Silence took the head chair for a time, everyone letting time deflate the tension. Relin sat, too, his anger at Khedryn seemingly dispelled as fast as it had appeared.
"Marr is Force-sensitive," Jaden said. "Did you know that? Did either of you?"
Khedryn spilled some of his own caf. "What?"
"How do you know that?" Marr said, and Khedryn thought he did not sound overly surprised.
"I can sense it. Relin can as well, I am sure."
Relin nodded absently, mostly lost in the depths of his teacup.
Jaden looked to Marr. "I apologize for springing this on you. I thought I would tell you after we returned to Fhost. If I mentioned it at all."
"What does that even mean, Force-sensitive?" Khedryn asked.
"It means he has an intuitive connection to the Force," Jaden said. "Were he younger, it would mean he was trainable. But given your age, Marr, even with your mathematical gifts, training is probably out of the question."
The possibility, even if remote, of losing Marr to the Jedi Order opened a hole under Khedryn's feet, and he started to slip. He held up his hands. "Whoa. Aren't we getting ahead of ourselves a bit?"
"Yes, we are," Marr said, and looked at Jaden. "Why did you tell me this now?"
"Because I want all of us to realize that the Force brought you to that signal. You may not have known it, but that is what happened. You selected the route back to Fhost, didn't you? Didn't you?"
"He's the navigator," Khedryn said.
"I chose the course," Marr acknowledged.
Jaden nodded, obviously unsurprised. "It was not chance that you chose this system. The Force is moving through you, through all of us."
"Not through me," Khedryn said before he could wall the words off behind his teeth. He knew they sounded petulant. He felt the odd man out on his own ship.
Jaden put a hand on Khedryn's shoulder, and that only made it worse. "The Force touches all of us. Look at us. Look."
Khedryn did, and had to admit that it would have taken an odd coincidence to bring all of them together, at that place, at that time.
Marr, staring at his hands, said, "I do not wish any training."
Jaden did not seem surprised. "Understood. I simply wanted you to see what is happening here. I want all of us to see it."
"Jaden is right," Relin said.
Khedryn tried to get his head around events, but could not. He faced the fact that perhaps Jaden was, in fact, right. Could he simply run as he usually did?
"Time is our enemy," Relin said. "Khedryn, please."
Khedryn downed the last of his caf, pleased to find the final sip heavy with bitterness from the pulkay. He was almost to the point of surrender. "What are you asking us to do?"
"Help us accomplish what needs to be accomplished," Jaden said. "I need to get down to the surface of the moon. There is someone down there who needs help."
Khedryn fired the last of his ammo. "And if you go down there and there's nothing? Have you considered that? I've seen that happen before."
Jaden shook his head, a bit too fast, a bit too forcefully. "That won't happen. Something is transmitting that signal."
"Jaden-" Khedryn began.
Relin cut him off. "I cannot go down to the moon."
Khedryn set down his caf cup and stared across the table. "No, you want to get aboard the cruiser. You said that. It remains crazy even when repeated often. Antique or not, that ship packs more firepower in its shuttles than we do on all of Junker."
"Relin," Jaden said. "I don't think-"
Relin held up his stump, perhaps forgetting that it had no upraised hand attached. "You seemed surprised when I mentioned Lignan earlier." He swirled his cup. "Were you?"
"Yes," Jaden said.
"And that tells me that you have never before heard of it or its power. Yet Khedryn mentioned Sith, so I know they still exist in this time. Putting the Lignan in their hands would be dangerous, yes?"
Jaden nodded. "It would, if it does what you say."
Relin's voice frosted. "You felt it. Do you doubt what I say, too?"
"No," Jaden admitted. "But… "
Relin ignored him, continued. "And Saes, the captain of Harbinger, should he figure out what has happened, may try to do exactly that: take it to the Sith. Or he may hoard it for himself. But he is very dangerous in either case. I need to destroy either the Lignan or the ship. And if he leaves this system, we may never get another chance. I do not have much time. Harbinger's hyperdrive is damaged. The whole ship is reeling from the misjump. This is the moment."
Khedryn thought he could see Jaden bend under some weight known only to him. The Jedi very much wanted to go down to the moon's surface. When his expression fell, Khedryn knew that Jaden, too, had just surrendered.
"You are right," Jaden said. "The ore is the greater concern. I am being influenced by… personal concerns. The moon can wait. I will accompany you aboard Harbinger."
Relin stared into his teacup. "No. Unless you can suppress your Force presence altogether, you are unwelcome. Saes will detect you easily."
"You could screen me."
"Your presence is too strong, Jaden," Relin said. "Masking it from Saes would be difficult and an inefficient use of my power."
Listening to their exchange, Khedryn perceived two men trying to give the other an excuse to do what he wished, all while purporting to want its opposite.
"Heed your own words," Relin said to Jaden. "The Force called you to the moon, and that is where you should go. Look to your feelings."
"I don't trust my feelings."
The admission seemed to take Relin aback. "You cannot accompany me, Jaden. This is for me to do."
"My Force presence is not strong," Marr said, his words surprising everyone. "I could accompany you."
For a long moment, no one said anything.
Khedryn was too stunned to speak. Finally, he said, "Why would you do that?"
Marr sighed over his caf, shrugged, tilted his head, finally found words. "I told Jaden how I once calculated the probability that my life would go this way or that. Do you remember me telling you the same thing?"
Khedryn nodded.
"Do you know why I did that? It was not just the math. I wanted to confirm that my life would mean something, that I would do something important. But then… other things got in the way."
"Marr… " Khedryn said.
"I do not regret a moment. You are my great friend. But is salvage all I want to have left behind me? This is a chance to do something meaningful. I concur with Jaden that something other than chance brought us to this moment. It is more likely that you'd win at sabacc than all of this to happen by chance."
Khedryn smiled despite himself. "That's sayin' something."
Marr continued, "Our lives have led us up to this place at this moment. How can I run away from that?"
Marr did not say it, but Khedryn understood Marr to be asking him the same question, and he had no good answer. For him, running away was simple habit. He'd been running away from roots and responsibility since he'd become an adult. It had worked pretty well for him.
Marr looked to Relin. "I will go, if you will have me."
Jaden started to speak, stopped.
Relin stared across the table at Marr. "You've only just met me, and you do not know what I have in mind."
"Whatever it is, it will require a ship. You'll need a pilot who knows the ship, not to mention one with two hands."
Relin tilted his head to acknowledge the point. "The Lignan will affect you more strongly up close. You've felt some… unease since Harbinger appeared?"