Tatooine was just as Tahiri remembered it: two blazing suns burning down on the barren landscape, while a dry breeze picked up

CHAPTER NINE:

Tatooine was just as Tahiri remembered it: two blazing suns burning down on the barren landscape, while a dry breeze picked up the loose sand and would eventually turn it into one of the many sandstorms that occurred on the planet on a daily basis.

She could barely contain the urge she had to take off her boots and run through the sand – and she would have if not for where she was.

Mos Eisley spaceport was not a place where you fooled around in. It was crawling with mercenaries and escape convicts who would not hesitate to shoot you if you looked at them the wrong way.

She did not know her way around Mos Eisley like she knew the dunes and deserts of Tatooine. Nevertheless, she would be able to find who she was looking for. Making herself appear as tall as possible, she headed in the direction her senses were pointing to.

Walking out into the main streets, she saw merchants had set up their shops for the day underneath the overhanging rooftops of buildings, in hopes of getting some relief from the heat. They sold everything from air-cooling systems to twenty-year old falling apart droids. The junk was long past its prime, but Tahiri had learned long ago that selling this 'junk' they had found lying out in the desert or in a scrap heap somewhere, was how many of the people in the city made a living. If you lived on the outskirts, then your choice of occupation was pretty much limited to being a moisture farmer.

She shuffled through the sand on the open streets, making her way towards an indiscreet building with no visible sign on it. There was no need to waste credits on a sign, when the beings that lived here knew what it was.

Walking into the cantina brought Tahiri a sense of uneasiness from being in a strange place. She had spent the first nine years of her life on Tatooine, so she had obviously been too young to wander into a place like this. Her first trip to a cantina had been on the planet Dundas, a few months ago, and this place did not look much different from that one.

An assortment of species were crowded around the bar, drinking their exotic drinks, while others preferred a private booth or one of the sabacc game tables. She wished she could block out the stench of it all but it was way too strong.

The unpleasant smell was forgotten though, when she spotted the human being she had traveled light years to find.

Walking confidently, and keeping an eye open for any trouble, she approached the booth that was currently being occupied by Anakin Solo, and slid in across from him.

"So," she began, "what's a nice guy like you, doing in a place like this?"

Anakin looked up from his untouched drink. "You shouldn't have come after me,"

In a huffy voice, she said, "I fly half way around the galaxy to find you and I don't even get a 'hello' or 'nice to see you, Tahiri,' "

"You flew here?"

"Well, no, not exactly," she admitted sheepishly, "Master Skywalker had someone who owed him a favour bring me here,"

"You're in no condition to be traveling anywhere," he looked guiltily at the graft bandage on the side of her head.

"You're one to talk," she retorted. When he did not reply, she said, "is it true what Master Skywalker said?"

"Yeah," he replied in a low voice.

She had not doubted Luke Skywalker's words after seeing Anakin's behaviour in recent days, but she had needed to hear him say it in order to really believe it. Anakin was the strongest person she knew but even he was not indestructible. She knew how he would clam up like a Mon Calamari shellfish. He would hold everything inside where no one could see it, not even her, and up until now, it had worked.

"I want to help," she said in a gentle voice.

Anakin's response was immediate. "No. I'm not going to let you get hurt again because of me,"

"I'm not giving you a choice," she said in that stubborn voice of hers that meant there was no room for argument. "I'm not going to let you go through this alone. That's how got you into this mess in the first place," she waited for him to argue with her, but instead – he smiled! The first display of emotion he had shown her since she had arrived.

"How do you do that?"

She was confused. "Do what?"

"Make me give in so easily,"

She shrugged, slightly embarrassed. "It's a gift,"

"Do you want to get out of here?"

"I think that's the brightest idea you've had in days,"

Anakin left a few credits on the table for his untouched drink – he had only ordered it in the first place so the bartender would not kick him out of there – and then he and Tahiri stepped out into Tatooine's searing heat. He went to walk out in the middle of the street when Tahiri stopped him.

"You are a lot of things, Anakin, but a knowledgeable expert of Tatooine is not one of them," she said to him. "You don't go walking out in the wide open street where there's no shade in the middle of the afternoon. That's when the sun's are at their hottest. Follow me,"

He watched as she stayed as close to the buildings as possible without touching them, trying to keep herself cloaked in the shadow of the overhanging roofs. After a few moments, he followed suit, glad that at least one of them knew what they were doing.

Tahiri could not believe the rundown building that Anakin had brought her to. He was staying at one of the few motels in Mos Eisley. 'The Sandcrawler' was what the crooked sign hanging outside said. The place could have just as easily been a jail by looking at all the thugs and lowlife's hanging around it. The inside was no better. Cracks had spider webbed along each of the walls, garbage lined the floor, and a ripped repulsor couch sat in the middle of the room. A dry, gust of wind blew into the room through the broken windows, creating a mini tornado with all the debris.

Against her better judgment, she followed Anakin as he led her up a set of rickety stairs to his room.

"It's not like the wonderful accommodations we're use to on Yavin Four," Anakin said with dry humour when they reached the door, "but I didn't have a whole lot of choices,"

Her mouth dropped open in a gasp of shock the moment she saw the inside of it.

A rickety looking table with two chairs sat in the far corner by the window – where the blinds where barely hanging onto it by a thread – and the bed, well, maybe at one time it had been that but now it was just a mattress with springs going through it, was pushed up against the wall. The 'fresher – she did not even want to get started on that. The only good thing about the room was it did not smell nearly as bad in there as it did out in the hall.

"If we ever go on vacation, remind me not to let you pick the accommodations,"

"It's not that bad," he said, walking over to the edge of the 'bed' and sitting down on it.

"I guess not," she conceded, "that is if you don't mind rodent infested places that smell like a Gamorrean." She had meant it as a joke but Anakin was back to his moody self now. She walked over and gingerly sat down on the mattress beside him.

"My Uncle use to tell me that constantly trying to control my feelings would come back to hurt me one day," he said, breaking the silence, "and he was right,"

"He told me that,"

"What else did he tell you?"

She regarded him seriously. "He said that if you don't let out all this junk you've crammed up inside you, it will drive you to the dark side,"

"So I have two choices then. I can spill my guts to you or become like my grandfather."

She could hear the bitterness in his voice. "No one said you had to tell me anything. If you want to keep everything cooped up inside you, that's fine," she said, folding her arms over her chest.

He sighed. "I didn't mean it like that. If there is one person I'm not afraid to tell my secrets to, it's you," he said, blushing slightly. "I just don't know where to start,"

"Why don't you start from the beginning?"

"The beginning, huh? Well, then I guess it all starts before I was even born. When my mother was pregnant with me, the cloned Emperor Palpatine touched me through her womb. I wasn't even born yet and I had seen the dark side."

"You joined with your mother and Uncle to fight him," she said, remembering he had told her the story soon after they had become friends.

"Yeah," he said, nodding his head, "and that's why she decided to name me Anakin. Because of how strong I was in the force, and she hoped that by naming me that it would help people to see the good that use to be in Anakin Skywalker before he became Darth Vader." He got up from the mattress and said angrily, "did she ever consider what it would be like for me to grow up with a name like Anakin? To have everyone around you, even your own family, wonder if you were going to follow the same path as your namesake,"

"I don't think she ever thought it would be this hard for you," Tahiri said.

Anakin snorted. "Hard? That doesn't even begin to describe it. My name is cursed. I use to have the same nightmare every night for years that I would turn into Darth Vader. Even now I'm not sure I won't turn out to be like my grandfather."

"You're not Anakin Skywalker," she told him, "you're Anakin Solo. Someone who's had ample opportunity to turn to the dark side but has resisted it every time."

"Because I keep all those feelings buried inside of me. But look where that got me. I'm losing my mind and I landed you in the med-center.

"Jaina and Jacen have no idea how lucky they've had it," he remarked bitterly. "They've never hard to work hard to keep their anger under control. No one ever worried about them falling to the dark side. No one ever watched them carefully to make sure they were following the right path. I was always jealous of them," he admitted in a quiet voice, "and it just got worse as we got older. The way they could do no wrong. They were Han and Leia's perfect kids.

"Everyone was so proud of my brother and sister's accomplishments by the time they were fourteen, that when I started my own training I felt like I was trapped in their shadow. You had the 'Solo Super Twins', and then there was me," he pointed to himself, "their quiet, introspective, younger brother. Do you think that even if I hadn't wanted to be a Jedi, I would have had a choice? Jaina and Jacen had already done so many great things, people were expecting no less from the youngest child of Rebel heroes Han and Leia Solo.

"Look, I love my brother and sister. I really do, and I've learned to deal with the fact that everyone expects them to be great Jedi Knights and everyone expects me to screw up,"

Tahiri had no idea he felt like this. The envy of his brother and sister. The resentment in his voice when he talked about how easy a childhood Jaina and Jacen had. She had never realized how deeply his name had impacted on him. Some best friend you are, Tahiri, she chastened herself.

"You're the only one who never judged me or expected me to fail," he said, looking at her. "When I told you who my grandfather was and about my dreams, they didn't matter to you. You told me I had the power to choose whatever destiny I wanted. You're the only real friend I've ever had," he said in a voice so low, she could barely hear him. "Sometimes I think it's you who kept me from turning to the dark side,"

"Wow," she breathed, "I don't know what to say." He had never said anything like that to her before. Come to think of it, she could not remember the last time he had given her any sort of a flattering remark. But what he had just said made up for all those years of no compliments.

Anakin merely shrugged. "I just thought it was about time I let you know how much you mean to me,"

"Wow," she said for the second time in less than a minute. This was a side of him she had never seen before: completely upfront about his feelings. She wondered if – no, better stop that thought right there. There friendship was too important to her to risk it on some foolish idea.

"You're awfully quiet," said Anakin.

"It's just you've never said anything to me like that before,"

"I didn't know you wanted me to,"

"Oh," was all she could think of to say.

He checked his wrist chrono. "It's late. We should probably get some rest,"

He sounded too restless to sleep. "We could talk some more," she suggested, "if you want to,"

"Tahiri, you don't have to. I've already laid enough stuff on you –"

"I know I don't have to, but I want to. You need to get everything off your chest, and I know you would do the same for me,"

He did not argue with her because he knew she was right. If their situations were reversed, he would do everything in his power to help her get through it.

No one else would have been able to make him just dump everything he was feeling inside. Pouring out his feelings was not something he did on a daily basis, and it was not something he would feel comfortable doing with anyone else.

Without hesitation this time, he plunged into how bad Chewbacca's death had hit him, and that even though he knew he had done the only thing he could have by leaving him behind, because he had a crammed ship full of people to look after, why did he still feel so responsible? Then there was his dad. He told her how much it hurt to see how he had let him down, and that he was afraid his dad would never trust him again.

Tahiri listened to it all without complaint, even when he would ramble on for minutes at a time. She would offer a few words of support here and there but mostly she remained quiet, knowing he needed this time to vent out all the emotional baggage he had kept bottled up for far too long.