Star Wars: Haste and Hutt

Ian froze momentarily, as he gawked at the marionette-like girl, whose strings had been threaded and pulled at; bringing her to life, only to be severed seconds later.

The sobs of the little girl had subverted his expectations and had subconsciously altered his attitude towards the test. It wasn't just a puzzle to be solved or game to be won anymore. No, this 'test' had quickly become something more... authentic. It didn't feel like an artificial construct of the system to Ian, but more like a... memory being played out.

"It can't be," Ian remarked, dubious, as he looked down at a pair of pale white hands; his hands. This was definitely his body, not one of the masters, or someone else's, and he had full control of his actions.

"It has to be a distraction, a trick. Yes... that makes sense, the purpose of this test... It should be to ignore external appearances, and see what lies within... See through the convincing masquerades, the fake tears, and find the evil... the darkness that lurks..." Ian started to infer. He felt like he was closing in on the truth, but still, something was off...

Ian could feel the answer; the reason and intent behind this test, brush against his mind for a moment, as he stared into Mia's tear-streaked eye's, only for the ever-present ticking of the dripping faucet to break his concentration, and implant in him a spurious state of nervous urgency.

"Tsk, there's not enough time... If I spend all day trying to figure it out..." Ian muttered to himself, and unbeknownst to him, his natural disposition was slowly starting to morph. The instinctive empathy he held for the crying little girl was diminishing; dwindling by the second, and a cold detachment crept into him.

The Junkers were his main priority right now, and no matter how many crocodile tears were shed by these synthetic creatures, or if they were indeed memories; ghost, it wouldn't make him wait around to sympathize with them. Real people. People whom by proxy he owed his life, were in danger, and he had to prioritize them.

Ian went to each 'suspect' one by one, interrogating them with, "Do you enjoy the suffering of others?" He would ask it again and again. To an anaemic old man, to a distinctive variety of abnormal-looking aliens, and even to what Ian recognised as a Wookie.

Ian finished questioning seven of them, and their reactions were all the same, fear, trepidation, and dread, interspersed with the occasional bout of blubbering and bawling. He ignored it, their empiric responses were all that mattered, and they had concluded in a resounding no; among those he had asked, none of them had said they enjoyed seeing others in pain. That was until he came to the Hutt...

Ben'bo'daga the Hutt was the last among the eight that Ian queried. The monstrosity was just far too obvious a pick to be the cast as the villain, at least in Ian's mind, so Ian had focused on questioning the others first, but when he finally came around to asking the Hutt, it's response was... something different.

"Do you enjoy the suffering of others... Ben'bo'daga?" Ian droned out, half expecting the same sorrowful rebuttal he had received so many times before.

The Hutt came to life, and threateningly, its tail whipped out, inches away from Ian, whirling around as it slapped off the floor. Ian quickly stepped back, distancing himself from the aggressive Hutt.

"Ha, you bastard! I am a glorious Hutt. Je'daii, your mind tricks won't work on me! Do I enjoy other's suffering? Hahaha, you cretin! I'd sure love to see you suffer!" The Hutt roared, indignant, and after it had finished its unexpected outburst of defiance, it remained animated; awake, as it glared down at Ian with its bug-like eyes, awaiting his response.

Ian was apathetic in front of the Hutt, ignoring it as he contemplated. "Hmm, a Je'daii mind trick... So this isn't just a simple guess-who type test then, there's some sort of... plot, underlying all of this. A sequence of events, that has led all of these, 'characters' here..."

Drip, drip, drip..

"F*ck does is it even matter, it doesn't change 'my' situation; I'm still short on time, and the question remains the same, who the heck is the villain?"

The awoken Hutt had added a new dynamic to the test, but Ian wasn't entirely sure yet how it would affect the outcome. The Hutt seemed to have free-will and was unaffected by the supposed rules of the test.

"It doesn't matter... if I can rule the others out." Ian said, glaring harshly at the Hutt, "It will just leave this bastard."