Alarm bells are sounding in Jarren’s mind as he dashes to the cockpit wondering why the repair process has stopped. He quickly covers the distance from the crew lounge and slips through the hatch in the bulkhead into the cockpit. Scanning ahead, in front of the ship, reveals nothing but the typical featureless landscape, melting into waves of heat induced distortion in the distance. Jarren feels secure that there is nothing out front, so he leans over the pilot’s seat to have a look out the starboard side. Again, even with his keen eyesight, the Omwati sees nothing but endless sun-blasted wasteland. Scrambling over the jump seat and into the co-pilot’s seat, he looks out the port side window and again sees nothing until he’s about to turn away. At that moment, he glimpses a flash of movement in his peripheral vision. Trying to spot the source of the movement, he presses his face against the window to look down the length of the ship toward the rear. It’s virtually impossible to make anything out due to the acute viewing angle, but he definitely sees movement near the back of the ship and it doesn’t look mechanical.

Jarren holds there for a tense moment, waiting. His patience pays off several seconds later as two childlike figures come slightly into view. It’s still extremely difficult to see clearly since it requires him to keep his face up against the window, but he has a wary suspicion that they are indigenous Jawas. As he knows, Jawas are not a technologically advanced race, so haven’t settled on worlds other than their native Tatooine. Nonetheless, (and as Jarren is well aware) they are famous throughout the galaxy as thieves and swindlers. Jarren also knows of their uncanny ability to “appropriate” anything that isn’t nailed down for their own use, not bothered by ridiculous concepts such as legality and ownership.

As he continues to look on, the small brown cloaked figures point behind the ship and raise their arms overhead in what he could swear are poses of excited victory. In fact, as far as he can tell, one of the glowing-eyed little creatures seems to be joyfully hopping up and down. What could possibly have them so excited, he wonders? Whatever the reason, it can’t be good.

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Callouste looks confused. Woodlands? Meadows? He adds invisible friends to the list in his head as well, but, not wanting to offend, doesn’t say anything out loud. The wasteland is a harsh place and the heat can be unforgiving - It must have shorted a few circuits in this fellow, he thinks. Otherwise, he seems decent enough. Might as well humor him a little and try to ease him back into reality.

“Um… right,” says Cal, trying to hide his disbelief. “Sounds like you’ve had some excitement there.”

“Thanks again for the pointers, by the way.” Twinkling with anger again, he goes on, “I’m going to find that son-of-a-bitch Joko soon enough, and now I’m going to be able to blast him, blast him just fine, thanks to you. That snout-headed bastard ran off with her, you know. That has to be worse than exploding fuel stocks, no?” Not looking at Ian, he glances off into space, his anger fading to sadness with the thoughts of his lost love.

“Treese is an angel, Ian … a green, Rodian angel! I’m not sure how that evil worm lured her away,” Cal says, breaking his stare and glancing up, “but, I’ll get her back. Yep, I’ll get her back …one way or another.”

“More water?” asks Cal, standing up and gathering the cups. He and Ears have a short tug-of-war before Ears gives up his cup with a crisp cackle.

Dex walks through the gate as Cal is getting set to head back inside. "Greetings, my good sirs. I am the hallucination going by the name of Dex. No doubt you have heard of me." He follows up his statement with a request for a glass of water as well.

Cal raises his eyebrow and looks at Dex then back at Ian not so sure that he can dismiss the rest of Ian’s tales as fantasy quite so easily now. Staring fairly obviously at the towel wrapped around Dex’s head, he calls out, “Hello Dex. I’d say the reports of your unreality are greatly exagerated. Judging by your matching, er …ponchos, I take it you are from the same ship as Ian here? Hold on, I’ll get that water.”

Inside his house, worry slowly creeps over Cal as he thinks back to what Ian was saying about slave traders. If this Dex guy is real, maybe his story about the Bothans is real too. And, if that’s true, then these guys must be escaped slaves. That would certainly explain their strange appearance and them showing up from the mesa instead of calling in for a tow from their ship. Somebody somewhere is probably looking for these guys. And… what if they’re dangerous? Ian seems harmless enough, but he sure knows a lot about weapons. There’s something about this new guy too. He has a bit of an edge to him.

Returning outside, Cal passes out the cups of water to the two humans and Ears, eyeing Dex with some apprehension. The dust stirs lazily as he takes up station once again on the corner of the junk box.

Dex launches into his description of how they are traders and their ship was damaged. Cal sits there listening, internally trying to figure out which tale to believe – Dex’s or Ian’s. Dex’s tale, although seemingly unlikely at first, is utterly convincing after hearing out the turbaned human. Cal can’t put his finger on it, but Dex just seems to speak the truth. Thereafter, Cal is sold. He believes every word Dex tells him about their origins and predicament, discounting Ian’s far-fetched tale and chalking it up to delusional paranoia. [OOC: Old Cal’s Sense Motive check failed catastrophically vs. Dex’s Bluff.]

Once Dex is done telling Cal their troubles, he goes on to ask Cal about the settlement.

“Mos Taike? That’s the settlement. It’s about a kilometer that way, beyond that ridge.” He points in the direction that the party had been traveling. “They’re good folk over there if you don’t count Joko - moisture farmers mostly along with some merchants. There’s just enough of them to discourage the Sand People from raiding, although they still do once in a while out of spite anyway.”

“There are a couple of cantinas, some supply stores, some scrap collectors that deal with the Jawas, and that’s about it. Oh, there’s a small spaceport and repair bay ran by Coozer not too far from the settlement. We used to be partners before I opened my place here.” Cal looks around at the piles of rusted junk with unabashed pride. “He could probably help you fix your ship, but I doubt he’d have any parts for it. You’d probably have to go to Mos Espa for that.” He sees that Dex and Ian are unsure about where that is, so adds, “It’s about 60 kilometers or so to the northwest, not too far past Mos Entha. Hey! Hold on a minute, I’ll be right back.”

With that, Callouste disappears once again into his office, coming back out after about three or four minutes holding out a datapad for Dex. “Here you go,” he says smiling and handing over the pad. “It’s an old map I had lying around. You can keep it. It ought to help you find your way around”

Dex thanks Cal and looks at the datapad which is presenting a map of Tatooine with their location marked.

“It has a built in tracking device,” remarks Cal, anticipating Dex’s question.

Stretching his portly frame, Cal asks, “You fellas need anything else? The day's getting on.”

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[OOC: If Dex wants to ask about the porn, he’ll have to phrase it and include it in the next reply since Cal’s reaction may depend on what you say.]