“You sure?” I shouted back.
“Probably!”
Well, that was a better idea than nothing. So I sped ahead of the caravan. About two hundred meters away, I parked horizontal in the road and waited.
The vehicle had kicked a dirt cloud high into the afternoon sky. The sandcrawlers chugged along quickly. There were three of them in a V formation, and as they came up to me and the speeder horizontal in the road, their flotilla slowed to a stop. The dust cloud drifted past us, and as it dissipated into the sky, Sian snuck away from the speeder. We had cobbled together some semblance of a plan while waiting for the caravan to catch up, though I was only half sure it would work. It’d worked inUnder the Tan-Tan Sun, but asteroids never struck the same planet twice.
From an open hatch of the closest sandcrawler, a Jawa shouted something. I squinted, wishing I had a translator, but my only translator was currently being held captive by the same Jawas I was trying to reason with. I knew enough Trade Talk to get the gist of what they’d said, though: “Get out of the way or we’ll run you over.”
“I just want to talk!” I shouted back. “I think you’ve got something of mine!”
The Jawa chattered, and I picked out enough words to roughly translate it to, “We don’t have anything of yours!”
“Two droids! I don’t remember selling them to you!”
The Jawa in question slammed the hatch shut, and through the metal hull of the sandcrawler I heard them shouting back and forth to each other. Bickering, much like a disgruntled family. I steeled myself, hoping I wasn’t about to find myself in the middle of a firefight—or worse,bartering.
Then the sandcrawler gave an exhausted sigh, the loading ramp fell to the ground with a clang, and three Jawas shuffled out. They came up to my elbows at best and were dressed in dark brown robes with munition strapped to their chests, yellow eyes glowing brightly like twin moons under their dark hoods.
I met them, twisting my fingers. Why did Sian get the easy job? “I’d like my droids back,” I repeated. “Please.”
The first Jawa folded their arms across their chest and chattered. I made that out to be something like, “What’ll you give us?”
Oh, no. Bartering it was.
“I won’t give you anything,” I argued, crossing my arms over my chest to mirror their stance. This one was clearly the leader. “They’remydroids. You stole them.”
The second one said in a high voice, “Wetradedfor them.”
“Traded?I didn’t trade anything,” I challenged, and the three Jawas exchanged confused chatter. Apparently, they didn’t carewhohad traded the droids. I sighed and said, “Fine, let’s trade for them.Again.”
The third Jawa muttered something to the first two, but I couldn’t make it out. It didn’t matter. I just had to keep them talking until Sian scaled the side of the closest sandcrawler and got the droids. Entoo’s signal was coming from the first one, so I knew at least the astromech was there. Veebee was probably with them.
At least, that was my hope.
The three Jawas discussed among themselves quietly before one signaled to the other two. With a loud sigh of exhaust, the other two crawlers in the caravan started moving again, giving us a wide berth, and left for the canyon in the distance. I hoped that meant the Jawas were willing to hear me out or, better yet, just give me my friends back.
Finally, the first Jawa asked, “What’ll you give us? Something good.”
“Something better,” the second one corrected.
My communicator crackled as Sian radioed in, quiet enough so only I heard.“Found them. Erm, parts of them.”
I curled my hands into fists. These guys really did work fast, didn’t they? They had a reputation for a reason. I just had to stall them long enough for Sian to getmy droids out of there. Neither of us had weapons, and I had a feeling the munition on the Jawas’ chests wasn’t just for decoration. Sweat prickled on the back of my neck.
“Well?” the third Jawa asked. “What to trade?”
From my communicator, Sian said,“Keep them talking. I can’t seem to find the astromech’s head—chuba.”
Chuba?What didchubamean?
There was a thunk from inside the sandcrawler and then a flash of electricity. Sian flew backward out of the transport and landed hard on the ramp. He rolled over himself and stopped, blessedly face up. “Ow,” he croaked.
A fourth Jawa marched onto the ramp, shaking an electrified baton, their voice loud and accusing.
I winced. I didn’t need to understand the words to get the gist this time.
Things were about to go very, very badly.
