"What happened?" Rey cried in joyful disbelief.
Somehow, inexplicably, the oncoming First Order Starfighters had scattered and allowed Jenny to pilot their ship easily past them. Soon after, the rocket craft had jumped to light speed.
Or so Rey assumed at first, but she began to wonder if Jenny's claims about her ship might be true. Instead of the streaking lines of hyperspace, the spacecraft's wraparound port showed a field of swirling indigo hues and some sort of storm clouds. Storm clouds?
Jenny calmly flicked a switch on the controls, seemingly unconcerned by the strange sight through the window.
Jenny glanced at Rey over her shoulder. "Like I said, perception decoys," she answered. "They projected a perception filter field out front of us. It's like an energy shield that deflects eyesight instead of weapons fire. While the field was active, they couldn't see us unless they concentrated extra hard. Confuses their instruments too."
"I've never heard of anything like those," Rey said, eyes still trained on the swirling madness outside the window. She barely remembered what she and Jenny were talking about. "What..., Jenny what am I looking at? It doesn't look like hyperspace."
Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Jenny grin cheekily. "Rey, meet the time vortex."
"Is it...really? No, it can't be," Rey whispered, concentration slowly absorbing into the spiraling, stormy chaos.
"Why can't it be?" Jenny questioned, a slight note of offense in her voice. "Why can't you accept the possibility of other things besides the ones you've grown up with on your desert world?"
Rey flicked her eyes to the other girl, emotional defenses raised. "I know about lots of things. I'm not some desert slum rat."
"Easy, I wasn't saying you were, was I?" Jenny soothed. "I'm only saying you seem dead set on refusing to believe anything I tell you."
"I...I..." Rey's lips moved, but she couldn't think of an adequate response.
Suddenly feeling very tired, Rey sagged against the flight harness. "What's the plan now, anyway?"
Jenny's grin widened. "Here's the best part: We can go wherever you want! Mind you, I could've said 'whenever,' but like I mentioned earlier, the manipulator is damaged somewhat. So yeah, your galaxy, my galaxy, take your pick!"
Rey merely stared, mind struggling to process the meaning behind Jenny's words. "Anywhere...in the universe?"
"Right you are," Jenny replied.
Rey shook her head in disbelief. She pinched the bridge of her nose. "I don't know..." She looked up again. "All I know right now, is that we should avoid Jakku for a while, but I need to get back there once the First Order leaves."
"Back there? Why do you want to go back?" Jenny questioned. "We can go literally anywhere!"
"My family," Rey insisted. "They'll be coming for me. I don't want to miss them."
Jenny's eyebrows raised. "We can go find your family. Why wait, let's go meet them! You can introduce me."
Folding her arms, Rey stared at the floor. "I...don't know where they are."
"Hmm," Jenny replied.
For a minute or two, the only sound in the rocket craft was the hum of the engines.
"Sounds like you've got the same problem I do," Jenny said finally.
"What? What do you mean?" Rey asked.
Jenny sighed. "My dad. I'm looking for him. But I have no idea where he is. He could literally be anywhere. Past. Present. Future. Here. There. Anywhere. He's got a motor like mine, but ten times better. Mine's scrap compared to his. I've been searching for him for a month now without any luck."
Rey studied Jenny again in the dim, reddish glow of the ship's lighting: her youthful, pretty face, her lithe form and deft hands.
"How did you get separated?" Rey asked. "Why are you looking for him?"
A dark expression crossed Jenny's face. "He thinks I'm dead. I mean, technically I was dead, but then I woke up."
A chill prickled Rey's spine. "You came back from the dead?"
Jenny nodded. "Something like. Still don't understand it myself."
After everything else she wrestled to comprehend, Rey quickly decided to file this incredible nugget on a shelf for later review, to avoid going completely crazy.
"Anyway, my dad, he didn't even hang around long enough to attend the funeral, did he?" Jenny continued. "So by the time I woke up, he'd already gone."
"And then you...borrowed this ship," Rey finished for her.
Jenny smirked shyly. "Yeah."
Rey frowned. "So what were you doing here? Over Jakku?"
Now Jenny frowned too. "Getting conned, that's what. I bought an AT-2000 from a bloke on Ravager Alley in the Ord Cloud Run."
"What's an AT-2000," Rey interrupted.
"Anomaly Tracker 2000," Jenny clarified. "Specifically time-space anomalies. See, my dad hops around in a time machine too, so figured the easiest way to track him down would be to slap the AT-2000 on the vortex manipulator and go hunting."
"It would lead you to him," Rey reasoned aloud.
"Yeah, or so I thought." Jenny rolled her eyes. "The fellow who sold it to me seemed shifty from the start. I should've known it wouldn't work. First place it led me was your planet, where I nearly ploughed straight into a super spaceship." She twisted in her seat and slapped a spherical protrusion on the control panel that blinked a dull green. "And now the thing's going off constantly. Thinks there's an anomaly all around us."
Rey watched the blinking orb. "I wish it worked for you," she offered.
Jenny waved a hand dismissively, but Rey thought she saw gratitude in her eyes. "Whatever. Good news is, I have a plan B. And if you don't have anywhere you want to go right now..."
Rey smiled reservedly, intrigued. "No, no place in particular."
"Well, in that case, let's head to a friend of mine," said Jenny. She began working the controls. "Well, I say friend, but I've only just met her. I made a quick stop there before I ended up on your planet. But something about her... You'll see. Once you meet her, you feel like you've known her your whole life, or maybe like she's known you."
"Okay..." said Rey. "Why are we visiting her?"
"If the AT-2000 doesn't work, the vortex manipulator needs to interface with a stellar map," Jenny explained.
"Yes, system charts," Rey added, understanding. "You need to download charts of the neighboring systems. But there are lots of places you can access those."
"Ah, but this friend of mine, she's the type who carries lots of information, stuff you can't find in maps or computer databanks," Jenny explained, flicking a series of switches on the lower right corner of the panel. The hum of the ship's engine shifted in pitch. "I want to knock about in your galaxy for a while, see if I can learn anything to help me track down my dad. I also need to find a way to fix the manipulator."
"Makes sense," Rey said.
"The ship's computer, if you can call it a computer, still has the coordinates for this friend's planet," said Jenny. "And...here we are: Takodana!"
The spiraling storms of the vortex faded out of existence, replaced by a verdant green planet. Bands of white cloud flecked the emerald orb, and small seas wreathed its hemispheres. Jenny flew the ship toward the portion of the world cloaked in night.
Cloud cover soon gave way to a landscape painted in rays from the setting sun. Jenny directed the rocket craft into a dive, speeding over an evergreen forest. Rey's mouth fell open, enthralled by how much green flora met her eyes.
A towering stone castle came into view, bordered by a long lake. Jenny guided the ship to a top corner of the building. A landing pad emerged, hidden from view between architectural protrusions unless approached straight on.
Unfortunately, Jenny's approach speed seemed destined to splat the rocket against the hangar's rear wall.
"Slow down Jenny!" Rey cried, gripping the sides of her bench.
"I'm trying!" Jenny shouted.
Jenny heaved backward on a control stick, sending the ship's nose skyward. The rocket flew into the hangar at a near-vertical angle. The sound of thrusters scraping loudly along the floor reverberated into the cockpit. Rey clenched her teeth, squeezed the bench edge until her fingers stung, and prepared for the worst.
Miraculously, instead of slamming into the wall, the craft turned and crashed onto its belly at a perpendicular angle to its original flight path. Sparks and the screech of metal on stone filled the air.
Finally, the rocket ship skidded to a halt less than a meter from the wall.
Rey worked to unclench her jaw and tried even harder to open her clawing fingers.
"Blimey, close one!" Jenny exhaled.
"You think?" Rey snapped. "Next time I'll do the piloting."
"Whatever. This is my ship, remember?"
"Won't be your ship for very much longer if you don't learn how to pilot it."
"Oh, get off it Rey," Jenny said. "We've got more important stuff to worry ourselves over."
"Yeah, sure," Rey muttered, but she found she couldn't stay mad at Jenny for long.
"Tinny, you stay here and guard the ship," Jenny instructed the droid with a wag of her finger.
"Confirmed," Tinny replied.
Rey unstrapped herself from her bench and replaced her staff on her back. Both young women discarded their sand goggles, left over from Jakku. Jenny pressed the button to open the cockpit, and Rey and Jenny hopped onto the hangar floor.
Rey followed Jenny to an archway set in a nearby wall. Jenny led the way down a flight of narrow steps and along a much wider hallway. Aged glow orbs lit the passage. Rey could hear an undulating murmur of hundreds of voices emanating from somewhere nearby and below.
"She spends most of her time in the main dining area," Jenny said. "Probably there right now."
Jenny guided them down three more flights of stairs. The final passageway they entered opened into a wide chamber full of bustle, activity, scents of food and drink, and a huge variety of people from all parts of the galaxy.
Rey gawked, ashamed by her rudeness but unable to stop. She surveyed the swarming, chaotic commotion. A hodgepodge of species engaged in continuous rounds of laughter, eating, drinking, gambling, and cards. Band music hooted and tootled through the room.
"Jenny!" a feminine, reedy voice cried happily from across the room. "Jenny my dear!"
The crowd parted to reveal an extremely short figure clad in aged, yellowish brown skin, baggy maroon pants, handmade boots, gray vest, and blue-green sweater. An assortment of tech devices hung from a belt on her waist, a pair of goggle-like glasses shielded her eyes, and rings and bracelets dangled from her wrists.
"Come, sit down over here!" called the old woman. She indicated an empty table in the far corner, held up by three rickety, cracked legs.
Self-consciously aware of the sudden subdued noise in the room and the numerous stares focused on Jenny and herself, Rey followed Jenny through the rapidly dispersing throng.
The woman met them halfway. She reached out and clasped Jenny's hand as she walked.
"It's good to see you again, child," she croaked happily. A stern visage appeared on her withered face. "From your bandage I see you didn't waste time getting into trouble after you left here."
"Err, not too much trouble anyway," Jenny said, glancing meaningfully in Rey's direction.
The elderly woman's eyes narrowed slightly as they appraised Rey. "Hello. Who is your friend?"
"Hi. I'm Rey."
"Well Rey, welcome to my castle. I am Kanata. Call me Maz. Be sure to use my name if anyone here gives you trouble."
Rey smiled reservedly, amused by the contrast between the old woman's diminutive stature and the commanding presence she exuded.
Maz swung nimbly into one of the chairs at the table and Jenny sat next to her. Rey seated herself on the other side of the table, removing her staff but holding it securely in her hand. She regularly eyed the nearby patrons. A life on Jakku taught her never to let her guard down.
She caught Maz watching her closely, and somehow she knew the elderly lady read her body language clearly and discerned her wariness.
"Where are you from, child?" Maz asked Rey.
Rey hesitated before answering. "Jakku."
"And what brings you two out here?" She looked at Jenny. "Surely you don't need to refuel already?"
Rey noticed that Jenny also kept a continual eye on the room. "No, no, though maybe topping her off couldn't hurt." She leaned closer and lowered her voice. "What we could really use right now is some information: maps, and some helpful intel plus. Any luck on the research project I asked about last time?"
"Hmm," Maz said, studying her. Her eyes flitted to analyze Rey too.
"Still searching for family are you?" The question seemed intended for Jenny, but she looked at Rey when she spoke.
Rey shifted uncomfortably in her chair.
"Yeah, I am," Jenny answered, still in a low voice. "He won't get rid of me so easily."
"Hmm," Maz said again. She looked back and forth between the two girls. "As a matter of fact, I was able to find some interesting information in my archives. We can discuss it after dinner."
Rey observed the darkness outside the chamber windows, again reminded that she and Jenny had landed on the night side of the planet.
"More like lunch for us," said Jenny. "But fine by me."
"Me too," Rey added.
Maz requested food for them, along with some light caf. Rey stared at the meats and cheeses heaped on her plate for a full minute before finally overcoming her awe enough to begin eating.
Maz made small talk over the meal, mostly explaining the purpose of her castle, which was, as far as Rey could understand, sort of a refuge and political asylum for refugees and travelers. Yet the entire time she talked, Rey's instincts identified Maz's tactics to be predatory, or at least calculating. For though she did most of the talking, she spent her time closely observing Rey and Jenny's reactions. Rey expected to feel more guarded and suspicious about this, but she didn't. Perhaps because Rey thought she could see wise, searching, truth-seeking eyes behind Maz's spectacles.
...
A few hours later, past midnight by planetary standards, the three of them gathered in a basement room beneath the dining hall. Despite the late hour, plenty of banging, footsteps, music, and other ruckus drifted down through the ceiling.
Bookshelves lined the walls. Rey stared in wonder: Books were a rarity. She'd only seen one on Jakku, and from what she'd heard, other planets experienced a similar scarcity. Datapads, holos, and similar tech rendered information printed on paper nearly obsolete in the minds of most people.
Not Maz, apparently. Her short-legged stroll carried her to a book extending farther out than the others, and when she slipped the leather-bound volume off the shelf, she did so delicately and almost lovingly. She snatched a nearby stool, dragged it back to Rey and Jenny, and hoisted herself onto the seat.
"I searched for a day and a half before I found the information you seek," Maz said, hefting the book.
"Blimey Maz, you didn't need to do so much work!" Jenny exclaimed.
"Of course I didn't," Maz stated. "Now, I suggest you make yourselves comfortable. I'm going to tell you a story."
"Story?" Jenny questioned. "What story is that then?"
Maz opened the leather-bound book on her lap and turned the first page, but kept her eyes alternatingly fixed on the two girls.
"The tale of the Oncoming Storm," Maz said.
