Star Wars - Tales From The Mos Eisley Cantina

by Kevin J. Anderson

  bright, but he's armed.

  I'm watching him.

  A Hunter's Fate Greedo's Tale

  By Tom Veitch and Martha Veitch

  1. The Refuge

  "Oona goota, Greedo?"

  The question, spoken fearfully, was answered by the mocking

  cries of luminous bo-toads hidden in the mountain cave in the

  dripping green jungle. Pqweeduk scratched the insect bite on his

  tapirlike snout and made a brave hooting noise. He listened as the

  sound echoed with the wind in the dark hole that had swallowed his

  older brother.

  Pqweeduk's spiny back shivered. He flicked on his hand-torch

  and the suckers of his right hand fastened tightly to the shiny

  hunting knife Uncle Nok had given him for his twelfth birthday.

  Pqweeduk stepped into the yawning cave.

  But the cave in the jungle was not a cave, and a few meters in,

  the rocks and packed earth ended at an open steel door!

  Pqweeduk leaned through the rectangular opening and flashed his

  torch upward. He was in a dome that filled the inside of the

  mountain. The young Rodian saw three great silvery ships squatting

  silently in the vastness.

  "Greedo?"

  "Nthan kwe kutha, Pqweeduk!" That was his brother's voice.

  Pqweeduk saw Greedo's hand-torch signaling and he walked toward

  it. His bare feet felt a smooth cold floor.

  Greedo stood in the open hatch of one of the big ships. "Come

  on, Pqweeduk! There's nothing to be afraid of! Come on inside and

  check it out!"

  Their bulbous multifaceted eyes, already large, grew even

  larger as the two green youths explored the interior of the silver

  vessel. Everywhere were strange and unfamiliar metallic shapes

  that glittered and flashed in torchlight or presented dark angular

  silhouettes full of hidden purpose. But there were also places to

  sit, and beds to lie on, and dishes to eat from.

  Greedo had a funny feeling he'd been here before. But it was

  only a feeling, without any memories attached.

  Indeed, the only memories he possessed were of life in the

  green jungle where his mother harvested Tendril nuts and his

  uncles herded the arboreal Tree-Botts for milk and meat. About two

  hundred Rodians lived together under the grand Tendril trees. They

  had always lived here, this was the only life he knew, and all his

  fifteen years Greedo and his younger brother had run wild in the

  forest.

  The Rodians had no enemies in this place, except for the

  occasional Manka cat, wandering through on its way to the distant

  white mountains during Manka mating season.

  The younger Rodians stayed close to home during that part of

  the year. The Mankas' savage roaring warned everyone of their

  coming, and the Rodian men would take weapons out of secret

  keeping places, and stand guard at the edge of the village,

  waiting for the Mankas to pass in the night.

  During Manka season, Greedo would hear the guns scream, as he

  lay in bed, unable to sleep. The next morning the carcass of a big

  Manka would be hanging for all to see, from cross-trees in the

  village center.

  Except for the Manka-killing, the Rodians led a quiet self-

  contained existence. The olders never spoke of any other life-at

  least not in front of the children. But Greedo overheard them,

  when they thought he was asleep, talk of things happening out

  among the stars.

  He heard the olders use words like "Empire," "the clan wars,"

  "bounty hunters," "starships," "Jedi Knights," "hyperspace." These

  words made strange images in his mind-he couldn't make sense of

  them at all, because the only life he knew was the jungle, the

  trees, the water, and endless days of play.

  But the olders' secret talk filled him with feelings of

  unexplainable longing. Somehow he knew that he didn't belong to

  this green world. He belonged somewhere else, out among the stars.

  The silver ships were the proof. He knew with uncanny certainty

  that these were the "starships" he had heard his mother and uncles

  speak about. Surely his mother would tell him why the ships were

  hidden under the mountain.

  Pqweeduk isn 't old enough to know . . . but I am.

  Greedo's mother, Neela, was sitting on the ground in front of

  their hut, by firelight, peeling Tendril nuts. Her hands moved

  rapidly, slitting the thick husks with a bone knife and peeling

  them back. She hooted quietly to herself as she worked.

  Greedo crouched nearby, carving a piece of white Tendril wood

  into the shape of a silver starship. When the ship was finished he

  held it up and admired it, making sure his mother could see it.

  "Mother," he asked abruptly, "when are you going to teach me about

  the silver ships in the mountain?"

  The rapid movement of his mother's hands stopped. Without

  looking at her son, she spoke, in a voice that betrayed emotion.

  "You found the ships," she said.

  "Yes, Mother. Pqweeduk and me - "

  "I told Nok to fill in the opening in the mountain. But Nok

  loves the past too much. He's always sneaking up there to look at

  the ships." She sighed and resumed peeling the leathery skins off

  the big nuts.

  Greedo moved closer to her. He sensed that she was ready to

  tell him things he wanted to know . . . things he needed to know.

  "Mother, please tell me about the ships."

  Her moist faceted eyes met his. "The ships . . . brought us to

  this place . . . this world . . . two years after you were born,

  Greedo."

  "Wasn't 1 born here ... in the jungle?"

  "You were born out there" - she pointed at the evening sky,

  visible through the tall Tendril trees, where the first stars were

  appearing - "on the world of our people, the planet Rodia. There

  was much killing then. Your father was killed, while I was

  carrying your brother. We had to leave ... or die."

  "I don't understand."

  She sighed. She saw she would have to tell him everything. Or

  almost everything. He was old enough now to know the facts.

  "Our people, the Rodians, were always hunters and fighters. The

  love of death was strong in us. Many years ago, when the meat-game

  was gone, we learned to raise all our food. But our people began

  to hunt each other, for sport."

  "They . . . killed each other?"

  "Yes, for sport. For deadly sport. Some Rodians thought it was

  foolishness, and refused to participate. Your father was one of

  those. A great bounty hunter was he ... but he refused to join the

  foolish gladiator hunts."

  "What is a bounty hunter, Mother?" Greedo felt a chill in his

  spine, waiting for the answer.

  "Your father hunted criminals and oudaws ... or people with a

  price on their heads. He was highly honored for his skills. He

  made us very wealthy."

  "Is that why he died?"

  "No. An evil clan leader, Navik the Red, named for the red

  birthmark that covers his face, used the gladiator games as an

  excuse to make war on the other clan leaders. Your father was

  murdered. Our wealth was taken, and our cl
an, the Tetsus, were

  nearly wiped out.

  "Fortunately, some of us were able to escape the killing, in

  the three silver ships you've found."

  "Why did you never tell Pqweeduk and me about the ships . . .

  and about our people?"

  "We have changed. There was no need to dredge up the dark past.

  We have become peaceful here. The guns are only brought out when

  the Manka cats are prowling. We made a vow, in our council, that

  the children should not know of the terrible past, until they were

  full grown. I am breaking that vow now, in telling you these

  things. But you are . . . almost as tall as your father now."

  His mother's eyes seemed to envelop Greedo. He loved the way

  she looked at him. Her skin exuded a pleasing perfume, a strong

  Rodian scent. He gazed at her wonderingly. Suddenly there was so

  much more to know. He wanted desperately to learn . . . every

  thing.

  "What is the Empire, Mother?"

  She frowned and wrinkled her long flexible snout. "I've told

  you enough, Greedo. On another day perhaps I will answer all your

  questions. Go to bed now, my son."

  "Yes, Mother." Greedo touched his hand suckers to his mother's

  in the traditional all-purpose greeting and good night. He went to

  his straw-filled bed in their little hut, where his brother was

  already asleep.

  Greedo lay for hours, thinking of silver ships, of his father

  the bounty hunter . . . and the greatness of life among the stars.

  2. Red Navik

  A month and a day after Greedo and Pqweeduk found the silver

  sky ships, Navik the Red, leader of the powerful Chattza clan,

  found the Tetsus.

  Greedo and his brother were climbing high in the Tendril trees

  when they saw a bright flash in the sky. They watched with quiet

  curiosity as the flash flowered and became a glittering red shape

  that grew larger and larger, until they could see it was a sky

  ship, twenty times larger than the small silver ships in the cave.

  Anxious voices called from below. Greedo hooted with excitement

  and began to slide rapidly down the smooth tree, using his suckers

  to skillfully brake his descent. His brother was right behind him.

  Below they could see the people coming out of their huts and

  pointing at the big sky ship. Uncle Nok and Uncle Teeko and others

  were running to get the weapons. Greedo sensed their fear.

  "C'mon, Pqweeduk!" Greedo shouted, as his feet hit the ground.

  "We have to save Mother! We can't let them kill her!"

  "What are you talking about, Greedo? Nobody's killing anybody!"

  Pqweeduk dropped to the ground and obediently followed his older

  brother.

  As they ran through the trees, the red ship swooped lower,

  uncoiled its landing gear, and settled in a cloud of fiery smoke

  at the edge of the village.

  Twin hatches hissed open. Greedo stopped and turned and gaped

  in awe as armored Rodian warriors poured out of the giant

  ship-hundreds of them, each wearing bright segmented armor and

  each carrying a vicious-looking blaster rifle.

  The sight of these killers transfixed the young Rodian. It was

  a full minute before he felt his brother tugging fearfully at his

  sleeve. And then he heard his mother's voice, urging him to run.

  The last thing Greedo saw, before he turned his face to the

  forest, was the figure of a tall, imposing Rodian with a bloodred

  mark that stained most of his face. The marked warrior shouted an

  order, and the others raised their weapons.

  The scream of laser fire mixed with the dying shrieks of the

  people, as Greedo and his brother and mother fled into the jungle.

  Uncle Nok and Uncle Teeku and twenty others made it to the cave

  ahead of them. There was a great grinding noise and the roar of a

  landslide, as the top of the mountain opened, throwing off its

  burden of earth and stones.

  Greedo caught his breath as the three silver ships gleamed in

  the light of the midday sun. Powerful engines already whined

  awake.

  Uncle Nok greeted Greedo's mother as he urged everyone to get

  aboard as fast as possible. "Neela-now you know why I was always

  visiting the ships! I was keeping them in repair for this very

  day!"

  Greedo's mother hugged her brother Nok and thanked him. Then

  they all rushed aboard, followed by a stream of refugees coming

  out of the forest.

  Two of the silver ships lifted easily on columns of repulsor

  energy, their fission-thrust engines whining up so high that the

  sound vanished beyond the range of Greedo's hearing. The third

  ship was waiting for the last stragglers . . . the last survivors

  of the massacre.

  A portly Manka hunter named Skee charged out of the forest,

  screaming that everyone behind him was dead-"Leave! Take the ships

  away, while you still have a chance!"

  The third ship never got its hatch closed. A single bolt of ion

  energy fused its stabilizers into a molten mass, and a split

  second later a powerful laser blast blew the power core.

  As the first two ships shot skyward, a bright sphere of fusion

  fire blasted back the jungle, mocking the midday sun. The third

  ship was no more.

  Greedo never heard the explosion. He was in the cockpit of The

  Radian, gawking at the starlines, as Uncle Nok's silver ship

  vaulted into the unknown.

  3. Nar Shaddaa

  Planning for this emergency, Nok had programmed the Rodian

  ships to jump to a heavily trafficked region of the galaxy, where

  the survivors of his little tribe could lose themselves among the

  myriad alien races engaged in interstellar commerce.

  So it was they came to Nar Shaddaa, a spaceport moon orbiting

  Nal Hutta, one of the principal worlds inhabited by the wormlike

  Hutts.

  There was a continual buzz of space traffic between Nar Shaddaa

  and the far-flung systems of the galaxy mighty transgalactic

  transports and bulk cargo vessels, the garish yachts and caravels

  of the Hutt ganglords, the battle-scarred corsairs of the

  mercenaries and bounty hunters, the pirate brigantines, and even

  the occasional commercial passenger liner, packet starjam-mer, or

  massive migration arks. And, of course, the ever-present star

  cruisers and sleek patrol vessels of the Imperial Navy.

  The surface of Nar Shaddaa was an interlocking grid of miles-

  high cities and docking stations, built up over thousands of

  years. Level upon level of freight depots and warehouse and repair

  facilities were linked by gaudy old thoroughfares that spanned the

  globe, bridging canyons that reached from the upper strata,

  swarming with life, to the glowing depths where several forms of

  subspecies thrived on the refuse that fell continuously from the

  towering heights.

  Greedo and his brother and mother and all the pilgrims on those

  two silver ships came to Nar Shaddaa, merging with the life of the

  great spaceport moon, finding a home in the huge sector controlled

  by Corellian smugglers.

  The Corellians kept things reasonably under
control in their

  part of the moon. Gambling was an important source of income for

  them. All races were invited to wander the brightly lit avenues

  and gawk and eat and drink and throw away money in the sabacc

  joints. A gun duel or a bounty killing now and then was to be

  expected, and petty thievery was largely overlooked. But there was

  an unwritten law in the Corellian Sector, enforced by Port

  Control If you want to make big trouble, do it somewhere else.

  The Rodian refugees merged with the denizens of the dingy

  warehouse districts on Level 88. Over the next months they found

  work as freight handlers and house servants, and went about their

  lives.

  Nok ordered everyone to stay away from the public levels, the

  thoroughfares, and the casinos, on the chance they'd be recognized

  by a Chattza hunter. Nok assured them their stay on Nar Shaddaa

  was a temporary one, until he could locate another jungle world

  where they could dwell in peace.

  For the adult Rodians it was not a happy time-they deeply

  missed the lush green world they had left behind. But for Greedo

  and Pqweeduk, a whole universe of excitement began to reveal

  itself.

  Four years later Greedo's people were still on Nar Shaddaa,

  working and surviving. Greedo was nineteen, his brother was

  sixteen. The green youths had merged with the boundless spectacle

  of the Galaxy.

  4. Bounty Hunters

  "Jacta nin chee yja, Greedo!" Greedo leaped back as three

  repulsor bikes whipped past, jumped a broken retaining wall, and

  disappeared into one of the crowded concourses that had been de

  clared off-limits by Uncle Nok.

  He watched his brother and friends swerve their bikes among the

  landspeeders, antique wheeled cabs, Hutt floaters, skillfully

  dodging the strolling gamblers, alien pirates, spice traders,

  street hawkers, ragtag homeless . . . and bounty hunters.

  "Grow up, Pqweeduk!" Greedo slouched against a wall, waiting

  for his friend Anky Fremp, a Siona Skup biomorph who had taught

  him the secrets of the street.

  Greedo, on the edge of adulthood, had left the games of

  childhood behind. He'd traded his repulsor bike for a fine pair of

  boots. He had stolen a precious rancor-skin jacket. He had learned

  how to strip therm pumps and shield regulators off Hutt floaters