Family Ties

Cornelius Bok stood, fully robed, near the entrance of a long and particularly dark alley. The rain seemed to violently bombard him from all directions; he became soaked in the filth of the city. As the Jedi retreated into the shelter of the alley, he vaguely recalled promising to a rich man who claimed to be his father that he would never enter the Coruscant Industrial Zone. Now the area, widely considered the most dangerous on the planet, had become a second home to him.

Just thirty-seven hours prior, Cornelius didn't give a damn about the man who killed his father. He couldn't have cared less about what his name was, who he was working for, or where he ended up. A holopad slipped under his apartment door while he was sleeping had given a time and place corresponding to his current location; thirty-seven hours prior, he didn't care to attend.

The message asked a simple question, "Do you want to know more about your father?" The question had initially been answered with a no, yet just thirty-seven hours later the question was burning in his mind. All Cornelius knew of his father, the Doge of Bok, was that he was a delegate from a feudal world to the Senate, and that he was assassinated not long after arrival. He had no memories of his true father, so he never cared much to know why. Evan Yarrow, Cornelius's adoptive father, was a distant but caring man, and Cornelius had grown up accepting him as his father. He had never sought after any additional information until within the last thirty-seven hours, not until he was asked if he wanted to.

In the last thirty-seven hours, Cornelius had confronted anyone he could about his father. "Master Ooo, did you know my father? Or know of him?"

The older Jedi had been cornered by his apprentice as they passed in the Jedi Healing Center. Cornelius knew it was a long-shot, but the question was burning in his mind.

"Coruscant is a large planet, the odds that any two people know each other are highly unlikely," Ooo had answered without a hitch.

Cornelius knew his master, and although nothing in the man's expression or inflection would suggest that he was hiding something, the apprentice could see through the veil that had been handed down in training. "Master, my father was a senator, he had to have been an influential man. You must know something."

The master let out a sigh before looking his apprentice in the eye. "The Doge of Bok was a powerful man on the planet he came from. However, he wasn't very well known on Coruscant, he wasn't here long before his assassination. It wasn't very public, and neither was he. That is all I know."

Cornelius wasn't satiated, and quickly erupted into a stream of questions? "But what planet was that? I've never even learned the name, I'd like to visit one day. Who killed him? Why?"

"Cornelius," the master started sternly, "I've told you all I know. You were satisfied with what you knew of your father, and you'd be in the right mind to return to that state. This isn't a path you want to take."

By the time Cornelius had fully processed his master's words, Ooo had already left.

As Cornelius approached the coordinates provided by the message, he pulled the hood of his robes further over his face. He sensed the danger in this meeting and realized the risk, but any feelings of doubt were outweighed by his raging curiosity. The Jedi Archives contained not a single mention of his father, and he was unable to reach his adoptive father. He could not have his questions go unanswered, and felt that meeting the unknown contact would be his only source for information.

However, Cornelius was disappointed as he approached a holopad attached to the side of a dumpster. He had hoped for an informant, not another message. Reviewing the information would have to wait though, as the letdown quickly sobered him to the dangerous situation that he was in. As he began to stuff the holopad into his robes and hurry off, he heard a voice speak up behind him.

"That's a pretty piece of tech you got there, mind if I take it off your hands?"

The Jedi turned around to face a particularly ugly Rodian, and he sensed several more bodies in the shadows. He tapped into his training and brushed his robes open, revealing his previously hidden lightsaber

"Gentlemen, I am but a Jedi Healer and I mean no trouble. You shall leave me be and we will go our separate ways."

The assailants just laughed, though, and Cornelius looked down to find his saber missing. As he heard a saber switch on behind him, he began to run.

The Jedi swiftly navigated the alleyways, working his way back the way he came. Blaster bolts scorched the ground behind him, seconds after his feet had touched it. Cornelius wasn't well trained in combat, and hadn't encountered many situations like the one he was in. Actually, the total number of similar situations that he was in was zero, so he was kind of screwed there.

He saw the light of the street in the distance and hurried his pace, racing towards salvation. As he neared it, however, a group of figures appeared just ahead of Cornelius, blocking him. The Jedi made the split second decision to try to rush the newcomers, and with a sweep of the hand he charged towards the light. However, his state of panic broke his concentration and he was unable to successfully move the enemies. As he attempted to run through them, two particularly brutish Gamorreans grabbed him by he arms and turned him around to face his pursuers.

The first thing Cornelius noticed about the Trandoshan he had come face-to-face with was a nasty scar across its left eye. The second thing was that it was brandishing his lightsaber. The third (somehow) was that it didn't look very happy.