Last Second Savior

by plums

While leading the final charge against a retreating Dark Lord, Harry is thrown through a destabilized Demon Portal, landing on a strange world in a galaxy far far away. Eventual Harry / Multi

3. Woke up to a Whole New World

Summary:

Harry Potter / Star Wars-over. While leading the final charge against a retreating Dark Lord, Harry is thrown through a Demon Portal, landing on a strange world in a galaxy far away.

Disclaimer

I don't own Harry Potter in any way. JKR has those rights... Also, Star Wars is owned by Lucasfilm/George Lucas, etc etc.

*Author's Note *

Inspirations: Sword and Magic by bluminous8

Chapter First Published: 2013-03-17

Chapter Last Update:

Chapter 3 – Woke up to a Whole New World

Harry left the quiet solitude of the cave mouth and headed back to his Wizard's Tent. As he walked inattentively inside the shelter, he pondered the idea he just had. At the moment, it was a bare-bones outline of a supply raid on an unknown facility using a time-turner. He could do it on his own, but he would likely never recognize half of the technologies these people utilized, so he would need his patient's assistance if he wanted the mission to be a success. With no other options, he felt the best plan was probably still to stow-away on one of those three ships with his patient, but maybe she would come up with a different idea.

Ducking into the tent, he thought about how lucky he was to have it with him. He had never really used this particular tent before. It had been thrown into his trunk as an afterthought half a dozen years previous. Originally, he purchased the thing with the intention that it would permanently grace the inside of an empty compartment of a the trunk, but then he realized that would mean the trunk itself would be left unguarded somewhere with him inside it. He was still very paranoid about being inside the trunk. There were no good safeguards for an unattended trunk other than wards, and If someone managed to close it, he would be left a prisoner like Mad-Eye Moody had been all those years ago.

Sometimes he would use the tent if he was on a solo mission, if he had time to set up wards around it and wanted a hot shower and some freshly laundered clothes. Otherwise, it was an unnecessary extravagance that he had never found a reason to utilize. But now, the small family room, kitchen, single bedroom, bath and shower seemed like a palace to Harry.

The pre-stocked food was a godsend. Quickly rummaging through some of the notes he found within the kitchen, he estimated he had enough food here to last himself a full year by himself. If the woman found the food edible, it would cut the supply in half, though with her species having two stomachs, he wondered if she ate more than a Human. He doubted Earth military rations would be very appealing to her, and to be honest, they were not very appealing to him either. He would also have to find ways of freeing up extra storage for her if the woman stayed with him.

He packed up the random medical supplies that were strewn about the room into the trunk. It would at least save them some time if they had to move quickly later. Suddenly Harry had a thought. He realized that he probably should not allow her to see the tent yet because it would be just one more thing to explain to her and time was short anyways. Harry quickly levitated the woman's bed outside of the tent. A few waves of his hand had the tent completely disassembled and jammed back into the duffel bag it originally came from, which was then tossed back into the trunk.

The cave seemed strangely empty now, with just him and a very out of place bed with a comatose woman resting peacefully. He let his mind wander as he randomly paced around. Eventually though, the pink elephant in the room could no longer be ignored and he decided to stand vigil next to the azure woman. After all, there was little else he could think to do except wait.

He conjured a chair next to her, and sat with a fist under his chin. His mind wandered in the silence, but his thoughts simply would not focus upon one topic, and he eventually came to the random conclusion in his boredom that the cave was a bit too dark for his tastes. To solve this, Harry conjured a dozen blue ball flames and floated them into the corners of the cave for light.

Then, he came to another realization. Any language comprehension between him and the woman was completely out of the question. He pulled out his wand and cast a translation charm upon her that all magical members of the Earth military were required to learn. Since the armed forces of the Earth pulled soldiers from every country to fight the demons, it was a given that there would potentially be over a dozen different languages spoken within the same battalion of troops. The charm allowed the user to understand any language spoken aloud. Eventually the spells were refined further into earrings that could be worn. Unfortunately, it did nothing for reading comprehension, so shore leaves were still often recipes for disaster.

'Well maybe not true disasters,' chuckled Harry to himself as he remembered all the trouble George, Angelina, and himself had gotten into on during shore leaves early in the war in places where they couldn't read signs and directions, and refused to ask for help.

Harry himself had gone one-step further to avoid unnecessary trouble and undergone the very painful process of transferring full languages from native speakers. He went a bit overboard and learned all the languages spoken by a majority of the soldiers, which ended up being ten very painful experiences. There was no danger of running out of room in his mind at least. Rumor has it that's the way Barty Crouch Sr. knew so many languages was through this language transfer method. He would have to ask the blue woman later if she would be willing to transfer him any languages she knew.

His thoughts returned to his self-appointed vigil and Harry focused his gaze upon the face of his patient. He marveled at how stunningly beautiful she was. He was sure she was the object of numerous men's desires and he himself had no chance with such a being. In the grand scheme of things, he was nobody now. She was obviously important and competent enough to be in charge of a large number of troops and then be dangerous enough to be the target of a mutiny. It was obvious the execution attempt couldn't be called anything less since they had targeted the only two magical users on the planet. The strange echoes of death he had felt afterwards also gave him the impression that other powerful magical beings were dying elsewhere… far from the planet.

Suddenly a chime that only he could hear interrupted his thoughts. His patient was waking up, and as he looked down at his watch, he found they had less than an hour and a half before the nine-hour window elapsed.

-o0o0o-

Jedi Knight Aayla Secura felt horrible. Her head pounded in agony and she had no clue why it was doing so or what caused it to happen. Her mind was all a jumble and she felt as if a herd of banthas had stampeded over her body.

She tried to move, and found her body sluggish like it had been drugged. She immediately started to run through Jedi exercises designed to remove toxins from the body just in case her suspicions were correct. This ability would get her fully coherent and mobile long before whoever drugged her could have expected her to be. The small movement she had made also let her know her back was extremely sore and the slightest shift made her grimace with a dull pain.

"Try not to move too much just yet. You've been through a lot. Would you like some water?" asked an unfamiliar voice.

She snapped open her eyes at the unexpected sound. She was in a dimly lit cave with odd blue flames burning in the corners. What was even odder was that she was found herself in a very out of place and comfortable bed. There was a Human, dressed in strange robes sitting next to her. He had wildly messy and dark hair, and the most vivid green eyes she had ever seen. In fact, she didn't think she had ever seen a human with purely green eyes before.

Then she felt his presence…

'By the Force, he's powerful,' thought Aayla incredulously as she felt how strong the Force was with this man. 'He could give Skywalker a run for his credits.'

She tried to speak, but found her throat to be completely parched. Even though she tried to speak the words "Yes, please," the actual sounds emitted from her throat sounded nothing like it.

To her utter astonishment, the human pointed and flourished a stick in a complicated motion at his hand, and she felt a brief but powerful flare of the Force. A tall crystal glass appeared. Then, he pointed the stick again and a stream of water erupted and filled the glass to the brim. A final wave of his hand and a few ice cubes appeared at the top of the glass.

He saw her shock, and she noticed him furrow his eyes in confusion. "I take it you've never seen magic used like this before?" he asked her.

Aayla shook her head in response, and she just barely caught his wince at her answer. But her own thoughts superseded any thoughts towards his reaction. What she had just witnessed was an impossibility. He had created something from nothing. It defied every bit of knowledge taught to her while at the Jedi Temple. Both the glass and the water in his hand should not exist.

'It had to be some sort of illusion. And what about those brief spikes from the Force? Was that the start of the illusion Is this some kind of Sith interrogation technique?' she thought.

"Here, please drink. I'll try and explain quickly. We're very short on time," he said politely while he handed her the glass. She understood the implied statement to not ask questions yet, and she could play along for now. The interrogation had obviously not gotten violent yet.

Their fingers briefly touched during the exchange, and it took all Aayla's increasingly diminished composure not to cry out in shock. She was an Empath, and the extreme emotions she briefly sensed from his touch startled her. Right now, when she wasn't in contact with the strange Human, she felt no emotions at all from him in the Force. If she based her awareness only upon Empathic abilities, she would have no clue the man was even there. His presence in the Force was bright as a star in the day, but nothing from his emotions. Yet when they briefly touched, his emotions seemed to flood through her. Nervousness, waning hope, suppressed despair. She goggled internally at how he could he appear so calm on the outside yet outwardly restrain the presence of such turbulent thoughts. Then she realized that she had never heard of an interrogation technique that could mimic Force presence, let alone her empathic abilities.

The stranger noticed her mind's distraction while still had not yet touched the water. He gave a mischievous smile. "You know I haven't poisoned that?" he said as he gestured at the glass of water she still had not drunk. "It would be awful silly of me to poison you after I just spent the last seven hours trying to keep you from dying."

'Dying?' Aayla suddenly thought as her eyes involuntarily widened. Had she almost died? She looked down at her body to check for wounds and was surprised to see herself clothed in strange garments of a type she had never seen before. In fact, she had no idea how the clothing had even been put on her since her head was larger than the hole in the shirt.

The human grimaced in apparent realization he probably should not have said that, "Ok, sorry. I think I'm just confusing you now. How about we introduce ourselves?"

He took a deep breath and said, "My name is Harry Potter. I'm from a planet called Earth. I doubt you've ever heard of this planet, right?" Aayla shook her head. She had seen Humans of course, but none that possessed the startling eye color this one possessed.

She collected herself, and did her best to sound confident, but the situation and lack of use of her voice betrayed her nervousness, "My name is Aayla Secura, I'm from the planet Ryloth and I'm a Jedi Knight."

She watched him as she spoke. He nodded at the information, yet showed no recognition at anything she said, even the word Jedi. Just what was going on here?

"Nice to meet you, Aayla. I doubted you had heard of my world. I doubt anyone has heard of my world in fact."

She wanted to protest his statement, but he held up a hand to forestall anything she might say.

"Yesterday, my world fought what we hoped would be our last battle against a large invasion force that we've been at war with for ten years. They used portals to bring themselves to our world from whatever universe or dimension that they came from. We finally beat their forces back until they were all at one location. They were gathered in a large crater around a single portal they were trying to use to escape our planet."

"However, it turned out to be a trap. I was the leader of our ground forces. Fortunately, I was cautious enough that I think I was the only one to fall into the trap. I defeated their leader, but he managed to fence me in the area around the portal and gave me a choice. I could die in a massive explosion, or jump through the portal to whatever dangerous world he had set it to take me."

The human smirked at this point, and looked her right in the eye with those two amazing orbs of his.

"I made my own option. I destabilized the portal so it would be pointed at a new world, then got thrown through, and ended up here on this planet. With me so far?"

She felt her own eyes widen more and more at the story. She had never heard of such an occurrence throughout all her research on obscure topics within the Jedi Library. Most people and even other Jedi always second-guessed her or looked down upon her because of her appearance, heritage, and origins. Most people she met while in the line of duty took one look at her and assumed she must be a moron who used her figure and beauty to achieve what had accomplished. It just meant she had to work twice as hard to earn the respect she had gained.

She understood what he said at least, but she wasn't sure whether to believe him yet. Not being able to sense his emotions were quite disconcerting to her. The usual ways she utilized to verify information through the Force and a person's emotions were not available with this person.

He continued on with his story, "So I got here, and was amazed by just how much magic was in the air in this place. I stretched out my senses to try and sense what exactly was going on nearby, and was rather surprised that, instead of being able to feel an area the size of this cave like I was expecting, I could feel all the magic on the entire planet. And I felt two really powerful magic users on the planet along with me."

His eyes seemed to lose focus at this point, as he stared through the wall over her shoulder, definitely seeing something she couldn't see in his memories. "It was strange. I've never felt magic this strong before. And then I felt something… guiding me. I think it honestly told me I needed to apparate, err…. teleport to one magic user instead of the other to try to meet them. Normally teleporting somewhere blind is as dangerous as it is stupid. You can appear over an ocean, or inside of a mountain or volcano. But for some reason, I just felt I would be safe. So I teleported, and ended up about fifty meters away from you."

"Someone as strong as you was able to teleport near me and my troopers without me knowing you were there?" Aayla asked, very surprised, and a bit annoyed. That shouldn't have been possible. Her own Force senses should have picked up a being this powerful from miles away, likely even far further.

And what did he keep talking about Magic? He couldn't possibly believe what he does with the Force is Magic. Isolated civilizations sometimes thought that the levitation of small rocks and assorted parlor tricks were Magic before contact with the Republic was established. Yet the powers that Harry described were nothing like she had ever seen before. The whole situation felt more and more unbelievable the further along she went.

'If I've been captured, and this is some sort of delusion based interrogation, why weren't the drugs being purged from her system? I've never failed to purge drugs in the amount of time this has taken so far. And why all the effort to come up with a ridiculous background story like this before asking me for information about the Republic.'

"I feel like I have to apologize to you. I followed you and your soldiers for a few hours yesterday. I was invisible and had my aura suppressed. It was something everyone I know had to learn on my own world. It was how the enemy hunted us. Wizards like me didn't live long if we didn't learn how to quickly become invisible to their senses."

Aayla watched as Harry briefly closed his eyes and she suddenly felt the man's presence in the Force completely disappear. His appearance did not change at all, but it was as if he was not physically there anymore. This was all too unbelievable. But she felt the beginnings of excitement in her mind. These abilities would be crucial for her fellow Jedi to learn. If this Harry person could teach them, they would gain a valuable weapon against the Sith.

"How did you do that? Can you teach me? My fellow Jedi would gain much from being able to hide ourselves from our enemies," Aayla asked, with a bit of excitement in her voice.

The human winced. "I can teach you, but unfortunately you will have a need for it a lot sooner than you will be capable of learning it. I have an alternative method to hiding you can use in the meantime, but it's not the best way. Let me finish my story first. Again, we're short on time."

Aayla nodded and acknowledged the mild rebuke. Harry was getting a bit agitated, and his composure was breaking just slightly. His aura was still non-existent, but she could now start to feel some emotions from the human as well. Very small glimmers of nervousness and worry had started to leak out.

Noticing this, she began to internally frown. Simulated interrogations Jedi underwent would often use delusions like this. But one of the reasons Aayla was always able to excel at fighting the hallucinations was that no emotions could ever be felt from the people questioning her. That was the problem. She was starting to truly feel Harry as he got more agitated.

"I was following you because I was trying to figure out a way to talk to you and ask for help without all your soldiers shooting me in the head."

"Anyways, that's unimportant now. I need to tell you a few more things, and this is all going be hard to hear. What was the last thing you remember happening before waking up here in the cave?"

Aayla leaned back. What was the last thing she remembered? Trying to recall significant events of the day, she recalled their "Larty" gunship air support being ordered to take out a Separatist outpost they were approaching. She remembered sometime later the Force guiding her, wanting her to check on something just off of their patrol path. It had raised her battle senses and gave her the feeling she needed to pursue the disturbance.

Then… nothing.

"I remember sensing something. I tried running off to the side of the troop column to determine what it was, but I don't remember anything after I started making my way over to where I thought I felt a disturbance in the Force."

"You call magic 'The Force'?" asked Harry, his head cocked to the side in curiosity.

"Yes," said Aayla. She felt amusement that Harry thought of his powers as magic. "We often encounter younger civilizations that believe levitating objects and other small things are magic. They often have no idea the broader things the Force can accomplish after a lifetime of teaching and instruction,"

Harry nodded in understanding and gave a small smile. "Well, we can discuss the finer points of that philosophical debate later."

He paused and tapped a finger on the bed between them. She could see he struggled to work something out in his mind before he said it aloud. The feeling of agitation and even a bit of fear now had began to become palpable, when suddenly she felt it get smashed down and his emotions became silent to her. Aayla sat secretly in awe of his ability to control his emotions to such a fine degree. Even Master Yoda didn't have such fine control.

"It's what happened next that you'll likely have a hard time believing. As you approached me, twelve of those soldiers followed you. They were acting differently all the sudden."

At her raised eyebrow, he clarified, "One of my abilities that helped in our war was my ability to look at a battlefield or skirmish and instinctively know who the leaders are. I could pick out squad leaders, battalion leaders, and the Generals in charge of the whole thing. The whole day I was watching you and your troops, I could tell you were the leader."

"But, when those twelve soldiers approached you from behind, I suddenly realized something. You weren't the leader anymore. "

Aayla balked at this statement. 'Not in charge of my own troops? What the heck was he talking about?'

"The soldier with the yellow armor was now in charge. The only impression I got from him was pure malevolence directed towards you. He had his troops move into a half-circle around you, and then all of them raised those black guns and pointed them at you."

She felt her mouth physically drop. What he was suggested could not possibly be true. Clones would never turn on their commander. They were bred and programmed for obedience to the highest authority. If Aayla gave them an order, there was no way they could not perform the order, and there was no way they could mutiny and betray her without orders to do so. The only one who could supersede her orders in the chain of command… was the Chancellor.

'No!' she screamed internally in her mind.

The human reached out and held her hand after he bore witness to her internal debate and its conclusion. His emotions were suddenly clear to her again, and all she could feel from him was sympathy, and a desire to help.

"I couldn't stop all of them. You saw it at the last second and looked like you were going to defend yourself with that metal tube thing you had on your belt. You were shot seven times in the back before I could kill them. I managed to change one body to make it look like you, so anyone who found the group would think you really were dead. I got you out of there, and brought you here so I could heal you."

At this, she felt him suddenly spike with embarrassment as he said, "Oh!"

He let go of her hand, which gave a jarring loss of access to his emotions, which left her a bit hurt by the sudden void. His concern had been a small comfort while she could feel it and its sudden loss due to lack of touch was actually painful.

She saw him go over to the side of the cave, where she recognized her clothes were folded neatly. On top of the pile was her light saber. He walked back over and passed it gingerly to her. "I figure this is a weapon, and I know I'm rather uncomfortable if I'm around strange people and don't have at least one of my wands. Here," and he passed the light saber to her as he sat down again.

He was right. She did feel better, thought she could tell through her empathy that Harry meant her no harm. There was the larger issue that she now held a weapon in her hands. No interrogator provided a weapon to their prisoner. She was beginning to think more and more this wasn't an interrogation and could possibly be real. His presence was the rock keeping her mind on track, especially after she placed her hand upon his again after a quick inspection of her light saber.

"So my clones turned on me?" said Aayla, and even with her Jedi training she couldn't hide the bitterness in her voice. The reality that this whole situation may not be a hallucination just made everything worse.

She had fought with the Bly, Galle, and their regiment for years. They had fought and bled together. They had talked about their dreams and aspirations after this war had ended. She thought they were friends. She had even endured ridicule and slander when she had been accused of getting too close to Bly…

…and Harry said Bly was the one who led the group to kill her.

"Barriss!" Aayla suddenly yelled with the sudden realization. Her fellow Jedi Knight would have been alone as well when she faced the clones. She had to know what happened to her friend.

"What?" he asked in alarm.

"There was another Jedi Knight on the planet, Barriss Offee. I sent her today with some ground infantry to another region about three hundred kilometers from where I was at with my troops. We're here because the Separatists are poisoning the planet's water supply. She was going to make a run at one of the possible contamination sources."

Harry had held her hand through her explanation, and she felt a sense of sadness grow in him while she spoke, and his dread. She knew what that meant, even before she saw him close his eyes in an effort to work up the courage to say it aloud.

"No… No…No…" Aayla could not believe it. She buried her face in her hands and cried.

They had been betrayed.

One of her closest friends had been murdered. Barriss had likely been dead for hours while Aayla lay unconscious, completely unaware of what had happened. Then she realized just how close she had likely been to death herself and that she owed her very life to the man next to her.

"Aayla?" she distantly heard Harry say, but she was lost to her own thoughts to care.

The clones she trusted had shot her in the back, without warning, like cowards with no honor. She didn't know what to do. She and her friend had committed no crimes worthy of such a betrayal, so the action couldn't have been directed at her alone, but because she was a Jedi. If the clones had been ordered to kill her and Barriss here, it was likely they were doing the same everywhere throughout the whole galaxy.

Harry sat down on the side of the bed next to her and pulled her into a hug. It was gentle and she could feel how pure his intentions were. She could feel his pain as well. With a small gasp between her sobs she vaguely recalled his story about how he had been torn away from his entire world today. Both of them had lost everything and here he was comforting her while she fell apart.

"Aayla, I need your help," he spoke softly, cutting across her increasingly depressed thoughts.

"I know this is hitting you hard. Can you hold it together for a few hours, and then I promise to be right here with you as you mourn your friends. We still may be able to make a small difference if you trust me."

'Still make a difference,' repeated Aayla to herself. Those were words that would rouse any Jedi from a pit of hopelessness. Unable to speak, she nodded.

"I'm not going to pretend I have even a small understanding of what's going on. But I think the soldiers have all left. I saw what I think were three massive ships take off from really far away about two hours ago. They were huge," said Harry.

Aayla felt herself blink after a moment's silence. Here was finally something she was familiar with. She cleared her throat and wiped at her eyes, while she pulled gently out of Harry's embrace a bit.

"They're called Venator-Class Star Destroyers. They are our orbital support platforms in space while we are deployed on a planet. They land in atmospheres only to deploy or pickup troops. If they landed, it means they've pulled out. There were three of them in the battle group I commanded. There are, dozens of Battlegroups out there with Jedi supporting their efforts."

She saw Harry nod while he processed this information. He looked back at her, and she was surprised just how much sorrow and pain she could see reflected in his eyes did not spread down to the rest of his face.

He spoke, "Well, we need supplies. Things like food, medicine, and information. Most importantly, I assume with what you just said we need a way off of this planet. I got the feeling earlier this place wasn't a center of commerce, and you just confirmed it," he said with a quirk of his eyebrow, which caused her to laugh in spite of the situation.

"The main way we could've gotten all of those just left with those three ships. That's why I'm going to suggest something that will sound… absolutely insane to you," he said, speaking almost tentatively at the end, his voice barely tinged with a bit of fear.

Her curiosity peaked. What could possibly sound insane after the borderline fictional story he had already weaved for her?

"I have something here that can help us," said Harry. "It's dangerous, and should only be used in extreme circumstances. In fact, I've carried this thing around with me for nearly nine years and I've never even pondered using it until today."

She could feel his fear. Well, it wasn't quite fear, she decided. It was more like extremely heightened wariness. His hand disappeared under the front of his robes, and lifted out an extremely small object on a very long chain.

"This is called a time-turner. If you wear it, and spin the hourglass, you'll go back in time three hours for each spin. I can take one person back with me as well. There's enough sand in this for the two of us to make only one nine-hour-trip, and that's it. We can go back in time, and steal the supplies we need and hide on their ships before they leave."

Aayla could hardly believe what she was hearing. Time travel. She mentally shook herself. It was impossible. No one had ever managed to go back in time. The Republic had attempted for millennia to do just that through experiments, and had always failed in their attempts, sometimes with disastrous consequences. But with the impossible things she had just witnessed, what was one more thing for her to suspend disbelief and just go with it. Then she realized, if they could go back in time, they could save Barriss. They could warn the other Jedi.

"There's a catch to this Aayla. It's the really dangerous part of all this," he looked at her straight in the eye, and Aayla's knew he expected her undivided attention to be on him.

"You can't go back in time and change anything you've actually seen, heard, or know has happened."

She felt the despair flood through her like a tangible wave. Her first instinct was to shout that he had to be lying. She would not be able to go back in time without trying to save her friend.

"Listen and let me explain, we're running out of time ourselves if we want to get back before the mutiny occurs where we'll be under less scrutiny. Imagine Time itself is like a string." Harry conjured a long piece of yarn out of thin air. She felt the small surge of the Force again, but was too engrossed with his explanation to care anymore.

Harry laid the string in a straight line on the bed. She watched as he pointed to two specific places on the string, and she saw the string turn red at the left and blue on the right at those places.

"Imagine this string represents Time. The blue part is where we are now, and the red is nine hours ago. If we use the time-turner, we don't really go back in time per se. What we've done, within the linear progression of Time, is create a bubble that will loop Time from now around to connect with Time from nine hours ago."

With a flick of Harry's hand, she saw the blue section of string pinch into a small circle, and then loop around to join to the red. "When we go back, we are still on the exact same time-line that's already happened. We cannot change anything that we ourselves have witnessed occurring. We can tweak things, but we can't do anything that would actively change something that we know for a fact has happened. I wouldn't be able to stop you from being attacked, nor could I save your friend because I know for a fact both of those things happened. The moment you do change something, you create a paradox. Your friend Barriss can't be both alive and dead."

"I really need you to understand this. Time does not like paradoxes. If one is created, time reacts by simply annihilating all parties involved. If we actually succeeded in saving Barriss, she would die anyways, and since we were the ones messing with Time, we would be destroyed as well. Do you understand how important this is? I cannot help you change what we directly know has happened."

Aayla noticed he stressed the word 'directly' like he was trying to tell her something. In fact he looked at her now as if beseeching her to understand some clue that would answer her prayers.

Then it hit her.

She didn't know what happened off world. At least not for a fact. She had assumed earlier that the Jedi were being killed by clones, but she didn't know that for certain. If she got a communication out, they could save lives, potentially hundreds, or even thousands, of her Jedi brothers and sisters. She was not arrogant enough to believe she could save everyone, but even some would go a long way towards the Jedi's continued survival.

"You can help me save those not on this planet that we don't yet know the fate of?" she asked tentatively, and the hope that she had reached the right conclusion was easily betrayed by her voice.

A bright smile reached his face and he nodded. Harry said, "I hadn't thought of that specifically, but yes. But again, we need to be careful when doing this. We have to make people understand they cannot contact you or Barriss, otherwise it could change time and destroy us."

He suddenly stood, and offered her a hand. "Are you willing to try?"

Aayla had no hesitation. She was being given an offer no Jedi would refuse. Should she allow her friends to die senseless deaths alone and uncomforted in the mud, or should she make a 'small difference'?

'That was an understatement of cosmic proportions,' she thought.

She threw the covers off of her and took the offered hand with a smile and a nod. She stood up, her back sore and a very tight, but she ignored the pain. She was scared to look at how it might appear now if she had been shot seven times. But the fact she could move at all was miraculous. Normally Bacta treatment for a close-range direct blaster shot would have required days of healing, and even longer to survive several.

She saw him check the device attached to his wrist. "We have an hour and fifteen minutes before time syncs up to the point you were shot. We need to hurry."

Hurry they did. Within five minutes, she was dressed in her old pants, shoes, and head guard. The light shirt Harry had been dressed her in had somehow been transformed, and it now very closely resembled the torn and bloody one that lay abandoned on the ground.

While this happened, she watched Harry quickly dismantle two small cubes, which screamed power to her through the Force, and drained their energies away. He stored them in an expandable box that somehow was hidden on his forearm. Another wave of his hand and the bed she had rested in vanished.

At her inquisitive look, he said he would explain these abilities later. She was beginning to lose track of the things he said he would explain later. The numerous new concepts and objects that were casually shown to her had somewhat deadened her surprise and curiosity. She was focused upon helping her friends and would worry about the wonders of Harry's universe later.

"Oh, one last thing before we go," he said. He reached down to the box, and after he pressed a few markings, the box opened once again. The inside of the box did not match what she had seen inside it previously a few minutes ago when he stored the cubes. She barely got a glimpse though before he had extracted a small necklace with a large clear stone on it. The box itself was quickly closed, shrunk down, and flew to his arm where it suddenly vanished from sight.

"I'm lucky I still have one of these with me. This necklace will restrain your magical aura. This way, our past selves will not sense us. It's going to be extremely important that you wear this at all times until you learn how to suppress your aura yourself. I only sensed two other magically strong people on the planet in the past, so it's imperative I don't change things and suddenly and allow my past self to sense two more, understand?"

Aayla nodded and once again thought this skill to reign in her presence in the Force was definitely something she would need Harry to teach her. She placed the necklace around her neck and saw the stone change from clear to a vivid sapphire blue. She only felt slightly different though. Her senses deadened just somewhat, and a slight tingle passed over her.

"The necklace won't really affect you. It will just feel a bit odd. You should still have full access to all of your abilities, just please use them with restraint while we do this. We cannot be seen and we cannot be caught."

"I understand." she asked. Aayla realized her body probably now ran on pure adrenaline. She would need to keep going though, because the moment she truly stopped, the death of Barriss and the betrayal she experienced at the hands of her troops would return at full strength.

Harry nodded to her, and left to perform one last check of the cave. He wanted to make sure they had left nothing behind. After he verified there was nothing left, he walked up to her.

"Grab on to my arm with both hands and hold tight," he ordered while he closed his eyes.

She did so while she wondered what was about to happen. He was quiet, though she could definitely feel him suddenly flare in power with the Force for a few seconds before the feeling suddenly vanished. His emotions had settled into a state of sheer determination, as solid and unwavering as durasteel.

"Ok, I know where my magic is telling me to go. I wanted to try and appear somewhat close to where I think I saw those ships take-off earlier. But now I think my magic is directing me somewhere specific for this," he announced and suddenly looked at her.

He smirked, with a very mischievous look that made her very nervous, "This… will be a bit unpleasant. Hang on."

And with a mighty *Crack!*, they were gone.

-o0o0o-

Harry was definitely happy with how things had turned out. Aayla had agreed to work with him, and she seemed to understand the very subtle boundaries they had to work with while going into the past. He had next to no information on what was going on, and had no clue about the war he was suddenly involving himself in, but for some reason it felt right to help the blue Twi'lek female.

He had apparated them to a spot that his magic seemed to want him to go to. He had no idea what this spot would look like nine hours earlier, but he felt it was wise to trust this new found seer's instinct he seemed to have acquired.

Aayla had not been happy with the unannounced apparition, judging by the quick succession of punches his arm received. "I told you it would be unpleasant," with he told her with a bit of mirth.

"Remember that remark when I get you back," she said with a glare of her golden eyes.

"I look forward to your response, Knight Secura," he responded with mock-seriousness as he rubbed his arm.

Her glare merely intensified as she growled, "Call me that again and you won't have to wait."

He merely nodded in acknowledgment. It was time to be serious. "Ok, I'm going to make us invisible so only we can see each other, silence our feet, and then put some repelling wards up so if we get too near someone they will instinctually think they have somewhere else important to be."

He saw Aayla stare at him as he cast each spell in what he knew was a very Hermione-like attempt to try to understand exactly what he had done. He knew she was magical, yet she had not performed any magic other than a very week form of Legilimency, which he had easily blocked. This observation troubled him greatly, but he realized he couldn't' dwell upon that now.

With the spells cast, they were ready. He looked at her half-invisible form that only he could see, and she looked back and nodded. Harry pulled out the time turner and extended its chain to encompass her head and neck as well as his.

"Well, wish us luck," said Harry as he released the safety latch on the time turner for the first time ever.

"May the Force be with us," replied Aayla evenly as she gripped Harry's arm tightly and took a deep breath.

Harry nodded and reached up and flipped the small hour glass that suspended from his hand between them three times. Suddenly, time began to reverse around them. He saw the twin moons move rapidly across the sky. Three ships suddenly landed, and troops and machinery suddenly expelled backwards from their innards and spread out, with the massive ships disappearing again almost as quickly as they appeared. The planet's sun suddenly rose into the air and brought a sudden brightness that made them squint their eyes.

Throughout the reverse-temporal trip, Aayla had gripped his arm tighter and tighter. Perhaps some part of her truly didn't believe she would be time traveling until that very moment. Or maybe it was the fact that she was now surrounded by her former comrades who very shortly would want her dead. Harry simply watched the bedlam around them while he waited for the blur to end.

Finally, the motion stopped and they stood invisible amidst what Harry could only refer to as ordered chaos. He had lived a military life for a while, and he could definitely appreciate and admire the controlled efficiency he saw as he realized they had appeared right smack in the middle of the trooper's base camp.

"Well, boss lady. It's your show. What do you want to do first?" Harry whispered as he took the time turner's chain off Aayla, clicked the safety on it, and tucked it away again. He didn't want to accidentally use the last grain of sand after all.

He could tell Aayla still hadn't quite recovered from the journey back in time. He could clearly see her knuckles growing a lighter shade of blue as she gripped her metal tube thing.

"Aayla? I know it hurts. I've seen betrayal too. Revenge is never as satisfying as you think it'll be beforehand, and all it does is make you lose a piece of yourself in the process. Please?" Harry all but pleaded the last few words to his companion. He needed her focused here on their goals, not getting payback against an enemy that probably outnumbered them ten thousand to one.

"You're right," Aayla said as she took a deep breath and clipped the tube back to her belt. She looked curiously at Harry, "You talk like a Jedi."

Rolling his eyes and smiling, Harry said, "Whatever, can we please go? We're losing time." He felt his lips quirk at the bad pun despite himself, and he was rewarded for breaking the somber mood with Aayla's own eyeroll.

"Let's go to the communications center first," she whispered as she set out in a specific direction.

"We'll need to clear the place out quietly and contact the Jedi Temple. It's the central place where all Jedi in the Galaxy are educated, train, and live when they're not on missions. They can spread the warning from there and we can make sure all the younglings get out. I'll make sure to remind them not to contact me or Bar… Barriss."

"Ok, sounds like a plan." He looked at his partner in crime and felt he needed to give voice to the respect he slowly felt grow for her. He had heard the slight crack in her voice as she spoke the last part of her plan, and knew that everything she felt was only just barely under the surface of her face. "You're doing well. You've got a good head on your shoulders. Just hold on for an hour or two more. Then we'll find a place to hide until these fools leave. Just take this one step at a time."

They slowly meandered their way through patrols and made it easily past security checkpoints on their way to the communications center. There were six clones on duty, and Harry had placed wards within seconds of their entrance that caused them to leave. Another muggle-repelling ward on the door would keep them from interruption for at least ten minutes, more than enough time for them to get the message out.

"Who will you contact?" asked Harry.

"Master Shaak Ti is at the Temple right now… at least she was during our status briefing this morning." Aayla said as she moved over to a console and began punching in codes. Harry watched her every move, though he had no clue what any of it meant, because he didn't know the system of writing yet in this universe. "She'll believe me if I tell her just enough. She also won't question me if I tell her to not contact me back."

The connection was established, and within a few moments, a light blue hologram of a woman with large ornamental horns and two appendages hanging from the side of her head down her chest appeared. She had darker skin around her face and bright white patches around her eyes. Aayla quickly blurted out to Harry, "Oh, Harry. Make me visible."

"Whoops," said Harry guiltily as he removed the charms from her.

"Master Ti, I bring grave news, and I beg you believe me despite how farfetched it sounds," said Aayla quickly, not waiting for Master Ti's acknowledgment of the greeting.

"What is wrong Aayla, I can easily sense your discomfort. I've never seen you this agitated before."

"Master Ti, it sounds unbelievable, but please believe me. I've travelled back in time nine standard hours. In less than fifty-five minutes, clone troopers will attempt to kill me on this world. They were ordered to do so, Master Ti. I believe the Jedi are about to be betrayed by the Chancellor. You must warn everyone. We need to evacuate the Temple and get the younglings to safety while we still have a chance."

"You can't be serious, Aayla. Time travel is a pipe dream, how can you be sure of all this?"

"I can't tell you the details right now. I've already been warned about trying to change too much. I'm not allowed to change anything I know will happen to avoid creating a paradox. Since I have no idea the fate of those back on Coruscant and on other worlds, I thought this would be possible to change and help Jedi… elsewhere," pleaded Aayla, her composure starting to slip.

Harry saw Shaak Ti's eyes widen. He knew that in that instant the woman had caught on to the fact that there was something on Aayla's planet that Aayla couldn't change, and that it likely wasn't pleasant. Shaak Ti visibly braced herself and asked, "You say the Chancellor ordered this?"

"Yes, he's the only one who could've given an order that supersedes the Jedi within the chain of command. Earlier today I was on a status briefing as General Kenobi engaged General Grievous in battle. Master Windu stated he felt the Chancellor was surrounded by the Dark side. Master Yoda and Master Ki-Adi-Mundi both thought if Grievous was killed today and the Chancellor did not give up his emergency powers, he should be arrested," said Aayla without any hesitation.

"Hmm. Master Windu just left minutes ago with Masters Fisto," Harry heard an involuntary gasp as this name was mentioned and a flare of emotion, "…Kolar, and Tiinto to arrest the Chancellor. They came to the conclusion after a discussion with young Skywalker that Palpatine is really the Darth Sidious persona we've been chasing for years."

Harry, still invisible, whispered to Aayla, "If they failed to arrest him, that's what likely kicked this whole shit storm off." She nodded in agreement with him.

"They probably fail Master Ti. And that's what started this chain of events against the Jedi. If the Chancellor defeated them, he would likely use the arrest attempt as an excuse to brand all Jedi as traitors. Master Windu said he felt a plot to destroy the Jedi while on the conference call. I have seen the result of it, and it's only through the most miraculous intervention I've ever heard of in the Force that I lived through it," said Aayla.

Shaak Ti stared at Aayla for a few long moments, and then finally nodded. "The Force is clearing. The shroud that has blurred our vision for so many decades begins to dissipate. My sight now suddenly feels clearer than it has since I was a Padawan… and it tells me to trust what you are saying. I will issue orders now. The younglings will be evacuated using a method long guarded but never spoken aloud of for fear of times such as these. If anything else, they at least will survive."

"Thank you Shaak Ti," Aayla blurted out, the honorific owed to the Jedi Master forgotten in her excitement, which earned here merely a small smirk from the holographic woman.

"I will try and contact as many individual Jedi as possible who are stationed at the front lines. I doubt I will be able to reach many though. Those I do will all be surrounded by their would-be executioners."

Aayla quickly said, "Please remember not to contact any of us here on Felucia. My original self is on the front-lines now unaware of all of this happening. I've been assured terrible things will happen to me if known events in the time line change because of the manner I've travelled back."

Shaak Ti closed her eyes and nodded in understanding, "You have a way off world?"

"We're about to go and attempt to secure it now."

"Understood. Take care of yourself, Aayla. May the Force be with you… and whoever else is there," said Shaak Ti with a forced smile.

"May it be with us all Master Ti. Please stay safe," and that, Aayla cut the transmission.

"How long, Harry?" asked Aayla, as she followed their quickly devised plan and used her access codes to delete the transmission log and order the backups destroyed immediately.

"Minute fifty-five. You were five seconds under what you said you could safely do." Apparently the comm. systems had different logging systems for communications longer than two minutes. They didn't want the transmission they just made going through that extra bit of scrutiny.

Harry walked over and put a hand on her shoulder with a smile. "You did great. Even this small difference will save lives that likely didn't have a chance before"

She turned her golden eyes towards Harry, and he could see the sadness there. He saw the flicker of comprehension, that she knew what he was trying to do, yet it visibly took all her strength to fight the buried grief just behind her eyes.

"Thank you Harry, the Jedi Order may owe its very survival to you because of your actions today."

"We're not done yet, we still need to ensure our survival. Come on Boss Lady, let's go steal some stuff," said Harry cheekily as he disillusioned Aayla once more.

He watched her shake her head in a bit of muted amusement and leave the room first, which allowed Harry to remove the Muggle-Repelling charms he had placed within the room and on the door as he left.

They proceeded first to the Mess Hall and through the attached kitchens to the storage area beyond. Most of the food was raw ingredients, and they both doubted they would have a need for drums of dried powder that weighed just as much as each of them did.

They did find a stockpile of field rations stored within stacked pallets. Each stack of palettes was easily five meters tall, yet, when Harry was done placing shrinking charms on all but one stack, they were only five inches tall. Feather-light charms applied to each had them placed within the trunk by the handful. A few overpowered Gemino charms had the stacks duplicated from the one remaining tower of palettes and moved to where they were previously standing. It would be at least twelve hours before the fake palettes vanished, and the ships would be long gone from the planet before that occurred.

As they left the makeshift warehouse, Harry realized that once upon a time he did cook for his relatives. He actually got quite good at it since a failed dish usually earned him a beating from his Uncle Vernon. He figured he would maybe try to reacquire that skill and cook for Aayla, so he quickly shrunk down one of each kind of container and stored them within a trunk as well.

Their next stop was the barrack's sickbay where they repeated the procedure. Crate upon crate of medical supplies were shrunk down, stored, and then replaced with empty facsimiles. Aayla said that some of these medicines were incompatible with both humans and Twi'leks, but it would be good to have around in case they eventually joined up with other Jedi who would need one of these medicines.

Their last stop within the barracks was the quarters of Aayla and her fellow Jedi Knight Barriss Offee. Harry stopped her from opening the door right away with her key card when they reached it.

"We can't use your key card to open it if you're supposed to be killed soon somewhere else," said Harry as he closed his eyes and began gathering magic to him.

"Then what are we supposed to do?" said Aayla with a bit of annoyance.

Harry was silent for a moment with his eyes closed, then his eyes snapped open and he said, "This."

He thrust his arms out and did a mass 'Alohomora' that hit every electronic sensor in the hallway. Harry had often used this spell to wake his troops up for impromptu drills early in the morning. He figured that if they worked on electronic locks in his world, there was a good chance they would work here too. The trick was to send your magic along the electronic pathways but not overload them.

Simultaneously, forty separate door locks on this particular floor opened and Harry quickly dragged Aayla inside while she gawked at scene.

"How did you do that?" asked Aayla breathlessly as she looked up and down the hallway.

"Ask me that and any other question you want later, not now," admonished Harry as he quickly pulled out a trunk and hid it from site from the still open door by placing it behind a desk on the wall.

Harry then watched as Aayla slowly grabbed her clothes one piece at a time. As she did this, he quickly made a copy of each piece and placed it back in the drawer. She was diligently emptying the contents of the room, but eventually Harry got a bit frustrated with the time it the whole process took.

He quickly ran to door to double-check no one was in the hallway, turned around and said, "Acio Aayla's Stuff," while he dragged his wand in a circle and then pointed it to the floor. While all of Aayla belongings began flew from their drawers and the closet, Harry opened up his trunk to one of his empty compartments.

When everything in the room settled on the ground, Harry pointed his wand at the pile and dragged its aim to the trunk and said, "Pack." All of Aayla's belongings folded and arranged themselves neatly in midair before they came to rest lightly in the trunk. He would always be thankful for Andromeda Tonks teaching him how to perform that spell after the second rise of Voldemort ended.

Harry looked at Aayla with a smile, and was greeted by a look of absolute incredulity over what had just happened, "Magic," said Harry as he waved his arms in the air comically and leaned against a wall.

Aayla looked back at the room again after she shook herself from her disbelief. Then looked at the other closet.

"The rest all belonged to Barriss."

"Will you take any of it to remember her by?" asked Harry after a few moments of silence.

"Jedi do not form attachments, so there is no need for something physical to remember her," said Aayla in a monotone voice. Harry lifted an eyebrow at the forced and automated way she made the statement, but did not inquire further.

"Well, do you feel any of her belongings would be useful for us to take while we are here," asked Harry tentatively.

He watched her eyes flash at the thought of stealing from her friend. "I will not steal from her."

Harry shook his head at the statement and walked over to her. He gently placed a hand on her shoulder. "Only someone who is attached would say something like that. You aren't a machine Aayla. It's okay to feel what you're feeling. We'll deal with our grief as soon as we've left here, but right now I need your head in the game. Is there anything you would like to take to remember your friend or you feel would be useful to us?"

Aayla hesitated for a few moments, and walked over to a drawer by Barriss' bunk. She withdrew a few crystals from the drawer, along with a spare lightsaber.

"These were lost Jedi healing crystals that Barriss managed to recover. Barriss spent many months researching their history and underwent many trials to recover them. Since you healed me earlier, maybe you can put them to good use as well. Plus you'll eventually need a lightsaber of your own I think. That is… if I'm going to train you to be a Jedi," said Aayla with a tentative half smile.

"Not if I teach you to be a witch first," said Harry with a grin.

With another flourish of the wand, Harry created copies of Barriss' items before they flew from Aayla's hand and into the trunk. Another caused the trunk close, shrink and then fly into Harry's forearm where it vanished.

"Come on, what's next?" asked Harry.

"We need transportation off-world." She paused for a few moments, as if she truly realized the first time the scope of what they faced. "Your idea was to stowaway aboard one of the Star Destroyers? I think it would be better to steal a ship or two, retrofit them after the Star Destroyers leave, and fly out of here on our own in a week or so."

Harry paused and thought it over a few seconds, and could not find any fault with the idea. "Sounds good. If you can lead me to the ships you want, I can place wards over them to make them appear to be trees or hills that everyone else will simply walk by."

"If you're really confident you can hide some ships, we should hide three or four. You can help me pull parts from them after the clones leave and we can make one combined ship out of them all."

At his questioning look, she elaborated, "This way, no one will recognize their engine signatures or configuration as being Republic military hardware. Normal ship and space station scanners can determine not only what model ship you have, but the level of threat your ship poses from certain characteristics."

After she received his nod of acknowledgement, she continued, "We should hide Barriss' and my star fighters as well. There are a few Jedi installations and outposts detailed within hidden files onboard them we could access for sanctuary, if only temporarily. Depending upon how badly the Chancellor's betrayal goes, some of those outposts may not be options. Each Jedi is only granted access to a few of the hidden bases, so that if one of us is captured, the entire network of safe houses is not compromised."

They proceeded outside and walked to an airfield. Harry couldn't believe how many ships there were. He felt more and more that it should be easy to identify a few out of the way ships that he could suddenly help to disappear. Militaries throughout Earth history lost and misplaced equipment all the time. Harry doubted the clones would search very hard for equipment if they were in a rush to leave this planet after their Jedi were killed.

They first came upon a fleet of three dozen "Larty's" as Aayla called them. They were a combination troop transport and gunship that had the capability to leave the atmosphere to ferry troops and equipment. Rare versions of the craft could apparently even enter hyperspace, which Aayla mentioned was how ships travelled from one system to another.

Harry and Aayla picked two about half a mile apart from each other that were slightly closer to the forest then the rest of the grounded fleet. Harry threw some semi-permanent Muggle-Repelling wards around each, and then put up wards to place a hardened dome over each ship. Harry than slowly transfigured the ground to encompass each ship, making it look like the combination of flower trees and rugged landscape had stood there for eternity.

"Wow," was all Aayla said as she watched Harry work. After she finally managed to find her voice after some silence, she walked up and kissed him on the cheek and said with a wide smile, "I honestly had doubts you could hide ships until right now Harry. You're a gift from the Force itself. This gives us so much of a better chance of surviving to get off this planet now, and it's all because of you."

After Harry turned away to hide the absolute Weasley-red blush that had just marred his face, he said "Well, we're still not done. Let's find your personal ships, move them a bit, and then hide them. I can see them wanting to destroy your ships as well if they belonged to you."

She nodded her agreement to him, "It's this way."

While Harry and Aayla walked from the airfield to find her ship, Harry stumbled, stopped walking, and suddenly clutched at his chest. The reverberation of betrayal in the planet's magic made Harry's heart feel like it had been ripped out of his chest. He did not even have his magical senses extended and he still felt the death echo of Aayla's friend Barriss.

Aayla was immediately beside him and offered an arm, looking none the better herself as she had obviously felt the disturbance as well, "By the Whill's grace, what was that? Are you hurt?"

"No… Not hurt… That felt even more horrible than last time," Harry wheezed.

"What, what's horrib-…. Oh no. Please no." asked Aayla, her eyes pleaded for Harry to not confirm what she immediately suspected was behind the surge in magic she felt.

Harry simply looked into her eyes and shook his head. Aayla fell to her knees with her face in her hands. Harry wanted to comfort her right this moment, but they were currently exposed where they were. Aayla had repeatedly reminded him to be mindful of the obscenely violent wildlife that frequented the beautiful landscape here, and he did not want her to become the snack of whatever these 'Ackleys' were.

Picking Aayla up in his arms bridal-style, he continued to walk in the direction she had told him her fighter lay hidden alongside Barriss'. He felt the subtle nudges magic gave him when he relaxed his mind and opened up. It very quickly led them to two single-person ships. One was painted red in a very standardized manner, while the other was a light blue similar to Aayla's skin.

He placed the still quietly crying Aayla on the ground, Harry decided it would simply have to be enough to hide the ships without relocation. Aayla had just about reached her limit with today's events, and needed time so she could deal with the emotions that finally overcame her senses. Harry knew she was strong-willed, but Harry doubted he himself would be able to endure what she had undergone today without eventually turning into a basket case. Heck, he was not sure he handled his own experiences of the day all that well.

Five minutes of ward application later, there was no indication two Jedi Starfighters were ever present at their location.

He walked over to where Aayla sat with her knees curled up into her chest and sat down quietly next to her. His rested an arm lightly around the shoulders of the now weary Twi'lek. "Are you ok to keep going a bit further, or do you need to sit here for a bit longer? I think we can spare a few more minutes," he said quietly.

She swallowed hard, nodded, and said, "I'm ready. We shouldn't stay so close to these ships anyways. It just was too much to bear for a bit there."

"I know. All of the echoes of death. They're still going. It's almost beyond me to filter it all out."

She nodded and closed her eyes, and Harry could barely hear her whisper, "I'm such a failure. I can't hold back my emotions like any decent padawan over the age of fifteen can. Barriss should be alive right now instead of me. She's a far better Jedi than me with how I've reacted today."

Harry removed his arm from her shoulders and turned her to look at him. "Enough with the pity party, Aayla. Survivor's guilt helps no one. You're going through what anyone who's ever experienced absolute insanity like this goes through."

Speaking a bit more quietly, he continued, "It happens to every single one of us who has to stand by and watch our friends die. Its natural and it takes time to deal with. And you just did recover. You needed ten minutes and look, you're almost ready to go again. You're not 100% yet and you won't be for a long time, but you're good enough to do the job that needs doing before we both find a place of safety."

He tried to make a bit of a joke. Anything to make her smile and get the courage to push just a bit further, "You know… so we can both go and completely fall apart together."

Harry could tell she was still held back by her despair and the feeling that somehow she wasn't supposed to be feeling like she did. It would take more than a few jokes to get through to her. "Look, anyone who says that you shouldn't be feeling emotions at times like this probably never left their nice comfortable library or their meditation mat. Real people feel emotions. Real people have to then deal with those emotions. If you ignore them, all they do is build up inside you, until one day they just explode. And on those days, it's a crap shoot whether you do or say something you'll regret the rest of your life."

"You've done an amazing job under the circumstances today, Aayla. Nine hours ago, you were a hair's breadth away from Death itself. And now look at you. You helped give the next generation of your Order a fighting chance to live on. Without you, they would've received no warning whatsoever. And you can bet, if these clones are shooting their Generals like you in the back out here in the field, they would've had no reservations about slaughtering four-year-old kids in your Temple."

Seeing he needed to say a bit more to her, he decided honesty was the best policy. "And you've helped me. I wouldn't have any clue how to get off this planet or where to go. My best bet would have been to sneak onto one of those massive ships and hope and pray my charms and wards didn't fail me while I hid. And then what? I don't know anyone in this universe other than you."

"You really sound like a Jedi, you know that," said Aayla with a sad smile.

"I'm a Wizard, Knight Secura," he said with a jokingly quirked eyebrow. Harry reached down and grabbed her hand softly, "I honestly don't think I could've found a better person to rely upon than you. There was one time you were truly under pressure today when you talked to that Shaak Ti lady, and you held firm. You did your job and got the objective done quickly and effectively."

Harry picked up the still silent woman and stood her up on her two legs. She didn't resist at all. "Come on, just a bit more. Let me memorize the way this clearing looks so I can apparate the two of us directly here rather than walk."

A slow spin allowed him to take in every detail he could of the surrounding area. Harry walked back over to Aayla, who now stared off into the distant sky, where three shapes were clearly seen despite the bright daytime light.

"It's sad. They will leave here and go on to wreak havoc in the name of the Chancellor now. Everything we've fought, bled, and died for was for nothing in the end," Aayla spoke quietly to herself.

Harry turned to her as she continued to speak, "While I would like nothing more to put a few rather large bombs on timers so we could safely blow them all to hell from a safe distance, it's still dangerous. Especially with an explosion that big. It's possible they could tie the explosion back to us since they'd know it was likely Jedi sabotage that did it."

"We should wait for opportunities to present themselves, and be proactive when we can control the outcome. Our information right now is incomplete. We have no idea where these guys are going next."

"We can do a bit of sabotage I think," Aayla pondered aloud after a few moments of silence. "They won't hang out in orbit for longer than an hour or two if they're moving out as fast as you say they were. Probably within an hour or two of when we went back in time, they'll enter hyperspace to travel to another system. Standard Operating Procedures. Clones aren't really capable of disobeying orders or procedures," she said with a mirthless laugh.

"We'll see what we can do then," said Harry simply.

They walked back to the airfield, invisibility and muggle-repelling spells still in effect. While they passed through, Harry noticed some robots as they wandered aimlessly through the area. Some of them appeared to be busy with tasks, which looked to be maintenance related.

"Aayla? What about those machines that are working on the ships? Do we need any of them?" asked Harry.

She stopped and looked at a few of the robots that were going about their business around them. Slowly she started nodding. "Yes, it would be quite useful to have some droids around. We'll need at least two astromech droids and one protocol droid."

Harry blinked and then chuckled. "Ok, I have no idea what any of that means. Can you point them out to me?"

After a barely noticed roll of her eyes, Aayla dragged Harry over to a maintenance bay, where they found three squat droids that resembled garbage cans plugged into a wall. "These are astromech droids. They're general purpose laborers, plus they help provide in-flight maintenance and quick system overrides in star fighters."

"How about we take all three? And what about this rack they're plugged into. I assume that's for power? Should we take that as well?"

"If you can get it, great. It would be better to have that than having cables lying around in order to charge them." Harry waved his hand and all three astomechs floated up into the air. All three immediately activated, though Aayla walked up to each, flipped a panel up and did something inside. Each droid immediately shut down.

With his wand, Harry pulled the charging rack away from the wall after using a few well placed cutting curses. Unfortunately, it had been welded into place, so a portion of the wall behind came with it. A quick transfiguration spell extended the wall around the hole so there was no evidence the rack had ever been there.

Floating the droids back into the rack, Harry plugged them all back in. Seeing a loose cable on a table, Harry wrapped the three droids with it.

"Here's another thing I can do. I can teleport myself directly, or I can make things teleport on their own and anything attached to them. This is called a portkey." A wave of his wand and a muttered Portus caused the cable to glow a soft blue. A few seconds later, the entire rack disappeared.

"Where did they go?" asked Aayla, clearly at a loss how all this was accomplished and simply attempted to go with the flow now.

I sent them next to that first Larty we hid, inside of its wards. We can pick them up when we pull down the wards around that particular one in a few days.

"It's going to take me years to learn all these things, isn't it?" asked Aayla, with a voice that sounded half dejected and half determined.

"Probably, and I fully intend to make sure you live to see all those years," said Harry. "What's next?"

"Protocol Droid. They're standardized translators that help with customs of any planets we may visit. We'll likely find some running around the command center adjacent to the Barracks

It took only five minutes to track one down. A silver humanoid shaped droid with a kind female voice found herself suddenly deactivated and portkeyed to the second Larty.

"I think the only significant place we haven't visited is the armory," Aayla finally said.

"Well, let's get some things to blow stuff up with and call it a successful mission," said Harry. He wanted to see what kind of technology they had up close. The bits he had seen had been so far in advance of what they had back on Earth they weren't even capable of being compared directly.

The security around the armory was quite impressive. Multiple checkpoints and scans prevented any sort of casual wanderings. Of course they weren't designed with Harry's ability to line-of-sight apparate right through the barriers. The noise of the place was more than enough to cover any sound the teleportation created.

The armory itself offered them many possibilities to acquire additional supplies. They quickly grabbed various weapons, armor, and specialized sensor equipment. Aayla was extremely reluctant to take any of the blasters for herself, since Jedi looked down upon them and her undercover work had always stressed hand to hand combat. Harry countered all her arguments deftly, saying she couldn't be using her "Force" abilities in hand to hand combat overtly anymore without giving away she was a Jedi. Instead, they picked up multiple sniper rifles, along without as much ammunition and blaster packs they could quickly grab.

As they were leaving, Aayla grew still and quiet. They watched as a large contingent of troopers passed by as they arrived back from battle. The column was supported by a large four legged transport vehicle that Aayla had referred to earlier as an AT-TE.

One that looked surprisingly like the one Harry assumed had made the crater that had killed Barriss earlier.

"That is Lieutenant Galle's squad. They're the clones who killed Barriss," said Aayla without any emotion in her voice.

Harry moved behind her wrapped his arms around her waist. He was a little taller than her, and he must admit that it was nice to stand behind a female and not get her hair in his eyes or nose.

"They used that AT-TE to kill her. I don't think anything else on that battlefield could make a crater as big as I saw out there," said Harry.

A slow smile gripped Harry's face. "Aayla?"

"Yes?" she answered with a voice as hard as steel.

"That big gun on top of the AT-TE, is it something that would work well on a ship?"

Her presence lost all fire that had been burned inside it. She took a calculated look at the gun and mused aloud, "Yes it would be, but you would never be able to fit the mass driver launch assembly, the ordnance it requires, and its power supply on a ship and simultaneously hide them from sensors."

"Let me take care of that part of things. I already have some ideas on how I can actually contribute to this starship, since I don't know squat about the technology and how to modify it. Let's go pull one, hide it, and then find enough rounds to last us a good while for it."

It amazed Harry how easy it was to steal a massive gun the size of half a house. A few cutting curses loosened the gun and four linked portkeys had it portkeyed to Aayla's starfighter. A few minutes of work after apparating there had it successfully hidden under the fighter's wards.

Afterwards, he returned and did the same for the power supply and all ordnance in the area. He easily managed to fit the hundreds of shrunken rounds within another space of his thirteen compartment trunk. All of the stolen hardware was replaced with duplicates that would evaporate into thin air later on.

After they secured the power supply near the second Larty, they made one more trip to the armory. Upon arrival, Aayla quietly led him into a far corner where they found a mass of cylinders and boxes. He watched as she stared at the pile for a minute, while she fought some internal battle within her mind. Eventually she asked, "Is there a way you can get people to not think specific lights or symbols are on and active with these?"

"Yeah I can place glamours upon them so the mimic something other than their actual appearance." Aayla quickly began pressing buttons on almost every cylinder present. Then she reached into the boxes and pressed a few buttons within each as well.

Turning back to Harry, she said "I need you to change these cylinders so these specific lights are not on. I'm hoping people just ignore the boxes and don't look inside them. Smirking, Harry quickly placed glamours upon each cylinder. Then he cast a compulsion charm on each box so that people wouldn't look inside.

"Done, are they all going to the same place, or will they be split up?" asked Harry.

"They should go mainly to one specific ship, with a few diverted to the other ships. Normally one ship is tasked to primarily carry munitions, but they will spread extra resources around to the other ships to ensure that losing one ship will not completely cripple a battlegroup until a resupply ship is deployed," said Aayla quickly.

"Do I want to know the payload of these?" asked Harry tentatively.

"They go boom, and will do so right next to many other things that go boom," said Aayla with a smirk before she walked away. Harry wisely figured it was best not to question her about the size of said 'boom'.

-o0o0o-

They had returned to the edge of the airfield and both sat on the ground in silence, lost in their own thoughts. Both knew they were done. They had accomplished every single objective they had so quickly set out to perform. All that was left now was to find a place to hide and lay low for a few days until it was absolutely assured the clones had left the planet for good and wouldn't return.

It was nearly an hour past the death echo of Barriss, and it took quite a bit of Harry's concentration to block out the continuing echo's of the distant deaths of Jedi that could still be felt happening somewhere else out in the galaxy. The idea that someone light-years away could die in a manner so horrifying that their death was felt instantaneously across a galaxy was very sobering to him. He could only imagine how Aayla felt at the moment, and whether she was taking the brunt full blast or had deadened her senses to the touch of Death that screamed to his own magical senses.

The sun slowly set upon one of the longest days of Harry Potter's life. It was likely a beautiful thing to watch, but Harry hadn't even glanced at it. He had awoken this morning, nervous and half-hopeful. The end of the war they fought for a decade well within their grasp. Now, he was a universe away, with only one companion who he did not know at all. An alien that was currently hunted like a traitor by a corrupt government that spanned a galaxy.

Harry placed his head down and curled his knees up into his chest in a manner he was only vaguely aware mimicked Aayla's own breakdown a short time earlier. He knew he was at his limit, and there wasn't a thing he could do about it. Everything and everyone he knew may as well be dead.

Aayla hadn't recognized any of his abilities, and had never heard of portals. The look of confusion she gave when she admitted she had never seen someone conjure a glass of water had been like a punch to the gut. He knew with absolute certainty from the moment he mentioned portals and got a questioning look back there was no going home for him.

Ever.

Involuntarily, Harry rocked back and forth while he sat, no longer fighting the panic that had slowly threatened to overwhelm him. He was now absolutely alone.

He was startled when he felt Aayla straddle him from behind and wrap her arms around him. Her forehead rested against the back of his neck as she squeezed his chest for all she was worth. After a few moments, she rested her chin on shoulder and spoke quietly. "We'll endure this, Harry. I'm an Empath, I can feel what you're feeling when I'm touching you. You're not alone. You've kept me from falling apart all day, you think I wouldn't do the same for you? The Force sometimes… very rarely, performs spontaneous miracles. They're rare… legendary in fact. Millennia pass between people witnessing them. After what you've done today, you are my miracle."

Harry felt her pull on his forearms so he would release his own grip upon his knees. She guided his arms to his chest and then held on to his hands while she hugged him from behind. After a few brief minutes of respite and quiet, she said, "We should get going. Find a place to hide and rest. Maybe get some food."

She then shook with what Harry could only describe as silent giggles, "Frak, I have to relieve myself. I've been holding it for the last hour."

Harry snorted in amusement. Which he figured was her intent all along. He looked over his shoulder at the woman staring at him inches away from his own eyes. He found nothing but concern in those eyes. "Thanks for that, it all just finally hit me right then."

"What are friends for?" she said, and Harry could hear the smile in her voice. After he gave her hands one more squeeze with his own, Harry stood and dusted his robes off. 'Friends? I think I can live with that."

He offered his hand to pull Aayla up and said, "Let's move then, any suggestions on where you want to hide? Or I should I trust these instincts that seem to speak to me now when I open up my mind?"

Harry saw her eyes widen at this statement as she took his hand again, almost to brace herself up, "Those aren't instincts. It is the Force guiding you. We Jedi train for years to get to the point where if you open yourself up, you can be guided in your decisions."

"The easiest method is to use the Force to help you predict how to move in a fight. When to dodge, parry, or jump. The hard part is using it to see eventualities… possible futures, or to just get guidance on a decision. I've only recently been able to get those specific aspects of things to work well, and even then only barely. My training has always been much more focused upon combat and stealth. I'm nowhere near what someone like Master Ti or Grand Master Yoda could accomplish when they ponder long-term eventualities and possibilities."

Harry tried to digest this. True seers were quite rare on Earth. And more often than not they were frauds. It seemed here almost all magicals were seers in some small manner.

"So trust my instincts, eh?" She nodded. "Okay."

Harry cleared his mind and extended his magical senses outwards. He needed somewhere safe to hide with Aayla where they could rest for a day or two. He felt a subtle mental suggestion, a guide that wasn't really there. He allowed it to shift his mind's eye as he stretched out and…

'There.'

He opened his eyes and smiled at Aayla, who still held his hand. "Found a place…3…2…1..."

And with one final "Crack!" they were gone.