Zoojoo

Zoojoo was a female Woostoid who was affiliated with the Grumani Hierophants during the Republic Dark Age. Zoojoo helped to guard a hidden Grumani temple on the planet Sarrassia and at some point prior to 1032 BBY, she and the Grumani met with the Humans Aron Holt and Mercia Holt, who informed her that the Sith Lord Odion sought to locate the Helm of Ieldis, an ancient Sith artifact that was concealed inside the temple. With help from the Holts, the Grumani rediscovered the Helm and shipped it to the planet Skarpos for safekeeping. In 1032 BBY, Zoojoo encountered the Jedi Knight Kerra Holt—the daughter of Aron and Mercia—outside the Grumani temple. Shortly afterward, Zoojoo blew up the temple in an attempt to prevent Odion's Novitiates from learning of the Helm's location, and she perished in the explosion.
==Biography==
===The Helm of Ieldis===
The Woostoid Zoojoo was a member of the Grumani Hierophants, a religion based on the planet Sarrassia, which was home to various warring religious factions. Zoojoo and her fellow religious adherents resided at the Great Temple beneath Mount Diligence. She was an acquaintance of Mercia Holt, an archaeologist who was doing research on the Helm of Ieldis, an ancient Sith relic created by the Sith Lord Ieldis prior to the Great Hyperspace War. Through her connections with Mercia, Zoojoo also became acquainted with Mercia's husband Aron and their daughter Kerra, who would become a Jedi Knight. When Kerra was seven years old, Zoojoo was present when the young girl climbed onto the roof of the Great Hall. While Kerra escaped unharmed, her actions caused the temple's elderly abbot to suffer a stroke and incurred the wrath of their parents.
During the conquest of Aquilaris Minor by the Chagras Hegemony in 1042 BBY, Mercia and her husband were captured by the Sith Lord Odion. From Mercia, Odion learnt about the existence of the Helm of Ieldis and dragooned them into Project Pandemonium, a task force assigned to recover the relic for Odion's own purposes. About three years later, the Holts returned to Sarrassia and were reunited with Zoojoo and their Grumani friends. Despite being in Odion's service, Mercia and Aron had not succumbed to the same sickness affecting him. They were also aware of the dangerous power of the Helm and were secretly conspiring to hide the talisman from him. With the assistance of Zoojoo and the other Hierophants, Mercia translated the ancient markings in the temple and learned the location of the Helm of Ieldis. The Helm was hidden within the Great Temple under Mount Diligence. Following this discovery, the Holts took the Helm to Skarpos to hide it from Odion. Meanwhile, the Grumani agreed to guard the Great Temple at all costs.
===Invasion===
Following this meeting, Zoojoo lost all contact with the Holts. Within days after their visit, Sarrassia was conquered by Ayanos Bactra, a Sith Lord who ruled a realm known as the Bactranate. Unlike the other Sith Lords however, Bactra's rule was comparatively more moderate and he did not interfere greatly within the lives of his subjects. He succeeded in ending the endless factional fighting between the Grumani Hierophants and the Spumani Crusaders, a rival religious sect. In 1032 BBY, the planet Sarrassia was conquered by Lord Odion's forces. The various Sith Lords of the Grumani sector were locked in an internecine struggle known as the Second Charge Matrica and Bactra's princedom had been invaded and carved up between Odion and his younger brother, Daiman. An Odionate military fleet led by General Beld Yulan launched a preemptive strike on Sarrassia; overpowering the planet's defenders.
Odionate forces gradually overcame the resistance and rounded up the planet's population as slave labor. Meanwhile, Kerra Holt had infiltrated Odion's Novitiates under the disguise of a Force-sensitive young woman named "Mercy." Mercy and her Sith comrades took part in a mopping up operation led by the Twi'lek acolyte Doyan against Hierophants at Mount Diligence. Zoojoo and her Hierophants were making a last-ditched resistance against the Sith invaders under the pretext of it being 'holy ground.' During the fighting, several Sith troopers and Novitiate acolytes were killed by friendly fire unleashed by Yulan's artillery. Having discovered a cave entrance, Yulan ordered the Novitiates including "Mercy" to explore the cave and find the Helm, continuing on from Project Pandemonium's last known whereabouts. Mercy separated herself from her team and discovered a steel door which she opened using her mother's pendant.
===Reunion and death===
Mercy found herself in an underground complex consisting of a lake and the Great Temple. She was immediately ambushed by Zoojoo who initially mistook her for a Sith. Zoojoo attacked Mercy with a stick and was about to bash her with a stone when she quickly recognized it was Kerra Holt. While Kerra wore Sith attire, Zoojoo could still sense the light side of the Force burning brightly through her. She recalled that she could remember that Kerra was the same little girl who climbed the roof of the Great Hall years ago. Zoojoo and Kerra rowed across the lake and entered the Temple. Zoojoo then shared with Kerra about the last known whereabouts of her parents. She confirmed that they had revisited Sarrassia seven years ago prior to the Bactranate occupation and that they had hidden the relic on Skarpos, a barren world within the Sith Lord Malakite's realm known as the Menagerie.
However, Zoojoo was unable to confirm their whereabouts following the trip and was unaware that Mercia had been pregnant with a second child prior to her capture. Zoojoo comforted a grieving Kerra who had been separated from her parents following the conquest of Aquilaris Minor. Kerra also informed Zoojoo about Odion's invasion of Skarpos and told her that she need to get there to prevent him from getting the Helm. Zoojoo tried to dissuade Kerra from returning to Skarpos by arguing that her actions would only attract Odion's attention. Kerra argued that his forces were already besieging the planet.
Zoojoo still advised caution, sensing that Kerra was also trying to find her parents. She tried to persuade Kerra to ignore her desires, just like her parents sacrificed what they wanted to keep the Helm from Odion. Their conversation was interrupted by an explosion triggered by Yulan's explosives. His troops had exploded an opening in the tunnel and stumbled upon the Temple. Zoojoo panicked, fearing that her efforts to keep the Sith from finding the Helm was only in vain. Despite Kerra's offer to protect Zoojoo and to get her out of harm's way, a desperate Zoojoo activated a bomb which buried the temple and much of the lake underwater; killing herself in the process but denying the Sith further access to the Temple.
Yulan and his men barely escaped with their lives. Kerra survived by diving underwater beneath the boat. Following their escape, Kerra revealed to Yulan the location of the Helm of Ieldis. She confirmed that Zoojoo had perished during the cave-in and then ordered Yulan to quickly take them to Skarpos. Kerra was left to lament the death of an important childhood friend and her futile efforts to save her. However, she was satisfied that she now knew the last known whereabouts of her parents and the Helm. Kerra was thus more determined to deny Odion access to the Helm.
==Personality and traits==
Zoojoo had a kind, maternal instinct which made it easy for most other sentient beings to relate to her. During her childhood, the Jedi Knight Kerra Holt developed a warm relationship with her. This relationship would play an important role during Kerra's quest on Sarrassia to find her family and the Helm of Ieldis. However, she was also prone to panicking, as when Yulan and his minions breached the underground Temple on Sarrassia. Despite Kerra's attempts to soothe her by promising to protect her, Zoojoo became suicidal. In an attempt to deny the Sith access the Helm, Zoojoo would trigger a remote-controlled bomb on her wrist band, which caused rocks and rubble to crush her and the surrounding temple. While Zoojoo's skin was smooth when she was young, the Woostoid woman had developed significant wrinkles across her body by 1032 BBY, reflecting her age.
==Power and abilities==
While Zoojoo was a Grumani priestess, she was capable of defending herself when she ambushed and was about to bash a Sith intruder during the Invasion of Sarrassia in 1,032 BBY. However, Zoojoo quickly recognized that the individual was actually her friend Kerra Holt, and the two women quickly reconciled. This brief incident also showed that Zoojoo could recognize a person based on the intensity of light-side energy emanating from their Force presence. While Kerra was dressed in Sith attire, Zoojoo still recognized her as a friend due to her intense light-side energy.
==Behind the scenes==
Zoojoo made her only appearance in Knight Errant: Escape 2, the second comic within the Star Wars: Knight Errant: Escape comic arc, which debuted on July 11 2012. She was introduced as a minor supporting character to the main protagonist, Jedi Knight Kerra Holt. She was drawn by Marco Castiello, Andrea Chella, and Vincenzo Acunzo, and was colored by Michael Atiyeh. Her plot was developed by John Jackson Miller.
==Appearances==
*Knight Errant: Escape 2 
==Notes and references==
Category:Females
Category:Religious workers
Category:Woostoids