we now return you to your regularly scheduled fan fic

The door swished shut behind her and Soniee let out a breath she must have been holding for the last several minutes. She had done it. The council had heard her case and now it was up to them to decide if they would send help to Mandalore or not.

The exhaustion hit her all at once. How long had it been since she had slept? It seemed like ages since she had woken up in Korkie's arms. The meditation during the flight had helped to calm her but the hyperspace jumps had totally thrown off her internal chronometer.

She was emotionally exhausted as well. First there had been Korkie's proposal and then the Duchess's death, that weird brush with the Dark Side of the Force and then meeting Korkie's father and Barris and having to rehash everything in front of the Jedi Council. She wondered how long they would deliberate, if she had time to find her way back to the hanger to check if Korkie had returned her comm. But what she really needed was sleep. She wished she had thought to grab her display visor on the way out so she would have something to keep her busy while she was waiting.

Then she noticed something on the floor across the hall and realized that it was the helmet Bo-Katan had given her. "How did this get here?" she wondered aloud.

"Padawan Barris Offee delivered it here so you need not return to her quarters, Miss Ordo."

The muffled voice made Soniee jump. She spun around. There, what she had taken before as statues on either side of the entrance to the council chamber, she now realized were Temple Guards. The one who had spoken (she supposed) gave her a brief nod. Other than that small gesture she had not seen either of them move once.

"Th-thank you." And then not wanting to turn her back on them again she sort of scuttled sideways to the opposite wall, picked up her helmet, and sat down on the floor where it had been lying.

She still had yet to try the thing on. So for lack of anything better to do and regardless of her carefully braided hair, Soniee slipped it over her head. This wasn't just some fancy piece of armor with a nice paint job. As soon as she had it on she could see that the HUD system was lightyears ahead of her old visor. The commlink tech was integrated so as soon as it was synced and activated she could send and receive messages from anywhere with an available signal. And the memory, it had at least 10x the amount of storage as her visor. This wasn't just some throw away gift to keep her from getting knocked on the head. This was a serious piece of machinery.

"Thank you, Bo!"

Again she wished she had her visor so she could start to transfer her files over to the new device. Even with the excitement of having a new toy however, her eyelids would barely stay open. It wasn't long before she had drifted off to sleep.

"Miss Ordo."

"Hmm?" Soniee gradually came back to consciousness. She didn't know where she was, only that her neck hurt from sleeping in a strange position and her scalp was being poked painfully in several places.

"Miss Ordo," The voice said again. "The council has reached a decision."

"The...council?" Her voice sounded strange and echoy. She sat up and her hands went up to the new helmet and pulled it off. She touched her hair, the braids now in disarray, and rolled her neck and shoulders to release the tension. Then in a flash she knew exactly where she was and why. "The council! They've reached a decision?"

She jumped up and then swayed, light-headed, on the spot.

The temple guard reached a hand forward to steady her and then went instantly back to his regular waxworks pose.

Soniee touched her hair once more, decided not to worry about it and stepped up to the door as it swished open for her to enter. The sky beyond the windows was nearly dark now so she assumed a good deal of time had passed though she had no idea how much. She gave a general polite bow to the room at large and then asked in a rush, "You've come to a decision, Masters?"

They didn't look as happy and welcoming as they had before. She supposed they had argued. Part of her felt guilty for creating discord in the group, but mostly she just prayed to the Force or anything else that was listening that they had decided to help.

Finally the Cerean spoke, "It is the ruling of this council that we can not at this time send aid to the Mandalore System."

"What? But..." She looked from the tall-headed Master to Obi-wan on his right. But Master Kenobi was just lowering her display visor from his face. His eyes were so intensely sad she nearly forgot her argument.

"We cannot send aid at this time," Master Windu picked up the dialogue. "without the approval of the Senate."

"Well," Soniee drew her gaze away from Kenobi and questioned the dark skinned Master. "What does that mean? What do we do now?"

Yoda answered her, "Before the Senate, you must bring your case."

"The Senate?" she almost squeaked. She looked around at them all, suddenly feeling very small and helpless. "Me? I wasn't even supposed to be here. I don't... I can't..."

"You can." Obi-wan finally spoke. Soniee had been unsure if he was even paying attention but now his mouth quirked into a smile and he held up the visor. "You were a brilliant Princess of Onderon, you can do this."

Her mouth fell open. She had completely forgotten that the recording of the play was saved on the device. She closed her mouth and covered it with her free hand. She looked around at the other Masters many of whom had regained their smiles. "But... that was acting. That was memorized lines and costumes and make-up..."

"That sounds about like the Senate." The Nautolan grinned.

Master Yoda chuckled. "Unrehearsed you shall not go. To Senator Amidala, Master Obi-wan will take you. Think you not, a suitable mentor she will be? hmm?" He directed the question to Kenobi who nodded.

"Yes," Obi-wan answered. "I was meaning to go anyway and inform the Senator of the Duchess's passing. They were friends."

"Settled it is then." Yoda nodded and then he looked at Soniee, well looked into her more like. "Though action on this matter we can not now take, our hearts with you go and May the Force be with you."

She nodded solemnly and waited for Master Kenobi to rise from his seat to escort her out of the chamber.