We Are All Made of Stars
Part II
Your sorry eyesThey cut through bone
They make it hard
To leave you alone
To leave you here
Wearing your wounds
Waving your guns
At somebody new
Baby, you're lost
Baby, you're lost
Baby, you're a lost cause.
-- Beck
I had begun to hate my trips to the market. Wedge was always asking me to buy him something, and with no income, only the money Boba had once left for me and any remains of my salary from the now-dufunct Republic, I couldn't exactly afford to spoil him. This would enevitably put him in a bad mood, and he would begin dragging his feet, insisting that he was tired, and asking to be carried.
It was on one of these tiring market days, when my six-year old son had found an old pilot's helmet in a pile of junk-shop rubble, and had placed it on his head and begun the usual begging routine, that a spector from my past showed up in the present.
" Calli?" a voice, somewhat familiar but long unheard, called to me as I was asking Wedge (a good deal more harshly than usual, though the little boy couldn't have understood why his desire to wear a helmet perturbed me more than his usual marketplace requests) to put the helmet back. I straightened, and turned to find a dark-haired woman in stylish clothes, who was holding a small bundle and looking at me with bemused interest. It took me a moment before I realized who she was: she looked strange away from the place where I had once been acustomed to seeing her: Eulee's bar. It was Tinka.
" Hello," I said, shortly, taking Wedge's hand.
" Its been a long time," she said, offering a smile that I didn't return. Uncomfortable with my stanch reply, she shifted her gaze to Wedge. " Hello there," she said, squatting to face him. He smiled before shyly clutching my leg.
" Hello," he returned in the small voice that children use with strangers.
" He's cute," Tinka said, standing. " He looks like his dad." My eyes dropped to my feet. Except for the ghostly white skin and the dark blue eyes, Wedge was Boba's spitting image, especially as he had been in childhood: button nose and all.
" So what's Boba Fett up to these days, anyway?" she asked. " Still working, I guess – I heard something about him showing up on Yavin 4 a few months –"
" Look, I wouldn't know," I snapped. " I haven't seen him in more than five years." All the while Wedge was looking up at me, and I wondered if he would question me about this later, or if he was even paying attention to the adult conversation.
Tinka surprised me by not turning her back and walking off as soon as she learned that I no longer had any connection to Boba, aside from the son he had left me with. Instead she fished around in the bag she was carrying, retrived a pair of death sticks, and offered one to me.
" No thanks," I said, " We've really got to be going."
" Hey, what's your hurrary?" she asked, placing the death stick between her lips. She snapped her fingers in front of her lips and the death stick sparked to life. " Hang around and have a drink with an old friend."
" I – I don't know that we were ever friends," I said, stuttering in the face of what she had just done with batting an eyelash. " How did you light that?" I asked. She took the death stick from her mouth, exhaled a neat line of smoke, and smiled.
" This old trick?" she asked, snapping her fingers and igniting a few sparks. Wedge stifled an entertained giggle against my leg. Tinka looked down at him and grinned. " My mother was a Yuilere – a fringe culture, humans who had once settled on Malastare." She looked back at me. "They were conjurers – simple stuff. Maybe they should've been Jedi but for whatever reason they weren't. I remember a few things," she shrugged, and took another puff. " So, a drink?"
I agreed, mostly out of loneliness. We walked to a nearby restaurant that catered to travelers, and sat down at a table near the bar. I hoped that Tinka wouldn't talk about Boba – that she would understand that it was a sore subject, or would be soon, when Wedge began school and learned that most children had two parents.
I had nothing to worry about – Tinka mostly talked about herself, and when she did mention Boba it was in vague allusions. Wedge was preoccupied anyway, watching a pod-race broadcast that was on the holovid set behind the bar.
" It's a tough break," she said, after her second glass of Antakarian Fire Dancer. " That he took off on you." She shrugged. " That the way it is, with them. Right? I haven't seen Dengar in – gods, who knows?" She laughed, but there was sadness there. " The time gets away from you on Geonosis. Well, you know that." She looked up at me.
" Yes, I do," I answered, reaching over to smooth Wedge's hair, sorry that I'd been angry with him earlier, when it wasn't his fault that we were stuck there with no money for toys. " The nature of it – its flexible here, time. Sometimes I feel like he's grown up overnight," I told Tinka, " Other days I feel its been centuries since he was born."
Tinka scoffed. " Yeah," she said, " I can barely remember what this place was like before the Empire took over. But some days I wake up and except things to be like they were." She looked up at me. " You know what I mean?"
I nodded. Because only a few people in the entire universe knew or remembered that I existed, the Empire had not interferred greatly with my life. But I still understood what she meant – I could scarely remember what it had been like to live with Boba, or even to be in love with him. But sometimes I still woke up and looked for him beside me in bed. Even though I felt only anger and resentment for him since he had deserted us, in my few moments of half-conciousness before fully waking, I would be crushed all over again to find his side of the bed empty.
Sometimes I felt sorry for him. The day that Mace paid his second visit to the cave, I felt incredibly sorry for Boba, even though he had only brought the disappointment of defeat onto himself.
" He showed up at the Inn that night, as I knew he would," Mace told me when I asked him what had happened after he left the cave. " I was waiting for him, sitting on the floor, meditating. He stepped out of the shadows, and the room quaked with his rage, but his aura was bleeding an unbelievable sadness as well."
Here, I had placed my head in my hands. I felt just as I had when Mace told me about my parents, and about their demise. Another person falling through my life, past my reach, only available in the Jedi Master's kind but detached rememberances.
" He asked me if I knew who he was, and I answered that I did," Mace continued. " He asked me if I had anything to say to him before he killed me. I said that I was sorry for what had happened to him, but I told him that if he was waiting for an apology for what happened that day, it would not and could not come from me."
I knew what Mace was implying – it was what I had quietly believed all along, and only stronger since I'd met the man who had brought Jango Fett's life to an end. The man who needed to apologize for what had happened to Boba was Jango himself.
Of course, all he would be apologizing for was his too-human desire to have someone to share his life with, someone to continue his legacy. For creating something and therefore allowing the possibilty that it might be destroyed. I was guilty of the same unforgiveable crime when I chose to bring Wedge into the world - into, specifically, my imperfect world: a cold cave in the midst of a galaxy that was crumbling into the hands of tyrants.
But there was no safety, there was no guarantee for any parent, that their child would be free from pain, from loss, from sadness. There was no such assurance in our world or in any other.
" What happened next?" I asked Mace then, my voice raw.
" We fought," he said. " And, as you can see, he did not kill me." He reached down to the sleeve of his robe and pulled it back, to reveal a ghastly scar on his arm. " This is one of several close calls that grazed past," he said. " If I did not have my force abilities, I would have been killed."
I felt horrible for Mace, but, that day, I did not yet know if Boba had survived him. I was shaking horribly, unable to look him in the eye.
" And . . ." was all I could croak out.
" I did not want to kill him," Mace said, and I choked out a sob, sure that he was dead.
" So," he continued, " I only injured him badly enough to force him to retreat. It was a painful wound, so he would have felt that he was going away to die. But there is a difference between a painful injury and a fatal one, and I have been long-trained to know that difference. It is one of the tactics we use when we need information from an adversary. But," he added, " I let him leave."
I was crying, though pathetically trying to hide it. " Why," I asked, from behind a hand I covered my face with. " Why, for me? For me you let him go? Mace, this isn't over for him. He'll find you again –"
" Callia," he said, smiling despite everything and placing a hand over mine. " My time in this world is coming to a close. I can feel it, especially now, after so many of my friends have died. I'm sure you've heard about the massacre of the Jedi on Corasaunt last year."
" I heard – something," I said, suddenly embarrassed at my small, personal pain, when the world was falling to pieces around me.
" The last bastion of Corasaunt," Mace explained, " The Jedi Headquarters, fell then to the Sith – or to the Empire, as they are now calling themselves. I was one of only a handful of us who narrowly escaped death that day," he said, " And my battle scars increased before the ones that Boba gave me had even healed." He smiled again, corageously.
" I am beginning to feel my age, I'm afraid," he said. " And my powers are dimming with my hope for peace." He was quiet for a moment, his eyes focused downward, on his hands, which were folded neatly on the tabletop.
" No Jedi believes, when he begins his career, that he might see this kind of destruction, face this kind of combat." He looked up at me. " It is not what we hope for," he added, his voice tight. I left my chair and went to him, put my arms around him. As I embraced my friend, I couldn't rid my mind of the dirty fact that I was hugging the man I had cursed and loathed since I was a teenage orphan hating in defense of the boy she loved – the man who killed Boba's father.
When we parted, Mace stood, and walked to where Wedge, then four years old, was sitting and playing with a toy ship I had made for him for his last birthday. My son was humming to himself, unaware that a Jedi master had his attention focused on him.
" Keep him safe," he said, and I nodded.
As he went to leave, I asked him if I would ever see him again.
" I don't know," he said, thoughtful. " I'm in hiding, of course, trying to stay clear of the Empire's agents. They're still searching for us – the last of the Jedi. I suppose they think we pose a threat." He laughed to himself. " Maybe, someday. But not this old man."
" Don't talk like that," I begged. " You don't know – how much it hurts me to hear that you've given up hope."
" Oh no," he said, shaking his head. " I have not given up hope – no, not at all." He looked back to Wedge. " Sometimes hope," he said, " Just has to lie a long time in wait."
" Calli," Tinka said, calling me back to the present. She was packing her death sticks away, and finishing her third drink. " I've got to go," she said. " Got to drop some stuff off for a friend . . ." she trailed off.
I nodded, getting her meaning. I wasn't much of a conversationalist anymore – I mainly only talked to my son, who didn't demand much in the way of sintilating dialogue.
" Sorry," I said, " I guess – I've got a lot on my mind." I laughed to myself – nothing had happened in my life in years, but I was still preoccupied at every moment with the past. I was as unable to let go of it as Boba was.
" Its alright," Tinka said, " It was good to see you alive. And your son, healthy," she said, nodding to Wedge. " You know," she added, under her breath, " Karmac was killed."
" Oh," I said, remembering the bulky, jovial man who had haphazardly told Boba about my pregnancy – who had, actually, been an important link on the chain of events that led to our explosive end. " I'm sorry," I said.
Tinka was looking at me, waiting, as if she wasn't sure she should tell me what she said next.
" The rumor was that Boba killed him," she whispered, " And just to win a bounty. Everyone was shocked. We thought – well. I guess we thought he was different from his father."
I wanted to laugh, but I knew if I did, it would be such a cold, angry laugh that I would frighten my son.
" Believe me," I said instead. " He is exactly the same." Even as I said it, I didn't want to believe it – something deep in the pit of me resisted this assertion. What has he ever done to prove otherwise? a larger, cynical place inside demanded.
I looked down at Wedge as I took his hand and led him out of the restaurant. I knew what made me think he was different: it was not that he had loved his son – Jango had been the same way with Boba, I was certain.
It was the part of me that longed to believe that he had once loved me that wouldn't let me pass him off as the reincarnation of Jango that he had very nearly become.
But as we headed home, I inwardly reminded this dwindling part of myself that, even if he had, he no longer did. He had grown up, and into the armored boots of his father. Whatever he felt for me, I decided, was only a stage in his development.
The soft, larve stage of a man who would, and, from Tinka and Mace's reports, had, hardened into a steel-plated killer.
The next day was a typical one for Wedge and I – I remember nothing spectacular about it. No feelings I had that something would change that day, that a maelstrom would suddenly blow into our quiet, stolid live in the cave.
Wedge had just finished with his lunch, and because he had eaten all of his veghash, I let him play with the holovid that Mace had brought us the second time he visited. It was an old holovid, and Wedge liked to tinker with it, and rejoiced when he found even an old Malastarian news broadcast to watch. Though he had happily read the children's books that Mace had brought for him, there was something special about the holovid for him – it was a connection to the outside world, which our place in the cave was otherwise almost entirely devoid of. Already, at six, he was curious, and I didn't blame him. I fully planned to send him to school on another planet, with other human boys and girls – or at least alien children who could speak our language – when I came up with a way to somehow get the money.
" Mommy," he said suddenly as I was cleaning the dishes.
" Hang on, sweetie, let me finish these," I said.
" Mom," he said again, more insistant.
" What, Wedge?" I asked, getting annoyed.
" There's . . . a man," he said, and I frowned, dropped my dish into the sink, and spun around. I started to ask Wedge what he meant, when I saw him – a man crawling into the cave on all fours. I gasped, and went for the trunk I kept near my bed, where I stored Boba's old blaster. Before I could get the lock open, I heard my name and froze.
" Calli," the man said in a hoarse rasp. My fingers trembled on the lock. I didn't want to look up – I didn't want it to happen again.
" Mommy, he's bleeding!" Wedge, cried, jumping and going to him. " Bad!"
It was Boba. And he was bleeding – his armor was still on, but there were snags in the weak places, and blood leaked from them. He leaned forward and coughed, and more blood sputtered out onto the floor.
" What the hell do you think you're doing here?" These were the first words out of my mouth. Wedge looked up at me with surprise.
" Mom!" he cried. " He's hurt! Help him!"
" My ship," Boba moaned, falling onto his side and spitting a mouth full of blood out of the corner of his mouth. " I had to – put – it down – out there."
" You've got some nerve," I said, laughing darkly.
" Mom!" Wedge screamed, starting to panic.
" Go," Boba growled, wincing in pain and curling into a ball with his hands on his stomach. " Go – get – it – before – someone – steals . . ." With this, he passed out.
" Mommy!" Wedge cried.
" Its okay, baby," I said, going to him and putting my arms around him. " He'll be fine."
" How do you know?" Wedge asked, clearly terrified. I wanted to kick Boba's unconcious head in for coming and putting Wedge through this, but I resisted.
" Listen," I said, " You know where I keep the laundry?" He nodded. " Go there, and get me some clean towels, and then bring them back to the bath. Okay?" he nodded, and ran off.
I turned to Boba. He was a mess, and, truthfully, I didn't know if he would be okay. With Wedge gone, my own panic started to set in – why had he come to me? What was I supposed to do?
I picked him up under his shoulders, and dragged him back to the bath. Wash the wound, I remembered from the Army's small instruction on emergency medicine – if you can, wash the wound before wrapping it. But first, I realized, I would have to strip him of his armor. Having no idea how to do this, I tried to prop him up as I went for the many ties and clasps that held his battle gear on. Wedge ran in with the towels as I was fumbling with this. He stood there, dumbfounded, watching and still holding them in a neat stack in his hands.
" Unnnh!" Boba moaned suddenly when I finally got his breast plate unattached. Blood poured out anew and drenched me, and he passed out again, his head lolling back and the full weight of his body falling back onto me. Wedge shrieked.
" Honey," I said, desparate to get him out of the room. " Put those towels down."
I spoke in my calmest voice, pretending I had everything under control.
" Good boy! Thank you very much. Now I need another favor. I need, um – six glasses of Bantha milk. Can you get that for me?" He nodded, silent, his face drained of color. I prayed that he wouldn't pass out himself as he trotted off to get the all-important milk – a task that I hoped would keep his small, six-year-old hands busy long enough for me to get Boba to stop bleeding everywhere and scaring the hell out of him.
After I finally got Boba out of his armor, I pulled off his dirty shirt and pants as well, and carefully loaded his dead weight into the pool we used as our tub. His head lolled forward, and I began to get worried – his blood quickly turned the water in the small pool pink and cloudy.
" Boba," I said, climbing in beside him, kneeling in front of him in the water, and lifting up his chin. His eyes were shut – I pulled back one of his eyelids and he groaned. I let out a sigh of relief – though it didn't make any sense, my wanting him to be alive – since I felt like killing him for having the nerve to show up and wordlessly ask for my help after everything that had happened.
I left him in the bath and went for the first aid materials I kept in the kitchen. Wedge had six glasses set out on the floor, and was very carefully pouring his second cup of Bantha milk.
" Good boy," I said, grabbing the kit and heading back to the bath. When I got back, I was setting to pull Boba out of the water when my frenzied mind remembered that I hadn't yet washed his wounds – only gotten them wet. Not knowing what else to use, I grabbed my stick of soap and went for the first abrasion I could find – a large gash between his neck and shoulder. When I brought the disinfectant to his skin, he snapped suddenly back to life, and screamed.
" Arggh – Calli!" he shouted, tipping himself away from the soap. " Don't - bother," he growled through gritted teeth. I was about to argue with him – I was sure I remembered something about cleaning a wound being important, to prevent infection. But he looked up at me, desparate, and said, mustering all his strength to get out a clear statement:
" Please, just wrap them. I'm bleeding to death."
At these words I let my anger slide away and realized how serious the situation was – Wedge might see his father die as Boba once had.
" A- alright," I stuttered, my hands trembling as I pulled him from the pool. He groaned as I laid him on the floor of the cave, and I pulled open the box of medical supplies. My hands fumbled ineptly at the bandages, and I began to become terrified – I had been through a lot in my life, survived a lot, sometimes barely – but I didn't know that I could handle watching Boba's life slowly leak out of him, watching him die at my feet.
I wrapped his shoulder, a gash on his thigh, and another just under his left arm. Finally I moved to his right side, which he was holding both of his hands over.
" Move your hands," I said, but he didn't hear me. He was shaking all over, his skin had grown pallid and dull, and his hair was soaked with sweat. He's dying, I thought, petrified with fear as I pulled his hands away. I recoiled when I did – blood came gushing out from the wound, which was obviously the worst of all of them. The others had been dulled by his armor, but there was an exposed, tiny crevease between the plates of armor on the side of his chest, and whatever weapon he'd been attacked with had struck him, in one brilliant and deadly stroke, just there.
I wrapped the wound, but the blood just kept soaking through the bandages. I cursed, realizing that if I kept it up I'd run out of gauze. I lept up and grabbed one of the towels Wedge had brought, and when I returned, removed the drenched, bloody bandages and pressed the full weight of one of the folded towels against his side. When the blood didn't automatically seep through, I was was heartened, and began wrapping again, tightly, to hold the towel in place. When I was finished, a small, red spot appeared over the wound, but stopped there. It was clotting, I realized, sitting back, relieved.
But my relief only lasted for a moment. Boba had gone completely still, and his breathing was harsh and unnatural. Not knowing what to do, and knowing I didn't have time to access the medical encyclopedia, I called for Wedge, meanwhile trying to remember any other bits of my brief medical training at the Academy. Something rushed through my mind: lift up his head? I elevated Boba's head, and placed it on my knee. Wedge ran into the room.
" Mommy?" he said, his little voice trembling. " I got the milk – but I can't carry it all –"
" Never mind about the milk," I said, no longer able to hide the fear and panic in my own voice. " I need you to get me blankets, Wedge – as many as you can. Those by the laundry, all of them off my bed – every blanket in the cave. Hurray!" He ran off, and I prayed he would be quick. I leaned over Boba and put my arms around him, trying to keep him warm – was he going into shock? I remembered going over shock in our crash course in medical treatment at the Academy – I saw a list of things to do in my mind: keep the person warm. I wrapped him in my arms as best I could while I waited for Wedge to arrive with the blankets.
I remembered another instruction, one that I had thought of at the time as silly and out of place in a military training regime:
Comfort and reassure the person to relieve anxiety.
" Boba," I whispered, leaning my lips down to his ear. His breath was coming fast and shallow, and his skin was clammy under my touch. " Its going to be okay," I promised him in a whisper. " You're going to get better. Wedge is going to get you some blankets, and we're going to make you feel so much better." I choked on my voice here, both because I didn't believe my own words – he was fading fast, his pulse weakening against my arm as I held him – and at the mention of Wedge.
" You rememeber your son, Boba Fett?" I asked in a teary whisper. " He's not a baby anymore. He'll want to meet you," I said, my own breath choppy as I let my tears fall on the dying body of the man I had loved. " So you can't die," I said, raising my voice, stilling it. " You can't."
Wedge ran in with an armful of blankets, and I took them from him and began to wrap them around Boba. I took one of the larger blankets and laid it on the floor, and gentley moved him onto it, stuffing another under his head. When he was sufficiently covered, I sat beside him and held his hand.
" Mom," Wedge said, his voice tiny, afraid. " Is he going to die?" I looked up, and I could tell that seeing my face red and teary was even more terrifying to him than seeing our cave become soaked with Boba's blood.
" Come here, baby," I said to him, trying at a smile and coming up with something like one. Wedge walked cautiously over to me. " I need you to do something for me," I said, my voice shaking. I put an arm around him and he sat down beside me, clutching my side.
" I need you to help me wake him up," I said, taking Wedge's hand and placing it on Boba's clammy forehead. " Ask him to wake up – ask him to do it for you," I said, " You don't even have to ask out loud. He'll still hear you." Wedge looked up at me.
" Like . . . magic?" he asked weakly. I nodded, and shut my eyes as Wedge concentrated on his task.
" Mom?" Wedge said after awhile. I opened my eyes hopefully, but Boba was still comatose.
" What is it?" I asked, reaching over to stroke his hair.
" Is he – a bad man?" he asked, looking at Boba. " Is that why someone shot him?"
I paused before answering. Was Boba Fett a bad man?
" Yes," I answered, a flick of pain stabbing me as I said it. " But we still have to help him."
" Why Mommy?" Wedge asked, not taking his small hand off of his father's forehead.
" Because that's the way the world works," I said, " I'm sorry to say it, but its true. Good people have mercy, even when they know that the person they are helping might not do the same for them. It is the burden of having a soul."
I knew Wedge wouldn't understand what I meant, but the answer silenced him anyway. He turned back to Boba.
" Look, Mom," he said, his voice quiet, careful. " He's opening his eyes." I shot to Boba's side and had a look for myself: sure enough, his eyes were cracked open. He looked over at me and blinked a few times.
" My –" he stuttered, wincing. " Ship."
" Yay!" Wedge cried, taking his hand away to clap gleefully. I, on the other hand, stood, stomped to the entrance of the bath, turned and screamed:
" IDIOT!"
Boba and Wedge stared at me, boggling.
" Mommy?" Wedge squeaked.
" Wedge, get away from him," I said, holding out my hand. Somewhat reluctantly, he stood up, walked to me, and turned back before leaving the bath altogether.
" I'm glad you're okay, mister," he called back to Boba before trotting off. Boba said nothing in response, just continued to engage in a staring contest with me. Whereas I had been petting and cooing to it moments ago, I then intensely wanted to rip his head off.
" Did you – just," he said in a weak voice that was slowly growing steadier, " Call me – an idiot?"
" Yeah, what'are you going to do about it, tough guy?" I shouted back. " I can't believe you – I CAN'T believe you. You actually got me feeling sorry for you – ha! Of course it required you practically dying in my arms, but still, I fell for it. I nurse you back to life – idiot that I am! – and you ask me about your damn ship. Well, to HELL with you, Boba Fett."
I stormed out of the bath area before he could respond.
When I returned to the front rooms of the cave, Wedge was standing, richly confused, in the kitchen. I stood there in thought for a moment myself, tapping my foot on the floor of the cave and trying not only to decide what to do, but how I felt. Boba was alive – however clumsily, Wedge and I had saved his life together. Was I happy about this? Or did I really want to kill him myself? I was still bitter about the past, about his abandonment of us. It infuriated me that I was similtaneously able to feel relief at his safety.
Or was he safe? I went to the entrance of the cave, and looked outside. The skies were clear, the surronding rocks still and silent. But it wasn't impossible that Boba had been followed – if he had brought danger to our son's doorstep, I knew that I really would kill him. Until then, I decided, we should have some protection.
" Wedge," I said, turning back to him. He was drinking from one of the glasses of Bantha milk that he had poured earlier. " How would you like to go for a ride in a ship?" His eyes jerked up, and I could see, with huge relief, the confusion of the day's events lifting with his excitement.
" A real ship?" he asked, a bit skeptical at first. He knew I didn't exactly own a fleet. I nodded.
" Real – and its just outside here," I said. " But we can't take the speeder – do you think you can make it down the rocks, if I help you?" He nodded, grinning hugely.
" Sure, no problem!" he chirped.
We made our way slowly down the rocky slope toward the canyon floor, and searched the landscape for Slave 1. It wasn't long before we found the hulking spacecraft, parked hastily on the rocky terrain.
" Mom, there!" Wedge shouted when he spotted it, pointing. We made our way over to the Slave 1, which was still radiating warmth from its last flight.
" Who's is it?" Wedge asked, running his small hand along the body of the cooling ship.
" It – it belongs to a friend of mine," I said, not ready yet to explain about Boba, about who he really was, about what his return might mean. " We're going to store it for him – in the cave, in that big, empty space to the left of the kitchen." I paused, put my hands on my hips, and looked up at Boba's ship. " But first," I muttered, suddenly daunted by the prospect, " We have to fly it there."
" How do we get in?" Wedge asked, bouncing with excitement. I remembered at least this much – I opened the boarding ramp, and Wedge ran in ahead of me. I heard him gasp when he reached the cockpit. Following him in, I saw why: the cockpit was covered with Boba's blood – the controls were a sticky mess, and the pilot's seat and floor were as well. I groaned. Wedge backed off, suddenly less enthused about the vehicle.
" Look at this mess," I said, tsking, and trying to keep my tone light for my son's sake.
" This is that man's ship, isn't it?" Wedge asked.
" Yes," I said, plainly, punching controls and starting the ship. I hadn't flown it since I was eighteen years old, and it wasn't very similar to the Republic vessels I'd flown at the Academy. I had expected it all to come back to me as soon as I saw the control panel, but suddenly I wasn't so sure that a smooth landing in the cave would be possible, and was beginning to regret bringing Wedge along.
" But you said it was your friend's ship," Wedge continued, timid but persistant. " That man is your friend?"
" I – suppose you could say that," I said curtly, climbing into the pilot's chair and pressing the button that closed the boarding ramp. " Come over here," I said to Wedge, and when he did I lifted him into the 'co-pilot's chair, which still bore the restraints Boba had worn as a child when flying with his father. When I had Wedge snuggly buckled in, he continued his query:
" But you said he was a bad man," he reminded me.
" Yes, I guess I did," I said shortly, quickly losing my paitence with this line of questioning, and where I knew it was headed. I pulled Slave 1 off the canyon floor, and we lifted up over the landscape.
" Mom, your restraints aren't buckled," Wedge warned me.
" Wedge –"
" If he's a bad man then why are you friends with him?" he finally asked.
What a question – something that I hadn't been able to answer in all the years that I'd felt an undying devotion to Boba, who had shown me so little in return.
" I don't know!" I snapped. " Quiet, please! I've got to concentrate on flying this thing." We moved steadily toward the cave – the part I was worried about approached: guiding the ship into the garage entrance – it didn't offer much room for error, the opening being roughly the size of Slave 1 when it was turned on its engines, in landing position.
When it came time to pull into the cave, my knuckles were white on the controls. Even Wedge looked nervous beside me as Slave 1 tilted into its landing position. But, amazingly, I was able to pull in without scratching the ship along the side of the cave. Before I turned the engines off, I made sure the twin blaster cannons were rotated to point outside of the cave, and that the proton torpedo launchers on the back of the ship were armed. Just in case someone came looking for him, it would be our best hope of getting rid of them, with Boba in such a sorry state.
Wedge and I left the ship and looked around our home – there was a thick trail of blood leading back to the bath, and I knew the mess was only worse back there. I sighed, and prepared myself to say something to my son that was horribly inappropriate, but then, we had never led normal, cushy lives:
" Help me clean up the blood?" I asked, my tone uncertain. Wedge was thoughtful for a moment before answering.
" Okay," he said, almost cheerfully.
We spent the rest of the day scrubbing, mopping and washing everything that had been dirtied by Boba's blood, including the inside of Slave 1. I tried not to let myself notice that I was allowing my son take part in my own disgusting life cycle – cleaning up after Boba's mess.
While Wedge was cleaning in the kitchen, I went back to the bath with a mop and a bucket of water. Boba's eyes snapped open when I walked in, and he grunted under his blankets.
" I expect compensation for this," I snapped, not looking at him as I began to clean. " I'm not doing you any favors anymore."
He said nothing, but kept his eyes open as I worked. When I was finished I looked over at him. He stared at me in silence.
" What am I supposed to tell him about you?" I asked him in a hissed whisper. " How do I explain you to our son? If you're just going to leave again, I might like to spare him the pain of knowing that you're his father."
Boba offered no suggestions, only looked away from me, so I picked up my mop and bucket, and left.
When the cave was clean again, I began to make dinner for Wedge and I. I also, grudingly, made a thin soup for Boba. Wedge sat at the table and watched me work.
" Mom?" he said after a long time. I paused in the middle of slicing an otoowerg root and looked up, but didn't turn. I knew what was coming.
" Who is that man?" he asked, his tone suggesting that he could already sense that it would be a touchy subject for me.
I whirrled around.
" Wedge, I'm sorry," I said in a rush, flustered by the coming sentence. " But he's your father."
Wedge frowned, looked down at his hands on the table.
" Um," he said, quietly, " My father?"
" Yes, baby," I said, going to him, sitting beside him at the table and placing a gentle hand on his back. " You do know – what that is, don't you?" He pursed his lips and thought for a moment.
" Yeah," he finally said, " The Rodian boy in my book has one. I wasn't sure if – it was something only aliens had."
" No," I said, wondering in that moment if Mace had purposefully not included any books that featured human father characters in the ones he brought for Wedge. " Humans have fathers, too."
" Have you got one?" Wedge asked, looking up me, his innocent question like a kick to the ribs.
" I had one," I said, " But he died before I was born."
" Why did he die?" he asked.
" Wedge," I said, my voice tight. I was trying not to get angry, because I knew he couldn't understand why these questions burned my ears. " Let's get back to what we were talking about before. That man back there – his name is Boba Fett – he's your father. How . . . do you feel about that?"
He looked down at the table.
" I don't know," he muttered. " Does that mean – he has to live with us?"
I sighed. " If you don't want him here," I said, " I'll ask him to leave."
Wedge thought about this for a moment.
" Maybe we should let him stay," he said. " Since he's hurt." I leaned over and kissed him on the forehead. Now that the secret was out, I knew that whether Boba left or stayed, things would still be hard for him.
After I had served Wedge his dinner and set my own plate down on the table, I filled a thermos with soup and brought it back to Boba. Again, as soon as he heard my footsteps, his eyes snapped open.
" Relax," I said, " Its me."
He blinked, said nothing.
" I thought you should eat," I said, holding up the thermos.
" No thanks," he grumbled, shutting his eyes again. I fumed in silence for a moment.
" Fine," I snapped. " Great. Starve to death – what do I care?" I stomped back out to the kitchen, slammed the thermos down onto the table, and fell heavily into my seat. Wedge was staring at me.
" Mom," he said, " Do you like him, even?" he asked, his young mind completely baffled by his first images of his parents' relationship.
" No," I said. " I think he's a despicable person, and I highly recommend that you don't get attached to him, because he'll certainly desert us again after he's gotten what he wants here – and who knows what that is, exactly." I shovelled two quick bites into my mouth without looking up, and then threw my fork down, sat back, and crossed my arms over my chest. I looked across the table, at my poor, bug-eyed son.
" Oh, honey," I said, pushing away from the table and going to him. I hugged him, and his small arms wrapped around my shoulders.
" Don't be angry, Mommy," he said quietly. I smiled to myself, wished it was that easy. Boba choose this moment to limp out from the back of the cave, dragging his blankets along with him, taking slow, labored steps and looking like the walking dead. Wedge and I stared. He walked past the kitchen and toward the front of the cave.
" What do you think you're doing?" I barked. He stopped, turned his head toward us, and said, with a glare:
" Getting my ship." He wobbled on his feet as he said this, and I nearly laughed at loud at his moronic persistance. It was embarrassingly obvious that if he stood for a few moments longer he would drop from exhastion. Despite this, he turned back toward the cave and took another shaky step, nearly tripping over the blankets he was dragging along.
" Um, Boba?" I said, supressing a wicked grin, " Hello?" He looked back at me, grudgingly, to see me pointing back at the garage, and his ship, which was parked there. He stared at it for a long time, and I half expected him to start hobbling over to it, climb in and fly off.
Instead he said, " Oh," and took two more shaky steps, this time toward the bed, before collasping into it.
" Excuse me," I called, annoyed with his presumption that he was still welcome there. " Get out of my bed." He mumbled something into the mattress.
" What was that?" I snapped.
" S'my bed," he said in a grunt. " Came from my ship." I scowled, unable to argue with that.
Wedge and I finished our dinner and retired to his small bed, which was vastly uncomfortable for me, but still, I told myself, better than giving in to Boba and sliding into bed beside him. I knew that if I let that happen, all my defenses would crumble.
" Mom?" Wedge whispered just as I was finally beginning to drift off.
" Go to sleep," I whispered back. " Its been a long day."
" Okay, but can I ask one question?"
I sighed. " Sure. One." I knew whatever it was it would be about Boba, and would probably be therefore also impossible to answer.
" Why is that man my father?" he asked. I put an arm around his small waist and leaned forward to kiss the back of his head.
" Because your mother made some bad choices when she was young," I said. " But in hindsight, I'm glad I did. If I hadn't, I wouldn't have had you. And you are the best thing in my life, Wedge." I squeezed him to me. " You know how much I love you, right?"
" Yes, Mommy," he said, patting my hand. " I love you, too."
After that he finally drifted off to sleep, but for me it wasn't so easy. Especially a few hours later, when I heard Boba dragging around in the kitchen, knocking things about and cursing under his breath. I sat up, pulled back the hanging sheets that made up Wedge's 'room,' and went to see what he was doing.
In the kitchen I found him drinking the cold soup from the thermos. He had obviously tried to heat it – there was an overturned saucepan near the fireplace – but had been hindered by his condition. I sat across from him at the table, folded my arms and watched him. I wanted to say something, ask him something – possibly why he had shown up at my doorstep bleeding and nearly dead – but I didn't get the feeling that he was in the mood for talk.
" Want me to heat that up?" I finally asked. He shook his head.
" Its fine," he muttered. Frustrated with his attitude, I left the table and slid into our bed, telling myself that I was reclaiming it, not relinquishing my will. I waited there, pretending to sleep and listening to Boba's movements in the kitchen.
It was so like the first night we had spent together in the cave that I almost laughed at the sad irony. Me waiting in the darkness for Boba's next step, wondering what it would be, frightened and excited. Only now there was the heavy weight of the past hanging over us as he moved toward the bed.
When he fell into it, he stayed on his side. I told myself I was relieved about this, and began to drift into a shallow sleep. When Boba spoke, I snapped awake easily.
" I killed him," he said.
I didn't have to ask who he was referring to. Mace.
My heart sank in my chest and I curled into a ball, pincing my eyes shut against the truth. My friend was dead.
" I," Boba said then, with a pause, " Killed Dooku, too."
This sent me over the edge. The man who had killed my father was dead, and yet I felt no relief. In the moment before I collasped into silent sobs, I wondered if this was the reason Boba's once bright eyes now looked dull: he had seen the other side of revenge and found only a cold and empty space, devoid of meaning and soaked with blood.
I tried to hide my tears from Boba, but he must have felt the bed shaking as I cried. He moved over to me, slowly, and wrapped an arm around my waist. I didn't turn, but let him curl around me while I wept.
There were many questions that I would eventually want to ask him about that day, about what had happened and what he had divulged. But that night, exhasted, we only held each other in the dark, letting them go unanswered.