'At Death's Door'
It was bound to happen, it always is. How long can a group of power-hungry beings cooperate before one of them makes a move? It was time....
The council chambers exploded with sound as the Grand Councilor entered. He was assaulted from all sides by demands and questions. The council was furious, and he knew there would be hell to pay before the meeting was over. The grand councilor ignored the shouts, screams, and even the threats and continued forward to his podium. Picking up his gavel, he began to bang it onto the solid base, attempting to silence the group.
*Bang* Few even noticed.
*Bang* Most ignored him, still.
*Bang* Few looked in his direction.
*BANG* The room filled with fire, smoke, and debris.
It would take investigators weeks to figure out exactly what happened, but they did figure it out. A massive security breach lead to a small, but incredibly powerful addition to the podium of the Grand Councilor. A small sensor had been placed in the base plate of the gavel. Three strikes in less than a minute and the bomb would activate, and would wipe out nearly the entire leadership of the Trade Federation.
Fewer than a dozen council members survived the initial blast, and all those that did only survived because they were running late or not attending meetings that day. Several died that same day, of mysterious speeder accidents, oddly timed heart attacks, or "street thugs."
Those that survived that day tried to band together, mostly of fear, but all suspected the others of plotting the disaster as a means of taking over the federation. By the end of the week, there were only a half-dozen of the original council members still living. Asani Kafil was among them, but he too had suffered an attack that was, fortunately for him, botched.
Asani's attacker was captured and interrogated, and his interrogation led to his employer, who had a money trail leading back to one of the other surviving council members. Authorities arrested him on numerous charges and immediately imprisoned him. Two days after his arrest, the council member was found hanging in his prison cell of an apparent suicide.
With the apparently plotter found and dead, the federation tried to reconstitute itself. The remaining 5 council members agreed on Asani as the new Grand Councilor not just because of his qualifications and connections, but because he had survived a direct assassination attempt and they thought it would send a message that the federation was not afraid. Asani graciously accepted the position and immediately put to work consolidating the control of the departed member's powers.
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OOC Note: This sets the stage for the transition of the Trade Federation into GCW 3.
