There are times when I need to know a thing and my overactive brain won’t stop spinning until I do know the thing. That’s why I kept asking my mother why she’d dragged me to Arbiflux, every minute of every day…until the day she died.

I never got an answer that satisfied me.

Anyway…lucky for me, Triple-Zero had his own observations about all the burnt-out droid husks littering the ground…

TRIPLE-ZERO:

Oh my. Such slaughter. Such terrible slaughter…These poor droids!

Forced to work on this dull moisture farm and now reduced to scrap thanks to careless fleshy ones…

APHRA (narration):

I knelt down on the grimy dirt floor, running my fingers over the blaster marks. And I felt a sudden flash of familiarity. This boy—

Skywalker—had grown up so much like I had. He probably spent his days wondering what life was like away from this dry, desolate place—

what adventures he could have. Why he ended up here.

He must’ve pestered his parents with the same endless questions.

APHRA:

I guess it’s an irony. If the boy was here when the jackboot came down, the Empire would still have the Death Star. But if the family wasn’t killed, maybe he’d never have left.

Revenge is one hell of a motivator.

DARTH VADER:

You are correct.

We are too late. Let us move on.

APHRA (narration):

We traveled just a few kilometers away, to the Jundland Wastes, and another small, boring structure that looked like it had recently sustained serious damage.

APHRA:

Assuming Mr. Greatest-Bounty-Hunter-in-the-Galaxy has got his grid refs right, this is where Boba Man, er, Fett fought the boy. And lost.

DARTH VADER:

Wait here until signaled…

APHRA (narration):

The Dark Lord entered the structure…and then I guess did some of his Force magic stuff? We heard him talking to himself, his deep voice booming off the crumbling walls…

TRIPLE-ZERO:

Mistress Aphra, according to my data banks, the act of eavesdropping is considered most impolite!

APHRA:

Exactly, Trip. That’s why I’m doing it.

TRIPLE-ZERO:

I knew there was a reason we get on so well, mistress. If I may say so: For an organic, you are not a complete waste of space!

APHRA:

Shhh, Trip. Big boss is talking to himself…

DARTH VADER:

He fended off the bounty hunter. The boy is strong with the Force…

but with little or no training.

APHRA:

[sotto]

Okay. Interesting?

TRIPLE-ZERO:

I’m not sure our definitions of interesting align, mistress.

BEETEE:

BLEEP BLEEP!

APHRA:

Shhh, settle down, you two. I just mean interesting in the sense that…

any information we can gather from observing Lord Vader is information we can also use to make ourselves even more valuable to Lord Vader.

TRIPLE-ZERO:

Forgive me, Mistress Aphra, but I am already quite valuable on my own! I am a protocol droid, fluent in—

APHRA:

Shhhhh! He’s talking again.

DARTH VADER: