bright, but he's armed.
I'm watching him.
A Hunter's Fate Greedo's Tale
By Tom Veitch and Martha Veitch
1. The Refuge
"Oona goota, Greedo?"
The question, spoken fearfully, was answered by the mocking
cries of luminous bo-toads hidden in the mountain cave in the
dripping green jungle. Pqweeduk scratched the insect bite on his
tapirlike snout and made a brave hooting noise. He listened as the
sound echoed with the wind in the dark hole that had swallowed his
older brother.
Pqweeduk's spiny back shivered. He flicked on his hand-torch
and the suckers of his right hand fastened tightly to the shiny
hunting knife Uncle Nok had given him for his twelfth birthday.
Pqweeduk stepped into the yawning cave.
But the cave in the jungle was not a cave, and a few meters in,
the rocks and packed earth ended at an open steel door!
Pqweeduk leaned through the rectangular opening and flashed his
torch upward. He was in a dome that filled the inside of the
mountain. The young Rodian saw three great silvery ships squatting
silently in the vastness.
"Greedo?"
"Nthan kwe kutha, Pqweeduk!" That was his brother's voice.
Pqweeduk saw Greedo's hand-torch signaling and he walked toward
it. His bare feet felt a smooth cold floor.
Greedo stood in the open hatch of one of the big ships. "Come
on, Pqweeduk! There's nothing to be afraid of! Come on inside and
check it out!"
Their bulbous multifaceted eyes, already large, grew even
larger as the two green youths explored the interior of the silver
vessel. Everywhere were strange and unfamiliar metallic shapes
that glittered and flashed in torchlight or presented dark angular
silhouettes full of hidden purpose. But there were also places to
sit, and beds to lie on, and dishes to eat from.
Greedo had a funny feeling he'd been here before. But it was
only a feeling, without any memories attached.
Indeed, the only memories he possessed were of life in the
green jungle where his mother harvested Tendril nuts and his
uncles herded the arboreal Tree-Botts for milk and meat. About two
hundred Rodians lived together under the grand Tendril trees. They
had always lived here, this was the only life he knew, and all his
fifteen years Greedo and his younger brother had run wild in the
forest.
The Rodians had no enemies in this place, except for the
occasional Manka cat, wandering through on its way to the distant
white mountains during Manka mating season.
The younger Rodians stayed close to home during that part of
the year. The Mankas' savage roaring warned everyone of their
coming, and the Rodian men would take weapons out of secret
keeping places, and stand guard at the edge of the village,
waiting for the Mankas to pass in the night.
During Manka season, Greedo would hear the guns scream, as he
lay in bed, unable to sleep. The next morning the carcass of a big
Manka would be hanging for all to see, from cross-trees in the
village center.
Except for the Manka-killing, the Rodians led a quiet self-
contained existence. The olders never spoke of any other life-at
least not in front of the children. But Greedo overheard them,
when they thought he was asleep, talk of things happening out
among the stars.
He heard the olders use words like "Empire," "the clan wars,"
"bounty hunters," "starships," "Jedi Knights," "hyperspace." These
words made strange images in his mind-he couldn't make sense of
them at all, because the only life he knew was the jungle, the
trees, the water, and endless days of play.
But the olders' secret talk filled him with feelings of
unexplainable longing. Somehow he knew that he didn't belong to
this green world. He belonged somewhere else, out among the stars.
The silver ships were the proof. He knew with uncanny certainty
that these were the "starships" he had heard his mother and uncles
speak about. Surely his mother would tell him why the ships were
hidden under the mountain.
Pqweeduk isn 't old enough to know . . . but I am.
Greedo's mother, Neela, was sitting on the ground in front of
their hut, by firelight, peeling Tendril nuts. Her hands moved
rapidly, slitting the thick husks with a bone knife and peeling
them back. She hooted quietly to herself as she worked.
Greedo crouched nearby, carving a piece of white Tendril wood
into the shape of a silver starship. When the ship was finished he
held it up and admired it, making sure his mother could see it.
"Mother," he asked abruptly, "when are you going to teach me about
the silver ships in the mountain?"
The rapid movement of his mother's hands stopped. Without
looking at her son, she spoke, in a voice that betrayed emotion.
"You found the ships," she said.
"Yes, Mother. Pqweeduk and me - "
"I told Nok to fill in the opening in the mountain. But Nok
loves the past too much. He's always sneaking up there to look at
the ships." She sighed and resumed peeling the leathery skins off
the big nuts.
Greedo moved closer to her. He sensed that she was ready to
tell him things he wanted to know . . . things he needed to know.
"Mother, please tell me about the ships."
Her moist faceted eyes met his. "The ships . . . brought us to
this place . . . this world . . . two years after you were born,
Greedo."
"Wasn't 1 born here ... in the jungle?"
"You were born out there" - she pointed at the evening sky,
visible through the tall Tendril trees, where the first stars were
appearing - "on the world of our people, the planet Rodia. There
was much killing then. Your father was killed, while I was
carrying your brother. We had to leave ... or die."
"I don't understand."
She sighed. She saw she would have to tell him everything. Or
almost everything. He was old enough now to know the facts.
"Our people, the Rodians, were always hunters and fighters. The
love of death was strong in us. Many years ago, when the meat-game
was gone, we learned to raise all our food. But our people began
to hunt each other, for sport."
"They . . . killed each other?"
"Yes, for sport. For deadly sport. Some Rodians thought it was
foolishness, and refused to participate. Your father was one of
those. A great bounty hunter was he ... but he refused to join the
foolish gladiator hunts."
"What is a bounty hunter, Mother?" Greedo felt a chill in his
spine, waiting for the answer.
"Your father hunted criminals and oudaws ... or people with a
price on their heads. He was highly honored for his skills. He
made us very wealthy."
"Is that why he died?"
"No. An evil clan leader, Navik the Red, named for the red
birthmark that covers his face, used the gladiator games as an
excuse to make war on the other clan leaders. Your father was
murdered. Our wealth was taken, and our cl
an, the Tetsus, were
nearly wiped out.
"Fortunately, some of us were able to escape the killing, in
the three silver ships you've found."
"Why did you never tell Pqweeduk and me about the ships . . .
and about our people?"
"We have changed. There was no need to dredge up the dark past.
We have become peaceful here. The guns are only brought out when
the Manka cats are prowling. We made a vow, in our council, that
the children should not know of the terrible past, until they were
full grown. I am breaking that vow now, in telling you these
things. But you are . . . almost as tall as your father now."
His mother's eyes seemed to envelop Greedo. He loved the way
she looked at him. Her skin exuded a pleasing perfume, a strong
Rodian scent. He gazed at her wonderingly. Suddenly there was so
much more to know. He wanted desperately to learn . . . every
thing.
"What is the Empire, Mother?"
She frowned and wrinkled her long flexible snout. "I've told
you enough, Greedo. On another day perhaps I will answer all your
questions. Go to bed now, my son."
"Yes, Mother." Greedo touched his hand suckers to his mother's
in the traditional all-purpose greeting and good night. He went to
his straw-filled bed in their little hut, where his brother was
already asleep.
Greedo lay for hours, thinking of silver ships, of his father
the bounty hunter . . . and the greatness of life among the stars.
2. Red Navik
A month and a day after Greedo and Pqweeduk found the silver
sky ships, Navik the Red, leader of the powerful Chattza clan,
found the Tetsus.
Greedo and his brother were climbing high in the Tendril trees
when they saw a bright flash in the sky. They watched with quiet
curiosity as the flash flowered and became a glittering red shape
that grew larger and larger, until they could see it was a sky
ship, twenty times larger than the small silver ships in the cave.
Anxious voices called from below. Greedo hooted with excitement
and began to slide rapidly down the smooth tree, using his suckers
to skillfully brake his descent. His brother was right behind him.
Below they could see the people coming out of their huts and
pointing at the big sky ship. Uncle Nok and Uncle Teeko and others
were running to get the weapons. Greedo sensed their fear.
"C'mon, Pqweeduk!" Greedo shouted, as his feet hit the ground.
"We have to save Mother! We can't let them kill her!"
"What are you talking about, Greedo? Nobody's killing anybody!"
Pqweeduk dropped to the ground and obediently followed his older
brother.
As they ran through the trees, the red ship swooped lower,
uncoiled its landing gear, and settled in a cloud of fiery smoke
at the edge of the village.
Twin hatches hissed open. Greedo stopped and turned and gaped
in awe as armored Rodian warriors poured out of the giant
ship-hundreds of them, each wearing bright segmented armor and
each carrying a vicious-looking blaster rifle.
The sight of these killers transfixed the young Rodian. It was
a full minute before he felt his brother tugging fearfully at his
sleeve. And then he heard his mother's voice, urging him to run.
The last thing Greedo saw, before he turned his face to the
forest, was the figure of a tall, imposing Rodian with a bloodred
mark that stained most of his face. The marked warrior shouted an
order, and the others raised their weapons.
The scream of laser fire mixed with the dying shrieks of the
people, as Greedo and his brother and mother fled into the jungle.
Uncle Nok and Uncle Teeku and twenty others made it to the cave
ahead of them. There was a great grinding noise and the roar of a
landslide, as the top of the mountain opened, throwing off its
burden of earth and stones.
Greedo caught his breath as the three silver ships gleamed in
the light of the midday sun. Powerful engines already whined
awake.
Uncle Nok greeted Greedo's mother as he urged everyone to get
aboard as fast as possible. "Neela-now you know why I was always
visiting the ships! I was keeping them in repair for this very
day!"
Greedo's mother hugged her brother Nok and thanked him. Then
they all rushed aboard, followed by a stream of refugees coming
out of the forest.
Two of the silver ships lifted easily on columns of repulsor
energy, their fission-thrust engines whining up so high that the
sound vanished beyond the range of Greedo's hearing. The third
ship was waiting for the last stragglers . . . the last survivors
of the massacre.
A portly Manka hunter named Skee charged out of the forest,
screaming that everyone behind him was dead-"Leave! Take the ships
away, while you still have a chance!"
The third ship never got its hatch closed. A single bolt of ion
energy fused its stabilizers into a molten mass, and a split
second later a powerful laser blast blew the power core.
As the first two ships shot skyward, a bright sphere of fusion
fire blasted back the jungle, mocking the midday sun. The third
ship was no more.
Greedo never heard the explosion. He was in the cockpit of The
Radian, gawking at the starlines, as Uncle Nok's silver ship
3. Nar Shaddaa
Planning for this emergency, Nok had programmed the Rodian
ships to jump to a heavily trafficked region of the galaxy, where
the survivors of his little tribe could lose themselves among the
myriad alien races engaged in interstellar commerce.
So it was they came to Nar Shaddaa, a spaceport moon orbiting
Nal Hutta, one of the principal worlds inhabited by the wormlike
Hutts.
There was a continual buzz of space traffic between Nar Shaddaa
and the far-flung systems of the galaxy mighty transgalactic
transports and bulk cargo vessels, the garish yachts and caravels
of the Hutt ganglords, the battle-scarred corsairs of the
mercenaries and bounty hunters, the pirate brigantines, and even
the occasional commercial passenger liner, packet starjam-mer, or
massive migration arks. And, of course, the ever-present star
cruisers and sleek patrol vessels of the Imperial Navy.
The surface of Nar Shaddaa was an interlocking grid of miles-
high cities and docking stations, built up over thousands of
years. Level upon level of freight depots and warehouse and repair
facilities were linked by gaudy old thoroughfares that spanned the
globe, bridging canyons that reached from the upper strata,
swarming with life, to the glowing depths where several forms of
subspecies thrived on the refuse that fell continuously from the
towering heights.
Greedo and his brother and mother and all the pilgrims on those
two silver ships came to Nar Shaddaa, merging with the life of the
great spaceport moon, finding a home in the huge sector controlled
by Corellian smugglers.
The Corellians kept things reasonably under
control in their
part of the moon. Gambling was an important source of income for
them. All races were invited to wander the brightly lit avenues
and gawk and eat and drink and throw away money in the sabacc
joints. A gun duel or a bounty killing now and then was to be
expected, and petty thievery was largely overlooked. But there was
an unwritten law in the Corellian Sector, enforced by Port
Control If you want to make big trouble, do it somewhere else.
The Rodian refugees merged with the denizens of the dingy
warehouse districts on Level 88. Over the next months they found
work as freight handlers and house servants, and went about their
lives.
Nok ordered everyone to stay away from the public levels, the
thoroughfares, and the casinos, on the chance they'd be recognized
by a Chattza hunter. Nok assured them their stay on Nar Shaddaa
was a temporary one, until he could locate another jungle world
where they could dwell in peace.
For the adult Rodians it was not a happy time-they deeply
missed the lush green world they had left behind. But for Greedo
and Pqweeduk, a whole universe of excitement began to reveal
itself.
Four years later Greedo's people were still on Nar Shaddaa,
working and surviving. Greedo was nineteen, his brother was
sixteen. The green youths had merged with the boundless spectacle
of the Galaxy.
4. Bounty Hunters
"Jacta nin chee yja, Greedo!" Greedo leaped back as three
repulsor bikes whipped past, jumped a broken retaining wall, and
disappeared into one of the crowded concourses that had been de
clared off-limits by Uncle Nok.
He watched his brother and friends swerve their bikes among the
landspeeders, antique wheeled cabs, Hutt floaters, skillfully
dodging the strolling gamblers, alien pirates, spice traders,
street hawkers, ragtag homeless . . . and bounty hunters.
"Grow up, Pqweeduk!" Greedo slouched against a wall, waiting
for his friend Anky Fremp, a Siona Skup biomorph who had taught
him the secrets of the street.
Greedo, on the edge of adulthood, had left the games of
childhood behind. He'd traded his repulsor bike for a fine pair of
boots. He had stolen a precious rancor-skin jacket. He had learned
how to strip therm pumps and shield regulators off Hutt floaters