Legacy VI

Chapter 10: Going Native

"Hey! Hey! Hey! Master – we're here!"

The pellucid Force trembled and broke into shards and ripples beneath the treble-pitched assault of Anakin's boyish excitement, bringing Obi-Wan out of his meditative trance like a whip-crack.

"Nng," the victim of this unwitting discourtesy complained, blinking in the cockpit's dim blue light.

"The navcomp says two minutes till reversion – can I do it, please? I've never dumped a ship out before, I'm sure I can do it real easy and smooth, please Master?"

His companion ran a hand through his hair and squinted at the console display. "Very well," he agreed, discreetly snugging his crash harness into place. "Have at it."

"Wizard," the boy breathed, hunching over the helm and clamping a pink tongue tip between his front teeth. "This is no problem. I've totally got this."

Obi-Wan suppressed a hard hiccup – irksome side effect of interrupted meditation – and raised both brows. The navcomp quietly ticked off the moments until calculated reversion and then signaled ready.

"Now," the padawan announced, unnecessarily, and gave the hyperdrive alternator shift a manful tug. The shuttle bucked and shuddered beneath them, groaning at every seam.

"Stabilizers," the young Knight offered, one hand instinctively tightening on the bulkhead mooring-post.

"Oh yeah." A few swift adjustments later, and the ship breathed a sigh of relief – then seemed to plummet upward and roll wildly, smears of formless colour snapping into points of cartwheeling light, a web of smearing nebula, and a roiling sea of inky void.

"Yipppeeeeeeee!" its underaged pilot shrieked.

"Grav compasss," his less elated passenger barked, reaching forward to make the needed compensation himself. The feckless vessel , flung like spinning shrapnel from the hyperlane's apogee, gently slowed and righted itself, eventually swinging into position with bows and stern aligned along the nearest star's gravitational well.

Anakin giggled and flopped back in his seat, well satisfied with the performance. "Whew," he sighed, beaming up at his mentor. "That was kinda wild. But I did it."

"With room for improvement," Obi-Wan remarked, clamping down on a second hiccup, lest it transform into something queasier. "You did well, Padawan….. I'll take the helm now."

Some things required a steady hand, after all.

"Whoa…" Anakin breathed, snub nose practically pressed against the viewport's convex curve. "What kinda place is this?"

The quadruple tiered pedestrian arcades rose before them, layer upon scintillating, neonium decked layer – a phantasmagoric architecture of transparisteel and sleek plastoids seemingly riveted and buttressed by gaudery. As their shuttle cruised upward toward the docking levels, a vast billboard rose to eyelevel like a bloated sun breaking its own artificial horizon.

"You-topia," the mesmerized padawan sounded out, scribing the shifting aurebesh figures with one finger. "Huh?"

Obi-Wan's smile was tight with repressed contempt. "Never will you find a more despicable hive of ostentation, egoism, avarice, and waste. Welcome to the most expansive shopping center this side of the Hygerrian."

Anakin's jaw gaped as they navigated their way into the main structure, revealing an inner honeycomb of glittering platforms and opulent facades, a vast cave dripping with inticement, with wares form a thousand systems. Its open mouth swallowed their miniscule vessel and drew them into its own resplendent microcosm.

"Don't worry about the navigation," the young Jedi advised his awestruck apprentice. "Tractors will bring us in."

"But…. What are we doing here?" the boy squeaked.

"Shopping." Obi-Wan folded both arms over his chest and leaned back, regarding their surroundings with both brows hovering upward disdainfully.

His padawan flopped back in his own chair, scowling. "But why here?"

"Why not? Besides, it's tariff free."

"But Jedi never pay – "

"Anakin. We are not Jedi here. Remember? We need to acquire some marketable goods if we are to pose as merchants. "

"Okay, but – "

A raised hand stemmed the tidal wave of curiosity. "This is where you stop asking questions. Follow me, keep your wits about you, and learn."

The valet droid executed an obsequious bow. "Please present this magnetocode at any valid docking kiosk and our friendly staff will retrieve your vessel."

"Here." Obi-Wan deposited the device in his padawan's outstretched hand. "I'm appointing you Transportation Chancellor."

"Is that like a promotion?" Anakin inquired, trotting to keep pace as they headed down the polished pedestrian bridgeway.

The young Jedi issued a gentle snort. "You have much to learn… let's see now." They paused beneath a sculptured archway. A grand courtyard lay ahead, domed in crystalline panes reflecting the starscape beyond. Upon every side stretched corridors echoing with the throngs of shoppers and the tinny cacophony of synthmusic. A heady musk of competing odors, alluring yet chaotically mingled, assaulted their nostrils.

"E'chuta," the younger of the pair muttered, wide-eyed.

A scantily clad PArthusian sashayed past on the arm of her escort, taking a moment to appraise the strangers with a lingering glance and a long wink. Anakin's gaze trailed after her, puzzled and intrigued.

"Uh, Master?"

"Focus."

"Yeah but how come she was thinking about eating you?"

"Focus, Anakin." Obi-Wan's eyes narrowed as he surveyed the vast labyrinth of shops, the grav lifts and moving stairways to upper and lower levels, the stalactite hover-chandeliers pendant above them. "We need information."

Doggedly jogging alongside, his young companion voiced another question weighing heavily on his mind. "Can we even afford to shop here?"

This earned him a sardonic chuckle. "We are loaded, my young friend, if you will pardon the colloquialism."

An automated stairway wafted them above the main plaza, toward a soaring mezzanine lined with pulsing crystal colonnades. Anakin leaned against the siderail, staring out over the dizzying spectacle below. "Oh…. I've never had any money, really. "

"Nor have I," his mentor pointed out. "But if I am called upon to squander the Order's resources, I intend to execute my duty with all due diligence."

This pronouncement was met with a startled look swiftly overshadowed by a grin; the smile was momentarily mirrored in the young Knight's face before he reimposed his grave demeanor.

"Here we are," he announced as they stepped out into the upper level foyer. "Welcome to Youtopia."

Anakin balked visibly upon the threshold, snub nose wrinkling in disgust. "Why are we going into a beauty parlor?"

"Because there is no more facile or efficient way to gather information."

"I don't get it… and this place is schuzzo."

The young Knight shucked off his cloak and deposited it in his bemused padawans' arms. "I will brave the gundark's den," he reassured the dubious boy. "You need merely wait it out in the reception area." A quick, assessing look at the posh appointments of the lounge followed. "And perhaps you should not pry too deeply into those magazines, either."

Thus pointed in the direction of fascinating entertainment, the boy meekly accepted his fate and plopped into one of the overstuffed pod chairs. "Yes, Master."

On cue, a gaily bedecked and decidedly quadrubrachial hairdresser made his appearance in the interior doorway, shoving aside the glittering bead curtain with two appendages while the other two traced almost dainty circles of delight in mid-air. "Welcome, welcome, welcome," this person greeted the newcomer in unctuous tones. "And how may we help you today?"

The young Jedi drew in a deep centering breath. "Just a trim," he replied, politely, acutely aware of his apprentice's silently sniggering appraisal of the situation.

"Oh dear, oh my yes yes yes," the barber tittered, all four hands splaying out in an exaggerated gesture of horror. "We are starting to look a tad… scruffy around the edges. Come this way, please… I will transform you, I promise."

With a single fulminating glare over one shoulder – sufficiently strident to remind his protégé that the brand of 'scruffy' under consideration was the sort that carried a lightsaber- Obi-Wan meekly followed his self-appointed savior into the perfumed and powdered inner sanctum, imploring the Force never to allow rumor of this adventure to reach Garen Muln or Feld Spruu's ears.

Upon closer inspection, Anakin found the magazines to be far less enticing than Obi-Wan's brusque proscription would seem to suggest. They contained not a scrap of mechanical schema or stats – their virtual holo-pages were filed with a dreary procession of advertisements for age-defying cream, absurdly embellished undergarments and expensive colognes, or else long-winded reviews of restaurants and theatrical programmes to be found in the local sector. More ennui-inspiring yet were the advice columns on ways to "triple your pleasure" and the odd holos of various species in abstruse gymnastic positions. All in all, a colossal waste of time. He tossed the last of his hefty pile down upon a side table with a blend of guilt at having disobeyed – however minor an injunction – and pique at having reaped no memorable reward for having done so.

Dropping out of hyperspace had been wizard… but this next phase of the mission was proving anticlimactic. How many hours did it take to get a stupid haircut, anyway? When they did it back in quarters on Coruscant it was about a five minute operation all told, including clean up.

He briefly entertained the dark suspicion that something untoward had occurred to his teacher - but then, he could distinctly feel Obi-Wan's presence in the Force: steady like a candle flame, with just the slightest ruffling about the edges, a subtle irritation flickering in the margins.

So he wasn't going to have to launch a rescue operation. More the pity.

He was just on the brink of making a reason to launch a rescue operation, when the object of said rescue managed to extricate himself from trouble, pushing through the chintzy bead curtain and reappearing in the anteroom, shorn and shaved and redolent of some sweet-spicy grooming scent from one of the magazines. Anakin wrinkled his nose and regarded the outcome with wide eyes.

On Tatooine, only really hoopachi ootmian got themselves fancied up like that. It was an invitation to be mugged and/or kidnapped for sale on the upscale slave market.

The young Jedi stabbed a shiv-like glance sideways in his direction, bringing this idle train of thought up short. "The answer to your question, young one, is yes. I have all the information we need. … And a great quantity in excess of that, as well."

That hadn't been Anakin's question but he had the sense not to scruple over trivialities, at least this time. He opted to make another inquiry weighing on his mind. "I still don't get why this is the best place to find out stuff."

"Hairdressers are always the best purveyors of gossip, all across the galaxy. Second only to the ranks of junior padawans at the Temple, and Master Qui-Gon, of course."

"Oh." They headed down the echoing concourse toward a set of decorative, counterweighted lift platforms. "So… how does that help our mission?"

Obi-Wan's mouth quirked at one corner and his brows lifted. "It would appear, based on local hearsay about the most frequented shipping lanes out here, that we need to make ourselves as tempting a target as possible for pirates."

An hour later, they meandered back toward the docking structure, each propelling a laden hover-palette before him.

"That was a lot of moolasa for empty crates," Anakin observed, frowning as the pressure seal security cartons loaded on his palette wobbled in place. "… And people are staring at us."

His companion paced ahead, unperturbed. "We appear to be departing with roughly half a billion credits worth of rare jewels or aurodium," he pointed out. "Hopefully a scout or two is observing us at this very moment. With any luck, we'll be attacked within the first forty parsecs out."

"I don't think pirates are gonna be too happy when they find this stuff is all empty, Master."

A shrug of nonchalance met this objection. "I only aim to lure them in, not make them happy. We will review procedures for receiving boarders once we're under way. "

Anakin pouted visibly. "I could fight if you let me have a 'saber. Or a blaster, even."

"And you won't be laying hands on either until you prove you can follow orders precisely. This isn't a Temple scholum exercise."

"I know." The padawan gave his hover-trolley a truculent extra kick with one foot, sending it skimming ahead of him on silent repulsors. "I just wish you would let me show you what I can do."

They halted at the valet parking kiosk. "That, my friend, will happen before you know it. If Master Qui-Gon were here, he would counsel patience."

The boy folded his arms across his chest, rumpling the new Corellian cut long tunic with its ostentatious breastpockets and double stitch embroidery over both shoulders. "Patience," he grumbled in exasperation.

"I on the other hand will settle for mere quiet," his mentor quipped, tucking the pommel of his 'saber beneath a coat flap and smoothing his own embroidered long vest. "Since we are on the topic of precious commodities."

Anakin merely rolled his eyes and tried to focus on more positive thoughts.

For one thing, they were going to get attacked by pirates – and surely that would be where the fun began.