Jez sighs sorrowfully as Rast disappears into the swirling dust. She'd only just met the man and she felt much more affection for him than she really should at this point. It had been some time since she'd known a man who wasn't abusive, or exploitative, and she supposed a good argument could be made that she'd never known one.
Jez was born on the lowest levels of Coruscant. Her father was killed before she was born in a death-stick deal gone bad. Her mother was a troubled person with a taste for spice so consuming that she sold her only daughter to the hutts before Jez had seen her seventh birthday.
Jez had ended up on Nal Hutta shortly after being sold to Husdaa, a minor figure in the Hutt Clan but a big deal in the Lower Coruscant spice trade. The slug kept a palace outside of Bilbousa set amongst a vast, sweltering, and foul smelling bog.
Husdaa was gluttonous, even for a hutt, and his kitchens operated day and night. Jez would be a dishwasher but as a young girl she did not take to a life of servitude easily until the gamorrean task-master Grig properly motivated her with regular beatings and frequent jabs with his nerf-prod.
Humans were neither a common or welcome site on Nal Hutta and even the other slaves would be cruel to her. At an age where most people can rely on the care of parents, Jez was entirely on her own.
"I don't like this, Jez," the twi'lek girl said fuming, "What are we supposed to be doing here while he's out there roaming?"
"I don't know, Zee," Jez sighs as she slouches against the back wall of the cockpit, "I need something to eat. You want something?"
Zamila shakes her head, "No. I'm going to work on those transponder codes."
Zamila rushes past Jez, her lekku bouncing wildly as she storms away. Jez takes one last look at the dust clouded wastes before heading back to the galley.
In Husdaa's kitchens Jez had begun to learn the culinary trade from an ithorian called Moe. Jez loved the skill it took to turn base ingredients into something wonderful. Best of all, you have to taste what you are cooking and so you were able to eat something other than the standard slave diet of swamp tubers and grist-porridge. Moe had taken her on as a sort of appentice and she had heard that some slave chefs could rise to notoriety and gain their freedom. Fate had a different path for young Jez.
The Black Cat's galley is a disaster of encrusted plates and flatware. She smirks at the idea that after everything that she'd been through, she's back in the kitchen doing dishes. She sighs and grabs a plate and starts to scrape.
When Jez was thirteen or maybe fourteen, Husdaa came through the kitchen, which he never did, with a human man. The man was tall, thin, and his hair was streaked with gray. He had a great beak of a nose and eyes that seemed to lack life, like a droid's optic inputs, she thought.
Moe was showing Jez how to properly debone a rock fowl when the man and hutt came over to them.
Husdaa croaks in huttese, "Well?"
The man stares at Jez rubbing his chin, "She'll do," he says in his own near perfect huttese before he turns and walks out of the kitchen.
"Good news, girl," the hutt exclaims, his corpulent body jiggling as he speaks, "You'll be going to Nar Shaddaa, to the Correllian Sector."
"But master, I'm learning to become a chef with Moe."
"Silence, girl," the hutt continues, "The deal has been done. Pack your things at once."
The slug turns and slithers out of the kitchen. Jez remembers hugging Moe and crying. Moe holding her and telling her it was going to be alright. But it wasn't going to be alright. She'd learned that Husdaa sold her for access to a supply of rare, soft body insects. She had always hoped he choked on those bugs.
Jez dries the last dish and places it in the cupboard and stands back to see what she accomplished.
"Still got it," she smirks, looking at the now spotless galley.
The Black Cat had one of these newer food synthesizers but to Jez it always felt like cheating. She puts a pot on the stove to boil some water.
The man Husdaa sold her to had a peculiar appetite that anywhere else in the galaxy would have landed him in a cage. In Hutt Space it was frowned upon but most turned a blind eye to it.
Whatever could be said about Husdaa, he was a shrewd businessman. Jez figures he acquired her at a young age with a mind to sell her off to Kel Nesdit when she was "old enough" for his taste. An investment kf sorts.
Kel Nesdit was what was called an importer. This meant he was a fence for smugglers and thieves, a go-between between the black market and the more genteel residents of Nal Hutta and Nar Shaddaa. Why they would rather deal with an abuser of young girls, than honest, hard-working criminals, she never understood.
Jez takes the noodles off the stove to cool. Zee said she didn't want anything but she made enough for her anyway. After Jez brews herself a cup of caff and puts some noodles into a bowl, she sits down at one of the tables in the dining area.
The noodles aren't the best she made, but not bad considering what she had to work with. When she's done eating, and after she cleans her bowl and cup, she goes to clean another one of the cabins.
Kel Nesdit abused her for a few years until she was too old for him and then he used her to grease the palms of prospective and current business partners. With her new job Jez got a level of autonomy; she still had to go on countless "dates" but she did get to leave the Correlian Sector compound, and get away from Kel.
Jez's dates would go out of their way (most of them anyway) to convince themselves that the dated were something that they weren't, that Jez had a choice. This meant dinners, concerts, and parties. Jez could almost convince herself that she was free, that she had a choice, but the bill always came, and Jez always had to pay up.
Jez enters one of the slaver's rooms that hadn't been cleaned out yet. It was certainly one of the quarren's rooms. She knew their scent very well. Some unpleasant memories began to flood in and she pushes them away.
She dumps several dresser drawers onto the bed, throwing the trash to the side and the few items of value into a neat pile. When she picks it up, an innocuous little cylinder that could fit in the palm of her hand, she didn't recognize it for what it was at first. As she examines it closer the realization of what it was came to her. She wraps her hand around it and looks behind her to see if anyone is around before looking again.
Jez looks at the spice-shooter again, just curious if any of the drug was in it. She slides it open and can see it's nearly full. Fear, anger, and excitement swells in her.
She had started using spice shortly after Kel had pushed her onto his clients. Many of them were users, and users don't like to use alone if they can help it. It made coping with her circumstances a little more bearable at first but it soon became a desperate need.
She had been conflicted about using it in the beginning. She was a slave because of her mother's addiction to it. Slaves less fortunate than herself were worked to death in mines to acquire it. It's production and sale helped to empower the hutts and their affiliates like Kel. She hated everything about spice, except of course, how it made her feel.
"Hey, Jez," Zamila shouted, startling her to where she almost dropped the spice.
"Hey, Zee," she responds slyly tucking the spice into her waistband.
"I realize we haven't spent all that much time together and I thought we could get to know each other a little."
It would be nice to have a little girl time. The other girls in the cages were like frightened birds and she couldn't even remember any of their names. All of the people Jez had ever known were either victims or bullies and it was time to find out what Zee was.
"Yeah, sure," Jez responded, "I'd like that."
The two lounged and spoke while 9-LOM brought them cups of caff. For the first time in her life Jez told the whole sad story, and learned the young twi'lek's life was not exempt from heartache. Zee told her how her father had been killed by the slaver's in a shootout. She managed to get off a few good shots which was the only reason she made it out alive.
The whole time Zee was opening up to her Jez could feel the spice-shooter pressing up against her hip. Taunting her. Jez wanted to keep the girl talking for as long as possible because Jez knew what she was going to do once she was alone. She felt disgusted with herself because she could be honest about so much but not this one thing. Zamila was being so open and honest with her but Jez was still just a liar.
