"Vader," Palpatine said, his voice touched with silky menace. "What are you doing?"
"I am facilitating politics, my master," Vader replied.
Palpatine looked at him, then up at the large poster Vader had just finished affixing to the wall of the Senate Chamber.
REMEMBER TO VOTE FOR THE NEXT EMPEROR, it said. REPORT ANY VOTER INTIMIDATION WHATSOEVER TO DARTH VADER, AND HE WILL KILL THE PERSON DOING IT.
"...you don't think that's a little paradoxical?" he asked.
"I am not telling people who to vote for," Vader replied. "I am attempting to make sure the Senate vote is fair and free."
"Vader…" Palpatine said, slowly. "I am the Emperor. The Senate is irrelevant."
"You said the Jedi were a threat to the Republic," Vader pointed out, in reply. "The Separatist Crisis is over. The Jedi are scattered and unable to intervene. It has been enough time that there should now be a new election. For Emperor."
"That is not the law any more!" Palpatine retorted.
"Why not?" Vader asked. "Meaningful elections are important. Padme said so."
Palpatine bit back his next reply, seething faintly.
Vader was usually easy to manipulate, but every so often one of those ideas about Padme got stuck in his head and he went from easy to utterly impossible. On that subject, he was immovable.
"Then… why the poster?" he asked.
"The vote should be fair and free," Vader reiterated. "I will prevent voter intimidation."
"...huh," Bail said, a week later. "How did that happen?"
He was looking at the election results, which showed that seventy-four percent of the Senate had voted for him to be the next Emperor.
"I suspect Darth Vader was involved," Mon replied. "His men ran an exhaustive investigation of the whole Senate over the last few weeks, then he killed everyone who'd taken their post through bribery or through falsified results."
Bail clicked through to the details of the report, and winced.
The number of people who'd voted for him was about what he'd expected, the Senators who he could count on. The number of people who'd voted against him was… drastically smaller.
Then the door opened with a crash.
"Emperor," Vader said. "It is time for you to take your position. The previous incumbent of your position was unwilling to vacate his post when the election results came in, but he has been dealt with."
Bail blinked.
"...you killed Palpatine?" he asked.
"That is a good question," Vader replied, somewhat quizzically. "I don't know if it was my lightsaber or something else, but he has exploded and so he is certainly dead whether or not I was the one to kill him. I do not believe it is tradition, though."
The Alderaanian senator swallowed, trying to hide his nerves.
"Are you going to kill everyone who looks at me funny?" he asked.
"No," Vader replied. "Though I will kill anyone who tries to assassinate you. That is tradition."
Mon and Bail exchanged glances.
"...would you actually have a problem if I tried to make things better for the galaxy?" Bail asked.
"You won the election," Vader said, firmly, and apparently that was all that mattered.
AN:
Breaking news: Rebellion wins by default, kinda