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The only warning they get is a blaster bolt hitting the duracrete several feet ahead of them.
Tristan takes a swift step back, and Sabine’s blaster is already up and searching the skies. The buildings surrounding the alley seem to hem them in, like a pack of wolves waiting for a reason to pounce. Tristan catches a flash of movement from the roof directly to their left, and he gives a slight nod toward it. Sabine follows his gaze, flipping her rangefinder up as he does the same. There’s a heat signature, just far enough behind the lip of the roof that the being causing it isn’t visible.
Neither needs to ask to know the other is ready, and they move forward together.
Sabine barely takes a step forward, however, before she’s thrown back against the wall, as if by an unseen force. Tristan fires, now that the figure is visible above the roof’s edge, and the bolts keep missing. His brow furrows under his bucket. What?
The figure jumps off the roof, landing surprisingly easily on a dumpster pushed against the wall. Tristan doesn’t bother trying to figure out who he is or why he’s attacking them; he hurries over to Sabine and starts helping her up.
Something yanks Tristan, sending him flying back against the dumpster. His bucket clangs against the metal, and he’s left dazed for a moment, forced to watch as their assailant advances toward Sabine, who still seems to be getting her bearings.
Tristan forces himself to stand despite the ringing in his ears, drawing his blaster. But by the time his hand has stopped shaking, their attacker has Sabine in binders and a vibroblade aimed right at the gap in her armor. Tristan swallows, hard.
“Set the blaster down, slow.”
Tristan hesitates, but the dark look in his eyes convinces him. He sets his blaster down, slowly.
“Now step back and raise your hands.”
Tristan backs up and raises his hands, slowly, even as he can tell Sabine’s glaring at him through her visor. “Who hired you?” he asks warily.
“Doesn’t matter. All that matters is she’s coming with me. My business isn’t with you.”
The kid—because that’s all he is, really, just a kid, despite the aged scars on his cheek; Tristan resolutely ignores the voice whispering that they’re probably the same age—shifts his weight, unconsciously pressing the vibroblade closer to the gap in Sabine’s armor, and Tristan stiffens.
“If your business is with her, it’s with me, too.”
The kid holds his gaze for a long, long minute before sighing. “You can come with if you promise not to do anything.”
Tristan’s brow shoots up. “You mean...you’re not going to…?”
“No. It’d be a waste of binders. Just don’t cause trouble, and I won’t hurt either of you. Oh, and I get the blaster.”
The abrupt change in the kid’s demeanor takes him off guard, but it’s the mentioned repossession of his blaster that makes Tristan take a step forward. The kid shifts the vibroblade, and the unspoken threat to his sister’s life is enough to make him back down.
The kid nods to the blaster. “Bring it here, but if you try anything….”
“I know.”
He stoops to grab the blaster, walking it slowly to their assailant. He shoves it in an empty holster before nodding. “Let’s go.”
They reach a ship—a decently sized one, especially for how young the kid seems—and head up the ramp, Tristan in the lead so the kid can “keep an eye on him.” The kid directs him into a common area, where he motions for them to sit and then heads off. Tristan and Sabine immediately glance at each other.
“Bounty hunter,” Sabine says in that authoritative older sister voice that she uses whenever she’s 100% sure of what she’s saying, but Tristan hesitates to agree.
“He’s...young.”
“You guys are probably the same age,” she points out, and he barely refrains from sighing. “Besides, maybe—“
Footsteps.
Sabine goes quiet, and Tristan turns to watch as the kid from before and an adult—an actual adult, too, not a Sabine-adult—round the corner. The man has dark hair pulled back into a tail, and a stern frown seemingly etched into his face. It’s the eyes, though, that get Tristan. They’re milky, the kind of milky that tells Tristan that the likelihood he can see anything is very, very low. An old scar, too, slashes across his face, covering both his eyes and the bridge of his nose, but it’s not any kind of scar familiar to him.
“I thought I told you no more strays,” the man says finally, and the kid next to him swallows visibly.
“But I brought the girl!”
“Yeah, but who’s that?” He crosses his arms and nods to Tristan, who blinks in surprise. Maybe he isn’t as blind as he thought.
“Uh...I don’t exactly know? But he wouldn’t leave. He made me bring him, too.”
“And why isn’t he in cuffs?”
“Because...I forgot to bring an extra pair?”
The man sighs, loudly, and pinches the bridge of his nose. “Fine. Kid, I’m gonna go get us out of here. Keep an eye on ‘em. Can I trust you to do that, at least?”
“Yeah, of course. I’ve watched bounties before.” The man nods in acknowledgement, turning to leave, but Tristan shifts forward.
“Who do you work for?” he asks.
The man turns back, taking a long sip from the flask at his hip before answering. “Whoever bids the highest.” He raises a brow, and the effect it has with his eyes is unsettling; he seems to be staring right into Tristan’s soul and judging it—and, by extension, him—despite the blindness. “And right now? That someone’s in Sundari, and they’re very interested in having you come back home, ade.”
The use of Mando’a has barely registered in Tristan’s mind when the man leaves, his footsteps turning into echoes that fill the corridors with his presence like a ghost.