"Well, look who's finally decided to grace us with his presence!" quipped Revan. She sat on Carth's lap in the pilot's seat. Atton scowled. That's my seat. A man who looked the way Carth would have in his early twenties, had he been clad in Jedi robes, sat in the co-pilot chair and looked curiously at Atton. Revan glanced at Atton approvingly. "Your robe's still fairly disgusting and you still need a haircut, but at least that growth is gone from your face and you no longer smell like… Hell, I don't even know what you smelled like. I didn't want to say anything, not to hurt your feelings…"
Atton scoffed. "Yeah, like you've ever cared about that, Revan."
"Hey," she protested, "I'm a completely reformed character. Ask Carth."
"It's true. She is." Carth then added behind his hand and underneath his breath. "You know she'll hurt me if I don't agree with her, right?" Atton grinned.
"HEY!" exclaimed Revan. "I'm right here! The least you could do is wait till I'm out of earshot or at least not sitting right on you to badmouth me."
Carth smiled. "Now, when have you ever known me to do that, beautiful?"
"You're lucky you're cute, flyboy." She leaned over and kissed him. Atton uncomfortably looked away. Is that how Jena and I were? No wonder the crew hated me…
"Aw, man!" muttered the younger version of Carth, rolling his eyes.
"Sorry, Dustil... Jaq…" laughed Revan, pulling away from Carth. "Right. You guys haven't met. Dustil Onasi, Atton Rand." Atton and Dustil awkwardly waved at each other. "Sorry guys… Carth and I haven't been back together for very long. I promise we won't always be like this."
"I hope not," laughed Dustil. "It's creepy."
"What do you mean, we're not always going to be like this?" exclaimed Carth, pretending to be crestfallen. "Dammit! There go my plans." His hand was rubbing her thigh and he smiled at her suggestively.
"Shut up, Onasi," she said, kissing him again.
Dustil looked away in disgust and Atton cleared his throat after a few seconds. Revan pulled away from Carth again and looked up at Atton.
"So… tell me…" said Atton. "How did you know to find me on Nar Shaddaa, anyway?"
"Oh, that was easy… I mean, Carth here was useless, because he didn't even know where you'd disappeared to when you left Telos… but your Jedi friend said you'd likely be on Nar Shaddaa. And hey, he was right. Although he was wrong about where you'd be… Thought I'd find you in the Pazaak Lounge. Man, it was a pain getting in there. That bouncer at the door just would not let me in without a password. I had to… persuade him to let me in."
"I'm really hoping by that statement that you mean you used your Jedi powers on him, and not what it sounds like you're saying," commented Carth.
"Whichever one makes your male ego feel better, babe."
Atton chortled. Well, I really must admit that this Revan is a lot less unpleasant to be around than the one I remember…
"So… where are we going, anyway?" enquired Atton.
"I told you! Coruscant!"
"Yes, but… you didn't tell me why."
"Oh. Well, there are a few people I want to see about something, and we have to drop Dustil off there…"
Atton sighed. "Okay… let me spell it out for you. Why am I here?"
"Well," retorted Revan. "I kind of figured you'd like to be there when we go get Jena. Of course, if you don't want to be…" She smiled innocently.
"Go… go get Jena?" asked Atton incredulously, his face lighting up.
"Aw… isn't he adorable, Carth? Just like a gizka. I can't believe I was ever mean to him."
"That's enough, Liah… Lay off the poor guy a bit." Carth's tone was gentle, but Revan suddenly became more subdued and spoke seriously. A Republic Admiral with that much power over Lord Revan… Never thought I'd ever see that!
"Yeah, Atton," she said smiling faintly, "we're going to go get Jena. At least that's the plan… She dropped off everybody's radar four months ago, and we honestly don't know where she is. She went off somewhere and was supposed to come back, and… she didn't. That's the bad news. The good news is, we don't think she's dead. We think she might have wandered a bit too far into the Unknown Regions… maybe got stranded somewhere, and might need help coming back."
"She said she was looking for someone and that she might be far and out of reach."
Revan straightened herself up quickly and Carth winced under the sudden weight shift.
"Sorry, Carth… What did you say, Jaq?" she asked.
"She said…" he began.
"Yes, yes, I heard that," dismissed Revan. "I was just wondering how you knew this. I thought your bond was… well, not severed, but… put on hold."
"It is… This is just what she told me in the message she left for me on T3."
Revan's eyebrows both lifted. "Message? Well, this is news to me. Can I see this message?"
"Well, I…" He hesitated. He didn't really want to show it to Revan… she would simply mock him as she had been doing ever since she walked through the door at the cantina. And it's personal stuff, dammit! She doesn't need to see it! No one else needed to see Jena telling him she loved him… that she missed him… that she hoped he was still waiting for her...
Carth peered at him and turned to Revan. "Liah, you don't really need to see the message, do you?" Atton threw him a grateful glance.
Revan shrugged. "I guess not… I mean I knew where she was headed… I just thought maybe there might have been a clue as to where she might have ended up…"
Atton resignedly sighed, turned, and walked out of the cockpit. "T3," he said as soon as he found the droid in the main hold, "I need you to come with me."
T3 seemed hesitant. "Dee-dweep deet?"
"What are you talking about? I did not hug you."
"Deet beep!"
"I didn't…" he began hotly, before taking a deep breath. "Look, I don't have time to get into this. Just follow me."
Atton walked back into the cockpit with T3 in tow. "Revan wants to see the stuff about Jena leaving," he told him a little bitterly. Great. It's bad enough the droid got to watch it the first time, now the rest of the crew does as well. Good thing Mical's not here…
The beam of light turned on again, and Jena appeared before Atton, Dustil, Revan and Carth.
"There's just one thing I really need to do before I go. I'm… looking for someone. Once I've found him, I think I might be heading back." The light flickered and the image jumped. "Anyway, I really hope this reaches you… in case at some point you start losing hope. I'll still be here, just far and… out of reach. So, don't give up. I'll come back just as soon as I'm done with this."
The light flickered off again. Atton tried to conceal a grin. Well, I guess I did just ask him to show the stuff about Jena leaving… Still… he didn't have to be nice…I really hope he doesn't think I like him now… I mean I hope it doesn't think I like it! It's a stupid droid. Why do I keep calling it 'he'? I've been drinking way too much.
Revan looked thoughtful. "Mmh… I guess you were right; there isn't much information in that message. Thank you, T3, you can leave if you want."
T3 rolled out of the cockpit, humming contently.
"So what now?" asked Atton.
"Now, we head over to Coruscant, like I said. Once we're there, we'll figure out what we do. You should go get some rest. You've ingested a lot of alcohol. I'm surprised you're still standing, actually. Carth and I are in the starboard dormitory… you and Dustil can share the portside one, along with Mical." Of course we can… all part of the sick joke that is my life. "We'll stay in the cockpit for tonight… starting tomorrow we can work out our piloting duty shifts. And I'm giving you a haircut."
Atton laughed derisively. "If you think I'm going to let the Dark L—"
"I'm giving you a haircut, dammit!" interrupted Revan heatedly. "If you think I want to step off the ship on Coruscant with a guy who looks like a cross between a human and a Wookiee…"
Atton shrugged. "Suit yourself." He started walking toward the door. "Oh, by the way," he said, turning around as he was about to walk out, "in case you kids are thinking of doing what I know you're thinking of doing once Dustil and I are gone, Mical doesn't seem to take the hint that if the cockpit door is closed, he probably shouldn't knock. And T3 just walks in if it's not locked. Thought you might like to know."
Revan laughed. "Duly noted."
Taking his hint, Dustil promptly got up and exited of the cockpit as well, shaking his head.
When Atton woke up, he confusedly studied the room around him. What? And then he groaned. He had remembered where he was and whom he was traveling with. Ugh. I was hoping I had imagined all this. I'd give up my pazaak deck to be waking up in a gutter on Nar Shaddaa right now… How drunk was I to agree to this? Revan is bad enough… but she had to throw Mical and that droid into the mix. He shook his head. He wasn't sure what time it was. It's always hard to tell with space travel… I'd forgotten what that was like. At least I didn't have to fight anybody for this bed. I swear, if Mical had tried to claim it, I would've described in explicit detail exactly what Jena and I did in it. He chuckled at the thought. Well, I'm certainly feeling cruel today… must be the hangover. I wish I had some of Mira's magical hangover cure pills, like the ones she gave me on Telos. I don't know what they were, but they sure worked. Maybe Mical's got something.
Atton got up and headed to the medical room in hopes of finding something to cure his massive headache. Mical was sitting on the floor, meditating.
"Oh, sorry, I'll come back later," muttered Atton.
Mical let out a huge sigh. "It's all right, Atton… what did you want?"
"I was just wondering what sort of drugs you had in here."
"Drugs?" asked Mical cautiously.
"Don't worry, I'm not asking you to be my spice dealer. I'm just looking for something for my headache."
"Oh." Mical rummaged through his cabinets and pulled out a few pills he thrust distractedly into Atton's hand. "Here. I'm afraid that's all we've got. Someone raided the cabinets before we reached Telos last year, and took all the good hangover cures. I actually thought you were the one who took them."
"No… must've been Mira," Atton said, regretfully glancing down at the pills he was holding in his hand. He popped them into his mouth and tried his best to swallow them despite his dry, pasty mouth.
Mical smiled. "Ah yes… Mira… How is she, anyway?"
Atton shrugged. One of the pills was caught in his throat. He coughed and swallowed again. "How should I know?" he said in a strangled voice. "I haven't seen her in over a year. I'm not her babysitter. We both took the same freighter to Nar Shaddaa, I saw her a couple times when I was there, then I came back to Telos, end of story." He hit his chest with his fist as he gave one final swallow. Finally! Stupid thing's gone.
"I thought you two were friends…"
"Hey, sure, we're friends, but it doesn't mean that we send each other birthday hologreetings or anything. What about you? Have you heard from any of the others?"
"No…" replied Mical. "I think Bao-Dur went back to Iridonia… I have no idea where Visas went… and last I checked, Mandalore was still on Dxun. But again, that was also a year ago. As for the droids, T3 is here, GO-TO never made if off Malachor, along with Bao-Dur's remote, as you know, and HK-47…"
"Irritated Query: Were there not enough meatbags on board already?" said a metallic voice behind Atton. "Unnecessary Clarification: I do not feel we required the presence of yet another one." Atton turned around quickly. "Surprised Recognition: I remember you, meatbag Rand!"
"No!" exclaimed Atton, rushing to the cockpit, passing HK along the way. "No, no, no!" he yelled at Revan as he burst into the room.
"What's wrong, Jaq?"
"For one thing, stop calling me that. And for another, why do we have that killing machine on board?"
Revan grinned. "I see you've met HK-47."
"Met him? I've gotten death threats from him repeatedly!"
"Well, of course… He is an assassination droid…"
Atton blinked. "And yet somehow you are not bothered by this."
"Of course not. Who do you think got him to use the term 'meatbag' in the first place? Malak hated that. I think HK's hilarious."
"You? That… walking hazard is your droid?" Now why does this suddenly make sense?
"Yes. Well, he used to be. You know… being Dark Lord of the Sith and all that… You should know – you keep reminding me of it any chance you get."
Atton leaned up against the wall, slipped down to the floor and held his head. Revan, Mical, T3 AND the homicidal droid!
"This is the worst hangover ever," he moaned.
Author's notes: Yes, I now realise I accidentally referred to Revan as "Jena" once in the chapter... Maybe it was wishful thinking on my part. ;) I can't believe I didn't catch that, considering how many times I proof-read this chapter. Anyway, thanks to those who pointed out the error to me... it has now been corrected. :)