CHAPTER FIVE
"You just gave me that look, Marr."
The Cerean poked his long head out of a port on the Junker's underside, a disapproving look on his face. "You mean this one?" he asked Khedryn.
"Yes, exactly! Why do you keep giving me that look?"
Marr sighed. "Because you've just agreed to give two complete strangers a ride to a worthless moon."
"So?" Khedryn asked. "They're paying well."
"Maybe so, but for all we know, they could be planning to hijack our ship and maroon us on this frozen moon we're going to."
"One of them is a Jedi," Khedryn murmured. "Maybe they both are...."
"So?" Marr retorted. "There is such a thing as 'rogue Jedi.'"
"Well, I still trust them a lot more than I do people like Reegas. Besides, I kinda owe them a debt ever since Luke Skywalker rescued me from the Redoubt."
"He rescued thousands of people, most of them having been raised to hate Jedi." Marr sighed again as he lifted himself back up into the ship's internals. "But if you have faith in you own judgment, I suppose I should as well."
* * *
"So, where have you been to these past three years?"
Toah stood with Jaden not far from the parked Junker, patiently waiting for Khedryn and his first mate to prepare it for take off. Not meeting Jaden's eye, he said, "I told you. I'm wandering."
"But why? Why are you wandering?"
Toah sighed. "Because I don't really have a place to call home. You and other Jedi have Ossus or whatever planet you were born on, but I don't... I can't really say the same. I can't even consider Dantooine my home, even though I was raised there."
"Why not?" Jaden asked.
"It just feels... strange going there. Knowing what I know now, that I'm a clone originally intended for nefarious purposes...." Toah looked out towards Fhost's setting sun. "I don't belong anywhere. So I am everywhere."
Jaden snorted. "Don't pull that melodramatic fierfek. You sound like an emotional teenager."
Toah smirked. "My kingdom for a cryptic statement."
At that moment, Khedryn Faal came up to the two Jedi, cleaning his greasy hands with an oil-stained rag. "Well, the Junker's all set and ready to go. How 'bout you guys?"
Jaden nodded. "We're ready."
As the Jedi began to follow Khedryn, Toah leaned in and whispered into Jaden's ear. "Wait, don't you have a starfighter?"
"I do," was the quiet reply.
"Then why do you need...?"
"Basically- and I'm being completely honest here- I wanted the company. You try making conversation with an astromech droid."
Toah furrowed his brow. "So you're putting your trust in complete strangers?"
"Not just any strangers." Jaden eyed Marr, Khedryn's Cerean co-pilot. The Force always seemed to shift whenever he looked at the long-headed man. "Strangers with potential."
* * *
Baleful dark eyes watched as the Corellian freighter disappeared into Fhost's dusk sky. Fuming, Reegas Vance turned to Jass Kropp, the burly Zabrak who had been one of his opponents in the sabacc game.
"Did you get a good look at their passengers?" the crime lord growled.
Kropp nodded. "Both humans with fair skin and brown hair. One's about ten years older than the other and more grizzled looking. The younger one's got gray eyes and something of a beard."
"Can you hunt them down?"
The Zabrak grunted. "For seven thousand credits, I might be able to."
"I'll make it eight thousand then, just to be sure." Reegas grinned ruthlessly. "I want all four of their heads brought back here in three days... not necessarily attached to their bodies."
Kropp laughed mirthlessly. "You're one scary man, Vance. That's why I like you."
He straightened the bandolier wrapped across his chest, patting it and his belt to make sure all of his weapons and ammo were there.
"Wish me a good hunting."
* * *
"The trip should only take about a half-hour," Khedryn said to Jaden, who sat in the seat behind his in the cockpit, while Toah stood behind Marr's. "So you can wait in the living suite and... meditate or... do whatever it is you Jedi do in your spare time."
Marr shot him a look that read Are you seriously going to leave those two alone, by themselves?
However, Jaden said, "We're just fine here, actually. If you don't mind of course."
"No, not at all," Khedryn said. "We've just... never had passengers before."
"What do you want with this frozen moon anyway?" Marr asked, not so much as glancing at either of the two Jedi.
"I had a dream about such a place and wanted to investigate it," Jaden said.
"How did you know I would have the coordinates to it?" Khedryn asked.
"I didn't. The dream simply told me to got to the 'black hole of Fhost.'"
Despite himself, Marr smirked. "Are all Jedi dreams conveniently specific?"
Jaden smiled. "Sometimes."
The four of them spent the rest of the trip in silence. Once a half-hour had passed, just like Khedryn had said, the Junker came out of hyperspace and was brought before a gas giant world, the frozen moon of Jaden's dream orbiting it.
"Well, it certainly has an apt name," Khedryn said wryly, nodding at the thick ice which coated the sphere. "I suppose I'll just pick a random landing spot."
"Wait," Marr said, leaning forward in his seat to peer at his comm station. "I'm picking up a signal."
Khedryn looked at him and raised an eyebrow. "Of what sort?"
"I don't know. It's just a signal, coming from over there." Marr indicated the spot on the moon.
"Then we should land there," Toah said. "Something must be waiting for us there."
Khedryn sighed. "And just because you said that, I now have a bad feeling about this."
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