Precautions:

Space…

With a glance, Anakin made sure the holo comm was set to show just the person in the pilot's chair and then he allowed it to make the connection to the foreign frequency that was hailing them.

No image appeared on his end, but the computer said the line was open so he said, "Hello. Sorry to jump in to your system unannounced like this, but we mean no harm. We just want to retrieve our friends who preceded us."

There was silence for about twenty seconds, but it didn't feel empty. Through the Force, Anakin sensed surprise more than anything. And then a male nearly yelled in an unknown language, ending his sentence in the word 'Huttese'.

As more unknown words were called over the comm that he somehow knew weren't meant for him, Anakin glanced over at Obi-Wan in the co-pilot chair and they exchanged looks of intrigue. "Apparently they don't know Basic, but someone might know Huttese?"

"Apparently," Obi-Wan returned in a dry mental tone. "Just how far to the back end of nowhere are we?"

"Very far, I'm guessing. None of the star systems the scanners are picking up look familiar, and I'm pretty sure we've travelled practically every known millimetre of the galaxy during the war."

"We have." Obi-Wan's mental tone was somehow even dryer than before.

And then one of the voices on the comm said in Huttese, "Welcome to Earth space."

"Where the kriff is Earth?" Ahsoka muttered from behind his chair.

"I've never heard of a planet called Earth," Threepio responded. "Has anyone else?"

To a chorus of no's which he hoped the comm unit wasn't picking up, Anakin addressed the voice on the comm in his first language. "Thank you. My apologies for our sudden appearance. But we're here to retrieve our friends who preceded us through the wormhole."

"Ummmm. Okay. Good. Just hang on a second."

Anakin's brows went up as the second voice spoke in the original language and was answered by the first, more dominant sounding voice. I think he's asking for instructions from his commander.

And then, "Okay, the boss says that's fine. You can follow an escort ship to Headquarters and your friends will be brought there to meet you."

Anakin smiled slightly at being right as he nodded. "That is fine. But I'd like to keep this as quick as possible. We want to go back through the wormhole before it closes."

A pause as more conferring occurred in the other language and then voice two said, "We understand. We'll keep this as brief as we can, but there are a few people who'd really like to meet you. And…" Another pause as more voices spoke in the background. "We have sensors on the wormhole now. It is currently reading as stable as these things get. We'll let you know if that changes even by a degree."

He was relieved to hear that. "Thank you. I see also that you are gathering up the debris from our destroyed warship. If you come across any more survivors or bodies while we're here, we'll pick them up as well."

More rapid talking.

"The boss says that is good but so far we haven't encountered any, but we just started not that long ago."

"Okay. Glad to hear it." I hope that means that everyone made it out the correct end of the wormhole in one piece. Except for poor Rex and Cody, of course. "Who am I following?"

Even as he asked the question, one of the ships surrounding them turned around and faced the planet. "Oh. Never mind. I see. Thank you."

And so Anakin and co followed a ship of unknown design down to a planet called Earth.

Meanwhile, back at Never Too High Stables…

Cody watched Tezza and the cops read his message as they all crowded over her wrist comm. He didn't really care what the officers thought, so his attention was all on her expressive face.

Her eyes widened, and then again, going absolutely huge, and then she turned those eyes on him and he didn't know what to do with that. Does she believe me or not?

The officers were saying something, exclamations of some sort, but she didn't seem to hear them. She just stared at him with that unfathomable look that made him wish he could read minds like the Jedi.

He smiled tentatively, which seemed to snap her out of the wide-eyed gawk she'd had going on, and she moved her arm up to type rapidly.

Holy crap! You're REAL!

Cody blinked at the message on his computer and then looked at Rex helplessly. "What the kark does that mean?"

Rex shrugged. "How am I supposed to know? Weren't we real before?"

"I thought so."

Cody typed back, Was I not real before? What did you think you were kissing? A ghost?

She shook her head at him in a sort of frustrated looking way and then moved to start typing again, but that was interrupted by Artoo calling out a warning.

"There are more ships approaching rapidly," he beeped, rocking on his struts.

Cody almost growled in frustration as Tezza looked at him in askance and the cops turned their gazes to the astromech with almost awed looking expressions. He didn't have a clue as to why that would be, though. Maybe they've never seen a droid before?

Artoo says there are more ships coming, he typed in rapidly, just in time for the sound of the engines of said ships to reach them.

Now what, Tezza thought in annoyance when Artoo started beeping.

And then it turned out to be more trouble, and her annoyance turned into trepidation as she spun and around and squinted at the sky until the fast moving aircraft came closer, inspiring her to exclaim, "Fudge on a stick! That's exactly what we need right now!" as the Canadian Air Force insignia became visible on the side of two of the aircraft and the NASA symbol on the other two.

The cops laughed and shook their heads at her. "What did you expect when clone soldiers from a galaxy far, far away crashed into your jumping ring?" Mike said dryly.

"I don't know," she shrugged helplessly. But I'm afraid I'll never see Cody again after they drag him away to perform horrible experiments on him or something.

As the four large aircraft landed on the front lawn, probably leaving permanent dents in the manicured grass, Tezza turned to look at Cody and Rex. The clones looked tense, and looked like they desperately wanted to put their helmets back on and go to war, but were admirably restraining themselves as they looked at her with questions in their matching amber eyes.

It will be okay, she typed in rapidly in reassurance. I hope. It's just more of the authorities come to investigate your crash.

Okay, Cody typed back, trusting her. Thank goodness.

When she turned back around, she was dismayed but somehow not surprised to see that soldiers with rifles at the ready were pouring out of the Air Force transports and people in yellow Hazmat suits were doing the same from the NASA planes. That's just great.

The two police officers moved to talk to the two in charge looking men from either group, leaving Tezza and her new friends to wonder what was being said as a rather enthusiastic amount of hand gestures and arm waving took place. I'm guessing the fact that they come from another galaxy is in there somewhere, she thought with reluctant amusement when the Air Force commander did a double take in their direction. The NASA minion didn't seem surprised, unsurprisingly.

And then the NASA guy and the Air Force guy started arguing in tones that where just quiet enough to make it impossible to catch the words, but their body language said neither was going to back down anytime soon.

While she watched the show with increasing amusement, Cody moved so he was right beside her, his arm brushing hers. She glanced up at him and smiled, receiving a beautiful smile back. Her heart fluttered, she was pretty sure.

What is happening? he typed.

Not sure. But I'm guessing they're arguing over who gets jurisdiction over your care.

Our care? His eyebrow on the unscarred side rose.

Yes. Someone's going to help you and undoubtedly question you. But one group is the military unit for the country you landed in and the other group is from a neighbouring country but is the acknowledged leader in all things relating to space.

I see. Both have claim on us, then.

Yes.

Who do you think will win?

Tezza glanced back at the stand off, both men glaring at each other, and shrugged. Not sure yet, but if I had to guess, I'd say the space guy. Americans are notoriously stubborn.

Cody huffed softly. I know a few people like that. I'm guessing the man all covered in yellow is the space guy?

That would be correct.

WHY is he all covered like that?

Yeah, why? Rex texted into their conversation.

Tezza winced apologetically. Uhhh. They may think that since you come from another galaxy, you might carry contagions that we are not immune to. We had a bad pandemic a year ago and lost a huge portion of Earth's population. Everyone is still super anal retentive about the spread of germs and disinfecting everything.

That makes sense, Cody typed, glancing over at the STILL arguing commanders before giving her a curious look with an undertone of remembered heat. You're not worried that l contaminated you?

She blushed as Rex gave his brother a congratulatory elbow nudge but managed to keep her gaze on Cody's for a telling moment. Nah. I was raised on horse dirt. Not much makes me sick. And even if there was a chance, l'd take it anyway.

He sucked in a breath and the look in his eyes practically turned the amber irises to flames. She had a really good feeling he'd be kissing her again right now if they were alone.

She certainly wasn't opposed to the idea.

As is, she leaned a little closer into him to show it, returning the look of desire.

Cody was still smiling quite brilliantly at her maybe a minute of unspoken but very telling looks later when Rex cleared his throat pointedly and looked at her wrist comp.

What did you mean when you said we were from another galaxy?

She shrugged. Exactly that. We're the only sentient life forms in our galaxy. We've explored the whole thing very thoroughly in the last hundred years. Your planets aren't here.

The men looked at her in amazement. And then Cody's eyes narrowed in the first hints of suspicion. Then how does your computer know Aurebesh?

Tezza grinned widely. Funny thing, that. You'll never believe the answer.

The clones raised nearly identical eyebrows (Rex's were a few shades lighter). Try us.

Before Tezza could tell them, the arguing duo came to an agreement. The Air Force commander spun on his heel and gestured angrily for his troops to pile back into their transports. The Hazmat covered NASA man strode towards them with the policemen on his heels.

Called it. But now what happens?