Star Wars - Kenobi

fished for credits in his cloak.
    Watching him count, Annileen spoke up. “Hey, wait,” she said. She started toward the door to the garage. “Meet me outside, okay?”
    Ben looked back at her, puzzled. “I should really be getting—”
    “Just trust me. I’ll be just a second.”
    Ben stood with his keg on the stoop outside the store. A garage door opened, and Annileen’s old X-31 emerged, with her at the controls. She parked it next to him and debarked. “Everyone’s not due back for a couple of hours,” she said, reaching for the water container. “I’ll drive you.”
    “That’s not necessary!”
    “No, it’ll be fine,” she said, lifting. “We’ll go around to the livery and put Rooh in the rumble seat.”
    “Will she ride there?”
    “My kids did. So we know it holds wild animals.”
    Ben looked back, seemingly troubled. “Really, you don’t have to do this. It’s been a fun afternoon—something I didn’t know I needed. But you can’t leave the store empty.”
    “It’s just Ulbreck and Bohmer in there. I think it’s safe.” Annileen gave Ben a look that exuded confidence. She’d gotten him to relax; she wasn’t about to let him ice up again. She reached out with her hand, only barely aware of a high, distant whine on the air. “It’s all right, Ben. I’m just saving you some time. Come on—”
    The sound grew louder—and Ben’s eyes widened, suddenly serious. He grabbed her arm. “Annileen, look out!”
    She saw it just for an instant, out of the corner of her eye. A copper-colored shape rocketed around the corner of the garage. The vehicle clipped her parked landspeeder where it hovered, sending it spiraling.
    In the same second, Ben threw his body into hers, knocking her off her feet. The two of them hit the sandy ground together. The world above went black as the underside of the careening X-31 whipped over them. The landspeeder slammed into the synstone outer wall of the building with a colossal crack.
    Ben rolled free, wary and alert. Annileen sat up, bewildered. Her landspeeder sat on the ground a short distance from the garage entrance. The vehicle’s right side was dented. Its left engine hung off, lopsided. And behind Ben, she could now see the cause: Veeka Gault’s Sportster, its nose smashed and half buried in the sand. Behind the controls, dazed, sat the young woman herself.
    And in the passenger seat: Jabe!
    Annileen sprang up, overcome with worry, but on reaching the wreck, her expression changed. Her son looked up at her—and giggled uncontrollably. “Hi, Mom. We’re home!”
    She could smell the cheap lum ale the Hutts served at the raceway. “Are you kidding me?” Her eyes darted to Veeka, similarly inebriated. Annileen scrambled across the crushed hood of the vehicle to reach her. “Veeka!”
    The young woman looked at the shopkeeper lunging toward her and burst into giggles herself. “Mama’s Jabey is all right,” she said in a syrupy voice. “But you shoulda parked somewhere else. It’s race day—”
    “Where’s your father?”
    On cue, two more landspeeders arrived, hurtling around the corner of the garage building. The first, driven by Zedd and Mullen, nearly caused another collision. Behind it, Orrin’s silver landspeeder arrived in a more orderly way. Kallie was driving, as Orrin chatted over the seat to a trio of horn-headed Devaronian males. Annileen recognized them as the business contacts from Mos Eisley he’d been desperate to impress.
    “We’re in the holy compound now, folks,” Annileen heard Orrin say to them as they stopped. “Kick the sand off your shoes, and genuflect as you enter.” Stepping out of the vehicle, he saw Annileen’s wrecked speeder first—and then her, charging toward him. “Uh-oh.”
    “Look!” Annileen sputtered, arms waving. “Look what they did!”
    Orrin walked up to the Sportster. Veeka and Jabe tumbled out, rocky on their feet but otherwise unharmed. He looked them over and then glanced at the battered wall of the garage. He whistled. “Looks like another lap at Mos Espa,” he said loudly. The Devaronians laughed.
    Annileen wasn’t amused. “Your daughter was drunk! And driving my son!”
    “The race ended early,” Orrin said.
    “This one did! Is that your idea of an explanation?”
    Orrin closed the distance with her. “The race was flagged to a stop halfway through. Two of the Hutts’ teams got into a big brawl. Big disappointment.” He shifted to a quieter voice and gestured