A Certain Point of View

Chapter 10: Sorry About The Mess

There was much to be done in Mos Eisley, and doing it right took time. Ben had learned the secrets of the spacers, and had mastered the art of doing business without standing out. It would be impossible, of course, with the boy in tow. Anakin's son might have been a natural pilot, but the lifestyle of the hardened frontiersmen was foreign to him. With masterful control, he slipped away before Luke realized it, blending in, disappearing. In the swampy gloom of Chalmun's Spaceport Cantina, Luke stood out marvellously, a beacon of innocence concealing Ben's purpose as the Jedi master slipped through the shadows, moving from conversation to conversation with one eye on the boy, one on the Wookiee.

Known now to the Imperials as G5-623, the Wookiee homeworld of Kashyyyk was little more than a slave farm; the proud Wookiees themselves had been branded as "non-sentients" by the Empire. A Wookie spacer, by default, was more likely than not an escaped slave, and would be both knowledgeable and motivated when it came to avoiding the Imperial hyperspace lanes. But for that reason exactly, making a beeline for the towering Wookiee pilot would brand him to anyone watching as a man seeking at all costs to avoid Imperial attention.

There was a delicate dance to this, an intricate series of steps invisible to the casual observer. But Ben had spent years learning the dance, and so approached the pilots with Imperial ties first, seeking passage through official Imperial channels as an old man with impractical requests. Slowly and deliberately, begging, demanding, grinning like an Outer Rim eccentric, he exhausted the goodwill of the reputable pilots one by one, and failed his way ever closer to the center of the bar, where the undesirable Wookiee waited. He was the pilot of last resort, or very nearly so; and as a hundred eyes followed the foolish old man from pilot to pilot, sneers of dismissive laughter began to echo in the air behind him. A horned Devaronian grinned at him devilishly from the shadows, delighting in his foolishness. The Imperial spies—those he knew to be Imperials—watched him for a time and then lost interest, just as he had hoped. Meanwhile, the steps of his secret dance became known to the Wookiee, who—it became clear—was not working alone. As he circled from one pilot to the next, Ben watched the Wookiee's eyes intently, watched his telltale signals to someone in the shadows. He was pulling work, Ben realized, for someone who did not want to be seen doing business.

A man so eager to avoid attention that he let an escaped Imperial slave make his contacts for him was just the sort of man he needed. There was something more to him, too: some raw glow about him. He was untrained, unfocused, like all born after the Purge—but the Force ran wild in him, too. There could be no mistake: Ben had found his pilot.

After that, the rest of the dance was frustrating. Eager to be on with business, Ben nearly let his haste give the game away. He locked eyes with the Wookiee, who nodded and moved to a vacant section of the bar.

Three more conversations to go. Then two.

Then one.

The last pilot between Ben and the Wookiee was a tall human, clean-shaven with dark sideburns, who had been audacious enough to wear a decommissioned Republic flight suit into the bar. He was an Alliance sympathizer, and easily recognizable as such. The kind of man a Rebel would trust.

Ben needed him to say no.

"I'm looking for passage to Alderaan," said Ben.

The pilot nodded. "I'm your man," he said. "I'm a Corellian. Name's BoShek. I know the Corellian System, I know the Corellian Run, and I know the Core Worlds as well as my own ship."

"What are you flying?" Ben asked.

"Light freighter," said BoShek. "She's called the Infinity. YT-2200, heavily modified. Six passengers, more if you don't need much cargo."