Prologue

Coruscant 21 BBY (Mid-afternoon)

"And that is the news for today, see you tomorrow when we conclude our assignment on the newest bill on giving Chancellor Palpatine more power than he already has." The humanoid woman said from behind the holo projector.

When the rest of the world saw this news broadcast there would be more propaganda than actual facts. The whole system of journalism was going to shit because of this war. Nothing seemed to be true outside of what the Holo-net was telling the people of the Galactic Republic.

It was not as bad as it could be. They could be putting it as if Chancellor Palpatine was the best person for leadership and not some power hungry man using this war as an excuse to gain unlimited power. The Hapan woman thought to herself.

She had been working for the holonet for over three years now and all that she had learned from working here was that people were more interested in reading about gossip and rumors rather than actual facts. As the war had gone by many articles now featured the Jedi as Hero's that were out there fighting for a reason unknown to her. They preferred reading about how a Jedi had been killed in a tragic accident than a story on the fact that Chancellor Palpatine was abusing the very power their government had given him!

The people of the galaxy were mad... then again many of them had no idea what else to do other than make others look like Gods. It was rather sad to think that people only cared about these stories because the war had made them believe that they could do nothing and those actually fighting were perfect hero's who had been chosen by the Gods themselves to fight for whatever reason it was that the war started.

Stupid really, but there was nothing that she could do about it... unless of course she assassinated Palpatine, which would land her in prison for the rest of her life. Not worth the time of the crime that she would get, plus the fact that perhaps a worse Chancellor could get elected and that would be the end of her.

The most she could do was try to fight the urge to rebel and just hope that when the war is over everything goes back to the way it was before... with democracy of course.

"Hey Freckles! We got a meeting in five." A rude Correllian man said rubbing her head like an animal as he went by.

She sighed and collected her data-pad filled with her notes on the next story she was working on for the next morning's broadcast. The story was just focusing on the recent increase in death among minors in the outer rim territories. An area not yet affected by the war, but at least it would be something people would actually read. The whole story was sad enough as it is, without the fact that some people would not even bother to read it before flipping the page and reading what the newest fashion trends were.

The worst part was the fact that these people were also the ones who paid more attention to articles on the war rather than what was actually happening in those battles. They had enough information to turn the whole galaxy against the war; however, they could not do this because it would show the enemy the weaknesses the Republic has in its military. If that were to happen then democracy as she knew it was more than likely dead.

Most of the more prominent Journalist for the holonet was all older men and women who had been at the same job for years. They controlled what was to be showed and what was not to be shown on the broadcast system and what was going to go out to a holozine. Though this was something she would never complain about she just thought things would be different if someone else was in charge.

"It looks like we are all here." The head of the news broadcast said as he sat down in the chair at the top of the table.

The horrible black table that was covered in interplanetary breaking and progressing news stories. The staff was used to having the moving images on the table and ignored them as best they could while telling the director speak of how the news was going to be distributed. The whole room was covered in old news stories that were the master work of the holonet in the first place, while many of them in the room could not remember or were not born yet, these stories were still what had been notable days in journalism.

When there was the day when she broke a story that big she would be on the wall. It was an honor to be on that wall and one day she would be the writer of those stories.

"Sit down everyone we have much to discuss." The Mon Calamari ordered.

As they took their seats the director put a holographic image of their ratings over the past months. To the average citizen these would look high and average, and they would be right to a certain point-of-view, however their ratings had dropped extremely since the start of the war. Everyone would think these were good if they were not trained in the media, these ratings were terrible they had to get them up within this quarter or else there was no hope of getting them back up. The complications of media were vast, but they would get through this quarter... well at least with a below average rating. As long as they were did not lose fifteen percent of their audience they were in no danger.

"With are ratings rather low since the start of the war, we need to find something more interesting to broadcast to the people. They are sick of this war, and they hear about it all the time. And what person wants to come home and read an article or watch the television where there is only war going on?" The director retorted. "No one, we are pushing this war too far down their throats and we need to give them room to breath. Does anyone know what we can do to get these ratings up?"

The question was a waste of time to be answered because once the boss's mind was made up there was no changing him, no matter if his idea was stupid of not. Last quarter in an attempt to get the ratings up he began to nickname the Jedi, which brought their ratings up, however, their critics did not take light of them making the men and women who were fighting the war were being treated like actors who were doing nothing but being paid to look good. The critics were right to say that they were using the Jedi to the holonet's advantage however, weren't all of them.

The people wanted to see the brave Jedi go into battles with lightsabers in hand and doing nothing but bring down the Separatist movement. And the holonet was giving them this, something to lift their spirits in a time of hardship. If it brought their ratings up they were prepared to do nearly anything.

A female Twi'lek raised her hand to give an idea, she was an intern of course and those were the only ones who ever bothered to raise their hands to give their opinions. The girl would learn with time that they were a business that did not need new ideas rather more ratings using these old ideas that kept being chopped up and sent out to the world. The director let her speak anyway, despite the fact he was going to shoot her down later. Perhaps he was doing this just to get a laugh or something? It was a sick joke to play but all the interns had gone through this.

The girl talked about how she thought it was a good idea to cut back on the hours spent working on war stories. She should not have done that, if they cut the amount of time working on the war they would lose more viewers than they wanted to gain. Her idea was typical of the average citizen, however, they were a business and the war had to be broadcast otherwise the people would become uninterested in watching the shows with the pretty actors and actresses. Before the war started when they were actually using stories that had at least a slight positive image they had tried to at least make it where there would be some politics and a few fun stories on the side. However, though good news would bump up their ratings it was not what the people needed; they needed news of what was really going on not the stories of a man who saved a baby nexu from a three thousand-story building.

"My girl, that was a very interesting idea, however," The director began. "I have already decided on an idea to use. What we need to do is focus more on the private lives of those who are in the government; they cannot all be perfect little politicians. We need those stories that cause controversy, what we need is good undercover journalism to uncover what makes these politicians the way they are. If they are using their power for good or for evil. It will get our ratings up plus we get an inside look at what is really going on in the government. Anyone have anything to add?"

No one dared to raise his or her hands to agree with the idea or argue about it. To argue was to be fired and forced out onto the streets, or worse back into their home world news stations! To agree with the idea was a sign of weakness and if the director sighted weakness there was going to be more pink slips going up than the office could afford. The director did not take too kindly to butt-kissers and if one dared to do anything that looked like it there was going to be hell to pay.

"Good," He said as he flicked the next holo up showing the amount of revenue they were getting. Profits are up at 5% from last quarter and we seem to be going on the same trend we were before the war started. With this we must be cautious not to do anything that might upset our profit margin any further. Furthermore, we must remind ourselves that the more money we make the better the ratings we make. Now what we really need this quarter is to have an increase in profits and as I have explained before my idea on how to get our ratings and profits up from last quarter.

"Now let's move on to something more interesting." He said with what could be counted as a smile. "Assignments, now we cannot have anyone reporting from their home world because some of our home worlds are neutral like Lubov's or Ayo's home worlds. Now we need to think of whom to assign to everyone. Now my idea of course is to assign everyone by home world, but that as stated could not work unless you girls can managed to dig up information on the Duchess of Mandalore or the Queen mother of Hapes?"

Lubov shook her head; there was no way that she was going to do any further research on the Queen Mother. Everyone on Hapes knew who she was and what she did for their planet; no one was truly interested outside of their planet at what she was actually doing. If they were they needed to get a life, or at least stop taking as many death sticks.

"Perhaps then we should assign each of them by their number of articles written about them?" The director questioned. "No, that would not work because their are too many co-authors in here. Hmm... How about this, I want all of you to go home tonight and think about who you would like to represent and report in my office at noon with your ideas."

Everyone nodded, no one in the galaxy would disagree with him unless of course they were desperate to get fired and sent back to their home worlds. Lubov was not going back to Hapes, her family was there, yes, but that did not mean she wanted to go back to the isolation of the planet. Though she could not see at night to actually explore Coruscant at least she wasn't on Hapes with the others, there forever, never to get off of the planet they were born on. She was going to at least live her life to the fullest and if did not matter whether on Coruscant or Hapes, she was not going to stay put and waste her life on doing nothing but listening to their isolated planet had to say.

As the group of Journalist left the room with their datapads in hand ready to upload their articles to the holonet after approval from the editorial staff, and were prepared to leave for home. If there was one thing everyone wanted to do was to go home and start working on his or her roles in the Director's newest "genius" idea. He would of course complain later if the plan failed however, no one would dare to say anything about how the plan was his idea in the first place and had nothing to do with him or her. Either way someone would get up fired and forced to live on the streets... or worse go back to running their local stations.

Lubov handed in her document on the three month long research into the recent increase of death in minors. She had concluded that it was the fact that with the war, there is less aids to those who need the medicine the most. People are too focused on fighting battles and winning war than the people that are being lost in these battles or the people that are being lost as a direct result of the war.

The war was destroying the Republic and it had hardly been a year of fighting and now here they were with the death tolls nearly as high as the holonet's last quarter ratings. Lubov had been taught that people were good and that they could do good things; but with this war there was no good, all there was, was death and destruction. The good in people was fading fast and if this war was not won soon there was something horrible that was going to happen.

She could feel a fall close by; she did not know when it was going to happen. All she knew was that the fall was there and that if she or the others did not notice it then the Republic would cease to excists.