"The Kingmaker strikes again! Once again, Senator Tub'r Fafi has crowned another Supreme Chancellor, this time the newly minted Senator from the Trade Federation Nute Gunray, who won his historic election against Senator Padmé Amidala by one...single...vote! This historically contentious election, set against the backdrop of severe allegations of blackmail and wrongdoing involving the highest levels of the Senate, including several assassination attempts on Senator Amidala and her colleagues, one of which even implicating the former Chancellor of the Republic Bail Antilles, will certainly do little to mitigate the tensions rife across the galaxy from the Senate to the Outer Rim. For his part, as we switch to the footage of the new Chancellor's acceptance speech, it appears that there will be no attempts at reconciliation from the former Viceroy.
'Glory to the Trade Federation and death to Amidala...I mean, glory to the...uh...Republic and death to...everything bad, everything I dislike! I am the future, and the future is me! Hail Gunray! Hail Gunray! Hail Gunray! Gunray is infinity! Gunray the Great to eternity!"
They all stared at the holo in disgust as the coarse Neimoidian delivered his address on the Senate veranda, hand held in a fist high above his head in a grandiose and grotesque gesture. Pacing the Senator's office, Obi-Wan shook his head in disgust.
"I can't believe it. They really did it. They really put Nute Gunray in charge of the entire...kriffing Republic. And he's already acting like he's some kind of petty tinpot...emperor, rather than one who is already the least popular Supreme Chancellor in several millennia."
"One vote," Padmé muttered quietly. Of course, with the margin of victory at one vote, every single vote for Gunray would have represented the pivotal vote. But Padmé knew out of all the votes that went for Gunray, it was likely Clovis's that represented the true swing vote. And it was ironic, Padmé mused, that Clovis voted his way not out of any animus for her or love for Gunray, but because of the man's ill conceived notion of love for herself. The poor deluded Senator still held on to the hope that he had a chance with his Amidala, if only she would never see the footage of himself screaming her name in ecstasy with the lookalike prostitute. Of course, the notion that he would never have the chance once Gunray ordered her death seemed not to have crossed his mind, but the logic was not strong with Clovis at this point, as he had been acting on impulse from the moment of that fateful first night on Cato Neimoidia.
"Chancellor Nute Gunray," Obi-Wan repeated in disbelief, but even as he bemoaned the future of the Republic, part of him felt relief. He had come to, maybe not admire, but certainly appreciate the courage and conviction of the young senator, and he was glad that his wild idea that she was some sort of master Sith who would have lied, cheated, manipulated, and murdered her way to the Chancellorship was clearly misguided. But still, he wondered as he observed the woman, who seemed remarkably unaffected by her loss and all its implications to come. Amidala's face was made of stone, and somehow Obi-Wan thought it was more than just a politician's mask.
"They had a choice," the would be Supreme Chancellor said quietly, almost as if in a trance. Again, it seemed odd to Obi-Wan that she did not seem all that upset about this catastrophic loss. "I gave them a choice. They chose avarice, and corruption, but nevertheless the choice has been made."
"You gave them the choice," Obi-Wan asked, puzzled completely by the Senator's words and demeanor. Perhaps she was indeed taking this loss hard, worse than he would have imagined. Maybe her mind was still unable to comprehend the events, and that was why she was just repeating nonsense to herself. He looked to Anakin, sitting beside her, hoping for a clue, but saw only that he betrayed no emotion at all as well. That was odd...Obi-Wan would have expected the emotionally turbulent young man he saw on Ryloth to be more upset than his wife, even, Force forbid, filled with rage. But it wasn't just now, for it seemed that throughout the entire course of events on Cato Neimoidia, Anakin Skywalker had become a stoic.
"I always knew politicians couldn't be trusted," the young man said simply, noticing Obi-Wan's gaze upon him.
Padmé ignored Obi-Wan's words, continuing her soft spoken tirade, but this time, as she looked up deliberately at Obi-Wan, her motions eerily resembling more a droid than a human. "I meant what I said in the Senate chambers, Master Kenobi. There will be a reckoning, a separation of good and evil, of light and dark, in this galaxy. It has been made abundantly clear now where the Senate stands. Soon, Masters Jedi, we will all have to take a stand."
Her words scared him, and despite the attempts at death now sure to come on the young Senator, Obi-Wan had a nervous feeling that Padmé Amidala was more dangerous in loss than in victory. Sifo-Dyas, sitting besides the young couple and who perhaps seemed the most dismayed by the election result.
"The Darkness is winning. But we will not surrender without a fight. The galaxy must be cleansed."
Obi-Wan shook his head. "I'm sorry for what's happened, and what's to come," he said, bowing politely. "I regret that I must take my leave and report to the Council."
He needed time to think, and so many things troubled him now, including the psychological soundness every person he currently shared the Senator's office with, as well as the new regime of the Republic. A regime, he thought, remembering Quinlan's words on Cato Neimoidia, that the entire Jedi Order now answered to. He had the express order to observe the election results beside Amidala and note her reaction which, while odd, was moot in light of the new circumstances. So she was likely exonerated as a sith, a crazy notion anyway, but still, there was something her words and her demeanor that unnerved him to the core.
Sifo-Dyas moved to follow him, but stopped. Waiting until the younger Jedi was out of earshot, he walked back to the Senator, still sitting motionless on her couch watching the holo news coverage. He bowed, and leaned down to whisper in her ear, his voice low enough so that only Padmé and her husband could hear.
"Kamino," he said.
Padmé looked up at him, her brown eyes expressing confusion. "What does that mean, Master Jedi?"
"Look into it," he said, looking back at the door to make sure Obi-Wan had not returned. "It means your salvation, and the galaxy's."
Lott Dod shivered nervously as he navigated his speeder down into the Works district of Coruscant, recalling what his mother had warned him regarding bargains with the devil. Little had gone right since his election as Viceroy, from the intercepted holocron, to the failed attempt at recovery, and now most surprisingly, the new political developments on Coruscant. With Bane's failure, Lott knew that the Jedi would put the pressure on him, even though all he had wanted to do in the first place was to try to repair the damage Nute had wreaked under the latter's leadership.
The Chancellorship election was his worst nightmare, a no-win situation. After careful consideration, Lott decided that he wanted Amidala to win. He may be out of a job with her in charge, but that was better than losing his life, which would no doubt occur were Nute Gunray be elevated to a position where he could exact vengeance on all those who had wronged him. He tried lobbying a few Senators he was close with during his own tenure, but his pleas fell on deaf ears. Without the actual footage, his leverage over the Senate was no different than Nute's or Amidala's. They had seen the footage, but none had proof, now that it was likely somewhere safe in the Jedi's deepest archives.
He had heard little from Mirayya since everything had gone south, besides a cryptic message that all would work out for the new Viceroy, and instructions to arrive at this abandoned warehouse in the worst district on Coruscant in the middle of the night. His instincts told him that this was a bad idea, but Lott had little other alternatives left. Like it or not, his only and last chance at survival lay at the feet of Lady Mirayya.
He entered the dark room and stumbled, tripping on a small table. Recovering his balance, Lott felt his way towards a wall, where he found a switch. He activated it, and the lights in the warehouse turned on just as he saw two hooded figures making their way towards him. Clearly Lady Mirayya and Lord Vader were on time as well, but he was distracted even from the two siths by a most morbid object hanging on an upper wall: it was the head of Senator Orn Free Taa, mounted above the room like a trophy, one lekku clearly cut off, and the dead senator's facial features forever frozen in a scream of sheer pain and torment.
Lott Dod looked back at the two Siths, who continued to almost float towards him like two ghouls. He understood now.
"Lady Mirayya." He bowed, and gulped. "Or should I say, Senator Amidala?"
Both the siths lowered their hoods, and though Lott Dod recognized the faces of the young Senator and her younger husband, he had never seen anything like those glowing yellow eyes, and he understood that he would see little else in his life.
"You are wise, Viceroy Dod," Mirayya/Amidala intoned slowly in her sithly voice. "Wiser than your predecessor and our new Chancellor. Wiser than most of your former colleagues in the Senate. You could have been of much use to us as a true ally...it is a true shame you were more useful as a means to the end."
"Why," Lott simply asked. The least he could have before he died was an explanation, a rationale for all the craziness and trials he had purposelessly undergone. "Clearly you never meant for the Trade Federation to keep the holocron. Clearly you wanted the assassination attempt on yourself to destroy Antille's regime. But why Gunray? We could have gotten rid of him entirely? Why specifically ask me to put him in a position where he could destroy us all, not just me?"
"Don't you worry about us, Viceroy," Skywalker said calmly to him. "The new Chancellor will not be able to touch us."
His voice was his own, and Dod realized that this Lord Vader must have used some kind of vocoder in their previous communication. It solidified his certainty that he would not survive this encounter, now that he had learned of not just the sith's true identities, but a voice that one of them had taken elaborate means to conceal.
"I gave the galaxy a choice," Padmé said, repeating the words she had spoken to Obi-Wan Kenobi. "A choice between right and wrong, a choice between good and evil."
"Even assuming you are good," Lott said, backing up slowly as the two siths advanced on him, "it was hardly an easy choice. You put the Senators in a difficult position on purpose, almost making it impossible to pick what you would...claim to be the right choice."
"If the choice is easy, then is it really a choice," Padmé asked, bemusement on her face. "It had to be a difficult one, a true dilemma. The only way I would have allowed the Senate, the Republic to survive is if they chose to sacrifice themselves for the greater good."
"And now there is no good anymore. Gunray will destroy us all."
"Yes. No longer will the corruption and decay of the Republic be concealed by protocol and niceties. Nute Gunray will show the galaxy the true depths of how far the Republic has sunken."
The last nugget of realization clicked into Lott Dod's brain, and he knew that he could at least die with the satisfaction of knowing the reason for his own sacrifice, the ultimate purpose his life served. "And then, the galaxy will need a hero, a savior, to save the galaxy from itself."
"You are wise indeed," Mirayya/Amidala said, and Lott could almost feel some sort of pride from the sith's compliment though, he wanted to ask, who were they to play Gods? But Lott Dod knew enough about the Sith Order, after the ordeal with Sidious a decade ago, to know that such the entitlement was inherent in their nature.
Instead, he watched as both the Siths activated their lightsabers, their colors, like Darth Maul's on Naboo almost ten years ago, blood red. She continued. "You would have served the Trade Federation ably, were I to have chosen its survival, or yours. But unfortunately, you are the only link the Jedi now have to the Sith Order."
"You will die now," Anakin/Vader spoke coldly behind his wife, "but we will make this as painless for you as possible."
"Why," Lott asked one last time. "Why show me this small mercy?"
"You are no angel," Anakin/Vader answered him, "but you strove to better yourself. Your ambitions were motivated not by greed, but by a fundamental decency that even years with Nute Gunray could not stamp out of you."
"Many such as the Jedi may believe us to be evil," Amidala/Mirayya continued, "but we are cruel only those who are base themselves."
Lott Dod looked once more at the gruesome trophy the former Senator from Ryloth now made for the two Siths, and as he envisioned the torture that would have been Orn Free Taa's last living moments, however long that lasted, for once Lott felt a small bit of gratitude for the choices he made in his life.
"I understa...I accept," Lott Dod said, and at once both lightsabers struck true through his chest, sealing his fate.
"May Shiraya save his soul," Padmé said instinctively as the Neimoidian's body fell lifelessly to the ground. His death had been quick, as they had promised.
"Now what," Anakin asked. He looked down at the corpse. "I guess we'll have to get rid of the body and any evidence of the transport." The Viceroy's disappearance would, of course, be blamed on the new Chancellor, given his reputation and the two's shared history.
"Yup," Padmé affirmed. With a few blinks, her eyes returned to their warm, brown color. "Then a stop through the Arts district on the way home."
"The Arts district," Anakin asked, an eyebrow raised over his now blue irises, returned to their normal colors as well. "What's in the Arts district?"
"There's this boutique toy shop that's open all night," Padmé answered nonchalantly, her mind already parsecs away from their evil deeds now. "Ryoo's Life-Day celebration is in two days, and we can't show up to Varykino empty-handed."
Anakin smirked. Padmé loved his smirk, and she leaned in to kiss him lightly on his lips.
"You really do think of everything, Lady Mirayya."
"One of the many reasons you love me, Lord Vader."
Nightshade's sydneylover150: About time too...though they've just suffered yet another setback on their latest lead.
ines1808: Anakin is almost 19 and Padmé almost 28. The timeframe is probably a few months before AOTC. Padmé is several years older than canon so that she would have had more time to become fully trained under Sidious.
ichigo urahara Shihoin: The original plans for the Death star exist, having been commissioned by Sidious before he died. The Jedi have thankfully discovered those plans as well, Quinlan Vos having found them during his undercover mission on Geonosis.
SilverDaye: Spearheaded by Obi-Wan too...though they just had the rug pulled from under them with this latest theory. But now that the idea has been introduced, it may linger in spite of things.
Thanks to everyone who read, reviewed, and stuck through this story and this series. There will be one more sequel, Darth Padmé and the Clones of Kamino, though I can't guarantee when that will come out.
To break the fourth wall a bit, I realize that the plot for this one was a bit byzantine, with a lot of double dealing and Padmé seemingly putting herself in danger on purpose. To clarify, everything that transpired, every small detail, was in accordance to her plans and her 'foresight', so to speak, which as you can see, succeeded to the tee. It's clear that she did indeed learn many things from Sidious. Where they appear to be in actual distress, it is all acting.
The only thing I imagine she did not predict was that Clovis would have recorded his conversation with Fafi. Padmé would have used the fact that the Chancellor was part of the extortion to implicate his involvement and call for a vote of no confidence, but Clovis's treachery made her plans go that much smoother.
You saw little actually from Anakin and Padmé's point of view so as to keep their true intentions and endgame hidden. Instead, I found that this story told itself from the point of view of its peripheral characters. I had not expected anything deeper in Lott Dod's or Senator Fafi's characterization (an OC that was surprisingly fun to write) originally besides as devices to move the plot along, but couldn't help but explore more their motivations and thoughts. But the next story will likely return with more focus on our two main characters.
And yes, Obi-Wan got so close, only to have truth ripped away from him.