Disclaimer: I don't own anything in this story except for the plot and Joad. The rest belongs to the geniuses.
Summary: When Joad was little, her father taught her about Mandalor folklore. Her favorite Gods had been the Gods of irony. When irony was afoot, it was said you could hear them laughing and snickering. Joad swears she can hear them now.
This is a redo of a previous story that I decided to go back and read while I was picking it up again. You know what? I hated it. So, here it is, all sparkly and new, fresh off the press! Well, not really fresh, since it will take me a day of two to write the first dang chapter, and not off the press, seeing that would be illegal, as this is a spin-off of a famous-type story. And the fact that there is no press for the Internet....
Ye Gods! Chapter 1
Stranded, Alone, and Totally Welcome
Inside the ship, the scream of the cannons could be heard all too well and were deafening. Outside, however, there was total silence. Even the last cries of the pirates, granted that they could squeak one out, were lost to all before they were atomized. Even if they could be heard across the empty space that separated the battling ships, Joad Fett would not be bothered by them. If one let death cries get to you in her business, one would go insane, or drop out and leave room for the heartless.
Her cold dark eyes stayed on the front window and the various screens that adorned it that followed the other ships. He hands flew over the controls and she barked out various commands that her ship followed to the word. She was confident in all that she did, yet a trickle of sweat rolled down her face and dripped off her nose. Others slid down and ran by her temples. She was alert to everything, to ever flashing light on her control board to every ship that bombarded her; she was full of adrenaline. Nothing could knock her out of her concentration. Even when she blasted a second ship to atoms, in every sense of the word, she had no time to celebrate.
So later, looking back, she had no idea what had gone wrong.
She was annihilating her attackers, who she had no idea who they were. She suspected that they were more than simple pirates, for they would have fled by now if they were. There were two more ships yet, and she still had the odds staked up against her. Any idiot could pilot a ship and kill people, and to outsmart those idiots, one had to use nasty tricks that often resulted in the death of the opponent, which was their purpose. The joy of it was, her father, the notorious Boba Fett (a/n: if you're making disgusted sounds right about now with the whole 'daughter of Fett thing' because I would be, you can read 'Mistakes Happen' which is not, I repeat, not some gushy Fett romance. Not a romance at all!) had made them up during his youth, and some of them where of her own invention. She gave one of her maneuvers a try. With some talented flying skills, she pulled her ship, much sleeker and flatter than Slave I, in to a fast sideways spin, the intent of which was to take her past her attackers in a seemingly out-of-control way.
It was a good move and may have fooled others, but it still needed improvement and a blast rocked her ship, which sent it reeling out of control. Another blast which broke her restraint strap and she flew across the cockpit. Dazed, Joad struggled to her feet and fund that the gravity was off- a very bad sign. She propelled herself toward her helmet, floating on the other side of the room, then, as she shoved it on her head, a calm voice echoed calmly through the halls.
"All passengers are to evacuate the ship immediately."
Why did they make those voices so damn calm? Joad composed self was shaken just has the ship now shook under the fire of her attackers. The lights in the hallway dimmed and flashed and Joad pulled herself through the door. She glided down the narrow hallways toward the escape pod with the calm woman's voice in her ears the entire way. If anyone else saw her, they may have compared her with a black and red wraith from the smoothness of her glide. After what seemed ages and more explosions than comfort allowed she reached the escape pod and swung inside. The door hiss closed behind her and she could hear and feel the pod leave the ship and blast away. (Little known Fact: due to most of the users of escape pods being blasted to smithereens by the attackers that forced them to evacuate in the first place, the Escape Pod Inc. made their products fast appose to slow, which is the reason thy are that way.)
Joad had never been in an escape pod before, but she had always supposed that the ride was smoother than what she was now experiencing. She was thrown from side to side, and tossed this way and that. After what seemed hours of brutal lurching, Joad felt her pod hit something hard, hopefully a planet. The striking of it, as well as going through the atmosphere, was by no means more pleasant than the ride. When a calm female voice told her that it was safe to exit, and the door hissed open, Joad was sure she would feel relief at being out of the terrible enclosed space of the escape pod.
But something was wrong. The feeling prickled along her skin, down to her toes and up her legs, down her arms, up the base of her neck. More importantly, her gut twisted dangerously. Yes, something was very wrong.
And then it struck her. Joad looked down suddenly as the breeze ruffled her hair and brushed the cloth around her legs. Her armor! Where was it?
Joad tried to suppress a shriek of pure terror, but succeeded only in falling backwards with a squeak into the escape pod. No, Joad was not in the nude. She was wearing strange clothes, clothes that she had not seen before, ever.
"Zarking podo," she growled, climbing to her feet. "Were the zarkit did these come from?" one hand strayed to her hip for her absent blaster while the other gripped air for a knife she didn't have. She turned circles, eyes the dark forest that surrounded her. Was it a mind trick? Were the Jedi toying with her? Was it the Sith, even though they were, theoretically, dead? Or maybe she had received a good knock on the head and had gone insane.
Gradually, the forest, the trees that were unharmed reached above her to block out the sunlight, remained silent. Joad's eyes darted around, but without the aid of her helmet, she could not see as far as she would have liked. Unable to do anything but, she let off a long string of words which would have made a less mature teen blush, or laugh, depending on who you know. Once determining that nothing was going to jump her from the forest, at least until she turned her back, and that silence was its natural state, she entered the escape pod once again to look for her missing armor. Finding nothing, she returned to the forest to sit dejectedly on a rock near the pod.
What had gone wrong, anyway? Joad made a mental list of all the weapons she had used that day. Nothing strange there. Where had she been? An outer-rim planet where if you shouted the name 'Boba Fett' in the middle of a crowded market square, they would look at you strange, or not at all, and go about their lives none the wiser. Then she had gone to Nal Hutta. That was where someone would sabotage, if sabotage it was, her ship. Sabotage was the only thing Joad could think of that could have gone wrong. Either that or that her mysterious attackers were better than her first impressions, which she highly doubted. But that just did not sound right.
The merchandise had been this old man who ran an antique shop with stunning blue eyes. She remembered his eyes because they hadn't quivered from her stare. He had fixed his eyes on to where her eyes were, which was creepy in itself because the point of her mask was so people couldn't tell, but the eyes had been such a riveting blue. He came quietly enough, rattling on about how this owner, her implorer oddly enough, had just insisted on buying this cupboard for his wife, who would just love it. Unfortunately, the antique merchant hadn't wanted to sell that cupboard because it had a nasty habit of 'eating' people and putting them in odd places, unharmed, usually, but always in a frightened condition. The buyer had then brought out the big guns and had forced the old man to sell it to him, at half price, no less! Joad had not paid any attention to this, but he had her interested in his shop. Unable to fight her growing curiosity of his shop as he prattled on about all that he sold, she stowed him safely away and went to have a peek.
That was, of course where the trouble had started.
Joad had never seen a book before. She had never even heard of them, so, naturally, it caught her eye. It was small, pocket sized if you cared to carry it with you, and had a hard blank cover with minute decorative latched made of polished silver. It was a dusty red and the binding black, and the whole thing cracked with age and just sitting there on the shelf. The pages were yellow and quite stiff, and-
Joad ran a hand along the black robes that fluttered around her in the breeze. There it was, in a side pocket, like the pocket was made just for that book. Joad pulled it out and stared at it. She had read it some of it, skimming it mostly, on the way from Nal Hutta. She had gotten to the last page and had time to think about it before the mysterious foe had attacked.
And now your journey begins... it had said. What was that supposed to mean anyway? And what kind of ending was that? It wasn't even a story, more like a guide book. It was all very imaginative really, this little world, with a government and history, not less. It was a 'How to Survive in My Made-Up World' guide book, for surly all the things in the book were not real. Right? Right?
Joad took out the book and unclipped the fine buckles and opened it to the first page, expecting to see what she had first seen- and promptly dropped it.
Come now Joad, you're being silly. The letters faded away. Look to your left. And Joad looked. There, sitting oh so innocently a few feet away was a domed-top wooden trunk with metal studs and bindings. The book fluttered a little on the ground to grab her attention. Stop dawdling and start walking...and keep this book open!
Naturally suspicious, Joad's eyes narrowed. "Why should I trust what you're telling me to do?"
What else can you do? Joad imagined a exasperated voice to go along with the words. Head toward the big oak and keep in a straight line. You'll know when you get there.
"Where?" Joad's voice was monotone, with a dangerous edge. No matter how talkative (ok, ok, writative) the book had been earlier, it remained silent now. With out a sound, though inside Joad was bursting with frustration, Joad rose to her feet and walked cautiously towards the trunk. She flipped the locks and sprung it open and jumped back in one movement. Nothing happened. The trunk sat placidly with its top wide open for all the world to see. Joad peeked in and saw, staked neatly, clothes similar to the ones she was wearing, along with a broomstick, which she had never seen before either, and another smaller stick. Beneath those were thick text books and under those....
Joad picked up her helmet and put her forehead to its cold surface reassuringly. She considered putting on her armor.
The book rustled. Don't put that on. It's not the kind of things the natives wear. Joad read the message and turned away, digging for more of her black and red weaponry to make sure it was all there. The book rustled again. You're trying to fit in. Now get moving.
Joad sighed and put her helmet away under all the clothes and books. Before she closed the trunk, she grabbed the book and tossed it in there. She saw a quick Hey! Before slamming the trunk shut and locking it. It must be some kind of advanced technology with a computer chip inside disguised as an old book, she figured. They could make robots with personality, and there could be a hidden camera to look at what she was doing.
And so, figuring this and with nothing else to do, she started off. The forest was dank and dark, and it remained eerily silent. The rustle of leaves in the underbrush, the faraway sound of hooves, the occasional hoot of owls and evil-sounding chatter of the black squirrels in the treetops, it all was there to create a totally creepy environment.
But as she walked on, dragging her trunk over gnarly roots and snagging plants, Joad began to notice that the trees were thinning, and, without loosing any of its menacing aura, little bits of sunlight squirmed through the branches. A little trail appeared and Joad stepped on to it. It appeared well-used and defined; obviously some kind of sentient beings lived on the planet for the trail was more than a simple game path.
Joad was fit and strong, so dragging the trunk was not a problem for her. What tugged at the back of her mind was, if she was attacked, she would have to fight hand to hand combat. Not that that was particularly unnerving for her, as she had been trained for that all her life, but that she had no idea what lived on this planet. She decided it was worth the time to get a blaster out; if she was confronted by natives who seemed too primitive for it, she could simply hide it in her robes until she could put it safely in her trunk.
You're not as bright as you pretend to be.
"Oh, shut up." She grabbed a blaster and slammed to lid closed. With a blaster in her hand, Joad felt much more confident then she had previously. And then suddenly, she came to the end of the forest.
A building loomed nearby, made of stone and there were what must have been more than a hundred towers. A giant lake expanded out beyond that, and all around the castle and lake was the forest Joad had just walked through.
Somewhere to her right a door slammed. Joad turned, blaster aimed, her initial shock at seeing a giant stone structure forgotten. There was a little round hut with a thin wisp of smoke coming from the crocked tin chimney; behind it in a little garden, were a variety of strange plants, the majority of which were small, round-ish, and bright orange. Behind the hut a ways was a stone paddock that looked as though more than half of it continued into the forest.
But Joad didn't see any of that. Her eyes and blaster were trained on the being coming toward her. Hesitantly, since he looked primitive and friendly, Joad slipped the blaster out of sight.
Her first thought was that it was a wookie walking toward her, for it was certainly big enough to be, and it looked hairy enough. But then she saw that it was wearing clothes and boots and had a specifically human gait. When it got closer, she saw it was a man; she could see his beaming smile underneath his tangle of wild black hair. He had black eyes that crinkled around the edges when he smiled and his big arms were open in welcome.
When he got close enough to talk to her, he said in a jolly, loud voice:
"Welcome to Hogwarts!"
