Star Wars - Kenobi

massiff by its legs and looked around. “What,” he called out, “you don’t want me to poison your friends’ well?”
    “I was saying that to A’Yark,” Ben’s voice boomed. “The one you call Plug-eye. Because she’s going to shoot you, and you might accidentally drop the animal in anyway.”
    Somewhere, Orrin heard a weapon safety clicking on. He nodded. So the Tuskens were listening to Kenobi. “Glad to have gotten your attention,” he said.
    “Turn back now,” Ben repeated.
    This time, Orrin could tell that the voice was coming from the forest of pillars to the west. “I don’t feel like turning back,” he said, tossing the creature’s limp form down the hole. It bounced twice before hitting bottom with a thud. The well was dry.
    Orrin looked around. No one had fired at him. Ben wanted Annileen alive, and the Tuskens were following his lead. But Ben could change his mind at any moment, and Orrin wasn’t about to let him call the Sandies down on him.
    Pulling his weapon, Orrin made his way carefully to an opening in the western rocks. He shot a look back to Mullen and Veeka and mouthed a command. Wait for me.
    Orrin stepped amid the megaliths. It was as bizarre a natural formation as he’d seen on Tatooine—almost designed by nature to form a labyrinth. Mountain wind whistled between the towers, which rose high enough to blot out even the midday suns. He certainly didn’t lack for cover here. Getting a clean shot would be another matter.
    “I know you’re there, Kenobi!” he bellowed.
    “Turn back now.” Ben’s voice resounded through the rocks, closer than before.
    Orrin spun and fired. The shot hit the base of a tower, leaving a smoking pit in the surface.
    He kept walking. There was more movement. Footsteps, fast and light. Orrin fired again, down a long corridor.
    Nothing. Somewhere, he heard a Tusken child crying. Orrin growled impatiently. “Enough games, Kenobi!”
    “Agreed,” Ben said, his voice coming from a different side now. “So turn back.”
    “No!” Orrin felt his eyes burning. With his left hand, he pulled out his second blaster; he raised both weapons and fired. Again and again, turning in all directions. He could see movement and dust rising. He only needed one lucky shot. Just one!
    Blasterfire from the labyrinth resounded across the clearing.
    “Ben, watch out!” Annileen yelled again.
    Unrestrained by his father’s presence, Mullen shoved her forward. Annileen stumbled across the shattered stones and fell. Sprawled across the rocks, she turned around to see the young man aiming his blaster at her.
    “I’ve never been able to stand these snotty Calwells,” he said, one eyelid twitching as he stalked toward her.
    Rifle in hand, Veeka looked at her brother. “Dad didn’t say to kill her.”
    “Do we need her now?” Mullen asked.
    “I don’t know that we ever needed her,” his sister responded.
    “Do you care?”
    “Not really,” Veeka said.
    Orrin continued to fire as he marched forward. He parted his hands and shot in either direction down the stony aisles—and then ahead and behind. He heard screaming from multiple quarters: the pathetic wails of frightened Tusken younglings. A bonus. All the frustration of the past months, all the worry of the last days fed through his body and the blasters in his hands.
    “Show yourself!”
    A cracking sound emanated from above. Reflexively, Orrin pointed his blasters upward. He’d been pounced on by Kenobi before—but the man wouldn’t get the drop on him again.
    Except the rock pillars were too tall for any man to scale, he saw. Then, suddenly, he heard another sickening snap, and a knife-shaped slab that had balanced for eons slid off the formation, plummeting toward him.
    Orrin leapt forward just before the massive chunk of stone stabbed the ground where he’d stood. Above, a fissure appeared in another stone tower. And another. Orrin cast his terrified eyes up and across the long rows of stone columns. This wasn’t a groundquake-by-bantha. This was something unreal—as if something invisible was pushing against the stones!
    He ran forward, blasters still clutched in his hands but his arms bent to shield his face from the rain of dust. Pebbles came down, and then chunks sheared off, striking all around.
    Orrin coughed as nuggets pelted his back. Another huge shard struck just ahead, and then another, behind.
    He screamed. “What’s going on?”
    Orrin looked up as a shadow fell over