Chapter 3
Tolobay waited anxiously as the Jedi starfighter returned to her bay. She didn't display any nervousness outwardly, with crossed arms and feet set apart, firmly planted into the ground, but she chewed the inside of her cheek as the vessel came to a stop.
Once the flight steps were installed, she moved confidently up the ladder to speak to the Jedi in the cockpit. She rested her chin and hands on the edge of the casing.
"So?" she prompted. "Tell me," she said, eyes serious.
Master Kenobi seemed a little taken aback by her abruptness but he recovered quickly and offered her a grim smile.
"It has improved. That much is certain," he said.
She noted how he referred to the starfighter as "it." Clearly, he was not one of those people that had a love for these beautiful machines.
"The thermoregulator is now working perfectly," he continued. "Even the Nav is less laggy and the controls are more responsive," he said before pausing for a moment.
"But?" she asked, feeling as if there was a "but" coming on.
He pursed his lips and rubbed a hand over his beard.
"There was a rattle," he said softly.
"A rattle?" she said, straightening abruptly.
A rattle was bad news. Any loose component in a ship could do considerable damage when exerting extreme g-force.
"Where?" she demanded, her brows knitted together in concern.
He gestured behind him.
"In the aft, on the right-hand side."
She turned to R4 who was still embedded in the ship.
"Did your sensors detect anything?" she asked the droid.
He emitted a series of slow and thoughtful bleeps. Something along the lines of: inconclusive, more data needed. She frowned.
Out of the corner of her eye, she thought she caught the Jedi smiling at her for a moment but once he noticed her gaze he quickly returned to thoughtfully stroking his beard. She must have imagined it, she thought to herself.
She slid down the flight steps, using her hands to slide down the rails and skipping the steps altogether. Highly improper for someone who had just been dictating the health and safety manual to a padawan but she didn't care. She was free to put herself at risk as much as she liked. Somebody else doing that on her flight steps was an entirely different issue.
Once she had extricated R4 from the fuselage she asked him to display a holoprojection of Master Kenobi's flightpath.
"Whereabouts did you hear this rattle?" she asked the Jedi, looking at the flightpath with her hand resting worriedly on her chin.
Master Kenobi mirrored her behavior unconsciously. She hated the way she always noticed things like that… She forced her arms to drop loose by her sides. He didn't seem to notice her sudden discomfort.
"There and there… I think," he said, pointing to two points in the path.
One was an acceleration before a vertical loop and another was during a sudden reverse in direction of a barrel roll. That left the possible causes pretty wide open. She was going to have to investigate this thoroughly.
"Alright," she turned towards him. "Don't worry, Sir. I'll get to the bottom of this."
Sweat dripped down the side of Tolobay's face as she attempted another maneuver that would generate extreme stress on the ship's hull. She had even resorted to turning off the inertial compensator to try and troubleshoot the problem faster. Over the last few days she had flown then tinkered then flown then tinkered again what felt like far too many times. But still, despite securing every suspect component she could think of, the rattle persisted.
As she entered another yo-yo sequence, the com. flickered to life with the voice of Shi-Fei:
"Are you alright out there Tolobay? You've been out there for hours," the man deep's voice sounded worried. "And your flying pattern is very erratic. Either there are some invisible space pirates chasing you up there or you really need a break," he said.
She looked at the levels of oxygen left in the ship's storage tanks and noted that she had only about an hour left. She was close though. She could feel it.
"I'll be wrapping up shortly. Just one last run," she said before closing the connection.
"Anything, R4?" she said into the headset.
R4 buzzed back a decided negative. She was going to have to try something else. As she pondered, she flew to the very edge of the dead zone to prepare for her last try. As she thought through the possibilities, she made her decision.
"Alright R4, I'm going to corkscrew it. Keep the reverse thrusters prepared to activate on my signal."
R4 bleeped his acquiescence.
"Alright then Tolobay. Don't lose your lunch over this," she muttered to herself.
Before she could think about it more, she activated the thrusters and after a couple of hundred meters, forced the controls hard to the left and began to spin.
She had outfitted the cockpit and internal fuselage with as many motion sensors as she could find. They were all now hooked up to R4 who was monitoring for any spikes in vibration or sound as they flew. As the spin started to become tighter and faster she hoped that this would be worth it…
As the revolutions per minute started to clock up she began to feel the g-force pushing her back into the cockpit. She held on tightly to the controls.
"Anything?" she managed to breathe out.
But R4 still came back negative.
As her eyes began to blur the stars in her view into spiraling rings she closed her eyes to reduce the sensory overload.
As blood began to fall through her body and pool into her legs the harness began to inflate and compress against her abdomen. It relieved her light-headedness for a moment but it was a short-lived relief. She started the special breathing techniques she had learned and the muscle exercises. She was at 7g and creeping steadily to 9g.
She knew she was close when alarms started to call out from the dashboard. She ignored them. Just a little more. She heard the sound of an incoming hail, most likely from the spaceport but even if she wanted to, she didn't have the strength to speak or activate it manually.
Finally as a numbness was beginning to descend down her head and neck, R4 came to life: Found it! Thank heaven's stars, she thought to herself.
She immediately reversed the controls to counter the corkscrew. R4 acted on her signal to engage the thrusters to slow down their revolutions. When they finally came to a stop, she accepted the incoming hail. It was Shi-Fei.
"Tolobay! Are you alright?"
Tolobay leaned back in the seat and gulped down air like a gasping fish out of water.
"Everything is… fine," she panted, breathless.
There was a pause where it sounded like Shi-Fei was rubbing his face with his hands.
"You're a maniac…" he said finally.
She smiled.
"So it was a weakness in the frame?" Obi-Wan repeated, slowly.
Tolobay nodded at him.
"Yes. Right here," she pointed at R4's holographic display. "This strut here would begin to resonate at 8.5 gs so I added some reinforcement. Now it will take 1000gs before you'll notice it. Though of course, you'd be dead way before that due to g-force," she said seriously.
Obi-Wan straightened from looking at the hologram.
"Well, I can rest easier now that mystery is solved. Thanks to your persistence."
She nodded at him brusquely.
"Any time."
She then walked to the workbench where the small pile of mobility sensors were slowly growing in number as she extricated them one-by-one from the vessel. He returned his gaze to R4 and uploaded the flight data from her test flights from the astromech unit to his datapad.
Out of curiosity, he pulled up the last run she had performed and frowned at what he saw. Where in the stars had she learned to fly like that?
He opened his mouth to call her over when his communicator demanded his attention. It was Master Windu calling him to the Jedi Council Chambers. His previous thoughts forgotten, he made his way back to the Jedi temple.
Two months passed before he saw her again. It had been a welcome respite not to have to travel off-world but with the trials and tribulations of managing a padawan such as Anakin, he had begun to feel restless for a change of scene. So at the next opportunity for excursion he volunteered himself. However once he received his new mission, he regretted it.
His latest mission was to travel to the planet Hoth to investigate what was believed to be illegal weapon testing activities. He was to collect information and if he had enough evidence and could find the suspects, bring them in for questioning by the Senate.
All of this he was perfectly capable of. What he wasn't so comfortable with, however, was the gigantic asteroid field he would need to pass through to descend to the surface. He had contented himself with the fact that he had never had a better ship to navigate through the treacherous and chaotic ringbelt. Unfortunately despite this, the trip was not without incident.
"What… happened?" said Tolobay, her eyes wide in shock as she took in the pockmarks and missing chunks of hull on his ship on his return to Coruscant.
There was no major damage and the shields had protected against most of the micro-asteroids that were too small to avoid but he still felt a brief flash of guilt when he looked on it.
Anakin was stood nearby, having come down to greet him on his return and was trying to unsuccessfully hide his smirk.
"Have you tried flying around the asteroids, Master?" he asked, trying to keep a straight face.
Obi-Wan felt his temper flare but bit back a retort. He returned his gaze to Tolobay who was walking around the outside with a flashlight to investigate the areas of greatest damage. He waited for her to finish her assessment before coming back to him. When he looked into her face he saw frustration, which was to be expected as he had damaged her prized starfighter, but he also saw to his surprise that she looked… tired.
"Tell me," she said softly, in those words that he was rapidly learning were her unique catchphrase.
He couldn't tell if her soft tone implied: repressed fury, sadness, tiredness or all three. He ran a hand through his hair whilst he thought of what to say. He had no idea why he was feeling ashamed about the situation. It was her job to maintain his ship and ships were always damaged eventually. But she was different from the other engineers he had had. She put her life and soul into that vessel. Almost as if it were a living being. He shook himself from his thoughts.
"I'm not sure exactly what the problem was," he said thoughtfully. "But the maneuverability was sub-standard."
He noticed her right fist clench at that and chastised himself silently for not being more delicate…
"I suspect there was excessive play in the controls. Particularly when banking to the left," he said, thoughtfully stroking his beard.
She looked at him, her eyes intense in their scrutiny.
"Excessive play… Are you sure?" she asked him.
He bristled.
"Well each time I tried to fly to the left the whole ship would lurch to the right. If that's not excessive play, I don't know what is," he said, frustrated.
Obi-Wan suddenly realized how tired he was. He needed a hot shower and a meal.
There was a beat where all she did was stare at him, silently. But instead of retaliating or reproaching him for his outburst as he expected, she turned around and consulted R4.
She sat down on her stool and consulted R4's holographic image of his flightpath through the asteroid field and cross-referenced it with her datapad. After a few moments of watching her studiously examine R4's output, Obi-Wan rubbed the back of his neck and turned away to head to his apartment. She would need some time to complete her assessment, he reasoned to himself.
As he made his way over to his padawan, he was surprised to hear her call him back.
"Sir? May I speak with you for a moment?" she called out to him.
He shared a look with his padawan who gave him a smile as if to say: rather you than me. Sighing lightly, he crossed his arms inside the sleeves of his cloak and went to her.
As he stood before her, she didn't raise her eyes from the hologram as she said to him in a low voice:
"It would be best if we continued this discussion in private," she said, pointing a meaningful glance in Anakin's direction.
He raised an eyebrow at her but her gaze was firm.
"Very well," he acceded wearily.
He turned around.
"Anakin, this is going to take a while so you go on. I'll meet you at my apartment later for dinner."
Anakin moved forward.
"Maybe I can be of some help?" he offered.
Drat, thought Obi-Wan. He tried to think of something else to say but was interrupted.
"Don't you have a certification to study for?" came the voice of Tolobay behind him. "Or have you given up already?" she said, with a hint of a smile.
Anakin's lips quirked and he crossed his arms.
"You wish," he replied.
Master and padawan shared a look together and finally Anakin gave in.
"See you later, Master," he said, offering him a small smile before heading out of the hangar.
With his padawan now successfully distracted, Obi-Wan returned his attention to the stoical form of his mech.
"So… what was it you didn't want to say in front of my padawan?" he asked warily.
She stood up from her stool.
"I've found the cause of the… excessive play," she said calmly as she picked up some bearings to clean with a cloth from her back pocket.
She held one up to the light to inspect its edge.
"And?" Obi-Wan said, unable to hide the impatience from his voice.
She looked him coolly in the eye and said:
"Pilot error."
Obi-Wan narrowed his eyes at her. How could it have possibly been his fault? Now it was his turn to be direct.
"Explain," he ordered.
Tolobay pointed with one finger at his ship as he banked left on the hologram.
"You're anticipating your moves. So when you decide to bank left you are tilting right first," she explained. "It's a common habit among pilots with less refined ships. However, I calibrated yours to be tuned to your force-sensitive reflexes."
Obi-Wan rubbed his beard thoughtfully as she spoke. Now he understood why she had wanted to speak to him alone.
"If what you say is true, what is the best way to correct this? I can't be fighting my own ship when I fly. Can't you make it less sensitive?" he asked.
Tolobay grimaced.
"Practice makes perfect, I'm afraid," she said grimly. "Even if I turn down the sensitivity, it will take you the same amount of time to adjust to that than to adjust to the current settings."
Obi-Wan rubbed the bridge of his nose between his forefinger and thumb.
"I can't keep crashing into asteroids, Tolobay," he said, frustrated.
"You didn't crash," she corrected him. "All the damage you collected was from debris. I'll have her fixed in no time," she assured him.
But he didn't feel assured. He was not going to be the laughingstock of the entire hangar.
"I don't think you understand," he said sharply.
He put his hand on her upper arm and didn't notice her tense as he moved to speak to her more closely.
"A Jedi cannot be perceived as reckless or out of control," he said urgently.
Her dark eyes looked up at him under long lashes that he had not noticed until now. Her mouth was drawn in a thin line.
"I thought Jedi weren't meant to be proud," she said with a look that pierced him.
He could see disappointment in those eyes. He dropped his hand and rubbed his eyebrows.
"That is true," he said with a sigh.
He had let his fear get the better of him. This… would not do.
Tolobay looked as if she was about to speak to him again but he waved a hand to stop her.
"I must think on this. Leave it as it is for now and we will discuss it later," he said abruptly.
She nodded solemnly and watched him as he left the hangar. Now was not the time for problem-solving, he thought to himself. He needed rest.
Obi-Wan found himself avoiding the hangar for a few days. At first he convinced himself it was necessary to focus on resting and recuperating but once he had recovered and provided his findings to the council, which had unfortunately led to a dead end, he found himself finding other things to distract himself from thoughts of his ship and Tolobay.
His current distraction was the whereabouts of his padawan. He had prepared dinner for them in his apartment but Anakin hadn't showed. Anakin knew that Obi-Wan had gone to the trouble of making one of his favourites: Ahrisa, from his home planet of Tatooine. It was unlike him to miss it.
Taking his cloak, Obi-Wan made his way to the dorm that Anakin shared with another padawan. When he found he was not there, he checked the Temple library and a few of the training rooms. He finally visited the gym where Anakin was fond of practicing his lightsaber technique but with no luck.
After all other possible avenues had been searched, he sighed with resignation as he realized that he must be with Shalaanx.
The hangar felt quiet at the end of the day. Most of the crews and engineers had retired for the night but a handful still lingered about their vessels, performing some maintenance activities. As Obi-Wan walked down the side of the hangar where Anakin's starfighter lay, he was relieved to find him working side-by-side with Shalaanx.
As he approached the workbench, the Kel Dor turned to him and nodded respectfully before moving away. Anakin was deeply absorbed in his work, not noticing Obi-Wan approach until they were stood shoulder to shoulder. He looked up at him in surprise.
"Master, I didn't see you there," he said quietly in a subdued tone.
"You should be more mindful of your surroundings, my padawan," Obi-Wan chastised lightly.
This earned him a small smile from Anakin who appeared to be disemboweling the innards of some form of motor.
They remained in silence for a few moments as Obi-Wan watched him work.
"Is something wrong?" Obi-Wan finally asked.
"How do you mean?" Anakin replied, tugging out some wires roughly, his jaw tense.
Obi-Wan could sense his frustration palpably.
"Well I specially prepared some ahrisa in my apartment but you didn't show," he said.
Anakin leaned back and groaned, finally looking at his Master properly for the first time.
"Oh, right. I'm sorry, Master. I forgot. I was… distracted," he sighed, returning his eyes to his work.
Whatever had disturbed him, Obi-Wan surmised that he was clearly trying to avoid thinking about it.
"Tell me," he said softly.
Anakin chuckled softly.
"You're beginning to sound like Engineer Tolobay."
Obi-Wan responded with a weak smile but tried not to think about her. Anakin rubbed his dirty hands on a spare cloth and turned to lean his back against the workbench.
"I suppose you're not going to leave me alone until I tell you, are you?" asked his padawan.
Obi-Wan joined him, leaning on the bench.
"What do you think?"
Anakin nodded and sighed again.
"Alright then. You'd only find out about it sooner or later anyway."
Given that Anakin wanted to keep this from him, Obi-Wan had a strong suspicion that he had been in contact with the Masters of the Jedi Council. He only hoped it hadn't been Mace Windu. Those two did not get along…
"I asked Master Yoda for funding for the certification," he finally explained.
"And?" Obi-Wan prompted.
"He said: To be a Jedi Knight, this path you take, you do not need," quoted Anakin, even mimicking Master Yoda's frail voice.
He didn't do a bad job of it, Obi-Wan thought to himself.
"So now I've almost completed the training, even practiced with real equipment that Shalaanx let me borrow and I can't afford to get the certificate. Tolobay will not let me hear the end of this," Anakin grimaced.
"He's right, you know," said Obi-Wan.
Anakin nodded slowly.
"I know, I know. And I'm sure the credits would be put to better use elsewhere in the order. I just… I'm not comfortable working alongside Shalaanx anymore knowing that he's putting himself at risk for me."
Obi-Wan stroked his beard thoughtfully. He understood what was driving Anakin. He had seen enough of it in Anakin's old room in his apartment. Anakin was gifted when it came to fixing things and it was one of his primary means of relaxation, given that racing was out of the question for a Jedi. And it did seem a waste after he had put in all the effort already.
"If it means that much to you Anakin, I'll fund you to take the exam," Obi-Wan said finally.
Anakin looked at him, surprised.
"How do you have the credits for that?" Anakin asked.
"I have my ways," explained the older Jedi mysteriously.
What Anakin didn't know was that Obi-Wan often bartered and traded on other worlds taking local artifacts between them. He could make a small but tidy profit that would allow him to keep an emergency fund. This wasn't exactly an emergency but he was willing to make an exception.
Anakin stood up abruptly and wrapped his arms around Obi-Wan who patted his back charitably.
"Thank you, Master!" he said, pulling back and grinning. "You won't regret it, I promise."
Obi-Wan straightened his cloak as his padawan pulled away. There would come a time when Anakin would no longer display that kind of affection for him. He tried to remind himself to enjoy it whilst he could.
"You'll only have one chance though," warned Obi-Wan. "I'm not funding a retest."
Anakin smiled.
"Have faith, Master."
Obi-Wan nodded and smiled at his padawan.
"I need to tell Shalaanx," said Anakin, who promptly turned on his heel and left in the Kel Dor's direction.
Left alone, Obi-Wan's gaze roved to the starfighters situated across the hangar. Most were in darkness, lit only by the pulsing standby lights of the astromechs behind them. But when his eyes found his starfighter, although the lights had been dimmed it looked like Tolobay was still at work in the cockpit.
"Tolobay?"
Tolobay felt her shoulder being gently shaken.
"Tolobay? Are you alright?"
Tolobay straightened, suddenly awake. Her drowsy eyes adjusted to the dimmed lighting and she realized she had drifted off in the starfighter. She rubbed her eyes with the palms of her hands before she noticed the Jedi looking at her from the flight steps.
"Master Kenobi!" she exclaimed.
She felt a blush slowly begin to creep up her cheeks. How long had he been there? Had he realized that she had been…? She batted those thoughts away.
He watched her solemnly but there was a slight look of amusement to his eye as she struggled to orientate herself. She glanced at her chrono.
"It's late," she said. "Is there something you need my help with?" she asked.
The Jedi's cool eyes started at her for a moment. She resisted the urge to look away and held his gaze calmly. Was he going to reprimand her for their last discussion?
"I wanted to thank you for your insight," he said quietly, his gaze moving into the distance. "I have not had such clear feedback on my flying technique in some time," he said with a small, wry smile.
"You're welcome," she said, a little uncertain.
She still wasn't sure where he was going with this.
"Would you be willing to help me… correct my bad habits?" he asked slowly.
She could tell that he was finding this topic unpleasant to discuss.
"Of course," she said, as if they were having a completely normal discussion. "I've prepared some beacons already that you can use in a practice run."
Obi-Wan nodded thoughtfully, a slight furrow in his brow.
"Right… Is there any way this exercise could be done in a more… private manner?" he asked her with a pointed look.
She resisted the urge to roll her eyes. How was she going to put this softly?
"I heard a saying once," she said focusing her gaze on him. "The best leaders are not afraid to show their vulnerabilities but show their wisdom in taking pains to address them."
Obi-Wan raised his eyebrows at her.
"How very sage," he said sarcastically.
Tolobay allowed a small smile to tug at the corner of her mouth.
"It's true though," she said quietly. "There's…" and she almost stopped herself from continuing but she pushed on. He needed to hear this, Jedi Master or no. "There's no shame in it. It's only you that sees it that way."
She looked up again to find his eyes staring at her but not in the same way as before. Well, he had thanked her for her "clear" feedback just now.
"You're not my first fearful flyer," she explained.
He leaned in closer, curious.
"No?" he asked.
So he didn't deny it. That was at least something. She shook her head.
"It's more common than you think," she explained. "That's not to say I've been successful in helping all of them. I'm pretty sure I put a padawan off for life," she sighed. "He was unfortunate enough to have been my first."
She rubbed her eyes, sadly.
"There's not a day that goes by where I don't think about it and wish I'd done it more tactfully."
She looked back at the Jedi to find him staring at her with eyes of disbelief.
"What was his name?" he asked.
Tolobay shrugged.
"That's the worst part. I don't know. I only saw him once before I got shipped off-world to the colonies."
She frowned as she tried to remember the name of the Jedi that her supervisor had thought so well of.
"I think his Master's name was Qui-Jee? Or Quin-Jen? Sorry, I can't remember."
She had been so angry and sad that day that she barely remembered any of the details.
"It's probably a good thing. I don't want to scar him any more than I already have done," she shrugged.
"It can't be…" said the Jedi beside her.
She looked at him, confused.
"What?" she asked.
But he was moving his head to study her from different angles, his hair glistening as it turned in the dim lighting.
Finally he became still. She watched him, worried.
"Well I'll be damned," he chuckled.
She had never heard the Jedi laugh before. She smiled awkwardly, not sure whether she should or not.
"Well I can assure you of one thing, Tolobay," the Jedi said smiling at her.
She tried not to feel too disconcerted.
"Yes?" she asked, uncertainly.
"The scars were worth it."
She raised her eyebrows at him. What in the stars? But then suddenly it hit her.
"You're the flyboy?" she whispered.
He nodded gently.
"And you're the flightless pilot that I thought I would never see again."
Tolobay sat stunned in the cockpit. She studied him as intensely as he had just done to her and she realized it was true. Although it had been well over a decade since they had last seen each other, the eyes, the shape of his jaw, his nose, were the same. How had she missed that?
Master Kenobi reached out his hand and offered it to her to shake.
"A pleasure to finally make your acquaintance, Engineer Tolobay," he said with a wry smile.
Tolobay felt a wave of relief wash through her. She took his hand and shook it firmly.
"And you, Master Kenobi."
As they shook each other's hands and looked at each other, their laughter echoed around them.