Armistice


Scene 8

"Which dress, Milady?" Sabe inquired.

It was an important diplomatic question. Halle Burtoni, cunning and malicious Senatorial representative from Kamino, was a force to be reckoned with. The aged Kaminoan was a wizened matriarch – a creature so pickled in her own spite that every wrinkle in her pallid skin was matched by a deeper wrinkle in her bitter soul. Attire, was of course, a rhetorician's first form of address. How to present herself to the contemptuous old crone? Regal? Sedate? Severe?

The beleaguered Nubian Senator sighed, and longed for the simplicity of - say, Anakin's wardrobe. Nobody ever looked askance at Jedi tunics; even singed and torn, they carried with them a certain mystique.

Sabe solved the dilemma nicely. "Here," the loyal attaché decided, laying out the form-fitting gription bodysuit Padme favored for more… athletic… excursions. "Straight to the point."

Padme smiled at that. The white cloth still bore a faint blaster-burn here and there and some well-placed but still visible reparative stitching put into the seams post-Geonosis. She only kept the thing as a sort of souvenir of that fateful day – the day on which she and Anakin had finally declared their undying devotion to one another and then faced death in the Geonosian execution arena. But it would do nicely for the present occasion, suggestive as it was of stark combative realities, and the experience of war that bound Kamino's and Naboo's fates together. "You're right, as always, Sabe."

A mischievous smirk tugged at the handmaiden's lips. "And there's no harm in reminding old Halle what she no longer has, Milady."

"Sabe!" Giggling, they worked in unison to wrest Padme into the Padme-shaped contours of her chosen costume.

"Let me do up your hair and then we'll go."


Halle Burtoni was in fine form that morning.

"What's this?" the ancient Kaminoan murmured, glazed and bulging eyes narrowing disdainfully as her gaze raked Padme Amidala head to foot. "Why, Senator Amidala… I don't recall offering you my hospitality this morning. I presume this is a business call?"

The Nubian Senator lifted her chin. "A word with you, please. I won't take any more of your valuable time than necessary."

Her cantankerous colleague waved her inside with one pale hand, attenuated digits graceful despite their advanced arthritis. Burtoni's squat head wobbled atop her crooked neck with its sagging flaps of desiccated skin, the peculiar scale-like quality of Kaminoan flesh more apparent with the ravages of age. "Very well. Spit out what you have to say and be gone."

Padme seated herself in a scoop chiar and was grateful for Sabe's discreet presence by her side. "You may not believe me, Senator Burtoni, but we have a common concern."

"We do?" The Kaminoan huffed to herself, clacking her long cane peevishly across the polished floor. Her ornate robes rustled as she lowered herself into the opposite chair. "And what pray tell could a shortsighted idealist such as yourself have in common with me?"

Padme swallowed some of the instinctive ire this jab inspired. Diplomacy. Always diplomacy. "While I oppose this war and the unethical means employed to perpetuate it –" she held her reluctant hostess' appalled gaze unflinchingly – "I also recognize that any threat to so many innocent young men is something no decent person would overlook."

"Whatever are you talking about?" the Kamonoan demanded, sourly.

Sabe risked a tiny wide-eyed shake of the head. Pame braced herself. "The loss of six hundred clone cadets on Deodar," she said, simply.

"Oh… for a moment I thought you meant citizens," Halle Burtoni scoffed. She waved a languid hand, dismissing her guest's outrage as childish indignation over some trifling matter of economics.

Then her puckered mouth curved downward sharply in displeasure. "But you should not know about that." Her eyes slatted. "I see that Senator Organa is given to rather loose-tongued pillow talk."

Sabe's hand on her knee kept Padme firmly in place. Useful – the rumor was useful. "You are not addressing my question. Surely your people are as eager as I am to solve the difficulty?"

Burtoni's head swayed back and forth, anger flaring her vestigial gills. "Hmmph. And why should I trust you?"

This was the delicate part. Padme spread her hands. "I can make inquiries you cannot. After all, I'm a notorious anti-militarist. Nobody in the legislature will suspect me of harboring any interest in your internal affairs."

But the Kaminoan wasn't buying at the price.

Time for aggressive negotiations. "And, contrariwise, I am very well connected in the information net. It would be unfortunate if news of this tragedy reached the public at a time and in a manner inconvenient to your profits. The Republic is deeply indebted to private sources for wartime funding; many of those private corporate investors might panic and withdraw support if they suspect a catastrophic failure."

Burtoni stood, lipless mouth rumpling into a sinuous line of wrath. "Blackmail."

"Leverage. I am sure you understand the concept perfectly."

The Kaminoan made a slow circuit of the room, grumbling to herself. An ostentatious pendant slung about her scrawny neck swung ominously as she tottered along the office perimeter, a heavy pendulum of thought. She halted behind Padme, thrusting her long neck over the young woman's shoulder.

"Very well, you manipulating little vetch. You leave me little choice. And do give my compliments to Senator Organa when you see him again… he has an exotic taste in pets."

Padme stood, wiling herself not to blush at the misplaced insults. "Tell me who might be responsible. I promise I will do my utmost to discover the truth."

Burtoni stumped over to her desk and ejected a data crystal from the imbedded reader. "This file details our list of likely suspects," she spat out, handing over the tiny device to her human visitor. "And you," – the cane swing abruptly upward, a sharp line of warning wavering inches from Padme's face – "Were never here."

"Believe me," the latter person replied. "I would rather that were the case."

She and Sabe were ushered out the door with none too good a grace.


Once safely around the corridor's bend, they sank onto a low bench and laughed away the stress of the surreal encounter.

"That was well-played, Milady."

Padme leaned her head against the textured wall, briefly overcome with relief. "I don't think I've been so repelled by anyone since I was face to face with the Nemoidinas on Naboo. She's just…. vile."

They fell silent as the Uutami delegation filed past them, en route to some dignitary function.

"Come on," Sabe urged her, all professional briskness. "We've a report to deliver."