Slave Quarters

Hutt Palace

Tatooine

41 BBY

"Hush, hush," Shmi Skywalker murmured, rocking her infant son. "Hush, little one, everything is all right."

"Shmi, you are to proceeed in the throne room," Gritzpa, an older Twi'lek male said harshly from the open doorway of the small room.

Shmi felt tears fill her eyes, but obediently rose and placed her four month old baby son in a rude crib by the side of the room. She hated leaving Anakin alone while she served her master, Gardulla the Hutt, but there was no other option; indeed, she knew that if she caused any trouble at all, the Hutt would be entirely pleased to kill her precious child.

"Yes, sir," she said meekly, and took a step forward, only to freeze in astonishment as three adult forms appeared around her, entirely out of nowhere.

The Twi'lek squawked in amazement and reached for the electrowhip at his waist. Shmi shrank back and released a cry of astonishment when first the whip, and then the slaver, were yanked into the room. A moment later, the door slammed shut.

Anakin began crying and Shmi quickly picked him up, wrapping her arms around her child protectively.

The three intruders were all, she thought, in their mid thirties. One was a dark haired woman, the second a red haired woman, and the third a dark blonde male. At the moment, they were tying the Gritzpa up using his own socks, which was weird, but the whole thing was weird.

Then things got weirder.

"Shmi?" the dark haired woman asked, turning her attention on mother and child. "Oh! Is that Anakin?"

Within a minute, both women were crowding around Shmi and her child, wearing equally adoring expressions.

"He is so precious!" the dark haired woman exclaimed, and the redhead said, "Doesn't he remind you of Biggs?"

"He does," the male said. "He really does. He is adorable. But wow, we have never been sent back this far before, have we?"

"No," the dark haired woman said, and turned a reassuring smile on Shmi. "I know this is very weird, but we are time travelers from like sixty years in the future. Given that Anakin is an infant, I assume that we are on Tatooine?"

Shmi stared at the woman and opened her mouth, "Time travel is…"

She stopped, closed her mouth, cogitated, and said, "But you just appeared out of thin air, so I guess many things are possible that I did not realize."

"Just shows how smart you are," the male said approvingly. "Yoda himself is ancient and a great Jedi and yet he still is boggled by time travel."

"Jedi?" Shmi demanded. "You are Jedi?"

"We are, but from the future," the dark haired woman said. "Let's do some quick introductions. I am Leia Organa Skywalker Solo, and this is my twin brother, Luke Skywalker. We are Anakin's children. This is Mara, Luke's wife."

Shmi stared at the pair in disbelief, but it did not take her a long time to respond. One of the challenges of being a slave, after all, was the need to adjust to changing circumstances quickly. It kept one alive.

"You are my grandchildren," she said in wonder.

"We are," Luke said with a grin. "But we never know how long we have anywhere, so we should get organized. Is this Gardulla the Hutt's palace?"

"Yes," Shmi said, and gulped. "I need to go to Gardulla right now, actually; I was called some time ago and if I am late…"

She trailed off and turned her gaze on her little angel, who was sleeping in her arms.

"No worries there," Leia said, and when Shmi lifted a puzzled gaze to her granddaughter, she was startled to observe a very confident grin on the woman's face.

"No worries indeed," Luke said. "Mara, can you please watch over and protect Shmi and Anakin?"

The red haired beauty saluted and said, "You bet. Let me know what the plan is when you are done."

"You got it!"

The twins left in haste, and Shmi turned a bewildered look on Mara and asked, "What are they doing?"

"Killing Gardulla," Mara said, reaching into a pocket of her practical blue pants and pulling out a protein bar. "Here, eat this. I am sure you are hungry."

Shmi took the bar, because food was valuable and scarce, but she did not lift it to her mouth, partly because she was holding Anakin but mostly because that was impossible.

"The two of them?" she whispered. "They'll be killed!"

"They won't," Mara said confidently, and held out her arms. "Can I hold that sweet little boy while you eat your protein bar?"

Shmi found herself insensibly cheered by her daughter-in-law's (!) assertion, and she handed over her sleeping baby and ate her protein bar.

/

Gardulla's Throne Room

A Few Minutes Later

Gardulla was a fat Hutt, and that was saying something. They were a blobby species anyway, and inclined towards being obese to the point of having trouble moving, and indeed, Gardulla was getting close to being stuck on her throne all day long thanks to eating too many paddy frogs and other tasty bits.

She wasn't too upset about that. She had slaves, lots of them, and she had droids, and they could move her around if she became throne bound. And eating was so fun!

Feeding slaves to the rancor was fun too! There was a male human slave dancing in front of her, at the end of a long chain which she held in her fleshly, fat hand, and she had already decided she was tired of the man and was going to feed him to the rancor. It had been four days since the rancor had eaten and she could hear rumbling from below. The poor thing was hungry and…

Out of nowhere, there was a sudden agonizing, ripping, searing, blazing pain in the back of her neck/head, an agony which quickly traveled around the right side, and then around the front of her neck/head, and now her bulging eyes noted, distantly, a green blade which looked like a, like a, like a…

Gardulla's head fell off her body and she was dead, which provoked, not surprisingly, a great deal of screaming and howling from the assembled courtiers, many of whom produced blasters and spun in circles, looking for threats.

Luke Skywalker, Jedi Master, did a complicated triple flip from his place in the shadows to land on the throne of the now deceased Hutt. This movement caused a lot of trigger happy morons to begin blasting him, but he deflected the first few with the Force, and the next barrage with his green lightsaber, and Leia (carefully hidden in an alcove) began yanking weapons from the aggressors, and within a minute, everyone was disblastered (as opposed to disarmed, always a possibility when trying to shoot a lightsaber wielder) and Luke raised his voice and began speaking Huttese, which shocked everyone into silence.

"Everyone shut up," he ordered. "I am obviously a Jedi Knight and I had an issue with Gardulla. I have no intention of killing anyone else so long as you go along peaceably, but if you attack me again, I will kill you quickly and painlessly. Everyone got it?"

There were a few seconds of silence, and then one tall, hulking Weequay rasped, also in Huttese, "Seems to me there is only one of you and a great many of us. Don't think you are getting out of here alive, Je…"

He broke off and lifted one hand to his neck, and began choking dramatically. Luke said, "You can certainly try to kill me, but you'll die in the process, Weequay. Besides, what's the point? Hutts may be a tough species, but losing a head is fatal and Gardulla is well and truly dead. I suggest you all run away and wait for the situation to settle down somewhat. Isn't that wise?"

Leia released the Weequay from her death grip and he sank to his knees, pulling in oxygen, and after a few shocked moments, a few miscellaneous minions ran out the two main doors exiting the throne room, followed by a few more, and within three minutes, the Weeuqay staggered out of the room, leaving it empty except for Luke and Leia and six terrified slaves.

"We don't mean you any harm," Leia said in Basic, emerging from her hiding place.

The slaves, four humans and two Twi'leks, stared wide eyed at the petite woman while the male dancer said, "We have transmitter chips. If someone…"

"Good point," Luke interrupted, and turned to his sister and said telepathically, "Leia, as soon as I remove Shmi's chip, can you and Mara take her and the baby to Varykino and ask the Naberries to take them in? I think I'd better stay here and remove the chips and get the Jedi from this timeline involved."

Leia frowned and thought and then nodded. "That makes sense," she said aloud, which provoked nervous twitches from the slaves, who were uneasy by weird conversations which were partly out loud.

"Great," Luke said, and looked around the grimy throne room and scrunched up his nose. "This place is really smelly and grimy."

"It is," Leia agreed just as there was a sad roar from beneath them.

"That poor rancor," Luke said, looking downward. "Let's feed Gardulla's body to it and then get cracking on other stuff."

"Sounds good," Leia said cheerfully, and gestured to the slaves. "Get off the grate, Ok?"

They all did with alacrity, and Luke opened the grate, and then the twins threw the Hutt's body and head into the cavern below, and the rancor began eating with great, slobbering enthusiasm, and then the slaves and the twins left for where Mara and Shmi and Anakin were, and Luke removed the transmitter from Shmi, and Leia found a reasonable hyperspace worthy ship and within the hour, Shmi and Anakin were safely in space, guarded by two protective Jedi Knights. All in all, it was a good day for Shmi and her child.