Chapter 8
Exar, Aang, and Jo finally got the the shuttle refueled and were then flying across Tatooine's dune sea. They were all scared and somewhat excited for the event soon to come. Exar still believed that they were all unfit to beat Erk, Aang thought otherwise, and Jo didn't give an opinion, for in the situation the team was in, he just sided with his closest friend's opinion.
The dune sea was big, nothing but sand and a sun as far as their eyes could see. That was all they could see for a little while.
"So where exactly are we going?" Jo asked.
"The middle of the Jundland Waste." Exar replied.
"The middle? What's in the middle?" Aang asked.
"The Jundland Cavity. It's a deep, deep pit that goes down, where the catacombs are. That's where I was trained and raised." Exar explained.
"I thought you grew up on Dathomir II." Jo said.
"Nah. I was born there, but transferred here for training. I trained here, almost as an expert, about eleven years. Being one of the-most-talented, I got my official job over on Dathomir II as a guard. You guys know the rest." Exar said.
"Do we?" Aang asked with suspicion, curiosity, and sarcasm.
"Yes. Don't worry, that was all true." Exar replied, grinning.
"So, to clarify, what is it about the sith that makes him 'so much better' than us?" Aang asked.
"To sum it up. He knows a lot more than I do. Remember the conversation we had about my fight with Erk?" Exar asked.
"Um, you mean about the mind battle?" Jo asked.
"He manipulated the force. At least a little." Exar said.
"I'm still having trouble processing that." Aang said, quietly.
"Well with any luck, everything might not be deserted from the place. We might learn a few things later on." Exar stated confidently.
"I like the sound of that." Aang said.
Just then, the ship stopped moving, and the team was jerked forward. Exar used his arms to keep his head from hitting the controls, Jo was dazed a little, Aang's four arms were used well to keep him from falling.
"Did we hit a rock pillar?" Jo asked, rubbing his head.
"We couldn't have. I was paying attention." Exar said, getting up.
Aang got up and looked out. He didn't see anything, except that they were on the entrance to the Jundland Wastes. He closed his eyes and probed the area with the force. He sensed organic beings beneath them.
"Guys, I think we disturbed the locals." Aang said.
"Oh, don't tell me." Jo groaned.
Then the ship slowly started descending down.
"Must be a grapple of some kind." Exar said. Then they heard a distinct victory roar.
"Sand-people."
"SAND-PEOPLE! If there are two things Anakin Skywalker and I have in common, it's that we hate sand and sand-people. Basically all sand-related things." Jo said.
Rye, Erickson, and Calista's team were standing on the rainy platform, watching the ships come down upon them. They came down, hovering above the platform. The soldiers pulled up their spear-guns, Calista whipped up her two custom blasters, and Rye and Erickson reached for their lightsabers, but didn't find them.
"Where are our lightsabers?!" Rye asked, starting to panic.
"On our ship." Erickson replied, recognizing his mistake.
"On the other side of the facility." Rye mumbled.
Then the foreign ships' ramps opened up, revealing fresh, new batches of stormtroopers ready for war. Then the blaster-fire started. Rye and Erickson pulled up their guns and their team started firing back.
"Without our lightsabers, we can't do much defense." Rye informed Calista.
"Don't worry! Soldiers!" Calista shouted.
Then her soldiers came up from behind them and placed their one-way shields in front of them.
"This'll do." Erickson said.
The team started approaching the squad of stormtroopers, firing all they had on them. Then as they had stepped a few yards up, stormtroopers started sliding from the roof, behind the Republic team, and fired at the guards in the back, shooting them down. Guards in front of the now-dead ones turned and fired at them.
"Rye!" Erickson called, noticing the back-attack.
"No!" Calista shouted, also noticing the counter-assault.
"We have to get inside, we were not prepared for this much." Rye said.
Guards hovered the shields above their heads and slowly marched inside, but some other stormtroopers dropped straight onto them, toppling them and firing at the others. Erickson shot them down, and he and Rye started shooting at the ones sliding down the roof. Then two of the front-guards were shot down, leaving some of the others wide-open.
A few guards made it inside, while the remaining guarded the Jedi and the Lieutenant Governor. They eventually made it inside and ran, evading the fire.
"Well this is going well." Erickson said.
"It could go a lot better if we had more than just blasters. Where's our ship?" Calista asked.
"On the other side of the facility." Rye replied.
"Well we don't have much time. You Jedi will go get what we need, we'll hold them off." Calista said.
"Um. That's the number-one way to get shot down quickly." Erickson said.
"Well of course we're not going to stay right here. We have no time to argue, go!" Calista commanded, right before Rye and Erickson sped off.
"Those sand-people are going to tear us apart!" Jo started panicking.
"Nope, we're getting through this." Exar said. "We just have to let them take us down."
"Face them face-to-face." Aang added to Exar's sentence.
"Not exactly. I want us to go directly to their leader." Exar said.
"And take them on from there?" Jo asked not-so-confidently.
"Yep. It'll be a piece of cake. Those Tusken Raiders are about as bright as tauntauns." Exar said.
"Except tauntauns are clever and somewhat intelligent." Aang said.
"Keyword: somewhat. If you think we can beat a sith, we can totally beat a camp of sand-people." Exar said. Aang nodded in agreement, then he and Exar looked at Jo, waiting for an answer.
"Ehhhhh, it's already a two-of-three vote; a 'no' answer wouldn't do any good for me." Jo said.
By that point, the shuttle had already been forced to the ground, and the team herd banging on the walls.
"We should get out now. I don't want this ship wrecked again." Aang said.
"They're going to kill us." Jo said, sternly.
"Actually I don't sense much hostility from them. Let's wait and see what happens." Exar said.
Aang and Exar headed to the ramp -Jo reluctantly followed- and opened the ramp. A group of Tusken Raiders ran in, surrounded the team, and cuffed them. Noticing this new, strange doing, Exar contacted Aang through the force.
'These guys take prisoners? They never do that.' Exar mentally said.
'Well apparently they do. But the questions are 'when did they start?' and 'why?' ' Aang replied.
'Another reason to see their leader. Maybe he has something to do with it.' Exar thought.
'We'll see.' Aang thought.
The team, guarded by six raiders, was placed on a desert skiff for transportation. To the Jedi's misfortune, they went away from the Jundland Wastes.
'Or maybe they're going to feed us to a sarlaac.' Aang thought to Jo.
'Very funny. You're not helping ease my conscience.' Jo replied.
Many minutes passed, and all they saw was sand. It was all they saw for a while. It was dark out when they finally saw a camp in the distance. The Jedi were relieved, then as they got closer, the size of the camp grew, and they started losing some hope of being able to get out. The camp was several yards wide and long. Pretty much the size of the base, the Jedi thought.
They were pushed off the skiff and led to the camp, where bunches of Tusken Raiders gathered around, shouting and roaring. The noise alone was enough for Jo to want to break free and escape, but he knew that would probably get them all killed, so he reluctantly and painstakingly stuck to the plan.
The Jedi were pushed into a tent in the middle of the camp, and in the camp were two oddly dressed sand-people -who if not for their regalia, the team wouldn't know they were the leaders- communicating with each other until the Jedi were pushed on their knees.
"So this is the leader?" Exar said, stifling a laugh.
"Don't underestimate them. There's two of them." Aang said.
'It indeed is not a wise thing to do." The leader said loud and clear, shocking the trio. "You are obviously surprised at my speaking your language, well you should know that I was not originally a part of this formerly small Tusken group."
"Then who are you?" Jo asked.
"Where are my manners?" The leader asked, taking off his mask, and revealing a scarred face.
"My name is Jiro Marek. And this is my brother, Galek Marek."