Once the pilot of the repulsor-lift craft had whipped his vessel through a hasty three-point turn and torn back the way we'd come, it was just me, Padme, Ahsoka and IG-1, standing on a well-used, pier-like platform at the edge of the enormous Lake Paonga.
Calling this body of water a mere lake was something of a misnomer, given the fact I couldn't see so much as the suggestion of curvature to either my right or left, and nothing that so much as resembled the faintest hint of the far shore even with Force-enhanced eyesight.
It would be more accurate to call "Lake" Paonga a sizable inland sea. One I happened to know ran a full order of magnitude deeper than the deepest point of the deepest ocean covering the world of my first birth.
The Gungans had long ago discovered that the plasma which sheathed the planet's core had honeycombed the planet's crust to such an extent, it was actually possible to circumnavigate the globe by simply following old plasma-chambers long since flooded. That was part of why they could seem so easy-come, easy-go about events which transpired on the surface.
At this point in their development as a civilization, building metropolises on the seafloor was a solved problem, and this fact gave them a degree of protection from any depredations committed by surface-dwellers. A degree of protection, but not invulnerability, as the amphibious race had discovered to their consternation during the invasion by the Trade Federation a decade earlier.
Droids didn't need to breathe, and as a rule, were far more tolerant of pressure and temperature extremes than organics, so with enough prior planning, assembling a force of military automatons kitted out for aquatic warfare and occupation was by no means an insurmountable goal.
The lake-dwellers had learned to their cost that they couldn't simply turn a blind eye to what happened above, and that they were stronger when they joined hands with the surface-dwelling Naboo than they ever could be alone.
"That's what makes this full-scale withdrawal and Boss Lyonie's paranoid belligerence so surprising," I considered.
Wracking my brains for any clue that might be hiding in my tattered and fraying foreknowledge as to what might be going on, while I kept a sharp watch on the jungle at our backs, the lakeshore to either side of us, and the waters before and below us.
My natal Clear Mind defense was presently a burst soap-bubble, for all the concealment it offered, because my Force Sense was sweeping out far and wide of us to warn me of any approaching life-forms.
The immense trees at our backs, the countless insects buzzing about us, and the sheer weight-by-area of all the simple and complex life in the water around us made keeping watch with the Force a difficult proposition at the moment, but Dark Woman had seen our long-ago trip to Circarpous V as a wonderful weeks-long training opportunity for occasions just like this.
At the time, I'd thought her demands that I successfully keep track of specific dragonfly-analog insects with my Force Sense over thousand-meter-plus distances had been sadistic even for her, so it was only a couple of years later, as I'd really begun to dig into the Sense umbrella during the final quarter of my apprenticeship that I'd realized what a blessing her unrelenting demands for success that brooked no excuses really had been.
I just hoped for Ahsoka's sake I had it in me to be the same kind of demanding, exacting, and remorselessly driven teacher she'd need.
One who wouldn't allow terminally shortsighted sympathy to ruin her chances of realizing her immense potential. I'd always thought my predecessor had cared too much about replicating the "More Older Sibling than Master" relationship he'd had with Obi-Wan when it had come his turn to teach, and I'd always insisted I wouldn't make that mistake in his position.
Something that was easier said than done, when you were constantly being sucked in by the young woman's earnest curiosity and passion for learning. It was already apparent to me how easy it would be to allow her drive to achieve to convince me I could rely on my student to supply her own motivation, thus sparing me from having to act as the always-critical heavy. That made me wonder how many other possible pitfalls to being a great teacher I hadn't yet identified.
"Credit for your thoughts, Master Jedi?" Padme asked in a quiet voice from beside me. Through our growing Force-bond, I could sense she was frustrated that she'd been unable to persuade our pilot to remain until our next ride arrived, and that she was unsettled by the looming and ominous swamp at our backs, but you couldn't hear any of that through the calm tone she'd maintained.
Again, I found myself impressed by her poise and self-possession. It spoke to the strength of her character, and that spoke to me, as I'd always been drawn to the qualities in a woman that you couldn't perceive at a glance. Not that there was anything the least bit objectionable about the wrapper this specific bundle of character came in.
"I was just thinking how much this place reminds me of another forbidding track of jungle and swamp I once slogged through, and how much good the place ultimately ended up doing me because of demands my former Master made of my abilities that seemed mad at the time.
Our circumstances seemed a bit cyclical for a moment, since now I'm the one responsible for seeing to it my young apprentice develops the good habits and judgment that will be the basis of her training.
The kind of good judgment that would allow her to recognize how inappropriate, inefficient, and downright silly it is, to use the Force to eavesdrop on a conversation she could have simply asked to join."
There was a startled gasp behind me, followed by a gulp so loud, it would have been audible from meters away. These sounds were followed by those of a half-dozen rapid footfalls on the hollow metal surface we stood upon, as my blushing Padawan all but skidded to a halt beside me on my right.
She'd already begun stammering her way through an apology before her feet came to a full stop, but I simply held up a hand in a silent request for silence that she quickly obliged, with a second and thankfully quieter gulp.
"Relax, Ahsoka, I'm not going to kill you and eat you because you let your curiosity get the better of you. I thought I felt a faint something a couple of times while talking to the Constable, and that tells me you've developed a fairly deft touch with a Sense technique I'm positive isn't part of the Temple's Initiate-curriculum.
Why don't you explain where you came by such knowledge, and we can chalk this little misstep up to a learning experience. With the understanding that you'll do much better asking questions than you will trying to spy on me, and that you need to control your impulses, rather than allowing them to control you," I stated after a moment in a relaxed yet firm tone. Turning to look at my unsettled apprentice as I did so.
Still a bit darker mauve than she was normally, I was surprised to see she was distraught enough to actually wring her hands, as a helplessly frustrated expression bordering on pained suffused her pretty features.
"I, I can't tell you that, Master. I gave my word not to tell anyone who taught me how to make my hearing keener and my eyesight sharper," Ahsoka responded, her voice starting out small, but gaining strength as she continued, until she was staring back at me defiantly.
Well, that certainly made things easier. I pasted an extremely serious frown on my face, then inquired in a grave tone.
"Are you refusing to answer your Master because you're genuinely committed to the ideal of keeping every promise you'll ever make throughout the course of your life, or are you simply trying to protect a friend who broke the rules to teach you something the Order has decided a Jedi should learn from their Master, after becoming a Padawan? The truth, now, my apprentice."
Looking more than a little queasy, yet still defiant, the Togruta's chin came up, as she replied with only the briefest hesitation, "I was the one who begged, pleaded, and twisted my friend's arm until they agreed to teach me. If you want someone to punish for that, Master, then you're going to have to settle for me, because I won't break my promise."
Sensing the absolute sincerity rolling off my apprentice in waves, I allowed the smile I'd been fighting to quirk the corners of my mouth upward, "Fair enough, Padawan Tano. I just hope Padawan Brood knows how lucky she is to have such a good friend."
I paused a moment to let the shocked sputtering on my apprentice's part play itself out, then tapped a finger to the corner of one eye by way of silent explanation as she continued to gape at me.
I had a wise, or at least wiseass remark that sounded wise on the tip of my tongue, but then I sensed a major disturbance in the water directly in front of us. IG-1 beat me to interposing himself between the group and the huge bubbling wash of the water in front of the platform, so we stood shoulder to shoulder, waiting to see what it was that was emerging from the deeps.
A sizable matte-yellow and brown submarine with huge bubble windows boiled to the surface parallel to the platform only a moment later. Allowing me to finally relax, because I hadn't sensed the nature of the approaching vehicle at all.
One of the bubbles in the mid-section of the sub-surface transport's midsection abruptly vanished. Signaling one very obvious conclusion as it did so.
Our ride to the Gungan city had finally arrived.
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