Trial of the Flesh

[Lilla Syrin]

Irrationally, Lilla made a lunge for the switch box, trying to get out. Reklama leaped to his feet right behind her and knocked her down with a vicious punch to the shoulder.

“Stupid!” he muttered. “Don’t you know what those signs say?”

Lilla held her throbbing shoulder. She just stared at him, waiting to see if he would kill her.

“I guess you don’t know,” he muttered, jerking his thumb at the strange letters. “This here is a zero atmosphere freighter. We’re in a self-contained cargo container with its own atmosphere. In this case, it’s set for oxygen. If you had opened that hatch, we’d be rolling on the floor, bug-eyed and suffocating, in less than a minute. Even a Jedi can’t breathe without oxygen.”

That wasn’t entirely true, but Lilla was of the opinion Reklama would not want to be put straight on the matter.

“For the moment, I’m not a Jedi. Or rather I am a Jedi, but I can’t use the Force. They pumped some drug into me. It stops me connecting and using my abilities.”

Reklama nodded. “Synthesised Ysalamir, no doubt.”

Lilla nodded, surprised at the man’s knowledge.

“I’m Lilla by the way. And I’m sorry,” she said, sitting up. “I’ve never been a fugitive before. I guess I’m not very good at it.”

Reklama shook his head, as if he couldn’t believe what he had gotten himself saddled with. He sat on the edge of a crate and just looked at her.

“Lady, the problem is, you can’t do nothin’ for me, and I can’t do nothin’ for you. You’re poison, all the way around.”

“That’s not true,” Lilla insisted, shifting around to see him. “I won’t ask you any more about the bombing - I don’t care what you had to do with it. But I know you can get me a fake identicard and a new name, and some clothes. Maybe that’s why I was put here with you.”

 

[Lilla Syrin]

Reklama rubbed the stubble under his chin. “Your benefactor must be awfully well connected to know my comings and goings. Yeah, I could arrange those things.” He smiled at her. “What could you do for me in return?”

Lilla wiped her face with her forearm and tried to think. “Isn’t there something in your line of work that could use a Jedi?” She saw the look on his face and quickly added, “That isn’t too illegal?”

The criminal leaned back and considered the offer. “There might be. But that doesn’t change the fact that you’re poison. By now you have the militia, special forces, regular cops, and all the school crossing-patrols looking for you. I’m small potatoes compared to you.”

“Okay,” she promised, “I’ll leave whenever you say you want me to go.” She couldn’t believe she was making promises to a petty gangster, who had in some way arranged the bombing. What could she find out from him? She didn’t want to think what it would take to gain his confidence.

“I’m going to regret it if I don’t plug you now,” said Reklama with all sincerity.

 

[Lilla Syrin]

Lilla stiffened as she felt the sudden sensation of weightlessness. At first, she thought the ship had stopped until she heard the whistling of wind all around them.

Reklama cut forth with a litany of swear words, his voice were quickly drowned out by a rush of air against the cargo container. They weren’t just weightless – they were plunging through planetary atmosphere! Massive gravity had its grip on them.

Then the naked bulb burst, showering them with glass fragments, and the air ventilators stopped working!

Lilla hardly noticed the way the cargo boxes banged against her, threatening to crush her in the free-fall. She just spun around in the darkness, her body a rubber ball cascading from one wall into another, swiping Reklama and the boxes in the process.

When she realized she might as well die calmly, Lilla wrapped her arms around her head, tucked her legs in, and tried to still her heart. Then the floor of the container abruptly rose up and crashed into her! She lay sprawling, gasping for air, as the big crate righted itself and shifted around. Now she heard groanings and creakings of a weirder sort, and air roared around the exterior of their strange vehicle.

“Damn,” muttered Reklama in the darkness, “I wish they’d warn us before they cut us loose.”

Still gulping air, Lilla wheezed, “You expected that?”

“Old smugglers’ trick. They plot their trajectory over the drop-off point and slow down just enough to push us out. With a parachute. It’s not very accurate, but the authorities are none the wiser that they dropped something.”

Lilla listened to the air whizzing past them, and she marvelled at the fact that she was taking a parachute jump, albeit inside a box with bruises and welts all over her body. Blood was running through the hair on her scalp from a nasty cut.

“The chute is open?” she croaked.

“It had better be,” mused Reklama, “Or they’ll have to scrape us off the ground to identify us. But what if they would never find our bodies. We could be legends! Everyone would think we ran off together, you and me, and are living the good life.”

“Yeah,” said Lill, doing her best to regain some Jedi-like composure. “So where are we, anyway?”

“You’ll see,” answered Reklama. “Brace yourself. I hear the wind changing.”

She had a second or two to curl up in a ball before the giant crate hammered onto something solid. She caught her breath, thinking they were safe, when the huge crate began to move again. This time it tilted radically to one side and slid down an incline like a house on skis. She could only stare into the darkness and feel the rattling bumps beneath her. They thudded to another abrupt stop, and this one held, at least until Lilla could start breathing again.

 

[Lilla Syrin]

“Are we alive?” she rasped.

“Yeah,” answered Reklama. “Cover your head - I’m gonna shoot my way out of here. Sometimes the metal starts to melt.”

She didn’t know Reklama very well, but she had learned to heed his warnings. Lilla covered her head, but she kept one eye open to see what he was doing. She gasped when several plasm streaks shot through the darkness and punched holes in the lid of the container. Using the light from the discharge to aim, Reklama worked the smaller holes into a jagged hole about half a meter in diameter, or just big enough for a smallish person to climb out.

Lilla squinted her eyes, expecting blinding sunlight to flood through the hole. Instead, soothing darkness greeted her eyes, plus the sight of nearly as many stars as a person saw in space. They weren’t near civilisation, she knew that much. But the sounds and smells were familiar.

“Where are we?” she asked.

“I told you,” muttered Reklama, “You’re gonna die here real soon if you don’t stop asking me questions. If you’re going to be useful to me, you’ve just got to obey me, and that’s it.”

“Sorry,” she answered. She closed her eyes and reached out for the Force – but still nothing happened. But the nothing felt different than before. As if previously it had been a bone-dry atmosphere and now there was moisture in the air.

Behind his rough exterior was a cagey and cool intellect, and she had every reason to believe that Reklama was as ruthless as he claimed to be. He would kill her for a slight provocation. So she opted to lie low and pick the time and place to challenge him, knowing she might only get one chance.

 

[Lilla Syrin]

In the dim starlight, she could just see Reklama scrounging around in his crate, the one in which he had been smuggled aboard the ship. He finally pulled out a black briefcase and a dirty duffel bag. He opened the duffel bag and took out a crowbar, which he used to pound down the ragged edges of the hole he had shot open. His pounding turned the crate into a tin drum, and Lilla had to cover her ears. Reklama finally stopped and took a glowstick out of his bag to study his handiwork.

“There,” he drawled, “At least we’ll have air. Want to go out and take a look around?”

Lilla shook her head. She was beginning to feel that terrible panic she had felt upon waking up after the bombing - the shock, the disorientation, the feeling that she was stuck in a nightmare. She hoped it was the feeling of the drug they’d pumped into her wearing off.

In fact, she told herself, she was stuck in a nightmare of the worst sort – reality. There was no waking up, so she might as well deal with it. She was in a shot-up crate in the middle of the what she supposed was a desert, chased by everyone, in the company of a murderer. No matter where they were, she was dependent upon this criminal for the time being, and it might get worse before it got better.

Right now, she wondered if it was even possible to get better.

 

[Lilla Syrin]

While she was musing in the dim light given off by a hole-ful of stars, Reklama turned on his glowstick again and began searching for something else in his duffel bag. He drew out a small electronic device, checked to see that it hadn’t been damaged, then pulled out its antenna. He pressed a button on the device, and a red light began to blink on and off.

Lilla was about to ask him what it was, but then she remembered: No more questions.

Perhaps she should just stop talking altogether? She was startled by a thud as Reklama turned one of the crates on end. Then he proceeded to climb up and peer out the hole. He made a low whistle.

“We are really in the middle of nowhere. I hope my boys have some decent coordinates.”

Lilla started to ask who the boys were, then she remembered not to talk. That device was some kind of homing beacon, it was clear, so somebody was out there, looking for them. She suddenly had a strong instinct to get out of the crate, and she pounded on Reklama’s calf.

“Hey!” he shouted down. “What’s the deal?”

She felt a rushing sensation – as if the rains had come at the end of the dry season. Suddenly she felt whole again. And wishing to test her new-found comfort, she tried an experiment and told him telepathically to get off the crate.

He blinked at her and smiled. “All you had to do was ask. Welcome back Jedi.”

Reklama climbed down and Lilla climbed up. By standing on her tiptoes, she could just get her head, the top of her shoulders, and one arm out through the hole, but she was glad she had made the effort. Their little vessel was parked at an angle at the bottom of a dry wash, buried halfway under the sand, and surrounded by scrubby desert. Trailing behind them like a tattered bridal veil was the parachute that had saved their lives. It was ripped and streaked with dirt from the tumble down the wash.

In the blue starlight she couldn’t see very far, but she could see gnarled trees at the rim of the wash and other ghostly shapes.

She suddenly had an overwhelming desire to stand on the ground. After the nightmarish events of the last three days, she just had to get out and stand on firm ground. She began to squirm out, and then used the Force to leap out, making sure her hips did not hit the sides of the hole.

 

[Lilla Syrin]

The desert was silent, but as she sat without moving for a few minutes, the chirps came back. She heard a distant roar. Unaccountably, Lilla had never felt more happy to hear the call of a Krayt dragon. For she was on Tatooine.

She was startled a moment later when a black briefcase landed in the sand not far from her. She reached over to open it, but the clasps were locked; it was a solidly built case. She pushed the briefcase away and ducked when the dirty duffel bag came flying out of the hole a moment later. The bags were followed by Reklama himself, squirming through the small opening. He was an unlikely saviour, she thought, but if she would ever end this nightmare and get her previous life back, she needed him. She would leave him his blood money in the briefcase.

She scrambled out of the way as she saw Reklama getting ready to slide down the crate and hit the sand. He rolled athletically off the edge of the crate and landed on his feet never losing his grip on his blaster.

“Ah,” said Reklama, “That’s better. If we haven’t been found by midday, we’re going to regret getting out of there. But maybe we can crawl under it for shade.”

He plopped down in the sand and fished a hat out of his duffel bag. “So,” he drawled, “Know any good jokes?”

She looked at him intently for several seconds, and he nodded.

“You’re not going to talk anymore, huh? Are you, like, suffering from some kind of trauma?”

Lilla nodded, and it was the truth. The loss of the Force, the loss of status, reputation, liberty and the place she for the first time called home hit her hard. What was she to become? An associate of the sort of man that she once despised. And why was she using the past tense? She still does despise people like him. But circumstances alter reality. Which, perversely, was the opposite of what she’d most recently been taught.

A Jedi was a Jedi, regardless of their surroundings. The greater good was the greater good. Right? For all of her losses, the one that frightened her most was the demise of her moral compass.

“So, when my friends show up, you’re a mute, right? And you ain’t no Jedi.”

She nodded again. “Not a bad cover,” agreed Reklama, “Because you can still communicate if you want to, with certain people. This ain’t new to me, you know. I’ve had experience with Force-types before.”

Lilla nodded. She was almost certain of that. And they weren’t Jedi either.

 

[Lilla Syrin]

The first rays of sunlight brought the temperature up. Lilla watched, as the fiery domes of the twin suns rose over the desert floor.

Reklama was asleep in the sand of the dry wash, clutching his briefcase and his PPG pistol across his chest. She could easily wrench one or both away from him now, but what good would that do her? Where could she go without Reklama and his friends, whoever they were? She did steal a few sips of his water, though, after she found a canteen hidden in his duffel bag. With Reklama’s well-developed sense of self-preservation, he had failed to mention that he had any water.

Lilla climbed out of the wash and watched the suns continue to rise.

She didn’t know how long she stood there, watching the ragged horizon, before she saw them. At first, it seemed they were just another copse of misshapen rocks in the distance, but the black specks kept coming closer. It was their unerring march through the wilderness that made her certain they were coming for her and Reklama. But who were they? What were they?

As the specks drew closer, she decided they were Bantha. She counted four of them. She heard some footsteps crunching the sand behind her, and she turned to see Reklama. He was drinking from his canteen, and he offered it to her without comment. She took a long drink this time. They were saved, so to speak, and there was no reason for Reklama to hoard his water any longer.

Lilla glanced at the criminal, and he shook his head. “No, they’re not like me. And they’re not like you. Unless you lived about five hundred years ago, they’re unlike anybody you’ve ever met. This is their home. Don’t make fun of them, okay?”

Lilla presumed they were Tuskens but didn’t comment.

 

[Lilla Syrin]

From his duffel bag, Reklama took out a pair of banged-up but good binoculars and handed them to Lilla. She nodded her thanks and put the lenses to her eyes to study the approaching party. The four Bantha were indeed being ridden by Tuskens. Lilla wondered how Reklama met them, let alone gained their trust.

The grubby criminal motioned at the vast desert. “They’re outcasts of their own kind. Nobody pays them much mind. So they do little favours for people like me.” He smiled at Lilla. “People like us, I should say. You’re a much bigger criminal than I am.”

She glared at him, and the man laughed. “I won’t tell them who you are. But there should be a big reward for you by now. Better watch your step.”

Lilla nodded somberly. After another twenty minutes, the Bantha came out of a gully and she could now hear the creature’s breathing.

One by one, the Tuskens got off their mounts, stretching their legs. There were no greetings, no shaking hands with Reklama.

Finally, one of them approached Reklama, but before he reached the criminal, he stopped and stared at Lilla.

Lilla felt the others staring at her too, and she stared right back. After her adventures of late, she was certain she was just as grungy and disreputable-looking as they did. She could feel the caked blood in her scalp and on her forehead.

Reklama took control. “She don’t talk, and I don’t know what her name is. But I would like to make some arrangements for her.”

The Tusken responded in good basic. The fee was increased. Lilla frowned.

“What?” squawked Reklama. “You had to come out here, anyway! How can you double it?”

The Tusken spoke again. They would leave her here if Reklama did not agree. And this far from anywhere, not knowing which direction civilisation was, she’d die before she found water.

But what was a Tusken doing, speaking Basic?

“All right,” muttered the gangster. “But she needs everything I’m getting – new identicard, passage.”

And since when did Tuskens deal with false papers – or technology for that matter?

“Reklama, you will ride with the boy, as he is lighter. Your friend will ride with me.”

The head ‘Tusken’ studied Lilla for a moment. “You may not talk, but we need to tell you things. So you will need a name, at least for our benefit. I will call you Lilla – it means lilac in my language – the colour of your eyes.”

Lilla nodded and kept her face as calm and as impassive as she could. Two people, entirely separate and yet they both decided to gift her the same name. Was he in some way connected to the governess? And what language did he speak of?

 

[Lilla Syrin]

It seemed like a mirage, shimmering in the desert heat, a pile of adobe cubes; they looked like loaves of bread baking in the sun. After the long haul over the rugged terrain on the Bantha, without seeing anything except endless tracts of desolation, even these humble abodes looked miraculous. Lilla rubbed her eyes, both to get a better look and to get the sand out. No, it really was a village, all the way out here.

Lilla gripped whatever she could get her hands on. There really wasn’t a second seat on the Bantha, and she was hanging on for all she was worth.

As they drew closer, she decided the adobes looked like a pile of children’s blocks, a smaller block piled on top of a larger block to form rudimentary second stories. The extra space also allowed walkways between various structures on the second story, and wooden ladders stretched to every roof in the pueblo, utilizing all the space. There were rounded wooden beams sticking straight out of the adobes at irregular intervals, and smoke curled from a chimney on the topmost structure.

Gathered around the pueblo were pens for animals and there were several low-slung lodges, little more than a metre high. Some of these low lodges were skeletal structures, nothing but twigs with colourful bits of cloth tied to them. Near each lodge was an immense fire pit filled with rocks, and Lilla wondered what so many fire pits were used for. Colourful feathers and handmade pennants decorated staffs and poles all over the village.

Dogs were the first to come running to greet the Bantha, and they were yapping and wagging their tails happily. They were followed by children, who were also yapping but had no tails to wag. They looked, to Lilla, like regular kids. Undaunted, they twirled clacking noisemakers over their heads, causing the dogs to scurry. Adults began to emerge from the adobes, and they exhibited only a mild interest in the new arrivals.

Lilla now saw that the village was nestled against a small plateau barely taller than the tallest adobe and exactly the same color. This must make it difficult to spot from any direction, she thought. Atop the plateau was the incongruous sight of solar panels, microwave antennae, and satellite dishes; and in the distance, were small white windmills, churning in the breeze. She imagined that the solar panels and windmills generated all the power the pueblo could ever need.

Then she saw the muddy stream, barely a metre wide, skirting both the plateau and the pueblo as if it were trying to avoid them. She saw no other signs of water, and wondered who nobody else had ever found this place.

The strange caravan came to a halt near more Bantha. A moment later, the Tusken had dismounted and was offering his hand to her.

“Come, Lilla,” he said. “Do you need food?”

She nodded and got down. The dogs sniffed her, and the children ran around her in circles, giggling. Lilla looked over and saw Reklama. The gangster managed to greet several people while keeping his black briefcase clutched to his chest. His duffel bag was slung over his shoulder.

The people of the pueblo looked healthy enough, but many of them had the kind of simple ailments that come from living primitively – or without credits: bad skin, bad teeth, limps, injuries, and one case of cataracts.

Those who weren’t nude were dressed in dirty clothes and wore waist-length ratty hair. Then Lilla was escorted inside a ground-floor adobe.

 

[Lilla Syrin]

She had to duck her head to fit through the doorway, and she was surprised to find a floor lamp giving off a subdued bit of light. She was even more surprised to see a table, upon which sat a sprawling machine; it had various spools and feeds and looked like it was intended for small manufacturing. The smells of the room were also a strange mixture of industrial solvents and food.

“I will be right back,” said the Tusken. He disappeared into the adjoining room, which Lilla assumed was the kitchen. She could see no cooking utensils here.

A moment later, Reklama entered and slumped onto one of the mats on the floor. He kicked off his boots and groaned with relief. His feet added another odd smell to the room.

“Ever see anything like this?” he asked.

She shook her head in an honest answer. She thought she knew Tatooine.

Reklama grinned. “They bend the laws, but they’re good people. They’re on the edge, like you and me. Outcasts from society for their beliefs. So, they made a life here. Kind of a kibbutz. But even communes have to pay bills.”

Lilla nodded. Unfortunately, she couldn’t argue with that generalisation, given her present circumstances. A young man with chestnut hair came in, and he was carrying a mangled pad of paper, a stubby pencil, and a measuring tape.

“Stand up, Brother Reklama,” he said, motioning to the gangster.

Reklama complied, and the young man measured his height, as if he were fitting him for a suit. When he was done, he wrote his findings on his pad of paper.

“I’m going to guess on your weight,” he said. “Our scale broke. But I’m pretty accurate.” He tapped his pencil on his chin until he came up with a guess, which he also wrote on his pad. “Sister Lilla,” he said, “It’s your turn. Turn around.”

She obeyed, and the young man ran the measuring tape from the crown of her head to the heels of her feet. In doing so, his fingers touched the bare skin at the nape of her neck, and it gave her a shock. For that split second, she glimpsed involuntarily into his mind and saw that his life out here was lonely. Painfully lonely, but he couldn’t leave.

“Fine;” he said, jotting down her measurements. “You look about the same weight as my sister – I’ll use that. Thank you. I need to go back to my house and get on the microwave link. In maybe an hour, I’ll have some matches for identicards. It’s gotten too hard to do real forgeries, so I’ll have to match you with a living person and download their data. You’re just going to travel around with these cards, right? You’re not going to apply for a job or a security clearance, are you?”

Reklama laughed hoarsely. “I don’t think so.”

Lilla shook her head.

The young man brushed his unruly hair back and gripped it in a ponytail. He waved to them and walked out.

 

[Lilla Syrin]

Lilla sat on the packed-dirt floor and wrapped her arms around herself. Having an identicard would make traveling possible, but it didn’t mean she could travel with impunity. It didn’t mean anything, except that she could risk her neck a dozen other places looking to prove her innocence.

Or she took the fake ID and returned to her former life – on this very planet – and disappeared from the grid and became something of a Jedi recluse. Doing good in her own way and keeping her profile low.

The man that was until recently dressed as a Tusken came back into the room holding a handmade ceramic bowl. Lilla recognised his aura. The food he offered smelled good, and Lilla sat up eagerly. The old man put the bowl in her lap, with no spoon, and she tried to ignore the strange things she found in it. There was a base of some sort of gruel, some vegetables which might’ve been bits of cactus, and some meat and then some sort of black things.

Lilla looked at him, and he smiled encouragingly. “Go ahead. It’s all yours.”

She apparently wasn’t going to get a spoon, so she dipped her fingers into the potpourri and grabbed a glob of it. After her first hesitant taste, the weary fugitive was soon scraping the sides of the bowl with her fingertips.

“I’m glad you like it,” the former Tusekn said, grinning. “You want some, Reklama?”

“No, thanks,” said the grubby criminal, stretching out on the mat. “But I could use a nap.” He put his briefcase under his head as a pillow.

“Make yourselves at home,” he said. “I have some crops to attend to.”

He strode out through the low opening in the adobe hut, leaving her alone with Reklama, who was quickly snoring. Taking a hint, Lilla lay back on the hard-packed earth, thinking she could never get comfortable again on bare dirt.

She was asleep in a matter of seconds.

 

[Lilla Syrin]

Lilla sat up, disoriented, and looked around the humble adobe hut, with the strange machine in one corner and the smells of cooking wafting from the other room. Once again, she thought about how her life had taken on such a surreal quality that her dream seemed normal by comparison. In her dream, she was conversing with tentacled Sith aliens. Awake, she was a fugitive from the law, a rogue Jedi.

Then she was aware someone new was in the hut.

“My name is Lilla,” said the girl, stroking her honey-blond hair.

Lilla almost answered the girl in spoken words, saying she was Lilla, too. But she didn’t have to say it. The girl laughed in a lilting voice.

“Yes, I know, you are.”

The Jedi fought back questions that tried to stampede out of her mouth. She shook her head vehemently, and the young Lilla surprised her by nodding in sympathy.

“I’ll see you later.”

Lilla tried to still her initial impulse to bolt from the pueblo and keep running. Where would she go, she asked herself. It wasn’t panic time yet, Lilla assured herself, although it wouldn’t take much to push her to it.

 

[Lilla Syrin]

'Young Lilla' had been so innocent about knowing her real name, and threatening at the same time. Lilla couldn’t believe they were scheming to do her harm. Would an adolescent be allowed to blurt something like that out, if the tribe was planning to turn her in?

Hey, she reminded herself, these people were breaking serious laws themselves. By running, she had naturally fallen in with people like Reklama and this weird offshoot. These were the people who lived in the cracks in the sidewalk. Like it or not, she was part of their world now.

And if she didn’t clear her name, she would have to live in the cracks forever.

No! she told herself. She wasn’t going to let that happen. Lilla wanted her real life back, and she resolved anew to keep her mouth shut, to keep to herself, and to keep moving.

Lilla glanced at the mat where Reklama had been sleeping and wondered where he was. She wanted to know how soon they would be getting out of the pueblo, and by what method. She might opt to make her own travel arrangements if what Reklama had in mind was too dangerous. Of course, she thought glumly, she didn’t have any credits.

She got to her feet and shuffled out the doorway. Shielding her eyes from the intense sunlight, Lilla peered into the courtyard formed by the crude semicircle of stacked adobes. The courtyard looked brown and dusty, like an old coin, and nobody was visible. Even the livestock were sleeping under lean-tos.

 

[Lilla Syrin]

Lilla went back inside and eventually Reklama returned.

He reached into his pocket and pulled out an identicard. “Here’s yours,” he said. “I want you to know that this card and your transportation cost me a one-carat gem. I don’t know when you’re going to pay me back, but I always remember my debtors. And I charge interest.”

She snatched the card out of his hand but didn’t promise him anything. At least now she knew what he carried in that black briefcase, and why he guarded it so closely.

“You need to know something about these cards. They’re okay to use up to four times, and you’re going to be discovered after that. And we’re supposed to be leaving at midnight.”

“Reklama!” called a frightened voice.

They whirled around to see the young girl. She looked worried, and she pointed to the sky.

“A black ship just flew over,” she said, panting. "Very high up.”

“That’ll spoil everything,” Reklama muttered. “If they find that cargo container out in the desert, we’re pretty much had.”

The ex-Tusken now entered the room. “You need to leave now.”

Lilla agreed with this simple philosophy.

“How?” growled Reklama. “Do you want us to walk?”

“We’ll sell you a speeder,” said the old man. He named his price.

“Whoa!” the gangster wailed. “That’s highway robbery! What the hell do I need a speeder for? Just get me to a town, and I’ll be all right.” He pointed rudely at Lilla. “I don’t care what you do with her.”

The former Tusken stepped forward, the muscles on his chest tight with anger, and he grabbed Reklama by the neck and shook him. “You came down with her, and you have to look after her! Remember, we could take all your credits and show the cops where your body burned up. There would be just enough left to identify.”

When Reklama reached for his blaster, the old chief was quicker and grabbed his wrist.

“Okay, okay,” said the petty crook. “I’ll pay! I want a fast one, and I’m gonna pick it out myself.”

 

[Lilla Syrin]

The suns were brutal, baking the pueblo and the plateau to a dusky brown. But she noticed that theyy had slipped substantially, and she guessed that it was about four in the afternoon. It would be dark in a few hours, and maybe they could elude capture until then. She didn’t want to count on her luck, because she hadn’t had any lately.

Lilla didn’t know whether Reklama had picked the fastest speeder, but he had picked the one with the loudest, brightest paintings on its hood. She guessed there was some logic in that – if they were spotted from above, it would be assumed they weren’t precisely travelling in secret.

As Reklama was already in his seat, she climbed aboard without another word. The tribe was gathering around to see them off, and they were silent and noncommittal.

“They were traveling west,” said the former Tusken, pointing toward the sky. “If you travel northeast, you will find civilisation.”

“Thanks,” muttered Reklama, not sounding like he meant it. Someone handed Lilla a waterskin, and she gripped it for dear life.

Lilla then nodded and gave a smile. Reklama started the engine. The speeder lifted higher a few centimetres and Lilla gripped the roll bars as they rocketed out of the pen and headed for the northeast.

 

[Lilla Syrin]

Lilla peered out the rear of the speeder with Reklama’s beat-up binoculars. She wondered if she could spot the ship before it spotted them. Probably not. Even if they did, that was only half the battle, because then they would still have to hide. They were skirting a ridge that had been formed by an old fault line, but it didn’t really offer any hiding places. They had to face the fact that they were ducks on a platter out here in this desert.

Lilla banged on his shoulder and shouted, “Stop this thing! Park it somewhere!”

Reklama let up gradually on the accelerator, and the speeder came to a stop. He wiped the sand off his face and demanded, “What’s the matter with you?”

Lilla jumped out of the craft and stretched her legs. “Stop and think about it,” she said. “They got us out of the village because they knew, one way or another, somebody was coming after us. Whether they sent for them, or they spotted us, or they intercepted a message, it doesn’t matter. They knew, and somebody’s coming. There’s no way to get across this desert by daylight without being spotted, so let’s try camouflage this thing and wait it out until nightfall.”

Reklama stared at her for a moment, then stared into the unforgiving suns. He grinned foolishly and scratched his stubbly chin. “Maybe we’re doing this all wrong,” he drawled. “Why should we run in a speeder when they have ships? Why should we run at all? Let’s set a trap for them. How many of them can there be?”

“Well,” said Lilla, “Assuming they’re after me, they won’t alert any local authorities. They’d need to capture me without anybody interfering. They probably have one ship, per planet, per tip-off.”

Reklama grabbed the bumper of the speeder and began to rock the vehicle. “Come on! Help me turn this thing over!”

“Why?” asked Lilla, leaning down to grab the bumper.

“To make it looked like it wrecked.”

 

[Lilla Syrin]

Lilla watched a scorpion scuttle across the sand about a metre away from her face. The tan arachnid blended in perfectly with the sand, and she hadn’t noticed it when she picked this place to lie down. Now its deadly tail was curving up and down, and its little pincers were looking for something to pinch. She was in horrendous fear that her nose would look delectable to the scorpion, but she couldn’t possibly move or cry out. She sent out gentle eddies with the Force, suggesting there was plentiful prey a hundred metres or so further away.

Then she saw it. A sleek, small shuttle was about a kilometre away and swooping in for a landing.

Lilla closed her eyes as the shuttle landed and its thrusters blew sand all over her.

She could imagine what the scene looked like from the air: an overturned speeder which had skirted too close to the ridge, and the body of a woman lying a few metres away, broiling in what was left of the late-afternoon suns.

It didn’t look very threatening, she hoped.

Lilla heard the door of the shuttle open, and she heard boots crunching across the sand. She reached out with the Force and sensed two of them.

“Is she alive?” one of them asked.

With her eyes closed, Lilla wasn’t able to see if they had blasters trained on her. But they couldn’t very well lift her, if they didn’t. She heard their footsteps coming very close now, and it was time for her to give the prearranged signal.

She moaned loudly.

That drew their attention, and neither one of them heard Reklama as he rose up, covered with sand, and drilled the nearest Psi Cop in the arm with his blaster. The cop collapsed to his knees in shock, and the other one started to draw his weapon.

“Go ahead.” Reklama grinned. “I promised the lady I wouldn’t kill you, but I’m not great at keeping my promises.”

Lilla scrambled to her feet and grabbed the blaster out of the wounded trooper’s holster. Then she very carefully took the blaster from the other one.

“You won’t get away,” said the second one. “We’ll find you and bring you to justice.”

Lilla said nothing. She was busy gathering up the water bag and Reklama’s briefcase and duffel bag from the fallen speeder. As an afterthought, she left them the water bag.

“Oh, please let me kill them,” begged Reklama. “Who would miss them? Even their mommas probably don’t like them anymore.”

Lilla shot him a glare, and Reklama frowned disgruntledly and began to back toward the shuttle.

“Well,” he said, “We are offering you gentlemen a great deal today - that perfectly good speeder for this beat-up old shuttle of yours. Now you just go northeast, and you’ll get to civilization. I wouldn’t go the other way, because we stole that speeder from some folks, and they might shoot first and ask questions later.”

 

[Lilla Syrin]

Lilla jumped into the shuttle and kept her hand on the button to shut the hatch after Reklama.

“You got my briefcase?” asked the gangster.

“Yes.”

He nodded and jumped aboard. Lilla quickly closed the hatch, and they scrambled into seats in the cockpit.

“Do you know how to fly one of these?” asked Lilla.

Reklama laughed. “You think I never stole a shuttle before? This is a hobby of mine.”

Before she even had a chance to fasten her seat belt, he jammed the thrusters, and the little craft started to buck and shake. It wasn’t a smooth take-off, but they were soon in the air, with the dusty desert fading away beneath them.

Lilla sighed and slumped back in her seat.

“Don’t panic,” said Reklama, “But you, uh, got a scorpion in your hair.”

 

[Lilla Syrin]

They’d been arguing for a solid twenty minutes about their destination.

“Then I guess this is where you and I part company.” To emphasize his determination, Reklama drew his blaster and aimed it at her.

“Then let me off somewhere. A town, I mean.”

“I’d have to let you off on the outskirts. You might have quite a walk.”

Lilla shrugged, too worn out to question whatever fate had in store for her next. “I haven’t got any credits,” she added.

“Damnation,” muttered Reklama, “What do I look like, a credit machine? This whole trip is more costly than I planned.”

“But you got a shuttle out of it, and you wouldn’t have gotten that without me.”

“Yeah,” Reklama conceded, putting his weapon away. “I guess you paid your debt. Hand me my case.”

She handed him his briefcase, and he put the craft on autopilot as he rummaged through it.

“Here’s a one-carat gem,” he said. “That should get you wherever you want to go. You know, you really should’ve let me kill those troopers. As soon as they get to a link, everybody will know you’re here.”

“I know,” said Lilla. She took the gem from him. “Which means they’ll be expecting me to get off the planet as soon as possible.”

“You’re a tough one,” said Reklama admiringly. “If we ever run into each other again – say, at my hanging – will you tell them I’m not totally bad? That I once did a favour for somebody, and let two troopers live.”

Lilla gave him a warm smile. “I will. We have lots of people inside of us. Good, bad, right, wrong, it all gets blurred together. I’ll never forget that you helped me, Reklama.”

He smiled boyishly.