Honesty startled awake. His first thought, of all possible things, was My father is dead. He ached with it. He remembered the first time he’d lost a molar in the back of his mouth. The tooth had fallen out, the same as most of his milk teeth, but the space left behind had been bigger, more noticeable. Knowing that his father was gone was like that, like sticking the tip of his tongue into that space where there should have been something, but instead there was only emptiness.

The comparison was weak but fit all the same.

He shouldn’t have argued with him. That last night, standing in front of the mirror and getting dressed. Honesty should have respected his father and told him how much he loved him, how happy he was to have him around. But he hadn’t, and now he never would. Tears pricked his eyes at the thought and he ducked his head. He’d spent the entire night crying quietly to himself. He would not let everyone else see his sadness, as well.

But then a tear was sliding down his nose and it was too late.

“Hey.”

Honesty dashed away his errant tears and looked up to find Imri sitting next to him. He held a water capsule, one of the few that had been aboard the maintenance shuttle.

“Are you thirsty?”

Honesty nodded and took the proffered capsule, biting into it so the stale water filled his mouth.

“There aren’t many of these, so I wanted to make sure you got one,” Imri said. There was no worry in his expression; as far as Honesty could tell, nothing bothered the Jedi very much, which was in itself a little annoying. Sure, the day before Imri had been just as upset as Honesty, but now that storm of emotion had passed, leaving the boy smiling once more. It seemed unnatural to be so steadfast and constant, even though Honesty’s instructors back on Dalna had often said that a cool head was the key to survival.

A cool head will help you prevail even in the most desperate of times. That hadn’t been advice from Honesty’s survival instructor, but from his father. Honesty squeezed his eyes shut and then reopened them.

Ambassador Weft had been correct, though. Honesty had to keep a cool head and assess the problem using everything he’d learned. He couldn’t save his father now—that had never been an option—but he could survive and pass on all that he had learned from his father. So far he’d been afraid to speak up. Vernestra was a Jedi Knight, after all, but it was clear that even though the Jedi were capable, they didn’t have any fieldcraft. Not like he did. He could help. It would give him something besides the loss of his father to think about.

The most obvious problem, besides how to get a message out, was the short-term care of themselves. There were precious few water supplies. And although they were fine with regard to food, they would feel the lack of drinkable water much, much sooner.

And the water on Wevo was toxic.

As he drank, Honesty looked out at the jungle beyond the cave, refusing to give in to the hopeless despair that tried to poke at him. The rain had stopped, and as he watched, the green undergrowth, which had been fried by the rainstorm the night before, grew rapidly.

“Whoa, do you see that?” Honesty asked, his previous malaise falling away in wonder. He climbed to his feet and walked to the entrance of the cave to watch as vines twirled up and around the trunks of the trees, growing many times faster than anything back on Dalna.

“Yeah, it seems that even though the rain here destroys a lot of the plant life the moon has a way to recover. Balance,” Imri said with a smile. A shadow flickered across his face before the smile brightened. “Look, even those funny little primates survived.”

The bright-colored creatures flitted from branch to branch, picking giant blue fruits that hung off the trees, heavy and round.

“Those weren’t there yesterday, right?” Honesty asked.

Imri frowned. “The fruit? No, I don’t think they were.”

Honesty drank the rest of his water capsule and handed it back to Imri while he considered the fieldcraft he’d been taught. In his survival classes he’d learned that on some planets the ecosystem relied on cycles for the survival of certain species. The rain on Wevo was caustic, and the little furred primates might be able to drink the toxic water.

Or they might be reliant on another resource entirely.

Honesty sprinted out of the cave toward the trees, ignoring Imri’s shout. If his theory was correct, they wouldn’t have to worry about going thirsty. He ran to the nearest tree, tugging at the lowest fruit and pulling it off the branch. A red-furred primate with six arms and an incredibly long tail chittered at him angrily, but Honesty turned and ran back to the cave before the little creature could do anything more than yell.

“What are you doing?” Imri asked, eyes wide. “You have to be careful. Who knows what those little things can do.”

“I think it was just mad that I stole this,” Honesty said, hefting the fruit. It was heavier than it looked, reminding him of the summer melon some of the farmers grew back on Dalna.

“What’s going on?” Vernestra asked, walking over to where Honesty and Imri stood in the entrance of the cave. Avon followed close behind, the goggles for the scout droid holding back her curly hair, which seemed to be growing just like the underbrush outside.

“I think Honesty has an idea,” Imri said.

Honesty nodded. “Back on Dalna, in preparation for our Metamorphosis, we have to take certain classes. I trained in fieldcraft—that’s stuff about surviving in different climates—and one of the things my teacher told me about was how in some places you have to get water from sources other than a stream or river.”

“You think that the potable water on Wevo is in the fruits?” Avon asked, frowning as she considered it. “That would make sense. Those trees have adapted to this environment in other ways.”

“And those tiny animals have been eating and drinking the fruit all morning,” Vernestra said. “But we don’t want to accidentally poison ourselves by eating that to test a theory.”

“We don’t have to,” Avon said with a grin. “Jay-Six has nanny programming. She should be able to sample it and see if it’s safe for us to consume. The language program shouldn’t interfere with that.”

Vernestra crossed her arms and gave Avon a disapproving look. “So you did do something to her programming.”

“I just relaxed some of her imperatives, giving her a greater measure of autonomy. Relax, Vern, Jay-Six is fine, just able to self-actualize a little better.”

Vernestra looked doubtful and Imri looked confused, but Honesty was impressed despite himself. He always thought it seemed unfair that droids had no say in their lives, that they were forced to live in a way that made them subservient to the organics they lived with instead of partners. Honesty thought it was good if they could decide a little bit of what kind of lives they wanted to live.

Avon gestured to Honesty to follow her, and they walked over to where J-6 stood in the back of the cave. She hadn’t moved all night, just stood in a corner contemplating whatever it was she’d refused to tell them the night before. Avon cleared her throat as they stood before the droid, as though she were a bit afraid to ask about the fruit.

“Yes, Avon. Did you have some other astronomical question you need addressed?” J-6 said, her photoreceptors a little too perceptive for Honesty’s liking. Maybe he’d been wrong. Maybe a fully self-aware droid was less interesting and more terrifying.

“No, but is your food safety program still functioning? We wanted to know if this would be safe for our biology to eat,” Avon said, pointing to the fruit Honesty still held.

J-6 sighed, which was amazing because droids didn’t even breathe, before suddenly taking the fruit from Honesty’s hands and crushing it with her own. Honesty jumped backward and Avon screamed as purple flesh and juice splattered all over her.

“Yes, this should be safe for you to eat,” J-6 said, dropping the remnants of the fruit as Imri and Vernestra walked over.

“Well, that’s a relief,” Avon said, picking bits of the blue fruit out of her hair. She took a piece of the flesh off of her shoulder and put it in her mouth, chewing slowly. “Tastes like mamba melon but a little tangier.”

“Well, at least we know that we won’t go thirsty,” Imri said, giving Avon a sympathetic look.

“Good job, Honesty,” Vernestra said. “That was a really good catch. We should get out there and pick a bunch of these fruits before the rain sets in. Didn’t you say that there was a twenty percent chance of rain, Jay-Six?”

“Did I? Perhaps. The information for this moon states that the rains come daily in the evenings, right before the night falls heaviest. So as long as the suns shine brightly you should be fine. Unless, of course, the information I have is completely wrong, but I suppose you will all be melted piles of goo by the time you realize that.” J-6 shrugged as a person might, and no one said anything for a very long time until Avon suddenly reached out and embraced J-6, a wide grin splitting her dark face.

“I love you so much,” she whispered.

Honesty decided right then and there that if he wanted to survive he was going to stay as far away as possible from both the genius tech girl and her moody droid, no matter how much the strange, smart girl intrigued him.