Bad Luck on Coruscant

The Rodian walked down the dark alley, constantly looking around nervously. The enormous buildings made the alley all the darker and eerier. His skin was pebbly and had a greenish-blue tint, much of which was covered by worn clothing. His eyes large, bulbous, and black kept looking around and his ears, protruding out of the top of his head, twitched at every sound. Just report in and get your reward. He kept repeating this thought but it did nothing for his nerves. At the end of the alley stood a tall figure, clothed in black garments, with a hood casting a shadow over his face. The Rodian was scared of him and it was obvious in his twitchy manner and the way he never looked directly at him. As the Rodian walked up to the figure, he gave a low bow.

“Is it done?” said the hooded figure in raspy whisper.

“Y-ye-yes, my lord.” The Rodian replied, again giving a deep bow. “He does not suspect a thing.”

“Good, you have served your purpose very well.” The hooded figure looked to the side of him, seemingly lost in his thoughts. “He will be my way to power.”

“M-my lord, umm, about my reward?”

“Ah yes, how could I forget my loyal subject?” as the figure said this, the Rodian got the sudden urge to run away. “Like I said, you have served your purpose.”

The last thing the Rodian saw was a flash of bright blue light and then there was nothing.
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The hooded figure looked down at his handy-work. Disgusting creatures, he thought. He shut off his lightsaber and began making his way out of the alley. He clipped it back onto his belt and took out his comlink. He waited for his master to answer as he made his way through the Coruscanti streets. Finally, there was an answer.

“Your mission went well?” asked a woman.

“Yes, he has been set on his path.”

“Good, any witnesses left?”

“None”

“Very well done, youngling, I knew I was right in choosing you.”

“Thank you, Master Ventress, is there anything else you would like me to do?”

“No, return to the Jedi Temple and maintain your reports as usual. You have helped the Separatist and the Sith greatly. We will soon gain a new weapon to use against the Republic and possibly, much more. You will soon be rewarded for your efforts. Ventress, out.”

The Youngling put the commlink away and made his way to the Jedi temple with haste. He knew he would have to get there quickly as bed checks would be soon. He was pleased with himself, though. He had accomplished his mission and had gained the praise of his master. This would make the morning lessons bearable.

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“We must unite against this threat to our civil rights! The Chancellor is growing too powerful and the Separatists know this. That is why they began this war! They want to uphold democracy, not destroy it. It is the Republic that is the true enemy! Join the Separatist! For democracy! For freedom!”

That’s when I decided to take my shot. It went straight through his eye socket, coming out the back of his head and digging into the wall behind. His body collapsed like a puppet whose strings had been cut. The crowd stared, stunned, then ran away in fear, some even yelling and screaming. I looked for signs of life, made sure he was dead, then began to pack quickly, taking out the ear piece through which I had been listening to the man speak. The dramatic ending to his speech would be going through all of the city-planet in fairly short time. Hell, he might even become a martyr. I quickly disassembled the DC-15x that I had “borrowed” from a clone barrack. The Coruscant Security Forces would be here any minute and I needed to be gone by then. I had been against doing the killing in public and had wanted more time to prepare but my employer had insisted and with the amount of credits he offered, I was convinced. This damn need for credits is going to kill me or worse.

I looked around the office I had used as my sniping position, remembering the exit route I had planned. It was relatively clean, the gleam of the desk only marred by the personal effects of the person who worked on it. He had a few drawings that looked to have been done by a child, as well as pictures of his family. My eyes lingered on one of them where he was posing with his family in front of what I assumed was their home. All of them had happy smile, truly happy. I turned away from them, shaking the train of thought and poked my head out the window again, to look down at the lower parts. It always impressed me how tall the Coruscanti buildings were and I always wondered what the fall would feel like from one.

“Pirusti, ca'nara bah ner” I muttered to myself. All of a sudden a bright light blinded me. When it pointed away from me, I saw a VAAT/e gunship floating in front of me, CSF in the hanger yelling at me to drop everything. “Haar'chak!”

So, I did what anybody would do in this situation. I ran. I heard the sound of blaster fire behind me as I ran out of the office into a more open area, filled with desks and computers, and other such things. I ran towards the exit jumping over tables and dodging objects. As I neared the door, I heard it open, and a blaster rifle barrel poke out. As quick as I could, I grabbed it and pushed it into the face of its user. I heard the crunch of his nose breaking as I planted my foot onto his sternum and pushed him back hard. I saw him fall into the rest of his squad, knocking everybody down. Still holding the blaster rifle, I flipped it and blasted the door mechanism, shutting the door. I was safe, at least temporarily.

I took a breath, and burst into laughter. I still had the thrum of energy and fear in me but seeing them fall over like that, I couldn't keep the laughter from flowing out. I made myself focus on looking around for another avenue of escape. There was only one way out, and that way was currently populated by a squad of CSF. As I looked around for another exit, I noticed the windows. I turned away and kept looking. I’m not that desperate…at least not yet. Then the door slid open a little bit and rifles poked through. Fierfek, guess now I am. I blasted the window out and looked down. The alley looked like a tiny creek from up here. Surprisingly, that was not very reassuring and I was still contemplating whether to jump or not when the door slid open half way and blaster bolts shattered the window next to me. I tossed the rifle and jumped out, spreading my limbs out a little to slow my descent.

As the alley rushed to meet me, I felt the mixture of terror and exhilaration that came with falling through the air. I enjoyed it for a couple of seconds before I took out my grappling gun and shot it at the building in front of me. It went through one of the windows, around the border, and out another window digging into the building. I held on tighter to the gun waiting for the sudden pull upwards, activated the locking mechanism and……nothing happened. I was still falling towards solid death and the locking mechanism in my gun was not working.

I panicked as I activated the locking mechanism again and again. After my brain finally accepted that it was not going to work I just managed yell really loudly. As if matters were not bad enough, I managed to bang my legs against something attached to the adjacent wall, making my body aim headfirst at the ground. I yelled some more as I saw the ground speeding towards me and decided it would be better to close my eyes. Just as I was about to hit it, the kriffing gun finally locked.

I opened my eyes to see that I was a foot above the ground with a death grip on the gun and my legs locked around the rope. I sighed with relief and promptly fell to the ground. I lay there for a while, thinking. The first thought that worked its way through the grip of fear was "This alley is very dirty". I got into a sitting position and checked my body for any damages. My legs were really bruised from hitting the wall but the armor seemed to have protected it from breaking or fracturing. The rest of my body seemed to be fine, albeit a little beat up. I managed to get up and look at my gun hanging there.

“I don’t know whether to consider you lucky or unlucky.” I said shaking my head. I unclipped the rope and put the gun on my belt anyways. I limped down the alley towards the getaway speeder I had hidden there. As I rounded the corner I was met with yet another bright light blinding me for a few seconds. When my vision came back, I saw a semi-circle of CSF officers standing in front of my speeder, aiming their very lethal looking guns at me. The VAAT/e gunship was floating above them also aiming very big and lethal looking guns at me. I put my hands up in surrender. “Fierfek, maybe it’s my luck that’s taken a turn for the worst.”