Jedha, Holy City

Day One, early morning

The vast expanse of the shadowy desert beyond the walls of NiJedha lay chilly and silent in the predawn light. Head Guardian Emmkar leaned against the temple parapet, gripping at the stone's cold, rough edges with equally rough hands as he waited for the sun to rise. Gradually, the shadows cast by the zeugen and the sand dunes began to stretch and lengthen across the desert, and an unseasonably wintry breeze brushed the towers of the temple. In the city below, people were stirring.

Emmkar listened to the familiar sounds of the awakening city – faint voices, crying infants, doors opening and closing, and occasional laughter, and tried not to think about the vision he had received last night. He should be meditating on it, but Emmkar found it difficult to even think about without recoiling. So much death. . .

The vision was simultaneously the worst and the most vivid that he had ever received. Images of an explosion, of his people and city twisted and burned and ruthlessly obliterated over the course of mere seconds – the last thing he wanted to do was relive that.

But meditate on it he must, and examine his vision in the Force. Only after this could he determine whether there were any actions he could safely take to prevent such a catastrophe.

Over the course of his seventy-nine years, Emmkar had learned never to act in haste when it came to visions. It was incredibly dangerous to do such a thing. In an attempt to avoid a particular fate that had been foreseen, people would often take a strange path to avoid it, and in doing so, meet the very doom they tried to flee.

Emmkar closed his eyes in weary consideration and allowed the Force to recall to his mind everything he had seen. Once again, he watched, as if in real life, as the massive explosion obliterated his home and all the people – not only the Holy City, but a huge portion of Jedha itself.

The sun rose, softening the intensity of the autumn chill, but Emmkar did not feel any warmer. He stayed where he was, gripping the edge of the wall even though his hands were stiff with cold. The images themselves gave him no further insight, and yet by the end of an hour, he understood beyond a shadow of a doubt that the fiery death of the Holy City would be directly connected to the theft of the kyber that the Temple had housed and guarded for so many ages.

The Head Guardian gazed towards the deep orange of the sunrise, patting the wisps of his short white beard back into place as the wind brushed past him. One thing was clear enough – the theft of the kyber must be prevented. But how? Who would attempt to steal thousands of statues, some of them a dozen meters tall, from the center of the city?

As Emmkar went slowly down the stone steps and towards the temple courtyard, he could hear the familiar sounds of the city. It was full of life, counteracting the silence that continued in the Force. Despite the time spent in meditation, Emmkar couldn't discern whether the destruction he had seen in his vision would take place years in the future, or within days. What he did understand, beyond the shadow of a doubt, was that the end of the Holy City would come . . . Of course, Emmkar had always been aware that nothing in this life lasted forever – but the annihilation of Jedha was something he had never even considered.

Only one bit of the knowledge he'd been given in the vision brought him some comfort. Emmkar understood that there was still time to consider a course of action, because until the kyber statues were gone, and the Temple of the Whills had been entirely emptied of the living crystal, the Holy City would not be destroyed.

Jedha, Crescent Caverns

Day Two, early afternoon

The cave where the Adder had landed was loud with activity and many voices. Dozens of men were setting up camp, their boots stirring up a haze of dust which drifted a few inches above the sandy floor. Meanwhile, Kage Akar stood watching from the boarding ramp, his arms folded.

A long, thin, poison-green snake coiled around his left sleeve and rested its head on his hand. It seemed restless, but Kage gave it only the briefest of glances. His resistance to the venom was so strong by now that it wouldn't matter if he was bitten a dozen times today.

A clatter of noise at the northern tunnel drew his attention there, along with the guards', but it was only Merrick and his men returning from their scouting trip. The thin chains that hung from the lieutenant's belt clinked a little as he gestured, sending the men to assist in setting up camp.

Kage stroked the snake's head with one finger, waiting while Merrick approached at a brisk walk.

"My lord Viper," he said, keeping a respectful distance from his leader – or, more likely, from the snake, as he always tended to stand farther away when Kage held Shépa. "As you expected, this cave system will work perfectly. There are two tunnels leading out of here to the main passage – one north, one west. Perfect for escape routes. The northern one cuts across the main passage to the ship cave."

"Excellent," said Kage. "What is the main passage like?"

"It's almost a mile long, heading east-west," Merrick said. "And there are dozens of caves leading off of it to either side."

"I thought there would be," said Kage. "The Crescent Caverns used to be a place of retreat for monks."

"Yeah?" Merrick grinned caustically. "Well, they did us a favor, carving out all those small rooms. Plenty of places ready for our job, and we hardly had to lift a finger."

"I want the chains in place early, all the same," Kage said.

"Sure, we'll be doing that over the next couple days." Merrick took out his datapad and turned it on. "By the way, we shot a few animals. I think they're going to be a problem."

"Animals. What kind?"

"They're called dunescratchers. Grif looked 'em up – seems like they're pretty dangerous, especially for the snakes."

Kage took a step closer to Merrick, peering at the picture on his screen. It showed a large, rat-like creature with grey, veiny skin, six red eyes, and pointed fangs.

"They'll go after helpless humans, too," said Merrick. "But we won't have to worry about that."

"Not yet, we won't," Kage agreed. "But they could be an issue in a week. Order the guards to kill them on sight, and set a double watch around the snake pit."

"Got it." Putting his datapad away, Merrick stepped back. "I'll get the men onto setting up the caves. Anything else?"

"Are the other ships in the main cavern?"
"Yeah, except for the one we sent for fuel. I warned Talbor not to do any scouting this time around."

"Very good." Kage thought that putting Merrick in charge of the men in his absence had definitely been the right choice. The Pit Vipers' client had called just as they reached Jedha, so Kage had been delayed in landing his own ship by nearly an hour; so far, though, it seemed that Merrick had made the same decisions in organizing the camp that Kage would have made. A promising sign.

"We'll scout the city slowly, over the next few days," the Viper said to his lieutenant. "Once we commit, we'll try to clear out within the week, but until then there's no rush at all."

"Right," said Merrick. "I'll get things organized."

"One more thing," Kage told him. "Pick ten men and send them to me. You direct the others. . . we'll work on the snake pit."

With a casual salute, Merrick left to do his bidding. The snake shifted on Kage's arm, and he closed a thumb and finger around the base of its head and hoisted it into the air. The creature coiled in lazy protest and hissed a little, too cold in this chill desert air to do much more.

The pit would not be ready for hours, so Kage took the snake back into the cargo hold of his ship. Hundreds of thin green snakes coiled and twisted in the confines of the huge glass tank that took up most of the room. Kage reached over the edge of the glass, ignoring the sudden hissing, and dropped his pet into the tank to join the others.

When the pit was finished, he himself would take care of putting the snakes into it. His men were afraid of them – with reason, Kage knew. None of them were willing to put themselves through the pain of repeated bites. And why should they? They had no real reason to work with the creatures as he did. And Kage had immunized himself to the venom's effects over the past few years. He no longer had reason to fear being bitten by the snakes, not even by Shépa.

Of all the rest of the gang, only Brett Modree had followed Kage's example; he, too, was now immune to their venom. The fact that he'd had to guts to do so, and his ability to handle the snakes without fear now, were two of the reasons he'd been left in charge of the Pit Vipers' home base. The Nautolan was nearly as good an organizer as Kage himself. In fact, Brett had only two failings as a gang leader – one was his impulsiveness, and the other was his lack of ambition. He had no interest in running the entire gang. The only reason he was in temporarily in charge of Coruscant was that Kage had insisted . . . or so the Nautolan had assured him.

Smiling thinly to himself, Kage Akar entered the cockpit to put a call through to Coruscant. Perhaps Brett knew that the surest way to stay alive, as the second-in-command of one of the most dangerous crime lords in the galaxy, was to maintain a careful lack of personal ambition.

Coruscant, Senate District

Day Three, mid-morning

Commander Fox straightened from his examination of the floor and clasped his hands behind his back, watching as the blue-armored forms of the Coruscant Security Force left the room with the dead senator's stiffening body carried between them on a stretcher. The Coruscant Guard stood around the perimeter, containing the scene, while more members of the CSF ushered the emergency response team out after the body and tried to gather evidence.

That last wasn't going to be an easy task for them, given that nearly everyone in the room had panicked – and probably trampled evidence – when Senator Hilt reportedly dropped dead in the middle of his drink. Since the on-call medic had immediately confirmed that it was poison that had killed him, and not a heart attack, the security forces would be actively treating it as a homicide case. The general rule was that everyone was suspect and no one could leave. . . But things were different when dealing with senators, especially when Hilt might not have been the only target.

And with over two hundred senators and escorts in the large room at the time of Senator Hilt's death – not to mention the kitchen staff and various serving and security droids, any of which could be reprogrammed by an enterprising criminal – it was going to take a very long time to collect evidence of any kind.

Unfortunately, Fox didn't have a long time in which to make a decision about the senators remaining in this room. He needed to ascertain, quickly, if there was a threat to any of them. For now, there was no immediate visible threat, though. All the senators' personal weapons were being secured by the CSF, despite protests.

Ordinarily, Fox would have kept a close eye on anyone who protested their weapons being confiscated, because that would imply they had a reason for wanting a weapon at hand – a reason such as intending to commit another homicide, or being ready to fight their way out to freedom. But quite a few important people seemed to feel themselves above the law, and a number of them were arguing with the CSF as they were ordered to temporarily turn over all their weapons.

Tuning out the loud protests of the woman behind him as an officer confiscated her blaster – "you have no right to do this! Do you know who I am?" – Fox checked the room for any signs of immediate trouble. There was nothing, so far, and he had no ideas as to who specifically to focus his attention on. At this early stage of the investigation, he didn't have much to go on, and neither did the CSF.

All Fox knew about the victim was that Senator Hilt was not an especially loud voice in any of the senatorial debates. As Fox thought about it, he couldn't remember even seeing Hilt with any kind of frequency. . . perhaps in the halls, a few times, and Hilt had never been arguing or debating or raising his voice. He just wasn't someone the security forces had associated with trouble or danger, unlike Senators Chuchi and Amidala. This made both Fox and Lieutenant Divo worry that the murder attempt had not been aimed specifically at Hilt. His death could be a mistake that would soon be rectified by another attempt on the actual intended victim, or – even worse – part of a mass attack.

Ironically, just as Fox thought the words mass attack, Orn Free Taa barged through a small knot of servants to reach the clones on guard. "You cannot keep us here! I demand you allow us to leave!"

"It's for your own safety, sir," Stone said, somehow managing to sound both apologetic and inflexible. "We don't know if this is an isolated incident or not."

"Incident!" The Twi'lek senator turned disbelievingly to the women who accompanied him everywhere, then gestured at the clones. "Senator Hilt dropped dead in front of my eyes, and you call it an incident!"

Stone didn't reply, probably because he knew he didn't need to. Orn Free Taa shouted and blustered all the time, and very rarely required a response.

Other senators, meanwhile, were more worried about the CSF men who were now moving among them.

"It's outrageous!" a turbaned woman exclaimed, jerking back as if in disgust when one of the blue-armored guards stopped in front of her. "You cannot suspect any of us of killing Senator Hilt!"

Fox could and did, and was more than a little surprised at her statement. After all, there were plenty of senators in this room with huge political differences, and senators had murdered each other before – through assassins, obviously; they would never do it themselves. Not only that, but murders or attacks in the Senate buildings usually turned into finger-pointing within minutes. . . and this time, nobody had blamed or hinted at anyone in particular being the culprit. Most likely, Hilt had been low-profile enough that no one really knew who he was, or were bothered that he was dead.

The angry woman folded her arms when the CSF guard asked her to turn over her weapon. "I don't have one!"

"Yes, you do," said the guard in a bored monotone. "In your left sleeve. Ma'am, we have to secure the room for the safety of everyone involved, including yourself."

The woman only scoffed at him, but when a few senators around her started sending dark looks her way, she subsided. Yanking a tiny blaster out of her sleeve, she all but threw it at the guard and spun away in a huff. She marched to the door, hesitated when she saw Commander Stone, and suddenly tried to force her way past him. He blocked her without seeming to move and angled his helmet down to regard her. Faced with the implacable commander, she eventually subsided with an angry glower and melted into the crowd.

An older woman near Senator Organa blotted at her eyes with a piece of white material, smearing makeup over her face. "Who would want to kill him, anyway?" she demanded querulously.

"I can think of a few interested parties," Organa said, and lifted a calming hand before the outraged looks had even half-begun. "Not in this room, of course," he added diplomatically. "But every powerful person will have his enemies."

Organa's statement set off a low buzz of conversation around the room, but at least everyone seemed distracted from trying to leave.

After a moment, Commander Fox determined that there was no harm in asking Bail Organa's opinion, even though he was a civilian. Organa was dependable, and had unofficially helped the Guard multiple times. On top of that, he'd survived so many assassination attempts himself that he'd probably developed a second sense for them.

Once decided, Fox lost no time in ushering the Alderaanian senator over to the door. "Sir," he said in a low voice. "Would you explain your comment about interested parties?"

"Certainly, Commander." Organa paused as two Rodians and their retinue wandered past, huddled in a knot. "There are those on Senator Hilt's planet who strongly believe he gained his position by killing his rival during the election."

"It's not unusual that they say it, though, is it?" Fox said, as he kept an eye on the crowd. "As you said, they all have their enemies. You've been accused of worse things."

"Yes." Organa frowned slightly, resting his thumb and forefinger on either side of his chin. "But the accusations against Hilt came from all three of the major political parties on his planet – his rival's, his own, and the party that was not involved in this vote. Although there was no definite evidence against Hilt, it is undeniably the case that his rival only died after winning the election, thus placing Hilt, the next in line, directly into a position of power he would never have been voted into."

Fox thought that through. "Is the CSF already aware of that?"

"I could not say for certain, but I imagine they are." Bail Organa tilted his head thoughtfully. "Commander, if it is not too presumptuous, I would like to make a recommendation."

"Please do, Senator."

"I believe that the CSF should focus its research on Hilt's history, and the suspicious death of his rival. They will likely find the motive for murder there, and not among the other senators."

"Why not the other senators, sir?"

"Senator Hilt had no true enemies in the senate. For that matter, he had no true allies, either. He was . . . noncommittal in the extreme. Easy to sway to either side of any given issue, and just as easy to sway in the other direction after he'd committed to one side."

The commander watched out of the corner of one eye as Thire and his men kept people moving into a line for the CSF to register as witnesses. "He wasn't what you'd call a good senator, then?" he asked.

Bail Organa replied with an eloquent shrug.

"The fact that he'd switch sides on a vote," Fox said thoughtfully. "That's been grounds for murder before."

"Indeed it has." Organa frowned. "And yet, Senator Hilt could have vanished from Coruscant some months ago, and not caused any of the debates or votes to turn out differently than they did."

Tilting his head, Fox hesitated. "You've . . . been tracking that, sir?"

"Of course." The Alderaanian smirked faintly. "I believe there are few senators who do not. At any rate, that is why I believe this murder was not a political assassination – at least, not in the usual sense of the term."

"I see."

Raised voices caught Fox's attention, and he glanced up to see Inspector Tanivos Divo not three meters away. The short man, who had a typically exasperated look on his face, was standing with his hands in the pockets of his long coat as he stared at a young female senator, who was pale and looked close to angry tears.

"I don't know anything about this murder!" she shrieked. "I hardly even knew Senator Hilt!"

"Sure, sure. But he died by poison, didn't he, Senator – ah . . ." Divo glanced down at his datapad. "Senator – Elin, was it? And after all, poison is a politician's weapon of choice."

Senator Elin spun away, chin lifted, and Divo wandered over to join Fox, muttering under his breath. "Come to think of it, poison is a woman's weapon of choice too, for that matter. Historically."

Fox's comm beeped twice, and he glanced over at Stone, who had lifted his wrist to his helmet. "Sir," Stone said. "How soon can we move these senators out of here?"

"Give me a moment," said Fox. "Inspector Divo?"

Divo, who had just reached the door, met Fox's visor with his sharp, ferret-like eyes. "What is it, Commander?"

His voice had changed completely from the sneering tone he always adopted with politicians.

"Many of the senators are demanding to leave," Fox said, then realized he should have led with something else.

"Ah, yes." The short inspector straightened his sleeves with a flourish and narrowed his eyes at Organa. "And of course their whims are more important than a murder investigation. Is that correct, Senator?"

"Hardly," Organa replied, unimpressed by the inspector's aggressive attitude. "If you have no further questions, Commander Fox, I will see what I can do about calming my fellow senators until you allow us to leave."

"I have no further questions," Fox told him, thankful that Bail was good at staying detached. "Thank you, Senator."

"Yes," Divo chimed in. "We'll do the investigating while you get back to your politicizing of . . . whatever."

Organa's only reply was a slight bow, and then he drifted back into the crowd as if he had been discussing the weather, rather than a life-or-death situation. Divo opened his mouth to say something, and his comm rang. With a disgusted huff, he mumbled for Fox to 'wait just a minute' and stepped aside to answer it.

While the commander waited, he glanced over the room and checked the positions of his men. Stone and Scrapper were standing at the wide double doors. On the other side of the room, Warden and Lock assisted a pair of CSF guards in checking the serving droids for foreign substances before clearing them. In front of the western entrance, Kilo paced, looking silently threatening, while Steele mirrored him on the opposite side. The two ARCs were very good at containment situations.

Fortunately, the situation was well in hand by now. It was still busy, but the senators had calmed down, and the most jittery ones remaining – the Rodians, predictably – were being talked to by Organa.

Fox didn't trust many senators, but Bail Organa was one of the very few he definitely did trust. The Alderaanian didn't beat around the bush or twist situations or evidence around to work in his favor, and he stuck to his guns. He also had a head on his shoulders and actually used it in dangerous situations – unlike the Ithorian senator, who panicked a lot because he got death threats every other week, poor guy. . . and who, come to think of it, didn't even have a head that was physically on his shoulders.

Fox was unable to avoid a smirk at the thought, but he quickly pulled himself back to the situation at hand.

"Politicians," grumbled Divo, scrolling down his datapad through dozens of notifications and updates from his men. "They're the worst."

Fox didn't bother to correct him. Lieutenant Divo's dislike of politicians – who, he claimed, all lived in extreme wealth while ignoring the squalor and misery on their own planets, as well as on Coruscant – was known throughout the entire Senate district. He made no exceptions for the good senators, apparently because he was convinced that there was no such thing.

"This situation's not good," Divo said. "We know it was a murder, but the news is already spinning it like a suicide. How they even got in here that fast . . . ugh. How'd they get in here?"

"Unknown," said Fox. He'd ordered that nobody enter the room, but he couldn't blame his men. Last time, there had been an undercover journalist in the room already, and the time before that, a reporter had been found in the ventilation shaft. It was ridiculous.

"I hate the media," said Divo, quite calmly. "They'll milk it for all it's worth, then we'll have to pick up the pieces, as usual, and hope that we can disabuse people of the notion that it was a suicide. Ridiculous. Now, all these people here are going to tell me that 'oh, yes, Inspector, now that I think about it, Hilt seemed out of spirits this past week', or 'he looked sad' or 'I heard his girlfriend from twelve years ago died in a speeder crash last month."

Before Fox could get a word in edgewise, Divo continued his rant. "You realize that the odds are not in our favor here. Forty percent of all witnesses wouldn't know a useful clue if it bit 'em in the nose, and another fifty-seven percent report things that that didn't actually happen and identify people they've never actually seen before. The worst part is, most of them believe they did see something. There's probably not a single reliable witness in this room."

"You could try Riyo Chuchi," Fox told him.

"Who?" Tan Divo looked up, interested. Then the light seemed to dawn, and he slumped. "The Pantoran girl . . .? Kid's not even old enough to be a senator – eh, can't lose anything by asking, I suppose. Did she know this Hilt?"

"She met with him last week."

"Ah. . . right. Was she friends with him?"

"I wouldn't know," Fox said. He doubted it, personally, but had no real knowledge one way or the other. "Why do you ask?"

"Well," Divo explained, for once not sneering. "We've got to approach these things more carefully if the witness is a friend of the deceased. . . or an enemy, come to think of it. Hard to separate fiction from fact in both cases."

"Hm." Fox gestured at the crowd. "Once your men have finished interviewing them, can we let them go? Or do you have a reason to think there will be another attack?"

"No reason to believe there will, no reason to believe there won't."

"But you're sure it was murder," Fox said.

"Of course I'm sure." Divo sniffed. "Hilt was known for his lack of – shall we say, a backbone? Do you really think he'd have offed himself in one of the most painful ways possible?"

"You've found out what kind of poison it was, then."

"Just that it was an awful one. If forensics is right, we've got an extremely rare poison with no known antidote on our hands. And we've got no way of tracing it right now. Look, it's been over an hour. I'll interview Chuchi and . . ." He looked around, as if in search of a target. "One more senator."

"Organa," Fox suggested. "If you want reliable information."

Divo shot him an irked look, but nodded with obvious reluctance. "Chuchi and Organa, fine. And while I do that, I'd appreciate if you could take care of guards. I don't have the manpower available right now."

"Understood." Fox tapped his comm as Divo left. "Warden, Lock, call in your squads. The CSF is screening the witnesses. As they finish, have the natborns sorted into groups of five, by destination. We'll provide a two-man escort for each group and get them to safety. If we don't have enough men to handle the various destinations, the senators will have to wait until we do."