"Luke, Qui-Gon, Typho, Rex, get your asses back in the house and put some clothes on!" Owen Lars yelled after the four small naked boys who had run past him and out into the dunes beyond the house. The heat of the sand finally caught up to the four three year-olds after they reached the first of the dunes. The boys started whining and hopping in place clearly unable to make their way back to the house.

What Owen saw going on at the edge of his property when he'd turned to see what it was that had flickered at the edges of his peripheral vision when he moved to retrieve his nephews made his heart stop. The bastard who thought he could dump a bunch of children on the Larses doorstep in the middle of the night and run was engaged in a lightsaber duel with a Tusken Raider while several other Sand People stood watching.

Cursing Anakin and his wife for being so fertile, he raced over to the boys and grabbed as many of them as he could. As he carried the three of them he had managed to grab to the house, he prayed that Luke would survive until he got back.

While he went back and grabbed Luke, he saw the lightaber duel end with that thrice damned Kenobi slicing off the Tusken Raider's arm and everyone but the wounded Sand Person and Kenobi leaving as he carried Luke back into the house. After he set Luke down next to his brothers who were being supervised by Beru, he grabbed his blaster and headed back outside. Whatever was going on was most definitely trouble, and if it didn't kill him immediately he would most assuredly defend his family with his life.

After coming upon the body of the Sand Person who had been abandoned by its fellows, he discovered that it was both fully human and alive. The man's missing arm lay clutching a lightsaber a few feet away. The point above the elbow from which the arm had been detached didn't appear to be bleeding. He moved in to take a closer look, and noticed that the wound had somehow been cauterized. If the man didn't die from shock in the next few hours, there was a good chance that he would survive.

"Great. Kenobi's dumped another problem on my doorstep." He muttered as he grabbed the man and started to drag him home, praying that he hadn't made a mistake.

On the one hand, the man was apparently a Sand Person and should be shot. On the other, he recognized the man's face from the time he had appeared with Anakin on the Holonet, and it had been stated that he was a Jedi, therefore he would be the perfect choice for babysitting a bunch of Force sensitive brats once he'd been fixed up. There was also the fact that when the man had appeared alongside Anakin in the Holonet news bulletin, it had been announced that he had saved his life. Because he had saved his step-brother's life, he owed him and when a Lars owed someone they made sure to repay them. A Lars never remained in anyone's debt for long.

&!&!&

Ferus Olin watched from a distance as Leia, Breha - born Padme II (which had been Anakin's first choice of name) - and Sola played in the gardens of the Organa family retreat. He'd sworn to protect the girls after he'd learned of their existence and had spent the last two years doing so. Fortunately for his vow, Bail tolerated his presence. Knowing that he'd paused too long, he got back to work trimming the border hedges.

He didn't envy Master Kenobi. The poor man was stuck on a dangerous desert world in the Outer Rim watching over four boys while staying out of the sight of their caretakers. Kenobi had rather unfortunately made a bad first impression on the family he had left his charges with, and it had all gone downhill between them from there.

As he trimmed the hedges, Ferus wondered what Kenobi had done to make the family threaten to kill him slowly and painfully if they ever caught him on their property again.

(**^**)

Edited Sept. 3 2010