[Boba Fett] - 2(14)

“Just a few minutes…” Boba liked the view, but he liked the dreams he had while staring into space even more. He was always dreaming of the day he would get Slave I back, and experience the stars on his own.

As they explored the ship’s corridors, Boba and Garr often had to stand aside for formations of clone troopers marching to the mess hall or to the main docking bay for a battle sortie.

“I think they are creepy,” said Garr.

“Me too,” said Boba.

“If you see them without their helmets, they all look alike,” said Garr.

The troopers marched from place to place, or sat in their dorms polishing their Tibanna-gas blasters. They never talked with anyone outside their ranks, and rarely talked to one another; and never noticed the two ten-year-olds who walked among them. They always traveled in groups of four, six, ten - always even numbers. They didn’t like to be alone.

They paid no attention to Boba and Garr as they continued to go everywhere together. They saw the vast hydroponic farms, tended by droids, that turned waste into air and water, just like the forests and kelp beds on the planets. They saw the immense plasma engines, tended by droids and a few harried crew members. They saw the clone troopers, never excited, never bored, endlessly cleaning their weapons.

After a few days of exploring, they had covered almost every part of the vast assault ship, except for one area.

The bridge.

“I would give anything to see the bridge!” said Garr. “I even tried it once, but I couldn’t sneak in. No kids allowed! The bridge is where the Jedi hang out, you know.”

“Who cares?” said Boba. The less he saw of the Jedi, the better. Luckily, they seemed to have lost interest in him after their surprise at finding him on Raxus Prime.

“I care!” said Garr. “I admire the Jedi. They are the guardians of civilization, willing to sacrifice all so that others can live in peace. I wish I’d be found to be Force-sensitive and trained as Jedi. Don’t you?”

“Not me,” Boba said. He thought about telling Garr the truth - that he hated the Jedi, and wanted to be a bounty hunter, like his father.

But he decided against it. There was a limit to how much you could trust anyone, even your best friend.

Garr had a secret too, at least as far as Boba was concerned. Or at least, a mystery.

The mystery was whether Garr was a boy or a girl. Boba had gone so long without figuring it out that now he was almost embarrassed to ask. But he knew enough not to let embarrassment hold him back. (That was part of wisdom, too.)

“Garr,” he said one day as they were strolling down a long corridor, “do you mind if I ask you a question?”

“Not at all,” Garr said. “As long as you don’t mind if I don’t answer. “

“Fair enough,” said Boba, recognizing what he’d said when Garr had asked about his mother. “Are you a boy or a girl?”

“Like, male or female?”

“Yeah, you know.”

“I don’t know, actually,” said Garr. “I mean, I know what you mean, but I don’t know yet whether I am male or female. On my planet, it’s not determined until age thirteen.”

“Determined?”

“Somewhere around our thirteenth birthday, our bodies change, and become one or the other. Until then, it’s sort of, you know, up in the air. “

“Cool,” said Boba. “I was just wondering.”

“Does it make a difference?” Garr asked.

“Not to me.”

“Good. I wish everybody was like you, Teff. Did you ever wonder why I don’t hang out with the other ten-year-olds? They want to treat you one way if you’re a boy, and another way if you’re a girl, and there’s no in-between. No way to be just a kid, just a person.”

“Stupid,” said Boba. But he wasn’t surprised. He had always thought most people, including most kids, were a little slow. “Can’t they treat somebody as just a friend?”

“Nope,” said Garr. “But come on! Let’s find something to do!”

They were off again.

The troopship cruised slowly (under light speed) through normal space, on the lookout for Separatist forces. There were no more battles, though they heard rumors of other battles taking place throughout the Republic.

“The ship will be warping into hyperspace soon,” said Garr one day. “It will take us to one of the central worlds, probably Bespin, where we will be offloaded at some orphanage. I hope we will still be together.”

“Me too,” said Boba. He didn’t want to tell his friend that it wasn’t going to happen. Boba had no intention of going to an orphanage.