Luke was beginning to worry. Something must have happened to Han and Leia down on the planet's surface, because the fleet never attacked. Too much time had passed. Concern for his friends pressed on his mind like a heavy weight, but there was nothing he could do, not while he was stuck filling out these drat forms! When the desk had fallen apart, the Emperor had just laughed and had a new desk brought in.

I wonder why it fell apart so easily though. Furniture's not supposed to do that.

Luke could imagine Han's reply. Yeah, unless it was built by an idiot trooper.

Getting to his feet, Luke marched over to where Palpatine sat in the over-stuffed chair. He guessed the Emperor didn't totally trust him because he still had his father standing by his side. Did that mean Palpatine was scared to be alone with him? Was it possible that he was really a threat to the man? It seemed hard to believe. But he was tired of just playing along, stalling for time. If the Fleet wasn't going to attack and destroy the Death Star than he would have to do something. If he didn't, he could wind up just like his father as one of Palpatine's slaves. Standing before the Emperor's chair, his legs spread in a V, he demanded some answers. "Why are you entering all these stupid sweepstakes? You're the richest man in the galaxy!"

"Because I like to win, boy." Palpatine replied. "I like getting prizes and I love money, money and credits. Greed is a powerful motivator. It is of the Dark Side, you know. And I have a strong gluttony for cash."

"But surely these sweepstakes are all fake. No one wins them!" Luke protested as he rubbed his sore arm. His tongue didn't feel so good, either. In fact, his entire mouth tasted like a herd of taun-tauns had rolled around inside it.

"And I suppose you are an expert on it, Young Skywalker?" Palpatine rose slowly from his chair and walked further into the cavernous room, motioning for Luke to follow him. Stopping before a closed door, Palpatine punched a code into the keypad next to the door. The steel door slid open silently and the Emperor stepped inside. "Look at all the things I have won! Me! All these prizes are mine!"

Luke stepped curiously into the room behind Palpatine, his mouth dropping open for he couldn't believe what he saw. The bedroom-sized room was just totally packed with … junk! Boxes were piled one atop another, each one supposedly containing some small prize Palpatine had won. The whole room was that way, in some places almost to the ceiling high overhead. It had the appearance of a very messy storage room. A narrow path, just wide as a person's boots, led deeper into the man-made mountain range. Luke noticed that many of the boxes near the bottom were sagging ominously from the weight on top of them, causing entire stacks to lean at crazy angles. It was a miracle the entire thing didn't come crashing down. The Jedi shook his head. "You don't need all this junk. Why don't you give it away to people that could use it?"

"Junk? Give it away? Never! It's mine, mine!" Palpatine reached for a small box that sat on the top of the nearest pile. It was just beyond his reach, but he used the force to grip it and bring it down to his hands. Carefully prying the box open, Palpatine pulled a carved crystal candy bowl out. He held it out to Luke. "See, it's not junk! Look how beautiful it is, how the light reflects off the angles of the cut crystal. It's priceless! Of course, being raised a farm boy you have no appreciation of the finer things of life."

"But having the bowl doesn't do you any good if you don't use it!" Luke protested as he turned the bowl over in his hands. There was something familiar about this bowl, but what? He knew his Aunt and Uncle had never owned anything like it, so why was it giving him this sense of deja vu? Had he seen one like it somewhere, on some planet he had visited with the Rebellion? Odd, since he usually didn't pay attention to this type of thing. "You could do the galaxy so much good with all the money you have and all you do is destroy and ruin lives."

"I see you are not impressed easily. Perhaps something else will convince you the contests are worthwhile." Palpatine inched further into the packed room, the sides of his body brushing the boxes on either side. "Now where did I put it? Hmm, it's here somewhere…"

Luke watched as the hem of Palpatine's Jedi-like robe got caught on the sharp corner of a box. The Emperor didn't notice and kept moving forward. The towering stacks of boxes started to sway wildly until gravity won.

CRASH!!!!!!!!!!

The floor under Luke's feet shook like an earthquake as the boxes collapsed on top of Palpatine.

"Ahhhhhh! Help! Lord Vader, help me! I'm trapped!"

"Trapped under your own greed." Luke muttered to himself.

Darth Vader stood in the doorway next to his son. He stared at the disaster before him, the only sound coming from his breathing apparatus. He could clearly see what had happened. It had started with just one box, the one that had gotten caught on Palpatine's robe. When the robe had tugged on it, it had moved and tilted. That caused the boxes on top of it to fall, which in turn caused more boxes to fall. In simple, it was like a line of dominoes; cause and affect. Secretly Vader had always thought Palpatine stupid for keeping all that junk. It was a disaster waiting to happen. Too bad it had happened while he was present. No doubt he'd get stuck with cleaning the mess up, as Palpatine didn't like commoners near his so called 'treasures'. Although he hadn't agreed with the Jedi for a long time about anything, he had to admit they were right about how they kept their personal quarters empty and free of trash.

"AAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHH," The Emperor squealed loudly. "I'm trapped! Lord Vader, I demand you move this stuff off of me!"

"Too bad it didn't kill him." Luke muttered as he turned away. An accidental death of Emperor Palpatine was too much to wish for. And from the strength of his voice it was clear the man was mostly unharmed. Was it of the Dark Side to want Palpatine dead? He was, after all, the enemy. And was it evil to wish him dead or to not feel sorrow about his recent accident? But his opinion was Palpatine had done this to himself.

Vader made the boxes fly into the main room and soon Palpatine crawled out, a bloody mark on his forehead. His red eyes stared at Luke. "Perhaps you are correct, young Skywalker. Perhaps I don't need all this junk, especially since it's turning against me. Lord Vader, call the Commander and have him send some men up to remove all these boxes. Have them pack it onto shuttles and then donate it to some charity."

"Yes, Master." Vader bowed his head and went to go make the call.

Luke was surprised, but he doubted if Palpatine had changed at all. In fact, he had already figured out that these small 'prizes' were really just worthless items given to you so you'd keep playing the sweepstakes. And when you played you usually ordered something, like Palpatine had ordered those two publications on disk. Of course, the prize that Palpatine really wanted was the money but no one ever won that. The company kept it for themselves!

But who was running the sweepstakes? Luke had noticed there were ones from different companies, yet they all looked quite the same. And who would publish stuff about the Sith? As far as Luke knew, Palpatine and Vader were the only Siths in existence. He doubted if either of them would share their secrets in such a manner. By nature, Sith tended to be secretive, greedy and power-hungry. It almost seemed as if the two items were geared directly at Palpatine's interests, as if the person running the contest knew he would buy them.

But who could it be?

The Jedi's thoughts were interrupted as stormtroopers came up and began removing all the boxes. They worked double-time and finished the job within an hour, which wasn't an easy task. But having their Emperor sitting there in front of them scared them even more than Lord Vader's presence.

Luke was about to go back to his desk when the door opened yet again and an Imperial officer dressed in gray entered. He carried a large foil-wrapped package that was almost taller than he was. "This just arrived for you, Your Highness."

"Very well. Put it down and then you may go." Palpatine replied.

The officer carefully set the package down, bowed and quickly left.

The Emperor went over to it and peeled back the foil to reveal a large potted plant. It had broad green leaves with red streaks, a tall central stem and an enormous orange flower bud at the top.

"I never saw such a big flower before." Luke admitted as he came closer to get a better look at it. "It's beautiful."

Palpatine picked up the card that was attached to the pot with a slim metal spike. "It says here I won this plant in the Endor Bulb and Shoots Sweepstakes. Now surely this prize can't be harmful. It will be something pretty to look at while I recover from that incident."

The orange flower bud slowly began to uncurl and open before their eyes.

"Ah, perhaps it reacts to light." Palpatine stated as he moved closer to it, eager to see what it would look like fully open.

The flower opened more and more, a too-sweet honey-like scent filling the room. Suddenly it lunged towards Palpatine, the upper half of his body vanishing inside the innocent looking flower. It picked his entire body up off the floor until his feet waved in the air.

"AAHHHH!"

Snap-hiss! Vader activated his lightsaber and sliced the plant's stem in half. The upper half of the flower fell to the floor and Vader tore the thick petals off his Emperor. "The plant was apparently carnivorous, Your Highness."

"Your actions are to be commended, Lord Vader. This is the second time today you have saved me." Palpatine got to his feet, staring at the remains of his latest prize. "Perhaps this was done on purpose, an assassination attempt of sorts. Find out who sent it."

"Yes, Master." Darth Vader bowed, and then went to make another call. The remains of the plant and pot would need to be examined by the lab on board the Executor. He would also be required to find out who was the mastermind behind these stupid sweepstakes that the Emperor has become addicted to. It had started innocently enough with a single envelope promising great riches if only Palpatine would reply. The Emperor saw little harm in trying and there were several items he wished to buy, so he sent his entry in. Within a short time the items he had purchased had arrived as promised and he was pleased with them. After that, more envelopes came. Then ones from other contests started arriving, each one promising a grand prize of an insane amount of cash. And if there's one thing Palpatine liked, it was winning. He had won over the Republic, had beaten the Jedi and their dumb Council, and had outsmarted the Senate. Yes, he was good at winning. So he saw no reason why he couldn't win all that money, too. After all, he was the Emperor! And he had the Dark Side as his ally, so he was sure to win.

"Master, I do not think it wise for any more prizes to be brought to you until they have been thoroughly examined." Darth Vader recommended after he had made his call.

"Yes, you have stated so in the past." Palpatine waved a hand at Vader. "Go authorize it."

Luke couldn't believe what he had heard. Apparently the Emperor had been letting these prizes be brought to him unexamined. If only the Rebels had known! But as far as he knew, none of the Rebels had even known these contests had even existed. They were too busy fighting for their lives to bother with such frivolous things.

"Do you still want me to fill out those forms?" Luke asked.

"I see no reason why I should stop my favorite pastime just because of one carnivorous flower." Palpatine replied.

If it's HIS favorite pastime than why do I have to fill out the forms?

Sighing and wishing for a way out of this craziness, he went to the desk. He had been busy for just a few moments when the blue ink pen suddenly exploded, covering his hand, clothes and the desk with indigo ink. "Oh no! This darn pen just exploded! Now why did it have to do that for?"

 Holding his messy hand away from his body, Luke got up and walked to the bathroom to wash the ink off. Palpatine's bathroom door was an old-fashioned door; one that swung on hinges so you had to push it open. Forgetting himself for a moment, Luke pushed the door open with his outstretched soiled hand, leaving a large print on the door's light colored surface.

Uh-oh. I hope no one notices that.

Hurrying inside, Luke ran to the sink to run water over his hand. Of course, the ink didn't come off so he picked up the bar of creamy soap that rested in a fancy holder. "I hope this stuff works. It sure doesn't look very good at cleaning dirty hands."

Almost as soon as he started to lather his hands, the wet bar of soap leaped upward out of his grasp. It hit him in the face and then fell to the floor, sliding out of sight.

"OW!" Luke rubbed at the tender spot on his forehead, noticing an instant later he had just smeared indigo ink all over his face. To make it worse, a thin trail of blood was leaking from one nostril. "Oh no! I got to get this ink off!"

Leaning with one hand on the edge of the washbasin, Luke peered under the sink for the missing bar of soap. "Now where the heck did it go?"

CRACK!!!!!!!

The sink jerked downward, causing Luke to loose his balance and fall to the floor. He rolled onto his back and picked his head up just in time to see a gap appear between the sink and the wall it had been attached to. "I have a bad feeling about this."

He scrambled to his feet and backed up against the old-fashioned door. He watched as the sink dipped lower and lower, and then the plumbing pipe broke. Water gushed outward as the now useless sink crashed to the floor. The water sprayed over the walls and ceiling, puddles forming on the floor.

"Yikes!" Luke's blue eyes bulged outward at the shocking sight, his mouth forming an "O". Opening the bathroom door as little as possible, the Jedi slipped out and closed the door behind him. Silently he slinked back to the desk where the forms were and slid into the seat. Picking up another pen, he got busy. He hoped no one would notice all the water that was now gathering in the bathroom.

To be continued….

Thanks to those who reviewed the first two chapters! I'll have more posted soon!