AN: It won't leave me alone! Gah! Ok here. It has five updates now. That's a nice good early milestone. The protagonist is tied into the canon plot now. The ship layout has been described now. I have other fics to work on. I'm off, be back later.

{}{}{}{}

I didn't get far before they caught up with me. Or more accurately, before Anakin caught up with me dragging Kenobi along in his wake.

"Captain!"

"Forget it, kid. I am not galivanting around the galaxy with a couple of Jedi. You know how much trouble that would cause me?" I shot over my shoulder before focusing on making my way through the crowds. "Everywhere I go, every corrupt official, smuggler, and general lowlife will be watching me like a hawk! Just waiting for an excuse or imagined conspiracy before they do their best to kill me."

Sure, I kept my nose clean. But that didn't change the nature of spaceports, or the people I had to deal with. Might as well strap a crates worth of thermal detonators to myself and try to hug people. A lot of places just were not squeaky clean and bringing along Jedi was asking to get shot in a dark alleyway.

"Please? This could be unbelievably important."

"Hauling a couple of freeloaders around with me everywhere, just so they can incite a bunch of random criminals to shoot me? Not my definition of important!" I snapped. "And even if you somehow managed to not annoy whatever local criminal element might cross my path, Force users are all trouble magnets. I can't go five planets without something popping up and I go out of my way to avoid trouble! With three of us I'll be lucky not to fly into a civil war!"

There were ten seconds of merciful silence before the kid spoke up again.

"You mean it's not just us?" That innocent question made me want to scream.

"Not making me want to take you with me, kid."

"We could pay for passage! And I'm a pilot, and mechanic! We wouldn't be freeloaders!"

That actually made me hesitate. I could fly the Arcane Knowledge on my own. But it wasn't exactly safe if I ran into pirates. I really needed a copilot and some gunners for her to operate at her peak. Even just having one of her turrets manned would be useful.

"I, look, I'm not planning to make any more trips back to Coruscant anytime soon. This could be one heck of a long haul you're signing yourself up for." I tried to make coming with me as unappealing as possible. Then paused as a thought occurred to me and turned to face Kenobi. "And why are you letting him try to convince me? I'm a filthy heretic, and he's your impressionable young student! You're supposed to be grabbing him by the scruff of the neck and running before I corrupt him!" I accused, trying to ignore that I was a little tempted. I was sick of flying by myself. It got lonely. I could probably dress them up like spacers and get the locals to ignore them. And now there was a vague sense of encouragement emanating from the Force… That more than anything told me they would be trouble.

Kenobi in contrast to what I expected actually seemed to be contemplating Anakin's idea. "You're not wrong." He admitted as he stroked his beard. "But we were ordered by the council to observe you, and I can think of no better way to follow that order."

"See? It's perfect." Anakin chirped. Fucking imp.

"No, it is not perfect." I growled. "And I don't answer to the Jedi council. Helping you two follow your orders isn't an incentive for me at all."

"Perhaps not, but unless you already have a crew, you might want to consider taking us regardless." Kenobi's mild smirk was actually a little worrying.

"Why?" I asked cautiously.

"Because if the Jedi have discovered your videos then it is only a matter of time until major criminal groups do the same." He answered serenely. "And when they discover there is a lone Force user loose in the galaxy you will no doubt become a very tempting target." That little nudge from the Force got a bit more insistent.

I didn't say a word. He wasn't wrong. I knew it was a risk. I knew it would come up sooner or later, but finding back up that would stick around in spite of that kind of risk? Not easy. I'd had some, but we went our separate ways when I bought my own ship. Most people didn't want that much excitement in their lives. Worse, someone who didn't think I was worth risking their neck over might just turn me in for a share of any bounty. But it hadn't been that long yet. There was no proof to back my claims so I likely had some time still before it became an issue. But enough time to find people that were trustworthy?

I groaned aloud knowing no matter what I said next I was likely to regret it. "The kid's a pilot and a mechanic?" I asked skeptically.

Kenobi's smirk was downright annoying. "He is very talented."

"Uh huh. Any chance you can work a quad laser turret?"

"I haven't fired one before, but I have worked similar laser turrets on a few occasions."

"I'm going to regret this. I know I'm going to regret it…" I looked imploringly to the heavens wishing for a trio of wookies who owed me life debts. No hyper competent furry alternative fell from the sky. Which was just as well because they would probably have crushed me. "Fine." That little nudge from the Force was replaced by a sense of approval that made me want to curse. "I've got an off world charter leaving in two days. You've got that long to find clothes that don't scream Jedi. In the meantime," I glanced at the kid. "you know anything about droids? I want to make my R3 double as an interpreter."

Anakin's face lit up. "I built my own protocol droid when I was nine!"

"... Of course, you did." This was the Force's fault. I didn't know why it was doing this to me, or what the end goal was, but I knew it would be troublesome. Worse, I'd been able to sell off all of my alcoholic stock so my ship was currently dry.

{}{}{}{}

My new copilot/mechanic was warming up the engines, and my new chef/gunner was getting an early start on the evening meal. Both managed to successfully find clothes that made them look like not Jedi. I did need to help them with finding out of sight spots for their lightsabers. Letting them hang off their belts would have defeated the purpose of getting them new clothes. Thankfully it was pretty easy to add custom pockets to the inside of their jackets. Not perfect, but better than nothing.

"Ladies." I greeted with my most professional smile. "Welcome aboard the Arcane Knowledge." The group of six young women tittered and followed me up the ramp.

I very firmly reminded myself that getting romantically involved with passengers was a terrible idea, no matter how attractive they were.

"We've got a room set up on either side of the engines, three beds to a room."

The cargo holds were pretty easy to convert. Just had to mag lock a few bunks to the floor. The ship wasn't big enough to have a lot of creature comforts, but there was plenty of space for passengers. Since Anakin and Obi-Wan had elected to share a room I could reasonably have fit two more people in the empty crew cabin. But I wasn't about to complain, I was lucky enough to have found a group of six.

Walking clockwise around the central hub of the ship I gave the ladies their tour. "First door on your left is one of the cabin's we've set up for you ladies." Opening the door showed an almost triangular room with a curved back wall. Not the most conventional cabin but plenty of room for three beds and some luggage. I paused the tour as several of my passengers stopped to deposit their things.

"The next door over is supplies, food, water, cleaning products and a few other things." I waved them along without opening the door. The room actually took up a good chunk of the unnecessary open space around the engines. It left me enough room to get at everything, and space for storage lockers for spare parts though. "Third door is to the engine room which is, of course, off limits. Nothing personal ladies." I gave my best disarming smile. "Followed by our second cabin." There was another delay as the second half of the group put away their belongings.

"That leads to the airlock, so we shouldn't need to worry about it this trip." I pointed at the nearly a blast door as we went by. "Followed by the all important fresher, and then my cabin." My room wasn't any bigger than the other crew rooms, but it didn't have bunked beds and, and if nothing else, it was right next to the fresher. Not the best benefits, but it was something.

Continuing along I pointed at the ladder nested in the central hub. "That leads to the ships laser turrets which are off limits. Opposite that is the corridor leading to the cockpit. While I have to ask that you stay out of the cockpit itself you are welcome to use the room before it." I explained leading them inside. On the right was a large couch taking up the entire wall and on the left was the majority of the ship's Computer. "Please don't touch any of that," I waved at the computers, "but the ship has a stored selection of vids it can play on the main screen, and it responds to voice requests." The woman nodded appreciatively before I led them back out into the ship's circular corridor.

"The last two doors are crew cabins, and then we are back to the loading ramp." I waved at the ship's second almost a blast door before turning to the ship's central hub. "Which just leaves the mess hall." I stepped to the side allowing the ladies a chance to glance inside. "As you can see it's a bit cramped so by all means feel free to take your meals in your rooms or on the couch by the cockpit. Whatever's comfortable for you. Now if you'll excuse me ladies I need to go and see about getting us off the ground."

Hmm, was it bad of me to leave a Jedi Knight at the mercy of six giggly young women… Eh, he'd agreed to play cook. They'd be able to find him whenever they liked regardless. Might as well throw him into the deep end.

The cockpit had a straightforward design. The front chair was the pilots. The copilot's chair was right behind it. There was an aisle on either side of the seats to move in, and that was it. Nice and simple. No extra seats for back seat fliers, and nothing was out of reach. Nice and simple.

"We ready to go, Anakin?"

"Yup." The halfhearted response made my lips twitch. Anakin really wanted to fly. I could relate, but I'd made it very clear the Arcane Knowledge was my ship, and I wasn't about to let anyone fly her without proving themselves. What I hadn't mentioned was that proving himself meant getting her off the planet and into hyperspace while I double checked his every move from the pilot's seat. He had the qualifications, but I wouldn't be happy until I saw him fly first hand. He was part of my crew now, and I needed to know what he could do. If he screwed up at all I'd be taking back control and he'd find himself spending the rest of the trip doing practice maneuvers in simulation.

"Alright then, Anakin. Take her up, nice and easy."

"Wait, really!"

I looked over my shoulder at the excited teen. "Yup." I popped the p. "But if I even think you're messing up... I'm taking back control, and you won't get another shot anytime soon. So, you better be sure."

Well, what do you know? The kid already had the cocky pilot's grin down flat.

{}{}{}{} AN: A rare but recurring complaint has been why would I add Obi-Wan and Anakin. Most people are fine with it but if you are not, I've listed my reasoning below. Feel free to skip this is you are fine with it. If you read this and still disagree with my decision to add them to the story that's fine as well. No one is forcing you to keep reading after all.

If the entire cast is OC's most people just are not going to read the story. Yes, this plot is crazy enough that it probably could have drawn people in anyway but an all OC cast is usually a warning sign people notice and turn around without even reading. Because the OC usually means SI and SI usually means wish fulfillment power wank. Just having the main character as an OC is already risking that prejudice an entire cast of OC's and well…

The Jedi were going to send someone. So, if I need a couple Jedi in the cast, and I do. Why not the big names? It's not like they'll be on the crew forever. Besides which their presence gives John a better opportunity to directly chip away at their opinions and values. Which has direct long term repercussions.

By having two reasonably established characters for my OC's to play off of I get to better flesh them out in my own head before getting to the point where I need to replace the jedi with two more OC's. hopefully by that point John and Delia will be established and liked enough that I don't lose half the audience because I've removed their nostalgia factor.

That's the reasoning.