Something nudged Satine's side, and she rolled over, mumbling in her sleep. Then she felt the thing force open one of her eyeballs, and she screamed.
All the little Jawas around her screeched in response, scattering everywhere. The duchess had been sleeping on the sand, and she scrambled backwards in surprise only to accidentally slap her hand onto Obi-Wan's face.
"Ah!" The Padawan lurched awake and budded heads with Satine.
"Ow! They both exclaimed, rubbing their heads.
Just my luck, the duchess thought. This is the second time I've smashed my head into his in the past week.
And while all this went on, Qui-Gon was sleeping peacefully in the corner of the cave.
"What is happening?" Obi-Wan asked with a grimace.
"Those awful Jawas woke me up and frightened me!" They were all fleeing the cavern now, and she glared into the last one's yellow eyes.
The Padawan seemed to relax and started yawning. "Could be worse." But then his eyes widened. "Oh, no."
"What?" Satine asked warily.
Obi-Wan jumped to his feet and held out his hand for Satine. "Well, I suppose you could refer to Jawas as scavengers." The duchess took his hand before he pulled her up. "Which means they like to steal things, and they don't care who it belongs to."
Satine moaned. "Which means they probably took our speeders?"
Obi-Wan nodded grimly.
"Shit," the Duchess growled.
"Whoa, whoa, whoa!" the Padawan waved his hands in front of her face. "This situation does not permit such a vile word."
Satine rolled her eyes and held up the middle finger. "It does in my book." Obi-Wan gasped.
She would have to teach him that cussing often made things a lot better.
"Vulgar," the Padawan said with a smile. "Absolutely barbaric."
"Oh, be silent." Satine flipped her hair and marched to the opening of the cave. She almost enjoyed bantering with the Jedi. "Let's see what the Jawas have done with our speeders."
"Nothing good," Obi-Wan sighed, coming up beside her.
Satine placed her hand on her forehead, shielding her eyes from the bright sunlight, and saw the Jawas in the distance with their giant sandcrawler. They were hauling the speeders behind them, leaving a trail of spare parts in their wake.
"Damn it," she growled. "They've taken the speeders apart."
Then she heard footsteps behind her, and turned to see Qui-Gon shuffling to them. "What's all this ruckus?"
Obi-Wan rubbed the back of his neck. "The Jawas might have invaded our camp and stolen our speeders." He flashed a nervous smile.
Qui-Gon stroked his beard. Satine had noticed that it had gotten longer, and when she glanced at Obi-Wan, she realized that he had some stubble along his jawline. For someone his age, it would usually look sloppy or silly, but the stubble on the Padawan's face almost made him seem... manly. The duchess barely stopped herself from snorting at the ridiculousness of the thought.
"Well, I suppose we'll have to get the speeders back," said the Jedi Master.
"But how?" inquired Obi-Wan, throwing up his hands.
"We shall see when we get there."
So the group of three made their way through the sand and to the Jawas, picking up spare parts along the way. Satine curled her lip when she picked up a little pipe. It was greasy.
When they got closer to the sandcrawler, the Jawas all stopped what they were doing and stared at them with their beady, yellow eyes.
"We would like our speeders back, please," Qui-Gon declared slowly, as if he were talking to children.
The Jawas burst into chatter, babbling angrily in Jawaese. Several of them crowded around the skeletons of the speeders and hugged the machines. Others simply ran into the sandcrawler with the metal parts in their arms.
"I guess that's a no," Obi-Wan murmured. He pulled on his Padawan braid. "What can we say to them so that they'll give the speeders back?"
"Hm, let me think." Qui-Gon folded his arms.
Satine shook her head. Did they know nothing about diplomacy? "We don't have time for this! I'll handle it." The Jedi just stared at her doubtfully.
Oh, I'll show you.
The duchess marched up to the Jawas and placed her hands on her hips. "I demand that you pause for a moment and listen to me, seeing as I am the Duchess of Mandalore. And yes, I know; you may not be citizens of Mandalore, but you shall treat me with utmost respect." The incoherent chatter died down. The Jawas seemed wary, but they were paying attention.
"You Jawas will return the speeders to us, completely repaired, or every single one of you will be taken into captivity for life." The little people froze in fear.
"Can she do that?" Obi-Wan whispered to Qui-Gon behind her. She smiled in satisfaction.
"What do you say, Jawas? A little sacrifice for the beloved Duchess of Mandalore, or a lifetime in prison?" Satine raised a perfect eyebrow.
The Jawas burst into chatter again, although this time it was quiet. Well, quiet for the Jawas. Eventually, some of the people shoved one of their own to the front of the crowd. The Jawa was taller than the rest of them, but he still seemed frightened of the duchess. Good, she thought.
He reached up and tugged on her arm, pulling her around the corner of the canyon to reveal a pile of junk. But as Satine got closer, she saw that it was a space ship, just a very old, very broken one.
"What are you trying to do?" she questioned. The creature just kept dragging her to the shuttle until they were right next to it. Then the Jawa slapped the ship, and pointed at Satine.
What was he trying to say? "Is that... are you giving the ship to me?" The Jawa nodded excitedly, and the duchess grinned. Her plan was working better than she expected. "But this shuttle obviously needs major repairs. How long will it take?"
The Jawa shifted from foot to foot and spread out his arms.
"Hm," Satine hummed. "So quite a bit of time?" The creature nodded again. "Alright, well you Jawas better get to work, and maybe I'll forget about you stealing my speeders." The Jawa scurried away, and Satine looked over her shoulder to find the Jedi gawking at her.
"How did you do that?" Obi-Wan asked.
She shrugged. "I told you that negotiating works."
The Padawan laughed. "That wasn't negotiating. That was threatening!"
"Mm, same thing," Satine smirked.
The Jedi Master smiled approvingly. "Well, done, Duchess."
"My pleasure." She dropped into a fake curtsy.
"You can't actually lock them up, can you?" Obi-Wan inquired.
"Well, technically I could if I wanted to," The duchess started walking towards them, and they all began their trek back to the cave. "But that wouldn't be right, so I wouldn't actually arrest any of them. They don't know that, of course." She winked at the Padawan.
He smiled at her, his blue eyes flashing. "I like this Satine! What did you do with the real Satine?" He pretended to knock on her forehead. "Duchess? Are you in there?"
"Stop that!" she snatched at his hand and he danced out of reach. Satine glowered at him, but she found that she rather enjoyed the Jedi's teasing.
Qui-Gon was laughing. "I suppose you two have finally stopped hating each other?"
"No," they both said at the same time, and then they burst into giggles.
Satine knew this was unbecoming of a duchess, but she didn't care. She was having fun for once in her life. And the duchess continued to have fun for the rest of her stay on Tatooine.
It took the Jawas a whole month to repair the ship, but she didn't mind. It was freeing to roam the sands of Tatooine. No diplomats and politicians biting at her heels. No bounty hunters or assassins threatening to kill her. It was just Satine, Obi-Wan, Qui-Gon, and the Jawas.
At first, the duchess was worried that she would quickly clash with the Jedi. That they would start arguing all the time, but that wasn't the case. She actually bonded quite a bit with the Master and the Padawan.
Qui-Gon taught her a lot about survival. She learned how to clean the food that the Jawas shared with them, and she became an expert at starting a fire.
He also taught her how to meditate. They would sit for long hours in the sunlight with their legs folded. They would clear their minds and listen to only the Force, even though the duchess was not a Jedi. By the end of the month, Satine almost thought of Qui-Gon as a father figure of sorts.
And then there was Obi-Wan. He taught her how to use Cad Bane's blaster. They would set up little targets along the walls of the trench, and he would help her shoot them. Well, he aided her at first, holding her arm and leaning over her shoulder, but now Satine thought she was pretty good at it by herself.
One day, the two of them had been on a walk when they had run into sand people. Obi-Wan had pulled out his blue lightsaber to protect her, pulling her behind his back, but the duchess had whipped out her blaster. She had shot at their feet, and the sand people had taken off. She would never forget that look on Obi-Wan's face after she did that. A little bit of surprise, and a lot of approval. That look from him always gave her a strange feeling, but it was pleasant in a way she didn't understand.
Some days Obi-Wan would even instruct Satine in hand-to-hand combat. Round-house kicks and punches, feinting to the right and tripping up your opponent. The duchess didn't necessarily like the fighting, but she did enjoy the view.
The Padawan would often take off his robes, exposing his strong chest and even stronger abdominal muscles. She had to admit that his back was nice to look at, too. He wasn't built like a rock and his shoulders weren't very broad; instead he was nice and lean, just the way she liked it. Not to mention that his skin had gotten darker under the hot Tatooine suns. And his hair had taken on more of a golden sheen. Even though Satine was not in love with Obi-Wan in any way, no woman could resist a body like that.
And sometimes she thought she saw the Padawan looking at her with appraising eyes, as well. Satine had cut off the bottom half of Cad Bane's shirt. It was simply too hot for all that. So now her stomach and lower back were exposed. The duchess knew it was extremely scandalous, but she honestly didn't care.
Now, she was lounging in the shade of their cave with an arm over her eyes when Obi-Wan came running in. "What is it?" She looked up at his smiling face.
"The ship is done! Pack your bags, because we are leaving, my darling!"