Chapter 22: Sand and Stone
21 BBY, Tatooine
Harry Potter laughed in excitement as he gunned the Speeder forward, while also swerving to avoid the blaster bolts. He turned around and looked at his many pursuers, took out his blaster, and shot a few of them before turning forward again.
This was the most fun that he had in a very long time, and that was a sentiment that had been echoed by HK-47, who was standing behind him on the Speeder while holding a very large blaster rifle, yelling, “Excited Statement: Die, meatbags. Die!”
Harry shook his head at that, though he was still chuckling.
Who would have thought that having a bounty on his head would end up being so much fun? It was a scene straight out of Mad Max, with a small army of bounty hunters chasing after him in the desert. He had thought that the few encounters in Mos Espa would have been the end of it, but it turned out that his pursuers, if anything, were more restrained there.
Maybe there were some kind of rules that were enforced in the Spaceport?
Harry wasn’t exactly knowledgeable about the unspoken etiquette of bounty hunting, though he doubted that most of his pursuers were actual bounty hunters, and not pirates or smugglers, trying to cash in on his bounty.
At least they had been useful. This whole bounty business did save him from having to go shopping, and that alone was a positive. He’d seen some of it done back in the spaceport, and the haggling looked tiresome, to be honest. He rather preferred just taking what he could from the people who tried to kill him, much like the nice Speeder that he was driving.
He had ‘liberated’ it from some idiot that tried to ambush him just outside of Jorin’s shop. It was a pretty stupid move, given the fact that HK didn’t bother hiding the many weapons that he had looted, which made Harry wonder if the criminals of Tatooine just didn’t have any form of self-preservation whatsoever. Still, it was good timing, to be honest, since he would have had to look for one to get to his destination.
He would have felt some remorse, but his attackers, especially on Tatooine, were not the nicest of people, and they were trying to kill him.
Speaking of HK, the droid seemed to have gotten bored with his weapon and took out what seemed to be some kind of sniper blaster, magnetically attached himself to the Speeder for stability, and started firing at them.
The assassination droid was quickly growing on him. He was more… vibrant than T7, who Harry thought had little to no personality or motivation, aside from serving him, despite the Rakatan technology involved in his making.
Harry privately liked seeing how people reacted to being called ‘meatbags’ by HK-47 to their faces, and the sheer number of weapons he collected, like an overgrown metallic Niffler, was funny.
The wizard was tempted to actually upgrade him with magical means. It would be an interesting project; his magic didn’t usually mesh well with delicate machinery, but using it in conjunction with the Force should work and have very promising results. Honestly, it was such a nice project that he planned on finding a way to replicate this interaction with the Force to be able to use this magic outside this universe.
Harry quickly remembered why he shouldn't get caught up in his head in the middle of the fight, as he felt a blare of danger, as one of his pursuers seemed to have a margin of competency and fired accurately at Harry's Speeder. He swerved, of course, making the bolt miss, but it could have been a pretty nasty shot.
He then turned back and saw how many there were, before releasing a loud sigh.
All good things must come to an end.
He would have loved to stay around for more fun, but unfortunately, he had places to be, and it wasn’t a good idea to have criminals following him where he was going.
Harry turned to HK-47, who was still blasting with great accuracy their pursuers, with an idea appearing in his mind, “Hey, HK! How well can you aim in a Sandstorm?”
“Offended Statement: I do not suffer from such meatbag weaknesses. A sandstorm may blind organic pursuers, but my sensors will continue functioning normally, allowing me to observe their suffering in exquisite detail while shooting them. Perplexed Query: Though I am curious as to why you ask, as I currently detect no sandstorm.”
Harry only answered by raising his hands and channelling his magic. The energy interacted with the Force, which answered immediately; a giant storm began to appear, too quickly for it to be natural, with a gigantic wave of sand appearing before them, ready to swallow them whole.
Well, that was certainly more than he had expected. Harry really should have held that back a bit, but it would do.
He turned to HK, who had suddenly stopped firing and asked, “What about now?”
“Concerned Statement: It appears my sensors have suffered a catastrophic malfunction, Master. They are now reporting the existence of a rapidly approaching sandstorm where, moments ago, there was no sandstorm whatsoever.”
Harry continued laughing and spoke up loudly, “I’m sure that your sensors are fine. Now, are you ready?”
“Gleeful Statement: I am always ready to destroy meatbags.”
With a smirk on his face, Harry continued to accelerate forwards towards the storm itself and found himself smiling at the feeling of complete bewilderment that he sensed from his pursuers as they realised that he had no plans on avoiding the storm itself.
Of course, they didn’t know that the wizard had created a protective bubble around the Speeder and that he was barely feeling the effect of the sandstorm as he moved forward.
To Harry’s surprise, far too many of his pursuers continued into the sandstorm, which should have been more than was reasonable. Most had stopped, though, having enough sense to turn around, probably assuming that Harry would have foolishly gotten himself killed by his little stunt.
In the meantime, behind him, HK-47 was using his sniper to take them apart one by one. He really liked that sniper, didn’t he?
Though Harry was surprised when the droid suddenly just jumped out of the Speeder. He trusted him enough to do what he wanted, but the explosions that he could hear in the distance made him pause. Harry's eyes widened as he realised that HK was essentially jumping from one ship to another, while dropping grenades into each one.
Harry shook his head as he chuckled, "Bloody insane droid."
A few minutes later, the explosions stopped, and the wizard tried to sense if anyone was around; it seemed like either the storm itself, or his droid, had finally gotten rid of his pursuers.
And when it was over, Harry raised his hands once more, and the sandstorm practically collapsed onto itself, revealing that a Speeder was next to him, one that was being driven by HK-47. The droid must have stolen it from one of their pursuers in the Sandstorm, which Harry thought was a pretty impressive thing to do.
He turned to the droid and spoke up, “I hope that you haven’t gotten your fill of fighting yet.”
“Offended Statement: I am pleased to report that my desire for violence remains fully operational.”
The wizard burst into laughter at that, “Well, you remember what comes next, right?”
The droid didn’t speak up to confirm, but the way his eyes gleamed was more than enough of an answer. If he had to put it into words, it looked more like a childlike excitement than anything else, which mirrored his reaction when Harry had initially told him of this plan.
Harry continued, “Alright, see you on the other side, HK.”
And so, the droid nodded, and both his and HK’s paths diverged, just as planned. Well, the original plan was to do it later, but HK had enough initiative to get a Speeder of his own, and so it worked.
Soon, Harry found himself alone as Tatooine’s two suns finally sank into the horizon. The beauty of the sight contrasted greatly with the harsh lands that he was on.
As much fun as this little incident was, Harry knew that this planet was definitely not a nice place to be. The best way to explain it was like this entire world was dead. He could feel the remnants, echoes in the Force, of what had once been a flourishing life, a thriving civilisation, having died quite horribly and suddenly, leaving this endless desert of a planet. And while that was tragic, this was not why he disliked this place.
The sad fact was that most people on this planet did not want to be there. He could see it in the eyes of every resident, of every child, back on Mos Espa, the wish to leave this place behind. This entire world was a haven for criminals to either hide or do their business without oversight, and it was the residents that paid the price for that.
There were just enough residents to keep things afloat for crime to happen smoothly, while suffering because of the criminals that this world was built to service. It was a home that everyone wanted to leave, and there was something sad about that.
And that’s completely aside from the rampant slavery. Harry hadn’t even thought it was a thing, with how common droids were, and yet, it was a very old and very established industry. In fact, it turned out to be very rampant across the galaxy, and Harry really hated it, especially the way that it was enforced, with bombs implanted in the bodies of slaves, able to be killed at a moment’s notice.
Harry wished that he could help them, but without centuries and an army, there was very little that someone could do to stop it, at least on the sheer scale of the slave trade, especially since it had been established for tens of thousands of years, from the looks of it.
Still, an idea did cross his mind, “Perhaps…”
Harry shook his head at this thought and muttered, “Maybe later…”
For now, he had a lead regarding the symbol of Deathly Hallows, specifically Jabba the Hutt.
The Force had led him to the Shopkeeper, Jorin, who had been quite helpful, and he didn’t mind further listening to it and being generous with the man. He seemed like a nice chap, though a bit on the fearful side. Then again, the fight with the pirates that tried to ambush would have probably scared most people.
That had been quite rude of them, fighting inside an establishment like that, though the gunfight was fun.
Harry’s thoughts were interrupted as he finally saw the target in the distance.
Jabba’s palace.
It was a pretty ugly building, at least in Harry’s opinion. The entire structure was made up of a few circular towers of rusted Durasteel, with a main one in the middle, like big cans of soup in the sand.
For a few moments, Harry thought about how he should approach this. A part of him thought about being stealthy, but where was the fun in that?
A wide smile appeared on Harry’s face, one that would have scared anyone who knew him, as an amusing idea appeared in his mind.
He wouldn’t have normally done this, even if he had thought about it sometimes. Unfortunately, Daphne wouldn’t have let him hear the end of it if he went through with it, if he had. But then again, Daphne wasn’t here, was she?
Harry chuckled as he increased the Speeder’s speed, specifically towards the largest rotunda that made up Jabba’s Palace. A few of the spires seemed to light up as the crime lord’s security forces fired blasts at him, but Harry shielded himself and his Speeder against them.
He could hear many people around him shouting in panic, especially as he reached the building, and to their surprise, his Speeder didn’t shatter at the impact with the heavy steel walls. Instead, it was the walls that were ripped open, as Harry reinforced the Speeder very much.
The Speeder continued forward, through the walls and a few stones into the depths of the palace, until Harry sensed the Force telling him to stop, which he did, letting go of his reinforcement of the Speeder.
Finally, the vehicle crashed in a rather large room, and Harry jumped out of it just before the impact, sending a wave of dust and sand around him.
And with that done, he finally looked around him. He was in a rather large room that held what seemed to be a gathering of some kind. People of all races seemed to be smoking and drinking, a party, then.
The wizard then put a wide smile on his face and spoke up loudly, “Hello there. I’m sorry for dropping in, heh. Anyway, I’m looking for someone named Jabba.”
His words had seemingly broken the guests from their stupor, with most of the people in the room suddenly unsheathing their weapons and pointing them at him, ready to fire at him.
Harry ignored them completely and took a closer look at the guests.
If he was a crime lord, where would he be sitting at a party?
The answer was pretty obvious the moment he saw it. It was a throne, a pretty large one, that seemed perfectly made to look down at the guests as some kind of superior. On it seemed to be the equivalent of a giant slug, though Harry noted the large life force coursing through it. Hmm, a long-lived species indeed, quite resilient too, if he had to guess.
It was the rage that confirmed it. It was almost radiating from the giant slug, complete and absolute, at Harry’s actions.
He smiled at the giant slug, “Oh, you must be Jabba then. I had a couple of questions to ask you, and I’ll be on my way.”
Jabba raised his hand without saying a single word, and suddenly, alongside the guests, turrets seemed to appear from the walls and aim themselves automatically at him. They were humming threateningly, as if preparing to fire.
Harry rolled his eyes, took out the medallion from his pocket, and held it forward, allowing Jabba to see the symbol of the Deathly Hallows clearly, and asked, “Have you seen this symbol before?”
For the first time since the wizard laid his eyes on Jabba the Hutt, the crime lord’s eyes were not filled with rage. Instead, he had been overwhelmed by fear at the sight of the symbol of the Deathly Hallows.
Harry Potter smiled at that reaction.
Well, wasn’t that interesting?
AN: I had a lot of fun writing this chapter. As I said before, I’m still getting the hang of writing a Star Wars story, so bear with me if anything feels off.
As for this chapter, I thought that a Mad Max-like experience for Harry would have been interesting to write. I sort of got the idea after finishing the original draft, so I sort of rewrote it afterwards, so please let me know if you like the idea. I'm really excited about the next chapter, to be honest.
As usual, I don’t mind rewriting this chapter depending on your feedback, so please let me know what you think and if you have any suggestions.