KAYWANTHA
by Vicki Vance
Summary: A light mission for Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan turns out to require more involvement than originally planned. Ranges from deep drama to quip humor.
Rated PG-13
Disclaimer: I own nothing, so I am making no profit from this.
Author's note: You get a golden balloon if you can tell me what the meaning of a certain planet's name is. Here's a clue: it has nothing to do with Star Wars.
A scuffle involving a green-skinned Neimodian teen and white-skinned Bith nearly broke out beside Obi-Wan and he ducked quickly to avoid it. He slid along the wall towards Pikinel's dressing room. He was about to press the panel to open the door when he heard something thump inside. He stopped and listened, but a Wookiee yelled nearby and he couldn't hear anything but the raspy vocal chords of the being grinding like a gundark with a cold.
He pressed his ear to the door and held his breath, plugging his other ear with his finger. He heard inside a girl making a quick, short sound: a call followed by a grunt, as if she had been hit by something, or someone. He heard the girl whimper and a man distinctly ask, "Once again, where is the jewel?"
Obi-Wan tried the door and when it wouldn't open he ignited his lightsaber and sliced the seal. It whooshed open and Obi-Wan charged into the room, taking everything in quickly.
There was a dresser with a mirror and lights to the left. A stand held a Fender Caster jizz bass guitar and elaborate necklaces hung over it. In a corner a tall, thin, armoire huddled under old denim jeans. A chair hid under a pile of black leather jackets and random tidbits littered the room.
Pikinel was on her hands and knees near the dresser. Two Mebyli rebels stood directly over and the last hovered aside, as if he felt he was in the way. All had blasters in their hands, but they were using the butts on Pikinel.
"Let her go," Obi-Wan ordered. The rebels whirled around to face him, shocked at his speed. The rebel who stood aside raised his blaster. In one swift sweeping movement Obi-Wan destroyed the blaster. It partially exploded and the rebel cried out, clutching his hand.
The other two raised the blasters and fired on him. He blocked and scuttled sideways towards the chair. Using the Force, he extended his hand and threw the leather jackets and chair at the rebels. As they fought through the tangle of clothe Obi-Wan rushed over to Pikinel, positioned himself in front of her and kicked the rebels away from them.
The rebel with the burnt hand came screaming manically at him, as if to tackle him. Obi-Wan used the Force again and threw datapads, game cartridges, and a lamp at him. He backed off, eyeing him with anger and contempt.
The other two rebels got up and leveled their blasters. "Get out of here, kid," one said. "We have no fight with you."
"I am a Jedi," he answered steadily. "I defend those who cannot defend themselves. Like helpless girls that are preyed upon by full-grown men." he smiled when the rebels realized what he was saying. "Is it true you're not strong enough to get one little girl? You need three whole people to complete the job?"
"Jedi-" a rebel barked, waving his blaster. Obi-Wan flicked his lightsaber threateningly.
"Let's get out of here," the rebel with the wounded hand said. "He'll kill us."
"Jedi don't kill." the brave one said.
"Would you like to take that bet?" Obi-Wan inquired darkly, moving the blade slowly through the air.
"C'mon!" the coward whined and grabbed his comrade's hand and dragged him out. The last one ran out after them, clutching his hand.
Obi-Wan turned off his lightsaber and hooked it to his belt. He turned and faced the girl cowering on the floor. He knelt beside her and touched her shoulder. She flinched and whimpered.
"I won't hurt you," he assured her. He brushed her hair away from her face and saw it was covered in blood. She was crying piteously. His over-active empathy easily put him in her place and a deep sympathy washed over him. He helped her to sit and gently held her for a few moments before he slipped his arm beneath her knees.
The door in the back of the club was a little old-fashioned; it was the type that swung on hinges. It flung open and from behind it the three rebels surged forth. Qui-Gon was ready for them. He activated his lightsaber and stood between them and the alleyway out. One clutched his burnt hand, one stood in front with a grim, set face, and the last looked about ready to pee his pants.
"Oh shit," the frightened one wailed. "Here's a man Jedi!"
"He can't be much better than the boy," the brave one said, holding his blaster like a bomb.
"He's a full-grown man!" he shrieked in response.
"The boy hurt my hand!" the other said.
"Let's go!"
The brave one hesitated and Qui-Gon acted.
"Get out of here or I will kill all of you," he warned. Of course he'd never kill them but he knew the threat would make at least two of them leave and the third would probably follow.
"Sweetelders,he'sgoingtokillus!" the coward screamed and bolted away like a Sith was on his tail. The one with the burnt hand followed quickly. The brave one holstered his blaster and looked levelly at Qui-Gon for several moments.
"What I'm doing is for the good of my planet," he said evenly. Then he too left.
Qui-Gon switched off his lightsaber and watched them leave. He started to walk toward the door to see if Obi-Wan was all right when he suddenly heard slightly uneven footsteps.
His initial thought was somebody was hurt from the rebels then he remembered they were after Pikinel. She could be stumbling with a hurt leg but then he wondered about Obi-Wan. What if his leg had been injured? Then he thought he'd have felt it if Obi-Wan was hurt. So, it was Pikinel, then?
Obi-Wan shuffled carefully out of the frame, holding Pikinel in his arms. He looked fine, but she looked awful. There were bruises on her body, her left boot was gone and her foot was swollen to twice its normal size and her face was streaked with rivers of blood. She visibly trembled.
"The rebels beat her?" Qui-Gon asked as he touched her forehead.
"Yes," Obi-Wan said. "They were after the jewel."
"Pikinel Roemohn?" Qui-Gon said. "I'm Qui-Gon Jinn. I'm a Jedi Master. I'm here to help you."
She didn't say anything, only whimpered.
"Don't worry. We'll take you back to you father. You'll be safe there."
"No!" she screamed so suddenly it hurt Qui-Gon's ear. Somewhere between screaming and moaning, she kicked her legs and buried her face against Obi-Wan's shoulder. Obi-Wan appeared slightly alarmed by this sudden irregular movement and tried to hold onto the girl who was beginning to feel like yesterday's oatmeal in his arms.
"All right," Qui-Gon didn't care where they took her, as long as they could get to some shelter and a place she could calm down. "We can take you to the Jedi Temple. It's very safe th-"
"No!" she screamed again and flailed her legs, sobbing hard. Obi-Wan had a look on his face similar to if he had been looking at a thermal detonator half-way through its single-digit countdown stage.
"Where can we take you, then?" Qui-Gon asked, switching tactics.
She hummed a bit and said, "My apartment."
Frank Furder the senatorial aide didn't know a lot about social issues. He wasn't a very social person, unless you call online chatting about the persnickety technical flaws of the newest adventure computer game from the company that brought Ultimate Faerie Quest VII to the galaxy. However, he was able to catch only the very obvious from the senator.
For instance, he knew there was an emergency Senate meeting to discuss the appraisal and use of a newly discovered spice found just at the edge of Unknown Space. Of course he knew the nature of the meeting, he'd delivered the memo to Rebine Roemohn and read it himself. He knew that newly discovered spices where big issues in the galaxy and appraisal was not only necessary but also very important to any senator who was interested in spice trade (nearly half of the Senate had some kind of spice connection).
He also knew the senator he served did not really have a headache and nerves. Just nerves, no headache. He hadn't taken any pain reliever and he kept standing up, as if he was too nervous to stay still. Someone with a migraine didn't keep jumping up and down.
However, he didn't know precisely why the senator should be so nervous. Only the senator knew why.
Roemohn was afraid of what the Jedi may discover. He was afraid that while returning his daughter to him, they'd find out the truth about Kaywantha. He worried briefly about his daughter, about whether she was safe, if she was getting along with other kids, if she was eating her vegetables, and if she was picking the right kinds of boys. Then he went back to worrying about the jewel and what the Jedi could find.
Frank Furder the senatorial aide didn't know a lot about social issues. But he wasn't a heartless young man either. He saw the worry on the old man's face as easily as the deep wrinkles on his forehead. He pitied the man and wished vainly he would cheer up.
After nearly half and hour of groggy directions from a half-senseless senator's daughter, the Jedi found her apartment. Crammed into the smallest place of a huge low-rate condo, her living quarters could have used a good cleaning.
Not that it was a mess. As the door opened revealing her living space, Obi-Wan noticed it wasn't messy like her dressing room back at the club, but just dirty. A layer of dust and grime coated the walls and the tan, splotched carpet had to have once been white or beige. The faded furniture was re-colored with dirt and was patched and frayed like ionized hair.
Qui-Gon entered first, checking to see if anyone was there already. It was empty.
"Do you have a room mate, Pikinel?" he asked, exploring past the living room into a greenish bathroom.
"No," she mumbled from Obi-Wan's shoulder. "I wanted to hide."
"No bedroom?" he asked as he speediously exited the bathroom. He'd discovered that the green stuff in the bathroom wasn't some kind of odd decoration he'd first taken it to be.
"Too expensive," she answered. "The couch is a bed."
Qui-Gon pulled off the cushions and unfolded the bed from within the couch frame. Obi-Wan, who'd been hovering by and becoming uncomfortably aware of how heavy Pikinel was, lay her on the bed and rubbed the soreness out of his arms.
"Do you have any first-aide kits?" he asked her as Qui-Gon ambled off towards the bar-like kitchen.
"Yeah," she murmured, pointing to a small table beside the couch. "In there."
What Obi-Wan found wouldn't help much: a few adhesive bandages, some aspirin and antacid. He pulled from his utility belt his own small Jedi-issue medpac and proceeded to take out the pain killers and wound-staunchers. He worked primarily on the wounds on her face because they were bleeding the most and would keep her from sleeping comfortably.
She stared up at him like he was a pubescent saint. He tried not to meet her eyesight.
"I'm sorry I hit you," she said at last.
"That's all right," he said. "It wasn't nearly as bad as this."
"You see, I thought you were a rebel in disguise," she explained.
"It's all right, really," he assured her. "You need to worry about resting and letting your wounds heal."
"It doesn't hurt," she said softly.
"That's because I put a nerve numbing agent on the cuts," he explained.
"I think it's the healing touch of a Jedi," she said. Obi-Wan looked at her in much the same way a grazer would when it saw the headlights of an oncoming speeder.
"Pikinel?" Qui-Gon came forward bearing a steaming cup of tea. Thank the Force, Obi-Wan thought. "Have some of this. It's my personal favorite."
"I didn't know I had tea," she said as she propped herself up and accepted the cup.
"You don't." he told her. "I always have a tea bag of this with me at all times."
"Now I feel guilty drinking it," she said, sipping it.
Qui-Gon waited a few polite moments before asking, "What can you tell us about the jewel?"
Pikinel stopped sipping her drink and shook her head, effectively dizzying herself. "I won't say anything."
"Kaywantha is causing your father a lot of trouble," Qui-Gon said. "It nearly got him killed."
"Not my problem," she said, refusing to look at him.
"Now it is," Obi-Wan said, dabbing at cut on her forehead. She didn't look at him either.
"That's not my fault," she said.
"But you took the jewel, didn't you?" Obi-Wan asked, amazed at how absent-minded she was being. "You brought this upon yourself."
"Obi-Wan," Qui-Gon suddenly said. "I think she needs her rest."
"I'm not tired," she said flatly.
"You passed out twice on the way over here," Obi-Wan reminded her.
"Obi-Wan," Qui-Gon said again, stronger this time. "She needs to sleep."
He took the cup of tea from her and before she could protest he put his hand on her forehead and nudged her to sleep with the Force. She fell back against the pillows, her breathing softening.
Qui-Gon purposefully put the cup aside, turned to Obi-Wan, and looked him square in the eye.
"Sometimes I know you," he said. "Sometimes I don't."
"What?" Obi-Wan asked, not understanding at all.
"I thought you were empathetic," he explained. "But you couldn't see the pain in her face just now?"
"I saw it," Obi-Wan said defensively. "I treated her wounds-"
"Not her wounds," Qui-Gon said. "When we started to talk about her father and the jewel, she became agitated and upset. Just look at her, Obi-Wan."
He did and saw that when she'd closed her eyes to sleep tears had been squeezed out. He felt a pang of guilt like a knife in his gut. He'd mistaken her behavior for anger at her father when she'd really been hurting. What had he said to her? Something heartless and cold, crushing almost. No wonder Qui-Gon tried to quiet him.
He sat quietly for several moments, reflecting upon himself, searching for some way to comfort himself and eventually came up with something.
"I was feeling sorry for her father," he said to Qui-Gon, still watching Pikinel.
"But her father's not here, is he?" he said. Obi-Wan lowered his head as if Qui-Gon had just cursed him.
Qui-Gon said nothing. He didn't want to punish Obi-Wan for acting the way he did because he knew Obi-Wan would punish himself. He could see it in his eyes; the way Obi-Wan sometimes sunk into his pool of shame and boiled in it. The trouble was he didn't always know when to get out.
"It's good though that you're getting emotionally into the situation," Qui-Gon told him. "I approve of this level of involvement for Jedi, though the Council does not. Just remember not to let it control your actions, Padawan."
"Yes, Master," Obi-Wan responded.
"I think we will need to be involved in this case," Qui-Gon continued, because what he was saying was true; he was glad it was convenient to use the lesson as a method of comfort for his student. "For I believe we will do more than simply deliver Pikinel to her father. We will also need to discover where the jewel is and return it, whether sham or real."
Obi-Wan nodded, raising his head slightly. "I wonder if the rebels have approached her before and she's refused them the jewel for several nights now," he said.
"And only now they've started beating her?" Qui-Gon asked. "Probably."
"Well, she seems to share their views," Obi-Wan said.
"Ah, I see now. You believe they've spoken before, expressed their similar feelings about the jewel, yet she refused to give them the jewel, even though they have the expenses to take it back to Mebyl and she doesn't. If she and they are so similar, why doesn't she join them?"
"She'd be a rebel against her father," Obi-Wan pointed out.
"She did run away from him," Qui-Gon said. "And went out of her way to stay away. The thing that troubles me is the location of the jewel. It certainly wasn't on her person, was it?"
Obi-Wan shook his head, glancing at her. She had no purse, no pockets in her black leather shorts. "It's not in here, is it?" he asked, glancing around the apartment.
"If it is here, I won't look for it," Qui-Gon said. "It'd be an invasion of privacy. And besides, we are guests in her home, correct?"
Obi-Wan looked at their sleeping hostess, the only bed (which she was sleeping in), the other, much smaller dirty sofa and the single chair that was missing a leg.
"A real five-star hotel."
To Be Continued…