"You're everything you need
But still suspicion holds you tight."
Still Suspicion Holds You Tight- Black Rebel Motorcycle Club
"I haven't seen Lyle in weeks." There was a rattling of porcelain as the administrator set her cup on the saucer with a shaking hand. Her eyes were dark, sunken. Her skin was ashen; this woman hadn't slept in days.
Meetra reached over the desk and topped up the harrowed woman's tea with sympathetic meeting of eyes.
"I understand you're worried. Any mother in your place would be." She set the teapot down and leaned back, blowing on her own steaming hot cup as she did so. "On that note, how many others have gone missing?"
The administrator cradled her forehead in her palm and stirred sugar into her tea. "Four. All from Khoonda and all within the last two weeks. Their manner of disappearance is what is most… troubling."
"How do you mean?"
"They…" Her breath caught and she stared out the window in silence until she could continue. "There have been no kidnappings, no signs of struggle, no evidence that the five who have gone missing did so against their will. It's as though they just… left."
"And I'm assuming all attempts at communication have gone unanswered?"
The administrator's tired eyes flicked up to Meetra's. "No, actually… for the most part, yes, but every so often I or one of the other families will get a reply from a child… these replies though… they're more disturbing than the silence. I – I… I broke down when I got one from Lyle." Her voice wavered and her eyes fell to the steam issuing from her tea.
"What did it say?" Meetra prompted gently, reaching out to put her hand; scarred and calloused and strong over the trembling one of the frightened woman. "It's important for us to know as much as we can so we can deal with this threat as safely as possible. We want to get Lyle and the others back but I need you to stay strong for just a little while longer… believe me, I know what a monumental task that may seem, but a time will come where you can afford to be weak… right now is not it."
Still pale, still frightened, the leader nodded once and forced herself to have a drink of tea. "He… I sent him a message, asking where he went, telling him that I loved him and if he could just give me some sign that he was alright… ease my worry, so to speak. Hours later a reply did indeed come, but it was not what I expected. Lyle has always been loyal. Family is as important as anything to him, so I knew right away that the words that had come to me were not his own."
"What were they?"
"The message read, 'Mother, I don't need your condescension and your false concern. You are a hypocrite and you need to stop worrying about me, for my salvation does not lie with you, it lies in the Force.'" Her lip trembled again and she drew a deep breath. "And that is the last I've heard from him. That was five days ago."
Meetra drew her teeth over her lip and tapped her fingernails against the sides of her cup.
"And the best lead we have to go on is the Enclave?"
"There has been… activity there." The administrator began. "But a dark energy keeps out all who attempt to get close to the ruin. I've sent my best men to investigate and though none of them have been harmed, they all refuse to go near that place again."
"You don't think there's just the slightest possibility that these kids all made a pact to go off and disappear and fool around with things they don't understand? That possibly in a week's time they will tire of the cold nights and lack of warm food and the comfort of home and return to your doorstep, un-bathed and bedraggled, richer in character for their stupidity?" Meetra watched the administrator's face go from exhausted to shocked, and immediately corrected her insensitivity. "I apologize, administrator. That was incredibly flippant of me. I'm only trying to be logical and perhaps put your mind at ease in some small way."
"What would put my mind at ease is having my son back." She said, her voice considerably colder than before. "I'm sure the other four families share the same sentiment."
"In that case I'll embark with my companions at once." Meetra offered a weak smile and drained her tea, standing from the plush office chair.
"We are happy to supply you with whatever resources you require for success. We have a number of landspeeders that survived the battle if you care to use one of those to expedite travel."
Meetra zipped up her jacket. "Actually, I was going to ask if you had mounts."
The administrator furrowed her brow in confusion, "Well we do have a herd of Bol that belongs to the outpost but they're primary use is for farming…"
"They'll do fine for my purposes. I require three." When the administrator still looked sceptical, Meetra explained. "I don't have any particular fondness for landspeeders. The openness of the vehicle and the velocity at which they operate make me… uncomfortable, among other things."
A smirk broke the stressed visage of the administrator. "I never imagined Jedi would be prone to something as simple as motion sickness."
"Oh no, we're full of quirks and surprises, motion sickness being only one of them." Meetra shook the woman's hand and made for the door. "Good day, administrator."
She entered the lobby and both Atton and Mical rose from their seats at the same time in a way that made Meetra shake her head inwardly and bite back a laugh; she nearly ran her hand over the top of her head to see if someone had placed a crown there and declared her queen when she wasn't paying attention.
"Off we go, gentlemen." She said briskly, exiting the compound and pulling on a pair of leather gloves.
"We're going after the young ones then?" Mical asked, falling into step on one side of Meetra, while Atton followed slightly further behind on her other side (but not before discreetly brushing a hand across her flank.)
"Yup." She said shortly, confidently as she circled the building and hurried her pace towards the Bol pens.
"Do we know for certain this is a dark Jedi?" He pressed.
"What do your feelings tell you?" She asked over her shoulder as she snapped the gloves closed at her wrists. "The cause of this is clear to me." She let Mical chew on the question and turned her attention to the dark haired man over her shoulder. "And what of your feelings, sir?"
"Is this why you're so excited? You're acting like you just won some sort of contest for a year long stay on some resort planet." Sarcasm and quiet humour crept into Atton's voice and Meetra subtly lifted her eyes to the sky and let them roll down again.
Truth be told, she did sort of feel that way. For the first time since she had returned to Republic space, she felt like she actually knew what was going on. She felt properly armed and prepared for the situation the three of them were about to undertake and that in itself was immense relief. Also contributing to her confidence was the fact that she had taken both Atton and Mical with her and so far there had been minimal sassing between the pair of them; Atton understood that Meetra called for Mical's presence because he was familiar with the ruins of the Enclave, and Mical understood that Atton came along because being under Meetra's tutelage required as much hands on experience with the Force as possible.
Oh, and she had been given permission to ride a Bol: A treat she had not enjoyed in nearly fifteen years, back in her days of freedom and youth and wanton adventures in the vast plains.
"It may surprise you both to learn this situation has nothing to do with a dark Jedi." She approached the Bol pen and caught the attention of the rancher watching over the animals, protecting them from the Kath hounds. "I have permission from administrator Terena Adare to borrow three of your Bol." She peered past the keeper and into the pens; her mood lifted further: The creatures were healthy looking and well-fed.
The rancher looked apprehensive only for a moment before he recognized Meetra from the battle. One the realization passed over his eyes, he wasted no time in rustling up three sets of reins and a bit for each Bol. He assisted Meetra in readying each beast before letting Mical and Atton into the pen.
"Stop!" Meetra cried out, pushing her hand through the air in Atton's direction, stopping him cold with the Force.
"What?" He snapped in annoyance, stepping back from her invisible barrier.
"You just about ended up ankle deep in a pile of Bol shit, that's what." She said, dropping her eyes and her hand. "You've not been around large animals much, hey?"
"No, actually." He said, glaring at the brown pile of filth he had nearly trodden on. "I like speeders. They don't dump everywhere."
Meetra glanced out of her periphery and saw Mical fiddling with the reins of his Bol, and though his back was to them, she could see the silent quakes of laughter that shook his shoulders. Meetra's eyes turned back to Atton and she smiled; he was less than impressed with this mode of transportation, and he made no secret of it.
"It'll be fun. I promise." She put stress on the last word for it had taken on a rather unique and special meaning for the two of them since the last night spent at Atton's apartment. She unbuckled her sword-belt and started re-purposing it so that it hung over her shoulder, leaving it clear to use even as she rode. When she was ready, she gathered the reins of her Bol in one hand and leapt lightly onto its thick-skinned back, waiting for Atton to join herself and Mical who had mounted his already still looking rather smug.
"Why? Why not a landspeeder?" Atton seethed as he tried to mirror Meetra's movements, gathering the reins in one hand and attempting to hoist himself onto the Bol. Unfortunately, despite his most valiant attempts, leaping onto a living creature was not the same as scrambling up solid buildings and structures and every time he picked up a leg to try and swing over the Bol, the animal let out a frenzied huff and shuffled its hindquarters away from Atton. After a good dozen tries, Atton dropped the reins in frustration and glared at Meetra, wounded pride evident in his scowl.
"You can't possibly be giving up so easily." She said lightly, resting her elbows on the neck of her own Bol, playing with the reins between her leather fingertips.
He glared at her and she knew exactly how furious she was making him, but she had chosen Bol for a reason. She wasn't prone to motion sickness at all and a landspeeder certainly would have gotten them to the Enclave faster, but lessons learned in real time were the best kind, and this opportunity presented itself as ideal: Today, Atton would learn that being a Jedi meant being adaptable to discomfort. If she ever managed to get him on the bloody animal, he'd have more to complain about than he did already. This opportunity also served to teach the virtues of patience and grace; all he was doing right now was embarrassing himself by having a fit – everyone knew he hadn't ridden a Bol before, so of course no one expected him to naturally know how to mount and control one. All he had to do was calm down and exhibit some sort of patience and acceptance at his situation, so Meetra stayed leaning against her Bol until he did.
He tried and tried and tried and failed again and it wasn't until the Bol finally started getting fed up and properly knocked him over on his last attempt that Meetra intervened, sliding off her Bol and helping Atton off the ground.
"How about I just run behind you?" He panted angrily. "I'll probably be better off doing that."
"Don't be ridiculous." Meetra said patiently, pulling the reins up from the ground and holding them out to Atton. "You know nothing of these creatures, let alone this one, right?"
"I know I hate them."
"Stop that." She chided gently. "You sound like a child."
She pushed the reins into his hand when he wouldn't take them and turned to the Bol; its eyes were wide and its pupils were dilated. It huffed in agitation and shuffled a few steps further away.
"This animal is just as unfamiliar with you as you are with it. For you to come around and just start trying to climb on it without any sort of measurable intention only confused it and the more pissed off you got about it, the more pissed off it got about you." She reached out and ran her fingers down the snout of the Bol, not hesitating when it snorted and jerked its head away. "Honestly, how would you feel if some asshole kept kneeing you in the kidney and yelling about it in some bizarre language?"
"Sounds like my last visit to Mos Eisley." He muttered in agreement.
She smiled; he was getting it now. She took the reins a little higher from where Atton held them and gently tightened her grip on them so there was no slack and the Bol had to move forward. It took a single step, and then another and she reached out with her other hand and stroked the jaw of the creature, avoiding eye contact with it as she did so. It took her a minute, but she was able to soothe the creature to the state it had been before.
"The Force allows us to enter the minds of animals as well as people. Animal minds are different though; they act purely on instinct. There are no walls, there are no tricks or defences or deliberately placed deceptions. Only instinctual feelings such as hunger, anger, fear… self-preservation is at the forefront of any creature's mind." She continued to soothe the Bol as she continued. "If you make your intentions clear to this creature and exhibit nothing but peace and calm towards it, it will have no reason to fear you."
"And how do I do that? Write it a poem?" Atton shot a dirty look at Mical.
"You feel the life in this Bol, right? You can sense the ebb and flow of the Force in it and around it; what makes it, it. To calm this animal and keep it that way, you have to first be calm and peaceful as I said, and then let your own Force flow into the Bol."
"Manipulate it, is what you mean. Get into its head and trick it."
She could have smacked him.
"There's a fine line between manipulation and what we're doing here. I haven't tricked this fellow." She let the reins drop to the ground and the Bol made no move to flee; it only gnawed at some hay on the earth contentedly. "I've only eased this creature's fear and reasoned with it in a way it understood, rather than wasting hours trying to explain to it with words that I mean it no harm." She bent and picked the reins up, shoving them into Atton's hands. "Now stop doubting yourself and get on the Bol."
She walked away and mounted her own again. Atton drew a deep, grounding breath and did as Meetra said. The idea of pushing into the mind of an animal was no less disturbing to him that the mind of a human, but there was a marked difference in the way the Force lived in this beast. From the second he stepped forward, its pupils widened again and he felt the tension building again as the creature's heart started racing. It was a stupid animal that had nothing to be afraid of.
It was an animal that had nothing to be afraid of.
It had nothing to be afraid of.
It has nothing to be afraid of.
You have nothing to be afraid of.
He reached out and touched the muscled shoulder of the Bol, letting his fingers linger for a few moments before letting them travel to its smooth neck where it allowed him to stroke it a few times. Deciding he was ready, he moved the reins up in his hand slightly and threw a leg over the back of the animal, surprised when he found himself sitting atop the beast. He looked over to Meetra to see her beaming at him from her own steed.
"Finally." She grinned. "Can we have fun with this now?" She didn't wait for a reply before digging her heels into the sides of her Bol and shooting out of the pens. Mical did the same and Atton swallowed hard before following suit, uttering silently something that may have been some sort of prayer.