Shmi, along with her four-year-old twins, Anakin and Aurora Skywalker, were walking through the marketplace buying vegetables for their new Toydarian master, Watto. Although Watto could be . . . coarse with her and the children, who were incredibly gifted for their age, he was better than most of the slave owners out there. He never resorted to using a whip on them, preferring, as he would say to not "damage his money-makers."

Shmi internally sighed as the twins rushed to keep up with their distracted mother. They deserve so much better than a life of servitude, thought the woman; while I never expected to become a mother; seeing as they had no father; I surely wish they could live their own lives. Speaking of their lives, they are old enough to start learning the Code my parents taught me. So distracted was the woman with her thoughts on her twins that she didn't notice she was on a collision course with a moisture farmer holding the hand of a toddler around the age of her own younglings.

"Oh!" cried Shmi as she crashed into the man. The slave woman's purchases of engine oil and Watto's favorite snack food went flying into the air only to change course and land in little Anakin and Aurora's outstretched arms. Sparing a brief smile of thanks to her little darlings, Shmi turned to face the man she'd collided with only to be stunned into silence.

Granted, he wasn't the most handsome man she'd ever seen, but he had a sort of rugged charm to him that appealed to her immediately. Due to her inexperience in romance, Shmi couldn't tell that the man looked at her with a similar appreciation in his eyes. While the slave woman and recently widowed moisture farmer stared at one another, Owen, the man's three-year-old son, took in his slightly older counterparts while hiding behind his father's leg. The twins, having never been shy in their lives, openly stared at the younger boy in fascination, as they'd never met children around their age before.

"Oh; I'm sorry Mister . . ." Shaking himself out of his stupor, the widowed moisture farmer answered the slave woman's unasked question.

"Lars, Madam; the name's Cliegg Lars;" answered the now identified Cliegg Lars; "and this is my son, Owen Lars." Shmi smiled at the shy boy clinging to his father's pant leg.

"And these are my children, Anakin and Aurora. They're twins." Anakin and Aurora stared at Cliegg before Aurora's eyes started to shine from childish wonder and curiosity.

"Mommy;" asked the black-haired, yellow-eyed girl, "Mr. Lars thinks you're really pretty!" Cliegg and Shmi instantly blushed as Aurora, in her child-like mind, had thought she was doing Shmi a favor. Though quiet chuckles could be heard from the beings close enough to hear the precocious toddler, none of them except the adults involved realized that Aurora had read the thought straight from Cliegg's mind subconsciously.

"Well;" began the flustered farmer; "you have quite the little girl there. She reminds me of those Jedi from the Republic I heard about. Does your boy have the same gifts?" Shmi nodded, not wanting to broadcast that her children were so unique.

"I know it may seem strange since they are my children from birth, but there was no father." Internally, Shmi had no idea why she was telling a stranger all this, but somewhere, on an instinctive level, she knew that Cliegg could help them with what she'd thought of before. This man could help her free her children.

"Well;" began Cliegg, seeing the twins in a new light, "if you say that is what happened, I'm inclined to believe you, madam."

"Please;" implored the mother, "call me Shmi."

"Well, Shmi;" intoned the farmer, liking the sound of the name on his tongue; "I'd like to help, but I couldn't afford to free all three of you." Anakin, having heard the nice man his mommy was talking to mention being free, brightened up before asking him his question.

"Couldn't you save up the money over time?" Cliegg brightened up at the genius boy's suggestion.

"It'll take a few years, but yes, that is precisely what I'm going to do." The Skywalker family brightened at the promise of becoming the masters of their own destiny.