The young boy, Aden, who was next to the girl blushed pink at the praise. "N-not any droid... but I'm pretty sure I can help fix yours." His pale pink hair messily hung over his face, shy from the attention now the focus was on him instead of the game of chase. "can we please have that part?" He asks the other boy politely while nervously fiddling with the tools on his belt, glancing at the girl clearly looking to impress her.

The force just slightly ripples as Aden unconsciously uses the force to help persuade the other child. If he knew what he was doing he wouldn't let the force influence people like that, but he was completely unaware of his latent powers.

The other boy gets an odd look on his face for a second then nods and hands over the part to the girl. She beams at Aden and he smiles back shyly clearly enjoying the attention from her, his crush obvious to any adult looking on.

The jedi walked towards them. "May I see this part?" she asked.

The girl looked up at her. "Are you gonna take it?" she asked suspiciously, squinting her eyes.

The vendor chuckled. "Jumen, she's a Jedi, dear,"

The girl's eyes widened. "Oh." She held the part out. "Why do you want it?"

The jedi knelt to be at the girl's eye level and looked at the part. It looked like a control board from her ship, but it had a clear sense of life energy.

"This part will fix your droid," the jedi said. "Aden is skilled."

Aden looks very uncomfortable at being praised by an adult, especially one as important as a Jedi. Attention from adults was usually not a good thing for him.

"Can we have it back now?." He asks the Jedi, and like before a flicker of the force pushes out to convince them without Aden knowing it.

He just wanted to get the part and go back to his makeshift workshop and fix Jumens droid so she would like him more. All this attention from adults was making him a little anxious. Usually, when adults took notice of him it was either to make him work or to yell at him.

The jedi handed it back to him. "You underestimate your own skill," she told him softly.

Her comlink beeped. "The meeting is over. We would appreciate your intervention."

She pushed the button on her wrist through her cloak. "I'm on my way."

On a second story above them, a door slid open. In a flash, she pulled out her lightsaber and deflected a blast. She leapt up to the second story and cut the blaster in half, then pushed the guard through the door.

Jumen watched with awe. "Jedi are so cool!"

"Let's get out of here!" He grabs Jumen and the other boys hand and tries to drag them to cover. No matter how good Jedi are supposed to be stray blaster bolts still seemed very dangerous! And surely anyone risky enough to take on a Jedi brought backup. Even if the Jedi was good enough to defend them all it would still make it easier for the Jedi if they were out of the path of danger.

"Come on, Come on, down the alley!" scrambling to try to get his friends to safety. The force gently guiding his movements so he wouldn't trip on any of the trash littering the streets and that his tugging them along did not trip his friends up either.

Jumen glanced behind them. "Nobody's running away," she said.

"I know," said Aden.

"Can we go back to the workshop?" the other boy said.

"Only if you don't steal my droid again, Gers," Jumen said, sticking her tongue out.

"Fine, I won't," Gers said, rolling his eyes.

He leads them down the twisty alleys back to his makeshift workshop. Hidden inside a shipping crate crammed into an empty alley is his sanctum. Half built droids and little whirring and beeping gizmos are stacked on makeshift shelves made out of boxes. He clears some boxes of parts so Jumen and Gers can sit down.

Aden seems a lot more in his element surrounded by his creations, pulling the hair out of his eyes and acting a lot more confident as he goes up to the broken droid Jumen found and slots in the part. Soldering some connections and giving the droid a smack on the side it lights up and beeps. "I did it! just need to fix up the plating and you'll have a camera droid ready to go!" He turns back to his friends beaming a proud smile at them.

The jedi leapt through the air, slicing his blaster in half. He ducked out of the way, letting her past, and watched as she sped into the meeting room, her saber still lit.

The room had a large, circular table, around which sat many beings, each with various forms of notes in front of them. Several of them were standing, with weapons pointed at both those who sat and some of those who stood.

"Let's put our weapons away," she said in a stern tone.

One of the spacers grumbled, but they all put their blasters in their holsters.

"Thank you. Let's all continue this tomorrow after the vote. I'll be here to ensure the vote is counted fairly."

One of the spacers sighed in relief. "Thank you, my friends and I have been concerned about the spaceport administration's honesty."

Another spacer stood up and shouted. "We've been nothing but fair! We've --"

The room filled with thick stillness, as though the air was more viscous. "Please sit down. I will ensure that fairness is maintained, and that no blood need be spilled to prove it."

The beings near the one who'd shouted fidgeted, then relaxed.

A being with grey skin and a respirator spoke, slightly garbled by the voice transmitter. "As the jedi says, we'll resume this tomorrow. Thank you for your presence, Master Jedi, I trust I speak for all of us when I say it is most appreciated."

She bowed deeply. "It is my honor. You may call me by name, if you wish. Master Rhuna at your service."

Many of the spacers stood and shuffled out, and those that remained slowly left as well, after first spending seconds and then minutes staring at the table or the wall.

----

Several hours later, Master Rhuna walked slowly through the city, listening. She was alone in an alley, between two bustling streets, listening to passers by. 

"... didn't want help, I told her I could do it, but ..."

"... twenty credits for the lot of them, they're no good in the ..."

"... have you? I wouldn't know what to do with ..."

"... that kid who works at the swoop races ..."

She turned back towards where she'd come, where that voice had been, and sped up, her brown robe flowing. She caught the same feminine voice speaking.

----

She stood in the shadows near the swoop races' pits, watching for the boy.

Aden rushes up as an aggressive-looking swoop piloted by an angry Iridonian pulls in, the pilot starts shouting at the boy even as Aden quickly fixes the damage to the swoop caused by collisions during the race. His hands seem to always know where to go with no wasted movement, moving out of the way of the helper droids without even looking at them. He wipes his pink hair out of his eyes before slapping the side of the swoop and saying something to the pilot before the pilot races off again.

Aden sticks around in the pit fiddling with the helper droids for a while, affectionately giving one of them a quick polish. The helper droids are all made up of mismatched parts that, if you had an eye for engineering, somehow seemed to all fit together perfectly. It is obvious from the way the boy treats them that he built them himself.

As he walks back to the crew area, a repulsor being fitted to a spare swoop activates by accident and flies off on its own towards Aden. He throws himself to the ground just in time, even though it came from behind him.

Master Rhuna walked out towards Aden as she saw an uncareful technician flip the wrong switch. She put a hand out to divert it, but as she did, he ducked out of the way.

She grabbed the stray repulsor with the force, slowing and stabilizing it. With a flick of her wrist, she turned it back off.

As she did, Aden stood.

"Are you alright, young one?"

Aden looked up at her and nodded.

"Aden! You okay?" came a shout from a few pits down, where he'd been working. A man stepped out. "Oh druk, hello Master Jedi,"

She raised an eyebrow. "Hello. Master Rhuna, at your service. You work with Aden?"

He nodded sharply. "He's a fine young fellow, does great work. Wish I could pay him a little more."

Aden looked slightly confused.

He didn't get paid at all, and his owner was always yelling at him for not getting enough done even if he outperformed most of the adults on the crew! Aden was a little worried that the Jedi from before had come in... Was there going to be another firefight? had she tracked down some criminal to the swoop races?

Aden brushed the dirt from the floor off of himself and tried to look obedient since he didn't know what was going on here, his heartrate was also a little high from almost getting spaced by that repulsor and he took the moment to calm himself down.

"Uhhmmm... did you need me for something master?" He looks up confused at the both of them.

"I'd like to talk to you alone, young one. Do you have a moment?"

Aden glances up at his master as if he was asking permission. Unsure how he should respond.

The man nods at Aden, whatever a Jedi asked for they should probably get.

"Uhm okay... let's go to the storage area?" Leading the Jedi to a back room where nobody was around.

She looked at him impassively for a moment, considering.

"Young one, you have great potential. With training, you could become a Jedi."

Aden has no idea how to respond to this at all.

"Me? a Jedi? but... I'm just me, Jedi are special magic knights! I just fix the swoops and bring old lady Oola her tea sometimes!"

He couldn't be a Jedi, he was a slave, nobody important like a Jedi was.

She sighed. "I was concerned you might react this way. It would require much training."

"You really think I could be a Jedi?" Letting himself hope just a little. A life offplanet in the stars, having Jedi adventures... what young boy didn't wish for that. "Oh... but uhmmm... I can't go off to be a Jedi... Master Teynar has my ownership rights..."

Looking as dejected as a child could, staring down at his feet.

Her mouth fell open in shock, her eyes wide. "You are a slave?" She turned her head, her lips thin.

"Yeah? Nobody free would work in the pit crew for gang races, The pilots blame you for losing all the time and the hazard pay would be huge." He shrugs as if this was just a normal state of affairs. "Teynar isn't the worst person to be indentured to, he just yells alot but you always get enough food and medicine. The gang leaders are much worse to thier slaves."

She pursed her lips. "Slavery is illegal in the Galactic Republic. I can easily free you. You are too old to be taken to the Jedi Temple for training, but there are other places Jedi are trained. The Almas Academy would train you, and you could learn more of machines as well. I must complete my mission here, but I will ensure your master frees you, and when I leave, you may come with me."

"Really? I get to go be a Jedi?!" His face brightening into a brilliant smile, bouncing up and down in excitement at the idea. Until he realises something.

"Wait...what about my friends?... do they get to come too?" He really really liked Jumen and the thought of never seeing her again made his chest hurt, and he liked his other friends a lot too and even old lady Oola who his master ordered to bring tea sometimes and the shopkeepers in the market were people he would miss.

She knelt to his level. "Do your friends not have lives here? You could visit them later, when you are both grown."

"I-I guess...." Still looking at the floor, he really wanted to go be a Jedi but he would miss his friends so much... "Okay, I'll come with you..." Not sounding terribly happy about it.

She nodded. "I can free you now, or return after my mission. Will you be in danger if I free you sooner?"

"How long is your mission? I need somewhere to sleep if its longer than a day, but I don't need to eat much." Teynar might even let him sleep in his room even if she did free him now though. The grumpy old mechanic had a not so hidden soft spot for his younger indentured workers, the only reason he worked Aden so hard is that Aden was able to take the workload better than anyone else.