Chapter Five

He sent the Hologram message, and for a few moments afterwards he could only sit and wonder. Was his mother even alive anymore? She had not responded to any of his letters, nor had he received any glimmer of her presence through his Force-enhanced senses. But his mother had always been able to cloak her presence from him, even when he was younger.

He was still young, he surmised, a little saddened by this revelation. Only nineteen, and already a wanted man.

Freigo peered into the cockpit, his copper eyes gleaming garishly. Jinks glanced up at him and quickly closed his Hologram pad. "What is it?" he asked.

"Nothing," Freigo answered, taken slightly aback by the question. "D40 just wanted to know if—"

"I’m not in the mood to deal with droids," Jinks said matter-of-factly. He sighed and tossed his Hologram pad nonchalantly onto a pile of tools heaped on the floor. He swiveled around in his chair and gazed at the endless black that met his eyes. Stars for as far as the eye could see; in his distant memory, Jinks knew that the boy he had formerly been, Ulysses, could name every single one of them. He wasn’t sure how that boy had known their names, but he had. In his bedroom one night, he had written them all down… but that was years ago.

Ulysses was dead. There was only Jinks now.

"Jinks," Freigo pressed softly. The drake took a step into the cockpit, attempted a smile, something he had never done on his home planet. "Methinks you’ve worked yourself up into a state again. According to the Georgina’s last status report, we’re nearing Kashyyk; if you want to drop in and enjoy yourself for a little while, I can watch the ship and make sure that D40 doesn’t screw anything up."

Jinks smirked. "Freigo, I know where this is going, pal. And you know as well as I that what me and Kurnok once had is over—"

"I’m not suggesting that you go to him and start up where the two of you left off!" Freigo boomed indignantly. Jinks flinched back from the drake’s roar and lost his train of thought as Freigo continued in a low growl, "Unless you haven’t noticed yet, our funds are severely depleted. The Georgina can’t repair her own hull, you know, and that hyper drive needs a replacement, regardless—" he pressed on, silencing Jinks protest—"of what you may say.

"Now." Freigo settled back onto his haunches and crossed his muscled arms across his armored chest. "If you don’t feel like going to Kashyyk, that’s fine. We can go to some second-rate peddler on some floating asteroid elsewhere in the galaxy to find hand-me-down ship parts that have likely been pawned by murderers. Or you can swallow your pride and face Kurnok like a man. You know as well as I that when it comes to business, Kurnok ignores personal matters. ‘A job isn’t worth doing unless it’s done well,’ are his exact words, if I remember correctly."

"Freigo," Jinks pleaded ardently, "I can’t face him!" In a softer tone, he continued, "You don’t know what it’s like talking to him now. We used to be—"

"Closer than a ball-and-socket joint, so you’ve told me," Freigo drawled in reply, "And just as inseparable, I remember it well. Jinks, I’m not asking you to marry the guy. I’m not even asking you to seduce him for one night and bribe money out of him in his throes of passion. Twi’leks aren’t that easily misled, and I know Kurnok. I know him better than you may suspect. All I’m asking of you, my friend, is to ask him to loan you some ship parts and a maintenance crew. You’ve never broken your word to him before, not when conducting business. He won’t doubt that you’ll pay him back."

Jinks brooded like a child in his pilot’s chair, regarding the Zoitian drake with a contemptuous stare. He could not find an err in what Freigo said, although he felt a little twinge of jealousy in his chest at the thought that someone else in the universe might know Kurnok better than he did… But to hell with that. It was over, and it had been over for two years now. Why scratch at old wounds?

"All right," he conceded reluctantly. "I’ll do it. But mind you, if he claws my eyes out, it’s your head that’ll be rolling."

"Good thing we’ve got a maintenance droid onboard then," Freigo replied with a chuckle and a cheeky grin.

The journey through hyper space was as uneventful as it ever was. Jinks left the cockpit to sit in the passenger area and played a game of chess with D40. The droid proved to be a tough competitor, despite his pleasant tone of voice and nearly flawless manners. He attacked each of Jinks’ pieces with a ruthlessness that the Zydirnonite had, up until that point, only seen in the bounty hunters he fled from.

Appearances can be deceiving, it seems, he thought with a wry little smile. The droid appeared to be looking for his eyes behind his darkly tinted glasses.

"I say, sir," D40 commented with a smile, "You are quite the tough opponent."

"Yeah, well, I can say the same for you Coppertone," Jinks agreed and leaned back in his chair. With his toe, he moved his pawn forward. "Your move."

"Hm, let’s see…" D40 leaned over the board, his joints squeaking with his each movement. He reached out with one metallic arm and surveyed the board quickly, then gave a little "aha!" and moved the queen forward, right across the board. "Check mate, sir."

Jinks stared at the queen in disbelief, then sighed and threw his arms up. "I give up. Computers these days are just too advanced for me."

"Beaten you again then, has he?" Freigo chuckled and arched one eyebrow. "No matter. We’re entering Kashyyk airspace anyway."

"Good!" Jinks said and hopped up. "I’m going to commune with the space traffic controller and try to bribe him into giving us a decent price on a docking bay. Freigo, you make sure that Chess Master here doesn’t short circuit the gaming system with his superior intellect."

"Do I detect a hint of sarcasm there, sir?" D40 asked pleasantly.

"None," Jinks deadpanned, then hurried down the corridor towards the cockpit.

"He’s a bit of a grouch, isn’t he?" D40 commented, a bit injured by Jinks’ words.

"Just ignore him," Freigo said lazily and lounged across all the passenger seats with little compunction about doing so. "He’s an ass to deal with sometimes, but in the long run you couldn’t find a better person to be friends with."

"I am getting the distinct feeling that Mr. Ulysses Jinks dislikes me greatly," the droid sighed, if you could call it that. His flickering optical unit flashed brightly for a moment, then went out. "Ah! I cannot see out of my left eye! Oh, sir, could you be so kind as to hand me that instrument at your foot?"

Freigo picked up a screw driver. "This one?"

"Yes, that’s the one." D40 held out one hand to retrieve it. "Thank you, sir."

"Not a problem," Freigo answered, adjusted his wings, and then let his eyes droop.

A few moments later, Jinks showed himself in the main chamber again and sighed, scratching at his forehead. Freigo raised his eyebrows curiously. "Well, any luck?"

"Yeah," Jinks sighed. "I got us a decent price on a decent docking bay in a decent part of the planet. Only problem is I’ve got to sleep with the traffic controller. And I’ve got to ‘make it good,’ I think were her exact words." The Zydirnonian shivered and ran one hand through his hair.

"This is definitely one of the more amusing stunts you’ve pulled," Freigo admitted with a grin and let his head rest in the palm of one claw. Despite himself, he chuckled.

"Shut up, all right?" Jinks snapped in retort.

Freigo simply grinned.

They landed the Georgina without incident, and Jinks set off for Kurnok’s shop with a stern word to both Freigo and D40 not to leave the ship. He had no doubt that Freigo would obey his command, as he was captain of the ship after all, but as for D40… he made sure Freigo understood that he was to keep a careful eye on the droid. Just in case…

Life had returned somewhat to normal for the residents of Kashyyk. An Imperial territory, storm troopers were a common sight, and Jinks learned to quell his terror long enough to get away from them. If he was forced to communicate with them, he turned on the charm. He smiled, made witty comments and flirted shamelessly. Nine times out of ten, his efforts were rewarded with bashful, demure comments about how strangers such as he rarely ventured to the Wookie home planet. Despite how he loathed the Empire, Jinks just could not get over how deliciously innocent all of the storm troopers were!

And then there was the tenth variable. The stoic faced, glaring type that refused to relent to his flirtatious nature. Jinks hated coming across those celibate statues.

Kurnok, he reminisced, had been a nice combination of the two. As a Twi’lek, by nature he was not easily fooled, and thanks to his personality, he had little patience for those who fooled. He enjoyed a little flirtatious fun—now and then—and if Jinks remembered correctly, he could be downright sultry when the opportunity presented itself.

When they had first met, the circumstances had not been pleasant at all. Jinks and Freigo had had to crash land their former ship, the Reaper, on one of the landing fields. At the time, Kurnok’s own ship had been docked there. Spiraling hopelessly out of control, Jinks and Freigo had plowed right into Kurnok’s ship, totaling both vehicles beyond recognition.

Sparks had flown when Kurnok and Jinks faced one another down.

"You incorrigible ass!" Kurnok had shouted, storming across the landing pad like a building storm—which would not have been far from the truth. His Twi’lek head-tails flicked irately, hanging loose and wild down his back. They were tattooed intricately, the black and blue and yellow ink swirling together in designs that Jinks’ eyes could not follow. The colors matched his flight suit, which was splotched with oil, as was his pallid face.

It seemed that genetics had been kind to the Twi’lek. Unlike many of his brethren, he was not oddly deformed; his eyes were a warm hue of green, his mouth and nose perfectly proportioned to the rest of his face. There were no odd humps and bumps on his skull, nor the rest of his body. He looked almost human, aside from the vicious fangs concealed behind his lips and the sharp claw-like fingernails that extended from his hands.

And even in his less than glamorous moments, like the moment in which they came to meet, Jinks found him absolutely irresistible.

"Hello? Is there anyone home inside that bushy skull of yours?" Kurnok had shouted and rudely cuffed Jinks across his brunette head.

"Oi!" Jinks had cried and rubbed his head. "Don’t complain! I’m sure that heap is worth more now than it was intact."

He had never intended to get Kurnok that angry. The Twi’lek had shown his teeth like a snarling wolf and had punched him square in the face, sending him reeling into oblivion. When he woke up, he was in the medical unit of that portion of Kashyyk, and Freigo was at his side.

"That Twi’lek fellow looked aside when he knocked you out," Freigo told him with a grin. "I don’t recall seeing a guiltier fellow for quite some time. I don’t think he believed that he had hit you that hard."

Still oblivious to his conscious state, Jinks had made the mistake of saying, "He can hit me again any time he feels like it," and that sent Freigo into uproarious laughter.

Jinks disliked remembering how wonderful the courtship had been. He loathed remembering the months in which Kurnok had traveled with them, a member of their crew aboard the Georgina. He wanted to imagine that it was all Kurnok’s fault that the relationship failed, despite the fact that deep within the recesses of his heart, Jinks knew that the fault lay with him.

But enough of that.

It took some doing, but the hike was finally finished, and he stood before the shabby front of Kurnok’s Ship Repair & Parts. The sign was written sloppily in many different languages; Basic, Bothan, Rodian, Wookie, Twi’lek of course, Mon Calamari, you name it and it was up there. The handwriting, however, was not elegant enough to be Kurnok’s. Kurnok, only two years Jinks’ elder, had studied languages and handwriting his entire life, as well as mechanics and computer repair. He was a genius, if one dared use that word in this day and age. A closet genius, as well as a closet several other things.

If ever there was a time for butterflies in the stomach, it was now. Jinks felt lightheaded with each step he took towards the wooden door, as if he were a condemned man walking towards the guillotine. He could hear the familiar sounds of metal-on-metal as Kurnok worked, recognized the smell of sulfur on the air. He was not discreet, that much was for certain.

Steeling himself for a tough rebuke, Jinks pushed open the door and entered the shop. The smell of burnt metal and sulfur was nearly overwhelming, but he managed to maintain his stomach. Just barely. One light bulb dangled from the ceiling on a chain, illuminating a small portion of the lobby with its dim light, while a series of other light bulbs illuminated the rest of the shop. Working with a laser scalpel and holding a face mask over his face, Jinks spotted Kurnok bent over the battered exterior of part of a hull, evidently trying to work his magic on the metal to make it recognizable again. The Twi’lek hadn’t heard him enter.

"Kurnok?" he called out meekly.

Kurnok continued working, his body language suggesting that he had not even heard Jinks’ voice. Jinks was not sure whether he was glad about that or not, but he was certainly glad that no one was clawing his eyes out yet… He cleared his thoughts and tried again.

"Kurnok?" Still nothing. "Hey! Kurnok!"

"Quiet down, Jinks, I hear you already!" Kurnok shouted back over his shoulder, over the roar of the laser burning through metal, then turned around and continued his repairs on the hull. "Sit down and wait a while. I’ve got work to do."

After so long, hearing his voice again was like a trip into the past. Memories flashed before his eyes, of Jinks coming up behind Kurnok as he worked on the hull of some expensive new freighter, scaring the shit out of him and laughing as the Twi’lek cursed him into oblivion. Of course, Jinks knew better than to take Kurnok’s caustic insults to heart back then; he always apologized later in his own way. Now…

He sat down morosely on a brittle chair in a far corner of the shack. The wait was interminable and Kurnok seemed determined to make Jinks wait as long and as miserable as possible. When the work was through, he switched off the laser scalpel, stood up, and popped his back.

"All right then, you impudent ass, what is it you need?" he drawled as he removed his face mask, flung it aside carelessly. His eyes, green and liquid as ever, glared at him.

"I…" Jinks stammered. He felt a blush rising into his cheeks; why now, of all times, must he lose his voice?

And Kurnok was not giving him any leeway, it seemed. The Twi’lek crossed his arms over his chest and leaned against hull he was repairing. "If you’ve got nothing intelligent to say to me, Jinks," he said easily, "then the door is right behind you."

"I’ve got something to say!" Jinks snapped irately, then brooded again.

"Well, what is it then? I am on a schedule, you realize."

"Just… give me a minute, okay? Being here is just a little difficult for me."

A note of recognition came into Kurnok’s eyes and he turned away, walking over to where a heap of metal was being filtered into useable metal and trash by two tiny worker droids. He monitored their progress idly, and Jinks felt a slight shiver of relief wash over him.

He remembers, even after all this time… Hope surged through him, hope that he had kept at bay for two years. Maybe after Freigo and I repair the Georgina…

Business first, a voice reminded him. Jinks twitched in irritation, then found that he had to agree. Clearing his throat, he said, somewhat tremulously, "Eh… you know how it always is with me, Kurnok."

"In trouble again, I presume?" the Twi’lek intoned.

"You could say that," Jinks admitted and shifted his weight uncomfortably. "Er, anyway, Freigo pointed out to me yesterday that our funds are next to nil, and what with all the star fighters constantly riding my ass through the Outer Rim—"

"Star fighters?" Kurnok said immediately. He turned around as if he had just been challenged and walked across the room, his step balanced as ever. "Jinks, just what sort of trouble have you gotten yourself into this time?"

"We can talk about that later," Jinks replied, "and I promise I won’t forget this time."

Kurnok regarded him skeptically, but waved him on with one clawed hand. "Continue."

"Okay, this is going to sound very pathetic—and I know that it is very pathetic, so don’t bother telling me that it is—but I was wondering if you might be able to loan me ship parts and droids to—"

"Just give me the number of the bay you’re in and I’ll take care of the rest," Kurnok answered without another comment. He turned and walked over to where a Hologram book lay on a desk cluttered with other mechanical stuff. He idly brushed it off with one hand, and Jinks’ eyes widened as a thermal detonator whisked through the air, and then began to plummet towards the wooden floor.

"Kurnok, look out!" he cried out and flung one hand out in the direction of the detonator. He channeled a wave of Force energy at the weapon and caught it, just barely.

Kurnok had not even looked up from tapping data into his Hologram book. Very quietly, he chuckled. "You’re still a basket case, I see," he said dryly. "Tell me, Jinks, do you honestly think I’d just set a weapon as dangerous as a thermal detonator out in the public where prying Wookie hands might get hold of it?"

"Well excuse me for thinking that you were going to get blown up into Twi’lek gumbo," Jinks drawled sardonically and let the detonator drop. It landed with a harmless little "chink" as it struck the ground.

Kurnok gave a small snort of amusement, then shook his head slightly and put his hands on his hips. "Gumbo? Is that the best you could do? My God, but you have grown absolutely pathetic since I last saw you."

"Better than your cooking, I suppose," Jinks grumbled miserably and crossed his arms over his chest. He was brooding again, and he knew it, but he didn’t have room in his heart to care.

An odd glimmer appeared in Kurnok’s eyes, and for the first time since the beginning of their encounter, he actually smiled. "There’s an improvement," he said, aloof again, then stretched. "Now. I believe you have some explaining to do."

"Huh?" Jinks murmured, distracted.

"Ulysses Jinks, stop sulking this instant," Kurnok demanded, "or I’ll send all of those ship parts back to my warehouse and you can make do with duct tape and a prayer!"

"All right, all right!" Jinks exclaimed and leered at the triumphant grin on Kurnok’s face. "So what do you want to know?"

"You said star fighters were trailing you," Kurnok reminded him easily. "What sort of star fighters? Are we talking big-time Republic hypocrites or Imperial TIE fighters?"

"Both," Jinks replied, a little nervously. He fidgeted with his sunglasses.

"Both?" Kurnok furrowed his brow and came a little closer. "Jinks…"

"It’s… sort of complicated," he said with a nervous smile and tremor in his voice. "See, me and Freigo are trying to get under the Second Imperium’s skin and cause them to leave Zoit and Zydirnon. Now don’t look at me that way! We’re not the only ones doing this, I promise. We’ve got allies from Kessel and a few pioneers from the Uncharted Territories have agreed to work with us. You should check out the blue-prints of their ships sometime, Kurnok, the design is absolutely phenomenal—"

"Jinks," Kurnok growled.

"All right, all right!" Jinks exclaimed again. He was unable to meet Kurnok’s gaze for a moment; the Twi’lek was regarding him with patience, but there was something else in his eyes that made Jinks… shiver.

"Anyway," he continued, "it was Freigo’s idea that we try to infiltrate their forces on Zoit before Zydirnon, for many reasons. See, Freigo’s clan was completely decimated during the Imperial raid four years ago, as you ought to remember, so if he was forced to take the life of another Zoitian drake, it would not be quite so painful. However, the Imperial troops there flat out refused to allow a ‘beast’ to enter their troops. So Freigo made a hasty escape before he could be rounded up and kept in a pen with the surviving drakes."

"And you?" Kurnok inquired with a raise of his eyebrow. He smirked slightly. "What did you do?"

"I enlisted in their ranks," Jinks replied with a shrug of his shoulders.

Kurnok blanched, then shook his head slightly in disapproval and waved Jinks on with one hand. "Continue. So you enlisted in their ranks… then what?"

"I was given a little cubical to live in. I say ‘cubical,’ because it really wasn’t any larger than the front of this shack here—very nice shack that it is, don’t misunderstand me—"

"Oh get on with it!" Kurnok moaned and ground his teeth together in irritation.

Jinks rushed on hurriedly. "I had a roommate, who is of little consequence to the rest of my story, and yet plays a fatal role. Each night, I forwarded encrypted tapes of my sector’s perimeter to Freigo back at our ship. He in turn forwarded them, re-encrypted, to the followers of our tiny organization, who shared them with their own small following. So, you see, I had a small armada pulled together in the space of, oh say, sixth months? Give or take a week or two."

"Remarkable," Kurnok commented with a very small smile.

Jinks bit back the question, "Really?" to save himself the humiliation of having Kurnok spit in his face. He simply smiled, then went on as if he had never been interrupted.

"I had to be careful each night not to wake my roommate, or not to arouse suspicion amongst my peers. You see, every single one of those dopes were nationalistic bigots who thought that humans were the superior species of the universe. They actually believed that.

"Anyway, one night as I was sending my latest message to Freigo, my roommate asked me none too gently, ‘What are you doing over there, Max?’ which was the name I had decided to use.

"I told him I wasn’t doing anything but sending a letter home to my mother, and that it wasn’t any of his business what I was doing anyway. That irked him, but he went to sleep and left me alone. The next morning, I awoke to find him fussing about my transmission machine, scrolling through all my past encrypted messages. He couldn’t read them, but he immediately sounded the alarm and informed my superiors that I was a traitor."

"You just can’t stay out of trouble for one moment, can you Jinks?" said the Twi’lek. He poured himself a cup of tea and sipped it while listening.

"Guess not," Jinks agreed with a slight grin, then went on, "Since I’d been snooping about the perimeter for the past three or four months while I was on patrol, I knew the base like the back of my hand. I slipped through a lax point in the barrier lasers and managed to escape to where the Georgina was hiding with only minor wounds. I was in no condition to pilot the ship, so Freigo got us out of Zoit airspace with relative ease. We met up with the rest of my troop and headed back to the Uncharted Territories for a little R&R."

"I see," Kurnok said, after a lengthy pause. He twirled one claw in his tea, one of the tattooed head-tails slung around his shoulder giving an idle twitch. "So. Why does the Republic, or should I say New Rebel Alliance, bear a grudge against you?"

"Oh, for a much more humiliating reason," Jinks said with a laugh. He ran one hand through his hair to get it out of his eyes. "When Leia Organa Solo’s special forces infiltrated Ryloth to free the ‘sentient’ races that were held captive there, they did not count the Zoitian drakes as anything more than beasts of burden. So, just a few months back actually, I located where the Alliance’s secret base on Dagoba was and ratted it out to a bounty hunter that was associated with the Second Imperium. Of course, the Alliance members escaped the Imperial assault—they always do—and now they’re after me too." He settled back down on his chair and quirked a shaky little smile at Kurnok’s glare. "What? It was fair punishment! They were going to leave all of those drakes to die in that pit—"

"I’m not angry," Kurnok interrupted, his voice as quiet and measured as it had ever been. He scratched the ridge of his nose idly, then said in a slightly exasperated tone, "I’m worried, Jinks. I’m worried about what sort of catastrophe you’ve brought down upon yourself—again. And I’m worried that this time, I won’t be there to… well…" He simply sighed again, silent and pensive.

Business is taken care of, Jinks thought. Why not?

He started to reach out and touch Kurnok’s arm, but caught himself, instead reaching out with a Force-touch with his mind. Kurnok’s eyes flashed a bit in recognition and he turned his head to face Jinks, waiting expectantly.

The Zydirnonite quirked a very nervous smile. "Y’know, Freigo told me to take care of business first, and for once I actually listened to him—"

"You strayed off topic enough times for me to have to remind you what it is we were talking about," Kurnok commented, but there was no malice in his tone.

"Yeah, true," Jinks agreed. He fidgeted with the fringe of his shirt and gnawed at his lower lip. "Look, Kurnok, I was thinking about what happened—and I know it was all my fault, I swear I do despite how much I wish… it wasn’t." He finished and felt the Light go out in his heart at the cold, callous stare he was met with.

God, those green eyes…He marveled, despite his sadness, at how many different emotions could be projected by those beautiful green eyes. Moments ago, he could have sworn that the word "concern" was written all across the irises of those eyes. Now… He swallowed painfully. The answer was clear.

"Not again, Jinks," Kurnok answered softly. His cold facade faded for a moment, and Jinks could see tears gleaming in the Twi’lek’s eyes as well. "Not again," he whispered, even softer this time.

Jinks forced himself to stand, with some difficulty, and swallowed back the onslaught of tears that were already battling for release against his eyes. Perhaps anger had not been why he had refused to return to Kashyyk after all this time. Maybe he knew in his heart that he wanted that relationship again, wanted that security and that love that Kurnok had given so freely… Maybe he knew that he would be unable to leave without asking, just one more time…

That was why he’d never come back.

He took a step closer to Kurnok and lifted his hand up to touch the side of the Twi’lek’s face. Kurnok did not move away, but neither did he encourage the action; the film of tears in his eyes was quivering, threatening to spill over at any moment. Jinks closed his eyes and leaned in to press his mouth against Kurnok’s unresponsive lips, felt the tears roll down his cheeks, and broke away shortly there after.

He didn’t have to look at the Twi’lek to know that tears were streaking down his cheeks as well. He knew. They knew each other that well. Silently, he stepped away from where Kurnok stood and without looking back, he left the shop.

Perhaps for good. He couldn’t know.

When he returned to the Georgina, Freigo was waiting for him impatiently on the landing pad. "Jinks!" he called out loudly. "You get everything?"

"Almost," he answered, his voice monotone. Freigo didn’t have to question him any further to know just what it was Jinks spoke of. The drake watched him walk up the boarding ramp without a question.