Qui was staring at the ceiling in his sour-milk-coloured room when the door hissed open and Syfo-Dias walked in as if he owned the place. (Qui reflected later that he did own the place, but that wasn’t the point.) Jinn sat up and stared into Vance’s blue eyes, waiting for him to speak.

Dias glanced about the room; “I see you have settled in,” he said dryly, seeing Jinn’s clothes still unpacked and the few draws and cupboards untouched.

Qui shrugged.

Dias continued; “We have a mission, you’ll be pleased to hear.”

Jinn felt his brow knot - a mission? Already? This was all too sudden! He opened his mouth to speak, but Syfo cut him to the chase; “Yes, I understand this is rather soon after your last… ‘unsuccessful’ one, but I assure you that this shall be much less taxing than before.”

Vance sat down on the end of Qui’s mattress; “Please do me the honour of working with me and not against me.”

Jinn still didn’t say anything. He wasn’t in the mood to mess about with Dias anymore.

“The Council agrees that this should help us both. We need a - how shall I put this? - ‘bonding’ exercise. This may just do it.”

Qui’s eyes wandered about the floor blankly for a moment; “Where are we going?” he finally asked.

“Malastare,” he said, “A simple trading dispute. It shouldn’t be difficult, and these” - here he tapped his lightsabre, hanging at his hip - “Shall stay at our sides.”

Jinn glanced at his ‘sabre hilt, then back at Syfo-Dias, shrugging again.

“Any qualms, Master Jinn?”

Qui-Gon shook his head.

“Good,” Vance nodded, getting to his feet and leaving the Padawan alone.

Jinn watched the door close behind the Jedi Master then sighed inwardly; Malastare… that was another fairly distant planet, somewhere near, or even in, the Outer Rim. The sentient species there… both [Ree-Yees] and Dugs, weren’t they? And the Hutts had their fingers in it, too. They always did.

Jinn sighed, collapsing back into his pillow - he had a bad feeling about this.

---

They were to depart early the next morning, which gave Qui a whole day to kill. He was again sent to the temple’s classes, seeing as Syfo-Dias was far from willing to preach to Jinn himself all day. The morning class was arithmetic. ‘Joy’ was Qui’s reaction.

The maths room seemed to be shared by several different classes, all working at different levels. In the corner, the infants got to sit on the carpet and watch their teacher in awe as she talked to them from her chair, holding her giant picture book in her hand and helping them count the dewbacks together. Qui half wished he were with them - at least they got the cushions to sit on and the comforting voice to help them out.

With a great breath, he looked back to his set task. Their teacher had had to disappear, due to some accident that had befallen her Padawan elsewhere in the temple, and she had left her ‘competent group’ (as she had called them) with a double-sided sheet of trigonometry. Qui-Gon didn’t pretend to like maths - there was something weird about people who actually liked maths, he thought - but he wasn’t bad at it. Master Dooku had taught him a lot, though his mentor was equally as enthusiastic (or otherwise) on the subject. Still, he recognised the necessity for his Padawan to use his head and taught him all he knew. ‘Never rely on calculators’ Qui remembered he’d once been told when his Master caught him sneaking one beneath the table, ‘In fact, never rely on technology. Rely only on yourself.’ Master Dooku and thenceforth thrown the calculator over his shoulder and, to add insult to injury, had somehow managed to lob it in such a way that it fell straight into the waste bin. Qui had hated him for that - for his flawless throwing, mind, not for the fact he’d taken away his calculator.

Qui valued his Master’s teachings, though, and he did do his best to make sure that he truly could rely on himself and not on the products of the material world.

Qui-Gon placed down his pen as he finished the last question and, blowing up his fringe, looked around himself for a distraction to while away the remaining fifteen minutes of the period. He found it first in an old abacus that some Youngling had left in the middle of the table. Reaching over and pulling it toward him, he set it before his face and leant his head on his hands, staring at it. Slowly, the beads rattled and slid across before his eyes as he manipulated the Force to his will.

A couple of passing Younglings were amazed by this feat, unable as of yet to command the Force in such a way.

Qui got to about the fifth row of beads, beginning to slide these across and following them with his eyes as he did so, until movement across the other side of the room caught his attention. Frowning, he rose himself up and looked over the abacus.

A small square of paper, that looked like a letter, was being passed subtly across the chamber, from Padawan to Padawan, with perfect skill and timing. But Jinn found that no one, except him, cared to notice this.

One boy passed it back over his shoulder, never looking up from his sums as he did so, and, just as he did, a girl walked by and took the paper between her fingers. Without breaking her pace, this girl then exchanged it with another girl, who she crossed at a junction between several tables, then this lass slipped it into the folded arms (or rather legs) of a young Dug, who was leant over some kind of Rubik’s cube. Finally, the dug tossed it carelessly back through the air where, not looking up from her sheet of work, Qui saw Tahl catch it between her raised fingers, and from there, it passed along the row on her table, then across to the row on Qui’s table, and at last ended up dropping into his lap with a gentle, but rather anticlimactic flutter.

Qui-Gon blinked, gaping. No one paid him any attention, though. It looked like they had just done it all in their sleep! After the shock had sunk in, a smirk drew itself up at the corners of his mouth - well, someone had been planning that for a long time, he could tell! What a feat - sounded like something only his Master could pull off!

His Master…?

Thoughts jarring to a halt, Qui picked up the article, which indeed was a letter, and saw that it had his name scrawled on it in that untidy hand he knew so well. His heart leapt - it was from his Master!

He looked left then right, and swiftly tore open the envelope beneath the table, pulling out the letter within:

Qui swallowed as he read the letter, then read it again, and again, and then again for good measure. He felt a lump in his throat, yet he felt angry, too, angry that everyone seemed to know where his Master was except him. Yet, to counter this feeling of inadequacy and injustice, he also felt gratitude, a thankfulness that his mentor had gone to such lengths to speak with him and (it would seem) to protect him. He felt more mixed up than anything.

As he looked up, he just caught Tahl’s eye for a moment. She quickly looked away again, going back to pretending that nothing had happened.