— Sheila The Sixth, ? —
(What, it's not like being on the ground magically makes me know where we are.)

Obi-Wan's attempt to challenge me to a staring contest is put on hold as the first of the mooks reaches the top of the hill and fires their blaster.

At me, because of course the uninvolved guy they've never seen before is a higher priority target than the Jedi.

Catching the bolt of plasma with the force, I reach out to poke it with my finger and try to absorb it. Sadly, despite all appearances to the contrary it seems to be more 'fire' than 'lightning' and thus not only inedible but now my finger is all tingly as the tip regrows.

Disappointed, and suddenly a bit homesick, I flick it back at where the shooter's been joined by a few more of his buddies, all of whom seem to have shared my curiosity about the nature of blaster bolts.

Fortunately, I remember at the last moment that Obi-Wan is watching and just barely manage to nudge the shot up and over them rather than committing murder in front of the local law enforcement.

The growing crowd of mooks take this as their cue to resume shooting. Despite being absolutely terrible at it, they do occasionally manage to get close enough to hitting me that I'm forced to shift my body or nudge a bolt aside. Something Obi-Wan seems to be doing as well except that the bolt he just deflected nailed one of the mooks in the chest and… yup; no heartbeat and no Force presence. He's dead, Jim.

"Obi-Wannnn… that kills people!" I point at the crumpled body. "You killed him!"

"They're…" Brows furrowed in a puzzled expression, Obi-Wan pivots around to pull the girl out of the way of one blaster bolt and then chops down with his lightsaber to deflect a second into the grass. "They're pirates."

"Oh." I pause, catching the next bolt and then sending it into the shooter's leg instead of just away. "You don't need any of them alive?"

"No, not particularly?"

"Oh. Okay." Sreabhann mo chumhacht tríd! Giving Obi-Wan a thumbs up, I dissolve myself into Force lightning and zap forward through the cluster of apparently superfluous pirates' front ranks. Reforming in front of one that looks to be mostly human despite having pastel pink skin, I shove them backwards off the hill with a palm strike to their breastplate before bathing the area in Force lightning until I'm the closest thing to 'alive' on the hill. Turning back to Obi-Wan I shrug apologetically, before gesturing at the various former pirates. "Sorry I was so slow on the uptake there, I sort of assumed being a Jedi meant you'd need to arrest them or something."

I open my mouth to continue, but a pained groan from behind me reminds me that my snack has a fairly short shelf life. "One moment!"

Whistling the final fantasy victory tune, I skip on down the other side of the hill to grab the pink-skinned pirate before they can recover. Sadly, given the large crack in the middle, it seems I overestimated the quality of their armor, so the sum total of my loot is a fancy looking blaster pistol that I'm now suspicious may also be mostly decorative. Worse, despite being wrapped up in pink packaging, there's no hint of bubblegum, strawberry, or anything of that sort to their flavor. They do taste a little different, but more or less in line with what I'd expect from someone with an unusual blood type like C- rather than anything truly alien. If I ignore that disappointment though, it is pretty good. Might be worth looking up what species this is and seeing if I can source some pink lemonade. Or maybe see if there's any equivalent to rabbits on whichever planet they come from that I can run through the infuser to emphasize that particular flavor note? Something to think about.

Though I suppose that will all have to wait until I settle down somewhere long enough to actually bother making an infuser.

Dropping the former pirate back onto the ground, I trudge my way back up the hill and wave to reclaim Obi-Wan's attention from where he's been distracted by Shmi making it to the top of the ramp. "Next time, tell me these things in advance and we can all save ourselves some time and aggravation."

"Next time?" Obi-Wan's voice comes out oddly strangled, his aura tingeing toward confusion.

"Uh… Yeah?" I shrug helplessly. "I mean, you are aware that you're Obi-Wan Kenobi, right?" Surprisingly, this doesn't seem to clear things up for him. Has he seriously not noticed? "Like, I can practically see the Narrative Force actively bending the very fabric of reality to drag trouble towards you. There's basically zero chance that we finish whatever it is we're doing without more of it showing up along the way. Which, uh…" I frown, pointing at the girl he's still holding in his arms. "What are we doing with the tiny human, anyway?"

"My name is Mara. And I'm not tiny." The girl in question protests in an eerily Dawn-like fashion. I get the impression that she'd have stomped her foot and everything if she wasn't currently being a Koala Bear.

"That's great for- Wait. Mara?" A red-head named Mara? "Mara Jade?"

"No?"

"Oh." I shrug. "Then I probably don't care. Now come on." I shoo them forwards, trying to corral everyone onto the ship. "Everybody get onto the ship so we can go get Anakin."

"Anakin?"

"Yeah, our brother?" I sigh as Obi-Wan somehow finds it in himself to become even more confused. "Dirty blonde about Mara's age? Blew up a battleship the last time you-"

"He did what!?" I count it as great progress that Shmi doesn't flinch at all as we all turn to look at her.

"Did I not tell you about that? It made the news and everything." I scratch at my chin as I try to recall. "Huh. I guess I never actually got around to mentioning it. Okay, so… basically, he and his friend Artoo…" I pause to clear my throat pointedly. "Ahem. Borrowed a snubfighter from the Nabooans and then Anakin somehow used the Force to perfectly time herpa-derpa-ing his way through the refresh cycle on the Trade Federation battleship's shields or something because they managed to rock right on up into the hangar bays of an actively hostile warship and shoot it up from the inside to destroy the droid control doohickey."

"Wizard!" Mara, having apparently been put down at some point during my recap for Shmi, pokes her head out from behind Obi-Wan to give my brother his due. She's also either from Tatooine or that slang is more pervasive than I thought. Hmmm… no. That's not the important thing here.

"I know right?" I point at the only one here that seems to properly appreciate the utter absurdity-given-human-form that is my new baby brother. "Only 8 years old and he's already blowing up- Errr… hmmm… okay, so I think it only ended up in two pieces rather than turned into confetti which might mean it only counts as being 'mission killed' rather than properly blown up? Not sure on the exact rules there. Either way a Lucrehulk silhouette is a pretty good showing for an 8 year old in his first space battle. Now…" I nod to Shmi, acknowledging the swirl of concerns and anxieties the idea of Anakin being in a battle have given her. " Admittedly, there's a perfectly valid argument to be made that 8 year olds probably shouldn't be getting involved in space battles to begin with but in his defense, I'm pretty sure he was safer flying with Artoo than he ever was during those incandescently stupid pod races back on Tatooine.

"Also, to be fair, Qui-gon left the two of them unsupervised for more than five whole seconds so yeah, I don't really know what else they could have expected. And that brings me back to the part where we all get onto the ship and go fetch him from wherever Obi-Wan stashed him before he gets up to any new mischief."

"He isn't here." Obi-Wan sighs, finally deactivating his lightsaber.

"My point exactly!"

"No, I mean he isn't here, on Tennefore." Obi-Wan shakes his head. "Honestly, I'm a bit lost as to why you seem so convinced he would be."

"Uh… because don't Jedi usually keep their Padawans close by?"

"Yes, generally." Obi-Wan's voice stays stoically level and his face serene, but I can suddenly feel a whole complicated whorl of irritation, jealousy, and self recrimination wafting off of him as he starts actively 'letting go' of it all into the Force. "Which is why Anakin is on Coruscant with Master Jinn."

"Oh." I nod, I guess that would make- "Ohhh…" I flash back to shouting neener neener at Maul through the Force as I left him stranded on that research base and then look over at Sheila. I guess I kinda stole the ship he'd have needed to get to the Battle of Naboo. "Qui-Gon's still alive."

"Of course he is." Obi-Wan feels more affronted than alarmed by the idea of his mentor dying. Then again, I vaguely recall him being the only reason Qui-Gon survived a number of their escapades so maybe that makes sense?

"Right. Right… So just to confirm: Anakin isn't your Padawan?"

"No?" Confused once more, he points at his head for some reason. "I haven't even finished my Knight Trials yet."

"...huh."

I think I'm going to have to sit down and rethink my current life plan at some point.

Or maybe now?

Yeah. Now sounds good.