Shamo's Shame
Chapter One: Blueprints and Senators
Shamo slowly allowed herself to fade back into the shadows as the storm troopers began checking random people's identification chits. It wouldn't due to be caught – especially not while carrying an entire data pad full of rather 'anti-imperial' files.
Reaching out with the force, she touched the minds of the troopers nearest to her and peaked in to see who they were looking for.
Three people, two haltija and one human – the human was a known terrorist that went by the name of Iosef Tahlov, and the two haltija were his associates. Randal Burskchev was one and the second name made Shamo curse, Azaria Zemmick.
How did they know her real name? Shamo had taken such pains to completely cut all ties to her true identity, even going as far as faking her own death in a speeder accident, only to be brought down on something as insignificant as this, being charged with taking illegal holos of classified information.
Of course, Shamo had taken the holos, and been well paid for them by the little uprising called the alliance, but it had only been of a new class of single-manned fighters. TIEs, they were called on the blueprints. Crappy little things they looked like, but simple enough to mass produce.
So now Shamo looked desperately for a way around the troopers... it was far too dangerous to use the Force out in the open, especially so close to the Imperial palace. Holding her breath, Shamo concentrated on the force, letting herself stretch out just a little further to see a window of opportunity... and it showed itself.
Just a little ways away from where she crouched in the darkness was a grating that seemed to lead into a ventilation shaft of one of the innumerable passageways.
With a smile, Shamo nudged the grating lightly with the Force, and gently lifted it out of its housing. So far, no notice had been made by the troopers, and the Emperor hadn't appeared out of nowheres to zap her with blue lightning, so Shamo let out a sigh of relief and slowly made her way to the now open grating.
All she had to do now was pass out of one shadow to another, right beside a large trooper.
Standing tall, Shamo moved out of the protective shell of the deep shadow and walked steadily, without even glancing at the trooper, towards her escape route.
Alas, it wasn't meant to be.
"Miss, can I see your ID?"
Shamo paused, "Oh, lemme see if I have it."
The trooper shifted his weight impatiently as Shamo pretended to search through her pockets for the little red identification chit.
"You know what, I can't seem to find it right now," the young woman extended her hands out to the side in exasperation. "I think my sister borrowed them again so she could go drinking."
The trooper moved towards Shamo threateningly and motioned to his partner to come over. Working quickly, Shamo reached out and used the force to control this trooper.
"What is it," the second trooper asked?
"Nothing, it was my mistake. Please continue, miss."
Shamo didn't release her hold of the troopers mind after she darted around the corner and down a hall. That had been far too close to call for her.
Pulling out a secure comlink, she buzzed a number.
"Yeah, who is this," a gruff voice answered.
"We need to shove off quick – they're looking for us and Tahlov. I nearly go caught right now. Get the ship ready, we need to go within the next 26 hours."
Randal sounded alarmed, "now! But Tahlov is on the other side of the friggin planet, and I don't have a secure line that far."
Shamo cursed.
"You can make a secure transmission to Alderaan but you can't get a safe message halfway across one planet?"
"No, frankly, I can't. Why don't you," Randal snarled, putting quite a negative emphasis on the word, "send him a message with your little Jedi trick?"
"Fuck that, Randal – you know as good as I do that if I try anything of that magnitude we're all toast. I pushed the line already today getting away from those sith-spitting stormtroopers. So get your act together and get the ship ready; if we can't get a hold of him, we'll have to leave without him."
There was a silence on the line.
"Randal?"
Finally a response came, but in a sort of strangled, very quite and panicked voice.
"Go! Get out of here, the imps must have traced the line! Get off this rock as soon as possible!"
The line was cut off just as Shamo caught the sound of blaster fire.
"Jesu!"
Without hesitation, Shamo flung the comlink off the bridge she was crossing and began to run towards the largest building she could find – the senate building.
Why she went there, she didn't know – it was the most heavily fortified and guarded building on the planet, after the Imperial palace and the old Jedi temple.
Rushing towards a busy entrance, Shamo filed into the enormous building with everyday people monotonously living their everyday lives.
Once she was in, Shamo paused... who could she possibly turn to?
Shamo wandered among the thousands of senatorial offices and the millions of legal aid cubicles until she ended up in front on one door. The senator of Alderaan – Bail Antilles wasn't that his name?
Before she could stop herself, and force only knows why, Shamo knocked heavily on the old fashioned wooden door, turned the brass knob, and let herself in.
Several guards and aids immediately rushed towards the intruder.
After brushing off the hands of the security guards and several unimportant clerks, Shamo grabbed the sleeve of the senator's personal secretary.
"I need to speak with senator Antilles! It is of great importance," Shamo insisted.
The secretary pulled his sleeve away from her grip and regarded her with a cold look.
"Who are you?"
Crying out in frustration at the endless sea of hand grabbing at her arms, trying to force her out of the room, Shamo shouted the senator's name at the top of her lungs.
After three such yells, an interior door opened and a man with a fairly dark complexion stepped out.
"Let her go."
Immediately the guards backed away and the clerks and aids disappeared.
Shamo calmly readjusted her mussed tunic and brushed non-existent dust off her sleeves.
Antilles, or perhaps his head of security, took another step forwards.
"Who are you and what do you want, miss?"
Shamo made a light bow in his direction and held out her hands in token of peace.
"I'm an old friend of some of the senator's old friends. I wish to speak to him that is all."
The man was silent for a moment, and then motioned for her to follow him into the inner office. The office held many fancy chairs, and at the centre was a very grand desk.
The man seated himself behind it and indicated that she was to sit down in a chair in front.
This confirmed Shamo's suspicions that this man was Antilles himself.
"Well, you wished to speak to the senator, here I am now. You were quite lucky to have come at a time when I hadn't any previous engagements."
Shamo looked at the desk which was piled high with papers and datapads. Yes, the senator seemed to have a healthy sense of humour, and irony.
"Is this room safe, senator?"
Antilles' eyes flickered towards a guardsman standing slightly behind and to the side of Shamo. The guardsman nodded and Antilles looked back at her and smiled.
"Of course, we scan the offices every half hour for bugs. Now please, tell me, why such a big battle to gain an audience with myself? You could have simply made an appointment with my secretary."
Shamo felt herself relaxing into the soft chair as the smooth, cultured voice of the Alderaanian senator surrounded her, deep with its silky accent.
"Senator, I understand that you had many friends and acquaintances among the old Jedi order."
Antilles stiffened.
"Indeed I did, miss, but what of it? They are an extinct religion now."
Shamo smiled sadly, looking down at the blue and green carpet under her feet.
"Not completely extinct, senator, although as of around three hours ago, there was at least one more than there is now."
Biting her lip as to keep her emotions under control, Shamo looked up into the startled looking senator's eyes.
"My name was Azaria Zemmeck; I was the padawan learner to knight Revii Aelfhald, who was killed several years ago in the Clone Wars. Since then I have been I hiding with two other former padawans such as myself in the lower levels of Coruscant. Recently we seemed to have gotten ourselves into a bit of a bad situation – I was caught copying a new experimental fighter's designs. I got away but they found out who I was and traced my comlink to on of my companions. I..." Shamo's voice faltered and tears welled up in her silver eyes, "I think he was killed."
Shamo bowed her head down and remained silent.
Antilles too fell into silence.
It was the guard who finally spoke, "so you're running from the imperial guard and you go to the senate building? That's either madness or complete brilliance."
Shamo looked over at the man with a hint of a smile on her face.
"You'd be surprised by how many times I've heard that before."
Antilles shook his head, "I can see, Miss Zemmeck that you are in quite a fix, but what do you expect me to do about it?"
The young Jedi shrugged, "I thought you might be willing to help me out if I help you out. You know, I'll feed your wampa if you feed mine."
Antilles laid his hands out on his cluttered desk and leaned in closer towards her.
"And how do you believe that you can help me?"
Shamo closed her eyes, calling on her training to calm herself and soothe her jangling nerves.
"You must understand, senator, that I am not here as a threat. I am not trying to blackmail anyone, I am merely trying to follow my orders and get off this rock."
Antilles leaned back and let out a tired sigh, "what is it?"
"I was hacking into the mainframe of the Imperial computer system and came across a message that was in the process of being sent to the office of the Emperor. It wasn't much, but enough that I knew it could not reach the Emperor. I altered the data and covered my tracks, but kept a copy of the original message."
Reaching into her tunic, Shamo pulled out a small datapad and lightly set it down on the edge of the senator's desk.
Antilles studied the datapad, but kept his hands where they were.
"What is on it?"
Shamo looked around the room, as though to check that there were no storm troopers hiding behind the curtains ready to jump out and say 'gotcha'.
Once she was satisfied that there weren't any imperial guardsmen hanging around, Shamo picked up the pad, turned it on and accessed a file that was heavily coded and scrambled, then passed the pad to Antilles.
As he read the message his face went stark white and his free hand clenched into a tight fist. "Where did this come from?"
"From a 'confidential source' on your home world, senator. I tried to trace the message back, but it was well hidden and I couldn't get through the codes around it. I altered the message to say, in formal speech, of course, that there wasn't anything to be reported at the time. A message was sent back later that, again, I intercepted and altered. The source was informed to do nothing and await further instruction. I made a program on my pad to warn me whenever messages are being sent or received by either source."
Antilles dropped the datapad back onto his desk and leaned back into his chair, massaging his greying temples.
"So they know about the latest member of the Royal family, eh? This is bad – very bad."
Shamo only nodded.
"But what do you have to do with all this, why would you help us," Antilles demanded.
"You already forget that I was a Jedi! What cause should I have to not prevent this atrocity? Imagine! I once met Vader, before he was turned. He was a nice guy, a little high stung, arrogant and impulsive, but a nice guy... and very easy on the eyes, if I should add. This would be horrible if it got out, the Emperor would slaughter the Royal Family to get this child out of the way. What kind of a Jedi would I be to simply sit back and watch it happen?"
Antilles closed his eyes.
"And besides," Shamo added, "it was a way that I could get in touch with the alliance... a way to get off this rock and help out. I know I'm being selfish, but I think I have a good reason for it – the entire empire is hunting down any Jedi they can find and Coruscant is open hunting grounds. I've already been tagged for stealing those plans, too. I think I've worn out my welcome here, senator. The Force led me here to you with some purpose in mind, so will you please help me out?"
Antilles sighed, his eyes still closed. "When can you leave?"