the huge commerce dome of the city. Nebo-Sun had several commerce domes, but this was the one that the Tilplens clan patronized and where the Gyseer-eve feast would be held. Multiple species lived closer to the city, so the area was well lit for all with bright, overhead lanterns. People were gathering towards the area where they would be seated and Pimas guided them to where the Human guests would be. For a large setting it was always easiest to separate the species to prevent someone from getting the wrong (and possibly poisonous) dish.

Pimas hesitated. Should he just leave them? He’d told them that after dinner they were free to enjoy any of the entertainments or take one of the transports back to the compound. They’d been non-committal about either choice. Pimas wanted to enjoy his dinner and have some fun with friends and he didn’t care for the idea of having to go find these two again in the crowd after he ate. Mama-Low had been right; they were pretty independent all by themselves. And the tall one had been responding less and less to any of his stories, giving Pimas the impression that he was losing interest, but was just being polite about it.

Qui-Gon Jinn freed Pimas from the obligation when he told him that they looked forward to seeing him back at the compound. Pimas wished them a good feast and hurried off.

Obi-Wan followed his master into the room of milling people. Most were Humans or similar species with a few Zonim hosts scattered in the crowd. Droids placed settings and appetizers onto the long tables that filled most of the large room. Glittering decorations and streamers hung from the high ceilings above. Servitor droids were already directing people to seats. Obi-Wan ducked behind Qui-Gon as a droid whizzed past with a very large serving tray.

“You don’t need get behind me to find your way this time, Obi-Wan,” his master said while still scanning the activity in the room.

Obi-Wan cringed. Of course, Qui-Gon had noticed. When they’d been walking on the Tilplens’ grounds Obi-Wan had relied on Qui-Gon’s presence to find his way. As night set in Obi-Wan had called on the Force to not trip and stay with Qui-Gon and Pimas. But his own senses, sight and sound, sometimes seemed to contradict what he felt through the Force. All his senses should have been working in concert, but once he got distracted, it was just an opening for doubt and missed step. But he’d been absolutely sure about Qui-Gon, his presence and where he was, so he’d stayed close all the way to the transport.

“I’m sorry, Master,” he apologized. “I should have done better.”

“Yes, you should.” Qui-Gon accepted, looking down at him. There was no lecture in his master’s voice, in fact, he looked amused.

“You will do better later, I think,” Qui-Gon assured him. They got into one of many lines to be seated. A slender, silver droid with a holiday garland around its head seated them in the middle of one long, narrow table, that faced another one row of diners. A gap between the tables allowed the droids to serve from the middle. The woman seated next to him passed Qui-Gon a bowl of nuts. He sampled a few before passing it on to Obi-Wan. They were crunchy and salty but with a flavor undistinguishable from many other nuts in the galaxy. The woman introduced herself as Azlu Bering and her husband, Yude Tal and their son beyond them, Mularin. They owned a shop in the city. On the other side of Obi-Wan was an older man who seemed to only be interested in speaking loudly with the even older man on the other side of him.

A persistent giggling caught Qui-Gon’s attention. He suddenly regretted where they were sitting, but the room was already nearly full and it would be difficult to find two empty places together. Seated at the table across from them was a row young girls, whispering and pointing. And they were looking at Obi-Wan like he was going to be the dessert. His apprentice did his best to not show the tension and discomfort that Qui-Gon sensed in him. Well, Qui-Gon reflected, there were worse hazards for a Jedi.

At one end of the room a large, rotund, blue-haired woman in an enormous floral dress stood on a table and banged two big metal cups together for silence. As co-mayor of Nebo-Sun she wished everyone a Happy Gyseer (the crowd enthusiastically replied). She gave a short and civic minded speech about how everyone would be inspired to volunteer more time to the city’s library and museums after they had unburdened themselves tomorrow. The row of Obi-Wan’s admirers at the table opposite theirs briefly directed some unflattering gestures and whispering toward the co-mayor.

As soon as the woman started to climb down from her impromptu podium the droids began moving up and down the tables with plates of salad and cups of water and drinks.

The food was excellent, savory and well prepared, but the meal progressed through soup and entree more swiftly than Qui-Gon preferred to eat. The droids snatched up any empty dishes or utensils as soon as they were laid down. They seemed to be running on their own tight schedule. Both Jedi kept their sthingys firmly in hand after the salad course was whisked away. If anyone lingered over their meal the droids would begin to hover in that area politely inquiring if diner needed anything. Obi-Wan had no trouble keeping up, especially since the men next to him stubbornly refused to notice any of his attempts at conversation.

Qui-Gon had to agree with Azlu and Yude next to him. The table arrangements were not very good for social occasions. She laughed when Qui-Gon suggested that the droids might designed them since everything was laid out for eating and very little else.

Once the main course was finished people began to get up and leave. Dessert and more refreshments were to be served in the courtyards and indoor garden areas where the evening entertainments would be. The girls across the table seemed to be waiting for them to leave, but they had fleeting patience and went off in a flurry of capes and skirts. The family next to them invited the Jedi come to the holo-entertainment that their son was looking forward to, but Qui-Gon politely declined, saying that they preferred to stroll about after eating. Their son exchanged a few words with Obi-Wan, apparently about the girls across the table from them. He was a plain, square-faced young man with short hair and heavy, dark eyebrows and not much older than Obi-Wan. The girls hadn’t paid him any attention at all, except for a few critical sneers. Whatever he said, Obi-Wan seemed to appreciate it and they waved as they parted.

They entered the public courtyard with the milling crowd. Night showed through the clear panes above the sparkling lights and decorations. There seemed to be no specific theme to the ornaments other than bright, cheerful colors and shapes. After-dinner refreshments had been laid out at a cluster of central tables where people gathered. Most were Zonims from the colony with a few Humans, Zolets and other species mixed in. Qui-Gon took some hot, red tea which the serving droid insisted on garnishing with a glittery slice of fruit and a flower. Obi-Wan took tea as well as some tiny puff pastries. There were no empty tables in the large courtyard and they wandered through the crowd and recognized no one from the Tilplens Compound. Only pedestrian traffic seemed to be allowed in the commerce area of the city with an occasional anti-grav lift cart going by.

Obi-Wan enjoyed looking at the activity, the people, but he wondered why Qui-Gon had stayed. His master was not in the least bit interested in parties. Or desserts; Obi-Wan ate another pastry, enjoying the sweet creamy filling. He knew that Qui-Gon intended for him to “do better” at finding his way. Was this part of that lesson? Obi-Wan had paid very close attention to where they were, where they’d come from, the crowds, the exits. He did not intend to falter again. And even without his earlier shortcoming, he knew that he was expected to be aware of his surroundings anyway.

Noise, snatches of conversation, perky pets, laughter, smells, bright clothes – the Force flowed like a noisy brook through a jovial crowd like this. He sensed the life essence through even the indoor plants and some small, burrowing creatures that probably weren’t supposed to be with them in their pots. A Jedi master like Qui-Gon Jinn knew these things without effort, but Obi-Wan still had to remind himself to open his mind to it.

A Jedi is at all times, a Jedi, he reminded himself. And Padawans learned by doing.

They had drunk half their tea and Obi-Wan had eaten all of his pastries before they found a small, high table in a smaller courtyard. A noisy band played dance music in a darkened club nearby. They put their cups and napkins on the table and Qui-Gon pulled out one of the tall stools to sit down. He sensed tension. He looked at Obi-Wan, and then around them.

“I sense it, too.” He stepped away from the stool. They were being watched.

It wasn’t peril. Not an attack. But some attention focused on them. They stepped away from the table; it was in a line of tables next to a short wall with planted ferns and flowers running along the top. The crowd moved around them, many of them going toward the club and another refreshment tables nearby.

“Aaaaaaeeeeeeeeee!!!”

A mob of girls in capes and colored skirts rushed out from out from around a pillar and cluster of plants. Qui-Gon tensed, but he did not reach for his lightsaber. They streamed around him, Humans and Zonims, squealing and giggling, pinching his robe as they went. But they grabbed Obi-Wan’s robe, dragging him with them, toward the club. Qui-Gon took a step toward them. He recognized one girl from across the table at dinner. She was older, with brassy blond hair and wore a swirling blue dress. And she cast a victorious glance back at the older Jedi, her hands firmly grasping...an empty robe.

She and her friends stopped, stumbling in surprise. Obi-Wan had vanished.

Qui-Gon caught a glimpse of a boot disappearing behind a column in his peripheral vision, but he did not turn his head to betray where his Padawan had gotten to. He folded his arms into the sleeves of his robe and smugly appraised the girls before him. Even he hadn’t realized that Obi-Wan had escaped until he was gone. They were still staring at the empty robe, poking it for signs of life. The brassy blond glared up at him, then jerked the robe away from the others, wadded it up and threw it back at him. Qui-Gon reached out and caught it, though there was no really good way to catch a hurled Jedi robe; most of it flopped in his face and over his shoulder. Some of the girls turned and marched to the club while others suspiciously glanced back at Qui-Gon as they drifted toward the refreshments.

Qui-Gon held the robe out, found the collar and hood and shook it out. He folded it over his arm and put it on the empty stool at his table. Then he took a seat to finish his tea.

Obi-Wan Kenobi sat with his knees folded to his chest between a huge potted tree and a pillar. A couple of older Zonims passed by, glancing at him curiously, but not stopping. Otherwise no one noticed him...except...

A young girl with very short, brown hair, a lot of face make-up and white pants and matching cape with the a pink border pattern silently looked down at him. She was from the group at dinner. But she didn’t say anything or wave to her friends where he was. She must have been hiding with them, but for some reason, didn’t take part in the ambush.

She turned, craning her neck around the column.

“They’re still looking for you,” she reported. “But they’re not coming here,” she quickily added. “You’re father’s just sitting at that table with his drink.”

Obi-Wan refrained from correcting her about his relationship with Qui-Gon. Or saying anything at all. If he simply waited, her friends would lose interest and they could leave. But...

“If we go this way, they won’t see us.” She pointed toward a wide walkway. “There’s another refreshment table over there.” He didn’t see any. He wasn’t hungry. Mularin Bering, the boy whose mother had sat next to Qui-Gon at dinner, had been quite emphatic that the girls across from them were only interested in their own amusement and no one else’s feelings. He hadn’t said anything more specific but his tone told Obi-Wan that he had been poorly used by the group.

But he felt silly.

He could wield his lightsaber to defend his own life, leap to great heights and command the Force (well, most of the time at least). This did not feel like a situation for hiding to him.

The girl smiled when he got up and they kept the plants and pillar between them and her friends as they moved away down the broad concourse. Around a corner there was a refreshment table and the girl helped herself to a glass of juice. Obi-Wan declined her offer.

“I’m Zerma.” She held out her hand. He bowed in reply.

“Obi-Wan.” She withdrew her hand and then apologized for her friends. They were fun, but sometimes they over-did things, but really they were very nice...

Obi-Wan nodded, drawing the Force in him, focusing it on one idea. He raised his hand.

“You’d really rather go back to them now,” he told her.

“But we could go back to them now...” she repeated a little vacantly.

“I’ll be fine here,” he hastily added.

Her smile returned. “You’ll be fine here.” She patted his arm, put her juice down and turned to go.

“There’s Eeli!” she suddenly gasped. Obi-Wan saw a familiar orange and pink cape from the girls at dinner emerging from the crowd and coming in their direction. Zerma whirled, pushing him away from the table.

“This way!” She led him down the corridor, bumping into some annoyed people on the way. They went into a darkened doorway down a hall where she pressed a panel that opened a door to a spiral staircase. They went up several levels and entered a dark room.

The upper walls and ceiling was a clear dome, bright starlight visible through it. Obi-Wan smelled soil and plants, but the only light came from blinking, outside lights, the glow from windows in the buildings below and the white reflections of snow on the roofs.

“They use this room for the roof gardens.” Zerma told him. His eyes adjusting to the gloom, Obi-Wan a closed door with a glowing locking panel next to it. Through the windows he saw larger transparent domes on their roof, dark shapes within protected from the cold outside.

“It’s nice up here,” Zerma said, taking a step toward him in the darkness. Obi-Wan anticipated her before she moved. He whirled away from her grasp. He heard her stumble, hitting the wall, then the outline of her head looked about before she spotted him against the opposite window. He looked to either side. The stair and the door were the same distance away.

“The door’s locked,” she told him, obviously seeing where he was looking. “I have the key.” Obi-Wan stayed silent. He could have just gone down the stairs when she’d stumbled. But he didn’t feel like this was something he should run away from. He didn’t know why.

“You’re pretty fast,” she said, standing, but not moving toward him this time. He still said nothing. Even without the Force, and Mularin Bering’s warning, he could see what her intentions were. But he did have the Force with him and he also had a very clear image of them, too.

What he didn’t know was what he wanted. If he stayed with her now, what would it be like? He certainly knew what it was supposed to be like, but his body felt the intensity of the void between knowledge and experience. Intimacy, or at least, the kind she was thinking about, was not actually forbidden by the Jedi Code. Attachments were. There were obviously no attachments here.

But he also had a very clear image in his mind of her only a few minutes ago, vacuously repeating the words he had told her to say, to get her to go away. That image formed with hers in his mind into something that repelled him.

[Ani-Chay Pinn]

“We could just wait here, I suppose.” She moved to the side as she talked. Not closer to him, not yet. That was when Obi-Wan sensed a presence on the stair. Someone, more than one someone, were very silently coming up.

He looked from the door that she had the key for, to the stair and then back to the door. She saw the motion and misread the meaning.

“I’m not so bad,” she said coyly, from her side of the small room. “I mean, people might talk, but that’s just cause they’re jealous.” She moved her body so her cape swished against the wall. He sensed the others at the top of the stair, listening in the dark. The situation had drastically changed and Obi-Wan wondered if it would be overkill for him to cut through the door with his lightsaber.

“And I saw you kept looking at me at dinner.” Obi-Wan was quite certain that he hadn’t. She unfastened her cape and took it off, the fabric rustling loudly in the silence.

A bright light flashed on. Three girls, two Human and a Zonim, and a Human boy rushed up into the room.

“You–” The girl holding the lantern up stopped short in mid-accusation. Zerma had not only taken her cape off, she’d loosened the shirt under it, showing a lot of bare shoulder. Obi-Wan was fully clothed and on the opposite end of the room. The boy started to laugh.

“Guess you didn’t get this one, Zerma! Not so good after all!” The others joined in. Zerma’s expression changed from surprise to stricken horror, which only encouraged them. Offended by the open cruelty, Obi-Wan stepped forward. But the others were already descending the stairs, the light going down with them. He heard a sob from Zerma. She went to the stair but he blocked her way.

“Don’t let them laugh at you. That’s how they hurt people,” he told her. He couldn’t see her expression in the darkness, but his arms came up automatically to block the blows she aimed at his head. But he did let her push him aside.

“You stupid, little, Jedi gois-maggot!!” she shrieked as she followed the others downward. He heard more sobs, stumbling and banging on the stairs, another screamed curse, then footsteps running away. Obi-Wan stared down at the dim light at the bottom of the stair. Then he went down himself. So, she’d noticed the lightsaber after all, he reflected. She hadn’t said anything or even glanced at it; he wasn’t even sure that she knew what a Jedi was. But she obviously did. And it was common knowledge that Jedi did not pursue personal relationships. He felt like he’d been in a fight that he should have avoided. He couldn’t think of anything that he’d actually done that was wrong, but it was still all wrong.

At the doorway to the brightly lit concourse, people walked by laughing, smiling. There was no sign of Zerma and her ‘friends’. The turmoil inside him washed out his earlier sense of the place and he closed his eyes a moment. Then he went back to the courtyard. Qui-Gon was still at the table. He heard peels of female laughter from the direction of the dance club as he approached. He didn’t turn his head to look, but Qui-Gon did and that was even worse than if he’d looked himself. There were some fairly specific taunts about “Jedi kid” and “stud”, but he didn’t acknowledge it. He really didn’t care what any of those people said or did, but the public display was beyond embarrassing.

His master turned away from them, silently got up and handed him his robe. Obi-Wan took it, found the sleeves in the folds of fabric and put it on, lifting the hood up over his head. Qui-Gon’s face was expressionless and Obi-Wan couldn’t possibly fathom what he was thinking and thankfully he couldn’t really find the energy in himself to wonder about it. Qui-Gon put the hood of his robe on as well and they left together.

Qui-Gon said nothing as they made their way back to the transport area. His Padawan was quite thoroughly miserable. He’d witnessed some of it, but he refused to speculate about the rest; he would not add his own prejudices to Obi-Wan’s obvious pain. Obi-Wan would have to find his own words to tell him and a crowded promenade was not a good place for such a conversation.

knots of people, many of them with small children, gathered around the platform, waiting for the next transport. Soon one arrived and they got on. Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan sat by themselves. No one seemed to want to sit near the two robed and hooded passengers. One little girl repeatedly asked her father in a high pitched voice why they couldn’t stay while a mother tried to shush a squalling infant.

“Qui-Gon,” Obi-Wan said very quietly. Qui-Gon turned to head, but Obi-Wan continued to stare straight ahead, his face hidden. There was a long pause. The baby wailing got louder in the car.

“I think I am in need of your guidance, Master,” he finally finished.

“Ah.” Qui-Gon settled back in his seat. Now it was his turn to search for the right words. “I can only offer what I know and what I have done.” Unfortunately, Qui-Gon regretted that he had more to say about what NOT to do than any real wisdom. But Obi-Wan seemed reassured by this.

Their transport slowed and then stopped at the compound platform. They waited for all the other passengers to leave first before climbing out. But instead of going into the warm entry building, they strolled out onto a darkened path amidst the snow and squat dark shapes of trees and shrubs.

Obi-Wan told him what happened. Or rather, what DIDN’T happen. Qui-Gon marveled that Obi-Wan had managed to fall into all the embarrassment and awkwardness of a youthful encounter without actually having done anything. But his story gave him only facts; it lacked substance.

“You haven’t told me how you feel, Obi-Wan.” There was a long pause in the darkness.

“I don’t what I feel, Master.”

“Do you regret what happened?”

“I...I think I should have done better.”

But ‘better’ was a relative term and Qui-Gon questioned him about it as their footsteps crunched on the frozen path. Obi-Wan took some time to circle around the shame and deception, but Qui-Gon was very proud to sense no anger or bitterness. But there was a lot of self-doubt and worry.

“You think that you were wrong to respond to the girl yourself?”

There was a long pause. “I think it would have been wrong for me to use her.” He hadn’t answered the question and Qui-Gon pressed him on it.

“I...I do wonder, Master. I know things but...I don’t think it’s enough,” he admitted. But Obi-Wan then asked the question that Qui-Gon knew was inevitable. “Have you ever had physical relations with another person, Master?” Qui-Gon sighed and glanced up at the starry sky above the edge of his hood.

“Yes.” He sensed only mild surprise from Obi-Wan, but his Padawan stopped walking when he continued. “Several times.” The first time, he’d been much older than Obi-Wan was now, a Jedi Knight, not just a Padawan. And he’d caused much more damage among many more people. He certainly hoped that the telling of this story for Obi-Wan was worth the pain of his having gone through it. He kept walking as he began and Obi-Wan hastened to catch up.

He tried to keep it short, but there were many complications. Obi-Wan had questions. He answered them. And he had more than one story to tell. They were NOT all bad. He emphasized this point and Obi-Wan solemnly absorbed it, but Qui-Gon knew it was just an academic point for him now. He’d barely internalized that evening’s debacle.

And it greatly pleased Qui-Gon that his Padawan could contemplate his experience in private. His own first crisis had involved the mission he was on; nobody was put at risk and it was deemed that he was not the only person at fault, but the cascade of advice and warnings that had fallen on him afterward had ranged from sage to impractical to completely ridiculous.

Qui-Gon’s boot slid out from under him on a suddenly slick, icy patch. Instantly he knew that he could not regain his footing and could only fall as well as possible. The bank by the path was somewhere between fluffy snow and hardened ice pack and his body made a huge, deep indentation in it.

Qui-Gon looked up. It was really a very beautiful, cloudless starry night. Bits of ice and snow trickled down on his face, into his beard, cold dribbling on his neck and into his collar. Obi-Wan’s dark shape leaned over him to help him up. Perhaps, Qui-Gon hoped as he took Obi-Wan’s hand, they had done enough personal introspection for now, and they could go back to the lesson about awareness of surroundings that he’d thought he would be teaching.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Qui-Gon woke to a soft whirring sound barely audible under the loud snoring. Something was different.

The room was dark with only starlight coming through the windows. Qui-Gon lifted his head and turned. The droid, its eye sockets glowing gold, was returning their clothes. It laid the folded laundry on the table and left. Lazmat’s snoring and Edi’s heavy breathing continued undisturbed. He didn’t know how long he’d been asleep but he felt rested. Day would not come for many hours yet.

The Bovadi day-night cycle was as long as two days on many other worlds, which was why he hadn’t expected to get stranded by the holiday. It was already so long he hadn’t thought that it would be extended. He sighed. He’d underestimated the colonists’ interest in celebrating.

He reached up and turned the lantern on to half power. The droid have given them lanterns when they’d returned to the compound and he’d put his in the corner of the sleeping platform with his and Obi-Wans’ lightsabers when they’d retired. The room was just as chilly as he’d predicted though he didn’t see any ice on the inside of the window. He pushed the blankets back. None of the padded body pockets they’d found in the jumble on the sleeping platform were long enough for him so he’d supplemented it with rugs and blankets on top. Obi-Wan stirred next to him, but the Urms slept on. Since Zolets and Zonims saw in the infrared light range it was never truly dark for them anyway. And the Urms had been somewhat inebriated when they’d returned, waking both of them. The Jedi had feinted sleep while Edi and his aunt stumbled about and shushed each other to be quiet, then fallen into bed fully clothed. There was really no reason to deal with drunk people if one didn’t have to.

Obi-Wan stared down at a lump lying across his stomach; the end of Edi’s snout poked out from under a blanket. Qui-Gon smiled. When thrown together, the species with the higher body temperatures tended to get more company. Which was why he’d chosen a spot next to wall and let his Padawan deal with the hazards of the middle.

Qui-Gon slipped out of the sleeping pocket and accepted the cold for what it was. He could just see the puff of his own breath in the air. He picked up the lantern and got up. He extended his hand and his lightsaber flew to his palm. Obi-Wan did the same. And after carefully sliding out from under Edi, Obi-Wan followed him to the table. They both wore only long nightshirts from their travel packs, warm enough the night, but the floor was cold on their feet, even through their socks. Their clothes sat neatly folded, next to their boots and belts, Obi-Wan’s lantern and their survival packs, but they were mixed together so they had to sort it before going on to the lavatory at the end of the hall. Even though Mama-Low had claimed it was small, there was enough space for them to use the room together, taking turns with the facilities and the bath. Once dressed, they took their lanterns and went downstairs to the morning dining hall.

It wasn’t too early and they saw several others eating as well. Some younger children openly stared at them. Qui-Gon had thought about not bringing the lanterns as a test for Obi-Wan, but the Force was good for avoiding obstacles, but not for reading expressions on people’s faces. And they were guests and would be expected to have them. And Qui-Gon had another exercise in mind anyway.

A servitor droid brought them bowls of porridge and water. They would only have porridge and soft foods for the rest of the day. While Zonims and Zolets had pallets hard enough for articulate speech, they had no teeth. The porridge was mildly sweet with small, soft blobs of unidentifiable fruit in it.

They ate in companionable silence and occasionally answered a ‘Happy Gyseer’ greeting from some passing clan members.

“I think some meditation and exercise would do for now,” Qui-Gon stated as they stood and the silvery, long-armed servitor droid slid their used dishes onto its tray. Obi-Wan nodded. The world had suddenly turned normal after last night’s disaster and that would be his contemplation. They took their lanterns and found an unused room with a padded bench facing out into a empty field and the tundra beyond that, barely visible in the starlight. They turned the lanterns off and settled cross-legged on the bench.

Qui-Gon’s thoughts stilled. He felt the Force around him, through him, through Obi-Wan next to him and beyond. The lantern on the bench next to him silently rose in the air. People stirred in the building above and below. Tiny creatures scurried under the snow outside. He let his senses lay stretched out around him in the Force for some time, noting only the moment without time or place. Eventually he opened his eyes. He felt the living things far out around him, much further than he normally might have for a simple, morning meditation. He glanced to his right.

Obi-Wan faced him, studying what he did with the Force. Had his Padawan noticed? This place was strong with the light side of the Force. The Force existed throughout the galaxy, waxing and waning in various places and times, but always there. But this colony was exceptional. The Force was strong in the city, but it was especially so at the compound.

It was so easy to note only the presence of danger and darkness and take life and the light for granted. Qui-Gon wanted Obi-Wan to see it on his own; it would mean much more as a discovery than if he just told him. But the previous night’s anguish was still too much of a distraction for him to see the larger perspective. Qui-Gon exhaled. The lantern settle back down on the bench and he unfolded his legs. It could not be avoided for now, but he would guide his Padawan toward it as well as he could.

Obi-Wan got up with his master, who picked up his lantern, but did not turn it on. Obi-Wan noticed and did the same. He followed Qui-Gon outside.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Pimas readjusted the blanket around his shoulders and looked down at the spectacle in the field at the back of the service wing. Mama-Low had told everyone that he was in charge of the guests and now it seemed he was. His bond-sister had gotten him up to tell him that the Jedi were fighting. Blue and green lightsabers clashed and circled each other. Their heavy robes concealed most of their body glow, but he saw glimpses of their hands and faces as they dove and lunged.

They were obviously just practicing. At one point they stopped, the older one jumped high, flipping over in the air and landing neatly on his feet. Then he pointed and the young one to did it a few times while he watched. Then they went back to fighting with the lightsabers again. Pimas could see why only Jedi used them. Surely Jedi had to have some kind of special powers just to not accidently take their own fingers off with weapons like that. Or perhaps they had some kind of safety device on them for practice to prevent accidents? He didn’t know. Or really care.

It was fascinating to watch. Which was the problem. They’d been at it for awhile and they were starting to attract a crowd inside as more people got up. But to Pimas’s great relief the lightsabers went out and they walked off, saving him from having to get dressed. He watched them walk off, just to make sure they were done fighting. It looked like they were heading out of the compound. He yawned and turned to go back to a bed. He knew that they were competent in the cold weather. He’d find them later and prevail on them to be less conspicuous.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Obi-Wan walked down the narrow ice path. Qui-Gon followed. They were going to the Nebo-Sun constabulary to check on their prisoner; the sherif had scanned them, given them passkey cards and introduced them to the guard droids and her deputies. They were at liberty to come and go, so long as they minded the droids and her staff.

They’d taken their gloves from their belt pouches and put them on against the cold and pulled their hoods up over their faces. The path was unlit and with only starlight above, almost completely black in shadow. They still carried the lanterns, unlit.

Qui-Gon hadn’t asked Obi-Wan if he remembered the way back to the constabulary tower. He’d simply invited him to lead. Obi-Wan had prepared for something like this, laying aside his dwellings on the previous night; he knew he would do more of that later. But now he would focus on his task as he led the way. After some time, he saw a patch of faint gray light on the ground and he lifted the hood of his robe. They were close. The constabulary was in the city which was lit for multiple species. Obi-Wan expected no praise for his success, but he sensed his master’s satisfaction as they walked up to the ground level, crossed the street, nearly devoid of traffic, and presented their cards to the sentry droid at the gate. They took off their hoods so they could be scanned and then followed a guard droid inside. The prison was on the upper levels of the building.

They exited an elevator into a gleaming silver hallway and their escort handed them off to a weary looking deputy in a wrinkled black and purple uniform behind a high, encircling desk. There was a lot more noise and activity than they expected, especially with the city so quiet outside. The deputy explained that they had quite a few Gyseer-eve party-goers who had made an extra effort to make sure that they would have something to confess to. It was a regular side-effect of the holiday. Most of them would be let go to their families. Members of the clans of the more serious offenders would be brought in for their atonement, if they asked for it. A security droid checked them in and put their lanterns behind the desk. It didn’t ask for their lightsabers, but instead asked them to confirm verbally that they had them.

“I wish we had more prisoners like yours,” the deputy told them as they passed another deputy leading an angry-looking Zonim in binders. They passed many windows into cells and quite a number of them were occupied with one of more prisoners. They stopped at a wide window into a large silver-metal cell. The ice block containing Nule Radeel rested on a deactivated anti-grav on the floor. Qui-Gon asked to be let inside. She shrugged, but passed her keycard through the lock. They entered.

“There he is. Hasn’t gone anywhere,” the deputy announced.

“Thank you,” Qui-Gon replied. “We would like to stay for a bit.”

The deputy looked confused, scratching her hairless blue head. “Uh, I suppose. If you want. Do you want a terminal, a recorder, something to write on?” she asked, trying to make sense of the odd request.

“No, thank-you. We will be fine,” Qui-Gon assured her.

“Um, I have to lock the door,” she continued.

Qui-Gon nodded. “That will be fine.” She hastily used her keycard to activate the comlink by the door. “Just call when you need to be let out.” The door locked firmly behind her.

There was no furniture in the cell, just hygiene facilities inset in the wall and some rolled up sleeping mats in a corner. Obi-Wan looked at his master curiously as he took one mat from the corner and unrolled it on the metal floor. He had no idea what they could gain from their frozen prisoner, but he sat down on the mat next to Qui-Gon. Outside, more deputies and others soundlessly passed by; the room was completely isolated from the noise outside.

“Do you sense anything from him, my Padawan?”

Obi-Wan looked carefully at the body in the ice, hardly recognizable as the angry man they’d last seen ordering battle droids to attack while he retreated. He closed his eyes, reaching out with the Force. “No, Master,” he finally answered.

“No even that he’s alive?” Qui-Gon prodded.

Obi-Wan grimaced, knowing that he’d jumped to the conclusion that Qui-Gon has sensed something unusual. Qui-Gon had simply meant literally anything. He closed his eyes and tried again. The Force flowed from all life; it bound all things, living and non-living together. A Jedi used it to draw strength from and sense the life around them. Obi-Wan felt it flow strongly through him, in the room around him, very strongly through Qui-Gon next to him, and through the block of ice before him. He opened his eyes. He felt the connection between himself and the ice and the being in it. Nule Radeel hovered in a weird non-death, but still alive. It wasn’t living in any way that Obi-Wan had ever sensed before; less than sleep, less than near-death, less than the tiny creatures of the microscopic world. He sat for a long time; Nule Radeel felt more like an expectation of life, than life itself, not waiting to be born, but to simply exist. He finally lowered his gaze and told his master what he’d sensed.

But the look of expectation vanished from Qui-Gon’s expression and he sighed. That confused him; he’d felt the Force so strongly, with less effort than he usually needed, that he was sure he couldn’t have missed anything. He turned back to the ice to try again. But Qui-Gon laid a gentle hand on his shoulder.

“No, Obi-Wan. You have seen something that you have not seen before and you have done well.” But Obi-Wan knew from his tone that he had not seen everything he could have. He stopped himself from asking. Qui-Gon could simply tell him what it was, but he knew his master wanted him to find it. But what–?

Obi-Wan jerked his head around to the window. Qui-Gon leapt to his feet. They were being watched. Qui-Gon went to the com to call the guard while Obi-Wan jumped to the window. He saw nothing that hadn’t been there before, the corridor, other cells with languishing prisoners. No one paid them any attention. The sense of being watched was gone. Whoever it was had retreated. Qui-Gon looked up at the security cameras. It could have been someone at the monitor.

“Was anyone else here just now?” Qui-Gon demanded as soon as the deputy let them out.

“Yeah, half the city is starting to show up,” she grumbled sarcastically. There were more people around, more voices, some yelling down the hall. Qui-Gon impatiently brushed past her down the hall to the desk. People clustered about, reading data screens, complaining to the droids and the deputies, or just sitting about waiting. Nobody reacted to Qui-Gon. He looked at the rows of monitors behind the desk.

“Are there other monitors into these cells?”

“Yes,” the deputy answered slowly. “There are monitors on each floor. They can tap into all the cells.” She wasn’t any more specific than that. She narrowed her small green eyes at him, a little annoyed by the sudden interrogation. Qui-Gon sighed. The moment was gone.

[Ani-Chay Pinn]

“I’m sorry,” he apologized. “My apprentice and I thought we saw something, but we must have been mistaken.” The deputy accepted Qui-Gon’s explanation and grimaced at the hubbub around them.

“There’s plenty of something around here to see.” The deputy reached down behind the top of her desk to retrieve their lanterns, but the light through the windows told them that they wouldn’t need them for now. The sun had come up. She pressed some buttons at her screen and turned it toward them.

“Sheriff Alhens has already contacted the Malipids Clan and they’ve already filed the declaration to disown this guy,” she explained. Radeel had grown up on Bovad, but had left many years ago. His clan’s rejection dissolved any legal protection he might have had on Bovad.

She also handed Qui-Gon a large data screen with printed script glowing on it, the report that they’d recorded with the sheriff for Nule Radeel. The charges were highlighted in orange:

* Attempted coup of the lawful government of Ildan Colony
* Misuse and theft of the Ildan Colony assets
* Escape from lawful authorities of Ildan Colony and the Republic

Qui-Gon knew that the Republic Judiciary would have a much longer list of crimes to prosecute Radeel on, but he’d only given them the more important ones.

“She just wanted you to confirm that you were witnesses to the crimes,” the deputy explained. Qui-Gon took the indicator stick and checked the affirmative on the report, wrote his name and authority as a Jedi.

“Yes,” he confirmed. “We were.”

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Qui-Gon had signaled for him not to speak, so Obi-Wan waited until they were outside, well on the path back to the Tilplens Compound.

“It was just like last night.”

Qui-Gon nodded. The paths by the city were wider and they could walk together. They’d both just assumed that it was only the girls from dinner who were watching them. But now it seemed to be connected their mission.

“Radeel has no known accomplices on Bovad. They were all captured on Ildan.”

“He does have family here,” Obi-Wan pointed out.

“Even if his clan has rejected him, it is quite possible that there are members still loyal to him.” Qui-Gon thought about this. “But it would be unlikely that they would be equipped to break him out of jail.” The deputies had agreed to contact them if anything even remotely amiss occurred near their prisoner. Radeel’s arrangements had allowed for either another person to thaw him from the ice or an attendant medical droid in the cave to activate automatically and free him. He’d clearly planned for his escape to be unassisted if necessary. If there were any accomplices, Radeel hadn’t expected them to be reliable.

They’d destroyed the droid and revival equipment when they’d taken Radeel from the cave and told the sheriff where the hideout was. But Alhens hadn’t sent out anyone to look at the site yet. Not even a sentry droid. So, anyone could have been there.

They made their way back to the narrow path that led back to the Tilplens Compound. When they arrived they found everyone busy cleaning and sorting things and it was well past the second meal of the day. But the kitchen droids gave them water and plates of mushy vegetables and spicy fungus. They ate at a small corner table while clan members debated what needed to be thrown out in the kitchen. Mama-Low went by but stopped long enough to introduce them to Mama-High and Papa-Low who were with her. They’d barely said hello when something large and heavy tipped over in the next room and the three rushed out to see what it was. Gyseer was not just a time to unburden one’s conscience, it was also a time to discard things that were no longer needed and to catch up on all those promised tasks that had been left undone.

As they finished their meal Pimas came by to wish them a happy Gyseer and to ask them to refrain from more lightsaber practice. Some people had complained about the violence. Qui-Gon agreed and offered to help, but Pimas declined. Guests were always welcome, but it was bad luck for them to participate in the preparations because they would invariably throw something out that shouldn’t have been. Then Pimas paused, looking at Qui-Gon carefully.

“There is one thing...” he began speculatively.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Qui-Gon held up one authoritative finger. Nearly a dozen pairs of small eyes followed his gesture rapturously. Then he pointed to an enormous, squashy blue ball to his left. They all looked at it together and then back at Qui-Gon when he lifted his finger again. They eagerly waited for his signal. Qui-Gon raised his eyebrows.

With a mass cry of glee the mob of children attacked the ball, climbing over each other to get to the top. It was pure chaos. They all wore brightly colored, padded body suits and matching caps, and they moved as if their limbs were as flexible as elastic. This sport would keep them busy for maybe twenty minutes before he needed to find them a new target. He had his eye on a big, green mat in the corner. They had actually already attacked that, but ‘new’ to this group was just something that they hadn’t been playing on in the last half hour.

This was the one task that the Jedi could volunteer for without bringing bad luck to the Gyseer preparations. They weren’t actually supposed to care for the children, just keep them out of trouble while their care-givers tended to their own affairs. These children were too young to help with the holiday but too mobile for their parents to keep them with them and still get anything done.

Qui-Gon Jinn had to admit that not even the Force could make a group of children like this behave all at once, but he could at least temporarily re-direct their energy. And this game was a great improvement over what it had started out as, which had been effectively ‘Jump of the Jedi’. All Zonim children were trained even before they were old enough to understand speech to always stay together and to always stay with adults. This was for practical safety so that they wouldn’t go off alone in the cold outside. But the result was that they tended to swarm.

When Pimas had introduced them to the chief care-giver, a stern woman with aqua skin tones and a long face named Vordlen. She’d declared them fit by announcing, “Well, if you can’t trust Jedi to watch children then the galaxy’s ready to implode anyway. But those robes have got to go.”

So, their robes and lightsabers were tucked away on a high shelf and Vordlen had given them plastic ponchos to put on over their clothes. When she decreed that Qui-Gon’s was too short (actually, she’d declared Qui-Gon to be too tall), she’d taken an enormous piece of plain sheeting, cut a hole in the middle and had Qui-Gon bend over so she could pull it on him herself. When he started to pull his long, brown hair out of the collar, she slapped his hand back telling him to keep it there because the children were just going to pull on it. He found out immediately that he had to hold them away from his face to keep them from pulling on his beard, though they were fascinated by any expressions he made with his eyebrows even if they weren’t allowed to tug on them. Obi-Wan got a purple cap to keep them from pulling on his Padawan’s braid. They pulled on the cap instead, but at least that didn’t hurt. The need for the ponchos had become clear at dinner time. None of the children needed to be fed, but food was just as much a toy as it was sustenance for them. And now Qui-Gon would need to wash his hair later.

This was the last batch that needed to be taken to bed and the last care-giver was late returning with their relations so Vordlen had gone to get them. Al of the care-givers had taken longer for their breaks than they were supposed to.

The climbing and squealing on the blue ball continued and Qui-Gon glanced over at a large, soft blue floor chair where Obi-Wan was literally covered with children. When they got tired these children would not lay down to rest; they would angrily cry in place. Fortunately, a nice, warm Human body to cuddle up to would calm them down right away. But now Obi-Wan was pinned down by seven of them, including the little girl who’d attacked Qui-Gon’s boot with a snowball the day before. Putting any of them aside now risked waking them and it seemed safer to wait until the adults came to take them away.

And they did arrive before the blue ball lost its appeal. The active ones bounded to the arms of parents or older siblings or other family members. And the newcomers plucked the sleeping ones off of Obi-Wan and carried them away leaving the large room of low, soft furniture and very high shelves empty. The Jedi took off the stained and rumpled ponchos and retrieved their robes and lightsabers. They were not needed after the midday sleep cycle. Most of the large preparations were done and the children would all stay with their families for Gyseer.

Vordlen did thank them for their help, in her own way. None of the family members and only a few of the other care-givers had. She stood before them, hands on her narrow hips, the aqua skin around her mouth crinkling with her appraisal.

“Well, you can do better for yourselves than just waste time with those laser swords of yours. And you,” she pointed at Obi-Wan. “Take off that cap.”

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Qui-Gon woke to a the sound of a door opening and footsteps in the room. The Urms had finally come to retire. Next to him, he sensed Obi-Wan waken, but neither one of them moved.

“Those Jedi turn in early,” Edi whispered.

“We should start doing more of that.” Lazmat grumbled.

At least they weren’t drunk this time.

The room was bathed in bright sunlight. Bovad’s star still climbed to its zenith in the sky. The Jedi were nearly concealed under blankets and rugs. Earlier, Pimas had declared that “We don’t need to hibernate.” And them he had belatedly offered to look for a darker, interior room for them for the day sleep cycle. But Qui-Gon declined. He and Obi-Wan had slept in far worse places than a safe, sunny room with snoring roommates.

The Urms were whispering about the fresh changes of clothes that Edi had put with their other things in their lavatory. All the droids would be shut down for the holiday and everything needed to be prepared ahead of time. This had alarmed Qui-Gon when he’d heard about it earlier in the day until he’d contacted the constabulary. Security droids and other essential city services were exempt from this tradition.

First one boot hit the floor, then another, followed by loud shushing. The door slid open; footsteps padded out and then returned followed by Lazmat’s admonishment to Edi to hurry. The two Zolets climbed under the coverings on their side of the sleeping platform with some complaining about feet and tails.

Then everything was quiet again.

Obi-Wan listened to the little sounds under the silence. Qui-Gon was already asleep again. Soon, Lazmat’s breathing turned to rumbling snores and Edi turned over, away from his aunt and lay still.

Obi-Wan could feel the life all around him. The Living Force flowed through him and he wondered if he was really advancing toward the skills of a Jedi Knight.

But that wasn’t supposed to keep him awake.

Was he still bothered about the night before? Well, yes, he admitted to himself. But he thought that he had really moved beyond the worst of it. But perhaps not.

He slipped out of the sleeping pocket and then crawled to the edge of the platform, mindful of Edi’s tail, which had slithered under his blankets. The cold prickled the skin on his limbs under his nightshirt as he crossed his legs, straightened and cleared his mind. His body immediately warmed from the energy flowing through it. He’d thought about retrieving his lightsaber and levitating it as a focus for his meditation, he couldn’t possibly do that without waking Qui-Gon. As grateful as he was for his master’s guidance (and sharing his own far more troublesome experiences) Obi-Wan knew that he was the only one who could settle the disturbances in his own mind. He just needed to discover what they were.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Qui-Gon sat back from the rows of shifting images on the monitors.

“No. Nothing.”

Obi-Wan looked disappointed, but not surprised. It had only been a faint hope. Qui-Gon keyed off the security tapes from earlier in the day, when they’d sensed the presence of an observer.

After their rest and a very basic meal, they had returned to the constabulary to pursue a hunch. The city prison was quiet now; all the minor troublemakers had been moved out. The deputy didn’t mind letting Qui-Gon look through the tapes when there weren’t three people at her desk demanding things. He’d queued the tapes, cleared his mind and watched the images cycle through all the cameras in the building. Sometimes a current in the Force would give a Jedi direction when nothing else was available. But Qui-Gon sensed absolutely nothing. This was not where they should be looking.

“Do you think that the person watching us is not on the tapes?” Obi-Wan asked.

Qui-Gon shook his head. “I don’t know.”

Obi-Wan looked at the monitors, then back at Qui-Gon. “Perhaps I could try?” he suggested.

Qui-Gon smiled. “No,” he replied emphatically. “You are strong with the Force, my young Padawan, but this is a task of subtlety and experience that you do not have.” Qui-Gon spoke kindly, but he inwardly shuddered to think of what kind of false trails and mistakes the boy could take them to if he tried it. And Obi-Wan had yet to accomplish that one lesson in subtlety that he was hoping he would.

They’d sat before Nule Radeel’s block of ice again, but this time Qui-Gon had Obi-Wan use Radeel as his mediation focus and not just use the Force to sense him. Obi-Wan had paled at the suggestion that he lift something so large but Qui-Gon had been firm about it. He had the ability, but all Jedi Padawans seemed to make the same mistake. The size of an object didn’t matter with the Force. Unfortunately, the size of their worry, about what would happen if they lost their concentration and dropped it, did.

Obi-Wan’s concentration had been steady and strong. But he had again failed to recognize the underlying point about the Force itself. And Obi-Wan knew that something else was expected from him. The problem was that he couldn’t see it because it was all around him.

The deputy returned from the lavatory and noticed the darkened screens.

“No go?” she asked.

“No.”

Qui-Gon got up from his chair and confirming that they would be taking Radeel away on Lazmat Urm’s ship in the morning, they left.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

“You were a student of Yall Nant’s?” Pimas asked the newcomer. She was very well dressed in purple and yellow, about his own height with smooth blue skin with a just a hint of green about the eyes and mouth and a very shapely head.

“Oh yes, I think maybe a class a few years before yours.” She smiled at him.

“I was in his class the first year he taught.”

“I meant after,” she amended without expression.

“Yes, well.” She’d arrived that afternoon, on a heavy speeder bike, the kind that hikers and campers liked to use for going out into the wilderness on. She certainly looked fit. But Pimas didn’t know her, and he didn’t know anyone who knew here. And it was odd, almost rude of her not to arrive earlier to help with the cleaning. And that could mean only one thing...

“You’ve got a Gys to beg, haven’t you?”

“Sort of obvious, isn’t it?” she asked, dropping all pretense of friendliness. They stood out by the hangar, near her speeder. She’d told Mama-Low that she was looking for fellow classmates and asked if she could stay for the holiday with any of their guests. Mama-Low had called Pimas, apparently deciding that he would be guest-control for this season.

“It’s someone here?”

She just looked at him. Now he was verging on rude. It was always bad luck to talk about a Gys before doing it, just in case the person backed out.

“Well, our home is yours for the night.” Pimas waved his arm toward the entrance and she gratefully accepted. Pimas grinned with anticipation as he walked behind her. Whatever she had, if she did it, it was going to be one to talk about.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

[Ani-Chay Pinn]

Qui-Gon piloted the borrowed speeder back to the Tilplens Compound hangar. It was one of the few that had been in good order and so wasn’t being taken apart and cleaned for the holiday. He parked it in its original spot near the hangar door and they got out. It was near sundown and they would be just in time for the Gyseer. As guests, it wasn’t necessary for them to attend, but it was polite and they were both was curious.

They passed by huge bins of rubbish, ready to be taken away the next day. Qui-Gon wondered that if they did this every 200 days, how they ever managed to accumulate so much junk. They entered through a door and passed through the connected buildings of the compound. There was no one else around. The holiday decorations were still up, but they didn’t make the place feel any less deserted.

They heard the crowd as they approached the compound’s auditorium. It was a huge, sub-level bowl, carved into the rock under the compound and everyone was gathered there. But the Gyseer would not be held there. They would never be done with it if potentially thousands of people took turns giving confessions. But the auditorium was a large enough place for everyone to gather and sort themselves out into smaller groups. It also allowed last minute participants to see if their targets would be attending and which group to go to. Each person was allowed only one Gys.

Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan already knew that they would be in Pimas’s group. Many were already gathered in large crowds under their chosen signs. The Jedi looked about for the sign that Pimas had told them to look for and Obi-Wan spotted it and Pimas by an exit door. It was a group of maybe two hundred people. There was a table of only the most minimal refreshments and water. Most people were not very hungry before a Gyseer. They took some water, but none of the snacks looked appetizing and none of them had any scent at all. There would be a meal after the ceremony.

Qui-Gon froze a moment over his water glass and then took a sip. Obi-Wan started to look around.

“Don’t show that you’ve noticed anything, Obi-Wan,” Qui-Gon instructed. They were being watched again. Obi-Wan drank his water in a couple of gulps and put the glass back down on the table. Qui-Gon sighed, finished his water and put his glass back down as well. Then he put the hood of his robe on and tucked his arms into the sleeves of his robe. Obi-Wan did the same. They had hoped that whoever it was had given up. Apparently not.

At last Mama-High and Papa-High stood on the center stage of the auditorium and sounded the gong, the signal for sunset. The groups slowly shuffled out.

“Last chance!” someone yelled out in the crowd, followed by a little nervous laughter and a couple of insults.


Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan moved silently with the rest of their group out of the auditorium, down several hallways. Their watcher stayed with them. They finally spilled out into an empty dinning room with a large window facing the last glow of sunlight in the sky. The chairs and benches filled up quickly and people sat on tables, on the window sill and on the floor. Obi-Wan and Qui-Gon sat on a chest in the middle of one wall where they could see the whole room. It was an inconvenient spot. They could not move quickly if the needed to; there were people all around them, but it couldn’t be helped.

It was now fairly obvious to Qui-Gon what would happen and he was certain that Obi-Wan had guessed it as well. Whoever watched them was connected to Nule Radeel and having no means of getting to him would confess to them about it. Would this person ask for mercy for him? For themself? Was it even a friend of Radeel? Could it be an enemy who wanted something? Qui-Gon discarded his speculation as an unproductive distraction. He sensed their watcher’s tension. But the room was thick with anxiety and it was impossible to single out where their watcher was.

An older woman, her blue skin wrinkled and pale with age, stood and gave a short story about the Gyseer. Then she started with her own confession. She walked to a table, her gaze singling out a younger man. People moved away, clearing a space for her to kneel. And then she told her son-in-law that his gifts, some of them handmade, were just awful, she had thrown out all of the ones she’d received that same day because she didn’t know what to do with them and could he please stop giving them to her. There was a little laughter in one corner, but the man receiving the confession looked stricken and in a small voice accepted and the older woman withdrew to her original seat.

Next came children giving their first Gyseer. Their confessions were for minor things and most of them fidgeted, not understanding what their elders wanted from them. The older children, who had a better idea of what the ritual meant, took their turns in the center of the room and then went to kneel and admit their faults. Still they were minor things, but more sincere. The oldest children had more serious admissions; a wrecked speeder, a pregnancy, a declaration of love that was rejected by the shocked recipient, a boy who’d secretly applied to and had been accepted to an off-world trade academy. The room grew darker as the confessions became more serious. By the time the adults started the Jedi could only see gray outlines.

Night fell. Marriages, divorces, stealing, break-ups, contracts, true appraisals, desire. Obi-Wan let the hood of his robe fall further over his face, since he could not see anything any more. He’d listen for the sound of movement, a new person going to the center of the room, then bodies moving aside and the next Gys would begin and the crowd would mutter or gasp, depending on what was said. He heard Pimas’s voice to their left asking a room mate to leave and go back to his own clan. There were a few happy declarations, but most of them were anger and dread, hopelessness and betrayal.

Next to him, his master was as still as a statue and he felt the Force, strong and certain, in him. Obi-Wan felt it in himself as well, in the room full of many people, filled with conflicting emotions and the one person who kept watching them with dread.

But as the ritual progressed, the tension diminished as the people unburdened themselves. And as that happened, by elimination Obi-Wan sensed that person who watched them was on their right. So, when finally one terrified person stepped into the center of the room, he knew where this one would go. The people before them moved aside and the sounds of surprise in the room were louder than for any other Gys. There was movement before them. A female voice spoke.

“I am Swinu. Nule Radeel was my brother. He is no more.” The speaker sobbed at this moment and had to pause.

“The Malipids clan has disowned him. The judge has already signed the decree.” There was another longer interruption of crying, but the room remained utterly silent, no one muttered or coughed.

“We were best playmates when we were children. We promised we would always help each other. And when he left, I was heartbroken. But he never forgot me, even if he hated the rest of our family, our home. And we always traded messages. And a few times he’d sent money so I could go off world to see him, his family.”

“I know he changed. Got hard. But he still cared about me; he named his daughter after me. I just want someone to know that he cared...”

“And I know that the government on Ildan collapsed, and he was important there. And he had to have done something wrong because he said he had to hide so no one could find him. But when I went to where he said, he was gone and I didn’t know where to look. And I went to the police and everyone was talking about the Jedi who brought in a prisoner in ice. And I knew what Nule did had to be bad. And I looked for you at the feast. And then I saw you at the jail. And there wasn’t anything I could do...” She stopped to cry again. “And I can’t even talk to Nule and I don’t know if I should.

“So I beg Gys from you...tell me what he did. So I can know. Tell me what he did, before it gets all twisted, and worse.

“Please...” This last word ended in more crying in the dark. Qui-Gon looked down to where the sound came from. He waited to speak, until it lessened.

“Nule Radeel was the vice-treasurer of the Ildan Colony.” His voice was the only sound in the room. “He conspired with five others to overthrow the government. He paid for mercenaries and battle droids from the treasury. And I saw him command them. But the plot was poorly done and assumed that the populace would support it. The did not. And when police droids killed two of their co-conspirators, Nule Radeel and the others fled. Their forces still controlled the spaceport and they and their supporters went there. But Radeel pursued his own escape without the others. Several ships took off at the same time. Radeel’s ship was the only one equipped with weapons and shields that could break through the government forces. All the other’s were destroyed. Including Radeel’s wife. I do not know the status of any of his children. I did not know he had any.”

In the midst of the sobbing response was a small, tearful, “Thank-you.”

After that, there were no more confessions. There was a call for anyone else to come forward. It went unanswered. Then the Gyseer was concluded. And people began to leave. Their presence left, with only a few who lingered by the far walls talking quietly. Obi-Wan and Qui-Gon didn’t move. And Radeel’s sister stayed before them. Eventually, her crying stopped.

“Will they want to talk to me, about Nule? She asked. “I tried to help him. I guess they’ll want me, too.”

“They may ask. But anything you might have done is of no consequence,” Qui-Gon assured her.

She must have accepted this. Obi-Wan heard her rise.

“I’m sorry. I’m keeping you here.”

“Well, actually we were waiting because we can’t see in this light–”

“Oh!” He felt air moving in front of him. “I’m so sorry! You’re blind! I should have known and I kept you’re here.” She sounded a little panicky now. “Let me help you.” He felt a hand grasp his arm. He stood and he felt Qui-Gon stand next to him. Then the woman pulled them forward with her between them, her hand on his arm.

“Thank you. That would be most kind of you,” Qui-Gon told her on his left.

Obi-Wan didn’t say a word.

He said nothing as Swinu slowly guided them out of the room, warning them about every piece of furniture. Some of the other people still in the room helpfully moved tables and chairs out of the way for them. In the hallway, Swinu asked where they wanted to go.

“Will you be staying here?” Qui-Gon inquired.

“No. I have my own speeder. I have to go back home and tell them what happened. Before someone else does.”

“I believe there are lanterns that will work for us in the hangar. We can go with you there.” So, they went slowly through the corridors with Swinu leading them, telling them about every stair and turn of the way. Qui-Gon even stubbed his toe once on a doorway and Swinu fretted over it. And she talked. About herself, her clan, about Nule. And the terrible fights he’d had with their parents. And how she’d hoped that he’d come back, now that he was well off and powerful and bring his children. Swinu asked how she could find out about them; they were under age and not likely to be involved in the plot. Qui-Gon promised to ask about them when they returned to Ildan and send her word. “He really turned out a lot like mother,” she reflected once. Obi-Wan and Qui-Gon listened.

They finally reached the outside door to the hangar. Some wide-frequency blue and yellows lights shone above and they could see a new-looking, shiny speeder bike parked next to the landing platform.

“Now, stay right here,” she told them patting their arms and not realizing that they could see now. “I’ll be right back.” She ran off and disappeared into the hangar.

Obi-Wan looked up at Qui-Gon. He shrugged.

“I thought she needed to talk more about it,” he responded innocently. But his helpless act seemed like a dishonest way to gain her sympathy to Obi-Wan. But...talking did help. It certainly had for him the night before. And he hoped for his master as well. And Swinu had been so distraught that he doubted that any sensible approach would have worked. He relaxed and Qui-Gon chuckled.

Swinu came running back with a huge plastic fixture.

“I think this has its own power source.” Qui-Gon reached over and tilted it down just before she switched it on. A bright white light bathed the ground all around them. It was a spotlight.

“There,” she announced proudly. “That’ll work until you get something smaller.” She smiled. She was a pretty Zonim with innocent eyes and smooth, blue skin. Qui-Gon bowed and thanked her. She hesitated, her expressions suddenly serious.

“I have to go and...I don’t think I’m going to talk Nule again.” She stopped...then, “If he tries to contact me. I don’t think I’ll answer. Except. I might. But I don’t think I will.” She looked at Obi-Wan and then back to Qui-Gon.

“Just tell him...when you thaw him out,” she started again. “Just tell him, you got there first.”

Qui-Gon nodded solemnly. “We will.”

She ran to the speeder, pulled a padded cold weather suit and helmet out from a side compartment, slipped it on and zipped it closed. She mounted the bike and started the engine. Then she was gone, disappearing on the horizon. They waited, with the spotlight on until they were sure that Swinu was gone. Then they returned the spotlight to the hangar.

But as they walked back to the compound Obi-Wan looked again to the horizon. Swinu was gone but he felt his awareness of the world around him. The Force all around him. And he realized it was something much stronger than his own abilities.

“Master.” Qui-Gon paused at the open door. Obi-Wan stood looking up and around at the field, his breath puffing in the cold air. “The Force is strong in this place,” he said, putting words to his feelings.

Obi-Wan was completely confused when Qui-Gon laughed.

“Yes, my Padawan,” he said happily. “It is.”

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

“There. All safe and ready to go,” Lazmat announced as the cargo hatch on her ship closed with a clang. Qui-Gon nodded his approval. “Just come up whenever you’re ready.” She stomped around to the open ramp.

“Hey Edi!” she yelled at her nephew who was with Obi-Wan pointing at a red-painted cruiser on the other side of the landing bay. “Get over here! We’re ready to go!” Edi scampered over and up the ramp after her.

But Obi-Wan stayed where he was. He wasn’t looking at the red cruiser. Qui-Gon walked toward him, looking over to an open door. He stopped. Swinu stood there. But she didn’t move or wave. She just looked very sad. Obi-Wan turned and then walked toward him until they stood together. They looked back toward Swinu. She wiped her face and nodded toward them, a small motion. Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan bowed their heads in return. Then they turned together and went up the ramp.

— FIN —