“Oh. You’re right,” he said. He looked back over at D’an, who was signing the contract. I groaned.
“Well,” Tech said. “At least he’s not selling us into slavery again.”
D’an came over all smiles. “We start in an hour. Get the rest of the band over here.”
“You do know that Greedo is a regular customer here? And he’s not going to be thrilled about you giving him up to Jabba,” I said.
“We have a Wookiee on our side! What can go wrong?”
—
Chalmun’s Cantina was better than Jabba’s. That’s what we could say about it.
When things go wrong, you can try to see how your situation challenges you. We have played in awards ceremonies against the wind, in the middle of a rainstorm, and for lords and ladies whose idea of fun would be to whip prisoners and feed them to rancors. (That last one was Jabba. Did you guess?)
At the cantina, we were shoved onto a small dais on the corner, having to get cozy with one another while we played D’an’s furious tunes. The stage was tight and the customers were unenthusiastic, but these kinds of challenges are what I live for. However, I didn’t realize what else would happen that afternoon.
First, Chalmun—the super-safe Wookiee that would save us from Greedo—went home. He said he wasn’t at the cantina all day and night and he needed a break. He promised Wuher would protect us, but with the sidelong look the bartender shot us, I thought that was unlikely. So I kept my eyes on the door while we played.
As the day went on, the cantina filled up with various unsavory characters. I had to hand it to Wuher, though. When people got pushy or something, he put a stop to it. A bar fight started near us, one patron throwing another one straight at the stage. As there was no free room on stage, we faltered on a song as we scrambled to get out of his way. D’an was furious and stopped the song while he called for Wuher to help out. The bartender threw both brawlers out, but then fixed us with a grungy eye.
“You don’t stop playing. Not for nothing. Got it?”
D’an nodded. We got it. We answered by starting the song again at the beat D’an led with.
People at these kinds of places tended to look alike, all of them dirty and shady, with something to hide. Outsiders stood out like—well, like a Bith on Tatooine. So when two humans entered the bar who stood out more than we did, they caught my eye. Wuher grunted at them to keep their droids outside—their gold protocol droid and their blue astromech. I looked from them to D’an and then remembered the rule. Keep playing.
I knew I should tell the Imperials about the droids during our break. There might be a reward that could get us off this hell planet. I begged D’an with my eyes to get us a break, but he ignored me.
These droids were clearly sought after, but why didn’t the stormtroopers outside find them? I was curious, but the two men were clearly up to something, as carefully innocent as they acted. It was their innocence that made them stand out, honestly.
Ironically, they blended right in once they were challenged by a huge brute, and the hairier of the men brought out a laser sword and cut the arm off their attacker.
The arm smoked slightly on the floor, and its former owner shrieked. We stopped playing, of course. But then Wuher glared at us and we hastily started up again. So we were supposed to just keep on with the music while people were losing limbs? And here I’d thought this place was better than Jabba’s. (Say what you will about the slug, he didn’t mind if we were startled out of tune when he murdered someone.)
A large Ithorian left his seat and headed for the bar, and I nearly swallowed my jocimer reed when I spotted Greedo. I don’t know how long the slimy little guy had been lurking behind him. Greedo looked right at us, and I faltered for a note or two, but we didn’t stop. Not for nothing, Wuher had said. Not for a severed limb, and definitely not for a bounty hunter with a grudge. Greedo went to the bar and ordered a drink, then watched us, unblinking.
D’an instructed us to start a new song, fast and catchy, and we played it, defiantly ignoring Greedo. He watched, impassively, fingering the blaster at his hip.
We were allowed to quit if our lives were in danger, right? Or did that fall under the not for nothing rule? I didn’t know. But I was getting into the music when Tech poked me in the back. Greedo had started to move. He was stepping around the bar (I wondered wildly whether someone had cleaned up the arm or if he was going to trip. He didn’t.) and heading our way. I tried to get D’an’s attention, but he was too into the beat.
In the middle of the song, I felt my double jocimer begin to slip apart at the joints. D’an hadn’t given me any chance to properly clean it, and I’d done a messy job oiling it to make up for the ever-present sand. Now I was in trouble.
Everyone has their own version of the next part, and most of them have to do with “look how clumsy Ickabel was!” but here is what really happened: Everything you’ve heard, I did on purpose. I gave my jocimer a quick turn with both hands, opposite directions, and it fell apart. The valves and tubes went flying, and the circular joints that made up the body and all of the vibrating reeds fell and rolled toward Greedo, who had picked up speed. He stepped on an oily joint and went flying backward.
D’an scowled and pointed at the mess while still playing. Don’t stop not for nothing, right. I hopped off the stage and got on the floor to grab the discarded pieces of my instrument. Greedo was still down, rubbing his head, and I kept an eye on his blaster. I scurried to the other side of the dais to put my abused instrument together.
The other patrons were giving Greedo a good ribbing, and he finally got up, bright green with anger. He glared at me, and then looked past me. His face changed, slackened, and then he smiled, if you can say his kind can smile. He turned and left us without a backward glance. What had delighted him so?
I saw he was heading toward another white human male who was with a Wookiee conversing with Wuher. Someone he wanted more than us; that must be someone with either a big bounty or with whom Greedo had a bigger grudge. I got back on the dais and started playing an even faster song, one of D’an’s favorites. Everyone looked exasperated but gratified that Greedo had been distracted.
They still don’t believe I did it on purpose.
I started thinking again about those droids and whether they could get us a good payout. D’an wouldn’t give the band a break while the bounty hunter was around, so I wouldn’t be able to tell the troopers outside until Greedo was gone.
The human male and Wookiee were speaking with the other two humans, the ones with the droids. Everyone left the table but the human that had caught Greedo’s interest. Greedo slipped over and, just as the human stood up, cornered him with a blaster. Greedo calmly encouraged him to sit back down.
The tempo changed and I had to focus on D’an for a moment, and then light flared and Greedo slumped down on the table in front of the human. I don’t see a lot of humans, but I thought their facial expressions were more expressive than this man showed. The patrons around them looked over in alarm, and Wuher looked ready to shoot the human himself, but the man tossed him some credits and sauntered out.
Although we wanted to cheer, we kept playing. We didn’t stop, not for nothing. We had been saved. Jabba had let us go. Greedo was done for. Our tip jar was filling up, and things might be looking up for the first time in a very long time.
As we played another one of D’an’s newest songs (captivity had been strangely inspirational to him, I have to admit), I thought about those droids and the stormtroopers that searched for them. I thought about a possible reward. And then I decided that if that human could do us a favor without us knowing him at all, we could do those other humans a favor and not report them. We were safe now, and could keep playing.
Which is really all we ever wanted to do. Play, and don’t stop. Not for nothing.
As if the day wasn’t bad enough, the gods-blamed droid detector wasn’t working right again. Because who just walked in, but a couple of gods-blamed droid
s. One was a rickety old protocol droid, tarnished and sand-scoured. The other a blue-topped astromech. Both probably came offa some Jawa sandcrawler—each probably half a circuit shy of a proper droid. A coupla junk-bots that’ll just wreck the place, like droids do. They got no hearts. They got no soul. And now they were here in his cantina.
It was bad news in an already crummy day. Like a hawked-up globba spit on top of a poodoo sundae.
Wuher, bartender at the Mos Eisley cantina, started his day the same way as he always did: up before the two suns, weary from a night of ragged dream-worn sleep, breakfasting on salted zucca and pulverized gravel-maggots before stomping upstairs to the cantina. He turned on all the lights. Warmed up the machines. Already the first bad news hit him: They were running low on damn near everything that would calm tempers on this hot, dead world. No gar-slurry, no fistula juice, none of that hooch that the Gamorreans cook up. Wuher pulled out the telescoping arm from underneath the bar top, popping the latches and unfolding his datapad screen with a rackety-clack. Of course, that wasn’t working either—he had to blow sand-scree off it, then whack it a few times, and all that got him was a glitching screen full of fat, corrupted pixels. That meant he couldn’t pull up the delivery schedule.
He was pretty sure that his guy, a spacer named Bims Torka, was supposed to deliver a shipment of stuff yesterday. Maybe even the day before. Torka was supposed to bring him the standard stuff, plus maybe a case of Knockback Nectar from Jakku, which was about as nasty a brew as you could get—bubbly, high-octane booster fuel, basically. Got people too messed up. Wuher knew that this thing he did, this thing behind the bar, it wasn’t art. Any lunk-brained sand-eater could do it. But to do it right, you had to know some things, and one of the things you knew was that you didn’t want your drinkers too drunk, too fast. That happened, and they were out. Stopped buying and starting fighting. Or worse, started puking.
Still, they wanted the stuff, so he charged a premium.
But now he didn’t have it. Didn’t have any of it. What he had was the dregs. Which they’d buy, but they wouldn’t like it. And that meant he’d have to hear them complain, and the last thing he wanted was to hear them complain. What was he, their nursemaid? Soothing the poor little babies?
Animals. Whining, mewling animals.
It was what it was, so he hit the button to open the locks and roll up the gates. That didn’t work, either, so he took a pivot wrench to it and gave it three good whacks—whong, whong, whong!—which got it open again. The locks hissed. The gate opened with a staccato rattle.
Didn’t take long before the joint was full up. Full of spacers and traders, pirates and smugglers. All around were dust-heads, spice-hounds, flesh-peddlers, gear-tinkers. The usual. But no droids. Never droids.
Later in the day, the Modal Nodes were playing, and they were all right guys and girls—at least for Bith, who let’s be honest were pretty bizarre—but he hated their music. Just sounded like noise to him.
Then again, everything sounded like noise to Wuher.
Worse than the Nodes was who came in next: that smuggler, Solo, and his walking shag-pile copilot. Wuher didn’t know where the hair-stack came from—he thought those Wookiees were a slave species, but this one didn’t look like no slave to Wuher. Only other Wookiee he knew was the one that owned this cantina, a fella named Chalmun. Also not a slave. Which was fine by Wuher. Nobody should have to be a slave. It was part of the lifeblood of this planet because of the Hutts, and now thanks to the Empire it was part of the lifeblood of the whole damn galaxy. But he wouldn’t have a part of it. Sure, he could have help here if he bought a slave or two. Then it wouldn’t just be him. Yeah, he’s got Ackmena working some nights, but a couple of slaves would take the pressure off him during the day.
But it didn’t seem right. It didn’t seem right at all.
So then, as Wuher was pumping drinks and ignoring questions, Solo headed over to a dark corner of the cantina. Like he was holding court. Like he was waiting for something or someone. The big hairy sonofagun went to the other side of the joint, which seemed strange to Wuher—you got a bowcaster-sporting tree-trunk bodyguard like that fella, you never let him leave your side. That monster looked like he could slap the head right off your shoulders. Solo, yeah, he looked tough enough, but not Wookiee-tough.
Plus, last Wuher heard, Solo had debts on his shoulders.
Not just any debts, neither.
A debt to a Hutt. The Hutt around these parts. Jabba.
It’s practically the kind of wisdom you’d want to hang on your wall: Never owe Jabba the Hutt anything—ever.
But there sat Solo, owing Jabba, sitting alone, the Wookiee gone.
That was when one of the freaks on the other side of the bar, a guy named Jerriko, pulled the smoke-stem out of his mouth, blew a few vapor rings, and then said in his undeservedly haughty way:
“Oh my. Somebody is in trouble today.”
He lifted his chin to indicate who came through the door.
Greedo. The Rodian.
Bounty hunter scum. Wuher didn’t care much for bounty hunters and bail-jackers. It went back to the slave thing: people owning other people. But he couldn’t close the door to them. (Unless they were droids. He had that droid detector installed for damn good reason.) If word got around he didn’t serve the hunters, he’d get a reputation. And on this world, you don’t want a reputation if you wanna stay in business.
Greedo walked in, looked around, sat down.
The Rodian saw Solo. Solo pretended not to see the Rodian.
That’s when Wuher knew: He was gonna be cleaning up a real farging mess soon enough. This was a trap for Solo. Or maybe, he thought: a trap for Greedo. Wuher figured they’d all find out soon enough.
Then—then!—he spied that crazy milk-eye moon-bat sitting down, guy who called himself Roofoo. Roofoo had a friend today, a sad-looking Aqualish who Roofoo introduced in his growly whine of a voice: “Hey. You! This is my friend Sawkee. He drinks for free!”
“Nobody drinks for free,” Wuher said.
But Roofoo kept talking like he didn’t even hear the answer: “That Rodian you just dragged out of here? I could have taken him. I could have killed him!”
“I’m sure you coulda,” Wuher said, scowling. Big boaster, this guy.
“I could kill anyone in here!”
“Uh-huh. You gonna order something?”
Roofoo ordered a couple of black fizzers for him and his brooding Aqualish friend, which Wuher quickly delivered before heading to the other side of the bar to fill a few more requests—
Someone hissed at him. Ugh. The smoker again. Jerriko.
“What?” Wuher snapped. The man had a drink already. Wuher always told people: If you have a drink in your hand, you don’t need me for nothing. And yet they always talked to him. Always had to jabber and yammer.
“That man over there. With the one bad eye and the…face.”
“Yeah. Roofoo.”
“That is not his name. He is a killer. A surgeon, or once was, by the name of Dr. Cornelius Evazan. Be wary of him. Be wary of his partner, as well. The Aqualish. Ponda Baba.”
“Uh-huh.”
Jerriko pursed his lips. The man was an incorrigible know-it-all. “I met him once, at a banquet. Though he surely does not remember. He was different, then. Less…mad. Not yet disfigured. But still, a killer.” It was then that Jerriko leaned in, conspiratorially. “I could dispatch him for you. Before he causes trouble. Because I assure you: He will cause trouble.”
“I don’t give a hot cup of jerba gall what you do, what he does, what anybody does. I just make the drinks and get paid.”
Jerriko nodded, a slight smirk on his face. “Ah, yes, I understand you.” But the way he said it sounded like he heard Wuher say something he didn’t say, and as Jerriko moved to the other side of the bar to be nearer to Evazan, Wuher felt it. Like everything was coming down on his head. Wuher felt hot. Sweaty. And you didn’t feel sweaty in a dry place like this, but he
re he was, feeling slick, woozy, feverish—not with an illness but with a moment of grave indecision about his life and his place in it. Even as he poured a glass of blue spirit for a pilot—a little Chadra-Fan screeching at him—the reality of his situation hit him across the back like a club. Wuher had no one. He had nothing but this bar and these people, these freaks, these spacers and traders, pirates and smugglers. Every day, another body dropped. Every day, protection money paid to the Hutts. Didn’t he see a couple Imperial troopers kicking around outside the door? Probably meant he would have to suffer an Imperial inspection soon, too.
And it was then, right then, that the gravest indignity hit him.
Those two droids came in the door.
The protocol and the astromech.
They came clanking in with the old hermit who showed up once in a wild moon and this fresh-faced desert kid. Already, Wuher felt heat blistering his forehead: not the heat of the day, which he was used to by now, but the fever of rage flashing across his brow. Droids. Droids.
“Hey!” he barked. “We don’t serve their kind here!”
The kid, looking flummoxed, asked: “What?”
“Your droids!” he growled. “They’ll have to wait outside. We don’t want them here.”
The kid looked even more flummoxed, and as the droids tottered back out into the desert heat, Wuher had to put his hand out to steady himself against the bar. The memories buffeted him like the winds of a sirocco storm—
—Wuher, a fresh-faced teen boy, heavy around the belly but spry enough, running down the halls of Arkax Station, the ground shaking, blasterfire lighting the dark behind him—
—droids, black and gleaming, moving through the station as they killed the power and executed everyone they found—
—his parents, dead, each peppered with blasterfire, the holes in them still smoldering—
—the hiss-and-whisper of pneumatic limbs behind him as droid eyes lit up the black, their blasters leveled at him, ready to fire—