Luke Skywalker jumped up and down in excitement as he headed to the garage where the family speeder was kept. Today was his sixth birthday, and since the harvest had gone so well this year, Aunt Beru was taking him shopping in Anchorhead for his present. She said that he could even fly the speeder this time too! Upon reaching the Lars family speeder, he hopped excitedly in place near the driver's side as he waited for his Aunt Beru to come out of the house.
"Easy Luke, if you keep that up, you will tire yourself out long before we get to Anchorhead." Beru said once she reached her excited nephew, before ruffling his hair and laughing.
"Well, let's go then!" he practically yelled, dancing with impatience as he flattened his hair back down.
Smiling, Beru climbed into the speeder and set Luke on her lap. She watched in amusement as the small boy carefully backed the speeder out of the garage with a most serious expression on his face as he did so. Once they were out and into the open desert, the boy smiled brightly and turned the speeder toward Anchorhead, flying to the small town at a speed she considered to be much too fast, which left her with the desire to cling to something for dear life.
As they hurtled along, Beru wondered if the woman who would have been her mother-in-law had felt the same while riding with Luke's father.
&!&!&!&!&
Boba Fett wandered around the pitiful excuse of a marketplace that ran along the main thoroughfare of Anchorhead. If it weren't for the fact that Jabba the Hutt payed so well, he would have entirely avoided this godsforsaken litterbox of a planet. The vast majority of what was available for purchase at the various temporary stands and more permanent stalls in the sand covered village he was wandering through while he was between jobs was junk, but on occasion he had found valuable items at markets similar to this one, and that was what had kept him browsing. As he glanced briefly at the stall next to him - where a collection of broken-down garbage was on display - a laughing child ran into him.
He looked down at the child who had the audacity to run into him, as most creatures of its ilk went out of their way to avoid him. It was a scrawny boy who had most likely come from one of the moisture farms in the area who had blonde hair, blue eyes, clothes that appeared to be at least third hand which was practically par for the course in this sector of space, and a hand shaped bruise on his left cheek.
"Luke," A woman's frantic voice called across the marketplace as he examined the uncommonly brave or rather uncommonly stupid child. "Luke, where are you? Come back."
"I'll be right there Aunt Beru." The boy yelled in the direction of the woman who had been calling out for her lost child before turning, running, and calling an apology out over his shoulder on his way back to his aunt.
After doing a subtle pat down and finding nothing missing which was somewhat surprising considering his current location, he decided to ignore the incident and continued wandering the marketplace hoping to find something useful, but seriously doubting that he would. He was about to give up his search and leave when he once again spotted the child who was now standing next to a woman who thanks to a hard life in the desert looked older than her (possibly) thirty years who was talking to someone in rather familiar brown robes. His attention caught, he studied the man more closely. Though he had copious amounts of grey hair and the desert had prematurely aged him, the man had a face that Fett would never forget. It was the Jedi Obi-wan Kenobi.
Curious about the Jedi's intentions, he decided to listen in on the conversation that was taking place between him and the woman. What did the Jedi have to do with this woman and child, and would the information about what he saw and heard make up for the valuable time he'd wasted wandering around this shit heap of a marketplace?
"...Owen wouldn't like..." Said the worried looking woman who protectively pulled the boy a little closer to her as she and the Jedi spoke.
"He needs to begin his training Beru, he should've started it years ago." Kenobi said to the woman who didn't seem too happy about the prospect.
He wondered why the Jedi persisted in attempting to take the boy when it was clear that the family didn't want their child to be trained. Outside the few forced surrenders when a planet's Children's Services had turned a child over to the Jedi order after it had been removed from its parents' custody, the Jedi were supposed to leave the decision about whether or not a child was to be trained up to the family. If the family said no, the Jedi were supposed to leave them alone. Why this Jedi was stupid enough to risk training a child in the first place when the Empire was busy hunting them all down and killing them, he didn't know.
He studied the small child that the argument was about. The boy seemed vaguely familiar. In fact, now that he thought about it, the child looked a great deal like the holo of Anakin Skywalker after he'd won the Boonta Eve Classic that he had in his memorabilia collection. His father Jango had been a Podracing enthusiast, and had shared his passion with his son, constantly showing him his collection of holos of the winners of the major races. The smiling face of the only human winner ("Cheating Jedi") had stuck in his memory at the time his father had shown him the image because the boy in the image had been only a few years older than he was when he first saw it at the time it had been taken. The few times he had brought out his father's collection, Skywalker's was the first image he would look at.
He had met Skywalker himself more than once during the Clone Wars. At one point, Skywalker had helped him repair the Slave I after it had crashed, and had done a damn good job of doing so. While he had a hatred for all Jedi, he didn't hate Skywalker nearly as much as he had hated say, Mace Windu for boy standing next to the woman had the same eyes, nose, and smile as Skywalker had at the age of nine. That smile had changed a great deal by the time he had met Skywalker durning the Clone Wars, having become far less innocent and carefree.
As he stood there watching the child and his companions, he came to the realization of exactly who the child was, and nearly hit himself for not realizing it sooner considering who he had been comparing the boy to. The boy was one of the two children who had been born to Senator Amidala exactly six years earlier. Kenobi had apparently hidden him and his sister here on this out of the way planet with their relatives in order to train them in secret. It was a rather stupid thing to do considering the fact that all it would take would be the wrong person such as one of Anakin Skywalker's childhood friends or former owners or someone who had a holo from the race Skywalker had won recognizing the boy for their cover to be blown. Kenobi's plan had apparently backfired anyways, since the family he had entrusted the twins to had decided that they wouldn't be trained.
"But Owen said..." the woman trailed off weakening, starting to give in to the Jedi's demands. It seemed that Kenobi would finally have his way, and the boy would start his training to be a Jedi soon.
He looked back down at the small and currently helpless boy. It would be a so easy to aim his blaster at the child and pull the trigger. He could almost see the look of stunned shock on the Jedi's face as the "Last hope for the Jedi Order" was killed right in front of him before he could even be trained. But, he had vowed never to harm a child if he could help it, and the mini Jedi was no exception. The child wasn't to blame for the actions of the Jedi who were using him as a pawn in whatever game they were playing with the Sith this time.
As he watched the argument continue, an idea began to form in his mind. The child and his sister were young and untrained, and could easily be taught to hate the Jedi. He almost smiled as he pictured the Jedi Order's last hope killing off the last of that hypocritical order before it could be rebuilt once again. That would be a much sweeter revenge against those who killed his father, and if his memory served him, had a hand in killing the children's mother as well considering the fact that the medical droids at Polis Massa weren't usually anywhere near as incompetent as they had been when treating Senator Amidala. Raising the boy and his sister who was apparently elsewhere at the moment would be doing them a favor. If the bruise on the boy's cheek and the state of his clothes were any indication, he was not being well cared for.
Taking the children here in the marketplace was not an option. The commotion it would cause and the ensuing fight with the Jedi, while satisfying, would be too much of a risk, and there was a good chance that one or both of the children would be caught in the crossfire. That, and if he acted now, he would have a much harder time getting the sister who was quite likely wandering about somewhere nearby, a sister that he hadn't seen yet and didn't have any idea as to what she looked like, increasing his chances of grabbing the wrong child if he went after her. He would have to get the children closer to home where he would have a better chance of getting them both at the same time with little to no interference from the Jedi who had allowed the Beru woman to return home with her nephew to "Talk it over with Owen".
&!&!&!&
Owen winced as he once again saw the bruise on Luke's cheek. He hadn't meant to hit the child that hard, it was just that the boy had to learn not to use the Force, even by accident. The Empire was still hunting the Jedi, and all those with Jedi powers, and wouldn't hesitate to kill Luke or worse if they found him. Owen cared for his step-nephew as if he were his own son, and didn't want to see him harmed. Here, on this farm, away from that dangerous fool Kenobi was the safest place for the boy. If Kenobi approached Luke again as he had earlier today, he would get more than a stern talking to.
He handed Luke the model ship that he had made him for his birthday and told him to go play outside while Beru fixed dinner. Luke was smart enough to stay close to the house, and there hadn't been any signs of Sand People for months. The boy would be fine on his own for a couple of hours while he dealt with that malfunctioning harvester droid.
&!&!&!&!&
Boba Fett had discreetly followed the woman Beru and her young charge home from the marketplace, wondering why she had only brought the boy into town considering the fact that the trip had been for the twins's birthday. The woman allowed the child to pilot the speeder home, which the boy did with a great deal more skill than most children that age, proving that he was his father's son. He had considered taking the child while they were en route from Anchorhead, but realized that he would most likely have to injure or kill the woman to do so, which would most likely severely traumatize the boy and put him in a position where he would not be willing to be in his care.
He knew that for his plan to work, he would have to raise the boy himself to ensure that he was kept away from any of the other remaining Jedi. This would be somewhat difficult without any added complications since he knew next to nothing about childcare, as his wife had been the one to tend to their daughter. Fortunately, the boy and his sister were at an age where they could mostly take care of themselves, and only needed occasional supervision. For the most part, he would just have to keep them out of trouble, and teach them what they needed to know to survive in the galaxy as his father had taught him.
He was currently watching the moisture farm at which the boy and his sister whom he had yet to see lived from a distance, waiting for his opportunity. Knowing from the experience of prior surveillance missions that he would most likely be waiting a long time, he had made himself comfortable. Nearly an hour into his vigil, the boy ran from the house alone, holding a model of a freighter aloft as if it were flying, playing one of those incomprehensible games that children that age were wont to engage in. The sister was nowhere in sight, and he was beginning to think that she had died at some point in the past, as discreet thermal scans of the farm showed only one child on the infrared.
Realizing that this was probably his best chance of getting his hands on the boy before Kenobi claimed him as the woman was busy preparing the evening meal, and her husband was otherwise occupied, he acted fast. A stun bolt swiftly dropped the boy before he even knew what had hit him. The instant he was down, he swiftly came in on his speeder bike, quickly dismounted, grabbed the boy, got back on, carefully situating the boy so he wouldn't fall off, and flew away at a speed that would put several professional racers to shame.
He was almost out of sight when Owen and Beru came out to see who had just visited their farm.
&!&!&!&!&
When Owen came up from the house, he saw one of Jabba the Hutt's bounty hunters flying off in the distance. Why the man had decided to buzz their farm, he had no idea. He decided to bring Luke inside where he would be safe in case either the man came back or someone else was hanging around for whatever reason. He called for the boy, and he didn't come. He called again, no response.
He began frantically searching around the farm for Luke, hoping that the boy had just decided to play some sort of prank or had just wandered off too far to hear him even though he had told the boy a million times to stay close to the house. He examined each sand dune near the farm hoping all the while that a certain shaggy blonde head would pop up smiling and giggling. The boy had buried himself in one of the dunes once as a prank, and that was what he hoped and prayed that the child was doing now. As he searched the dunes near the house, he swore that he would give the child a punishment he'd remember for the rest of his life for scaring him so badly.
As he poked at a dune near his parents' graves that looked like it had been recently disturbed, he heard Beru yell for him to come. He ran to his wife as fast as he could, hoping that she had found Luke uninjured, but fearing the worst. When he reached her side, he learned that she hadn't found Luke. There, lying on the sand berm that they often stood on to watch the suns set, was the toy freighter that he had given Luke less than an hour earlier. The bounty hunter hadn't simply buzzed their farm as he had originally thought, he had taken Luke.
Owen Lars held his crying wife, doing his best to be a steady support for her while his own heart was breaking. Luke had been a light in their lives, the miracle that had turned up when he and Beru had learned that they could not have a child of their own.
Edited 3/12/2012