James Luceno - Darth Plagueis

Valorum turned to look at him. “The Jedi are not an army, and they number too few, in any case. They intercede at our request, but also at their own discretion. Furthermore, the Order has seen more deaths in the past twelve years than it saw in the previous fifty. Yinchorr is fast shaping up to be another Galidraan.”

Palpatine took secret pleasure in Valorum’s reference, since what had occurred at Galidraan had been clear evidence of the dark side acting in concert with his and Plagueis’s subterfuges. Most important, for Plagueis the provincial conflict had had a devastating effect on Jedi Master Dooku, deepening his schism with the High Council regarding its decisions to deploy the Jedi as warriors.

“Once again we come full circle.” Orn Free Taa’s voice boomed through the Rotunda. “The Republic can find the credits to contract with private militaries but not to raise a military of its own. And yet the Supreme Chancellor sees fit to lecture us on antiquated thinking. Why not simply turn those credits over to the outlying systems and let them do their own contracting?”

“Perhaps the Senator from Ryloth has touched on something,” Valorum said when the applause died down. “Better still, perhaps the time has come to impose a tax on the free-trade zones to supply the outlying systems with the funds they require.”

Palpatine reclined in the platform’s padded seat as angry rebuttals spewed from the stations of the Rim Faction worlds, as well as from those belonging to the Trade Federation, the Commerce Guild, the Techno Union, and the Corporate Alliance. How wonderfully and predictably the Senate had deteriorated over the course of twenty years. As had so many ordinary and extraordinary sessions, this one would end in chaos, with nothing resolved.

For the screens that filled the Rotunda, hovercams captured Valorum’s sad expression of impotence.

Soon, very soon, it would fall to Palpatine to impose order on everyone.

Outside the curved walls of the Senate, the crises in the outlying systems had little effect on the lives of the billions who resided on Coruscant. Beings living in the lower levels continued to do their best to survive, while those living closer to the sky continued to spend lavishly on food, fine cloaks, and tickets to the opera, which Valorum had returned to fashion. Palpatine was an exception to the rule. In what sometimes seemed to him like perpetual motion, he met frequently with his peers in the Senate, listening carefully to what each had to say about galactic events, but not so carefully that any had reason to suspect him of being anything other than a career politician, fixed on enhancing his profile. If there was anything that set him apart, it was an impression he gave of taking his job perhaps too seriously. With just over a year remaining in Valorum’s second term of office, the chancellorship was up for grabs, and those who knew Palpatine best suspected that he might actually pursue the position if asked. His equivocations on the matter only made him more desirable to those who thought he could bring something new to the mix — an authentic centrist viewpoint. Others questioned why, given the unprecedented challenges of the times, he or anyone else would aspire to the position.

Several days after the Senate met in special session, Palpatine violated the privacy he so valued to host an informal gathering in his suite in 500 Republica. The move to Coruscant’s most exclusive address had coincided with Ars Veruna’s ascent to the Naboo monarchy twelve years earlier. Veruna’s victory had hinged on a renegotiated contract with the Trade Federation for Naboo’s plasma, although it was widely believed that the King and his cronies had fared better from the deal than the citizens of Naboo. Unlike the apartment Palpatine had occupied when he first arrived on the capital world, this one had a dozen rooms and views of the government district surpassed only by those from the building’s spacious penthouses. The neuranium-and-bronzium statue of Sistros — which still concealed the lightsaber he had constructed early in his apprenticeship — shared space with antiquities that had been procured from remote worlds.

Fashionably late, Finis Valorum was one of the last guests to arrive. Palpatine welcomed him at the door, while a contingent of cloaked and helmeted Republic guards took up positions in the corridor. The Supreme Chancellor’s round face looked drawn, and perspiration beaded his clean-shaven upper lip. Clinging to his arm like an adornment was Sei Taria, ostensibly his administrative aide but also his lover. Just inside the threshold, Valorum hooked his thumbs in the wide blue cummerbund that cinched his robe and stopped to take in the suite and nod in appreciation.

“What the HoloNet newshounds would give to see this.”

“It’s hardly a penthouse,” Palpatine said dismissively.

“Not yet, he means,” Corellia’s Senator remarked, causing several others to lift their drink goblets in a kind of toast.

Palpatine pretended to mask embarrassment. Once he would have been acting; now he wore the guise of Naboo’s Senator as effortlessly as he wore his robes and cloak.

“Journalists are more than welcome to visit,” he said.

Valorum cocked a silver eyebrow in doubt.

“Now that you’ve gotten them accustomed to transparency and accessibility,” Palpatine added.

Valorum laughed without mirth. “For all the good it has done me.”

Sei Taria broke an awkward silence. “You certainly make no secret of your favorite color, Senator.” The lids of her oblique eyes were colored to match the burgundy of her septsilk robe; her dark hair was twisted into an elaborate bun behind her head, while in front, bangs bisected her flawless forehead.

“Scarlet figures prominently in the crest of my ancestral house,” Palpatine explained evenly.

“And yet you favor black and blue in everything you wear.”

Palpatine’s thin smile held. “I’m flattered that you notice.”

Taria’s expression turned devious. “Many have taken notice of you, Senator.”

Servants hurried over to take Valorum’s and Taria’s veda cloth cloaks.

“I hired them expressly for the evening,” Palpatine said quietly. “I’m a solitary man at heart.”

Taria spoke before Valorum could. “The title of the latest HoloNet piece about you, if I’m not mistaken. The Senator who turned his back on a vast fortune to devote himself to politics. Who worked his way up from Naboo’s legislative body to the ambassadorship to the Galactic Senate …” She smiled without showing her teeth. “A heartwarming story.”

“And every word of it true,” Palpatine said. “From a certain point of view.”

The three of them shared a laugh, and then Palpatine led them deeper into the press of guests, all of whom were well disposed toward Valorum. There was no one in the suite the Supreme Chancellor didn’t know, and he greeted every one of them by name. The ability to make beings feel as if they mattered to him, personally as well as politically, was one of his few strengths.

A protocol droid delivered drinks on a tray, and Valorum and Taria helped themselves to glasses. When Valorum’s trophy excused herself to make conversation with the wife of Alderaanian Senator Bail Antilles, Palpatine steered Valorum into the suite’s main room.

“How is it that you manage to enjoy the support of both the Core and Rim Factions?” Valorum asked in genuine interest.

“A consequence of Naboo’s location more than anything else. Mine is something of a displaced world — located in the Rim but sharing the sensibilities of many of the Core worlds.”

Valorum gestured to a figurine in a wall niche. “Exquisite.”

“Quite. A gift from Senator Eelen Li.”