It was a rare occasion, as all four of the master-padawans were currently in the same room, and none of them were attempting (however politely) to kill anyone else. But the situation was no fun party as you might imagine; they were actually meeting to discuss various things involved with the visit to Hoth.

It was also a sort of semi-rehearsal for the same, which required Mel to wear the dress she was rapidly coming to despise. The redness was rather overpowering in such large amounts, and she'd wanted the black one anyway.

Obi-wan was in the middle of instructing them on the proper way to use the various new and suspicious looking utensils, when there was a loud BANG. Naturally, everyone stood up and began making the usual stupid remarks that follow such happenings, such as "Wonder what that was." "You have any idea?" "What was that?" though there was absolutely no chance of them actually being answered.

Unfortunately, the BANG was followed by a sudden lurch of almost an entire 90 degrees. Mel grabbed onto a table, but that didn't help much as this began sliding too. Katie also tried to grab onto the most stable object within her reach, which turned out to be Vader himself.

Before long the world had righted itself, though there was another great lurch as they set down not so gently on a hard surface. Mel was still partially upright, hanging on for dear life to her table. Obi-wan looked rather unfazed. Though the abrupt tilt had startled him, he had enough mad Jedi skill to keep himself on his own two feet.

Katie as well had had a relatively easy time herself, though she looked rather embarrassed to be discovered hanging off of Vader like a typical, love struck teen. Letting go rather hastily, she looked about for something to comment on.

"Well. Apparently Mujab was mistaken." Obi-wan commented, referring to the less-than-reliable tech supposedly in charge of replacing the stabilizers. He didn't look very concerned, more like this was an amusing addition to his day.

"I'm going to kill him." Vader looked much less than amused; though his face showed little emotion. Without another word he strode from the room.

"Did either of you like Mujab much?" Obi-wan commented, again as lightly as if nothing out of the ordinary was going on.

"He was nice. Why?" Mel dusted off her hands, noting with a bit of bitter disappointment that she hadn't managed to rip her skirt.

"Because I wouldn't be surprised if he made good on that threat." This comment seemed to be addressed to Katie more than Mel was; though the other girl wasn't listening.

- - -

As it turned out, the disturbance had been due to the fact that they had just made good their landing on the Ice planet. True to Obi-wan's word it was exactly as he had described it. Large, cold, and empty. Every here and there large half-globes were sunk into the crust, which served as both a base for the diamond mining business and to provide livable quarters for the people that worked said mines. The ship docked into one of the largest, where the current family-in-power was situated. This was how most of the 'governing' of sorts was done, whoever currently had the most money was given the most power.

Obi-wan found this a sad state of affairs given the thriving democracy that had been from Before, but that was the price you paid.

Mel was slightly less gung-ho to go exploring, but the desire to get out was still nearly overpowering. After having been worn down by a near hour of constant begging, Obi-wan had agreed to take her outside, though he was starting to regret the promise. She'd looked so very discouraged when he'd turned her down the first forty-two times, so he'd relented, but bouncing about on the back of a tauntaun for hours with an overexcited student was not going to be fun.

Of course, things snowballed after he'd reluctantly agreed, with Katie pressuring her own Master to get them out of the artificial atmosphere of the ship. Surprisingly enough he had agreed as well, though he'd made sure to send Obi-wan plenty of irritated looks behind their backs.

In any rate, this culminated in exactly what the poor, put-upon and tirelessly worked Master Kenobi (bundled up in nearly fifteen layers until he looked like a penguin) following his student about on the back of the thing that looked like it should have died out a few hundred million years ago. That is, after the obligatory snowball fight.

Poof! The massive chunk of snow landed square on Obi-wan's ear, sending uncomfortable wet melty bits down his neck. I wonder who did that… he thought, with as much sarcasm as he spoke.

Of course, Mel spoiled the entire 'secret' charade by giggling loudly. He sighed, looking down at the saddle morosely. This was going to be a long ride But at least it was with someone he could mess with… Without turning around, he caused an equally large chunk to go flying into her face.

"This means war!"

- - -

Katie was having about as much fun as her counterpart, though it was in a less obvious way. As there was an obvious but unstated rivalry between the two, Vader had made sure that they'd started out earlier.

They were also taking a more 'educational' view of it, as he was more giving a tour of notable spots than just chilling in the open air. The landscape was admittedly beautiful, once you got past the cold. There was no wind at all that day, and what sun got through the clouds illuminated the shiny silver coatings of ice on the outcroppings.

The point they were trying to reach was a large, impressively deep crevice (known creatively as The North Crevice) to the north, which had all the effect of an icy Grand Canyon. The edges were uneven, and wickedly jagged as though they would be sharp if you touched them, and great fells of snow blunted the sharpness at intervals. Altogether, it was breathtakingly beautiful.

With a small gasp, Katie drew off the goggles to take a better look. "Oh my god…" She whispered. It was all she could say.

He looked vaguely happy, mostly at the idea of having managed to please her. Not that he had realized that this was any sort of motive at all until she'd looked up at him, eyes full and shining…

A deep-throated bellowing to their left shattered what could have been a sentimentally lovely moment.

"What the hell was that…?" Katie asked, looking back at him thought this time it was more from fear than any wonderment.

Though he could have responded coolly, or even mockingly, something stopped him. Perhaps it was the way she was looking at him. Or the way he found himself looking back. "Wampa." He replied. "Nasty yeti-like thing, hides out the caves waiting for travelers to walk by. Huge, bad-tempered, and it'd just love to eat us." Thinking quickly, he dismounted. Reaching into a deep pocket, he drew his lightsaber. Turning its head to the side he slit the underbelly of the tauntaun, making a face as it slid to the ground, stinking. "This should keep it busy, and off of our trail."

Without another word he jumped up on her unharmed animal, taking hold of the reins. Katie did not say anything either, though she found her heart was in her mouth at the idea of being so very, very close to him.

If she weren't certain it was just the effect of all the fresh air, she'd swear she was in love.

- - -

Mel keyed in her password sometime later, happier than she'd been in a while. She'd just had a wonderful time outside, and even managed to score a genuine compliment from Obi-wan about her snowball-making technique. Some of the guards at the building's entrance had joined them, turning it into a rather vicious war. Mel's group had dubbed themselves the insurgents, and managed to capture Obi-wan's group's main fort. This had lead to a triumphant victory, with them ceremoniously whitewashing several of the more irritating opponents (obviously Obi-wan would have killed anyone attempting that on him, so Mel had to be content with getting snow down the back of his neck).

Much to her surprise Katie was already in the room, and looking rather happy as well. Katie was standing in front of the mirror brushing her drying hair, humming (on key, for once) the song 'A Whole New World' from the movie Aladdin.

"Wow." Mel began stripping off her heavy outer layers, sending drops of water flying everywhere. "You find a diamond lying on the ground somewhere? Or was it just a shiny rock?"

Katie chuckled, making a face at the mirror so Mel could see. "No… I'm just happy. The outing put me in a good mood, that's all." She went back to humming.

Mel grabbed a towel and began drying off her own sodden locks. "Whatever you say… but oh man, it was brilliant. Me and Obi-wan had the most extreme snowball fight…"

"That sounds great! I would have loved to get him with a snowball…" She made a throwing motion, nearly whacking the mirror with her brush.

"Yeah, but he was really good. So we got these others to play, turned into a giant war." Looking around, Mel found Katie's stash of bobby pins. Using them as the people, she re-enacted the day's epic battle.

This led to a pleasant hour or so they spent just talking, and being together. Though Mel hinted at it several times, Katie never did explain what had made her so happy. After all, she was probably just hallucinating. And even if she weren't, it wouldn't come to anything right? Not that her friend would approve anyway…