Chapter Eleven – Adventure
"Did you miss me?" Harry asked his two droids after he landed on his ship right back in the same spot where he left and at the exact same time he left. He had checked is Datapad for the stored information in case he forgot. The only difference was his change in clothes.
"But you never left, Harry," replied OP3C, "except… you are now wearing different clothes. Oh, my!"
QE3C warbled and beeped his own reply.
"It may not seem like it but I've actually been gone about two years or a few days depending on how you look at it. What were we doing before I left?"
"You just told us to inform the Jedi Council about where you were going if you failed to return."
"Ah, yes. I suppose it wouldn't hurt to chat with them before we leave."
"Leave? Where are we going this time Harry?" asked OP.
"I'll explain that when I get back, OP. I have lots of plans and a few adventures for us. QE, prepare the ship for take-off. We'll depart when I return."
"Beep, beep."
"Thanks," Harry said as he turned and exited the ship to enter the Jedi Temple.
Even though Harry had explained to the Jedi Council on his way back from Dromund Kaas about his failure in rescuing Revan and Malak, he still felt it necessary to discuss it with them in person. However, he also wanted to inform them of his ability to go back to his home planet now and that he was leaving on personal business for a while.
They asked about his planet but when he explained that his people had never managed to make it out of their own solar system, they understood how far behind in technology his planet was. Then when he explained that he wasn't sure it was even in the same dimension, not to mention time frame, they were speechless.
He went on and shared a little more with them and they answered a few questions about the best planets to find rancors and highly magical or force sensitive trees and plant life. Dathomir and Felucia were both recommended for magical plants and they had rancors too. Most were a sub-species called a Jungle Rancor. There were many sub-species, including the Gnarled Rancor, Shadow Rancor, Tra'cor, Chrysalide, and Rancor Pygmy. The Bull Rancor species was known as the largest and were generally located on Dathomir, but could also be found on other planets like Felucia, Tatooine, and Teth.
"If you like looking for dangerous creatures, you might keep a wary eye out for the Acklay. They can be found on Felucia but are natively from Vendaxa," offered Master Lestin. "Oh, and beware of the Sarlacc which I believe can be found on Felucia as well. Very nasty creatures."
"Large Sarlacc on Tatooine there is," added Master Tokare. "Dangerous, yes! Careful go you."
"Thank you masters. I believe that will help me on my way. Please be sure and contact me if Revan or Malak show back up. I wish I could have helped them but the Sith lord was just too powerful. He somehow controls realities and would not allow me to even get near him. However, if I learn of a different way to beat him I will be sure and pay him another visit."
With a bow, Harry apparated back to his ship.
After speaking to MT in the Med Bay he had all three droids exit the ship with him before he shrunk it down using the spell Diminuendo. He then cast a spell over the entire ship called the Unbreakable Charm before returning it to its regular size. He had attracted some attention when he did that but they left immediately afterwards, as soon as he had all three droids back on the ship that is.
oOo
Now they were landing in the Dathomir Spaceport. On the trip over, Harry occupied his time by making sure the inside of his ship was protected with magic too. He even applied some runes to the storage area and increased its size a good bit. When not busy doing that he continued to study magic in the books he brought with him. QE was tasked with digitizing as many of the magic books as possible, with an emphasis on spell books, and placing them on Harry's Datapad for quick reference.
From the viewport, Dathomir looked very much like a hostile world, perfect for dangerous beasts and plants.
When he stepped off his ship, he was not overly impressed. The spaceport was basically just a grassy and muddy field with a few permacrete domes in a dull gray color. Over to the east looked to be some marshlands. A very high, mesh durasteel fence surrounded the whole place.
Harry checked in the Administrative office and Monarg's Mechanic Works for any information on where he could find what he was looking for but mostly he was looked at as if he was crazy. In the end, it was simple they told him. Once he stepped outside the fence, he was sure to find all and more of what he wanted. The trouble, they warned, was making sure what he was looking for didn't find him first. He promised to be extra careful.
Remembering a tool on his ship that might help, Harry went back and dug through all his personal items before he found the lightsaber he took off a Sith a few years ago. It had a dark orange blade. He had practiced some with a lightsaber (on the lowest setting) when training with the Jedi, but as he told them he wasn't interested in cutting off one of his limbs. However, since he was hoping to run into a rancor that was resistant to magic, then he was counting on the lightsaber coming in handy.
He hooked it on his belt and took off running toward the fence. Making himself feather light he was able to run super-fast, and then he leaped incredibly high in the air to clear the twenty-meter tall fence with ease. The people at the spaceport who saw it thought he was a Jedi, but certainly didn't think he dressed like one. Harry just continued on without breaking stride.
After he walked for a bit he came across some white trees that he felt attracted to, as if they were infused with magic. He checked his datapad and discovered that the trees were called Snowbark trees. Deciding this would be a good specimen to take back with him, he removed two of the trees from the ground, roots and all. Next, he cast a Stasis Charm on each, before he shrunk them down to a tiny size and stored them in one of his bags for safekeeping.
Travelling on, he found a few plants that caught his interest. They wouldn't work for wands but they were definitely worth studying. His datapad said they were good for healing. He collected samples of a Greybush, Lesset plant, Ongmuel plant, Redweed plant, and the Rinor herbal plant. Each pair were put in stasis like the Snowbark tree and stored for safekeeping.
When Harry drew closer to where the Witches of Dathomir were supposed to be located, the Singing Mountain Clan to be exact, he came across a crooked tree with woody barbs that he felt drawn to. This type of tree was called Grave Thorn. He made sure he added two to his collection.
However, while he was in the middle of doing that he found his first rancor, or rather the rancor found him. Of course, his first one just happened to be a Bull Rancor, the biggest of the bunch. It was distinguishable by its size and also sported four large tusks. Harry barely finished stowing his samples before he had to move quickly away from the hungry rancor.
He stayed on the move away from the monster until he was able to put away his samples and belongings properly. Once they were secured, he cast the Feather Light Charm on himself again and pulled his lightsaber.
"Pssshew Nnnnnnnnn…."
The orange glow of the blade was like a homing beacon to the giant behemoth. His head snapped around to the blade after he had lost sight of Harry for a moment. The rancor must have stood ten meters tall. Now then, just how to kill him but not ruin any important parts? Actually, how to do that and not die in the process?
When the overgrown rancor rushed Harry again, he leaped high onto a rock at the last moment. When the rancor stopped and wasn't sure where Harry went, Harry jumped down onto the rancor's neck and shoved the full blade of his lightsaber into the top of its head, hoping to reach the brain. It must have worked because the rancor came to a complete stop and all noise ceased, except for the quiet hum of the lightsaber, which was currently muffled due to it being buried deep in the rancor's skull.
The rancor made one last half-hearted growl before going completely slack and falling face forward. Harry quickly shut off his lightsaber and leaped free of the beast. Checking it carefully he was able to determine that it was indeed dead. He put the body in stasis right away.
After he did, he heard clapping behind him. Harry turned and saw a group of women, all with braided hair, save one, and in native-type clothing. The Witches of Dathomir, he thought.
"Can I help you?" Harry asked.
"Are you Jedi or Sith?" the apparent leader of the group asked.
They weren't afraid of either one. Just curious. The leader's hair wasn't braided like the others. It was a red-gold color and hung down past her shoulders. Her eyes were brown with gold flecks. She was quite beautiful.
"Neither."
"But you carry a lightsaber," another one spoke up.
"I was trained in the Jedi Temple but I'm not Jedi. A Sith tried to kill me with this lightsaber, so I killed him instead. However, I'm not a force user. I use magic."
"We use magic too," a third one replied.
"I'm well aware of your type of magic. I've studied it using the Jedi Archives to see if it was similar to mine, but it's not. We are very different."
"How is your magic different?" asked the leader.
"Can you do this?"
Harry pointed his finger at the large rancor and shrunk it down to a tiny replica of itself before picking it up and storing it away.
"No," several of them answered.
"How about this?"
Harry waved his hand at himself and changed the color of his clothes a few times before returning them back to the original colors.
"No. How is this possible?" asked the leader.
"Magic…. I'll give you one more."
Harry waved his hand again and a comfortable looking chair appeared before them. There were a few gasps of breath.
"Would you like to try it out? Touch it? Sit in it? I assure you it's real."
The leader stepped forward carefully and reached out to touch it but she appeared to be afraid of it. She was being extra careful. She poked it with her spear first.
"I promise it won't hurt you. It's only a chair," Harry said chuckling.
She finally touched it and looked at it closely. Then she gingerly sat in it until she was confident it would support her weight. She found it comfortable so relaxed a bit. She turned her head toward Harry.
"But how?"
"I'm not from around these parts. I'm not even sure I'm from this same galaxy or even the same dimension."
"We have never seen magic like this… ever," she replied before standing back up and allowing the others to sit in the chair. She walked over closer to Harry. "You created a chair from nothing…. Are you a god?"
"No, I'm not a god," Harry replied amused. "The chair is not permanent. It will eventually disappear. I'm a mage, which simply means a powerful magic user. I came from a planet with many magic users. They can all do what I've demonstrated for you. However, I can do a good bit more than some."
"You are very powerful." She stepped closer to Harry until she had to look up into his face. "Would you consent to fathering some children with a few of us?"
Harry smiled.
"Tempting, very tempting, especially since I find you so attractive, but it would go against my beliefs to do this. I'm sorry, truly I am."
"That's too bad," she said with a sexy pout. "I'm quite certain we would have a very good time," she smiled seductively.
"Oh, I'm sure we would."
She thought for a second.
"I've got a better idea!"
"What's that?"
"What if we forgot about making children and just indulged ourselves in the act before you have to leave?"
"I believe I could be amenable to that," Harry replied with a big smile.
"If you're done collecting, follow us back to our clan site," she said turning around and walking off with a bit more sway to her hips.
"I'd be delighted."
She turned her head back toward him.
"If you're hungry, we'll feed you. If you're not hungry, you will be when I get done with you," she said with a smile.
"Of this, I have no doubt."
Harry saw two of the women carrying the chair he conjured. He pointed his finger at it and it disappeared. The two witches stopped and glared at him.
"Why did you do that? We wanted to show the others!" one of them complained.
"I will conjure some more for you later to show the others. As I mentioned, the chair is not permanent. It will eventually disappear after a few days."
"Thank you," they said with a smile.
Harry continued to follow them while he looked up a few things on his datapad. When they reached the clan site, he was impressed with their dwellings. They weren't nearly as primitive as he pictured them. Given the advancement of technology in this galaxy, he shouldn't have been so surprised, he told himself.
Harry continued to shock them with his abilities. He conjured a few chairs for them as promised and even shared a meal with them. Tanwynne Djo was the leader of the group that met him but she was not the Clan Mother. The Clan Mother was an older woman who was the aunt of Tanwynne. When Tanwynne was questioned as to why they didn't simply capture the mage and force him to sire their children, she stood tall and proud, then warned them heatedly.
"He is too powerful. He can just use a finger and make wondrous things happen. We do not want him angry with us. Even if we gained the upper hand, it would not last very long. Several of us saw him kill a Bull Rancor with ease, using a lightsaber he took from a Sith, and he's not even a Jedi. His magic is so beyond ours, he's like a god to us. It is against his beliefs to father children that way. We should not try to force him, as I fear we would not survive his wrath. As surely as I stand before you, he is capable of killing us all. Why make him angry?"
"Thank you for your warning, dear Tanwynne," replied the Clan Mother. "We will heed it."
The ruling was made so no one questioned it further.
"Thank you. Now, if you'll excuse me, I've promised the mage Harry Potter an afternoon of fun. I don't plan on disappointing him." She turned and left the assembly to a myriad of giggles from the younger women.
After a very enjoyable afternoon with Tanwynne Djo, Harry apparated away from their clan site to the outskirts of the spaceport. Leaving in that manner sealed the witches' belief that he was too powerful to anger in any way. He could have returned directly to his ship but wanted to let the locals see him returning safely. He leaped over the fence again and walked back to his ship.
Felucia was next on the list.
oOo
Once again, Harry spent his time studying magic while traveling. While he learned a lot over the two years, there was still much to learn so he continued his studies, mostly just learning new spells. The spell he learned and cast on himself to prevent getting Tanwynne pregnant really came in handy. Tanwynne wouldn't have minded getting pregnant, but was impressed with the magic nonetheless.
Harry was very interested in three subjects: Charms, Transfiguration, and Defense. He was always looking to expand his repertoire of spells so found some of the offensive ones very useful, based on all the fighting he did during the war.
Felucia was a marshland planet with mostly jungle terrain that was home to many dangerous creatures and plants. Harry was looking forward to seeing what he could find on it. They came out of hyperspace near Felucia and were immediately assaulted by a pirate ship. The ship fired at them before any shields could be put in place.
Luckily the spell work he did on Coruscant held and the blast left no damage to the ship, other than shaking them up a bit. The pirates thought they had scored a direct hit and crippled the other ship so they opened a channel.
'This is the pirate ship Trust Me. We have just disabled your vessel. Prepare to be boarded."
QE reported on-screen that there was no damage at all to their ship.
"Harry, we took a direct hit without our shields up," replied OP. "How did we manage to avoid damage?"
"Magic, my friend… magic."
"What do we do now?"
"Let them board, of course."
"But they are pirates and will surely kill us all."
"Not if I can help it."
Harry reached over and opened the channel to reply.
"Well, you have me right where you want me. Come on aboard. I can't stop you." He closed the channel. "Stay out of the way until I have them all subdued. I don't want either of you taking any damage."
"Yes, Harry."
"QE, stay at the controls in case I need you to move us quickly."
"Beep, beep."
They watched as the ship pulled up closer so they could board. The pirate ship was a Teroch-type Gun Ship capable of a maximum of 14 people. It was the same type of ship used by the Mandalorians during the war, only it looked like they had modified it a bit. It was a little smaller than Harry's ship, which was a Republic Escort Gun Ship that could hold up to 50 people.
"Now, I shall go and welcome our guests. Wish me luck, boys."
"Do be careful, Harry."
"Always, OP, always," Harry replied as he headed toward the back of the ship. He spoke to MT on his way past the medical area.
Harry was waiting at the loading doors for the pirates to connect and board his ship. He put on his biggest smile and waited. As soon as they connected he had the doors open for them and was waiting on their first move.
Predictable, as usual, six pirates of various species rushed through the doors firing their blasters at Harry to kill him outright. Harry put up his shield with one hand that just soaked up all the blaster fire and with the other hand he cast a wide area Stunner that took all six of them out immediately. He watched them as all six just dropped in front of him out cold.
"Huh. That was anti-climactic."
Harry removed all their weapons and technology from their persons then used some magic he'd learned and tied them all up magically with ropes.
Incarcerous
Next, he moved them all over to a small storage area behind a door in the main storage area. He put up a ward on the door to hold them in place. Exiting his ship and into theirs he looked around. He found a couple more and quickly did the same to them, adding them to the warded space with the others.
He came across three astromech droids and asked if they would like to work for him, especially since all their crew was now going to be handed over to the authorities. The droids did not hesitate to agree. Harry had them shut down the pirate ship then head over to his own ship. He checked the ship thoroughly and found a few piles of credits. He put it all in one of his pouches that was applied with an Undetectable Extension Charm before he disconnected the other ship and closed its doors magically with just a couple of waves of his hand.
Then standing in front of the shielding that was protecting him from the rigors of space, Harry pointed his finger at the other ship and shrunk it down to the size of a small model before pulling it into his ship with him and closing his doors. He placed the newly acquired ship with his other collectibles and introduced the new droids to OP and QE with instructions for them to find out all they could from the droids about the pirates. OP was to report to Harry afterwards.
Meanwhile, Harry used Enervate on the eight and did some questioning of his own. At first they didn't want to participate but Harry was quite convincing and got the answers he was looking for. They even gave up some of their other pirate associates and the general area they were known to be in.
Afterwards, Harry put the three new droids on the job of helping QE digitize all his spell books then continued down to Felucia and landed in the largest spaceport.
He had already stored what he collected on Dathomir on his ship while travelling to Felucia. He exited down the ramp ready to fill his bags with collections. He just needed to see if he could unload his prisoners here and not have to make any extra trips to get rid of them.
He went immediately to the authorities at the port and reported the eight pirates he had captured. Luckily, they were willing to take them off his hands. They were aware of the ship sitting just outside their atmosphere attacking other ships when they came out of hyperspace but no help had arrived yet to deal with the problem. They asked about the ship the pirates were using but Harry wasn't sure what to tell them so they dropped it, especially after they found out he was Captain Harry of the Mandalorian Wars. A couple of them had served in the war.
Harry moved off into the jungle after turning the prisoners over to the authorities. He was glad they were able to take them off his hands. The bounty on some of them was helpful as well.
He discovered that Felucia was a very dangerous place. He came across some Spike plants that were an orangish-green. They released a barrage of green spikes when touched. There was something about the spikes but they were too small for wands, not to mention poisonous. Another plant he found was a Spore plant which released deadly spores when touched. His quick shielding was the only thing that saved him on both occasions.
On the bright side, Harry collected two samples of Nysillin which was a healing herb. However, right around that same time he ran across his first Acklay. Acklays were usually over three meters in height, with three eyes, and were amphibious reptilian crustaceans, with a green color. They had six deadly claws and razor sharp teeth. Not something you ever want to run into unprepared or prepared for that matter.
Just like the rancor the Acklay was also resistant to magic, so Harry lightened his body again for speed and agility before igniting his lightsaber.
"Pssshew Nnnnnnnnn…."
He leaped around and dodged the vicious creature as it tried to kill him with its sharp claws and teeth. Before long though the Acklay was missing some limbs and finding it difficult to stand and fight. The killing blow was another lightsaber blade into the head. Harry quickly placed all the body parts in stasis before shrinking them and bagging them up.
The whole planet was bathed in the force but most of its plant life was fungal in nature. It had massive mushroom forests. The mushrooms were as tall as trees. Harry could not find a use for them though. But he did find a couple of different rancors that he collected. One was a Jungle Rancor and the other was a Shadow Rancor. The Jungle Rancor was fairly easy to kill but the Shadow Rancor made it a bit difficult. Harry nearly lost a limb on that one.
He thought he was about done on Felucia until he came to the area of the Sarlacc. It was located in a sacred place on the planet called the Great Abyss. Past civilizations had used the place as a sacrificial site. This sarlacc was recorded as the oldest and largest sarlacc in the galaxy. Its teeth and gums stretched a good four kilometers around its maw.
It had powerful tendrils that reached out and grabbed its prey. Even rancors were not powerful enough to escape it. Harry made sure his body was feather light and his lightsaber was close at hand. However, when he tried the spell Immobulus on the tendrils he was surprised when it worked.
Of course the sarlacc was basically a plant, a rather large omnivorous plant that lived to be tens of thousands of years old. Using his lightsaber, Harry cut off a good section of one of the tentacles, put the piece in stasis, and then shrunk it down before placing into a container. According to his datapad the sarlacc would regrow the tentacle over a short time.
From a safe distance, Harry removed the spell to free the creature and then apparated back to his ship. He had been on Felucia for two days and was looking forward to a nice shower. However, his ship only had a sonic shower. He was going to have to consult his spell books to see about setting up a real shower using magic. A shower with hot water sounded really, really good.