Zoraida Cordova - A Crash of Fate

Jules rested his hands on his waist and shook his head. “Can’t do that.”

Yes, you can, Belen’s voice said in his mind. It would be so easy to keep going, to pretend that he’d never seen someone getting robbed on the side of a dirty road. He’d survived his life in the Outpost by learning how to fight back only when he needed to. Not everyone could say the same.

“At least we’ll even the odds,” the young guy behind them said. His eye was bruising like passion plum, and he used a staff to push himself to his feet.

The attackers glared at each other, then took off.

“I suppose they decided my trinkets are not worth the risk,” the boy said.

Jules shook his head, his heart still racing from the anticipation of a brawl. “You all right?”

“I’ve seen better days.” Covered in dusty scarves and a long brown robe, the boy grabbed his side and winced. Jules offered his forearm to help him climb back up the slope and onto the dirty road littered with round white stones.

“I’m Nate Grattonius,” he said, extending his hand to Jules. “I’m in your debt—”

“Jules. And you aren’t. Will you be all right?”

Nate tugged the hood of his cape up and lowered himself to the ground. Jules realized that there were things scattered on the dirt, not only pebbles. It looked like a bunch of junk, but Jules knew that a bit of junk was treasure to anyone who scavenged. The boy had bright blue eyes and hair that looked recently shorn. The tops of his cheeks and bridge of his nose were shadowed with blooming bruises. When he reached for the metal trinkets on the ground, he hissed.

“Easy, friend,” Jules said. “They did a number on you, didn’t they?”

Nate chuckled despite the pain but didn’t stand. “It’s no matter, thanks to you.”

Jules had been mugged by off-worlders twice when he was nothing but a skinny runt, before he’d gotten so tall and bulky that people thought twice about picking a fight with him. The first time it happened, he was eight and he’d spent all day rummaging in the salvage yard, one of his first jobs working for Savi and Son Salvage. He’d found a fighter pilot’s helmet from the Clone Wars. How it’d ended up in that wreck was something he’d fantasized about while playing with the other boys. He’d been walking down by the docking bays, wearing the helmet, when two bigger kids yanked it off his head. Jules had put up a fight. Being small was no excuse for not being brave. One split lip and a bruised cheek later, he’d run home and told his mother all about it. She warned him to stay away from strangers, not to walk alone on the outskirts of the Outpost. Mother Rakab had never liked venturing into the market or the spaceport. She preferred the solitude of the inner lands, where her family had settled when she was a little girl, and wished Jules felt the same.

Another time was five years back, when he’d been with some of his friends at Oga’s Cantina. He was careless and had wanted to splurge on one of the extravagant drinks they mixed, though he knew he wasn’t supposed to. The minute he’d stepped outside and started back home, three guys jumped him and took the last of his spira. He’d promised himself then and there, as he threw blind punches, that he’d never be picked on again. He learned every street of the Outpost, who lurked in the alleys, who did jobs for whom. He wouldn’t lose himself in the bitterness of those humiliations, but would use the experiences to drive himself forward. And he knew that when he saw it happen to someone else, he would intervene. Especially now that he was big enough to fight back properly.

“I seem to be in the right place at the right time today,” Jules said. “Or the wrong place at the wrong time. I’m not exactly sure.”

“Both things can be true, Jules.” Nate’s face split into a bright smile. “For my assailants it was the wrong time, for me it was the right one.”

The boy adjusted the cluster of necklaces around his neck. It reminded Jules of the scores of trinkets Dok always wore. Nate wore a peculiar little crystal strung around one of the necklaces. He started collecting small metallic pieces and circuit wire from the ground.

“Here, let me help,” Jules said, and toed the stray bits of grass with his boot. It was easy to spot metal glinting in the rising suns.

“You’re very kind,” Nate said. “I hope I’m not keeping you from somewhere you have to be?”

Jules chuckled lightly, picking up something that looked like a metal finger. Maybe this man knew where Jules was supposed to be, because as the day progressed Jules had no clue, other than his job for Dok. “Believe me, I’ve been where you are. What are you working on? Customizing some sort of droid?”

“Sort of,” Nate said, wiping his brow. A shuttle raced past above them, and two kids on a speeder bike were a blur on the open road. “Everything can be made new again. Now, I believe that’s all of it, friend. I must get on my way.” With his pouch filled with bits and bolts, Nate steadied himself on his staff and held out a hand to Jules.

“Are you going anywhere near Hondo’s?” Jules asked. “I can drop you off.”

Nate squinted against the suns and tugged his hood farther down. He appeared even younger when he smiled at Jules, the dust on his face like a smattering of freckles. It made Jules think of the freckles on Izzy’s cheeks even though they didn’t remotely resemble each other. “I need to be elsewhere, but I thank you. Should our paths cross again, I hope to return the favor. May the Force be with you, Jules.”

Jules nodded but said nothing. He hadn’t heard that phrase since he was a child, when a group of Force believers had made themselves known on Batuu. He was raised with the idea that there was something out there guiding him, but while his parents had referenced the Force a handful of times throughout his life, only the very old people he knew still believed in that religion. Jules considered that all his talk about fate and the universe might be the same thing.

Nate turned onto the road and continued his journey in the opposite direction. Jules jumped into the driver’s seat of his speeder. He wasn’t done thinking about Izal Garsea and what it meant that she’d blown back into his life, even if just for a moment.

Back inside Dok-Ondar’s Den of Antiquities, Izzy settled into the dim, cool shop. Jules’s absence was palpable to her. She unraveled the scarf from around her neck because it smelled like him. It wasn’t that she wanted to forget him. Not again. Being with Jules, even for a few hours, had sped up the healing of something she hadn’t even realized was broken. Why couldn’t she do that on her own?

With the arrival of Ana Tolla, she’d officially been pulled in too many directions. All she wanted to do then was crawl into her bed and sleep. She reset the course in her mind to what she’d originally gone there to do, before Jules.

Tap looked up from an ancient holovid game. His eyes narrowed with skepticism until he recognized her.

“Hey, kid,” she said.

“Dok’s not back yet. I’m powering down until he gets back.”

A feeling that something was wrong needled at her. Why would Dok leave his shop unattended, except for a small child, for so long? Besides, he was expecting her. This was her opportunity to deliver the parcel and then get going. She’d already said good-bye to Jules; she couldn’t do it twice. What if he came back before she left? Would they have to do the same farewell again? One for the day was enough.

She muttered a curse and stalked over to the metal railing that barred off the mezzanine of the shop. She slumped down to the ground and took off the pack. It was heavier than when she’d put it on that morning, but she blamed the strain of pushing Jules’s speeder.