𝐕𝐈𝐑𝐔𝐋𝐄𝐍𝐓 ── ᴛʜᴇ ᴍᴀɴᴅᴀʟᴏʀɪᴀɴ

0.4

FOUR.
the villagers

🔹️🔹️🔹️

No one had spoken a word; all was quiet.

Everyone had their eyes fixed on the tusken raider leading a bantha towards a dark and empty abyss -- we were all sitting atop a cliff, a little too uneasy to talk. I took a deep breath in, watching the small figures steadily make their way over to the ditch. But for some reason..

I had a bad feeling about this.

My arm throbbed, sensing a dangerous creature lurking in the shadows of that large trench across from us. I glimpsed up at Din and noticed how focused he was on the two silhouettes in the distance. I gradually shifted my gaze onto the child and saw that he was leaning against Din, also absorbed in the situation. I couldn't help but soften my cold expression.

Just then, a raider had broken the silence when he said something to Din in Tusken, using his hands to communicate with him. Din nodded in response before glancing back at both me and Cobb.

"They say it lives in there; they say it sleeps," Din announced, studying the cave-like pit from afar. A different raider had noticed my partner gawking and offered him some binoculars. Din gently took the gadget, taking a closer look at the trench. He continued, "It lives in an abandoned sarlacc pit."

My heart dropped, 'A sarlacc pit?'

"Lived in Tatooine my whole life," Cobb mentioned, staring at the krayt dragon's hiding place. "There's no such thing as an abandoned sarlacc pit."

".. There is if you eat the sarlacc." I shook my head. Cobb surveyed me in disbelief, furrowing his eyebrows. Din just scoffed, giving the raider his binoculars back.

"They're laying out a bantha to protect the settlement. They've studied its digestion cycle for generations," Din said, causing the Marshal and I to turn our gazes back onto the sacrificial bantha. "They feed the dragon to make it sleep longer." The raider leading the bantha stopped in front of the ditch, pushing the creature's tether deep into the ground to keep it from running away. Din huffed, "Watch, the dragon will appear."

I narrowed my eyes down on the far-off raider and bantha, the wind blowing strands of hair away from my face. As if on cue, the raider shouted into the pit, his voice echoing throughout the large cave-like area. The child tilted his head to the side, whimpering slightly.

We all waited anxiously, anticipating the krayt dragon's reaction. Not even a minute later, the beast inside the sarlacc pit had let out a deep growl. This had signaled the raider to start running away and get out of the scene.

But that's when the ground began to rumble, making the raider trip and fall onto the floor. Almost immediately, the krayt dragon emerged from out of the darkness and made its way to the tusken, swallowing the poor raider whole. The beast heavily dragged itself into the sand, returning back to its hiding place inside the trench.

It completely ignored the bantha.

All of us were startled, stunned by the outcome of the raiders' plan. Everyone was dumbfounded by the tough situation, eying the sarlacc pit in dismay. The child wailed once more, huddling close to Din frighteningly. I bit my lower lip, my whole mind going blank.