Star Wars: The Unlikely Hero
--sparkvallen

Disclaimer: Star Wars is copyrighted by Lucasfilm and associated companies. I do not own any of the Star Wars characters, settings, etc.

Chapter Ten

By the time the Chadra-Fan ambassadors had caught up with the Jedi again, the duo had convinced as many as they possibly could within the lowlands to evacuate. They were headed back to the spaceport when both parties met.

"You have done wonders!" Ambassador Serry exclaimed. Forty nodded his agreement.

"Thank you," Kire said, speaking for them both. "Is there any other location we can assist at?"

Both Chadra-Fan shook their heads, their large ears twitching. "This was the most difficult… and stubborn area, thank you. We are wondering though if you could stay on-planet just a little longer to assist with something else."

Yeah, why it's flooding, Falco thought.

Forty said exactly what the Padawan had been expecting to hear, explaining that neither their geologists nor their meteorologist natives could make sense of the situation. He went on to elaborate upon rumors of some sort of trickery that no one could prove in the rush to evacuate. He impressed upon the Jedi that if there were any secret plot to be uncovered, they were the best trained and prepared to deal with such a threat. Kire and Falco exchanged bemused glances; they were technology freaks who were hardly the crime investigation types like Obi-Wan Kenobi had been with his master, Qui-Gon Jinn. Still, they were already on Chad and had wondered the very same thing.

"We will look into this rumor, Ambassadors," Kire said to their relief.

"Where will you start?" Serry asked.

Falco bit his lower lip, lost in thought. "Your people already know there's no historical basis for this, right? No other time in Chad's history where there has been flooding to this extent?"

"This is correct."

Kire looked on as Falco began exploring the situation through questions. "Has Chad remained loyal to the Republic with everything that's going on?"

"Of course!" Forty squealed, his Basic strained.

Kire nudged Falco through the Force. It was the same as tapping a non-Jedi on the shoulder to get their attention. The Padawan was subtle enough to not blurt out, "What!" at the nudge but instead paid even better attention if there was something his Master had noticed just then.

"Don't be upset - we just have to think about everything here," Falco said reassuringly. "After all, dark times are affecting… like the whole galaxy!"

"There is no problem, Jedi Volt! We just know that Chad is very loyal to the Republic!"

Falco nodded, almost feeling bad for having posed the question at all. The look on his Master's face though puzzled Falco even more; he could see there was something in Kire's expression that he was supposed to understand but the Jedi Knight was not speaking to him through the Force to explain. When Kire still did not speak up, Falco addressed the ambassadors again.

"Can you get us a speeder, please? This mission might take us out of the immediate area, you know?" he asked politely. "And a map! Or at least an on-board map so we don't get lost! Thanks. Also… some sort of direct connection to Chad's political library--"

"But we're not--"

"Just in case, please." Kire's tone was far too soft and commanding all at once. Falco whirled around to look at him, realizing he'd just used a Jedi Mind Trick on Serry before he could protest further.

Okay, wow, the Padawan thought.

"Thank you," he added. "That should be all we need right now."

"Right away then!" Forty and Serry said at the same time. They scurried off, their robes soaked from their knees down on their much shorter bodies.

Falco turned to Kire and looked up at him. "Okay, what was the nudge for? I'm sorry; I don't understand."

Kire crouched down to his Padawan's eye-level, taking care to gather his sodden robes about him so they didn't get any wetter. "You had an insightful theory there and I was congratulating you for the realization."

Falco's eyes widened. "What'd I realize?"

"The Separatist connection."

"Huh? Oh, you mean the question about loyalty to the Republic?" Falco asked. "But I didn't mean anything by it. Like… I was just quizzing them and trying to think."

"And in so doing, you prompted a thought for me that's worth our exploration," the Knight said patiently. "We are good with mechanicals and computers but the answer here lies in what people are doing, what nature is doing."

"But people can't make it flood without using technology," Falco pointed out.

"Another excellent point." He nodded, looking down at the murky waters at their feet. Kire guided Falco up to a drier point of the catwalk. "Let's see what we can find here on Chad that's making it flood… and why."

In a rusty and worn speeder, Master and Padawan rocketed over the swampy conditions that seemed to cover every inch of land on Chad. With Falco once again at the controls, Kire was free to quickly assess the databases the ambassadors had managed access for at Falco's request. While Falco was driving them around and searching for any others who could be persuaded to head to the evacuation shuttles, Kire was poring over Senate proceedings, trying to see if the Chad senator had created any determined enemies through his voting process. He found nothing.

Thinking of Falco's accidental question of loyalties, Kire began looking at Chad strategically. If the Separatists might someday plan to secede, he wondered what political or technological advantage there was to the bog-like world. Still, there was nothing that Kire could directly link to which was perplexing; he was sure his Padawan was onto something, intentional or not.

Suddenly, Falco pulled over off of what was left of the roadway.

"What is it?"

"This way." Falco leapt from the idling speeder and began trudging his way over the swampy land. His expression was full of determination, sensing something that Kire did not.

Kire climbed out and hurriedly followed his Padawan, trying to get a sense of what had caught the boy's attention.

"Here. Lookie what we have here!"

Kire stared in surprise at the data-crunching box-shaped droid that was plugged into a remote computer system. "Falco… how did you--?"

"Sensing energy, sensing the Force. You know, like how we're taught?" Falco smiled as though it were perfectly obvious.

"But the Force is part of life," Kire said, wondering why he was lecturing the Padawan at all.

"These are alive. In their own way," he insisted. "You have to listen with another part of your mind, trust me."

Kire just stared.

"I wonder what this little guy is up to…" Falco looked away from his master to focus on the droid before him.

He bent down to study the computer arm that came from inside his hull and plugged him into whatever network he was accessing. It was clear that the droid's AI was so low that he had no idea that the two Jedi were standing over him. The "trick" was going to be gaining access to the droid's brain or finding some means to learn what he was doing.

"We have to make sure he doesn't stop what he's doing," Kire reminded gently. "Whoever set this droid out here would know if--"

"--his work suddenly stopped. I know." Falco grinned and pulled out his pocket datapad. He opened up the adapter and punched a few commands into the datapad, ensuring that his own data wouldn't be lost in this effort.

"The plan?"

Falco couldn't believe Kire was really trusting him to handle this when he was the more experienced. He tried not to beam with pride and instead just do the job. "Add my datapad as a peripheral device, programmed to record the droid's instructions and progress."

"You can manage all that?"

Falco's smile widened as he looked up at his Master. "How do you think the cafeteria menu was set to such good food for so many days in a row?"

"You!"

"I had run this same program as an experiment on the cafeteria droids. Learn their instructions and progress. In that case I just… well, modified those instructions a little."

Kire shook his head, shocked and amused. "It was a good trick… now get going then!"

"On it."

Falco turned back to the droid and inserted the adapter end of his datapad into the peripheral sockets of the box-like droid. He smiled with satisfaction when the datapad wasn't rejected and could only sit back and wait while it gathered the information they needed.