Star Wars_ Tales From the Mos Eisley Cantina - Kevin J. Anderson [131]
Another of the preachers fell silent. BoShek wasn’t sure he liked their attention, but the cops had moved to surround the ship, and he could hear the commotion in the cargo hold as they began their search. And now, attracted to a scene of trouble like flying insects to light, a stormtrooper patrol was also heading toward the ship.
BoShek pulled his robe closer about him and leaned farther out the window, saying, “Repent! Dig deep into your hearts, and the truth shall set you free!”
“Be silent,” the priest on his right hissed. BoShek noted that he wore a robe considerably cleaner than his own, and his fingers and wrists were spangled with gold rings and bracelets. Preaching was evidently good business.
“Be silent yourself,” BoShek told him. He could hear the cops ascending the ramp now. “On second thought, don’t be. Preach, or we’re both going to be saying our prayers in jail.” He turned back to the window and said to the crowd below, “There are disbelievers among you, people who deny the existence of the Force, or say that it’s weakened with time and no longer useful in these modern days, but I say to you, every living creature that is born increases the power of the Force.”
The preacher who had shushed him glanced warily down the ramp, then turned back to his window and picked up where he’d left off, saying in a voice loud enough to drown out BoShek completely, “Consider the banthas of the dunefields. They quail not; neither do they sting. They are the holiest of beasts …”
Oh, boy. This guy was the real item. BoShek was glad he hadn’t tried to fake the monastery religion, although the preacher didn’t seem too thrilled to be hearing a competing doctrine, either. Well, it couldn’t be helped; BoShek was committed now.
The other preacher resumed his spiel too, offering to heal anyone who tossed him money.
BoShek gladly let them drown him out, babbling on about the Force merely to keep up his cover. He could sense the cops behind him, three of them sweeping blast rifles around the observation deck. He closed his eyes and wished for a miracle, wished that they would just turn around and march back down the ramp and go away.
A high-pitched Jawa voice chittered angrily from below. The unmistakable crack of blaster fire made BoShek nearly leap out the window, but he realized just in time that the shooting had come from outside, too. He leaned out and peered around the curve of the hull, and could just see the Jawa lying in a smoking heap on the ground. The patrol squad of white-armored stormtroopers stood in the middle of the square, waving their blast rifles around menacingly, but no one else fired.
The cops behind BoShek rushed back down the ramp to investigate. BoShek leaned against the window frame for support, his legs suddenly weak. Whatever the Jawa had done, its noisy death had distracted the cops long enough for him to escape.
He turned to go, only to meet a gold-ringed fist with his face. He staggered back and landed hard on the floor. “Mock us, will you?” the preacher snarled at him, aiming a kick at his ribs that BoShek barely dodged.
The other preachers quickly joined the first in kicking and hitting him. “Here’s for trying to make people laugh at us!” one of them said as he nearly wrenched BoShek’s arm from its socket. “And here’s for leading the militia up here,” another said.
BoShek scrambled to his feet, trying to explain. “No, wait, I didn’t mean to—” But they weren’t interested in excuses. Under continual pummeling, he covered his head and dived for the ramp, rolled halfway down it, and came up running. He thought the preachers would leave it at that, but two of them chased him right out of the wreck and out into the plaza, where the police, gathered around the Jawa’s corpse, turned to see