The Weaving force Chapter 10 (Patreon)

Chapter 10:

Hannah

Helping Shmi’s Bith friend back to her home was a slow affair. Bith bones, apparently, were different from that of humans, less dense, more easily splintered when broken. So keeping his shattered hands away from the rush of Tatooinian citizens that might bump into him or jostle the injuries was difficult at best.

Shmi herself seemed nervous at the unwanted attention they were drawing to themselves, and that was enough to put Hannah on edge, which didn’t help matters.

Even so, with one step in front of the other they eventually made it back.

Dennis was awake, sitting at the dinner table before he stood at the sound of the door opening.

“Honestly when I woke up and didn’t find you guys I was a bit worr-- Oh hell.” He blanched at the sight of the clearly injured Bith.

“Come on, Rugess, let’s sit you down,” Shmi soothed, ushering her friend over towards the living room couch. The blankets and pillows used by Hannah and Dennis were thankfully neatly folded on one side. The boy knew how to be a decent house guest.

The Bith muttered something in his language that Hannah could guess was some form of thanks.

“You just rest, love. I’ll get you something to eat,” she promised, and though it was subtle, Hannah could see the glance of worry she tossed towards her kitchen and wondered if the slave woman had enough to feed so many.

She felt a twisting in her gut and looked to Dennis, who luckily caught her eye as she gestured with a jerk of her head for him to follow her the opposite direction of Shmi heading towards the kitchen, and giving the Bith plenty of room where he laid on the couch.

Once they had some semblance of privacy, Hannah leaned in close to whisper in Dennis’ ear, “He fought in that arena yesterday.”

Dennis’ features scrunched up, then his eyes widened in realization. “Shit.”

She nodded at his rather apt summation.

There was no guarantee Alexandria had been the one to hurt him. But if she was… that might make things more complicated.

Hannah took a breath. “You have another day with Watto right?”

Dennis nodded. “That’s the deal.”

“Head out. Finish. If Alexandria heads there rather than here let her know.”

“Got it,” he affirmed. “What are you gonna do?”

She turned, looking at the injured Bith and Shmi, fretting in the kitchen. “Help out around here.”

(X)(X)(X)

As she’d suspected, Shmi didn’t exactly have the luxury of staying at home all day helping an injured friend. Before long, Watto called for his slave and her work day had to get started.

So Hannah was left to help the injured Rugess.

Before that though, she needed to bathe. While thick, heavy clothing had done well enough to… smother the smell, the reality was that she felt disgusting after so long without a proper shower.

Tattoine, unfortunately, did not have a ‘proper shower’ desert planets and water of course.

What they used instead were sonic based showers, where thrumming sound waves would quite literally break apart the filth and dead matter.

It was a decidedly… odd sensation and she desperately missed the feeling of hot running water but it was far better than nothing and she swore the first chance she had she was going to soak in a bathtub and damn anyone who told her otherwise.

Even so, once she was done cleaning herself she stepped out into Shmi’s home to start helping her, or more specifically, Rugess, Shmi’s Bith friend.

She rebandaged his hands, using clean bandages from a first aid kit Shmi had, tossing away the ratty, bloodied sack cloth they’d been bound in before- then spoonfeeding the Bith some porridge which was… interesting to say the least considering the odd shape of Bith mouths.

In short, if Alexandria had indeed hurt the man she was doing her level best to make up for it- even if just by proxy.

She couldn’t understand his language, but clearly he could understand her- and while he spoke and mimed his best to communicate through charades, she never got the feeling he was asking for something specific but rather asking about her through the impressions.

So she answered. She needed to practice their supposed cover story anyway.

“Our ship was destroyed in a crash along the Junland Wastes-” She answered, remembering one of the first bits of this planet’s local norms- don’t go to the Junland Wastes. “So we’re stuck here until we can afford transport off world. Dennis is doing odd jobs as you can tell and I’m…” The word stuck in her throat. “A bounty Hunter.”

Rugess nodded, mumbling something else she didn’t understand, then raised his injured hands. She could guess he was referring to his job.

“Shmi said you were some sort of engineer?” He nodded, more enthusiastically now- his bulbous head making him look rather comical as he started talking in a rapid fire staccato of gibberish that was even funnier somehow.

It made her smile, seeing someone clearly passionate about their work, even as a slave.

It made her hate the industry all the more, as if she needed another reason; how all they saw were the injuries that supposedly made him ‘useless’ rather than someone who obviously loved what he did and likely did it well as a result.

Suddenly however, he stopped speaking, his head turning towards the door as though he heard something

Bith, apparently, had very sharp hearing because suddenly, there was indeed a knock on the door.

“Militia.”

Alexandria.

Shit.

She stood up, ready to intercept the woman and hopefully tell her what the situation might possibly be when Rugess started… for lack of a better term freaking out-

He patted Militia’s hands with his wrists, seemingly trying to grab hold of her, his sentences spilled out of his mouth in a word vomit that even if she understood the language would have been difficult to follow.

Did he recognize Alexandria’s voice? Or was it something else?

“It’s ok. It’s ok, calm down.” She implored, and his rapid sentences ceased but his wrists pressed tightly together, pinching her hand between them.

Another knock.

“Militia.”

“I’m here.” She answered and felt Rugess stiffen.

Alexandria took her acknowledgement as permission to come in, because she opened the door a second later.

Quick on the uptake as ever, the flying Brick took one look around the room and seemed to realize exactly what was wrong; likely helped by Rugess letting out a moan of despair before standing and trying to hide on the other side of the couch.

“Shit.” Militia heard her mutter under her breath

It was… an apt summation of the situation.

(X)(X)(X)

When Shmi returned, she… hid her displeasure well- but it was there, hiding beneath a venere of calm and disquieting false serenity, beneath a blank face and pointed politeness.

Shmi had joked the other day that she was taking care of children and now, somehow Militia felt very much like a child talking to a disappointed parent.

“We didn’t know-” She tried to explain again.

“I understand. Shmi said, speaking softly. “You needed credits.”

She cringed.

Rugess was sitting on the couch, almost curled in on himself, staying far far away from Alexandria

“We did.” Alexandria answered with a cold flat tone that made her wince. “I’m sorry I hurt your friend but we had our needs as well.”

“And now you’ve met those.” Shmi answered. “I suppose you’ll be on your way then-”

She didn’t need to say the obvious, they would be leaving her friend, and her holding the proverbial bag.

Her stomach turned.

Alexandria’s lips twisted in displeasure.

“Lets take him with us.”

Dennis spoke up and Militia had to blink for a moment before she turned, all eyes turning to the younger boy who had been standing quietly beside the dining room table.

Dennis looked at each of them, then shrugged. “Between the bounty and the arena we have eighteen thousand credits- offworld transport is a few hundred for each person. We can afford to take him off this dustbowl at the very least.” He turned looking at Shmi, and she could tell he was thinking about extending the offer to her.

Shmi caught his thinking too.

“You don’t need to take me.” She said, turning towards Alexandria. “He has no master, he’s a skilled engineer. He can be useful to you.”

Militia turned looking towards Alexandria in askance.

Alexandria’s lip curled, turning away. “I’ll remind the both of you we don’t know where we are, how far we can stretch this money, where the next proverbial paycheck will come from or how much we’ll need in the future. This…” She gestured between herself and the two slaves in the house. “Is regrettable but it’s not…” She paused. “-our problem.”

Militia knew, objectively- that all of that was true. And yet…

“This is wrong.” She said, almost whispering the words beside the woman.

A muscle in Alexandria’s jaw jumped, seemingly grinding her teeth.

She turned, looking towards Dennis and Hannah saw the boy meeting her gaze unflinchingly, almost glaring at the Triumvirate member.

“Fine.” Alexandria bit out. Turning to look at the Bith who straightened in obvious surprise in his seat. “We’ll take you off world with us.

The alien started rapid fire talking again and for the first time since she returned home, Shmi’s stony, disappointed facade cracked, a small, relieved smile slipping through.

“Now lets decide where exactly we’re going to actually go.” Their commander said next and Militia realized that- indeed- she had no idea where they were going.

Taking a seat by Shmi’s dining room table, the woman sighed, and for a moment Hannah thought Alexandria dearly wished she could remove her helmet.

“As Dennis so eloquently put it.” She began. “We have eighteen thousand credits. With that we can easily afford offworld transportation. I’d like to head towards the center of Galactic power, all consensus states that’s a planet called Coruscant. But there are no transports that take us from Tatooine to Coruscant” She turned towards Rugess and Shmi. “So you tell us. What would be our best route to actually reach Corrusant?”

The Bith started speaking, Shmi turning, listening and then translating for him. “Rugess asks what you’re hoping to find on Corrusant.”

“Information.” She answered quickly. “Where we are, how we got here, a means to get back. Likely we won’t find it on corrusant but as the center of this… Galactic republic, its bound to get us some lead.”

Again, Rugess spoke and Shmi translated for him.

“Sounds like you just need a holo-net connection.” Shmi cleared her throat. “He says that Corrusant is a planet of quintillions of people. You’ll never find anything there. Other worlds might help more.”

“Such as?” She wasn’t dismissive of the idea. But rather genuinely curious.

Rugess answered.

“Alderaan, Naboo, and Mandalore.” Shmi said, before she grew pensive. “The people who took my son came from Naboo.” She smiled, a wistful turn to her lips. “He says that those planets have less traffic, and the people there are known to be cultured and diplomatic. They have libraries and can perhaps give you some help.”

“And I suppose they have good medics that can help heal those hands.” Alexandria observed.

Rugess’ head bowed but he didn’t deny it.

Hannah’s one time Mentor sighed “What can you tell us about these worlds and their people?”

“Naboo is a peaceful world.” Shmi said, not waiting for Rugess to answer. “But they’ve… recently been attacked by the Trade Federation… I’m unsure as to the details or how that’s been resolved. They may be more untrusting of outsiders given that.”

Rugess spoke next.

“Alderaan is considered to be one of the most peaceful planets in the galaxy. Their people are said to be very kind and welcoming, of all the planets you might be most welcome there. And Mandalore was once a very warlike planet that has recently been preaching pacifism under the New Mandalorians.”

“Have you ever been to any of these places?” Hannah asked.

Rugess nodded-

“Mandalore” Shmi said for him. “It was a long time ago, before he came to be a slave.”

“Might be good to show up with someone who knows the locals a bit.” Dennis muttered. Militia couldn’t disagree.

Alexandria looked to both of them in turn, seemingly making certain that they were certain.

They weren’t of course. They were all flying equally blind.

But at least now they had a direction.

“Alright then.” She nodded. “Mandalore it is.”

(X)(X)(X)

Spaceports don’t close.

Rather obvious really. Airports don’t close back home so why should Spaceports.

Such as it was, before the twin suns of Tattoine were even cresting over the distant crags, hills and dunes, with the light barely casting glimmers of gray across the sky that Militia, Dennis and Alexandria found themselves at the Mos Eisley Spaceport.

Everything that they had could basically fit in a single suitcase. Two changes of clothes Alexandria had purchased for all of them with their eighteen thousand credits, three ‘communicators’ that were the equivalent of phones or walkies, and two dataslates that would connect to the holo-net once they reached a system with a proper uplink.

That was it. Even Rugess had a suitcase for himself rather than shared between him and two other people

It really was… disconcerting.

If something happened to them, any of them in this place, this galaxy… not even a full suitcase to mark they were ever here.

Shmi saw them off, offering Rugess a hug and whispering reassurances to her friend as Alexandria went to the clerk to purchase their tickets.

The slave woman pulled away, turning to look at Dennis and offering a soft smile his way.

Dennis, as sincere as she’d ever seen him, stretched out his hands, taking Shmi’s in his grip and shaking them. “Thank you. For everything.”He said, sincerely.

“It was no trouble. And you’re helping Rugess.” Shmi noted. “You’ve paid me back many fold, truly.”

She noted Denis shift from foot to foot, his hands still holding onto Shmi’s and she could read the question on his face, feel it bubbling up to the surface, the offer he was just about to give.

She knew what she should do. She knew she should interrupt, stop him, or at worst, consult with Alexandria, try to convince her before Dennis made an offer he couldn’t keep- or resent Alexandria for not keeping.

That’s what she should do.

“We can come back.”

She didn’t recognize she spoke, not until Dennis and Shmi turned to look at her.

She startled herself… then realized it was true.

“We can come back.” She repeated. “Alexandria’s right that… things are very precarious now. But once we know. Once we’re more familiar…” They’d gotten eighteen thousand credits and three days. Who’s to say what would happen in three months? In three years. “We can come and fr-”

“My son said the same.” Shmi interrupted, that soft, quiet little smile back in place. That expression that said she knew something they didn’t. “He dreamed of going offworld, becoming a jedi and returning to free all the slaves of Tattooine. Ekkreth come to life.”

It was wistful, like a faded dream, a child indulgence…

She shook her head.

“You don’t have to come back for me.”Shmi whispered. “My son is free, my friend is free. Yes, I am a slave. But that is enough.” Dennis’head bowed.

…

“We’ll come back for you.”

Again, she hadn’t realized she’d spoken, not until Dennis nodded.

“Yeah. We’ll get you to see an ocean planet before we head back home.”

There was laughter in Shmi’s eyes, a faded dream… a child indulgence.

“Perhaps you will be Ekkreth.” Shmi muttered before bringing Dennis’ hands up to kiss his knuckles, and then doing the same for Militia’s.

“Go-” She urged. “Go and find your way back home.” She wished.

They would find their way back. Militia had to have faith in that.

That didn’t mean they couldn’t return to keep their promise along the way.