Chapter 10 – Another Bender
Atton dropped his empty glass. It bounced twice and landed sideways next to his foot. His brain vaguely registered the fact that it was probably good that it had not shattered as it hit the floor, but he was too stunned to care right then. "I'm sorry, you what who where, when?" he exclaimed in a strangled voice.
Bao-Dur glanced apprehensively at the row of surprised faces lined up before him. He smacked his lips and hesitated. "The… General," he said uneasily, trying to decide whose face was worse to look at: Atton's, which was turning from white to purple, or Mical's, which remained consistently ashen. "I saw her a couple months ago on Ilum. I… happened to make a stopover there and I ran into her. The most peculiar thing, now that I think about it… I wasn't really all that surprised at the time… figured she was there for the crystals… Of course I had no idea she was supposed to still be in the Un—"
"The crystals?" asked Atton faintly, vainly attempting to recover from his shock.
"Lightsaber crystals," Revan purred. "Ilum has a Crystal Cave. I was there once. It only produces blue and green crystals, though."
"But Jena only uses violet crystals," mused Mical, his color slowly returning to normal.
Atton glared at Mical, as though the latter had no right to know the color of Jena's lightsaber. He felt obligated to add something to Mical's observation. "Why would she even be looking for lightsaber crystals anyway? She has a lightsaber," he stated unnecessarily, amazed at his own witlessness the instant the words came out of his mouth. Of course she has a lightsaber. Everybody here knows that!
Bao-Dur shrugged and ignored the lameness of Atton's comment. "She doesn't have it anymore. She only had vibroblades with her. Said something about having crash-landed on Rattatak and having had to fight in the gladiator pits to find her way off the planet, and that somehow in the process she had lost her lightsaber, seeing as she couldn't use it."
The carelessness with which Bao-Dur spoke of Jena's former predicament, coupled with the effect of the Spice liquor, made Atton a little dizzy. He turned a delicate shade of green, shut his eyes and shook his head violently in an attempt to stop the room from spinning, and to prevent himself from throwing up. "Whoa, whoa, whoa," he said. "Back up a minute. You say she crash-landed."
"Yes," replied Bao-Dur. "Despite the fact you weren't flying the ship," he added with a slight curve to his lips.
"She crash-landed on Ra… Rattatak," added Atton, ignoring Bao-Dur's flippant remark. "Now please explain to me what is Rattatak."
"Rattatak is a planet in the Outer Rim, near the Spor Sector, Jaq," said Revan wearily. "I have no idea why she would have ended up there. She was supposed to find…" Her voice trailed off and her eyes suddenly opened wide. She turned to Bao-Dur and asked eagerly, "Did she have anybody else with her?"
"No, was she supposed to?" the Zabrak enquired.
"No, I suppose not," said Revan regretfully. She tried hard to conceal her disappointment, and fooled all but Atton and Carth. The latter frowned slightly and the former looked at her curiously. Why would Jena…? Wait a minute. T3's message…Jena said something about finding 'someone'. Who is this person? I wish I hadn't drunk so much. I can't think. Revan pursed her lips and seemed furious with herself for having opened her mouth at all. An uneasy tension was felt among the fellow crewmembers, although most could not quite figure out why.
After a moment, Atton broke the silence: "Okay. So she was on Rat… Rattatak." He stammered as he tried to get used to the name of the planet. "She obviously got away from the planet, without her lightsaber… by… fighting in gladiator pits?" he asked incredulously. Bao-Dur nodded. Atton closed his eyes and took a deep breath. It's okay… She's okay… she obviously survived this…No need to panic at this point. He shook his head in disbelief and opened his eyes again. "Why again is it that she couldn't use her lightsaber?" he asked with an odd catch in his voice.
Bao-Dur seemed puzzled. "She didn't elaborate. Something about not wanting to be noticed." Well, I suppose that would go hand in hand with her hiding.
"And she somehow ended up on Ilum, which isn't far from here, I think," continued Atton, rubbing his temples.
"That's correct, Atton." Bao-Dur stuck his hands in his pockets and exhaled deeply, uncomfortably looking forward to the end of this interrogation. He wasn't used to being the center of this much attention, vastly preferring the company of machines to that of sentient beings.
Atton dropped his arms, walked up to Bao-Dur, grabbed him by both shoulders and asked desperately, "So where is she now?"
Bao-Dur wrinkled his nose over the strong smell of alcohol on Atton's breath. He turned his head slightly and looked down. "I don't really know. The only thing she did tell me was that what she was attempting to track down was proving to be a little bit more difficult than had been anticipated."
Atton looked crestfallen. "So she didn't say where she was going?" he asked dolefully. His hands started slowly slipping down from Bao-Dur's shoulders.
The Zabrak looked at him pityingly. "I'm sorry, Atton," he said quietly. Atton tried to smile despite his heavy heart, but the result was quite ghastly and made him look woebegone.
"Hey, it doesn't really matter…" said Atton, sporting his fake smile. "I mean, it's not like she'd likely still be there, right? You know how she is… can't even sit still five minutes…" He noticed he was still holding on to Bao-Dur's sleeve and let go. Mira walked up to Atton, put her arm around his shoulders sympathetically and said gently, "Come on, let's get you back to the ship…" Atton shook his head.
"You guys go on ahead without me," he said dismissively. He looked pleadingly at Mira. "Just… give me a couple minutes, will you?"
Mira shot a concerned glance at him, and looked questioningly at Revan. The latter nodded slowly. "I'll pick up your robe for you, Jaq," said Revan simply. "We'll meet you at the ship." She raised her eyebrow cautiously. "Don't be long," she added warningly. She looked at the others and, without a word, tilted her head slightly, motioning at them to follow her. She threw a handful of credits on the counter and walked out of the cantina, the crew right behind her. When the door closed behind the last person—Mira, who threw one last anxious look before leaving—Atton turned toward the bar and slouched down on one of the bar stools, his elbows on the counter, and held his head in his hands. Why am I so upset about this? Things are no different than they were before. In fact, I should be happy—I know that she was fine as of two months ago. But she was so close… and now I haven't got the slightest clue where to look for her. She could be anywhere.
The bartender stood near him, collecting the credits that Revan had dropped off for him. He looked at Atton puzzlingly and then counted his credits. He looked at Atton again, turned, and came back holding two full glasses, which he set down under Atton's nose. "Your lady friend gave me too much," he said gruffly, gathering up Revan's and Dustil's dirty glasses, and walking away with them in hand. Atton lifted his head and looked at the Zabrak.
"Thanks," he mumbled, picking up the first glass and reaching into his pocket to check that he had in fact taken his credits out of his robe and transferred them over to his new garments. He had. A faint smile developed on his lips.
When Revan walked back into the cantina half an hour later, utterly unimpressed, Atton had not moved from his spot. He was calmly sitting, carefully studying the bottom of his glass. "'Sup, Rev?" he said without turning around or even taking his eyes off his empty glass. "I may be have been drinking, but I still know you're there."
She pursed her lips. "This has got to be the longest 'couple minutes' I've ever witnessed," she snapped.
"Why? How long's it been?" he asked nonchalantly, slowly turning toward her. She stood, red-faced and with her arms folded.
"Thirty minutes!" she flared.
Atton grinned stupidly. "Impressive!" he said, half to himself.
"What's impressive?"
"The number of drinks I managed to fit in that half-hour," he said gesturing toward the neatly piled stack of glasses that had accumulated in front of him. "I'm getting better all the time. I was about to start building a castle out of the glasses, but then you had to show up and ruin my fun."
"You're drunk," stated Revan futilely, walking up to him.
Atton grinned again. "So what if I am, Lord Revan? What are you going to do? Force choke me?" He laughed sardonically.
Revan turned very pale and sat down next to Atton. "Jaq!" she whispered pleadingly, leaning toward him.
Atton's smile faded and he frowned. He stared at Revan as though he was remembering something. "Hey, wait a minute… You did, didn't you?"
"Let's just go back to the ship. We have to go," she said evasively, getting up again. "I mean—you do want to find Jena…" She rather hoped that last part would convince him to drop the topic and to follow her out.
Ignoring her comments, Atton seized her wrist, stopped her, and looked intently into her eyes. "You did, didn't you?" he repeated seriously. "I was drunk and you Force choked me. I don't remember what happened before or after, but I remember that." Revan froze for a moment, staring at Atton scrutinizingly, as though she was searching for something. Her eyes finally wavered and dropped.
"Yes," she hissed. "Yes, I Force choked you for no apparent reason—just on a power trip. I'm sorry," she said. "But that's not who I am anymore. You have to believe me."
Atton cocked his head and studied Revan closely, still firmly holding on to her wrist. "There's something you're not telling me. What happened after that?" He tightened his hold.
"Nothing happened," said Revan, wriggling her wrist slightly in a weak attempt to get it free. "You sat back down and ignored me. I was impressed with your nerve, because that would have normally sent everybody else cowering in the corner. And I… left you alone." She looked at the wrist Atton was holding. "Please, Jaq…"
Following her glance, Atton realized what his right hand was doing. He loosened his hold and cocked an eyebrow. "I don't buy it," he said as Revan quickly withdrew her arm and shot him a black look. "You're lying. But I'm too drunk to care right now. Come on my Lord, let's go back to your ship. I'll get back to drilling you when I'm sober."
Revan clenched her teeth and, without a word, turned around and stalked out of the cantina. Atton chuckled faintly to himself. Oh, I'm going to pay for this later, I can feel it. Still chuckling, he tossed a few more credits onto the counter, nodded his thanks to the bartender and proceeded to walk out. After taking a few steps, he staggered and regretted having angered Revan. Damn, that liquor may not have affected my head too much, but it sure did something to my legs. He wobbled his way out, looked over to his right, and could see Revan already well ahead of him down the road. He sighed resignedly, determined he would not call after her for help, knowing full well she would never let him forget it if he did, and proceeded to walk very slowly down the path to the ship. Nothing I've never done before… I've walked back to my apartment from the Telos cantina way drunker than this. He continued on his way, vaguely wondering if 'drunker' was even a word, but finally deciding that he honestly didn't care.
When he finally made his way to the Ebon Hawk, he immediately headed toward the cockpit—out of sheer habit more than anything else—and met Revan along the way. She was holding some brown fabric in her arms. She wordlessly tossed the robe into Atton's arms and kept walking past him without glancing at him, evidently still holding a grudge about their earlier conversation. He decided to slip into the security room to get changed. Having donned his own garments, he stepped back out and dropped his borrowed clothes off in the cockpit, where Dustil was playing pazaak with Mira. Seeing their pazaak cards made him mechanically reach for the spot where he normally kept his own. He frowned when his hand met an empty pocket. Pursing his lips, he walked as decidedly as he possibly could considering his drunken state, and made his way to the starboard side of the ship.
"Dammit!" he yelled belligerently as he practically stumbled into the garage. "Bao-Dur, I hate your entire stupid planet! They took away my pazaak deck!"
Bao-Dur set down his hydrospanner and smiled furtively before turning around to face him. "Now why would they do that, Atton?" he asked, fighting hard to repress a smile, trying to avoid poking at the angry drunken krayt dragon. "It's illegal to play pazaak, but strangely enough, it's not illegal to own a deck… which is probably a good thing for people like you, who carry one everywhere, regardless of whether they'll need it or not. I think your friend Revan would've rather let you rot in jail than get you out."
Atton started checking his pockets again. "Yes, she did express that sentiment already," he grumbled distractedly, patting down the sides of his robe. "Actually, I'm surprised she didn't make Mira take off without me." He frowned. "I need to find that card," he muttered under his breath.
"What card?"
"My plus one—" Atton stopped moving for a moment and peered cautiously at Bao-Dur. "Never mind," he said, resuming his search by feeling down the length of his legs.
Bao-Dur folded his arms. "Are you sure you left it in your robe at all?" he asked, amused at the scene. "You are pretty drunk, Atton."
Atton, hunched over, paused just as he was about to take off one of his boots and looked up smugly at Bao-Dur. "Yeah, I am drunk, and it feels pretty damn good, let me tell you. Cause for the first time since I set foot on this ship, I can finally worry about something other than Jena's safety… you know… like keeping my balance," he said, vacillatingslightly, putting veracity to his words.
Rushing to his rescue, Bao-Dur grabbed him by the arm and led him to the workbench. Atton leaned up against it, muttering something that remotely sounded like thanks. "I hope you've got some good hangover remedies on board," said Bao-Dur, smirking. "The stuff you were drinking really hits you hard the next day."
With the air of one who no longer cared about anything at all, Atton shrugged. "I'll worry about that when we get there," he said, slurring his speech slightly. "Maybe Mira still has those really good pills she swiped from Mical's stash last year." He glanced down at his tattered robes, and a puzzled expression developed on his face. "You know, this thing is a completely different color than what I remember. It's a much lighter shade of brown than I thought. I didn't realize it was that dirty. But then again," he mused, "I guess that's what waking up in Nar Shaddaa gutters almost every day for the past two months will do to you." He laughed, though his laughter was not joined by Bao-Dur's. The latter wrinkled his nose.
"Is that what you've been doing?" he asked, looking vaguely annoyed about something. "I thought you promised the General…"
Atton quickly let go of the workbench and stood up straight, furious, looking like he just sobered up. "I know what I promised the General, dammit! Why do you people keep reminding me what I promised the General, just in case I'd forgotten?" he spat venomously. "Like I'd be likely to forget." He quickly put his hands back where they had been as he felt the room spin a little. He closed his eyes. Why can't I keep my balance? I don't even feel that drunk anymore.
A wave of color rushed up to the Zabrak's face. If Atton's eyes had been open, he might have reflected that he had never witnessed such an occurrence. "Sorry…" stammered Bao-Dur. "I just… was wondering what you'd been up to…"
Atton opened his eyes and his expression turned sour. "You want to know what I've been up to?" he asked, exasperated. "Fine. I'll tell you… I worked my ass off on that Telos restoration for a year—a year—waiting for her to come back. And she didn't."
Bao-Dur stuck his hands in his pockets and he sighed. "She never told you how long she'd be gone, Atton," he said gently.
Atton shook his head. "Of course she didn't. I was hoping she'd be back by then, but she wasn't. But I could've dealt with that if she hadn't just… disappeared."
Frowning, Bao-Dur said, "Yes, Mira was saying something about you losing your bond with the General. What did she mean?"
"She meant Jena's gone. Missing. Disappeared. Vanished. Bye-bye." Atton's temporarily limited cognitive abilities prevented him from thinking of more synonyms. "I lost my bond with her—happened really suddenly one night four months ago. Scared the hell out of me. Force, I didn't know what to think…"
"Maybe she was in trouble…" muttered Bao-Dur.
"No… I mean, you saw her and she was fine." Bao-Dur nodded. "It's not that at all… She's hiding on purpose and Revan won't tell me why, and—" He heaved a frustrated sigh. "Anyway, I didn't have Revan around to give me vague useless words of encouragement on a daily basis then, so I didn't exactly think happy thoughts. At first I thought she was in trouble, like you. I kind of hoped she was, actually. I mean, not that I wanted her to be in trouble, but better in trouble than dead, right?" He tittered nervously and moved some of Bao-Dur's tools off to one side of the workbench, so he could clear a spot. He clumsily heaved himself up and sat down on. "But after a while… I wasn't so hopeful."
"So that's why you ended up on Nar Shaddaa," said Bao-Dur thoughtfully. "You lost your bond, you thought she was dead, you abandoned your post, and you…" He looked Atton up and down. "You started drinking heavily, I presume. Hence how you ended up in the gutters."
Atton glanced away shamefacedly, slowly sobering up. "What did she expect me to do?" he said inaudibly. "I thought she was dead."
"If I were to speculate, I'd say the General may have expected you to go on without her," said Bao-Dur a little sharply.
Atton looked dispirited. "I probably would've been able to… if…" His eyes dropped and focused on his feet as they dangled off the side of the workbench. "If I could stop thinking about the fact that the last memory she had of me before she died was that I had abandoned her while she slept. I've been feeling so guilty," he muttered, looking almost nauseous. "I didn't even let her say goodbye, and—" He swallowed with great difficulty. Why am I telling him all this? "She left me a message… on T3, you know… She told me not to worry about it, that it's okay." He forced a derisive laugh.
"Maybe it is," said Bao-Dur softly. Atton shook his head.
"Even if it's okay with her… It's not okay with me," he said firmly. "I shouldn't have left her. Not like that. She must've been really hurt when she woke up and realized that I had slept with her and just… bolted." Atton felt his eyes starting to smart and he pinched the side of his leg in an attempt to prevent himself from crying. I don't know what was in that Spice liquor stuff, but it's turning me into a girl. I need to stop talking!
There was an awkward silence, at the end of which Bao-Dur hesitantly asked, "You said you were only on Nar Shaddaa for two months… what were you doing for the first two?" T3 had just rolled into the garage and Bao-Dur waved him over and opened up his side panel.
"Oh, I kept working on Telos," replied Atton, grateful for the slight change of topic. "Only, maybe not as… hard. My motivation started wearing a little thin when I started to wonder whether she'd come back at all. Then one day I gave up and left and…" He frowned. "Well, the other two months are kind of a blur. I vaguely remember Revan showing up at the cantina one day and getting me to come along, and then I woke up on this ship." He laughed sardonically. "Let me tell you, waking up to discover that I'm on the same ship as Mical again is not my idea of fun."
Picking up his hydrospanner again, Bao-Dur chuckled. "Still locking antlers, I see."
"Yeah…" Atton looked perplexed and mumbled distractedly. "I don't know, he's gotten weird… I mean, not in a cryptic Jedi sense. He's always been weird like that. I mean he seems more… annoyed with me than before. He's always snapping at me."
Bao-Dur smiled as he started doing some maintenance work on T3. "Well, you are a bit much to take sometimes, I'll admit. No offense, but I never understood what the General saw in you."
"Gee, thanks," grumbled Atton, his eyes closing.
"That's not what I mean… It's just that for a woman who likes to be obeyed without discussion, her choice for you as a mate is… a little surprising."
Atton's eyes opened suddenly and he scoffed. "Any more surprising than me picking a Jedi?"
Bao-Dur grinned. "Fair enough," he conceded. "But as for Mical, I don't know what to say… I haven't had any time to talk to him yet. Maybe he had just… forgotten about you—and about the General—since we all parted ways a year and a half ago, and being around you again brought it all back with a vengeance."
Atton frowned. "Yeah, but… I mean, he was never happy with me, but he was never that bitter toward me."
Bao-Dur snorted. "Is that what you really think? You must have drunk even more than I thought," he said, setting his hydrospanner down on the floor and looking up at Atton in disbelief. "Oh, he did his best to hide it and to repress it. That's why he kept spending so much time meditating and reciting the Jedi Code. Not to mention that I think the General's presence seemed to have a soothing effect on him. But I could tell. Ever since that day when he and you had that first blow out on the ship, right after Dantooine—that day the General pulled you into the security room to… well, to yell at you. You must remember."
Atton smiled coyly. "Hard to forget," he muttered, recalling the scene.
"Honestly Atton I would love to spend more time talking to you, but all you ever seem to want to do is play bloody pazaak!"
"Oh, there are other things I like to do, sister!"
"Oh yeah? Such as what?"
He chuckled faintly. How I managed to not kiss her right then, I'll never know…
"Atton?" asked Bao-Dur, noticing Atton's glazed-over look.
Atton started violently and almost fell off the workbench. "Sorry, Bao. You were saying?"
Bao-Dur smiled indulgently and continued. "While you were getting yelled at—which judging from your earlier facial expression you may have been enjoying a little too much—Mical said something about being glad he wasn't you, when he first heard the General berating you. I told him he hadn't been around women like the General enough. He followed me and asked me to elaborate. I only told him that the General was very unpredictable… and told him what I had been noticing."
"Which was what?" Atton asked, suddenly remembering that he had not looked in his boots for his pazaak deck and pulling off the one covering his right foot.
"That the General seemed to have a soft spot for a certain pazaak-playing pilot," replied Bao-Dur, watching Atton with great amusement. "And I told him that after the little conversation you and I had after I came on board—the one where you asked me if I thought the General would be interesting in a guy like you—you appeared to reciprocate those feelings."
"I thought you said you didn't understand why she picked me," said Atton, reaching into his boot and immediately pulling his arm out, disappointed. He quickly put his boot back on and started taking the other one off.
"I don't understand. But it was still clear that she had a bit of a… weakness for you."
"So Mical has been resenting me since that day?" asked Atton incredulously as he shook his left boot upside-down, tapping on the bottom of the sole.
"Basically, yes." Bao-Dur's eyes followed Atton's hands as they pulled his left boot onto his foot.
"This is insane!" Atton threw his arms up. "Nothing had even happened between me and Jena then."
"And this is different from you resenting him… how, exactly?" Bao-Dur smirked.
Bao-Dur's point seemed to hit home, as Atton slid off the workbench and said grouchily, "This conversation is really killing my buzz. Can we talk about something else?"
"Actually, Atton, I do have a lot of things to do around here…."
"All right, then I'll let you get back to your stuff… Maybe we can talk later when I'm not so… drunk."
"That might be preferable."
Atton flashed Bao-Dur a tired smile and made his way toward the door, still staggering faintly. He stopped on his way out and hesitated. Without turning around, he stammered, "Bao-Dur… Did she… did she say anything about me?" He tried not to fiddle with his robe as he nervously awaited an answer.
Bao-Dur put his tool down and turned slowly to look at Atton. "No… But I mentioned you. And…"
Atton's heart beat a little faster. "And…?"
"And she blushed and her face lit up," said Bao-Dur gently.
Atton smiled, nodded, and walked out toward his dorm.