Star Wars - The Last One Standing

by Jude Watson

  Star Wars

  Legacy of the Jedi-Secrets of the Jedi Omnibus

  The Last One Standing

  By Jude Watson

  Sometimes he talked to him in his head. Arguments more furious than the ones they’d had. Talks in which he explained, Master to Padawan, why he’d done what he’d done. Simple words that managed to say everything he’d meant to say, only more clearly than he’d ever been able to say it. In these talks, Anakin listened and understood.

  Of course, he was talking to a ghost. Anakin Skywalker was dead.

  Obi-Wan Kenobi shut the door of his dwelling on Tatooine and drew his cloak up over his nose and mouth to block the blowing sand. He headed off across the empty dunes. The suns were just rising, but the air still held the night chill.

  The galaxy was in the hands of a Sith. The Jedi had been completely destroyed. He would tell himself these things, but there were moments when it all still seemed impossible, even though he’d been in the middle of it. He had seen events firsthand and learned of others as if they were body blows.

  Anakin was still alive in Obi-Wan’s mind. Obi-Wan was engaged with him so intensely that he expected his apprentice to walk over one of those shifting sand dunes and grin at him again. Or scowl. He’d take anything. Any mood, any defiance. Just to see him again.

  Every day and every night he violated every principle the Jedi had taught him about staying in the present moment, about acceptance. Going over every argument, every talk, to find the key that he should have turned in order to unlock the secrets of Anakin’s heart.

  Why had he turned to the dark side? When did it happen? The Anakin he knew and loved couldn’t have done it. Something had twisted in him, and Palpatine had exploited it somehow. Obi-Wan knew it wouldn’t change anything to know, but he couldn’t help going over the same events, again and again. The chances he’d missed, the things he’d seen, the things he hadn’t.

  Obi-Wan reached the top of the dunes and began the hike down to the salt flats. He had grown used to land that constantly shifted under his feet. He had learned how to move forward even while the very ground he walked on fought his progress.

  Anakin had always hated sand. It was one of the many things about his Padawan that Obi-Wan understood better now that Anakin was dead. That was the horror of losing someone: Understanding came too late.

  As a boy, Anakin could walk through a storm of ice pellets so sharp they cut his skin. He could hike kilometer after kilometer in the blaze of three suns. He could plunge into a lake dotted with ice floes… but he would complain bitterly if he got sand in his boots.

  Obi-Wan didn’t like the sand, either, but he was grateful for the absence of color. He didn’t find the planet beautiful, so at least he felt no loss when he traveled across the landscape. Once he had loved the vivid greens of forests, the deep blues of lakes and seas. Now everything blended into everything else, mesa, cliff, hill, road. There was no vegetation to refresh the eye, no sudden explosions of flowers to startle you into a fresh appreciation of living. He didn’t want to appreciate anything. He wanted a place of no color, flat light, dark shadow. It suited him now.

  Every sunrise and every dusk he went to the Lars homestead. They did not see him, or, if they did, they did not acknowledge him. He traveled the perimeter, making sure that all was well.

  He had only one purpose now.

  Luke was a baby in a straw bassinet, who laughed as Beru went about her chores with him strapped to her, nestled in a sling. It was hard to picture that happy baby growing up to be the new hope of the galaxy, but Obi-Wan knew he must trust Yoda.

  He waited for Qui-Gon, Yoda had told him that his former Master had been as powerful, as attuned to the Force, as any they had known. Only more so. Qui-Gon now had the ability to transcend death. He had trained with the ancient Whills, and would train Obi-Wan.

  But Qui-Gon hadn’t spoken to him. There was only the sound of the wind.

  Obi-Wan reached out to the Force to find him, but met only the thin stirring of a barren world. It was strange to live in a galaxy now that had no Jedi in it. He hadn’t realized that he had once felt a humming presence, alive with the Force-ability of his fellow Jedi. It had fed him, and he hadn’t even known it.

  Obi-Wan climbed a cliff overlooking the Lars homestead. He knew the routine of Owen Lars, who would wait for first light to check the vaporators. Owen and Beru — Luke slung securely at her side — went out together, he to check the perimeter, she to gather the mushrooms that clung to the moisture that beaded on their exteriors. There was little fresh food on Tatooine, and mushrooms were highly prized.

  Beru, of course, was perfectly capable of getting the mushrooms on her own, but Obi-Wan knew why Owen insisted on going with her. It had been on an early-morning mushroom hunt that Anakin’s mother, Shmi Skywalker, had been taken by a band of Tusken Raiders. Taken and tortured, for a month. She had died in Anakin’s arms. That was all he knew.

  Obi-Wan lay flat, far enough away that even Owen’s sharp eyes couldn’t pick him out, but close enough that he could reach the family should a raiding party appear. Despite the presence of a blaster rifle on Owen’s shoulder, Obi-Wan took no chances with Tusken Raiders. They were tribes without mercy or scruples, who stole what they needed to survive and took pleasure in their brutality.

  Obi-Wan sensed something was wrong before Owen did. He reached for the electrobinoculars hanging on his utility belt and raised them to his eyes. He scanned the expanse of sand and salt flats. Something was missing…

  The vaporators. The electrobinoculars jerked as Obi-Wan searched, moving from one position to another and seeing only clots of sand and a set of snaking bantha tracks. The Tusken Raiders traveled in single file in order to confuse their trackers.

  Owen and Beru stood, shoulder to shoulder, looking at the places where their vaporators should have been. The devices were what gave them water, enough to run the farm and enough to sell to keep on going. The loss was a huge blow.

  Forsaking his promise not to interfere, Obi-Wan Force-leaped down from the bluff and trudged the last few meters to where Owen and Beru were standing.

  He noted how Beru moved a bit closer to Owen and turned slightly, shielding the baby from Obi-Wan. It wasn’t that she didn’t trust him, exactly. He had delivered Luke to her, placed the baby in her arms. But perhaps the preciousness of that gift made it all the more likely to be taken away, in her mind.

  “They’re back again,” Owen said. “It’s them.”

  He would not speak their name, but Obi-Wan knew he meant the Sand People.

  “How many vaporators did you lose?” Obi-Wan asked. His voice cracked like a dry riverbed. He hadn’t spoken to anyone in months.

  “Maybe twenty,” Owen replied.

  “Oh, Owen,” Beru breathed. “What are we going to do?”

  Owen squinted out into the distance. “Get them back.”

  “No,” Beru said. “We’ll let them go.”

  “We can’t survive the year without them,” Owen said. “Do you want us to starve?”

  “We’ll find a way,” Beru said. “How can you think of going after Sand People, after what they did to your stepmother and your father? I can’t lose you, too!”

  Cliegg Lars had lost a leg in the attack meant to rescue Shmi. Obi-Wan knew that he had eventually died of his injuries, later, during the Clone Wars.

  “What would you have me do, then?” Owen burst out. His frustration and anger rang in his voice, and Obi-Wan could hear the undertone of panic.

  Beru hung on to his arm. “Just let it go,” she pleaded. “They’ve probably already broken them down and sold the parts for scrap to the Jawas.”

  “And now I’m to buy back m
y own vaporators?” Owen’s mouth was a thin line of determination. “I’ll talk to the other farmers. They know that if one of us is hit, we are all in danger. I’ll visit every farm today. We’ll be off by first light tomorrow.”

  “You’ll start a war.”

  “A war they began.”

  Obi-Wan saw the anguish on Beru’s face. Despite his courage and resourcefulness, Owen was no match for the Raiders, and she knew it. The lessons Obi-Wan had learned from Qui-Gon flooded into him: how to connect to the Living Force, how to read what someone is feeling.

  Look at their eyes, their hands, the way they stand. Listen to what they will not say. Feel the vibration in the Force and read it.

  They were desperate and afraid. Young and untried. Cliegg was dead, and he had been the bulwark between them and the harshness of this life. They had not yet found their rhythm here without him. Beru came from three generations of moisture farmers. She knew this life and loved it. Owen had to be strong for her. He could not risk losing the farm. In his fury and resolve he would go too far.

  “I can help you,” Obi-Wan said.

  “Meaning no disrespect, Ben,” Owen said, “but I can take care of my own.”

  Beru slipped her hand into Owen’s, and they walked off back toward the homestead.

  And if Owen lost his life, Obi-Wan wondered, what would happen to the baby?

  Yoda had given him no parameters. Just to protect the child. Make sure he grew to adulthood.

  The Tusken Raiders couldn’t have gone far. He had a day to act.

  He would retrieve the vaporators himself.

  Sand People were not easy to track. They moved in single file and used switchbacks, false turns, and seeming dead-ends to confuse any trackers. Even though he knew their tricks, Obi-Wan still had trouble following the trail. He kept losing it and having to double back.

  It is not the Tusken Raiders that are preventing you. It is your own concentration.

  That was what Qui-Gon would tell him, and he would be right.

  Obi-Wan came to a canyon that was scored with a series of twisting dry riverbeds. While his eyes searched the ground for every sign of disturbed pebble or partially obliterated bantha hoof-print, part of his mind drifted to the past.

  Anakin had done exactly this. He had successfully tracked the band of Raiders who had kidnapped his mother, even though Shmi had been held for so long. He had found her, but too late. He had brought her dead body back to the Lars homestead.

  What else had he done there? Obi-Wan didn’t know. He knew only from that day on, a shadow began to engulf Anakin, something Obi-Wan couldn’t penetrate. He had tried to talk to Anakin about it, but his Padawan had brushed off his questions. He realized now that Anakin had begun to confide in Padmé instead. They had married in secret, and the marriage had been part of the reason Obi-Wan had felt a divide between him and his Padawan. If Anakin had told him of the marriage, he would have understood. Not approved, but understood.

  He had been tempted once, too. He had loved, too. If only Anakin had confided in him.

  If only…

  And why hadn’t he? Because Obi-Wan had failed him. If he’d been a better Master, if he’d had more of Qui-Gon’s kindness and wisdom… Anakin might have approached him, have felt free to say whatever he was thinking or feeling…

  If…

  They had flown together, wingtip to wingtip. They had relied on each other. He was more daring when Anakin was with him. Anakin had taught him how to take risks.

  But in the end he had lost everything.

  I hate you! Anakin had screamed at him on the volcanic slope. Writhing in pain on the black sand while the lava river burned behind them.

  That was where Obi-Wan kept returning. That vision of hatred. Because no matter how Palpatine had corrupted Anakin, no matter how the dark side had taken him over, no matter what decisions he’d made in his heat and his fury, he was Obi-Wan’s apprentice and he ended by hating his Master. And that was a Master’s failing.

  The landscape faded and Obi-Wan saw the black ash of Mustafar. He tasted ash in his mouth and fire in his lungs.

  He had never expected, in all his missions, in all his wanderings, to taste the depth of this kind of failure, the agony of this grief.

  He could see the moons rising. He knew he was close, but now it would be too dark to track. Obi-Wan stopped and looked up in frustration at the first star overhead. It was then that he heard it… a soft sound, a high sound… children calling.

  He dropped to his knees and took shelter behind a rock. He could hear the children of the Sand People, called Uli-ah, running, sticks in their hands. They pretended the sticks were gaderffi, the poles the Tuskens used as weapons. One end a deadly spike dipped in venom, the other a spiked club. With guttural cries, the children used the rock he crouched behind as target practice. He could feel the shudder of the blows through the solid rock. He understood why the Sand People were such fierce fighters. They trained, from the time they could walk, how to kill.

  Obi-Wan followed the Uli-ah at a distance and, after scrambling over a dune, he saw the camp. The urtya tents, made of animal skins and sticks, formed a circle. Off to one side, banthas were tethered to poles fashioned of scrap metal.

  The Raiders were noted for their skills as sentries. They knew when someone was approaching their camp. No one knew whether it was their sense of smell, or their sight, or an ability to divine changes in the air currents, or some extrasensory ability. But a Jedi knew how to walk the world lightly, to move through air and on ground without leaving a trace. Obi-Wan was just another shadow in the dusk.

  The smells and sounds of the preparation of the evening meal came to him. Good. They would be distracted. The Sand People weren’t sociable, even amongst themselves. Each family retreated to their own tent. There they ate their meal and then retired.

  He had learned about the Sand People shortly after he’d arrived. The men fought. The women kept the camp. They did not invite each other into family tents. Their need for concealment was close to a mania. If skin were exposed on a Tusken Raider, he would be banished or killed. So at this time they wouldn’t be wandering. Families would be secluded.

  Obi-Wan moved from shelter to shelter, treading lightly. If the vaporators were still intact, he hoped he would be lucky and they would be out in the open and unguarded.

  But he was not lucky. He spied a sentry in front of one of the tents.

  He pressed himself against the skin of the tent and activated his lightsaber. He felt the hum in his hand, the familiar heft. He sliced through the back and stepped through.

  Spoils from raids littered the tent, bundles of cloth, metal, a droid half-dismantled for parts. The vaporators were stacked in the middle of the tent. Obi-Wan let out a slow breath. They hadn’t been dismantled. He was in luck.

  He didn’t want to fight a battle. He wanted only to get the vaporators out of here. But he needed a bantha to carry them. The thing about banthas was, you couldn’t count on them to keep their mouths shut.

  He’d have to take the chance.

  The banthas were tethered twenty meters away. Slipping through the shadows, he approached them. He watched them for a moment, letting the Force work. He picked out a bantha and put a hand on its flank. He felt it shudder, then relax. He dipped into his pocket for the lichen he had picked on the way and fed the beast.

  Then he led it back, closer to the tent. He should be able to load all the vaporators on one beast. Luckily banthas were capable of carrying heavy burdens.

  Boldness. That’s what Anakin would encourage.

  Moving swiftly, Obi-Wan transported the vaporators, four at a time, into the satchels that were slung over the bantha’s back. He did not make a sound. The bantha stayed quiet as he fed him more bits of lichen from his pocket.

  He was almost done when the Force warned him, surging an alarm. Behind him the gaderffi moved, the spiked club end headed for his skull. Obi-Wan leaped to one side, his lightsaber activated and in his hand. He
struck the gaffi stick and turned it into splinters of smoking horn and metal. The Tusken Raider let out a howl of fury and challenge.

  The cry was picked up by others.

  The men ran out of their tents. Obi-Wan spun in a slow circle. They raised their gaderffi above their heads, crying the terrible howl that could freeze the blood in anyone unlucky enough to be within its hearing.

  He could read their confidence in their identical stances. They didn’t need to hurry. It was one lone figure against many. They had him. They would enjoy this.

  Then with astonishing speed, they came at him. The gaffi sticks whirled. He jumped and twisted, his lightsaber coming down again and again, whirling in an arc of light. He flipped, his boots connecting with a Raider, who went over with a strangled cry of rage. As he went down, Obi-Wan grabbed the gaffi stick.

  He was more than they had bargained for, but they weren’t daunted. He could smell their bloodlust. He was only enraging them.

  Obi-Wan’s fighting style had always been about evasion and disguise. His most successful battles were based on his ability to deflect attack and surprise his opponent. He rarely depended on brute strength to achieve victory.

  Anakin had taught him about aggression.

  He knew this was what the Tusken Raiders would understand. They understood necessity; they lived by it. They did not farm or make things or buy things. They attacked and they stole, and they survived.

  Time slowed down. He looked into their faces, obscured by their intentionally terrifying headgear. Round dark holes for eyes, mouths composed of metal shards around a gaping gash. Not a speck of skin or flesh to be seen. That would soften them too much, make them look like living beings, connect them, somehow, to the life-forms around them. They wanted to be distinct. They wanted to look like walking death.

  Loathing choked him. The Sand People made nothing and gave back nothing. They merely preyed on the weak. The moisture farmers, who worked backbreaking days, were attacked on raids that often resulted in death and complete destruction. Stealing the vaporators from Owen and Beru’s farm would bring on terrible hardship.