Star Wars - Kenobi

turning toward the pouch on the ground. “That can wait until Mos Eisley.”
    Kallie’s eyes widened. “Mos Eisley?”
    “I know we were just there yesterday,” he said, lifting the backpack. “It certainly doesn’t seem like yesterday. But there’s a transport preparing to leave from Docking Bay Fifty-Six the day after tomorrow, and passage is booked.”
    Annileen gawked. “How is that possible?”
    Before Ben could answer, Kallie hugged him—just hard enough to cause him to drop the pouch again. He laughed. “Don’t you want to hear the destination?”
    “Not really!” Jabe said, stepping back and slapping hands triumphantly with his sister.
    “The first stop is Bestine,” Ben said. “The planet, not the city.”
    “ First stop?” Annileen echoed.
    “That’s right.” Ben smiled and looked over at the single sun that remained. “It should be safe going to Mos Eisley, tonight of all nights. With all the posse activity out there today, Tuskens will be avoiding the north for weeks.” He gestured to the second landspeeder. “If you would, kids, please wait at the bottom of the hill. I need to talk to your mother for a moment.”
    Dazzled, Kallie looked back at her mother. “You never said we’d be leaving Tatooine!”
    “I didn’t know,” Annileen said, mind still reeling. It seemed to fit, though: just one more impulsive act in a day of them. She felt as if gravity would give way next.
    Jabe was already behind the controls of the second landspeeder, waving. “Kallie, come on!”
    Kallie leapt up, kissing Ben on the cheek. “We’ll see you soon!” She spun and dashed to the vehicle, dust flying beneath her feet. In a moment, the siblings were driving to the foot of the hill, cheering audibly over the engine.
    Annileen looked at Ben and marveled. “You don’t give a woman a chance to catch her breath, do you?”
    Ben smiled wanly for a moment before turning away to his eopies. “I want you to know something,” he said, reaching for Rooh’s lead. “I … would have liked to have saved Orrin.”
    “He wasn’t your responsibility,” she countered, watching him place the animals in their pen. “You didn’t live around him for years, not knowing what he’d turned into.”
    Ben smiled back. “But once you knew, you did something. And you didn’t wait.”
    “You’re giving me too much credit. The only reason I did anything was because of you.”
    “No, I think you deserve quite a bit of credit. And a new start,” he said. He walked to the backpack. Opening it, he drew out a datapad.
    Annileen recognized it in the dimming light. “Hey, that’s my old one. The one I gave you!”
    Ben activated it. “I had to take the speeder bike to a village to get a signal offworld this morning. And I rode on Rooh this afternoon to get a response. But it’s official,” he said, passing the device to her. “You’re in.”
    Annileen’s eyes scanned the words. She staggered backward, as if struck by a great weight. “You sent my application?” She gawked at him. “But that was twenty years old!”
    “Alderaan still exists, right? So does the university system.” Ben stepped beside her and pointed to an entry on the screen. “They’re still doing the exobiology expeditions, launching from their branch on Naboo.”
    Annileen remembered the advertisement by heart. Ten worlds in two years, studying a thousand species, most little understood by science. She looked at it again. “Accepted? How is that possible?”
    Ben crossed his arms. “That’s one of those things I can’t let you ask me about. Let’s just say you had strong references on Alderaan.”
    She wasn’t sure whether to believe it—or him. The whole thing seemed impossible, incomprehensible. “Going to university at my age! I just can’t believe it. It doesn’t make any sense!”
    “It makes more sense than someone of your abilities serving caf and shelving feed,” he said. “There’s a slot for Kallie to get in this season, too. And there will surely be more opportunity out there for your son than there is here.”
    Annileen looked at the screen and laughed, in spite of herself. “I see you couldn’t get me into a school on Coruscant.”
    “My powers are indeed limited.” Ben took the datapad back from her and walked it to her landspeeder.
    She glided after him, barely feeling the ground under her feet. He placed the datapad safely inside the vehicle. Almost giddy, she cracked a joke. “Are you sure