Legacy IV

Chapter 8

Anakin downed his fourth cup of blue milk with an enthusiasm bordering on desperation. The child seldom, if ever, had enough to eat – that much was apparent to any observer.

"I really gotta go, Mister Qui-Gon sir, or Watto will be choobazzi mad."

The tall Jedi nodded. " I understand. But will you promise to think about what I told you?"

Nose crinkling, the prodigy gave his mute assent. "But….I mean, does studying the Force mean going to a school? - 'Cause there's no way I'm going to school. Ever." Anakin folded his arms obstinately. "School is for chumps and schuzzo'chi."

" I think your mother would want you to attend school, if you had the opportunity," the Jedi master gently admonished. "And you are swift to judge that which you have never experienced."

The reminder did nothing to erode the child's certainty. "I don't know… I mostly learn whatever I want without help. I don't think I need any teachers."

"I am sure you have," Qui-Gon replied, levelly. "But the ways of the Force are not something you can learn from a cybernetics instruction manual."

Anakin shrugged, still not entirely convinced. Then a happier thought struck him. "Are you a teacher, Mister Qui-Gon?"

"All of us are. The oldest and wisest Jedi alive teaches our smallest younglings."

"That's weird," Anakin declared. "No offense."

They stood, and Qui-Gon paid the food vendor for her goods, wrapping the extra portions in a slip of cloth and handing them to the half-starved slave boy. "Here. For later. Promise me you will give it due consideration."

The boy scratched perplexedly at his scalp. "Okay, I will." He hesitated, lingering in the tall man's shadow as though magnetically anchored in place, torn between the certitude of his familiar milieu and the allure of the unknown, the broader world. "Umm… thanks."

"You are welcome, my small friend."

"Bye!" The child scampered away, tearing down Mos Espa's dusty alleys like a womprat fleeing a predator.

The suns gradually climbed higher, deepening the sky to an abysmal bright blue.

Beneath that glazed dome, the Watcher lay splayed upon the already burning sands. His black robes soaked in the heat like greedy mouths; beneath his back, the very earth scorched and sizzled with stored fire. He was hammered between two infernos, filled with hate.

It felt wonderful.

Here, where Light and Dark flowed pure and unsullied, thinned to transparency, oily distillations trickling over the marble-hard surface of this barren world, he could trace the patterns of fate easily, see connections, weave among the threads like an arachnid laying its net. He had seen his foes, noted their movements, watched and waited. And now he would build his snare, lay out the irresistible bait and reel in his prey, step by step.

Here, Life craved itself, consumed itself for want of other nourishment. Every living thing in the desert hungered for another: the carcass of one creature was a siren call to others; their fallen corpses an allurement to yet others, and so on, humblest to mightiest. Even the vast krayt lizards became food for their own kind, when they died - nothing was so majestic that it could not be trapped by the law of death. The blood of simple beasts spattered upon the sand would call others more fearsome, and others after them; the cadaver of a monster would summon the desert's wide-eyed settlers; the massacre of such innocent fools would bring the older Jedi winging to the scene; and his blood would cry out to the younger one, the Chosen. To capture an angel, one had but to slaughter a lamb, set in motion an exquisite cascade of destruction.

He rose, and stalked in the direction of the eopie herd he had spied the evening previous, twin suns burning above and within, the Dark frivoling in the sweep of his cape, the yellow pit of his eyes.

Soon, he would prove his worthiness, and claim the title Darth.

Lord. With but one master… and the bottomless night at his command.

Cliegg really needed to get back to the farm; the vaporators could store collected moisture up to forty-eight standard without overloading, but the purity would be compromised if he let it go that long. And any claim without a homesteader physically present on the premises was just asking for trouble. He, and his father before him, had learned this the hard way. He'd meant to leave before dawn, like any sensible person, but it was too damn hard to leave Shmi behind knowing that the accursed auction would occur the day after tomorrow.

He couldn't lose her, not like that. Not when he had enough money in his pocket to buy their happiness. Well, not quite enough, as it turned out.

He'd stopped for a drink in the cantina. Cliegg was abstemious as a rule, but if any man deserved to drown his sorrows, surely it was one who had renounced love after bitter loss, only to rediscover it late in life, only to have it snatched from him again by something as damning and irrefutable as impecuniousness. The local ale was murky and bitter, like destiny.

He ended up having three, and then he loitered a bit longer, avoiding the morning glare, idly procrastinating. That's when he noticed Watto the junk dealer holding court with some of the bookies in for the big event. The stout Toydarian was holding forth loudly and brashly about the virtues of his slave boy and predicting an upset win. Most the bar's patrons scoffed or laughed into their grimy cups. Everybody knew that there wasn't a human born who could podrace.

Cliegg contemplated the foamy dregs of his last glass. The thing was, Shmi's son was…. different. Spooky, almost, though he would never say it to Shmi and he would adopt the lad in a heartbeat to make her happy. But the boy had… something about him. The way he looked a a piece of machinery and could fix it without consulting a schematic. The way he disappeared when he wanted to. The way he seemed to know what was coming, sometimes, or what folks were thinking. The way some animals raised their hackles when he walked by.

Lars was a pragmatic man, and the scraps of education he'd gleaned for himself along the way were all of a stolidly materialistic bent. He didn't believe in hokey old religions, or Knights and Wizards, or happy fairy tale endings. But he did believe in luck and far-fetched odds. Anyone who made his living off collecting moisture from Tatooine's miserly skies had to. So when the tall, groove-faced offworlder bookie sarcastically offered Watto thousand-to-one odds on his slave boy winning the Boonta Eve Classic, Cliegg's ears perked up.

Shmi believed in her son, even though she'd never confided the father's identity to Lars. Maybe she didn't know, and was shamed. And Cliegg, in his turn, believed in Shmi. He'd risk everything for her – a humble man's one act of courage, one last act of defiance against the yoke of his inherited lot in life.

He got up, faced the bookie square, and gambled every last penny of his savings on that thousand to one bet. The cantina's patrons milled about him, sneering and chortling. The bookie took the money, gladly enough, and waved him away with a sad, knowing look stamped on his lined features.

Cliegg caught Watto's bulging eye, nodded once, and left, chin held high. He'd cast his chance cubes; let them fall as they might. Nobody could say he'd had an opportunity and let it slip, and if he lost everything on the wager, it would make no difference anyway. Without Shmi in his life, he was utterly broke.

As soon as the farmer had made his exit, Watto the Toydarian guffawed loudly and gripped the bookie by one elbow.

"Heh heh.. a fool and his money are soon parted, eh?"

He promptly laid everything he had to spare, and a little more, on Sebulba the Dug.

Anakin was good, sure…. But Sebulba was going to win.

Jabba the Illustrious slept late , by Tatooinian standards. Not that any of his cowering retinue or retainers would dare accuse the vast slug-like crimelord of indolence. Such brazen displays of disrespect were likeliest to end in a one way ticket to the Hutt's private rancor pit. Or worse. Of late, he had taken a fancy to feeding people – alive- to the sarlaac rumored to dwell in the tartarus-depths of the Great Pit of Karkoon.

So they held their tongues, rose early to work, and called the hour when their slimy master finally roused himself "first hour" – regardless of the suns' stations in the sky. At that time, vats of bitter arjees were prepared and the steaming concoction distributed to all and sundry, while the more mellow musicians strummed a gentle tune on mandol and ioli.

At noon, Obi-Wan was waiting in the throne room along with the Hutt's other esteemed guests when Jabba finally deigned to squirm and wriggle his way onto the sagging platform that served as high dais. Watching the gelatinous body heave and undulate its way across the floor and onto the raised wooden palette was… nauseating. He kept his expression neutral, recalling that ideals of beauty and grace were somewhat species- relative. In his own circle, Jabba might be considered a paragon of virility.

Well. He might. One never knew.

A Twi"Lek slave girl handed round steaming cups of argees, brewed black as the night sky and with a sludge of grounds clinging to the bottom. Her eyes stayed down, the decorative collar about her slender neck crusted with jewels and a transceiver circuit for conveying a painful voltage should she disobey.

"Thank you," the young Jedi said, accepting his serving with a pang of repressed anger. There were slaves in every corner of this dwelling… but this one was barely older than Zhoa Pleromata, her body bearing only the first traces of budding womanhood. His hand closed impulsively about her wrist – but the poor creature shied from his touch, misunderstanding the gesture.

His mouth thinned yet further as she moved hastily away upon her errand. I am not here to free slaves.

But surely someone ought to be here to do just that?

You cannot save everyone.

And yet, every life is part of the universal Life, and worthy of our compassion, no matter how pathetic or seemingly humble. All things are interconnected in the Force. He was not the pupil of Qui-GOn Jin for nothing; some lessons remained branded deeply on the soul, never to be expunged.

The Order served the Republic, while the Republic looked steadfastly the other way.

Once again, that distant thunder in the Force, a tectonic shifting of realities. Tipping, tipping, tipping - - premonition, or the Unifying vision, spilled over into physical vertigo. He blinked away momentary dizziness.

Something was happening, here, on Tatooine, whether he wanted it or not, whether the Republic and the Order acted or not, whether all the galaxy knew it or not. And he was caught, somehow, within the pincer of Fate, pinned helplessly at the nexus of some event he comprehended not in the least.

Force,he needed to think – but at the moment, he was having an audience with a bloated sack of avaricious narcissism.

"Ah…. Esteemed Jedi ambassador: the Magnanimous Jabba inquires whether you spent a pleasant night, and hopes that this fair morning finds you hale and hearty."

Obi-Wan wrenched his attention back to the present moment, and fixed the protocol unit with a bland stare. Really. Behind the robotic interpreter, the Hutt sprawled squalidly upon his 'throne' – slatted eyes gleaming with displeasure and surprise, and fat purple tongue just tracing the ragged outline of his mouth. A dribble of viscous slime trailed down his four chins.

The young Knight stepped forward and made a very courtly bow. "Please thank His Eminence for the lavish accommodations, and express my gratitude for the entertainment so thoughtfully provided me."

He extended one arm from beneath the duster's obscuring folds, allowing the severed assassin droid's head to clatter out over the grille at his boots.

The company gasped and murmured. Jabba roared in astonishment, then spat out a long string of Huttese at his quavering droid.

The flustered translator wrung its metallic hands. "Oh, ah, the Supremely Benificent Jabba is most gratified by your compliments, and hopes you will stay as his guest at this morning's business meeting."

Obi-Wan's brows twitched upward, ironically. "He is too kind."