Of Love and War: Us Against the World

Off Limits Beyond This Point

(11 Years After the Rise of the Empire)

Luke squirmed in his seat in one of the more secluded corners of the cantina his mother owned, bent over the table as he reached for the datachip that had skidded to the opposite side when he dumped his studies bag on the table. Once he finally got his hands on the chip, he plugged it in and eagerly settled down for some reading about piloting and recent ship models.

He'd love to do some reading of his Jedi studies, but his mother didn't want him reading any of his Jedi stuff in public in case someone happened to see, so these days where Uncle Owen and Aunt Beru couldn't pick him up from school and his mother had a longer shift at the cantina gave him the perfect opportunity to catch up on piloting.

The cantina was loud and bustling with activity, but he'd grown accustomed to it by now, able to block out the sound and focus on what he was doing. His mother had been bringing him here before she owned the cantina, though back then she wouldn't let him linger long on the floor, mostly keeping him hidden away in the back. She'd finally allowed him to sit in an actual booth instead of crammed in a corner in the busy back room a little while after she inherited the cantina, her reason being something along the lines of she'd had time to lay down rules and get people used to following them.

He didn't know how. Even he had been able to hear some of the ugly fights that broke out from the back before his mother owned the cantina.

There was a roar of sound from one of the gambling tables, and Luke looked up just long enough to see Han Solo putting on a show as he raked in the pot he'd just won in a game of sabaac. One of the other gamblers at the table looked like he was ready to fight Han over it, and something—perhaps a prompting from the Force—was telling Luke that a fight was definitely about to break out.

The gambler Luke had been looking at did in fact lunge across the table at Han, who immediately responded—in a more defensive manner, though. Within moments Ameenah was there to throw the offender off Han, promptly picking the sprawled Rodian back up and carrying him out the door while Luke's mother swooped in from where she'd been bringing a table's drinks to make sure Han was in one piece.

As the fight was being swiftly dealt with, a shadow suddenly loomed over Luke in his already darker lit area (due to his mother's discomfort with the idea of 'shining a spotlight on him' in a Tatooine cantina known to attract the lowest of criminal elements). Luke only had enough time to look up and register that it was a human man that seemed to tower over him with a mess of black hair and shadowy beginnings of a beard before the man grabbed Luke by the arm and hoisted him out of the booth he'd been sitting in. Luke was about to let out a shout of protest before a slim and blunt cylinder was pressed just below his ribcage hard enough to make him flinch back, though he was held in place by the man. Luke immediately sucked in a breath, terror slipping down his spine like a damp slime as he realized it was a blaster muzzle the man was pressing into him.

"Not a sound, boy," the man said when Luke looked up at him with wide eyes. A slimmer, slightly shorter man appeared around the corner, making an impatient motion with his hands as if to encourage the one holding Luke to hurry.

"The owner isn't very kind to the slave business—if she catches us, it won't be pretty," the shorter one hissed as Luke was yanked forward away from the table and towards the back exit of the cantina.

Slave business!

Panic snapped through Luke like a krayt dragon's bite, making him dig in his heels as much as he could as he tried to resist being dragged out of his mother's cantina, though the man was much larger and stronger than Luke, making the gesture futile. Though he wanted to scream and shout for his mother, he kept silent, painfully aware of the blaster that could kill him in a moment. He wanted to use the Force to try and slip away, but his mother's warnings about what could happen if someone saw him use the Force and the fact he was in a crowded cantina was stronger than that urge.