Chapter Text
The Hutts were, and had always been, a plague on the Outer Rim. Their slimy fist tightened around countless systems and planets out there before the Old Republic was even enacted, enforcing an age of destruction and slavery that would not be abolished for millennia.
Hutt control peaked amidst the height of division in the Force, wars between dark and light overseen by the Old Republic. You, a member of the budding Jedi Order, were appointed by Grandmaster Shan to soothe relations and negotiate terms on Nal’Hutta, so that the growing syndicate might lend its power to the light. She’d sat cross-legged, hovering inches above the ground, aided by the force. It was endlessly powerful there on Tython.
“We require the suggestive power of the Hutt syndicate, if we are to hope for wider galactic support of the Light.”
You hadn’t frowned, per se. Just internally grumbled a little. Why couldn’t she go and sort out relations? She got to meditate all day and boss people around. Now you’d have to leave the care of the youngling Yoda to some other (perfectly capable) jedi knight! Yoda pouted a lot when you told him of your mission, packing extra robes into a little case alongside your green lightsaber.
“I know kid, I know! But you’re too young for such a.. task.” You rolled your eyes. Having the youngling as company could have eased the boredom of diplomatic relations, but no. Yoda burbled at you, you could hardly resist those void-like, wide eyes.
Still, you dropped him off in the youngling nursery, and made your way to the spaceport dutifully.
The invention of hyperspace technology was utterly revolutionary, you thought absently, whilst taking your seat on an interplanetary transport. It reduced space-travel to mere hours where previous use of kyber powered thrusters took days. You felt lucky to be alive in an era of such ingenuity, the rise of technology, diplomacy, peace; even odd creations like carbonite and bacta tanks seemed to better the galaxy as a whole.
You slipped into a deep meditation (okay, a slumber) as the sleek cruiser rocked and swayed to the motion of space. Your robes spilled out over the metal-alloy seat, hues of deep brown and light cream swathing your body. Your fellow passengers scrutinised you with some curiosity, some irritation. A Rodian child tugged at your silken garments, but failed to rouse you.
Before you knew it, you were touching down on the dusty surface of Nal’Hutta.
Stepping out of the spacecraft had your robes billowing with a breeze that smelled of oil. Far from the fresh air of Tython you were used to. Imposing droids with guns for arms and ammunition packed into their clanking bodies seized hold of your arms before you could react, marching you towards a huge palace built of mud and embossed with gold in the distance.
Your voice caught in your throat in surprise as they practically carried you, your feet dragging over the ground, before uttering: “Uh.. excuse me—“
Robotic, programmed voices blared over yours. “By the orders of Lord Deela the Hutt, you are to be taken to the throne room.”
You frowned. Quite literally every time you opened your mouth after that, the same sermon would be chanted again.
Finally, once bypassing hordes of Gamorrean guards that glared and snorted at you, your droid acquaintances deposited you on the surprisingly shiny floor of the Hutt throne room. Hard. You’d likely have bruises for days.
You looked up at your summoner and tried not to wince at his (hers? it’s?) repugnant, oozing flesh. How it spilled over the sides of his seating platform, how it glistened with sweat and the remnants of an oily meal. It was worse when he spoke with the smell of his breath hitting you, a shockwave of rotten Gungan flesh and aged eggs.
Despite that, negotiations were almost pleasant. Until you made an unforgivable misstep, a vague comment on the ‘backwards’ culture of Nal’Hutta. You were trying to appreciate the planet like a quaint community that stubbornly held onto pre-Republic traditions, not cause offence. In hindsight, that was not the best move for negotiations with a crime syndicate, however.
So, Lord Deela decided to teach you a lesson in just how Nal’Hutta was keeping up with the galaxy’s insights and innovations. By encasing you in carbonite.
It was supposed to be temporary. A quick spell that would show you (and the Jedi as a whole) that the Hutts were not to be messed with. However, Lord Deela was a busy man, his attentions couldn’t be focused on wrangling an unruly Jedi for more than a cycle. He forgot to send ransom transmissions to your faction on Tython, forgot that the beautiful artwork of a terrified woman clad in robes, turned to stone, in his throne room, was in fact a trapped living human.
Time passed. Deela died after ruling over the Hutt syndicate for years, only to be replaced by a descendant that equally admired the picture that your frozen figure made. Your jedi council stopped searching after moons of radio silence, all that remembered you perished after a while. You became an instalment that Hutt guests would briefly glance at, comment on, and overall ignore. For millennia.
Of course, you were unaware of this. Your last memory was of pleading and screaming with the large Lord to please, oh please let you go! He would not hear it, and fear chilled in your gut.
Sentience softened around the edges of your soul. Your senses dulled to black stone. Your tether to the Force was what kept you living, despite being encased for eons, but your consciousness stayed stuck in the nanosecond before being frozen.
Then a crash. One that echoed over space and time.
Leather-clad fingers closed around your wrist. Your senses of touch, taste, smell, they seemed to be amplified as your hearing and sight were all out of whack. You felt yourself smack into hard terracotta walls, come off them with sand coating your sweaty skin. The air tasted and smelled of smoke and oil, harsh to your weak state. A muffled yet urgent voice pervaded the ringing in your ears, deep and modulated, it accompanied the sound of distant explosions and crashing.
You did not know what, in the sweet name of the Force, was going on.
Just minutes ago, Deela the Hutt had been threatening carbonite imprisonment for your unsavoury manners, now your eyes and ears were not working, and Nal’Hutta seemed to be exploding beneath your feet as some stranger dragged you through the palace halls. You did not expect this from your diplomatic excursion.
Din had just sent the twin Hutts to a watery death with their captive dragonsnake. Fitting, really. He, Rotta and Grogu were just about to flee the crumbling palace, when he caught sight of a carbonite statue. A prisoner, really, not a sculpture. A woman, draped in traditional jedi robes, her face suspended in open-mouthed torment. He could not just leave her, it is not the Way to leave the defenceless to die. So, he’d barrelled towards her prone form and furrowed his brows beneath his helmet at her prison.
He paused only momentarily to take in her beauty, even in this state of obvious frozen fear.
The decarbonisation mechanism looked simpler than any he’d ever used. Not even pre-imperial, it must have been implemented years before that. Usually, carbonite alloy was pressurised and required a specific deactivation override sequence, a set of numbers and symbols in a combination that only select people were privy to. Carbon-freezing was primarily used for capturing criminals, after all.
This panel, however, was far simpler. Din pressed his thumb to the large red button titled ‘DEPRESSURISE’ (in ancient galactic?), and the carbonite began to melt. He grabbed the newly-freed woman by her wrist and ran. She’d need time to recuperate after however long in carbonite, but he couldn’t afford that with the palace collapsing around them. Not the best environment to wake from such a deep sleep.
You fell unconscious as he dragged you. He couldn’t blame you, really, you’d been through quite an ordeal, thrown from liquefied carbon into a literal warzone. So, with Grogu cradled in one strong arm, he threw your pliant body over his armoured shoulder. Before long, he had you laid out in the sleep bay of the Razor Crest (2.0).
Grogu hopped up, lay his tired little body in the warm crevice of your curled body, where your knees met your chest. He turned his wide, dark eyes to where his father stood. Hands on beskar-clad hips. Grogu pawed at your ragged robes, and babbled inquisitively. Din sighed.
”I don’t know, kid. Couldn’t just leave her, could I?”
Grogu responded with little more than a spit-bubble. Din chuckled and wiped it away with his cloak. His eyes were again drawn to your attire, distinctly Jedi, yet the material was so different to what he’d seen Skywalker clad in. It was lighter, silkier, and you had a symbol embossed on your shoulder that he’d only glimpsed in ancient Jedi records when researching for Grogu. None of this added up, Din decided absently; the ancient Basic on the even more ancient carbonite machine, your unfamiliar clothes. Why would the Hutt Twins have a Jedi imprisoned in their throne room? The galaxy wasn’t governed by imperial propaganda anymore, Jedi were no longer feared or hunted.
Din lowered himself into a crouch, his knees popped from the exertion. He narrowed his eyes at you through his visor, noted how low your bodily temperature was through his thermal sensors. He pulled a blanket from the foot of the thin bed, and tucked it over your and Grogu’s bodies with a huff. He already had Rotta and Grogu to care for on this blasted ship, now a stray Jedi too?
Still, you didn’t seem bothersome. After some more careful examination (standing a foot away and frowning at you as you slept), Din trudged out to the cockpit, leaving Grogu cuddled up with you. He seemed drawn to your presence, your Force-sensitivity, and that deemed you trustworthy enough in Din’s eyes.
You woke to little, green, three-fingered hands pressing to your sweat-slick cheeks. Wide, void-like eyes staring into yours, just like little Yoda’s. But that was impossible, you’d left him safely on Tython. And this child’s Force signature was most certainly not that of Yoda. You raised your eyes weakly, surveyed the unfamiliar sleep-bay sluggishly, before your vision went black again.
Grogu squealed excitedly.