Star Wars - Kenobi

needed, and a lot of the prospector types could stay out for weeks at a time. Or perhaps he’d forgotten her mention of the day. Or maybe he was at the races, himself.
    She rejected the last possibility. That would make Ben like everyone else here—and thus far, he hadn’t seemed like that. But she had to admit she had no idea what he might do. Once again, she mentally calculated the time to traverse the distance from Ben’s house to the oasis on eopie-back. Why didn’t the man have a landspeeder? Just another mystery—but little puzzles were all that separated one day from another at the Claim.
    Sadly, this puzzle seemed doomed to have only three or four pieces.
    Doomed . This was the right datapad for thoughts like that. Annileen shifted back to another document and read. She had written it such a long time ago; it almost seemed scripted by another person.
    “My name is Annileen Thaney, and I would like to tell you about myself …”
    She hadn’t been Annileen Thaney in nearly twenty years. It had been that long since she’d written anything but a bill of sale. And what she read now aggravated her. The words were written by a child, about a child. Or rather, about a grown-up who would never exist.
    Annileen grew increasingly disgusted with each paragraph—until finally, she reached her breaking point. She stood and turned to the right, where a sand berm had piled up behind the vaporator. Grasping the datapad in one hand, she twisted her torso and hurled the device. The datapad spun like a discus, sailing over the dune and out of sight.
    Annileen plopped back down on the blanket, satisfied and ashamed in equal parts. It was an old device, rarely used—and what was on it was of no use to anyone. Let the Jawas have it.
    But suddenly she realized she’d never heard it land.
    “Lose something?” Ben said. The cloaked man stood atop the dune, with the suns high behind him and the eopie at his side. In his right hand, he held the datapad.
    Annileen stumbled as she tried to get up. “Sorry,” she said, quickly recovering her composure. “I hope I didn’t hit you with that.”
    Ben held up the datapad, amused. “Obsolete model?”
    “Obsolete life,” Annileen said, grinning. “And I can sell you ten better datapads than that.”
    “I wouldn’t have use for them, I’m afraid.” Ben smiled politely as he stepped into the shade behind the vaporator. Out of the glare, he glanced at the screen. What he saw made him look again, more closely. He scanned the words. “Educational opportunities … offworld … swift placement.” He looked to her, eyes widening. “Why, this is a university application!”
    Annileen felt flushed. “Look at the date on it,” she said.
    “Oh.” Ben’s eyes narrowed. “More than twenty years ago,” he said.
    “It’s from after my father lost most of his ranch—not long after I had to go to work for Dannar. Back then I still had my sights set on working with animals.”
    “A zoological expedition authorized by the University of Alderaan,” Ben read aloud. “Travel ten worlds in a two-year exobiology program.” He looked up at her. “It sounds nice.”
    “For someone.” She took off her hat and ran her fingers through her hair. “Twenty years ago, maybe.”
    Ben studied it further. “I don’t know about that—it looks like they’ve been offering this program for centuries.” He looked up at her. “I’m sure they’re still running expeditions—”
    She winced. No, she didn’t want to go over this again, and certainly not with him. Seeming to sense her unease, he deactivated the gadget and offered it. “Don’t you want this?”
    “I threw it away,” she said. She changed the subject. “So why are you here?”
    He straightened and cleared his throat. “I have actually come for a drink,” he said, lowering the datapad.
    Annileen’s eyebrows rose. “Really.”
    “Yes,” he said. “I’ve been having trouble getting my old vaporator into service. But I met Orrin Gault the other day, and he had the best water I’ve ever tasted. I was wondering—”
    She smiled. “By the keg, my friend, by the keg. But first,” she said, “you should try this .” She reached out and took his hand.
    Her touch startled him, but as she turned him to face the vaporator he saw what she had in mind. A key sat lodged in a lock. “Ah,” he said, watching her open the door. “This is one of Orrin’s—what did he call them, his Pretormins?”
    “Yes,”