Entry Eight – Days after Geonosis, Thirty-Seven
It is still difficult to accept the events of the previous two days. If not for the persistent ache in my ribs I might imagine it was all some sort of maddened hallucination. Bioengineered assassins from a completely unknown system of life, private militias with high-end assault weaponry, secret partnerships between the police and narcotics syndicates; all these things seem ridiculous, absurd even. That I briefly held a military command seems least likely of all, a farce dreamed up by some anti-Jedi satirist, but my datapad contains the certified official documentation confirming it did in fact occur.
Those records represent a curious mixture all their own. Prefect Xeril's drowns beneath a flood of legalese, barely a sentence passes without some parenthetical reference to an obscure point in the civil code. The document reeks of an effort at self-protection, though not merely a personal one, I can tell he is trying to shield his men from consequences as much as himself. That actual substance is not particularly complementary of anyone, least of all me. I hope I have not made an enemy of that man, it is something I could ill-afford, but the doctrinal asides obscure the meaning so much that I cannot say. Perhaps I can simply avoid any encounters for a while. I have no desire to engage in political affairs anyway, and I think that any actions taken at the stage of a Level Prefect are inherently political.
Major Kayi's report, by contrast, is much more positive. One gets the sense, reading the highly concise prose, that she rather enjoyed unleashing her arsenal in all its bright glory. Not an impulse I share. Better that we never need such weapons. But, given that they exist despite this I do understand the desire to utilize a rarely handled tool. There are certainly pieces of medical equipment that have induced that feeling. Thankfully, her report barely mentions me at all, relegating me to a text box with no reference in the narrative whatsoever. Appropriate, since I did not actually do anything except tell her to go ahead.
How do the Knights act as generals? Certainly I never received any training in how to run a military force, not even as a padawan. No more than a handful of Jedi have led armies or acted as military advisors in over a century. Do they simply stand aside and let the clones organize the battlefield as I did? Or does the Force offer them some special insight into the ways of warfare?
I dislike the latter thought. That the Force should tell us how to better kill each other, to end lives rather than preserve them, seems antithetical to the Jedi Code. Far better to leave such choices to those like Kayi.
As for my own report, finally sent off to Master Rancisis, I confess it is uncharacteristically muddled. I am not happy with it. In my work, I have always tried to present findings with clarity, to inform the reader and never obscure, but this incident is beyond my descriptive capabilities. I find no proper path to presentation. Worse, I have now lied to the Council, if only via omission. I kept my promise to Prefect Xeril; Takul received no mention in the report. I simply stated that I synthesized a tag capable of identifying the assassins and offered no details.
This will not be questioned. I know it. Many on the Council are skilled healers, Master Rancisis not least among them, but Force Healing is not medicine and they lack the training to deduce the skipped step. I can be confident that this deception will pass undetected, even as I despise myself for formulating it.
Perhaps regret will keep the memories fresh. I suspect that will be necessary. Every day now brings with it a sudden flurry of news. Reports of great battles in far off star systems fill the HoloNet, while local channels resounded with endless coverage of Separatist bombings and murders. The war brings other changes too, less violent but perhaps ultimately more disruptive. A huge fraction of the galaxy's industrial output is part of the CIS and therefore lost. The endless array of products they once produced and shipped have vanished from sale. Little in the Bucket is purchased new, of course, but the flow of second-hand goods, recycling, and salvage from above has slowed significantly as the people of Galactic City and the Upper Levels delay their typical conspicuous consumption. Many of my patients are grumbling at this, for it has impacted their working hours, and it has been little more than a month.
Strangely, the death of nineteen prominent political officials scattered across a mere trio of levels has gone largely unremarked even as holos of the Ayae assault – thankfully without my face in them – circulate on every street corner and diner display. I acquired an explanation from Officer Morne, one of several I consider myself owed. It seems that the various appointed political administrators have rather severe constraints regarding their authority. They control the patronage network that determines permitting and development, which allows them to grow spectacularly rich, but they can do little to change the pace of that process and have very little influence over other aspects of life here. The true government of the Bucket is controlled by institutions that report through their own internal hierarchies to the leadership of the Municipal Authority, bypassing the local politicos entirely. This includes such massive institutions as the police, the atmospheric, power, and water utilities, and the all-important Maintenance and Disposal Administration.
I also learned that Officer Morne's father sits on the board of the Power Utility, which answers the question of why his work history consists of a string of liaison appointments and other unusual jobs far removed from the daily grind of police work despite his complete lack of any special qualifications. He was admittedly both reluctant and somewhat embarrassed to mention this, which I suppose I understand, though truthfully displaying any shame at the profit one's connections provide seems to be a rare trait down here. If anything the complex nepotistic network of family relations, intra-species favor sharing, and inter-species alliances seems to govern much of the social map of the Bucket. Regrettably it is wholly foreign to an outsider such as myself. No matter how long I stay here I do not think I will ever learn it well enough to navigate those currents with any success.
Many portions of this network have astonishing ancient roots. I have had patients casually mention to me informal agreements hundreds or even thousands of years old that hold weight to this day, such as one that apparently reserves a monopoly in the category of 'exotic dance' for Twi'leks over all other species with flexible cranial appendages. Such long-term stasis seems to be a characteristic of the artificial nature of this realm, where little ever changes and that which replaces the old is almost identical to what came before. It is a stark contrast to the rapidly shifting trend-consciousness that characterizes Galactic City. Like the stubborn fungus whose activities continue to fill my waiting room, it seems the underworld itself envelops all.
It worries me, this pervading characterization. What will happen if I stay here too long? What already has? I cannot forget Takul. Working with him, a being who traffics in misery and madness, that is not something I can soon erase from myself. And he is merely a lesser representative of a terrible shadow network that is threaded, a black spider web, throughout this realm below. The power of the syndicates would dwarf that of the government, or so Morne believes, if they did not expend so much of it upon their boundless hatred of each other.
I have scheduled a brief trip back to the Jedi Temple, ostensibly to lodge my samples of the assassins everyone has taken to calling Yellows in the archives. Perhaps it will help to spend some time there, to see a real sky and cleanse myself of underworld air. Admitting that I should need to take such a step hurts. I have never felt the desire to run back to the Temple before, not even during terrible pandemics. Why now? Why here?
I cannot find an answer, worst of all.
Notes
I made the important point here that Rig Nema is a doctor, not a Jedi Healer. In fact, she cannot utilize the Force Healing ability at all, despite being very capable at probing people with the Force as a diagnostic aid. This is the reverse situation for most Jedi Knights and Masters, who may know a great deal about how to move life force around but would probably struggle to identify internal organs on a standard anatomical model. Consequently, Nema can spout just about any amount of technobabble to the Jedi Council and they will have no idea whether it's true or not.
With regard to the extremely unrepresentative nature of the Coruscant Underworld government, I feel this fits with the timeframe of the Clone Wars and the extremely corrupt final period of the Republic. It is a democracy in name only, with the number of people per elected representative so large as to become effectively meaningless. This allows the entrenched bureaucracy to function more or less autonomously, and like most bureaucracies it's far more interested in preserving its own fiefdoms than actually changing anything for the better.