Those in the Hutt's disfavor were inside the recesses cargo bay, less comfortably attired (if attired at all) and shackled wrist and ankle to railings, pipes, scaffolds, or anything else that sufficed. The heat and the wind of the Bright Lands blasted them without relent through the open door of the ship, but if this were to be the extent of their punishment they would, indeed, be fortunate. As usual, however, Njon had more sadistic things in mind and, also as usual, these things served his purposes in more ways than one.

"We got one!" shouted one of Njon's men from somewhere amid the flurry of hot sand and rock outside the ship. "Coming in! Coming in!" Blue flashes could be seen in the dust cloud, then the sound of stun blasters firing. A moment later, a pair of Njon's people charged into the cargo bay taking occasional, clumsy potshots behind them. A dark, ominous figure could be seen following them through the cloud, its form growing larger, and larger still. Then, it appeared; a lylek, the fierce predator peculiar to Ryloth and feared by the planet's people. The henchmen, as they had practiced, quickly disappeared through doors or beneath bulkheads, leaving only the shackled, helpless beings, the objects of Njon's disfavor, to be the objects of the lylek's fury. Their screams could hardly be heard over the frenzied shrieking of the beast as it eviscerated them, bloodily.

This went on for some moments, whereupon Njon's men, organized and coordinated, converged cautiously on the lylek and pelted it with their stun blasters again, and again, and again. More than one of them, too, were seized by the creature's tentacles or run through by its long, slender talons. Then, finally, it was done; the lylek collapsed, sprawled on the floor of the cargo bay. The few beings who survived, horrendously injured, were left in place for the next go around. And so the process was repeated. Some hours later, the freighter would leave Ryloth with eight of the ravenous creatures in its cargo hold—a room thick with the blood of those who dared to disobey or to cross Njon Anjiliac, the leader of the Hutt Cartel.

"Nal Hutta Special, you are cleared for approach," said the voice of Kala'uun Starport's ground control, two months later (present day), over the comm of the ship it had just cleared to land. The portcullis entrance to the underground port grated open and the freighter cruised slowly, deliberately through it on its way to the landing pads inside. It was the latest of three small, nondescript and seemingly unrelated cargo ships which had arrived that day and told customs that they were only passing through and therefore were not required to declare any goods (or be subject to the inspection of their cargo). This was fairly common—Ryloth was at the end of the Corellian Run and ships often stopped there, emptied of cargo, to rest and provision before returning to the Core Worlds for the next run.

Scans of the Nal Hutta Special, and the two other vessels, would find that they were traveling light and with a high concentration of life forms, but nothing too far out of the ordinary. Ryloth had long been a hub of the slave trade, and officials at Kala'uun Starport generally did not ask many questions when a cargo hold was discovered to be containing life forms—in fact, they asked fewer questions.

The ship set down gracefully among many others on the crowded lot, but not without some fanfare; a few merchants and potential passengers approached the ship as it landed, but it otherwise drew little attention. There was a bazaar within sight, with hundreds if not thousands of beings, mostly Twi'leks, perusing the goods and wares on sale. The foods of a dozen worlds could be smelled, and the languages of ten dozen could be heard. Kala'uun was one of the largest and most bustling starports on the Outer Rim.

(( OOC: it's gotten a bit late, I'll finish up this post tomorrow. ))