Having decided that I had enough of paperwork I would lay down and take a short nap before I was up and about again. I swear, it was almost like the Republic or the Hutts didn't want individuals coming to planets where all the Republics dirty little secrets happened, and adopting a few daughters. Especially if they were rich enough to make sure they were well cared for. It was ridiculous, and I had an entire team of lawyers devouring the paperwork and legal channels.

  In the meantime I had briefed the droids on the change of address. While they weren't in charge of the droids, they were to protect my new 'daughters' and make sure their needs were met. Who am I kidding, even the short time it would take to get them citizenship I wouldn't be able to care for them properly, I was never a parent and neither was old Nute, to his knowledge, which wasn't much he got up to some things...

  Ugh, I would never be able to raise these things, I needed a proper handler, I wasn't qualified! Was there a qualification? Could I go to college for a degree in child rearing****?... No, I wouldn't have the time if there was one...

  I enter my bedroom and prepare to just lay still and not for some time. Meanwhile the blue girl starts to unbutton her shirt. I'm tempted to ignore her, but decide to just ask. "If you need to change you could have just asked, I could give you the room for a couple minutes, I have paperwork." I said.

  At that she immediately pauses, like somebody had hit the emergency stop switch. Meanwhile the pink one started to giggle for some reason. I raise my eyebrow and look at her questioningly. But before I can ask the blue one is rubbing up against my leg for... some reason?

  "Please take us to the core Mr. Nute... Please? We can make the trip very, entertaining." She said in a voice that I assumed was supposed to be a low husky...

  Wait... was she trying... "Are you, are you trying to seduce me?" The pink one burst out laughing. Meanwhile the blue one paused again, turned and pouted, got back to rubbing up against my leg and said "No, why would you say that?"

  I felt a vain throbbing in my head, here I was trying to help these little shits, and they pull this kind of poodoo on me the moment my back is turned? "Daaad, forgive Fifi, she doesn't know any better! She just wants to go to the core. They say that everybody lives freely there and nobody has to worry about food ever again!" The pink one said still giggling, only to go dreamy at the end.

  Nope, I wasn't having it! Not. At. All! "Eriwura Fi Nicpia! You will stop this immediately, and turn around facing the bed!" I yelled.

  "Better do what dad says Fifi, he sounds mad." Stated the pink one.

  "But Mr. Nute! Your not supposed to use my real name here! You're supposed to call me Afin or Rafina!" pouted Afin.

  "Eriwura, Fi, Nicpia! You will turn around this instant or I swear! It. Will. Be. So much worse!" I said.

  The pink one Said "Better do what he says Fi, he sounds mad." with a giggle.

  The blue one, Afin turned around and bent over the bed with a "She whined.

  I took my hand, raised it up, and spanked her. Not as hard as I could, but hard enough I knew it would hurt. "You. Will. Not. Seduce. A. Man. Ever. Again! Do you hear me?!" I yelled, punctuating ever word with a spank. Afin screamed at first before collapsing on the bed, crying fat tears as she stopped resisting.*** Meanwhile, the pink one was just giggling away.

  I turned on her and raised my hand up "You think this is funny do you?!" I screamed at her. She tried to stop herself while holding her hands up, chastised, enough for now anyway. I had calmed enough to know that the giggly menace couldn't leave well enough alone, but she would at least try for now.

  I turned back to Afin, she was still in the same position, crying fat tears. I pulled her up to sit next to me as I sat down. I pulled her into a hug which she resisted as I said "I'm sorry, I really am. But you have to know, you just simply CAN NOT do stuff like that. There are people out there, and you know that, that will take you away. They will take you away and neither I nor your sister will ever see you again. And we will never know why. Least of all doing that to somebody like me, or anybody for that matter." I said as she slowly stopped resisting and cried into my chest.

  Slowly we moved into the bed and the pink one. It dawned on me then "Anturc Potal, why have you been calling me dad this whole time?" I said in a warning tone as I turned to her. She stiffened in my arms for a moment, noticing that she was in trouble now. Afin glared at her from the other side of me, still with tear filled eyes, but using me as protection from her sister. I didn't know what to do with that.

  "I, may have, MAY have, accidently mind you, seen the adoption paperwork." She said.

  "You mean the adoption paperwork that was in my office, and not at all in a place you should have seen it?" I asked in a monotone.

  "If you didn't want me to see it, then why was it in the public network!" She defended herself... while outing herself, needs to learn how to lie and deflect better that one.

  "And I don't remember giving you access to the public network, specifically the public network of !" I said.

  "I'm sorry! I didn't mean to, but the scomp port is right over there, and I was bored! And there's this new holoshow from Alderon, and we are going to Alderon and I want to fit in with the kids there, and I didn't mean it!" She 'defended' herself without taking a breath. I could only sigh.

  This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.

  "You knew?! You knew and didn't tell me?" Screamed her sister. Admittedly letting her get a beating over the misunderstanding wasn't exactly fair, especially since she was the older sister.

  "I had to know, ok? And it wasn't like he was going to hurt you, I could . So it was OK..." She fired back. Oh, Afin had some grip strength, she was holding onto me so tightly. This was not going to end well for her sister.

  Afin at her sister, with the screaming battle . Annie wasn't going to let herself be attacked without returning the favor. So she grabbed Afin's hands. Soon they were rolling and tackling each other and I was collateral damage. Afin made a fist and was ready to swing and I had enough.

  "Tickle attack!" I stated as I started to tickle her. "No!" She screamed "What are you doing to me?!" She wheezed between breaths. Annie, seeing the opertunity for what it was, launched her own tickle attack. "You two? You're both being ganging up and being mean to me!" She wheezed out, tears in her eyes. She was right of course, but she was also wrong.

  "Tickle attack!" I stated as I instantly changed sides. Annie yelped, not expecting my vile and evil betrayal. But soon she was laughing too hard to deal with me or Afin.

  When she was down on the bed panting, and I stood looming over top of both of them victorious, she nodded to her sister, who nodded back. Then they tackled me screaming "Tickle attack!". I capitulated instantly, holding my hands up in surrender. Only to attack them both once they let up. For they forgot, I had two hands, and they were two targets.

  Soon we all fell to the bed, panting and breathless from our bedtime activities. I had about thirty minutes left till I had to start my operations. The Trade Federation council had called an all hands meeting already, fully aware that they were running out of time now that their 'nefarious' plans were out in the open. I knew that everything was legal, but the senate was duplicitous, which meant it was simply going to be expensive. More expensive than the operation was going to make the Trade Federation, but not me.

  Still, I had to make preparations if I didn't want to be caught flat footed. And I still hadn't met with any of our suppliers for heavy weapons. At least until we could legally produce our own, well legal as in separatist where such legalities didn't matter.

  I was on my way back from having secured a private deal when it happened. It was times like these when I regret not being able to bring the Bs and instantly being outed as a Niemidian. It started with a blaster bolt. I heard it but didn't think anything at the time. Afterall, the under might be Hutt controlled space, but that didn't mean there was fighting, just almost immediate stop to the fighting. It did not stop. I heard more blaster fire coming from the other end of the causeway.

  Now I knew that something was wrong, but I still had a distance to go before I could get to the entrance to my underground passage.

  More blaster fire, that should not be happening. Something was really wrong, and I need to be anywhere else right now. I was no longer looking for my entrance, and was looking for entrance to a back alley. Some farghul jumped out of a store, blaster raised, and fired into the crowd. I pulled my pistol on him and fired, over the railing he went as his run turned into a stumble. But apparently I wasn't fast enough. I saw an entire gang heading my way, and now that I had shot somebody I was no longer furniture, but an active participant.

  I saw the look in their eyes, as I killed the guy that pulled a weapon on me. Not good, so I dodged behind some storefront sign and pulled my out to shoot at them. I was glad to have swapped out from the useless rifle, it was stupid to have brought it here. I pumped the charge, hearing it slowly beep, that was all the warning they had as they cleared the streets with random blaster fire.

  Spinning around my cover I pulled it on them and fired. I would realize latter that spinning around the cover was stupid, I should have aligned the fire first, but movies...

  It was devastatingly effective. But I needed to hide behind the signage to pump the blaster again. Pulling back around overtop I blind fired, the screams meant that I hit. Cover, blind fire, cover blind fire. Eventually the screams stopped, but I double tapped just to make sure. Not hearing any more blaster fire and no more screams from my blind fire I peeked around my shot up barricade. Welp, they would need a new one now, my side was the only one still in one-ish piece and it had scorch marks on the opposite side from where the rounds of pure plasma hit.

  I jogged over corpses and dodged past those in hiding. Only shooting the occasional shop keeper that got inventive and decided to take a pot shot at me. Sometimes they got close, sometimes I hit them, but I was running too fast for them to hit me in the time they had to aim. Still, I didn't let such an thing go unanswered incase they got brave, this was Nar Shaddaa, most of their items did not come with a proof of purchase or an invoice...

  I finally made it to the entrance of my tunnel, I could lose any tracker through the maze of tunnels. Well, most trackers. Most trackers that did not have space magic...

  Blaster fire answered me as I got ready to enter the tunnel, hiding behind some more signage, what ain't broke don't fix? And I see the owner and his pet bird, woman, harpy thing. He takes a shot to his lower chest as he's running, the bird woman just looks bored.

  I stand out from the signage, ready in case somebody stupid runs around the corner, but, well I'm intrigued. He turns to me and crawls, handing me the leash attached to the bird woman. "She's yours now, don't let those bastards have her!" he says. I hear a click as he places the leash into my hands, and it transfers ownership of the bird woman over to me.

  After the leash clicks, finishing the transfer he sighs satisfied, only for the bird woman to strike him in the back with her tail. "Why?" He gets out weakly after the acid starts to leak out from where he was stabbed, quickly eating away at his flesh. I want to ask that to, like what the corellion hell? I don't get to as blaster fire starts to splash between the two sides in front of the entrance. If I'm going to leave, it has to be now.

  So I take the bird woman with me, she squawks but seems content to follow, her claws clacking like stilettos. I don't dare let go of the leash in case she decides to stab me with her tail.

  When we get back to the ship I give her over to the Bs to stick into a cage, unclipping the leash which retracts into a slave remote. I quickly upload the slave controls for the slave collar, a fancy one that looks like an epic dark chocker**. She seems content with life and doesn't really want to be bothered. I task the B1 OOMs to see if they can figure out her language or if she has one. As far as I can tell she isn't sapient, but she might be sentient enough for language.

  Finally it's time to get off this rock! Finishing the deals with Mordello and the rest went on without a hitch now that I finished my business. And right as I am leaving the entire Trade Federation council is bombed! Oh, and I'm being sewed by Padme, because she has rescued 'Naboo' from 'Trade Federation oppression' or something.

  I start to cackle as the girls look at my private office strangely. Even the bird woman backs away as if something evil lay there. Man, with the bird in it's cage, and the girls it's starting to get a bit cramped in here.