They camped a few miles away from the grave site. The Jedi kept watch for the first night, wanting for Cherris to get some sleep that evaded her.
They had found a few dried up plants, which they had used to start a fire. It was almost burned up, the coldness of the night slowly creeping into Cherris' bones. Her ankle was about driving her mad; after long minutes of going through her pack, she had finally retrieved pain medication.
She lay on her back, staring up to the black sky, wondering what she had done wrong in her life to deserve something like this. Absent mindedly she began drumming her fingers on the sandy ground, catching the Jedi's attention.
He was sitting with his back to her, "You should sleep."
Cherris frowned, "I can't. There's too much on my mind." She sat up and rubbed her eyes.
Under different circumstances it would have been a beautiful evening. A soft, cool breeze had replaced the warm sunny afternoon and there was not a sound, except their own breathing.
"I can take over, if you want." Cherris suggested, "I'm pretty sure I won't be able to sleep anyway."
But he shook his head, "Rest. You'll need all your strength for later on."
Cherris rolled her eyes and sighed. She didn't want to argue the point and changed the subject, "You haven't told me your name yet. I'm Cherris, by the way."
He turned around and nodded, "Kyp." was all he said and nothing more.
Cherris thought back to the reports she had read about the Jedi. The name Kyp wasn't too uncommon among humans but if her memory served her correctly, there was only one Jedi named Kyp and he was the man who had blown up a planet.
She arched an eyebrow and cleared her throat, "Kyp. Hm. Is your last name Durron?"
He ignored her henceforth, the stars suddenly catching his attention.
Cherris didn't much care. She shrugged and lay back down, waiting for the first beam of yellow sunlight to show on the horizon.
Cherris awoke with a very stiff neck. She had used her pack as a make shift pillow; not a very smart idea, she had realized when sitting up. She stretched painful muscles and slowly got to her feet. She didn't know what time it was but already it was heating up.
Kyp stood a few feet away from her, one hand shielding his eyes as he seemed to be watching something.
Cherris grabbed her backpack and hurried to stand next to him – wincing just a little as she shifted her weight onto her other foot – , a smile surfacing as she realized what he was looking at.
"We didn't have time to name them yet." She said while rummaging through her pack, trying to locate her binoculars, "They're magnificent creatures." Cherris went on.
Large, round and lucid, the strange animals floated through midair. At first glance it seemed they travelled in packs and she watched with fascination as the creatures suddenly began to move more directly. At first Cherris thought this was their way to communicate; their entire body suddenly rippled, resembling a small water pool.
She dialed the magnification higher and suddenly caught sight of a rather large, furry spider-like creature scurrying across the sandy plain. And within seconds the round, lucid beings were atop the it.
Cherris heard Kyp suck in his breath as both of them witnessed the balloon like beings dive towards the spider. One of them caught head on and flattened itself atop the spiders' body.
Cherris dialed the magnification even higher and was appalled as she witnessed the lucid balloon fill itself with a very dark red substance. Within seconds the spider collapsed to the ground, seemingly drained of blood.
"Disgusting creatures. " Kyp muttered and shook his head.
Cherris wrinkled her noise, "Vampire balloons. This is new."
"Not so magnificent anymore, now are they?"
Cherris stashed the binoculars back into her pack and shrugged, "In their own way they still are. It's eat or be eaten; the oldest law of life." She heaved a sigh, "Still, I suppose it would be wise to move around them. I'm not too fond of blood-sucking balloon Vampires attached to my body."
She shivered involuntarily as a picture of one of the creatures hefted to her face appeared in her minds eye.
Cherris turned around and was happy to finally take a good look at her Jedi captor/rescuer. She wasn't quite sure which fit Kyp the best. She couldn't feel any hostile intent from him but still she wanted to be careful.
She didn't trust him.
He was taller than she was, with short dark hair and light green eyes. Cherris had to admit, the man was handsome. And at this thought she frowned at herself. Rolling her eyes and taking a breath, she limped after Kyp, who had began walking in the opposite direction, away from the balloon creatures.
"How do you know which way to go?" Cherris asked, shouldering her back pack.
"I just know."
Cherris hoped their future conversation would go a little smoother. If not, it would indeed be a very boring and uneventful trip.
"Fata Morgana." Cherris muttered, as she held up her hands above her eyes, again wishing she had thought of bringing a pair of shades for the trip.
Kyp, walking beside her, gave her a quizzical look.
"Am I seeing things or is that really a patch of green over there?" Cherris pointed.
To her surprise Kyp nodded, "Unless we're both having the same hallucination."
They had been walking for almost three hours, Cherris having to stop in between due to her ankle, hardly saying a word and continued on in silence. Unlike Cherris, Jedi Durron didn't seem to be a very talkative person.
So she started asking questions, "Do you know what happened to the others of my team?"
He shrugged, "When I got to you, the camp was already deserted."
Cherris sighed, "Well, they must have fled somewhere." Her voice trailed off as she thought about the whereabouts of her teammates. She hoped that they were alright.
They walked on – in silence – until the reached the beginning of the greens. It was a strange sight, Cherris thought; a beautiful, lush, green landscape with thick, tall trees in the middle of the desert. The scientist part of her brain tried looking for explanations as to how this was possible, whereas the skeptic part kept telling her to be careful.
"You know," she began, stopping in mid stride and letting her backpack fall to the ground, "I have a bad feeling about this." She knelt down, opening the pack and extracting a water bottle.
Kyp nodded absent mindedly and slowly walked towards the trees, one hand on his lightsaber. Cherris raised her eyebrows as she watched him move, throwing her backpack over her shoulder again.
She kept quiet while she followed him, not wanting to disturb whatever it was he was doing. She guessed he was using the Force. Cherris didn't know too much about Jedi only that they had powers normal beings could only dream of.
Well, according to various holo movies.
She hurried to keep up with him, moving alongside his tall form and watching him intently. He had a strange look in his eyes; Cherris supposed he was concentrating on something or someone.
There was a loud screeching sound and Cherris jumped, her eyes searching the sky for whatever had startled her so.
"What in the world was that?" she whispered.
"I thought you and your team already catalogued all sentient beings around here?" Kyp said and Cherris thought she heard amusement evident in his voice.
"Well, not everything. It would have taken months –"
She screamed as something dark and furry jumped towards her, lunging for her throat. Cherris dropped to the ground as she heard the snap-hiss of Kyp's lightsaber and relief flooded her body as the creature lay dead beside her; what was left of it, anyway.
Large, yellow fangs protruded from its mouth; Cherris looked for its eyes or something resembling a nose but the creature was completely covered in long, nappy fur.
"Thank you." She whispered, getting to her feet and moving away from the dead animal. Kyp shut off his lightsaber and Cherris frowned, "You have a purple lightsaber?", she asked incredulously.
He ignored her question and clipped his weapon back to his belt, next to her blaster, "We should keep going."
A shudder ran down Cherris spine as she shifted her gaze into the dark woods, "I wonder what else is lurking in there…"