The Moment

- Part 3 - - - by ardavenport

Qui-Gon opened his eyes and stared up at Dooku's dark brown ones. The cabin of the ship was now level. Eenid sat in the co-pilot's seat on the right, Yewmakkor in the pilot's seat on the left. There was a pink, bald vaguely-humanoid head in the seat right in front of him. There were silver metal implant with blinking yellow and white lights on its sides, just above the head's ears.

Dooku looked quite amiable.

"I regret disturbing you, Qui-Gon, but our friend here," he gestured toward the head which did not move in return, "is eager to be gone, especially now that people know where he has been hiding. And I doubt that even you could meditate through the noise we're about to make." Eenid clicked a switch and the ship's engines started up.

"Especially with that damn door open," Dooku yelled. Qui-Gon looked back over his shoulder. The door was still stuck and if Dooku and Yewmakkor couldn't get it closed then it likely wasn't possible without an overhaul for the whole ship or possibly a scrap yard.

They lifted off and immediately entered the thick, low cloud layer above them. The cabin became very humid. They could not go high enough to get above the weather without entering atmosphere too thin to breathe, so Yewmakkor flew by sensors until they finally clear skies. The flat, featureless plains had changed to rolling, yellow hills. Qui-Gon could not see very much from his seat behind the others, so he sat back and closed his eyes. No one spoke.

Their mission was complete, at least partially. None of the Jedi knew what knowledge inside the cyborg's machine-augmented brain made the creature so valuable, but it was important enough for the Jedi Council to divert Dooku and Qui-Gon from their return trip back to Coruscant to rendevous with Yewmakkor and Eenid who had purchased the ship they were in on the authority of the Galactic Senate itself so that they could arrive at this world as quickly as possible. It had taken them nearly a day to travel together to this world. It could take them maybe two days to get back to Coruscant depending on what transport they could acquire.

Qui-Gon wondered if the trip back to the Core would be as unpleasant as their shorter trip out. Dooku and Yewmakkor seemed to irritate each other personally and they agreed on almost no point of Jedi philosophy. Yewmakkor acted spontaneously; Dooku liked tidy planning. On top of that they seemed to know instinctively what would annoy the other most. Dooku found Yewmakkor sloppy and undisciplined (and she shed hair in the ship). Yewmakkor clearly thought that Dooku was rigid and narrow-minded. Their planning for this mission had been fractious at best.

That was why Qui-Gon had been so shocked when Yewmakkor had gone after Gooly. The rage that had slammed into him had been a real lust for death, as unlike Yewmakkor's verbal swats at Dooku as lightning was to a spark. Qui-Gon knew perfectly well that other species had other temperaments and the Force flowed through all individual in unique ways, but this was the most extreme case he'd ever experienced. Qui-Gon wanted to learn more.

Unable to speak without shouting over the wind, everyone remained in their own private holding pattern until they finally reached Masalkey Spaceport, the planet Eyal's lone interstellar port. They had to declare themselves disabled to Port Control and were directed to a special docking bay. Yewmakkor landed the ship lightly, but as soon as the engines were off, it tilted over to one side, this time with the door facing downward.

They got up and exited. Dooku threw his dark brown robe over the cyborg before they left. This was the first time that Qui-Gon had a good look at it. The cyborg, whose name was Pyax-83, had no expression in its gray eyes, no emotions in its face, and no obvious thoughts that Qui-Gon could sense unless it was reacting to them. It was of average height for a humanoid though shorter than all of them. It had a pale, pink-tinged complexion and a seriously blank and neutral face. It wore a plain and spotless silver-tone body suit on a figure that favored neither male nor and female features. Aside from the implants on the sides of its bald head, metal also showed from under the cuffs of its sleeves, and extended down the backs of its seven-fingered hands.

Their first priority was to obtain a new ship, dispose of the one wrecked in the storm and leave. Others who wanted Pyax-83's knowledge would come, if they weren't already there among the beings they passed in the wide walkways of the spaceport. The portmaster himself met them with a security detail that hustled Gooly away. Portmaster Binny was typical of the native species of Eyal. He was short, wide and more or less humanoid with no hair, thin lips and vertically oriented, black eyes. Dooku gave him and his assistant their priorities.

Binny complained about the damaged ship, the expense of the emergency landing, the lack of available ships for them, and the ends of his mouth turned down with distaste at Dooku's Republic credit chip. Currency exchange was often a problem on outer rim worlds. Dooku advanced on the smaller being, his will and the Force pressed in on Binny, who stood stammering a moment before announcing that he could certainly accept their payment and would return to them with some suitable choices of ships. Dooku bowed and asked to be directed to the port's med-center.

They all went together, Pyax-83 in their midst. They could not be separated. Many factions wanted the information that the cyborg held. The Republic had agreed to negotiate with all of them about the disposition of that information, but all the interested parties knew that this would only happen if the Republic had possession of the cyborg. Most people they passed seemed intimidated by their group and stayed away anyway. Both Qui-Gon and Dooku were taller than most other beings they passed in the terminal, but they were both dwarfed by the Wookiee and the Whiphid whose presence seemed to discourage the curious from getting too close to them.

They entered the med-center. A few bored locals lounged in the aggressively beige waiting room. Dooku and Qui-Gon went to the receptionist desk. The man behind the desk looked back and forth between Qui-Gon and then at Dooku.

"We would like some assistance please," Dooku announced impatiently. "My Padawan has been injured." The receptionist looked quite confused; Qui-Gon sensed it. The yellow-tinged, blank-faced being sitting before them did not understand what was wrong. This confused Qui-Gon; he thought that the enormous cast on his face was enough of a clue.

The receptionist signaled for a protocol droid to take them back to the med-center itself. The droid paused when the Whiphid, Wookiee and cyborg followed them, but didn't say anything after seeing Yewmakkor's toothy grin.

The med center bay was as aggressively powder blue as the reception had been beige. It and the attendant droid looked a little well used, but acceptable. The droid stared back with unblinking black, sensor-eyes. It was gold-tinted, a metalized version of the hue of the local populace. After Qui-Gon sat down on the examination table, it approached.

"What is your malady?" it asked innocently. It held a scanner up to Qui-Gon's chest.

"It's his nose, you imbecilic machine!" Dooku almost yelled at it. The droid lowered the scanner and looked back at the older Jedi, its posture offended.

"There is no cause for raising your voice, Sir. My audio sensors are functioning at peak efficiency. I realize that your friend has suffered a trauma to his face, however I am unfamiliar with the bony growth at the center and wish to ascertain–"

Yewmakkor howled. Startled, the droid backed up. Dooku looked from it to the protocol droid still lingering by the door and back to the medical droid.

"You're locally programmed, aren't you?" he demanded. The blank-faced locals were humanoid, but they did not have noses.

"I am a fully capable of ministering to this being, Sir. I have been–"

"Does your database include our species?" Dooku advanced on the machine.

"I can extrapolate–"

"Damn!" Yewmakkor echoed Dooku's sentiment with her own exclamations about Outer Rim hicks and provincial spaceports too cheap to buy proper programming. Eenid slowly shook her head. Even Pyax-83 lowered its eyes.

"Give me your equipment; I'll do it," Dooku told it. The droid started to object. Dooku's lightsaber flew to his hand, the blue blade suddenly hummed next to the medical droid's head. It silently pointed toward a tray table of medical equipment and a storage container behind it. Dooku and Yemakkor helped themselves while Eenid stayed back with Pyax-83. Qui-Gon watched this activity with increasing dismay.

"Master, should we not find another med-center?"

"We don't have time. And I fixed your leg on Cuumiqk-Two, Padawan. I'm perfectly capable." Dooku pointed a lecturing finger at him. Qui-Gon had to admit that this was true, and that his Master was as well trained in emergency medical aid as any experience Jedi, but a leg was a long way from a nose.

Qui-Gon lay down on the examination table and waited for Dooku and Yewmakkor to sort out the equipment. He carefully measured his breathing, pushing away nervousness. The Force would guide his Master's hand.

Yewmakkor challenged Dooku about how many noses he had repaired.

"About as many as you have," Dooku retorted. Then Qui-Gon heard, "Don't do that, you'll get hair in it."

"Sirs, If I may–" There was a sudden snick as someone shut off the medical droid.

Qui-Gon tensed.

The two older Jedi seemed to have forged some kind of truce for the sake of the mission, and for his own sake, Qui-Gon had to admit, after he had been injured. However, Qui-Gon now feared that their cease-fire was breaking down at the worst possible time.

Qui-Gon opened his eyes as Dooku returned to the side of the examination table. Yewmakkor stood opposite him.

"I'm sorry, Master, that I could not avoid being injured," Qui-Gon stated. He had been meaning to say so to Dooku; he regretted that his injury had added a complication to their mission, and that he was on this table with them looking down at him. He now also hoped that his admission would focus his Master's attention on the task at hand.

"You could not have avoided it, Qui-Gon. Regrets are wasted energy." Dooku lowered a long, silver cylinder to the edge of the cast and began loosening it. The skin of Qui-Gon's cheeks tingled and hummed under the focused beam. "Even you do not have enough awareness or skill, yet, to prevent such a mishap."

Yewmakkor rumbled that awareness was not the problem. Some events were unknowable, and no connection to the Force, no matter how strong, could change that. Dooku bristled.

"That argument is the most common excuse used by slackers who lack the will power to apply themselves."

Yewmakkor growled.

Qui-Gon kept himself perfectly still as Dooku removed the cast. The air felt cool on his face. His nose started to throb. It had been some time since Eenid had applied the anesthetic. He closed his eyes, drawing strength from the Force. Both Masters sensed it. Yewmakkor rumbled approval.

"Of course he is," Dooku declared. The solid confidence his Master felt in him touched Qui-Gon deeply. A scanner hummed over his face.

Then Dooku lowered the bone knitter to his nose. It burned. Yewmakkor told Dooku that he was moving it too slowly. Dooku retorted that it was not too slow for a Human. Eenid asked if they shouldn't reduce the swelling more first to make sure that the bones would knit smoothly. The bone knitter went away and the burning in Qui-Gon's nose stopped.

"Give me that," Dooku demanded in a hurried, hushed voice. Yewmakkor growled that he should have asked for it in the first place and she told him to take some other things. Qui-Gon did not open his eyes to see what else his Master might have overlooked.

Qui-Gon focused his mind on suppressing the urge to sneeze. He felt long Wookiee hair tickling the side of his face. Something pressed next to his cheek and the burning and throbbing and pain disappeared, but the squishing and sucking and whirring sounds that followed were even more disturbing to him because he now couldn't feel what was going on.

Dooku muttered along with the Wookiee's cooing and little hoots about bones and noses. Qui-Gon silently accepted that this was a bad sign that his Master was talking to himself. He kept still and trusted the Force, but he had to fight back a cringe when he heard Eenid politely inquire about checking with the portmaster to see if there was another medical droid. Yewmakkor barked back that this wasn't necessary and commanded her Padawan to keep her attention on the cyborg.

They eventually finished, both taking away the instruments at the same time. His eyes opening slowly, Qui-Gon peeked up at them. A stiff, pale green shell covered his nose; he couldn't tell how much of the swelling had been healed but the patch bulged differently under one eye than it did under the other. He sniffed. Even numbed, his airway felt perfectly clear; at least that seemed to have gone well.

"It looks fine," Dooku said, though his voice lacked his usual confidence. Yewmakkor turned her head sideways. "It will look straighter when it's healed."

Qui-Gon did not ask for a mirror.

Qui-Gon supposed that his Master had been correct that they had not had time to look for another med-center for treating his nose. Several suspicious characters eyed them, and especially Pyas-83, as the portmaster led them to their new ship. Yemakkor's snarls sent many of them scurrying. Eenid kept a huge clawed hand on the cyborg's shoulder, her narrowed eyes suspicious and warning.

The trip back to Coruscant was uneventful save for the one time that Pyax-83 tried to access a data terminal on their ship. Eenid and Dookus' lightsabers had almost simultaneously blocked the move. That incident had produced the only expression–total shock–that Qui-Gon ever saw the cyborg make. Pyax-83 was not exactly their prisoner, but her presence on Coruscant was strongly encouraged by many of her former comrades who would be party to the negotiations that awaited the cyborg.

Qui-Gon's nose mostly stopped hurting after the first day. He took his bandage off to evaluate his new face in the mirror in the ship's private fresher. He presumed that it was technically healed, but he kept touching the new bulges on the side of his nose and checking his profile every time he went to the fresher.

The trip did give Qui-Gon time to ask Eenid and her Master about 'The Moment', when the Force flowed through them, full of primal but ephemeral rage that disappeared when spent. He meditated and learned about the Living Force and the difference between knowing, not knowing and the unknowable. Dooku sometimes listened, but often he scowled as he sat pointedly between Pyax-83 and the nearest computer terminal. Sometimes he looked as if he was about to say something critical, but his brown eyes would flick toward Qui-Gon's nose and he would visibly suppress his misgivings. Qui-Gon could sense it through their bond, unhappiness and disappointment directed inward, which was very disturbing. Qui-Gon had never sensed such self-doubt in his Master before.

When Qui-Gon asked Dooku if he wished him to stop, Dooku cut him off even before he had finished the question.

"No. Absolutely not. I'm disappointed that you would think such a thing of me. Just because I don't like something doesn't mean it isn't something you should have, Qui-Gon," he answered, his back straightening. "I've told you before that you are strong with the Living Force. You have finally recognized that for yourself and found a suitable teacher." His eyes flicked toward the Wookiee. "Though I think I can direct you to other instructors when we return to the Temple."

Dooku laid a hand on Qui-Gon's shoulder. "We will have very different paths, my Padawan; I've known that for years. Do not shy away from your own path, however misguided it might be, because I might be unhappy about it. I'll get over it. I'd be a poor Master if I didn't." Qui-Gon silently nodded, trying to understand this odd contradiction. Dooku looked pleased by his Padawan's confusion. "Do not ever doubt that you will be a great Jedi. As your Master, I will make sure of it."

It took them four days to reach the orbiting spaceport of Minadus where they were met by a senior team of Jedi with a large, fast ship to take them back the rest of the way to the Republic's capital planet where they handed over Pyax-83 to its fate.

A couple days later, Qui-Gon and Dooku sat together in one of the Temple's larger meal halls. Other Jedi around them quietly came and went with food and dishes and ate at their own tables.

"Are you going to have that fixed?"

The question had come out of nowhere. Qui-Gon paused, a piece of breakfast bread halfway to his mouth. Master Dooku sat across from him, his bowl of fruit and boiled grain still untouched as he casually wiped his spotless hands on a warmed hand wipe. He sat across from Qui-Gon at a small table that they often ate at.

Qui-Gon lowered his bread, letting his expression ask the question of what his Master was talking about.

Dooku tapped his own nose with one long finger.

Qui-Gon looked down at the new terrain of his face.

Exasperated Dooku put the hand wipe down. "You look cross-eyed when you do that, Qui-Gon. Are you going to have that fixed? It's certainly had time enough to heal. The droids in the med-center could probably take care of it in a few hours."

Qui-Gon suddenly realized that his Master was annoyed by his appearance. He was surprised himself that he had just gotten used to it. The droids had advised him that it was best to let the damage around his nose fully heal before they restored his appearance. He just hadn't gone back to have it done. Now, he realized that it really wasn't necessary, but his Master...

Dooku sat there, impatiently waiting for an affirmative answer. Qui-Gon knew immediately that he was not going to give it and that his Master was going to have to suffer the indignity of having a Padawan with a non-symmetric face. There wasn't much he could do about it. Qui-Gon knew it was his decision, and his nose.

"No," Qui-Gon answered directly. For a moment, Dooku's expression was not just of surprise, it was hurt, too.

Then he got over it.

Qui-Gon sensed his Master's 'Moment' passing into the Force and they ate together in peaceful and amiable silence.

– END –

(this story first posted on tf.n: 11-May-2006)

Disclaimer: All characters and situations belong to George and Lucasfilm; I'm just playing in their sandbox.