The ship was always a lot quieter without Talward and Talos's chattering. While they ran off doing archaeology together, they usually left Ashara behind on the ship to do "textual surveys" as Talos called them. She didn't have archaeological training, beyond having seen a few dig sites on Taris when she was a Padawan there, and while the two of them were always trying to help her, it would take years to get to the point where she would be useful for more than some basic digging and moving things around. She didn't mind. Sometimes she liked the quiet.

But sometimes it drove her nuts. Her meditations were going nowhere. He mind was a maelstrom of thoughts and worries and even her practiced meditations couldn't soothe her mind.

Talward had just asked her to marry him. So much of her wanted to say yes, to tell him that she'd love to be his wife, to have a wedding with all their friends. But the rational part of her said no. He even offered to ask the Council for permission to marry her. It was things like that that made it even harder for her to turn him down. She couldn't do it in good conscience. Not while war still raged between the Jedi and the Sith.

"I guess I'll just have one more reason to work harder for that day," he said. "Besides, what would a ring change about our relationship?" He smiled. She didn't need to see his eyes to know that he was sincere.

But still Ashara felt that she should make it up somehow. Find something to tell him that she still loved him and always would. There were ways other than marriage to tell someone you loved them. And Talward did like gifts. She had few things to give, except for the gifts he'd given to her himself.

She went over to the cockpit, where she knew she would find Andronikos. He was glued to it almost all the time, only barely coming out to grab a bite to eat or sometimes to sleep, but though he had his own designated quarters, Ashara had seen him sleeping at the helm on more than one occasion.

"Andronikos?" she asked to get him out of his flight trace. He wasn't a Jedi or a Sith, but she could tell when someone was meditating.

"Something you need, Sith?" He swiveled the chair to look at her.

"How long do you think Talward and Talos will be down there?"

"If there's Sith ruins on Voss like they say there are, probably a while. You know how those two get about their old junk. Getting restless?"

"I was just thinking that maybe, I mean, if it's possible, we could land the ship and I could buy something nice. For Talward, I mean."

"Well you won't find all that much on Voss. But I know exactly where you could go in this sector of the galaxy to get the kind of weird junk that Talward's into. You can buy pretty much anything on Nar Shaddaa. Artifacts, weapons, clothes, droids, body parts, you name it, it's for sale. You wanna get him something real special, huh?"

"Yes, I do, but probably not an artifact from the black market, unless it's got all the context with it and you can prove it wasn't stolen from the Sith. You know how he gets about that."

"I usually drone out all the artifact talk that he and Talos do. But we'll find something, don't worry. Now what do you say we blow this joint, head over to Nar Shaddaa and pick something out for him, huh?"

"Right now?"

"Do you think they'll show up that soon?"

"It is rather unlikely."

"Exactly. Here, why don't you put in the coordinates and try flying this bird?"

"Really? I mean, you'd let me do that?"

Andronikos rose from his seat and presented the empty chair for her.

"She's all yours, Jedi."

Ashara could barely contain her excitement. She leaped into the chair and looked over the controls reverentially, as if touching it would activate the ship's self destruct sequence and kill them all.

Andronikos crouched down beside her, sensing her lack of familiarity with the ship's systems. "Here," he said, pointing at a menu on the galaxy map. "It's in Hutt space, which isn't so far off from here."

Ashara fiddled with the map to get the hang of how it worked. Once she figured it out, it was simple to find Nar Shaddaa.

"Pretty fancy stuff," Andronikos mused as she put in the coordinates. "First ship I worked on didn't have one of these. Had to do it all manual. Still do it sometimes, just out of habit. But I gues they don't skimp on Sith lords. Here." He moved her hand over to one of the levers. "Make the jump."

Ashara pulled the lever and felt the thrill of acceleration, though the ship's top of the line inertial dampeners made for a smooth ride. No wonder she barely noticed when they went to lightspeed. She decided she needed to spend more time in the cockpit, where she could see the stars. She liked it better when she could see them.

"So what're you thinking of getting him?" Andronikos asked as soon as the ship settled into its course.

"I don't know. You say you can buy anything on Nar Shaddaa, but I've never been there, so I don't really know what that would even be."

"You've never gone to Nar Shaddaa, huh. Shoulda figured. Not sure if you'll like it much, it's kind of more a place for my type. I know the black markets pretty well. Had to sell my loot somewhere. Just hope that things haven't changed too much since I've been out of the game with you guys."

"I guess I'll just have to let the Force guide me. And you."

Andronikos laughed. "I'll try to be as good a guide as the Force."

They chatted a bit along the way to Nar Shaddaa, about what to expect on the Smuggler's Moon and what they might get Talward and how not to get shanked in a dark alleyway and what sorts of drinks to be careful of and the casinos they might visit if they have more time and strategies in sabaac.

The ship shifted slightly as it dropped out at the destination. Nar Shaddaa glittered like a crystal beside the large sickly mass that was Hutta. Ashara had been to Coruscant before, and the moon reminded her of it, but something seemed off. It could just be that she was letting her knowledge of its reputation color her perceptions. She would just have to visit with an open mind. The time they had wasn't enough to judge an entire world, and if there was one thing she learned with Talward, it was never to judge things from what she's been told.

"You feel good enough to bring her in for a landing?" Andronikos asked.

Ashara hesitated for a moment. "Well, I guess I can try."

"I'll be here if you need me. Now, we need to transmit our registration to Control if we wanna land in the Imp's spaceport. There's other places here where you don't need to do that, but I'd rather not show up and see that Khem Val let this ship get stolen because he's mad at the Sith for some reason."

He sat down beside her and pressed a button that she assumed was to activate the comm. "This is the Fury to Menzenti, we're coming in for a landing. Registration number Besh-12934."

After a moment, someone spoke back to them in accented Basic. "Menzenti Spaceport responding, you're all cleared Fury. Land in docking bay 29-West."

Andronikos smiled. "I've been getting used to doing this. I don't think Talward even knows the registration number of this ship. Now here, look at the display. It should tell you which way to go and when to start coming in."

She could sort of figure it out, mostly because Andronikos told her "Now!" when she was supposed to hit the spaceport. She pulled the ship downward towards the moon and towards the bright lights of the spaceport, lit differently from the lights around it to make it easier for pilots to find where they were supposed to land. She took a deep breath and carefully guided the ship into the open hangar labeled 29-West. Andronikos had to point out to let out the landing gear before it came to a complete stop.

Once the ship was safely parked, he patted her on the back. "Not bad for your first time, Jedi."

"Thanks for letting me pilot. I know how much this ship means to you."

"No problem. Everyone should pilot a ship at least once in their lifetime, just to see what it's like."

"So on the way back you'll let Khem Val pilot the ship?"

Andronikos put on a deep growling voice. "The great Tulak Hord did not pilot ships!" They both chuckled at this quietly, hoping that Darth Zash was in control now and that Khem Val wouldn't use it as an excuse to eat them both.

Andronikos helped her power down the ship and the two of them left the ship.

"The Promenade's the main fancy shopping district, but you probably would find the weird stuff that Talward's into in the Old Rodian District. Lots of animal body parts, artifacts, even a store that sells nipple paint."

"Nipple paint?"

"In all colors and flavors."

"I don't think he'd be able to see the colors, but the flavors? Maybe sweetmallow flavored? He'd like that, you think?"

"Okay, there's something I didn't want to know about you two."

"Then you shouldn't have brought up our nipples."

The two of them exited the ship in awkward silence, trying not to think about nipples. The spaceport was busy, and she wondered if there were any times of day or night when it wasn't busy. There certainly seemed to be a lot of traffic, mostly Imperial. Made sense if this was an Imperial spaceport. They were probably here to keep the war going, she thought sadly.

They got to the taxi pad and Andronikos waved down a droid. "You there! Two to the Old Rodian District!" The droid told them in a languid Imperial accent to enjoy their stay on Nar Shaddaa. Must be to make the Imperial visitors feel more at home, Ashara guessed.

They flew downward from the top of the city towards the middle levels, glittering lights all around them, advertising everything from dancing girls to cybernetic implants. The whole effect was dizzying. She'd been to Coruscant, but it wasn't like this, not at the top levels at least. As they went downward, the lights got a little less bright and the sun became a bit less visible, as if it could get any darker and any more artificially lit. She'd seen holos of Nar Shaddaa, but nothing did the city justice like a short ride in a taxi did.

Eventually they landed on another taxi pad about halfway down the skyscrapers.

"So," Ashara said. "Where to?"

"Don't know. Let's just browse around and see."

There were advertisements everywhere, for all the shops in the district. Andronikos was right, this was where the weird stuff was sold. She even saw what she thought was an advertisement for the nipple paint store, "Painted Fancies: Every flavor of pleasure!" Both Ashara and Andronikos laughed when they saw it.

They came across a shop that advertised that it sold taxidermied animals from all over the galaxy. The display windows showed a rancor head, a variety of skulls and the hollowed out heads of all sorts of insects.

"Here," Ashara said. "He likes biology, right?"

"Something creepy to put in his quarters that would give normal people nightmares to sleep with them watching? Sounds right up his alley. How do you stand sleeping in his quarters all the time?"

"You get used to it, for a cute guy like him," Ashara said with a half joking sigh.

"Excuse me while I vomit, Jedi." Andronikos stuck his finger up his mouth and gagged as Ashara laughed.

With that they entered the shop. The walls were lined with even more skulls, skeletons, small animals, large animals, all sorts of beasts that she'd seen and never seen before.

The proprietor was a bored looking Rodian. "Tell me if you need any help, and don't touch the displays unless you're buying," he said.

Ashara nodded, going into her own dream world, wondering which of these she could afford.

"Hey! Look at this!" Andronikos said from behind her. He was pointing at a large pair of insect mandibles. "These came from a Kilik queen! Ever tell you about the time that Talward almost ruined all chance the Empire had on Alderaan by yelling about how the planet'd be better off if all the Kiliks ate everyone at a wedding he wasn't even invited to?"

This sounded like something Ashara had to hear. "I don't think so."

Andronikos grinned in memory. "Yeah, that was his first time getting drunk, he told me after he woke up the next morning with the hangover of the century. But he's never told you about that Jedi he tried to marry? Well, to get to marry."

"I don't think so."

"I can't believe it! He wouldn't shut up about it for weeks! Oh man, I gotta tell you this."

He got into his Storytelling stance; Ashara knew it well. "All right, so we were on Alderaan, right? We're trying to get this artifact from this one Jedi, an Organa. So it turns out this guy, he was betrothed to this lady, a real killer, huh. So to get this Jedi to come to Alderaan, he gets this girl to ask him to come back to Alderaan, and he did."

"I'm surprised that worked. Jedi are supposed to give up their attachments. They can marry, but not without the Council's permission."

"Talward assumed this meant that the Jedi still had feelings for her. So like a sap, he tried to convince him to uphold his promise and marry this lady. Never seen him so distracted from an artifact, but he really wanted these two to get married and be happy. And he thought it worked. That dirty, lying Jedi told him that they were going to 'catch up' on everything. Now, he gives us the key to his vaults, 'in gratitude.'"

"I assume that something went wrong?"

"That double-crossing Jedi was right there, with his Padawans, waiting for us, telling him that there was no way he was falling for a Sith's manipulating his emotions. Ended up having to kill him."

"That's awful!"

"What, that we had to kill him?"

"No, that he lied like that. That he misjudged Talward's intentions. That he just tried to kill him just because he was a Sith, and denying himself any happiness, or at least closure with this woman."

Andronikos shook his head. "Well, after we got our artifact, the Sith really was set on going to a wedding. So he went looking for any wedding to crash. Found a Thul wedding at the palace the next evening. Went there, started ranting and raving about how no one on this planet deserved love except Rehanna Rist, how all Jedi are liars, how all nobles are scumbags, how things would be better if Kiliks just devoured all the people on this planet, that sort of thing. Took a whole squad of Imps to get him out of there, had the Diplomatic Corps yelling at me for not stopping him."

Andronikos shrugged. "So that's that." He looked back at the Kilik mandible. "He really liked those Kiliks, huh."

Ashara couldn't believe Talward had never told her this story, but part of her understood. All that she had grown up and changed with him, it hadn't occurred to her that he had matured with her too.

After a moment of looking at the mandible, Ashara spoke up. "So you really think he'd like this?"

"Probably. He'll probably like anything from you."

"Then we're getting it."

They arrived back on Voss before Talward and Talos noticed they were gone.

Talos and Talward came back, covered in dirt and grinning like madmen as usual. Ashara tried to catch him as soon as she could. "My lord! My lord! While you were out, I got you something."

"Oh? What'd you get me?" He certainly looked excited.

She took him to their chambers and showed him her spoils from Nar Shaddaa. He picked it up and examined it, touching it in exactly the way the shop owner told them not to. After a moment of examination, he smiled. "A Kilik mandible! From a queen no less! An amazing find!" He embraced her.

"So you like it?" she asked. After all that Andronikos told her, she was beginning to get a bit worried that it'd bring up unhappy memories.

"We can use it as a disguise when the Kiliks inevitably take over the galaxy! Of course I love it!" With that, he embraced her in a kiss.

"My Sith," she said, holding him in her arms. "My strange, handsome Sith Lord." She leaned in for a second kiss.