A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away...
Star Wars
Prelude to Mandalore's clash...

It's a dire time for the ailing Galatic Republic as the mighty leader Mandalore the Ultimate raids the Outer Rim. Galatic citizens cry out for aide from the Jedi to no avail. The Jedi council firmly stands that action is not the proper coarse in the matter and continues to train its members as though ther is no war. However,with the republic's forces fighting the Mandalorian threat alone, those Jedi not in training are reduced to mere law enforcement. Crime blooms in the galaxy, but not all illegal actions go unpunished, just as not all learning happens in a classroom...

A light breeze blew across the plains of Dantooine, rustling the purple grasses of the planes that lead up to the Jedi Enclave. Inside the Enclave, the Jedi Master, Vandar Tokare, met with a small number of Jedi knights.

"The Republic has not the forces to continue maintaining order in this region. As such you will be sent on patrols with the local militia to supplement what they lack in combat training. But remember, my students, that violence is not always the best way to deal with criminals and most small time criminals will give up if they feel they are outmatched..." He said to them, his raspy voice cracked with age and wisdom as he spoke.

Vandar's green ears lifted and fell as he briefed his students on their upcoming mission. The Master's race did not have a name because there were so few of them in the galaxy. But they were characterized by their small stature and green skin along with large triangular ears and three clawed hands and feet. He never spoke of his homeworld how he became a Jedi. However, one thing was clear, he commanded a respect that most humans would have killed for despite his small size.

"Johnny, you will be leading this expedition. A local informant has been feeding us information about a small smuggling ring associated with the Exchange and we now feel that we have enough evidence to move on them. Tonight they will be moving cargo from their hideout in one of the crystal caves along the cliff's of Ishtar to a ship that is just beyond the pass. Your mission is to intercept them and convince them to surrender with as little resistance as possible. Arrest everyone involved, however, if their are any aliens in the group, bring them back here." Vandar frowned as he spoke, "Sadly the local authorities are highly raciest and our order will be fairer on the off-worlders... Understood?"

Toa Fong and the others of the smuggling ship, Estraya, walking into the cantina filled with Humans. She stood out, being the only non-human in the joint, as they looked for their contact, Atti. The other patrons of the bar glared at her and she knew instantly that were was a strong ani-alien sentiment on Dantooine similar to where she grew up on Taris. She scoffed at them without paying any further regard to their angry reactions toward her.

"There," whispered one of her human companions pointing out a blonde woman in the corner wearing a disgusted look.

Toa moved her head as if to roll her eyes before making her way to the back table where the woman was sitting.

"I thought I told your boss to stop sending blasted in-humans," Atti spat to one of the other crew members as she shot Toa a mean glare, "Their kind attracts too much attention and are never quiet as good at their jobs."

Toa's face tightened and her large eyes narrowed slightly. "Look, if you're any good at your job, I'll be off this backwater moon before any other feathers get ruffled. Got it?"

Atti sighed and began to explain that the cargo was hidden in a crystal cave outside of town. "Sadly most of the trenches around here are too narrow to land a ship in, but on the other side of a canyon to the north of the cave in our normal landing point. Park your ship there before sundown so that the glow from the propulsion drives doesn't attract any unwanted attention, unlike your crew mate... At sundown, we'll meet in the cave and begin loading the cargo. Until then, lay low."

The crew agreed and returned to their ship to make preparations. Toa trying her best not to let Atti's attitude bother her, she said nothing further as they parted ways.

That night, they met in the caves as planned and loaded their cargo onto hover-raft for transport. Half of the crates of ryll spice all fit neatly onto the cargo bed and Toa was feeling confident they could get it moved before anyone realized what they were doing around the cave. In the darkness beyond the light of their glowrods, she could hear hissing and scuttling noises deeper in the caves.

"Don't worry about that," whispered one of the hired hands helping them to move the cargo, "the Kinrath don't come this close to the mouth of the cave and even if they did, we've set charges to make sure they don't get into our stashes. We'll set more charges at the entrance when we leave to keep any one from the outside away."

Toa nodded and when everything was ready, they began to move through the pass toward where the plains were the Estraya was waiting for them.

"Yes Master Vandar" replied Johnny, turning to face the other Jedi Knights. It was a small group, varying with different species of alien and human alike. Out of the group, he was the oldest by far.
He looked at them all individually, silent as he did so, evaluating they're skills and weaknesses, how effective they' be in a surprise attack or if they'd be better in the wave of attack behind.

When Johnny finished his cold study, he broke a warm smile and laughed deeply.
"Well men, and woman, this should a good night... there is no chance a group of smugglers can beat a group of Knights like us!", smiling broadly he lead them out of the Enclave room towards the plains of Dantooine.

Once outside he split the group into three, one group would wait in the Caves and would follow the Smugglers silently, a group which would ambush and get the Smuggler's attention and a third which would wait further up the path and surprise them with another wave of attack. If the plan went well group 2 would get the attention and make them surrender, but more likely than not, he would call a signal and groups 1 and 3 would rush them from behind and the side. Perfect.

later that night...

Johnny lay flat on his stomach, breathing slowly and keeping quiet. He lay next to the rest of Group 2, a group of slightly bigger lads than in the other groups... to intimidate the smugglers. Hopefully. But if Smugglers weren't scared by Republic starships then how would a group of Jedi deal with them?
Shaking his head he motioned for the group to move forward as he saw against the moon shapes moving forward along the path. They silently walked onto the path, still hidden by Darkness. When the Smugglers drew near Johnny shouted out to them,
"HALT, give up your cargo and yourselves!"

Atti and the others who were talking next to the hover-sled jumped at the sound of Johnny's voice. Toa, who was driving the large hovering truck, could not hear anything over the engines and continued driving. "We've got authorities at our 12 o'clock," Atti said to Toa over the comlink, "No doubt they spotted your green skin and decided this was a good time to conduct a random search of the area. We don't want trouble, Frog, so just keep quiet and let me do all the talking and hopefully we won't be searched..."

Toa frowned inside the cockpit of the transport, but complied with Atti's unspoken order to cooperate with the authorities until things went south. The hover-sled came to a halt as did the rest of the group and waited until the Jedi approached. There was a tension in the air as everyone tried to look as causal as possible. The crates were marked as being Trandoshan Ale and they had foraged documents to verify their story. However, Ryll was not as heavy as Ale and thus it was important that the containers never be weighed or their contents lifted. So long as the authorities weren't thorough, they would be fine. However, on racist planets such as this, the mere fact that they had a non-human with them, might make things harder.

When the Jedi were with a few meters of the group, Atti approached them with a sultry gate and an innocent smile while everyone else watched. "What seems to be the problem, Sir?"

"The problem is that you're illegally smuggling... I'm not sure what, but something"
As Johnny spoke three of the other Jedi's went over to the crates of supposed Trandoshan Ale and began to scrutinise them. One of them, a stronger, burly bloke, picked it up.

"Oi, Johnny, Trandoshan Ale is heavier than this, I'd know! I used to help carry it from the transport ships to the merchants" as the Jedi said this a noticeable change of atmosphere occurred, the "traders" went tense.
The burly Jedi dropped it back onto the hover sled heavily and joined Johnny. The other two Jedi continued to look at the crates until one piped up, "Johnny... why don't we pop one open? If we're wrong then at least they'll be able to supply the rest of the shipment"

Johnny grinned. Give them a lifeline which'll make them think they had a chance... then cut it.
"Go on then, pop it open!"

There was no use holding up the charade any longer as the Jedi opened one of the bottles and poured it's contents onto the deck of the hoversled. The powdery spice flowed out in place of the frothy ale. The smugglers all looked at one another and Atti glared into the cockpit of the hoversled at Toa. They all put their hands up as the Jedi began to arrest them all.

"It was the Frog," Yelled Atti as they restrained her, "That filthy water-breather tricked us! Our superiors will hear about this Toad! You'll pay for double crossing us!"

Toa climbed down from the driver's seat, it wasn't like they had any chance against a force this big and the ship was more than likely landlocked even if she could out run them. She allowed herself to be taken into custody, however, she narrowed her eyes at Atti's treats. She looked to the Jedi closest to her, which happened to be Johnny. "You guys seemed to be expecting us, am I wrong? Or where you tipped off by someone that we would be here?"

"To be honest ma'am I just followed my orders"

Johnny flet disgust at how quickly the lead smuggler was to turn on his fellow smuggler, especially if it was a foreigner.
Bloody racists... he thought and turned to the big man behind him.

"Jupe, can you take this hovercraft to the council... and can you take this Nautolan with you? I'm sure she won't resist, right?" he gave her a look out of the corner of his eye.
Jupe nodded and he and the Nautolan climbed into the hovercraft, another Jedi sitting on the back.

"As for you lot... you're going to the local authorities, apart from you Snitch, you're coming with me. You seem to know quite a bit. Men, and woman, lead them away"
The Jedi nodded and roughly led the criminals to the main port of trade on Dantooine, about a 10 minute walk away.

Johnny walked over to the Snitch and grabbed him by the scruff of the neck, dragging him in the direction the hovercar went.
"You my friend, are in for a fun night..."

Atti had been the snitch and when she was out of the others' sight, she shook herself free of Johnny's grasp. "You could have blown my cover," she scolded him, "you have to return me to the local holdings cells so that the other's won't get suspicious. I've been working this job for four years trying to get enough on the ring leaders to get them all arrested... They know where I live and until we have all been 'processed' and sent off planet, I can't allow them to figure out it was me! Don't worry about the Nautolan, since she was an off-worlder to begin with, she was the perfect scapegoat. The Jedi can't allow her to enter this planet's court system so they took her away, that was exactly what I needed since it would look suspicious to the others..."

It was clear that Atti knew everything, the politics of the planet and had used the racism to her advantage. It seemed as though she had set Toa up as the fall guy from the start and was using her to draw suspicion away from herself. Atti was good at her job, that was clear, but at what cost. Setting up another smuggler was not as honorable a means of clearing her name in their circles as one would hope.


Meanwhile Toa and the two other Jedi were arriving at the Jedi Temple. Toa had been skeptical about going with the Jedi, but she knew that she wouldn't get a fair trial if the leaders of the planet were even half as racist as the smugglers were. They were greeted by Vandar who explained to her what she already knew about the opinions of the locals regarding non-humans.

"I understand you're reasons, Master Jedi," Toa said with a sigh, "But do realize that this will look really bad to my employers..."

"Well, what if you were under the employ of someone else? I can arrange that instead of serving any criminal sentence for your part in the smuggling activities on this planet could do community service," replied Vandar.

"What type of community service?" Toa asked with a skeptical look.

"I think a good start would be to clear out those caves... Smugglers are known for setting up traps to discourage anyone from finding their stashes. If you were to accompany a small group of Jedi to clear the caves of any remaining contraband and traps, I would think that the law might be willing to overlook your past transgressions..."

"Fine, I agree," said Toa, "I figure this is as fair a deal as I can expect on this planet..."

"Great, as soon as Johnny reports back, you and he will start preparations and clear the cave..."