Chapter Text
Her next house was Yaddle, the older woman with the coughing problem.
She saw the old lady sprawled on the floor when she walked in. Padmé rushed to her, worried she might be injured or dead… she didn’t want another person gone because she refused to help.
“Ma’am? Ma’am? Are you alright?” she said, helping her get up.
“I’m fine!” Yaddle snarked at her, leaning all her weight on the cleaner as she got up with haste.
Padmé grunted, pulling away when the rude woman was back on her feet. “Where is your caretaker?”
“That stupid bitch ran off! Couldn’t handle a little heat. I hope she drops dead soon,” she replied bitterly, before directing her anger at the woman in front of her, “The floor is wet. Clean it!”
The angry old crone hobbled away and Padmé looked down to where she had been, and sure enough, there was a puddle where she had relieved herself.
The cleaner sighed and began gathering her supplies.
Moments later, Padmé had helped the old lady to her bedroom so she could rest, while she folded laundry on the floor.
“You know,” she started, “you should find another caretaker. You need someone to help you eat and go to the bathroom. And make sure you keep the next caretaker, don’t swear at them too much.”
Yaddle huffed at the comment, “You can do it. After all, you’re already here to clean, and I could pay you double.”
Padmé pursed her lips, stacking one shirt over another, “What if I steal your things?”
“Fine,” the old lady spat, throwing an empty box of medication of some sort at her, “Don’t do it then, you brat. I was just trying to be nice to a poor young woman, struggling through life. But like they say, you can lead a horse to the water, but you can’t make him drink it”
The cleaner dodged the box with skill, replying, “Thank you for the offer, but I’m going to quit the cleaning job soon. Because of personal business.”
The older woman chuckled, “I knew you would be caught up in trouble. Is it a man or money?”
Padmé’s heart raced, but she didn’t give it away. She turned to look at the woman, expression vacant.
“Or is it both?” Yaddle prodded, smirking.
The younger woman ignored her, gathering the folded clothes in her arms, and getting up to put them in their place. “I’ll call the agency and tell them you need a new caretaker. That’s all I can do for you.”
“You think you can sneak out, but you can’t get away. You will be caught someday.” The old lady called after her.
Padmé turned around on her way out, looking pointedly at the woman, “What did I do wrong? Don’t say things like that. You don’t know anything about me.”
“At this age, I can see through everything, you wench.”
This woman was beginning to scare her. Padmé wondered if her poker face was becoming transparent or if this woman truly was the witch she acted like.
“Do you think a thief can have a happy life? Well, snap out of it, stupid bitch .” Yaddle cackled, and Padmé’s fear quickly turned into anger.
She was just a crazy old woman, that’s all she was. She always said things like this and insulted all of the people who took care of her. But now that she had that money, she would finally be free of treatments like this.
Obi-Wan sat in front of Cody’s tombstone, staring at his brother’s worn-out watch. He had come to identify with it and had grown to love it as much as he had, although it was for different reasons. He still couldn’t believe his brother was gone. Every day he woke up with a broken heart, and every little thing reminded him of Cody. Memories of their childhood, things that happened last month… All of it flooded his mind, filling him with more guilt and crippling sorrow.
He was his little brother, Obi-Wan had always thought he would go before him. And he had known that if anything threatened that, he would protect him. But he couldn’t. He didn’t even know what mess Cody had gotten himself into.
However, one thing was certain, he would avenge his little brother. It’s the least he could do, after pushing him away in their last moments together, for not being there for him, for being such a disappointment, to quell the guilt that gripped his heart.
Almost as if he were cued, Obi-Wan’s boss walked up to him, a yellow envelope in hand.
“Have you eaten yet?” he asked after paying his respects.
Obi-Wan just stared at the envelope, ignoring the question, “Did you open it?”
His boss handed him the parcel, worry creeping onto his face for a second. Obi-Wan ripped it open, pulling the stapled pages of his boss’s research, as he leafed through them his boss briefed him on his findings.
“S.I.T.H. Tech. The company was founded in 2014.” He said, “The CEO is one Maul Zachary. It’s a company that develops apps, like mobile games. Their annual sales are about three to four million dollars. But this company is just for show. There’s something else that they make money out of. An illegal gambling website .”
Obi-Wan perked up at the confirmation that his suspicion was correct.
The other man continued, “It is said that they earn millions of dollars a day, without paying any tax.”
From a distance, a car door could be heard slamming, a boy walked up to them with a bouquet in hand. “Hey, is this the grave of Cody Kenody?”
The aforementioned man’s brother looked up in disdain, “It’s Kenobi, pipsqueak.”
“Oh. Sorry. Anyways, someone told me to leave these here, but since the space is kinda occupied, I’ll just give them to you.” The boy handed Obi-Wan the flowers and turned to leave.
“Wait! Who sent you?” Obi-Wan asked, getting up.
The kid shrugged, “Some guy from a company, S.I.G., S.I.T.? I don’t know, all I know is he paid me in cash. Oh, and I think his name was like Mal or something. Weird guy.”
Obi-Wan’s grief turned into white-hot anger. He knew this Maul guy had been involved in his brother’s death. He had some audacity sending flowers to his grave as if it were nothing.
He threw the flowers on the floor, crushing them with his shoe. Feeling as if it weren’t enough he kicked them, stomped on them, anything to make them disappear.
“Whoa, man! Calm down!” His boss yelled, getting a hold of his arm and the angry man stilled. “What did the flowers do to you, huh? Maul is the problem.”
Obi-Wan’s mouth twisted into a down-right evil smirk, “You’re right. He is the problem. I’m going to go pay him a little visit. Please stay here and watch over Cody.”
“Kenobi… Don’t do something you’ll regret, man.” the gang leader chided, concern tingeing his voice.
“Not making any promises! Thanks, buddy!”
A man with tattoos all over his face aimed a crossbow at three men standing in front of targets meant for darts. All of them had their features schooled but the man with the weapon, Maul, could smell their fear, no matter how hard they tried to conceal it. But that just spurred him on.
“10 million dollars are gone,” he said calmly, aiming at one suited man, “Those who carried the money are all dead, but we can’t find the thieves.” He shot and the arrow pierced the man’s knee, knocking him down to the floor as he yelped in pain.
Maul held his hand out, and one of his men put another arrow in his hand. He loaded the bow, setting his sights on the second man.
“We’ve checked Cody Kenobi’s brother and our rival company, sir,” he said, eyes downcast, “but we haven’t found anything yet.”
The CEO tsked, “Grievous. Do you think I made you director to hear this kind of lousy report?”
“No, sir. Sorry, sir.”
“If you would like to apologize, take responsibility for it… give up your title.” He positioned himself to shoot, and Grievous almost flinched, when suddenly a yell was heard from outside the door.
“Maul Zachary, come out right now!” It was followed by the sounds of struggle and then a big thud at the door.
“We need to talk, Maul!”
Grievous recognized the voice, “That’s Cody Kenobi’s brother, sir.”
“Didn’t you say he was a detective and then got fired?” Maul asked, relaxed as ever, as if there weren’t a crazy man pounding his door and trying to get in to kill him.
The director nodded, adding, “For excessive investigation and bribery.”
The CEO nodded, “Okay. Let him in before he puts a dent in my door.”
One of his men walked over, opening the door to reveal the man whose glare was the embodiment of poisonous hatred.
Obi-Wan strode over to where Maul stood, ready to rip him apart limb by limb, before Grievous stood in his way, blocking him both times he tried to get around him.
His unsettlingly calm and provoking smile unnerved the former detective, and he turned all of his hatred onto him.
“Sorry about the circumstances in which we. As you can understand, it is a desperate time for our company as much as it is for you.” Grievous told him, hand on his shoulder, in case he tried anything.
Obi-Wan wished he could burn it off of him. How dare he compare losing their dirty money with him losing his brother? After all, it was thanks to that same money that they could even have the audacity to say that sentence.
“Your company ?” Obi-Wan scoffed. “You’re an illegal gambling website disguised as a mobile game, aren’t you? Well, you can stop hiding it, because I know and I don’t care. All I want to know is what exactly you made Cody do.”
His voice threatened to crack, anger, grief, and guilt manhandled his vocal chords, “Why was he in that van that day?”
Maul finally spoke, “Listen, buddy. I’m hearing you’re Cody’s brother, but honestly, I’m having a hard time believing it. It seems like you know next to nothing about him.”
“What?” Obi-Wan directed his attention to the inked-up man picking up a cigarette between his fingers, rolling it around idly, looking at it for a moment before looking back at him with sneering eyes.
“Do you really think your precious little brother didn’t know what this company was doing?”
The brother of the deceased was left speechless for the first time in hours.
“He was the leader of a team here. Of the finance team to be exact.” Maul brought a lighter to the end of his cigarette, calmly watching the flame as Obi-Wan attempted to launch himself at him, Grievous holding him back.
“You’re lying!”
Maul waved a Grievous, signaling him to explain as he smoked, ever so calm.
“Our servers to run the website are in Thailand. We manage burner bank accounts and game money in Canada and send the profit to the US using the burner account and withdraw it at the bank. Keeping, transferring, and managing the money. That’s what he used to do.” Grievous was almost surprised that the man had let him finish, but the struggle continued as Obi-Wan tried to knock him over.
“Do you think I’m really going to believe your lies? My brother would never do that!”
“Kenobi!” It was the first time Grievous had raised his voice since their unfortunate meeting in the desert. “It wasn’t just a simple car accident. Ten million dollars have disappeared. We couldn't find the dashcam and we lost the signal of the tracking device at some point.”
Obi-Wan’s grip on the other man’s blazer loosen as he let himself listen to what he was saying. “Someone figured out the transportation time and route and stole the money.”
“Those godforsaken ten million dollars.” the former detective muttered.
“The very same.” Maul said, standing up. “We can easily make 10 million in a month, the problem is not the money but that our information leaked.” He took Grievous's place in front of Obi-Wan. “Once the water starts leaking, blood will soon follow. I need to know who took the food from my table.”
“What are you getting at?” Obi-Wan asked.
“You catch the guys that killed your brother, I remove the rats. It’s a win-win situation. What do you say?”
The former detective sneered, “Win-win, my foot. I don’t work with criminals.”
Maul mirrored his expression, “Then for what noble reason did you take the bribe? That’s what got you fired, isn’t it? Or did I hear wrong?”
Obi-Wan stared back at him, at a loss for words once more. The man in front of him continued, “Do whatever it takes to catch them. You need money, I’ll give it to you. Information, we’ll get it. You want to avenge your brother’s death, right? This is your chance.”
“I’m not helping you. And I suggest you and your men stay out of my way,” he looked at Grievous pointedly. “Or I’ll crush you too.”
Satisfied with his visit, Obi-Wan walked out, glaring at every last man in black, hoping he’d never have to see any one of them ever again.
Grievous watched him go, turning to his boss, “Do you think he’ll be alright?”
Maul smirked, “He’s got madness in his eyes. When people like him snap, they’re capable of doing anything.” He slipped back into the chair behind his desk, “This will be interesting.”
Tick. Tick. Tick. Tick.
Cody’s old watch counted off the seconds, as Obi-Wan caressed it somberly, squeezing his eyes shut to keep tears from flowing out.
He found himself at Cody’s tombstone once more, the clutches of grief stronger than any single emotion he ever felt.
“Cody,” he whispered into the air, “I’ll catch the people who did this to you. I promise.”