The Raider

It's almost impossible to be a tribesman when you are all alone. And Grutex was not reflecting on the isolation of this icy, barren, hellish planet he was on. He was thinking back to home, in the middle of the daily activities and normal routines. When he was a child, he would sit alone and draw circles in the sand, wondering if the others might ask him to play. They never did, so he grew accustomed to the circles we would make and wipe away, make and wipe away.

His heart felt hollow when he wondered if his mother had been glad to give birth to him, if she smiled down on him, if she held him tightly, if she could see him now. He felt better now if he pretended she was there, because he imagined she would understand him, and tell him everything was alright, even if he chose to let go. He pretended many times in his life she was close, there to correct him with love and there to praise with pride. He had no control over this need, even though he had been raised by two of the tribal kin after his mother died. Grutex was grateful for the two kin, Babgrat and Yishbro, male and female. It was unheard of for Tusken Raiders to adopt an orphan, but Babgrat was not typical. By all standard practices, the infant Grutex should have been left to die.

There was no greater certainty he was different than on the night, as a youngster, a fight between two other young Tusken Raiders was settled. There had been a fist fight earlier between the two, and no one attempted to stop them; they could have fought to the death. Instead, the tribe massed around to spectacle in all the roar and glee of gladiator sport. Grutex had been front row for the event, and he sickened inside to watch the hopeless event transpire. He pushed his way out of the crowd, not interested to see the end of the fight, which would come later in the night and he would see anyhow; and he saw Babgrat sitting alone outside his tent, hands hanging limp between his legs, head hanging low. It was clear, Babgrat too was sickened, and even though the thick wrappings on their heads protected them from an incredibly harsh environment, it was not enough to shield them from the insanity.

"Papa?" Grutex touched Babgrat on the shoulder, "Papa, are you okay?"

Babgrat wrapped his arm around Grutex and looked on him through the soulless mask. He tightened the embrace, and Grutex was sure inside the mask, there was a smile for him, and probably tears. As a family they stood alone in the tribe, as a species they were more so shunned by all others, which blotted out the brightest sun for their existance. Perhaps this is why Tusken Raiders needed a planet with two.

Grutex watched that night, as the youngster who had lost the fist fight made his final statement on the matter. It was not unusual for Grutex to be wandering alone on the outskirts of the camp, and he witnessed the loser carrying a torch to the tent of the family of the young Tusken who had won. Grutex stood silently, not sure completely of the intentions of the loser. The loser crouched, ready to touch the flaming torch to the tent. Grutex backed a step, in disbelief, stumbling and alerting the loser to his presence. The loser pointed at him and hissed an unmistakable warning to be silent. The tent went up in flames.

The loser had vanished quickly and the tent was consumed in only a few moments. A shining figure staggered out of the tent, arms flailing the dark, blazing and crackling, and fell to the ground. The figure was young, only a child. It was the winner of the fight earlier in the day. No one helped. There was only another crowd assembled, and a few chuckles could be heard. One Tusken Raider stepped forward and cursed in all manner of Tusken over the loss of his possessions inside the tent, but not the loss of his child. The other children were running about as Grutex stayed paralyzed where he sat. They were jumping about, trying to catch the drifting flakes of ash.

Grutex watched the flakes of ash fall about him in his memory until they transformed into the snow floating down to settle on him. He had made it out of the tunnels where the tentacle beast dwelled. The wampa he had been following had bombarded through an ice wall into the quarry; the underground tunnel ran directly adjacent inside it. Grutex had stepped out to see the wampa hunched over panting in the icy quarry. "Thank you," Grutex said in his growling and slurping native tongue. The wampa shot a baleful glance at him and roared, flexing its shoulders and shaking saliva from its mouth. Grutex did not know what to make of the roar, was it "Your welcome," or "Don't stand so close to the tunnel entrance," or "Different circumstances would find me eating you."

The wampa dashed away into the snow, presumably to find a place where climbing out of the quarry would be possible. Grutex placed some distance between him and the entrance back underground, and the other walls of the quarry to be safe, and sat down in the snow. The coat of taun taun he had fashioned did help, but night was coming, and the cold was becoming unbearable. As he lied on his back and watched the snow tumble down, he silently spoke, "I am sorry Babgrat. I know you miss me, and I miss you too. It's sort of your fault, though. You taught me to love, and our kind just wasn't meant for that."

Beneath his tunic, strung to his neck, he pulled out a threaded, shiny blue stone. It was given to him on a night he would never forget; the night Sandagra placed it around his neck. There was hope for her. She was almost like him. Babgrat had told him she was rare, and she was. Her name meant 'shade of the desert' in his language, and she had been most positively that for him. She gave him peace, even now, at the moment of most loss. He saw his reflection in the stone, and so saw her. He smiled beneath the dirty, frosty mask despite it all. For the first time since he had landed on this disdainful planet, his heart felt warm and alive.

"Sandagra," he whispered, "I was right to not leave it alone."

The butt of a blaster thumped against something half buried in the snow. The morning was golden, and the snow had stopped for a while. Again a thump, and a human wrapped in thick coat, hooded and goggled, called back to his partner. "Joel! Hey Joel! Come take a look at this."

Joel called back, "What is it Karl?"

Karl shoveled some of the snow from the half buried thing and said, "Don't know. Looks like…. Looks like a damn taun taun ate a sand man."

"What?"

"I said it looks like a taun taun with a sand man inside of it. Weird man."

Joel made his way through the snow and asked on the way, "Karl, you think we could get some ice dug out before the weather gets bad?"

"I've already set three charges. We're good. You really need to take a look at this."

Joel, also goggled and coated, looked down at the thing. "What the hell? Is that a Tusken Raider inside of a taun taun hide?"

"'S what it looks like." Karl thumped it harder with his rifle butt, "I think he's dead."

"How did a Tusken Raider get all the way out here on Hoth? I have never heard of a Tusken Raider being anywhere except Tatooine."

Karl shoved some the fur away from Grutex's mask, "It's a sand man alright."

"They're called Tusk – en – Raid – ers."

"I always called 'em sand men, being how they live out in the sand."

"Okay, one more charge to set and we blow out this big hunk of ice and be on our way." Joel had begun to walk away.

"Can we keep it?"

Joel stopped and his shoulders drooped, "No we can't keep it. Why would you even suggest we keep a frozen Tusken Raider?"

Karl raised his goggles, pulled back his hood from his long thin nose and deep chin, and said, "We could unwrap it."

Joel turned towards Karl and shrugged, "Why?"

"Oh, I hear these things are a horrible sight. We could take it back on board and unwrap it."

Joel paused, "No, no. We are not taking that… thing back with us."

"Come on Joel, aren't you just a bit curious?"

Joel stood still the way a thinking man stands still, and said, "Okay, you win. Drag it back to the ship while I set this last charge…" Karl leaped in the air and howled, but Joel cautioned, "and then no more fooling around down here. I want to leave while the morning calm is happening."

Karl jigged a little dance and heaved the stiff Tusken Raider over his shoulders, "Taun taun hide stinks. Wow." He began his trek to the space vessel. "Sheila is going to love you."

The charges went off with a thunder and puffed a billowy blanket of snow inside the ice quarry. Four enormous harpoons fired from the belly of the spacecraft and stabbed the cube of ice, some fifty cubic meters, and hoisted it into the cargo bay. It was the last of five they removed that morning. The craft swiveled upward and bolted into space.

The space carrier was basically shaped like a drinking flask, the metal kind for high spirits, with the nose where the cap would be. It had hard angular shapes and outlines of riveted panels all about it. Sensors and pipes were abound the hull with no aesthetic rhyme or reason, including some energy canons which had never been fired in any battle; they had however been fired for fun and the occasional asteroid clearing. The nose of the ship was snub with large transparent viewing shields and shaped like a small shuttle itself, which it was. Should worse come to worse, it could separate from the cargo bay and make a short escape, it was of course the last resort.

The dim glow of the cockpit made streaks on Sheila's dark brown hair as she monitored read outs and the space before them. The cockpit hatched slid open and Joel stepped in, his freshly showered messy hair and under shirt on, and he plopped in the seat beside her. "So, how we doing?"

She was flipping a switch over her head, "Good. Looks like we will be making the jump to hyperspace a little late though."

Joel raised an eyebrow, "Oh yeah? Why is that?"

"Got some odd read out on our cooling coil. You'd think with all the ice aboard cooling would be our last concern."

"Want me to go check it out?"

"No, I can get RP4-1 to go take a look at it, make some readings. Could be a bad sensor. Probably nothing to worry about."

Joel, an incredibly handsome man of average height with short messy hair and cool gray eyes, limply dropped his head back and sighed. "Well, since we have a little extra time, Karl has a surprise for you."

Sheila stood from her seat, "He bring a taun taun back?"

"Close."

She laughed, "Good old Karl. You never know what's going to happen next."

"Never a dull trip."

"He's a trip for sure." Sheila stretched and yawned, her petite frame quivering a bit, "I better go have RP take a look at those coils."

"Yeah, yeah. Don't forget to check in on Karl, I think you will like the surprise."

She paused at the door, "Oh no. What is it for real?"

"Nothing bad. Really rare. I mean really really rare," he thought for a moment, "as a matter of fact, I can't think of anything more rare."

"You have me curious now. Why aren't you back there with it?"

"There is only so much Karl I can take at any one time. I need a break. Other than that, I would be."

She nodded and left the cockpit, shortly while walking down the dim narrow corridor she ran across RP4-1, "Oh, RP, glad I caught you here. I need you to go back and take a reading on the cooling coils, make sure everything is in speck there."

The grimy, flat gray protocol droid nodded, "Certainly ma'am."

She added, "Oh, by the way, do you know where Karl is?"

"He is performing the most peculiar inspection of a… oh wait, I was not supposed to tell you. Sorry."

The two shared an awkward moment and she said, "Okay, where at?"

"Oh, back in deck hold three."

RP4-1 stood awaiting another command and Sheila released him, "Carry on."

She took a deep breath and entered deck hold three, a common spacious room used to sort smaller cargos out, and saw Karl busy tugging on some mass lying on a steel table. He was in black tank top and baggy, dark green cargo pants. Karl was a good foot taller than Joel, his head shaved to a pepper and salt stubble which traveled around his jaw, chin, and upper lip. Sheila moved closer and began to recognize the mass on the table. She shielded her nose, "OH Karl! It is a dead taun taun. It smells so bad."

Karl whipped his head back to her only to acknowledge her and continued to tug, "Help me get this off."

She moved in closer, "What it that Karl? Wait, is that a…"

He looked back in her eyes, "There's a sand man in here. Died out in the cold. Poor bastard tried to keep warm. I have no idea how he could have caught a taun taun and skinned it."

Sheila was amazed, "What are you going to do with it?"

Karl stood upright and placed his fists on his hips, "Well, first, I have to get this stinking taun taun off him. The inner skin has frozen to his tunic. It's slowly thawing out. Then I am going to unwrap him and take a look. Always wondered what a sand man looks like under all this bandaging."

Sheila's eyes sparkled and she grinned from ear to ear, "Oh let's do!"

The two wrestled the smelly skin off and discarded it. Now they were ready to remove the wraps from the prize inside. Karl asked, "What should we take off first?"

The two smiled at one another and said, "The face!"

Sheila reached for the strapping making the mask and cowl, "Now, let's take a see what's under here." She looked down and saw the shiny blue stone hanging on the leather twine around Grutex's neck, "Oh, pretty." She took it in her hand for a closer look. Her wrist was immediately grasped by a dirty bandaged hand. Grutex had seized her from taking the stone. "Karl?" she said in a most worried tone.

"Bless me Yavin," Karl said, "The mummy has come to life."

Everyone was at a standoff, Sheila slowly released the stone, "Okay guy. Easy."

Karl said, "I don't have a blaster. I need to go get a blaster."

"Don't you leave me in here, Karl. Just be slow and easy, don't excite him."

"Don't excite him? What about me? I'm pretty shook up right now."

"Calm down, Karl. If he wanted to hurt me he would have already." Grutex sat up still tightly gripping her wrist. He hissed, and it sounded vehement. "Ouch, ouch, you're hurting my wrist," Sheila pleaded.

Karl exclaimed, "You turn her loose!"

Grutex turned to Karl and screeched, tightening his grip. Sheila said, "Karl, you are not helping." Sheila held her other hand up in surrender and spoke quietly, "Hey, hey big guy. Listen, I know you're just as afraid of us as we are of you…"

"I don't know about that."

Sheila stayed focused on the Tusken Raider, "I know you have obviously been through a very… strenuous and stressful ordeal. But it's okay now, you're safe."

Grutex listened to the soothing tone she spoke, and though he could not interpret the words, he had heard this soothing tone from Babgrat many times as he was growing up. He loosened the grip a bit. "Thank you, thank you," she said silently. "Trust me. No one's going to hurt you."

The bandaged hand fell away, and Sheila slowly moved a step back, "See, see? No one is going to hurt you."

Karl said, "What you want me to do?"

"Go get RP, and also Joel. But don't tell them what's up."

"What? Why not?"

"I don't want Joel bringing a blaster in here and killing him. You better not bring one back either."

Karl said, "We need a gun."

She and the Tusken Raider sat gazing at one another in fascination, "No we don't Karl. He's not going to hurt us."

When Joel, RP and Karl returned to the holding deck, Joel stepped in very casually, but when he saw the Tusken Raider sitting up, he gave a shout of alarm, "Whoa! Hey, what? Karl, did you know about this?"

The Raider recoiled and barked at Joel. Sheila placed her hands on Grutex calmly and said, "It's okay." She looked back at Joel, "Joel, take it easy. Be calm."

Joel stepped closer with wild eyes. Sheila addressed the droid, "RP, come here. Can you speak Tusken?"

RP said, "There are some variance in tribal slangs, but I think I should be able to communicate with him, though I must warn you I have never maintained a conversation with a Tusken before to test the proper.."

She glared back at RP, "Can I take that as a yes?"

Joel asked, "Are you going to talk to it?"

She said, "Yes, aren't you interested in how he got down there?"

RP stepped close to the Tusken Raider, who leaned back in discretion of the metal man. A string of rolling, rasping noises came from RP, causing the Raider to jump a bit. When RP was done, Grutex nodded and responded with a similar roll of grunts and phlegm.

Sheila asked RP, "What did you say to him?"

"I asked him if he could understand me."

"What did he say back?"

"He said yes he could. He also wants to know if you plan to kill him."

Sheila said, "Tell him no. Tell him he is our guest."

Joel said, "Yeah, well first ask him if he plans to kill us."

RP and Grutex shared more snarls and yaps. RP said, "He wants to thank you for the invite. He adds that he has no intention to harm anyone."

Joel remarked, "I don't understand, why not? I mean why not? These creatures are supposed to be blood thirsty, heartless killers. It's doesn't sound right."

Sheila said, "Well, he's not an average Tusken Raider, of course. How many have you ever heard of taking a vacation on Hoth?"

Grutex expounded more rumblings, RP interpreted, "He would like to know if you have any blankets and possibly something to eat. He is still a bit chilled and hungry."

Sheila smiled at him, and for the first time Grutex witnessed another species look on him and smile. She said, "Sure we do. Sure we do."

Karl said, "Alright! He'll have to take his mask off to eat."

Sheila said, "Joel, can you go heat up a bowl of soup and bring it to our guest? And RP, what do you think about pulling one of the ships universal communicators and isolating a download of Tusken for this guy to wear. You know, maybe put it in his cowl so we can understand each other."

RP said, "I think it may be possible."

Joel was stepping out when he muttered, "Never thought I would see the day I would be waiter to a Tusken Raider. What's the galaxy coming to?"

Karl watched RP leaving and said, "Hey, aren't you going to ask him to take his mask off?"