Author's Note: So since I am surprisingly not dead, yet, I've it would be a good idea to keep this story going. I'm sure to finish it someday, right?
One important thing to note is that I will be going back and making serious revisions to several of the previous chapters after this chapter is posted. I have been inspired to rebirth them with exceptional quality, so I will put further chapters on hold until I finish this task. For now, enjoy the latest chapter of my story.
Episode 10: An Illegal Hangover
Though time is already an artificial construct according to certain philosophers, the lack of a day and night cycle made the schedule of society in Coruscant's Underworld all the more unnatural. Engulfed in perpetual darkness that is penetrated only by a system of half-functioning lighting, the levels and sectors lying beneath the surface experienced certain events and the people lived lives dissimilar to those living on the affluent surface level. Thieves and pests have a much easier time sneaking around and laying low with the darkness that covered every corner and backstreet that didn't have lighting. The air was constantly cool without the radiation of the sun, yet was also polluted from the exhaust coming from the local industrial centers. The overstretched police force hold only as much power as the local gangs and crime syndicates who strongarmed the populace for unwanted "protection" allowed them to. The feeling of vibrancy, openness, and freedom that is experienced on the surface contrasted greatly with the claustrophobic, isolated, and simply depressing feeling of the Underworld.
Nevertheless, certain aspects of society down below remained the same as on the surface. People who worked at menial jobs got on and off their work at a fixed schedule every day, Police patrols would comb through the area in a predetermined order and at predictable intervals, and the people who attended the local brothels and cantinas would eventually get tired of being drunk and go home or would be kicked out for being too drunk and rowdy after a general period of time; it was at this time where things currently stand in the sector, as a large portion of the residents were sleeping and general activity in the streets were lesser than a previous hours. This all made for the area to be much quieter than it was earlier, which for some was a welcoming change compared to the bustling noise of earlier but also gave a sense of unease and anxiety for others.
However, the first thing Cad Bane thought about was the awful smell that he noticed as he woke up. His hands felt like they were grabbing onto something soft yet uneven and slimy; he opened his eyes and to his dismay, he was lying amidst a pile of garbage and filth. To make things worse, he also felt pain in his face as well as a general sense of uneasiness and disorientation. He looked over and saw Embo laying silent on the ground.
Bane tried to remember exactly what happened that led to this embarrassing and vulnerable situation. He knew that the Jedi had fallen from several stories off a building and he himself was about to finish him off, but then a bright flash of light spurred his attention before he was beaten up and knocked out. Bane summoned enough strength and pushed down with his hands to the ground to get up, crushing some of the garbage and to Bane's annoyance, reviving the stench which Bane's senses had only just begun to get used to. He hobbled over to the Kuyzo, knelt down and put his hand to Embo's neck to check his vitals. Thankfully, he wasn't dead, just unconscious.
"Hey, Embo wake up." Bane said to him, shaking him roughly on the shoulder. "Come on, you can sleep when we track down the Jedi," Embo was still silent, it was as if he couldn't even hear him. While he was somewhat sympathetic considering what he punishment he had to take in order to get taken out in the first place, Bane was not in the mood for waiting for Embo to eventually wake up. He felt that every second spent here waiting for him to wake up was another second taken away from planning their next move. "EMBO! WAKE UP ALREADY!" Bane yelled right in Embo's face and nearly tearing his own vocal cords in the process; Embo, however, remained unphased. Annoyed beyond measure, Bane resorted to slapping Embo in the face, but as he swung his right hand toward Embo it was suddenly caught by Embo's own right hand in a firm grip.
"/My... my face hurts./" He said to a surprised Bane as he slowly let go of his hand.
"You don't say," Bane said unsympathetically, "Well we can talk about it after we find Aurra and kill that Jedi." Bane scanned the area looking for his weapons. Though it was difficult in the dim lighting, he eventually found his LL-30 blaster laying in the middle of the alley, being throw out of Bane's hand in the previous scuffle. "Speaking of which, you remember what happened by any chance? My memory's foggy." He asked as he put his blaster back into its holster.
Embo shook his head as tried standing, but he winced in pain and cursed in his own language as he attempted to use his left arm to push himself off the ground and he fell onto his back again. Bane remembred seeing Embo having his left arm broken by the mysterious assailant during the scuffle, and it definitely looked like it hurt. He walked over and gave him a helping hand. "That's broken too? Whoever did this to us must be a trained killer, except for some reason they chose not to kill us. I don't like this one bit, this job is not as simple as I would've thought."
There was a pause after Bane finished talking to himself. Both Embo and Bane stood there trying to remember what had happened, but it seemed to both of them that they already knew what the other was going to say since both of them had experienced and remembered what had happened to a certain extent. And so they stood there silently, unable to recollect anything of relevance before suddenly a bright, almost blinding light showered over both bounty hunters.
"Freeze!" A voice rang out from the end of the alley. A squad of four security droids had converged on the area without either Bane of Embo noticing and were now pointed their blasters right at them. One of the droids who was shining the light from one of its eyes, the captain of the squad being identified by a yellow dash across its helmet-shaped cranium, walked forward towards the bounty hunters. The blinding light was replaced by a brief flash red lasers coming out from its left eye, evidently scanning and cross-referencing them in its existing database to determine their identity. "Identity: bounty hunters Cad Bane and Embo. Drop your weapons and put your hands to the air! We are given the authorization to use lethal force against level three criminals and above."
Bane grunted in annoyance at his situation. Neither he nor Embo was in any condition to fight, still being somewhat disoriented and injured from the scuffle that happened before. Even if that weren't the case, the odds of Bane drawing his blaster and gunning down four droids before any of them managed to fire their already aimed blasters were low to nonexistent, even for a quick gun like himself. Without any other option, Bane slowly took his blaster out of its holster and threw it to the ground near the droids and putting his hands above his head, with Embo quickly following suit. The captain picked up the blaster and holstered his own blaster; he took out two pairs of handcuffs and walked behind the two bounty hunters, quickly restraining the both of them.
"Cad Bane, you are charged with the possession of illegal weapons and other contraband, conspiracy to commit terrorism against the Galactic Republic, and several accounts of murder, including a Galactic Senator. Embo, you are charged with the possession of illegal weapons and contraband and working for the Confederacy of Independent Systems as a mercenary against the Galactic Republic. Your rights are to remain silent, to fair and impartial treatment until and during your trial, to an attorney, and to express any of the other basic rights nominally granted to citizens of the Galactic Republic. Do you have anything to say, criminals?" The droid captain asked.
"Yeah, you droids would've been better off if you stayed as scrap metal back in the junkyards on Tatooine," Bane replied scornfully. His current situation was not going to excuse the fact that he openly despises these sorts of police droids, who's programming make them competent at their job when the only criminals around to arrest are drunks and amateurs. To him, it was a complete embarrassment to be captured by them.
"Insults are not appreciated," the droid replied, "you should know such language will eventually be used against you in a court of law." The droid captain then pushed them both towards the other three and began talking into a wrist-com. "Headquarters, come in. This is unit CPD-395, requesting transportation for two criminals found in alley OH-141." Description: Two males, one duros, and one kuyzo. Identified as bounty hunters Cad Bane and Embo. Over."
"Copy. We are sending transport now, estimated time of arrival is fifteen minutes. Note that it is critical to keep those two within your optical range at all times until we can reach you. Once the prisoners are successfully placed transported, investigate the area near the cantina in subsector 63-I. CPD-835 and CPD-210 reported blaster fire in that area but have been failed to respond to our communications for the past thirty minutes. It is probable that your two prisoners are related to their inactivity."
"Affirmative, we will await transportation and then proceed towards subsector 63-I." The droid captain replied before putting away its wrist-com and turning towards the other droids. "CPDs 557, 163, and 203, guard the prisoners until transportation arrives. I will detect any civilians that could be taken in for interrogation regarding this incident. Remember, do not let these two escape at any cost, terminate them if they cause too much disturbance."
"Affirmative" replied all three droids at once as they saluted they droid captain. One of them went behind and pushed Embo and Bane forwards. "Let's move these prisoners into the streets until transport arrives." It said.
Aurra Sing woke up with one of the worst headaches in a long while; her head was positively throbbing from the pain and it didn't feel as though it was going to go away any time soon. She stood up slowly and with great difficulty fought off the temptation to fall over again from disorientation. She put her hands to face and forehead in an attempt to alleviate the pain and remember what had happened. She was shooting at the Jedi, who was running on top a set rooftop near the Cantina after he confronted Bane. Embo was also there and did something with that large hat of his, and then...
She stopped thinking as her foot had hit something hard and metallic, being too dark to distinguish it easily, she bent over and picked up the object, which was much larger and heavier than what she expected. It was round and wide and in an instant, she remembered what had happened.
"That's right. That Jedi got me with Embo's own hat, threw it at me like it was a child's toy and must've gotten me square in the head." She said to herself as she unconsciously let go of the metal hat with one of her hands and put it back to her forehead. "Made me look like a complete idiot in the process too." Before she could wallow any further in her misery, she heard a faint noise coming from street level, the sound of metal clanking softly against metal. She leaned over the side of the roof and saw that a single droid was walking down the street. Quickly she looked back at the roof and found her longblaster lying to the side. She picked it up and used the scope to zero in on the droid. From the sleek design and the blue-color scheme as well as the oddly shaped cranium, it was definitely a police droid.
She contemplated shooting the droid right now, but she realized that if there was a single droid here then there would be more nearby, and trouble was the last thing she needed right now. Aurra tapped on the wrist communicator on her left arm and attempted to contact Cad Bane, whose communicator should have been linked with hers; after twenty seconds, there was still no response. From this, Aurra realized that it meant one of three things: he was dead, his communicator was broken, or he was a little too busy either sleeping or in handcuffs to respond at the moment. Given the sighting of a police droid, the fourth possibility seemed to be the most likely to her.
"Looks like I'll have to find them my own way." She said with a voice hinting at her slight annoyance...
The droid captain did not find as much success as it anticipated in finding civilians. The already desolate nature of the backstreets and the fact blaster fire tends to scare people away meant that the only thing besides itself there were moving around were pieces of garbage and the various pests that dwelled in the Coruscant Underworld. It had moved off the main street and was walking through a series of backstreets that was wedged between apartment complexes that towered overhead; still, no civilians in sight. He chose to enter one of the apartment complexes to check inside for residents. The dark, maze-like corridors were eerily silent, and though it were becoming increasingly clear that the place was deserted, the droid knocked on multiple doors on the first floor with no response. Then it climbed a flight of stairs to the floor and checked multiple doors, again with no response, and the third floor was more of the same.
It was then after the droid entered yet another desolate room on the third floor that his wrist-com communicated to him. "CPD-395, transportation will arrive in two minutes. Have you detected any civilians in the area?" One of its subordinates asked.
"Negative", it replied as it walked over to a full-sized window that overlooked the side-street. "I could not detect a single civilian so far. I checked several side streets and an apartment complex yet my sensors haven't picked up anything; perhaps my system requires another set of diagnostics. No matter, prepare for the prisoners in alley OH-141 to be transported out of this sector and then link up at subsector 63-I in three minutes. We need to confirm the status of CPD-835 and 210 to headqua-"
The droid failed to relay its own orders as a sudden, powerful blast tore through its chest from behind and exited out the front, hitting the window as well and shattering it instantly. The force of the hit sent the droid falling forward toward the ground, and it landed with a hard thud on the floor. From the shadows of the hallway came a grey-skinned woman who was carrying a longblaster in her arms. The darkness hid the smile on Aurra's face as she successfully stalked and ambushed the lone droid without it having the faintest idea.
"Diagnostics is an understatement," Aurra jested. She noticed that the droid had managed to continue functioning after getting shot clean through with a sniper blast. "Hm, Alley OH-141? Guess that's where they're napping." She was walking away when a disgusting, digitized voice that attempted to replicate human speech spoke to her.
"Halt." The half-disabled droid said as it used its limb motors in a failed attempt to stand back up, the jarring noise of which made Aurra grit her teeth in disgust and agitation. "Yoou are... chaaaargeed wiith seeeeveral acooounts of batteery annd asauuult," The robot said, struggling to speak with the damaged voice box located where the blast hit. "Drooooop yooourrr we-" it couldn't finish its command as Aurra took out a hand-blaster and shot the droid multiple times in the head, firing as fast as she could pull the trigger and illuminating the dark room with bright flashes of crimson red. At point-blank range, each consecutive hit was close enough together to form a massive hole in the droids face and with a final shot completely blew away whatever was left. The droid fell over instantly, letting out a few sparks of electricity before finally shutting down."
"Thanks for the reminder. I'll remember to turn myself in once I get my money." Aurra declared as she opened up a small holo-map from a gadget on her wrist. She inputted the information for Alley OH-141 and was about to run off searching for her two associates when she noticed a blaster that had fallen off the droid. She knelt down and picked it up, immediately noticing it to be one of Bane's weapons.
"And to think he calls ME an amateur!"...
The two bounty hunters had been sitting on the ground for some time now. Though neither of them felt any disorientation or pain anymore, the fact that they had their hands bound behind their backs made any attempt at escape incredibly difficult. Both of them were silent, realizing that they probably couldn't figure out a way to break free themselves while they were being watched by three police droids. With this in mind, Bane understood that he would need Aurra Sing, who probably wasn't found by the police, to help free him and Embo, and it was this fact that irked him; he imagined Aurra was probably still asleep on the roof that she was knocked out on, and even if she were to wake up and find them there wasn't a guarantee that she would actually want to free them. Knowing her all too well as cruel and irrational, Bane half-expected Aurra to simply let them die just to eliminate the competition.
Soon, a large police speeder arrived in the street where Bane and Embo where being kept. To Bane's surprise, only a single droid- the one piloting the speeder- arrived to pick them up. It climbed out and landed on the street and approached one of the other droids. "Where is CPD-395?" it asked one of the other droids. "395 requested transportation from headquarters and is required to be here to confirm the transfer of prisoners."
"395's location is currently unknown," the other replied, "395 ordered us to remain here and guard the prisoners while it would detect any civilians that are available for interrogation. We attempted communication but the connection was suddenly disrupted."
"Troublesome," the first droid replied, "first 835 and 210, and now 395 has ceased communication; that's now three units in the past hour in this sector that have ceased communication. I calculate a 92% chance that there is another criminal operating in this area."
"Oh, really?" Cad Bane asked sarcastically as he overheard the chatter of the police droids. "I would've never figured that out myself. What about you Embo?", Embo, playing along and making fun of the droid's so-called "intelligence" shook his head in agreement.
"Silence, prisoner! You are not permitted to speak at this moment!" The droid ordered sternly before looking back at the other droid. "It is now critical that these two are transported out of here immediately. One of you contact headquarters and request reinforcements, we need to flush out this criminal before they-". A loud noise suddenly interrupted the droid right in the middle of its sentence. The usually silent backstreets and alleyways made the sound all the louder, and it echoed clearly several times before finally quieting down.
"What was that?" One of the droids asked. All eyes and optical sensors were now fixated in the direction of the source of the noise. It appeared to have originated from a metallic object that must have fallen from one of the roofs, laying near a streetlight which reflected off the object. More importantly, however, Bane noticed that this particular object seemed to be of exceptional interest to the droids. Perhaps it was because he felt his perception of time slow to a crawl, but the droids seemed to be fixated on this object to an unnatural degree and span of time, completely oblivious to what they were just doing.
Whatever the cause of this anomaly, Bane wasted no time to take a risk at freedom. Locating the blaster inside the holster on of one of the droids, Bane quickly turned around and faced away from the droids; he moved backwards towards the droid and seized the blaster from its holster with his cuffed hands without being detected. He then moved back towards Embo and with his back to his, fired a single shot straight through Embo's handcuffs, shattering the restraints. Understanding what Bane's plan was, Embo quickly grabbed the blaster himself, stood up and aimed at the four droids in front of him, fired four shots at each of the droids' heads in quick succession. They all dropped to the ground before any of them could even turn back around and aim their weapons at them.
Bane looked on with mild amusement at Embo. "Never knew you were such a good shot with a blaster like that. Good thing I'm still better." Bane remarked. In his mind, he knew he was right, as his experience with handheld blasters was virtually unmatched compared to the thousands of other bounty hunters and outlaws in the Galaxy. He saw that Embo, while skilled in aiming and firing, aimed the weapon manually and with a sense of care that is seen in those unfamiliar with using certain weapons. Bane then noticed Embo looking at him after that remark. He couldn't tell if he wasn't mad, as Embo rarely ever displays his personal emotions to anyone, or just curious for an explanation. "You have a good eye, but you lack the instinct that I do. I don't need to aim as much as I need to trust my gut to make all the tiny adjustments for me, then I can fire with a good chance that I don't get shot back. You should stick to your bowcaster, or actually, a bowcaster." He finished, remembering how Embo didn't have it after the chase with the Jedi, who probably destroyed it with his lightsaber.
Embo chuckled as he went back and shot through Bane's handcuffs and freed the Duros from his binding. He dropped the police blaster to the ground like a common piece of garbage before walking over towards the metallic object. In the light of a nearby streetlight, Embo discovered that is was his own hat. He grunted satisfyingly as he put it back on top of his bald head, giving it a good spin in the process. "/She is here/", Embo remarked. Soon enough, a woman descended from right above Embo, landing gracefully onto the street. "You're welcome.", she said as she walked past him and approached Bane.
"Why didn't you just shoot them yourself? "It would've been easier that way.", He asked her. He had noticed that Aurra had been watching the whole ordeal for some time at a vantage point while being completely undetected in the darkness; a sniper's dream. If she had chosen to do so, Aurra and her superb skill with a sniper blaster could've taken out all four droids in an instant with the accuracy and efficiency befitting a trained killer.
"Exactly. I wanted to see if there was a chance that you two would've gotten killed if you two tried to free yourself." She said, taking out Bane's own LL-30 blaster and holding it by the barrel for courtesy's sake. "Would've been nice actually, I'd get all the money for killing the Jedi and I also could've kept this nice blaster of yours," She finished before suddenly noticed an awful, putrid smell coming from Bane, "My, you've been down in the dumps lately, haven't you Bane?"
"Well, aren't you a comedian?" Bane said as he snatched his blaster from Aurra. "I'll remember that next time you get thrown in prison. Embo, how's the arm?" He asked him as he walked back towards them, kicking away one of the police droids to the side in the process.
"/Already healed/." He answered as he spun his left arm in circles for a couple of seconds to indicate that he had fully recovered from his injury; Bane looked at him with a face of suppressed astonishment. He knew that he had a few tricks up his metaphorical sleeves, but he knew also for a certainty that was the same arm had been very broken not thirty minutes prior. "/Now I will hunt down who broke it/."
"Are you talking about the Jedi?" Aurra asked. "You know, I'd have thought he was done for as soon as that synthetic spice was in his system. Come on, don't tell me he was still too much trouble for you two."
"You're one to talk, Miss knocked-out-by-a-metal-hat," Bane replied sharply, "That spice did its job well enough though; we thrashed the Jedi and my finger was right on the trigger when we were attacked by someone else. Not sure how exactly how it happened, but when we came through both they and the Jedi were gone and we soon got cornered by the police."
"Really? What did they look like?" Aurra asked, "You think they could've been another Jedi who was watching us without us knowing? Could this have been a setup to try and get all three of us?"
"Don't be dumb. Why are we not in a cell already if they're trying to get us off the streets? Besides, the Jedi are fighting a war right now, they wouldn't risk one of their own getting killed by hired guns like us in a sting operation. But as for our mystery person, well I can't really tell you if they looked like a Jedi, I don't remember much of what happened. Actually," he interrupted himself, "it probably isn't a good idea to stick around here for too much longer. Way too much noise we made here." He walked over to the police speeder and climbed into the driver's seat. "Get in, both of you. Oh, but I suppose I would understand if you felt like you're too good for my hospitality, Aurra."
"I've never asked for your help and I don't plan on it, but I'd also rather not sleep off my headache in behind a laser door," Aurra said.
A small smile of satisfaction came from Bane. "Good, keep thinking like that and I won't have to shoot you when we got our money. Now hop in, I'll take us somewhere more 'pristine'," Bane said as he activated the speeder with a few button presses on the control console. A low hum began to emit which gradually increased in noise, the draft from the engines blowing away loose garbage in the street. Embo and Aurra quickly climbed into the speeder, and after pressing a few more buttons, the speeder was soon moving. After clearing through the backstreets, Bane made for open air and flew towards the nearest docking port at one end of the sector. He passed clear through an opening, bypassing customs security on the ground and entering into one of the many wells that connect the dark, underground levels of the Coruscant with the vibrant day filled surface...