Chapter 2: To Coruscant

Keth approached the bar and ordered a Flaming Wookiee, a reddish- brown alcoholic drink, and handed over a few credits. He looked around the bar for his son, Brak Arthul, who had been waiting for him while he talked with Val'Tala. Brak sat opposite of him, so Keth took his drink and moved to the seat next to his son.
Brak was eating Ahrisa, a spicy food, with a side of Deneelian Fizz- pudding and a cup of the pink and green, soda-like Bantha Blaster. Brak's helmet was sitting on the bar, a Kidarian battle helmet much like his father's. It had steel-gray spikes protruding from the top (like his father's), a wide black visor (like his father's), air vents (like his father's), and coats of spicy orange paint (unlike his father's). The rest of his armor was light, most of it left it's original steel-gray color, but he wore an orange tunic under it.
"Well, did you take the job, Dad?" asked Brak without looking up from his food.
"Yes, I did," answered Keth, and then ordered another cup of Flaming Wookiee and some Ahrisa as well. "He's offering two million credits for the death of a Dark Jedi and three of his associates, and one million for just the Darkie. I took the job because we need the money and because I'm probably one of the only hunters who can take on a Jedi!"
"Awesome...wait, a Darkie? Dad, the few years you spent as a Jedi Hopeful aren't going to help you! The Darkie has more experience! He'd chop you up into mincemeat with his lightsaber! He'd choke you until your head popped off like a doll's!" shouted Brak, drawing attention from a few nearby people. Two men began to approach, drawing blasters to shoot at them.
"No he won't...Brak, get down!" commanded Keth, drawing his own blasters. He aimed his twin Sundance-560 blaster pistols at the two men, and then opened fire. With a loud pa-ping! pa-ping! And a flash of light, the two men fell as the laser bolts hit them both right between the eyes. Keth then grabbed his son and their helmets, and dashed to the exit. The jazz band stopped playing, and people began crowding around the dead men, wondering what had happened. More men began to race after the two bounty hunters.
Keth and Brak rushed from the skyscraper and towards the spaceport. They had landed the Wraith Hunter in Docking Bay forty-nine, and got there quickly. Keth stopped and shouted to Brak. "Brak, get to the Hunter and initiate the launch sequence! I want the ship ready for take-off by the time I get there! Understood?" Brak nodded, then began to run towards the spaceport again. Keth unholstered his twin pistols, and turned around just in time to see a man swing a vibro-ax at him. He ducked under it and began shooting. The thug dropped the ax and fell over. It continued like that for at least ten standard minutes, laser bolts bouncing off of walls and smashing windows. The whole time the bounty hunter was not injured or even scratched. He kept firing with only his small pistols, nailing many thugs with fatal shots.
Keth then activated his jetpack. A blasting roar filled the air as he darted upwards. Then he dived low and dropped a thermal detonator, first making sure that he had set it to a lower setting. Then flew upwards again, and towards the spaceport. Behind him, a large explosion began ripping apart the walkway and the thugs, tossing debris and people in several directions. His thermal detonator had done it's job, and he smiled to himself as he saw the thugs plummet into the seemingly endless shafts between the buildings of Nar Shadaa.
Soon he was at Docking Bay forty-nine. His starship, the Wraith Hunter, was purring like a nexu, the engines roaring. "Come on Dad!" hollered Brak from the back seat of the ship. Keth leapt into the front seat, and closed the cockpit window. He activated the seals, closing them off from the airless void called outer space so they wouldn't be sucked out once off of Nar Shadaa. He hit the accelerator, causing the ship to rise into the air and shoot forward as if fired out of a cannon. A few thugs had reached the docking bay a little late, and began shooting rifles at the Arthuls' ship.
Soon, at least three other ships emerged from another docking bay, and began chasing after the Wraith Hunter. They were Star Vipers, jagged gray and black ships with four laser cannons, with which they opened fire with, violet rays of energy speeding towards the Hunter. Keth maneuvered the ship around the laser fire, and pounded the accelerator to the max. Brak took control of the rear cannons, and began shooting back at the Star Vipers. The clash of violet and red was startling to the traffic controllers -- though not uncommon -- and let the ships pass without even so much as a safety message.
Soon the ships were in space. Brak was aiming carefully in the rear seat, locked onto a fighter, and pressed the trigger. He had squeezed the wrong trigger though, and instead fired an enhanced proton torpedo. The sparkling energy-shelled warhead raced towards the doomed starfighters, and Brak had to look away from the blinding explosion. "Brak, don't waste my torps! You know the enhanced ones are illegal!" growled Keth from the pilot seat.
"Sorry Dad, but at least I took them all out," Brak muttered. The boy looked back into the viewport to see blue sparks shooting in all directions, and chunks of twisted metal floating around. One fighter was still spinning around, heavily damaged. Brak open fired on it, this time pulling the right trigger, and vaporized it with a quick barrage of lasers.
"Good job, but just don't use the torps unless I say," Keth said as he waited for the navi-computer to bring up the hyperspace coordinates for Coruscant. As soon as he heard the beeping sound that confirmed there finding, he pulled down the lever and the Wraith Hunter made the jump into hyperspace. Star streaked past, becoming white blurs, and then formed a big blue, tunnel-like light.
"Who were those guys anyway?" asked Brak.
"Probably thugs of an 'old friend,'" chuckled Keth, thinking of how many traitors he'd thwarted in his years of experience.
Keth sat back in his seat, looking out the window. He had always liked making the jump to lightspeed. It was always so calm -- though deathly quiet -- and he knew that there was almost no possible way he could be tracked. The computers would sense homing beacons immediately, and he could evade all sorts of scanners. And his ship could out-run any others with its powerful sublight engines and the fastest hyperspace engine possible.
The navi-computer made a bleeping sound, letting Keth know that they were nearing Coruscant. He sat up and began fiddling with the controls, and then took the Wraith Hunter into normal space. The blue light disappeared, and the stars became specks again, and the planet of Coruscant began to appear in front of them. It was a large planet, with rings and specks of light dotting the surface. Depots and spaceports floated in Coruscant's orbit, which Keth passed as he entered the planet's artificially created atmosphere. No different than Nar Shadaa. Just more civilized... Keth thought to himself.
"Greetings traveler, welcome to the capitol world of Coruscant!" A traffic control droid had contacted Keth's ship. "Please land on platform 1214!" it ordered. Keth flew past the traffic control tower and flew around the buildings to his assigned landing platform. He saw it and put his ship down on it, the ship using it's air jets to keep the ship hovering for a few seconds while the pilot put down the landing gear. Three mechanical legs appeared from the belly of the starship, and the Hunter had landed.
Keth emerged from his starship. The nightlife of Coruscant was not very different from Nar Shadaa. Cantinas were crowded, the airspeeder lanes full of zooming ships, and lights were bright. Just another typical city planet. Keth took out his electrobinoculars and began surveying the horizon. He found what he was looking for.
"Ah, there it is..." Keth said to himself.
"There is what, Dad?" asked Brak.
"The Hyperspace Nova Diner. The owner of the place is an old friend of mine, and he knows almost everyone and everything. He's a Siniteen, and an ex-smuggler. He can figure out hyperspace coordinates in his head," replied Keth.
"Oh, you mean the Brainiac species, with the big heads and glazed reddish-yellow eyes?"
"That would be them. My friend's name is...well; we just call him 'the Brain'. He should be able to tell us about our quarry and where they could possibly be staying..." Keth told Brak as he activated his jetpack. He grabbed his son by the waist and flew over to the Diner, landing outside the chain of buildings. They were dome-like buildings, with a ring of round windows going around the bottom. They each had a spire going up towards the sky, in which had another ring of windows. Near the top of the spire was a beacon-like bright blue flame. There were four buildings like this, all surrounding a fountain that spouted giant blue flames instead of water, which Keth had entitled the Flaming Fountain. They were also connected by bridges, which each had a few blue-flame lamps.
Spacers and aliens and other people were walking around. A few landspeeders hovered around area. A man was snapping pictures of the nightlife with his holocam. Teenagers were zipping around on swoop bikes. A bearded man was running to greet another man. Beggars were sitting by the walls in piles of discarded junk. Skinheads were throwing empty alcohol containers into the Flaming Fountain. Yep, this was the nightlife.
Keth and Brak entered diner, heading up the entrance ramp from beneath the closest building. He brushed past a few patrons of the cantina, and walked up to the bar. Sitting there was a bored humanoid; large of head, and with a lanky body. His glazed reddish-yellow eyes stared at the people walking around the bar. It was the Siniteen that Keth had told Brak about.
"Hey, Brain!" called Keth. The Siniteen was startled, and nearly fell out of his chair. He then stood, with a height of about that of the average human.
"Keth! Nice to see you old buddy!" said Brain in raspy voice. He shook Keth's hand. "You want the usual? A Flaming Wookiee with a Alderaanian cherry or two in it?"
"Sure, I'll have the usual. But I'd also like some information regarding my latest quarry..." Keth whispered, not wanting too many people to know of his business.
"Ah, I see..." Brain whispered, his voice sounding raspier and deeper. Brain quickly made the Flaming Wookiee and plopped two Alderaanian cherries in it, and handed it to Keth. He then turned to his bartender, a Rodian. "I'm taking a break, I'll be back in a few minutes!" he shouted to the Rodian, who nodded. Brain walked out of the bar and brought the two bounty hunters into his back office. He peeked out, looked both ways for any signs of people that might listen in on the conversation, and closed the door. He locked it, and then walk to his desk and sat down.
"So, the great Keth Arthul needs some information, does he not?" asks Brain, with a sickly grin. Most Siniteens have a permanent sneer, so that is why his grin was not the best grin you could ever see. "What are you up to now? Big money by any chance?"
"I've got a one million credit bounty on a man named Mon Tifoke. He's a Darkie. If I can pick off his associates as well, the bounty is raised to two million," answers Keth, passing Brain the holo-projector storing the message from Val'Tala about the bounty. Brain activated it and listened intently until the end of the message. He stared off into space for awhile, and then began talking about the whereabouts of Tifoke.
"The information will cost you one thousand credits," he mutters. "I can wait until you get the bounty finished though, since we're good friends. Anyway, Tifoke is a powerful Dark Jedi. He was born on Corellia, and was found to be Force sensitive at the age of two-years-old. He was trained up to the rank of Jedi Knight, achieved at the age of twenty-one, and turned to the Dark-side after coming into too much contact with information in a Sith Holocron. He destroyed his own lightsaber, as the green blade was a symbol of Jedi authority. He made a new one, with a blade of yellow. He is currently here on Coruscant, most likely in the Belag District."
"The Belag District!?" exclaimed Keth, not worrying about the amount of credits the information was costing him. "I know that area well. I lived there for awhile, if you remember. But why would he be in Belag?"
"Because he has set up a base there. My Rodian bartender is also a spy, and an information broker. He works for me and gets twenty-five percent of the informational payment fee, as well as credits for working in the bar out there. But that's besides the point! The point is, he spotted pirates setting up a base in the lower levels of Belag while visiting his family down there. He spotted a man in flowing black robes, walking out of an obviously stolen Republic airbus. The base is in an abandoned hangar, made back when the lower levels were the top levels. It is also connected to the buildings around it, and no doubt the pirates are expanding it for their dark leader," Brain explained. He then showed Keth a symbol on a computer screen:
"This is the pirate's symbol. It looks somewhat like a maze, if you ask me!" declared the Siniteen.
"I see...thank you for your time Brain," replied Keth, motioning for Brak to leave with him. "I'll give you the credits as soon as I bring in the bounty!"
"Alright then. Be careful, and don't get yourself killed! I want my payment!" chuckled Brain, waving from his desk.
Keth and Brak were soon back in the night air. There were more people, but Keth noticed they were all going in one direction. Some people were screaming, some looking in wonder, some looking in fear. Nonetheless, they were all looking at one thing: a Krayt dragon. A Krayt dragon had been let loose on Coruscant.
"Look, Dad, the symbol of the pirates!" Brak shouted, pointing to a now empty transport. A landspeeder had collided with the hovering transport, and it had startled the Krayt dragon, and it ripped out of its large cage. It had ripped through the metal door savagely, and had right away began killing people. On the shredded cage, the symbol of the pirates was painted in blood red on the side of it. The pirates had been smuggling the rancor onto the planet and into the Belag District for their use and entertainment!
"We've got to get past that dragon. It isn't our problem, it's the Republic's. We should go see if the landspeeder pilot is still alive. If he is, we'll shoot to stun, and we'll take the pirate back to the Wraith Hunter," plans Keth, talking to Brak. "You got that?"
"Got it," answers Brak, removing a blaster pistol from his belt. They then charged towards the screaming crowd, into the crowd, and towards the landspeeder. It wasn't until they got to the pirate landspeeder that the Krayt dragon spotted them. With a resounding roar, it reached out with a massive claw, and attempted to grab at the bounty hunters. Brak ran and jumped out of the Krayt's grasp, and ducked on the other side of the crashed speeder. Keth kept running and began shooting off his rifle at the Krayt's face.
The Krayt screamed in outrage, clawing the air around Keth. Keth bent down and aimed with his jetpack, and launched a missile. The rocket flew fast and hard, and collide with the monster's nose. It began making a sneezing sound, and roaring in anguish. It charged at Keth, who jumped out of the way with the aid of his jetpack. Keth fired a wrist rocket from his wristband gauntlet, and miniature explosive hitting the dragon's back. The Krayt squealed again, and turned around. It dashed for the Kidarian again, but Keth threw a round object into the beast's mouth, and ducked under it. He was tumbled along, but quickly got out of the way. A few seconds later, the giant lizard was ripped in half by an explosion from the inside.
"How'd you do that Dad?" asked Brak, who had been busy getting the pirate out of the landspeeder crash.
"I popped a grenade in it's mouth. It's the oldest trick in the book!" exclaimed Keth. Keth grabbed the pirate by the waist and boosted up to the Wraith Hunter's platform. He put the unconscious pirate in the back seat, and started the ship. He piloted the ship down to the wrecked speeders, where Brak had started fighting another pirate that had climbed out of the wreck. Brak shot the man and climbed into he Wraith Hunter once it had landed, and then sat in the seat behind his father. Behind Brak's seat was the pirate, who was just coming to.
Keth shut the window and piloted towards the Belag District. He flew through the sky over the tall buildings and large mechanical canyons. He zipped through the sky over Monument Plaza, soared like a hawkbat over Monument Park, and zoomed speedily past the Jedi Temple. It's good to be back on Coruscant, Keth thought to himself. The buildings and skyscrapers gleamed like jewels in the just rising sun. It was a new day on Coruscant.
Soon Keth had arrived in the Belag District. A traffic control droid contacted the ship and ordered him to put the ship down in landing bay 1138. He obeyed and landed the ship in the underground landing bays. He got out of the ship and dragged the groggy pirate to a bench near the exit to the private landing bay, and began to question him.
"Okay, you're going to tell me the exact location of Mon Tifoke's base, you understand?" ordered Keth, shaking the man by the scruff of his neck.
"I don't know nothin!" shouted the man, his eyes going wide with fright.
"You'll tell me or I'll cast you into the Flaming Fountain back at the Hyperspace Nova Diner! Or even worse, I'll tell the authorities about the Krayt dragon you were smuggling from Tatooine to your boss..."
"Okay, okay, I'll lead you there! It is not far from here, since you are headed to the Belag District..."
"We're in the Belag District..."
"Yes, I knew that, I really did. Anyway, I'll lead you to my boss's lair. Just don't kill me!" yelped the pirate.
They emerged from the underground bay, and began walking around the empty platforms. Keth noticed the difference between the night life and the day time. There were almost no people, and very few policemen. They took a lift down to the lower levels. The pirate took them very far down, down almost to the planet's ancient surface. The surface that no one ever saw. Soon they stopped, probably only a few miles from the surface. The lift would not go any farther, because the rest of the lift had been destroyed by stone mites. Ancient walls of flimsy metal were rusted and rotting, and old wires were laying around like thin rubber snakes.
A rusted door sat in the way, obviously tinkered with and renewed. The pirate opened it, and led them to another lift. It took them a few levels upwards, and they stopped on a black walkway, cleaned and waxed to give it a brilliant sheen. There was no junk or old wires were on the walkway, and the old walls and guardrails had been removed and replaced by stronger, newer ones. Soon they came to a hangar, in which was an airbus, modified to have laser cannons and a new coat of black paint. On the side was the pirate's symbol in yellow. Besides the Arthuls, their hostage, and the airbus, there was nobody and nothing inside the hangar.
Suddenly, a laser bolt soared from up above and hit the pirate. He stumbled back, and toppled off the edge of the walkway. Keth didn't even hear him hit the bottom, but that was probably because a roar of laser fire that had began rushing at him. Pirates were flooding out from all of the lower doorways on Keth's floor. They all had blasters, or vibro-blades, or anything that could cause Keth and Brak to be blasted, incinerated, or diced.