Aldor's Eye - Part I

Chapter I - The Eye

Grogu had been dozing for more than an hour, but suddenly perked up from Din's lap, craning his neck to see out the cockpit as if he was looking for the source of a sound.

"You okay, Buddy? Do you... sense something?"

Grogu looked up at him, still groggy, as if he'd forgotten Din was there. He merely pointed out the port side of the N1 and asked, "System?"

Din looked over his sensor array, and saw nothing but empty space. Pretty much all they'd seen since they left Hovak 5. Their time there was almost pleasant, but the indigenous reptilian tribesmen there looked at Grogu a bit too much like a source of protein, and not near enough like a sentient child. They were a brutal lot Din didn't want as neighbors. At least he'd managed a friendly transaction with them. They had enough meat to last three years and Din was allowed to refuel and restock his ship from their surplus. Since then, it had been two weeks of uninhabitable systems and space, and not nearly enough fuel.

Din tried to remain as hopeful as Grogu was, but as he peered between data, he saw nothing but more space. He heaved a resigned sigh. "I'm afraid not, Kid, I don't see..." Din trailed off as a blip on his screen indicated a system some three parsecs off in the direction Grogu had pointed. "Well... okay then. Looks like you were right, Buddy."

Grogu hopped up onto the console, looking in the direction of the system. He was suddenly awake and excited. It was nice to see. The poor Kid had been anything but lately. It was enough to bolster Din's sinking spirits, and he was inclined to be particularly indulgent as he locked in a course. Grogu tapped on the transparisteel with his little claw, looking back at Din expectantly. "Ha-to."

"Yeah, Kid. Already on it."

They'd been in the Unknown Region for nearly a year now, charting a sector that seemed promising for habitable planets. Din wasn't sure yet what they were looking for or what they should do when they found it. He had no idea of their future. He only knew there was too much heat in the known galaxy. Too much darkness. All that mattered now was Grogu, and Din would die before he let the darkness have his boy. So he'd gone in search of peace. By consequence, he had become more willing to bend to Grogu's wishes. It worked so far because the Kid had an uncanny knack for finding good layovers.

The system came into view just as they dropped out of hyperspace. R5 did a quick scan and announced there was one planet in the system that was habitable. "More than the last four," Din muttered, and steered the ship toward a small system with three cool suns locked together in the center of it. Only four planets. Two gas giants, a frozen rock, and the planet in question. As it came into view, Din started running more detailed scans through the N1's array, and told R5 to fill in the gaps. Between the two, the data painted the picture of a cool climate, an ideal atmosphere, drinkable water, and a varied landscape. Interested now, he flew the N1 a bit closer until they were just beyond gravity's pull.

While the scans progressed across the surface of the planet, Din considered the data carefully, flicking his eyes out the cockpit every so often to correlate it with what he saw in front of him. Massive ice caps enveloped both poles. The scans showed ancient bedrock underneath, but it would take three much hotter suns and many millions of years to melt the ice. From the northern pole toward the equator, the ice began to thin out, revealing high, craggy mountaintops at first, then tundra fusing with a band of forested taiga, and finally a narrow coastline along a shallow equatorial sea that appeared to wrap all the way around the planet. The southern hemisphere was almost a copy of the northern one, but the sea and the land met farther from the equator, and the scans showed a much smaller land mass under the endless glaciers.