HTTYD-Star Wars: ECLIPSE

Part 11

Savro part 2

The blaster fire had stopped when Tris charged at them, catching them completely off guard. The Force lightning hit the hovercraft causing the engines to overload and explode. The force of the explosion sent those that had been targeting the Twi'lek sprawling to the ground. Tris then used his lightsaber to make quick work of them before they could come to their senses.

"Who are they?!" Navida asked as she and Thrawn came up from their cover along with C1. She studied the prone bodies when something caught her attention. "Oh Makers" She exclaimed pointing to a symbol that was tattooed onto one of the men's biceps. "These are Outcasts. Some of the worst slavers in the Unknown Regions."

"This planet may be their base of operations." Thrawn mused. "A virtually unknown planet away from hyperspace lanes seems a plausible option."

"They must have been too far away for Tris to sense." Navida mused. "But that still begs the question as to why they were chasing that kid."

At the reminder of the unknown humanoid child they turned around to see the little humanoid bang on C1's dome with great curiosity. C1 however was not amused and let out a startled beep before rolling backwards. Navida approached and bent down as to not startle the child. "Hey there....." She said, keeping her voice pleasant. Large pupils looked at her, then at Tris, and finally they landed on Thrawn. Before Navida could utter anything else the child exclaimed "Haliha!! Haliha!!" and ran off, back through the thick foliage, in the direction that it came from.

"That wasn't Basic Galactic. Could any of you understand that?" Navida asked, perplexed by the child's behavior. Both Thrawn and Tris shook their heads.

"He ran in the direction that I'm sensing the settlement." Tris told them. "These Outcasts might have attacked them. It's best to be careful."

They slowly started walking towards the direction the child had disappeared to, leaving the corpses of the slavers and the burnt hovercraft behind them. It was after two hours of walking that things got interesting. Thrawn stopped them when his keen hearing picked up sounds coming towards them. These sounds however did not seem threatening, Tris sensed awe, excitation, skepticism, and reverence. It did not take them long to come face to face with the origins of the sounds. The small grey humanoid child was back but this time he brought older humanoids with them. They stood, weaponless before the group that had Navida pausing to reach for her blaster. "Haliha! Haliha!" The child exclaimed once again, pointing at their group. A frenzy of words followed from the older humanoids before they got onto their knees and bowed deep to the group.

"Do you think this is some form of greeting?" Tris whispered low to the others. He had never seen humanoids act like this before. The child approached them and took Tris's hand and tugged. "Haliha, Haliha, saquare!"

"Eh......." Tris wasn't sure how he should answer the kid and just looked lost. The child tugged again and this time he decided to follow in that direction.

"This is rather interesting." Thrawn stated as he observed the humanoids stand up as soon as Tris decided to follow the child. They were flanked by the humanoids as they followed after Tris, the humanoids mumbling something in their language that they couldn't understand. "I would certainly like to know more about their fascinating civilization. They seem to be associating Tris with the word Haliha. I wonder just what that means."

"Well they approached us without weapons." Navida mumbled. "I don't think that they have any bad intentions. Maybe they just want us to thank us for saving that child?"

"If their society is one giant community I could see something like this happening." Thrawn confirmed. "But it would take more observations to conclude that."

"Right" Navida nodded as she watched the procession. The humanoids that flanked them had yet to look them in the eyes, it seemed like they were intentionally avoiding doing that. They wore primitive clothing, a simple brown or beige robe reaching to their knees that was tied with a sash of similar color.

They soon came upon a well worn path that they followed to a peculiar village. From their clothing it looked like these people were quite primitive, having not yet learned how to craft metals. The settlement they came to was anything but. Instead of huts made of wood from the forest they were crafted of stone. The stones packed so tightly together without mortar that only tiny seams could be seen. The remnants of ruins littered the settlement. Large stone or metal towers, covered in ivy, moss, and weathered from the humidity of the jungle jutted out in various places.

"Intriguing!" She heard Thrawn say with a hint of fascination as he studied the village and its inhabitants. "These structures, they were not crafted by these people." Meanwhile the humanoid inhabitants had approached the group in curiosity. Several were chanting the same word the child had shouted as they allowed them passage to the middle of the village. Tris was not so far from Navida and to her it seemed that more of the inhabitants' attention was on him.

C1 let out a startled beep as he was poked and prodded. Even the Lothcat on Tris's shoulders looked mildly alarmed at the inhabitants. They managed to join Tris in the center as more villagers came to the square. "This is becoming insane." Navida told her partner as she bumped into him.

"YAAAAHHH!!!!" Was shouted suddenly, quieting the curious villagers. Many suddenly walked backwards, giving Tris, Navida, and Thrawn some breathing room. A small path opened up as the grey inhabitants let a smaller but muscled, decked out in jewelry made of woven cloth and several gem-like rocks, older grey humanoid through. Its large pupils narrowed as he looked at all three of them. He then turned and shouted something to those gathered that had the crowd mumbling in their language that the trio and droid still couldn't decipher.

"I don't think he likes us very much." Navida whispered to both men as they watched the smaller grey humanoid frantically wave the ornate staff that he was carrying around. Thrawn was silently observing the situation. "Let's get out of here." Tris told the others and indicated that they should quietly leave while the man was still ranting.

Their departure however did not go totally unnoticed. The child that had led Tris here along with a younger one ran in front of them. The child said something that Tris and the others couldn't comprehend as an older humanoid, most likely his mother, was trying to shush him. Yet the boy didn't stop. Tris felt worry and sadness from the child before the boy ran past them and towards the man that seemed to be admonishing the people in the square.

The boy shouted something at the man causing him to still. He then gestured to them, and told him something else that got the jewel wearing man angry. "I thought you said that they were not hostile." Thrawn asked as he took in the scene of the staff wielding man advancing on the boy.

"It's not hostility I'm sensing." Tris stated as he narrowed his eyes. "It's disgust, I will tell you more later. This is getting out of hand." He stated as he saw the man lift his staff to strike the child. Thrusting out his hand, Tris called upon the Force to help him. He sent a Force wave at the man, knocking the staff out of his hand and causing him to skid backwards. Gasps rang through the crowd as the boy, who had closed his eyes upon seeing that he would be hit, looked at the man that now lay further from him on the ground. "Haliha!" The boy shouted and surprisingly it rang through the assembled crowd as they all bowed low. Even the man that had wanted to strike the boy got down on his knees and bowed.

"What the kriff!" Tris exclaimed as he looked at the bowing inhabitants.

"It seems they think we, or more likely you, are gods." Thrawn drawled out.

"We do end up in the most bizarre situations." Navida mumbled as she wasn't sure what to do.