Chapter Fourteen

"I assure you that your search is in vain, all of my goods are above board! My books and even the two cargo freighters here at present are open for your perusal of course, but you won't find what you're searching for among my good." Said the Twi'lek in front of Master Tholme, one Pol'secura, head of the Secura clan.

He was a Rutian Twi'lek, and a somewhat obese one, a sign of wealth and power among his people. Given the conditions here on their home planet the Twi'leks very rarely had more food than what was the minimal requirement, one of several reasons why they had been so eager to sell themselves into slavery for interstellar trade.

"I rather think you're right, however we have to be thorough." said Master Tholme, not allowing any of his real thoughts appear on his face. The Twi'lek put out so many waves of anxiety, which spiked when they mentioned what they were here to look for, that it was obvious they had found at least one of the people involved in the endangered animal trade.

That would allow them more time to hunt down whatever the local disturbance in the Force was. The joyful feeling in the Force had grown since their arrival, and now he too was feeling a sense of purpose here, much like his padawan. Whatever their official purpose, the Force was hinting that there was more here to be discovered, perhaps someone as well.

And the sooner we finish our investigation, whatever the outcome of that, the sooner I can devote all of my time to that search along with my padawan's. Even now his padawan was moving through the caverns of the Twi'lek city, trying to sense whatever it was that the Force was hinting at.

The Twi'lek smiled at Tholme's words, then frowned as one of his aides entered. "Why are you interrupting us!?" he barked.

"Clan Leader," the Twi'lek said in Ryl bowing his head, his tentacles twitching and agitation. "The Hutt is on the line."

Pol frowned, gesturing at the Jedi master. "Forgive me, but I have to take this. Politics, you understand."

"Often the Order's bane as well." Tholme replied sagely, nodding his head. He could feel another spike in Pol's emotions, sudden tension and anxiety a palpable wave to his senses, and wondered what had gone wrong somewhere else for the Twi'lek . As Pol left, the Jedi master sat down in his chair, closing his eyes and concentrating, sending his consciousness out through the Force to follow the man.

Soon enough the Twi'lek had hurried into a small communications room. "What is it, you know you're not supposed to be contacting me!" He said in Huttese, a language that Tholme had learned as a matter of course, since he preferred to work on the Outer Rim of the Republic, where Huttese was almost as universally spoken as Galactic Standard.

"We have a problem. Your niece is missing. She was gone from her cell this morning, without anyone the wiser. I've had the guards on duty last night flogged for that, but I have no lead on where she went."

The man gaped at the HUD and astonishment. "How could a young girl of nine have escaped from your slave pens!"

With that Tholme pulled his senses back frowned thoughtfully. Interesting, very interesting, I think I just found a target for my padawan's side of this search.

OOOOOOO

For several local days Harry and Aayla learned together, with Aayla teaching Harry many of the words and even some of the sentence structure of the Twi'lek people. In turn, on their second day together Harry began to teach Aayla how to concentrate, indicating that it was the first stage of teaching her magic.

That was incredibly difficult to get across thanks to their inability to communicate well, but Aayla was very intelligent and understood what Harry was trying to explain, and even had something to show for it quickly. Before that second day was done, she was able to hover a small pebble a few inches above her hand.

While Aayla was giggling and dancing around in delight, chanting "ma'gic" to herself Lily shook her head. "I don't know what it is here Harry, but I think the magical aura of the planet itself is somehow easier to use than Earth's. That and her own power are the only two explanations I have for Aayla being able to learn so quickly."

At hearing her name, Aayla turned, staring up at Lily with a wide smile on her face, as she held up the stone. A second later it began to float above her palm again, and Lily clapped her hands, making a sound only they could hear. "Well done!" Lily smiled, and watched as the girl flushed in pleasure at the positive reinforcement even if she couldn't understand the words.

Harry nodded with a smile. "Maybe that, or maybe magic users have been wrong about when to start teaching magic before this."

"I think it's possibly all three. Well, in any event, I think that you need to head out and find some more food for the two of you. For such a small thing, she eats more than you do these days." Lily laughed, reaching out to ruffle her son's hair.

"Okay." Harry smiled at Aayla, then made a motion toward his mouth. "Food. Harry, get." That was about as good as Harry could do with his current ability to speak what he had learned was called 'Ryloth.'

Aayla looked at him, before she nodded and set her pebble down. Then she moved to stand beside him, looking at Harry expectantly. Lily frowned. "I think Aayla want's to go with you."

"Well, I can cover her with the spy special I guess," Harry said, speaking of the number of spells Harry had come up with to help him move around without being seen. "If I were Aayla I don't think I'd like to be left behind too."

"That's either there dear, but alright. This way I can go along as usual anyway to keep an eye on you."

With that Harry nodded at Aayla, gesturing around the two of them. "Speak, I hear, Twi'lek no." He said, substituting the word for the local species with the word 'other' since he didn't know that one yet. After a moment, Aayla understood what he said and nodded her head, still grasping his hand.

Leaving Harry's small hideaway the two children made their way through the mountain's interior moving toward the small area among the richest zone where Harry knew they would find food stalls. Aayla looked around her avidly every step of the way, never having been allowed out save on the Hutt's land.

She eagerly gestured at some of the foodstuffs on sale, watching as Harry stole a few things with on one the wiser. The two of them split a frozen bar of Ryloth Ice cream, a hideously expensive treat that Aayla had always wanted to try, while they moved through the crowd.

After about an hour however their fun was interrupted by a deep baritone roar, followed by the screams of those nearby.

OOO About an hour previous: OOO

Pol Secura's position as head of Clan Secura was not a secure one. While one of his brothers had died, the other, Lon, was still around, and while young, was well liked both inside the clan and out. Worse from the Republic's perspective was Pol's illegal contraband trading, including the issue the Jedi were here to look into.

But Pol's position in the clan itself was so tenuous he had gotten rid of his older brother's daughter, Aayla, in such a way to enrich himself and to make it seem as if she had been hidden away to protect her from the clan's enemies. But if Lon or any of the rest of the clan learned he had sold her to a Hutt, the consequences for Pol would be dire. So he and the Hutt in question, whose name was Lirraca, had decided to cut their losses.

"Are you certain of this master?" said a medical droid, entering a large cage, holding in one of its hands a blanket that Aayla would have recognized. It's other hand, a multi-tool, was open to the syringe, and a drug of some kind was already percolating through it. "Once used, TZ1-052 will make any further training of the subject impossible."

"Do it droid." Said Lirraca the Hutt, an obese slug of a creature, speaking via a communicator set onto the droid's head. "It must be done, and it is not the loss of the wampa that I regret. Shame, she would have made me a pretty profit down the line." With the Hutt equivalent of a sigh, the crime lord cut the connection, opening the cage behind the droid and the doors to the outside of his underground mansion at the same time.

The droid gave an electronic snarl that was his version of a sigh, and then proceeded with what he had been ordered to do. He moved toward the sleeping creature, first waking it up by holding a piece of meat under its nose. The massive mountain of dirty white fur growled, and chomped on it with serrated teeth, ripping and tearing.

After it was finished its meal, the droid silently held up the blanket taken from slave Secura's quarters. "Seek and kill." It intoned in a sort of hypnotic, droning tone. "Seek and kill." It went on in this vein for several moments, until the wampa was blinking it's eyes and shaking it's head, trying to sniff out the trail already.

With the command imbedded in the semi-trained wampa, the droid swiftly jabbed in the syringe, pumping it full of the drug underground gladiators everywhere in the Republic called 'Brainbash', because while it would give the body an immense boost, it would also destroy the person's brain if taken in all but the smallest doses. Even for the massive creature's weight, what the droid had just injected was more than large enough to destroy what little mental acuity it originally possessed.

The droid backed away rapidly, watching as the wampa's eyes went bloodshot, and it roared. "RAAAROOOOO!" A second later it heaved at its chains, all previous training gone, it's entire being now centered on the last thing it remembered, a scent, the smell of its prey. And nothing would be allowed to get in its way.

The droid began to back away rapidly, watching as the restraints on the wampa strained against its enhanced strength. "Oh dear." Before the droid could leave the cage, the beast's chains broke and it charged forward. "Oh deaaaazzzzhhghhsh….."

Moments later the wampa was gone, roaring its way out of the Hutt's mansion, leaving a trail of destruction, though not death, Liracca having pulled all his people out of its way. Almost immediately after the creature left some of those servants droids and slaves, went to work, making it look as if the creature had escaped without any kind of aid, even supplying a few dead bodies just in case.

But before they could get to the wampa's cage and dispose of the medical droid, Quinlan got there first. Master Tholme was a master at covering his presence and had passed on this skill to his padawan, who was using it to the utmost now. Once in the cage Quinlan reached down, touching the medical droid's mangled head, closing his eyes. After a moment he frowned, setting it into a small pack he carried on his back. The next thing Quinlan touched was the blanket.

The Kiffar people were unique in that some of them were born with the ability to use psychometry, the ability to see images of the past taken from an object. Quinlan was remarkably gifted in that area, and it served him now, as did the Force. Suddenly in that moment Quinlan knew, he knew what, or rather who, he personally was here to find, the image of the young blue-skinned Twi'lek girl appearing in his mind with a clarity he had never seen before.

And he also knew that she was in danger, the Force was practically clamoring for his attention. Dropping the blanket back to the floor Quinlan hurried out of Lirraca's mansion, using his skills at covering his presence until he was out and on the maddened wampa's trail.