Anakin's Quest Page 4

"

  Luke realized that the alien Jedi Master was right.

  "Anakin needs more time and training than I have to give him," Luke

  admitted. "When Yoda taught me, he had no other students, but I have so

  many to train it could be months before I can break free to take Anakin to

  Dagobah."

  Luke thought for a moment.

  "I might be able to send Tionne with him. She could leave sooner than

  I could." He sighed. "But I'm not certain she can help Anakin face this

  test. She's a wise Jedi, but she has never come face-to - face with the

  dark side in the same way I have... and as Anakin has."

  "I will take the boy to Dagobah myself, if you will permit it," Ikrit

  said.

  Luke looked at the white-furred Jedi in surprise. Why hadn't the

  thought occurred to him? Luke knew so little about this alien Jedi Master.

  He could sense the goodness in Ikrit and that Ikrit would do anything to

  protect Anakin. Luke chuckled as a thought struck him.

  "I don't think Tahiri will agree to let Anakin out of her sight."

  Ikrit made an odd wheezing sound and Luke guessed that this was the Jedi's

  way of laughing.

  "No, you are right," Ikrit said. "I will take the girl as well."

  Luke wondered if this could be the solution he had been looking for

  after all. Anakin needed time and attention from a Jedi Master, and here

  was a Jedi Master offering just that. Luke began to think practically.

  "How would you get to Dagobah? Can you pilot a ship?"

  Ikrit's large fluffy ears drooped in the moonlight.

  "I have been a pilot, yes. But I was asleep for hundreds of years

  before the children wakened me. I am not familiar with your newer ships."

  The ears pricked up again. "The supply shuttle is still here - would the

  pilot take us to Dagobah?"

  Luke was doubtful.

  "Old Peckhum fly you in the Lightning Rod? It's a pretty long

  hyperspace jump to Dagobah. I'm not sure his ship could make it."

  "The boy claims that the ship is much more sound than it looks," Ikrit

  replied. "After all, one should not judge a ship based solely on the looks

  of its hull, just as one cannot judge a Jedi by his appearance." Ikrit

  swept a paw down his furry form to indicate that he was an unlikely-looking

  Jedi Master.

  "Size matters not," he added.

  This brought a surprised laugh from Luke.

  "That's what my old Jedi Master used to say."

  Somehow hearing Yoda's words from the mouth of the tiny white-furred

  Jedi helped Luke to make his decision.

  "All right," he said, "I'll talk to old Peckhum about taking you to

  Dagobah in his shuttle. I'd feel more comfortable if you had a backup

  mechanic in the Lightning Rod, though. You should only be gone for a week

  or two at the most, so I'll send Artoo-Detoo with you. If you run into any

  emergencies he can help Peckhum make repairs."

  Ikrit gave a satisfied-sounding grunt.

  "It is agreed, then."

  "I still have to persuade Peckhum to take you," Luke warned.

  "If it will help," Ikrit said, "you may explain to him that I am a

  Jedi Master. I will watch over the children."

  "I think that will help," Luke agreed. "After that, there are only two

  people left to convince."

  "Tahiri will agree," Ikrit said. "And Tionne will not object."

  "True," Luke said. "But the two people I was thinking of are Anakin's

  parents, Han and Leia."

  Anakin stood with Tahiri and Artoo-Detoo in front of the large screen

  in the Jedi academy's communications center. On the screen, his mother's

  face registered alarm.

  "Old Peckhum is taking you to Dagobah in the Lightning Rod?" Leia

  Organa Solo asked. The image of Han Solo put an arm around his wife.

  "Hey, the Lightning Rod may look like a hunk of junk," he said, "but I

  just helped old Peckhum and his friend Zekk install a new hyperdrive

  motivator last week. Mechanically, the ship's in pretty good shape."

  "And Master Skywalker is sending Artoo-Detoo with us just in case

  there are any problems," Tahiri piped up. The little droid warbled and

  bleeped encouragingly.

  Leia looked slightly relieved-but only slightly. She bit her lower

  lip, her face creased with motherly concern.

  "Are you sure this will help you get past all of those things that

  have been bothering you? And are you certain this... this quest of yours is

  the only way?"

  "I'm sure," Anakin said. "But I won't stay a minute longer than I have

  to."

  On screen, Han and Leia exchanged a look.

  "Then you have our permission, kid," Han said.

  Anakin could tell that it was hard for his parents to let him go on

  this trip.

  "Thanks for understanding, Mom and Dad," Anakin said.

  His father forced a lopsided grin onto his face.

  "Dagobah's a strange planet, you know-you kids keep a close eye on

  each other."

  "We will," Tahiri agreed. "And trust the Force," Leia added.

  Stars, millions of them, stretched into starlines around the Lightning

  Rod as it jumped into hyperspace. Anakin finally let himself begin to

  relax. They were really under way. They were really going to Dagobah. One

  way or another, he would soon face his worst fears and find the answer to

  the question that had been burning in his mind: was he truly doomed to fall

  to the dark side as his grandfather had, or was there hope that he could

  rise above the darkness, as Luke had?

  Tahiri sat next to Anakin in the cramped cockpit of the Lightning Rod.

  There were only two passenger seats, so Ikrit rode on Anakin's shoulder.

  Peckhum had rigged a tiny harness of crash webbing for Ikrit that attached

  to the headrest of Anakin's seat. From this perch, Ikrit could see the

  front viewport over the head of old Peckhum, who sat in, the pilot's seat.

  Tahiri sat behind Artoo-Detoo, who was clamped down at the copilot's

  station.

  Peckhum had removed the copilot's seat to make room for the little

  barrel-shaped droid. Tahiri, always the optimist, yanked at a strand of her

  pale yellow hair and grinned at Anakin.

  "This is really kind of cozy, isn't it?" she said. "It's a shame we

  couldn't bring Uldir along. He looked kind of unhappy when we told him we

  had to go away for a few days. Do you think he'll be all right?"

  "He did seem upset at first," Anakin agreed, "but when I got back from

  packing my bags, he was almost cheerful."

  "Well, that's good," Tahiri said, smiling. "He's probably looking

  forward to the chance to settle in to his new work at the Jedi academy

  while we're gone."

  "He has a lot to get used to," Anakin said. "It'll probably take him

  some time."

  From his place at the copilot's station, Artoo-Detoo beeped once.

  "Well, I can tell you," Peckhum said, "it's not always so easy to

  adjust to changes. It's still hard for me to believe that that furry little

  pet on your shoulder is really a Jedi."

  "A Jedi Master," Anakin corrected.

  "If you say so," old Peckhum replied.

  The longhaired pilot flicked a few switches and double - checked his

  readouts.

  "Looks like we're right on cou
rse," he said, "so we've got plenty of

  time to just sit back and get acquainted. What did you say that critter's

  name was again?"

  Artoo-Detoo made a rude-sounding noise, as if scolding Peckhum.

  "My name is Ikrit," Ikrit said. "You may talk directly to me now that

  you know who and what I am."

  Old Peckhum glanced back at the furry creature in surprise. It was the

  first time he had ever heard Ikrit talk.

  "I guess I'm so used to thinkin' about you as Anakin's pet, I'm not

  used to thinkin' about you as a person, Master Ikrit."

  "Ikrit," the Jedi said. "Just Ikrit will be fine."

  Anakin couldn't help smiling. It was pretty funny to watch someone

  trying to grasp for the first time that Ikrit was a Jedi Master.

  "If you'll pardon my sayin' so, Master, uh, er, Ikrit," old Peckhum

  said, "you just don't look much like a Jedi Master."

  Ikrit did not seem offended.

  "And what does a Jedi Master look like?" he asked.

  "Well, um... bigger, I guess, for starters."

  Anakin grinned.

  "Tahiri and I aren't very big."

  "No," Peckhum admitted, "but you're just trainees, and you'll get

  bigger as you get older. From what I've heard, little Ikrit there is

  already hundreds of years old."

  "This is true," Ikrit said. "Never will I be larger than I am now, and

  never will my body be stronger than it is now. Many of my people once

  thought as you do, that I could not become a Jedi Master. Let me tell you a

  story."

  Ikrit rose up on his hind legs and held his paws out before him as if

  he were drawing pictures in the air with his arms.

  "I come from a planet called Kushibah in the Outer Rim. My people, the

  Kushibans, are a simple folk, and my size is normal for our kind. "The

  Kushibans from my village are farmers and weavers. They grow silkweed and

  combine it with the fur we brush from our coats each day and spin it into

  thread. With the thread we weave cloth and tapestries in every color you

  can imagine. Our weaving is famous throughout the galaxy."

  Peckhum nodded.

  "Sure. I've seen some of it."

  "As a farmer and weaver, weaver, my skills were unremarkable," Ikrit

  went on. "However, when I was still quite young for my kind-a little older

  than Anakin and Tahiri are now-a Jedi Master came to our planet and visited

  our village. My people were surprised by his visit, for he was seeking a

  student to train. I was honored that a Jedi Master should come to our

  village to search for a student, so I offered to assist him in any way he

  needed while he stayed on Kushibah. I did not dare present myself to him

  for testing, but to my surprise, he told me that I was the student he had

  been searching for-just like that!

  "I laughed out loud, and so did the people of my village when they

  heard. `That's a good idea, Ikrit,' they said. `Become a Jedi Master. You

  could always build a lightsaber and use it to help us with the silkweed

  harvest.' In spite of their joking, I went away with the Master and began

  training to become a Jedi.

  "I had been training only about a year and was still unsure of myself

  when I went back to visit my family. The people of my village were happy

  that I came, though they still teased me. The night before the silkweed

  harvest was to begin, one of our villagers returned from the fields torn

  and bleeding. She told us that a herd of vicious xinkra-beasts three meters

  tall who could eat one of my people in a single gulp-were headed down the

  mountain slopes toward the silkweed fields and the village. One of the

  monsters had seen her and surged ahead, hoping for a quick meal, but she

  had outwitted the beast, dazzling its eyes with her harvesting knife so

  that when it sprang at her it bit down on the sharp blade first instead of

  her arm. And so she had escaped to warn the rest of the village.

  "The Kushibans scrambled through their houses searching for anything

  to use as weapons. They brought rakes, scythes, hoes, even spindles or bits

  of cloth, but I knew my people were pitifully armed. They would not be able

  to defend themselves against the beasts. A few of them brought torches, for

  fire was the only thing that xinkra truly feared. I knew that if the

  villagers fought that day many would die.

  "I climbed onto a grassy rooftop in the center of the village and

  spoke to my people. I asked them to trust me, to let me fight the xinkra

  alone before they attacked the beasts with their weak weapons. And then,

  without waiting for a reply, I rushed out to the fields to meet the beasts.

  My people must have trusted me, at least a little, for they waited to see

  what I would do.

  "As the beasts thundered closer, I climbed onto a stack of harvested

  silkweed. I knew I did not have the strength to fight the xinkra with my

  hands. A hundred or more of them stampeded toward me, snapping at the air

  with their sharp fangs and slashing it with their long claws. I knew then

  that I only needed to change the xinkra's minds, so I sent them a picture

  with my mind. I sent them a picture of the village ahead in flames, red and

  orange and yellow tongues of fire licking toward the sky. And I sent the

  picture of food-far away behind them in the forests and streams of the

  mountains. Plenty of food: flying creatures, rodents, reptiles, and fish.

  "Within seconds, the xinkra turned and headed back toward their home.

  "When I returned to my village, my people greeted me as a hero, for

  they too had a new picture in their minds. I knew then that I would return

  to my Jedi Master and become a Jedi Knight, so that I could help to defend

  the galaxy against the darkness that was rising up to devour it."

  "I hope," Anakin said, "that when I leave Dagobah I'll be as sure

  about being a Jedi as you were when you left Kushibah."

  "Well now, little Ikrit, I'm glad you told us that story," old Peckhum

  chimed in. "Even if you're not very big, seems like you're a mighty fine

  person to have around when there's trouble."

  Uldir huddled in the hold of the Lightning Rod, wondering how long it

  would be until they reached Dagobah. He knew that there was something

  special about where they were going, that Anakin and Tahiri would be

  learning something important about becoming Jedi. Well, he had decided, if

  it was important for them, it was important for him, too-no matter what

  Master Skywalker thought. Uldir figured it was easier to apologize

  afterward than to get permission to go along.

  Besides, he knew he had to take his chances wherever he saw them.

  Uldir did have what it took to become a Jedi, he was sure. He just needed

  the right opportunity, the right equipment. And he had to learn the right

  tricks. He needed to have all the same chances that other Jedi students

  had, like Anakin and Tahiri. He wondered what his friends were doing up in

  the cockpit of the Lightning Rod, but he couldn't afford to show himself

  just yet. No, there was still a chance that old Peckhum would turn the ship

  around if he knew that Uldir was on board.

  Uldir smiled as he imagined the surprise on Anakin and Tahiri's faces

  when he finall
y showed himself. But for now he would have to bide his time.

  He was going to be a Jedi. And Jedi had to learn patience.

  Tahiri observed the small milky white planet that hung in the front

  viewport. She looked at Anakin and shrugged.

  "Looks harmless enough."

  "Well, I'm reading millions of life-forms," old Peckhum said, "but no

  cities, no landing beacons-in fact, no technology at all."

  "Sounds like the right world, then," Anakin said.

  "Yes...," Ikrit breathed, as if talking to himself. "That would be the

  right one."

  "Are you sure you know how to get us close to the right spot, Artoo?"

  Anakin asked.

  Artoo-Detoo swiveled his domed head around and bleeped once for "yes."

  "How does he know where to go?" Tahiri asked, suddenly curious.

  "Oh, didn't I tell you?" Anakin said. "Artoo's been here before with

  Uncle Luke."

  "Speaking of your uncle," Peckhum said, "he told me that it might be a

  bit tricky navigating through the atmosphere and that having Artoo-Detoo

  along would help. I sure hope he's right-about the droid, I mean. Here we

  go."