"Everything okay back there, Artoo?" Luke asked through a small microphone on the Noobian Cruiser ship's console. He'd felt the slightest twitch in the force since they had exited hyperspace. Something bothered him, but he couldn't figure what. Before them two planets loomed up, a grey quagmire world, and behind it a blue and green fertile-looking planet. Artoo beeped back a rapid, nervous string of binary. Luke looked at the small translation screen before him, but was suddenly reminded of Threepio's presence as the protocol droid spoke worriedly behind him.

"Oh dear. Artoo says the port engine is beginning to generate unequal radiation pulses..."

"How bad?" Luke asked.

Leia looked up from the console beside him, her questions and worries etched across her face. She said nothing. As Artoo beeped his reply Luke began to notice some difficulty in controlling the ship. "Now I can feel it..."

"We'll have to stop at the first base on Circarpous five and get this thing fixed," Leia said. Her very presence washed through him in the force as she spoke, soothing him.

Luke shook his head. He didn't look away from the planets ahead of them. "I think we can make it..."

Artoo interrupted with more binary chatter. "Artoo says we must land as quickly as possible," Threepio said nervously.

"Circarpous five might not even have an emergency standby station," Luke argued, though he turned the ship toward the swampy planet.

"There's a directional landing beacon, so maybe they do. I hope we don't miss that meeting. I have to convince them..."

"I know, Leia. We'll do what we can." He could feel her eyes on him, sense her like a tidal wave of mixed feelings. He had to risk a momentary glance into her eyes. He turned to her, but she looked away. Embarrassed, or afraid... he could almost feel her emotions. The ship rattled; Luke returned his attention to the moment.

Silence pierced the air while Artoo attempted to fix the ship's many problems, and Luke concentrated on flying the ship. He tried to quiet his mind, as Ben Kenobi had instructed, but it ran a thousand marathons in opposite directions all at once. He couldn't pick a track to follow. Luke eased off the acceleration, attempted again to reach out into the force. He eased his brain to silence until he could sense the world around him. The ground, the twisted, mangley trees, the ship, the Princess...

A sudden fear washed over him, ominous, foreboding. He swam his mind out of the force's gentle stream, longed for the chaos to retake his mind. Her voice pulled him free. "What is it, Luke?" she asked, attempting to conceal her concern.

"I sense something..." he trailed off. The battle-worn Noobian ship stole into the fog of the marsh-filled Circarpous V's outer atmosphere.

"What do you sense?" Leia asked.

"I think it's a... disturbance in the force..."

"I don't even know what that means," she said, her voice slightly tweaked with masked despair. She looked outside the ship to see what he was sensing, but they were surrounded by thick fog.

Luke took in a deep breath to calm his nerves. "I'm not sure I do either..." Again he could feel her eyes. They searched his face for answers. "It's just that I had a strong feeling... oh, I can't describe it. I wish Ben were here... he'd know." Luke turned to meet her eyes. Suddenly a tinny metallic voice smashed through his ears.

"We're doomed!" Threepio called out, pointing just ahead of them. They looked to the storm of multicolored electric energy that soon engulfed the ship. It raced all along the inside and out, swallowed it whole, and then passed on behind them. Luke pulled back on the controls to right the ship before it lost power. All the lights went out in the cockpit just as Artoo rolled in casting a faint blue light. The swarming, swirling electric storm lent flashing disco lighting to its discarded victims. Then the ship struck swamp, skidded and skipped, slowly easing into a stop. Luke wrestled with the ship's controls, to no effect. The ship stopped flat on a tree, jarring them all to a halt and sending Artoo into the back of Leia's chair with a high-pitched squeal.

Rain pittered upon the pane in front of them, the only sound. The smell of burnt silicon snuck into the air in small wisps of smoke. The sky flashed and flickered above them. Finally the ship's emergency powers kicked in, and Luke turned from his pondering over the strange storm to Leia. She stared at the fallen tree that had wrinkled the front of the ship in its effort to stop them.

"Well that could have turned out better," Luke said.

"It could have been worse, too," she said, turning to him.  She smirked, remembering where she'd first heard it.

Luke smiled, and became aware of the small motors in Threepio's neck propelling his brass head back and forth to watch them speak.

Luke and Leia's eyes met.

Artoo whistled and beeped into their silent moment. They turned to the droids behind them.

"Sir, if you don't mind my saying so, I think we should evacuate before this ship sinks further into the swamp," Threepio

said.

Artoo swiveled his visual sensor on Threepio and beeped at him curtly.

Threepio drew back indignantly. "Oh, who cares, you glorified paperweight! I relayed your message, didn't I?"

Artoo razzed him and rolled out of the room. Luke and Leia got up and gathered their essentials into a large pack, which Luke then placed on his back. Leia opened up the inner airlock door, and they all stepped inside. Leia and Luke each grabbed a mask hanging from a tube on either side of the airlock and put them on. Luke pressed a button on the wall and the inner door slid closed, then the outer door slid open. Another button extended the ramp.

Threepio followed Artoo out onto the crooked ramp, then stopped and turned back to them. "The atmosphere levels are perfectly safe for humans," he said.

They took off their masks and followed the droids down the ramp, carefully picking their way to the boggy surface of the swamp world. All around them stood endless swamp and glades, in every direction. "I think it's worse," Luke said.