Padmé woke the next morning and got ready for her day as usual. Classes flew by in a haze as she thought about the dinner from the night before. Clearly he felt something. He had made sure she knew that he appreciated her. She would just have to be patient. She could be patient. For him. After her classes were over, she made her way to the campaign office where they staged all the aspects of Sheev Palpatine's race for governor. The office was abuzz with gossip. There was a debate that weekend, and that was when he'd unveil the fact that he was making a run at the position. There was much to do, and quite frankly not enough time to do it. Any reasonable man would have canceled. But, this is Mayor Palpatine. He was used to defying the odds and getting the job done. It was why so many people supported him.
She would have to be stealthy in order to snoop through Mas Amedda's things. He was steadily walking out of the office with the mayor for a meeting across town. That should give her just enough time to find proof, or more as she suspected, the lack of it. Surely someone this close to the mayor couldn't be a nefarious person. Democracy couldn't be that corrupt, could it?
Casually, Padmé crossed over to the break room, peeking around to notice if anyone was nearby. When the coast was clear, she slipped into his office next door and shut the door. A quick scan around the room showed that she really didn't know where to start looking. She was a politician, not a detective, yet here she was, doing a detective's job. She rifled through his filing cabinet, only finding various deeds to land owned by the mayor and also to plots that overlapped which were owned by Sith Inc. In fact, Sith Inc appeared to be buying up a lot of property around town. She pulled up a map of the city with houses colored in red which were owned by the company, and noticed that it formed a weird pattern. Not quite sure of what it meant, but also not so naive as to dismiss it, Padmé decided to snap a photo of it with her phone before moving onto the other areas of his office. Not much else was of interest. She started to leave, but noticed his calendar. Cheekily, she thought about how most detective shows had evidence in a person's schedule and decided to look it over. There were multiple times blocked off for a "Tyranus." Interesting, she thought as she snapped another photo. On the way out, she paused to inspect a photo on the wall of Mas Amedda, Mayor Palpatine, and the local billionaire, Count Dooku. Also interesting.
She snuck out of the office and made it back to her desk, hoping that no one had noticed her absence. No one looked up as she sat, so she figured she was safe.
Nonchalantly, Padmé pulled out her phone and sent the pictures to Obi-Wan.
Padmé: I found these in Mas Amedda's office. I'm not quite sure what any of it means, though.
Obi-Wan: I'll see what I can dig up at the library later.
Padmé: Are you still researching Maul tonight?
Obi-Wan: If I wait too long, the lead will go cold.
Padmé: I'll join you. I want to look into this Tyranus. I haven't heard the name around the office at all.
Obi-Wan: Sith Inc. could be a point of interest as well. Very well, I'll meet you there in an hour.
Padmé: See you soon.
Padmé sighed and put her phone back in her bag. That didn't feel as awkward as she thought it would. The time crawled by as she spent it setting up mail to go out in the morning. Then, she packed up her things and made her way to the library.
The library was so quiet that she could hear a pin drop. Looking around between the shelves, she found that familiar auburn hair peaking out behind one of the study nooks. She smirked and made her way over, finding him hunched over the computer.
"Find what you're looking for?" she murmured.
He flashed her a sheepish smile over his shoulder. "Not yet, although I'm getting closer to sorting it out."
A blush crossed her face. Was he talking about Maul... or about her?
Obi-Wan pulled a chair over for her and she settled into it.
"Have you tried looking through the microfilm catalogue?" she offered.
"Not yet. I'm looking into that Sith Inc. that you sent me," he replied, turning the laptop towards her.
"Anything interesting?"
"They've been buying up whole neighborhoods in the poorer areas of the city," he said, leaning back in his chair and crossing his arms.
"Like the kind of area Maul would live?" Padmé asked with a raised eyebrow.
"Or like the kind that the lower level crime syndicates would operate out of," he replied, stroking his chin in thought.
Padmé pulled the photo up on her phone, sending it to her email so she could open it on the bigger screen. She zoomed in on the city.
"Not all of these are in those neighborhoods, though," she murmured, scrunching her brows as she highlighted the areas on the screen.
"Those haven't come up in my research. I'm not entirely certain that those have been purchased yet," he replied.
"Why would Mas Amedda have a map with properties that this company was going to purchase?" she asked in confusion.
"I don't know, darling," he sighed, leaning forward again to take over the laptop. She watched him start to search for a Tyranus. The search came up empty. He flicked his eyes to hers, an intense look.
"Look, he has to be meeting with someone," she murmured.
"You have the time and the place. Why don't we spy on one of these meetings?" he asked.
She bit her lip in thought. "Alright. If it's the only way, I guess that's what we'll have to do."
He nodded and got up to search through the microfilms for Maul. She took over investigating the property lines until he came back.
"Well?" she asked.
"Nothing like the crimes we defend. Ran with a gang called 'the Sons of Dathomir,' usually sticks to burglary, a few assault charges," Obi-Wan informed her.
"Why do I feel like the deeper we get, the murkier this becomes?" she sighed.
"Dangers lurk in deeper waters."
They both shared a look. The plot was thickening.