Domus Publica
 |  |
The President’s War Room
They had met long ago, by chance encounter on the day they both coincidentally entered the Galactic Senate as freshman
senators. They had both been little more than children, really – she had been twenty years old, while he was a little over
twenty-two. She was a hothouse prodigy, long on theory and principle but short on practice; he had five years’ experience as
a backbencher in the Sector Assembly. She had benefitted from the finest tutors and proximity to her world’s center of power;
he instead had spent much of his time abroad, holding two doctorates (history and moral philosophy, and economics) and
even briefly an associate professorate. They’d first met when he sheepishly asked her if she would mind terribly if he asked
her to move; she’d been stepping on his foot.
They’d been quite the pair, back then; she, the fiery, iconoclastic radical – he, the introverted, cautious moderate... He avoided
the spotlight as carefully and successfully as she courted it. There seemed to be nothing at all in common between them. As
always, gossip made its rounds; did she plot to turn his academic and diplomatic credentials to her advantage? Did he hope to
use her to compensate for his apparent timidity? Where they perhaps trying to force a realignment of voting blocs in the
Senate? Perhaps she was merely using his known, firm placement in the Center to try to conceal her own far Left leanings.
Nobody knew why they seemed to be so close, only that they were. For a time.
In later years she would claim to have opposed him on principle from the beginning, that she had immediately recognized
some unspeakable, nameless evil in him that filled her very being with revolting. This was merely rhetoric, and demonstrably
false. One had only to ask anyone in the social circles in which she moved to learn the truth: For all his intense privacy, for all
his bookishness and reticence to speak, she was quite taken with him. Indeed, some of her friends began to suspect that she
might have been falling in love.
At the time, she blamed their split on his closest and most intimate of friends – something quite incredible, considering how
few close friends he had – Sanya, Baroness Tagge. Jealousy and prejudice, she claimed, had driven the pampered prima donna
to turn him against her. In fact, it was the sheer lunacy of her politics that accomplished that; take for example her proposal to
repeal all laws after twenty years, so as to ensure that bureaucratic morass could not build up. Or her proposed seventy
percent tax on luxury speeders. Or the time she moved that the Republic require periodic re-application for admission to the
Galactic Union, so as to prevent convention and privilege from becoming entrenched.
And split they did. He retained his masterly inertia, she continued her radical ways. She extended a few half-hearted
invitations to him asking him to join her Progressive caucus, but as always, he remained a cross-bencher. When their split was
finalized, it was characterized by such vitriol on her part that many thought her totally irrational, obsessed; he never uttered
an ill word against her. She would go on to describe him both in public and private as “that monstrous thing disguised as a
man.” There was no surer way to ensure her vote against a bill or resolution than to reveal that he was voting for it. She had
come to hate him with the white-hot fury of a thousand suns. It was a bizarre position to take on a man that was universally
respected, but thought to be singularly unambitious. How evil could a man be if he repeatedly turned down appointment to
prestigious commissions or powerful committees?
When he was elected Supreme Chancellor of the Republic – the first cross-bencher in 457 years to hold the office – she began
in private to talk revolution. In public, though, she allied her Progressives with a group of other caucuses and voting blocs and
became the first recognized Leader of the Official Opposition since Supreme Chancellor Alhakim’s impeachment. The
influence of her position enabled her to force her way into becoming ranking member on the Defense Committee,which
automatically gave her a seat on the Defense Procurement Subcommittee. It was a position she used to be a thorn in his side
for years.
On this particular day, Senator Mon Mothma (Progressive - Chandrila), Leader of the Official Opposition, was convinced she’
d found yet another of the grotesque mockeries of democratic process perpetrated by that monstrous thing disguised as a man.
As she stalked through the halls of the Presidential Palace, the administrative center of the Republic, a fire burned in her eyes
that cleared a path through the crowded passageways for her. Aides and senior officials stepped aside, not eager to come
between her and her hated enemy. She looked every bit the predator swooping in on wounded prey.
She swept into the anteroom outside his war room – keh! A war room! Whoever heard of the Republic needing such a thing?
– and brushed aside the other Senators she found waiting there. She knew them by sight – Garlan Limoth, the Viscountess
Romodi, Iskander Bey, Shayla Paige-Tarkin, Khalid Ozzel... lackeys, sycophants, and political hacks, all of them. All of them
enthusiastic supporters who could be counted to deliver their votes on demand to whatever abomination might emanate from
the sick imagination of that monstrous thing disguised as a man. She bypassed them completely and headed directly to the
door leading directly into the war room. As she drew near, the Executive Secretary to the Supreme Chancellor, an impeccably
dressed Rodian named Dar Wac, stepped in front of her.
{Excuse me, Senator, but there is an important meeting in progress,} he said calmly. {If you wish to speak to the President – }
“The Supreme Chancellor,” she interrupted sharply, cutting the Rodian off. That was conceivably one of the most annoying
things she’d noticed about his administration; despite a thousand years of the Basic title “Supreme Chancellor of the
Republic” being in common use, members of his Government frequently insisted on using the much older Galactic Standard
version, “President of the Republic.” That title conjured up images of the powerful chief executives of yesteryear, the grand
leaders of a bygone era. It conjured up images of greatness and glory. She was sure he was behind this tendency to refer to him
by that title.
“Senator,” from behind her came the voice of an unremarkable-looking human dressed in generally nondescript clothes who
bore the forgettable name of Ars Dangor. His personal inconspicuousness belied his cunning; as the Assistant to the Supreme
Chancellor for Legislative Affairs, Dangor’s sly machinations and adroit wheeling and dealing had foiled Mothma countless
times. He was, second perhaps only to his employer, one of her most hated enemies. “Madame, as you know, His Excellency
has a very busy schedule. It is customary for Senators who wish to speak to His Excellency to arrange appointments through
my office.”
Mothma turned over her shoulder to fix Dangor with a steely glare. “Mr. Dangor, I am not some freshman hoping to impress
your boss, nor am I some corpulent politico hoping to snatch bits of largesse from his table. I am the Leader of the
Opposition. You can make time in his ‘busy schedule’ to speak to me.”
But Ars Dangor was one of the most powerful men in the Republic, and her piercing glare and imperious tone, which could
terrorize lobbyists and Senators, were as nothing to him. “Madame, we are a society of laws, not of men. Or, in your case, of
women. Custom dictates that you should arrange an appointment through my office.”
“Now, now, Mr. Dangor.” A third man approached, the senior of the three. He was a balding human of average build, but he
wielded even more power these days than even Dangor, whom he had only recently surpassed as that thing’s left hand man.
Kinman Doriana was the Assistant to the Supreme Chancellor for Galactic Security Affairs. “Exceptions can be made in
matters of urgent importance. Madame, what is the matter that must be brought immediately to His Excellency’s attention?”
“It is not a matter I wish to discuss with underlings,” she answered loftily. Who did these drones think they were, to detain
her with their useless talk? But Doriana was too powerful, Wac too punctilious, and Dangor too cunning for her to bluster her
way through all three at once; better to play the Senatorial privilege card. “It is a matter of privileged information regarding
confidential testimony given before the Senate Defense Procurement Subcommittee, and as Ranking Member I have the right
to exclude any person from discussion of the details who is not a member of the Subcommittee or a responsible minister. As
none of your appointments are subject to confirmation by the Senate, I exclude you under Rule XXIII of the Senate Rules. I
demand to speak to the responsible minister and the Supreme Chancellor, under Section 5 of the Sensitive Information and
Special Security Act. If you do not comply, I will report you to the Committee of the Whole for contempt of the Senate.”
Dangor’s eyes narrowed. He knew the Senate’s politics as well as any Senator; in fact, he knew the passions and prejudices of
that body better than most. She couldn’t make the charge stick – there was just no way that the Committee would find three
senior members of the Office of the President guilty of contempt in a time of war when that same President already held
dictatorial powers. But it was the President’s reputation as a fair-minded, reasonable man that made it possible for the Senate
to trust him with dictatorial powers in the first place; only a man with impeccable integrity and immaculate reputation could
lead the galaxy in these trying times, and accusations of contempt at the highest of levels could undermine the President’s
reputation, the fact that Mothma couldn’t force them through notwithstanding. It was best to avoid even the appearance of
impropriety whenever possible.
In the fast-paced politics of intrigue in the Galactic Republic, bare seconds could contain in their entirety entire plots and
counterplots. No more than a heartbeat passed after Mothma’s threat escaped her lips before Doriana conceded the round to
her. He spread his hands in a gesture of openness. “If the matter cannot be discussed with senior members of His Excellency’s
staff, then surely it is important enough for a minor interruption of schedule. Mr. Wac, on my authority, kindly admit the
Senator to the war room.”
Mothma allowed not the slightest hint of satisfaction that her gambit had succeeded. She could threaten them with contempt
of the Senate, but Dangor in turn could spread the story that she thought herself too important to bother with such time-
honored traditions as arranging a meeting in advance; knowing Dangor and his spin doctors, given enough time they could
portray even her as some tyrannical empress in the making, irrationally lashing out at senior administration officials. He might
even drive a rift between her Progressives and the Ishtarakists’ Union – or, even worse, the Rights of Sentience Party. The
latter would break her coalition and force her out as Leader of the Opposition. If she could bring Dangor down, he might be
able to do the same to her. But she had won this hand, and Wac compliantly opened the door to the dictator’s war room.
Mothma entered without so much as a word of thanks.
And so Mothma entered the katarn’s lair.
It was an enormous room, with vast viewscreens stretched out across the walls and the ceilings, each depicting in varying
levels of detail the operations and campaigns of the Grand Army of the Republic, the Republican Guard, the reconstituted
Republican Army, the Republican Navy, the Security Forces, and the allied powers’ own navies and armies. Staffers and
interns and aiguillette-wearing aides de camp and others bustled about like drones in an enormous hive; blood-red cloaked Red
Guardsmen, the Supreme Chancellor’s personal bodyguards, flanked the entrance and were positioned throughout the room.
In the center of this room was a huge conference table, around which were arrayed many of the senior leaders of the Galactic
Republic.
Here among them was Admiral Terrinald Screed, the Chairman of the Supreme Defense Council; here was Captain General
(Retired) Indutiomarus Trachta, the General Minister and Head of the Government; here was Ranulf Trommer, the Minister
of Defense; here was Ishin-Il-Raz, the Minister of Finance; here was Ardus Kaine, the Minister of the Interior; here was
Laddinare, Lord Torbin, the recently-appointed Attorney General; here was Armand Isard, the Director of the Senate Bureau
of Intelligence; here was Admiral Josef Holt, the Commander of the Republican Guard; here was General Wyte Corvae, the
Chief of Staff of the Republican Army; here was Admiral Farid Banjeer, the Chief of Naval Operations; here was 000001, the
Commanding General of the Grand Army of the Republic; here was Sly Moore, the Assistant to the Supreme Chancellor and
Chief of Staff; here was Mas Amedda, the Vice Chair of the Senate; here was Sate Pestage, the Assistant to the Supreme
Chancellor and Senior Advisor to the Supreme Chancellor.
There, at the center of the room, his subdued presence eclipsing the grandeur of them all, sat he.
Supreme Chancellor Palpatine.
A long time had passed since they had first met, when he had politely asked her not to step on his shoe. Back then, he had
seemed a meek individual, respected by all on the somewhat rare occasion that they thought of him; he said little and did less.
Yet now he bestrode the galaxy like a mighty colossus, the dictator of the galaxy, charged by the Senate to take care that the
Republic should take no harm. Now vast armies and navies were at his beck and call, as he waged war to bind together the
thousand-year Republic. She hated him now with every fabric of her being.
He regarded her from his chair with a lack of interest that approached outright boredom. “Senator Mothma,” he said in his
quiet and subdued voice. “To what do I owe the honor of your unexpected visit?”
It was a mild rebuke for a dictator to give to someone that had just unceremoniously invaded his war room.
“Don’t try to fob me off with diplomacy, Palpatine,” she warned, her face displaying clearly her opinion of his pacific
opening.
“There are seven correct modes of address for the President, Senator,” Pestage said. “Addressing him by surname alone is not
among them.”
“This doesn’t concern you, Mr. Pestage,” she snapped. “As Leader of the Official Opposition, I want to speak to the
Supreme Chancellor immediately. Alone.”
The shocked and apoplectic looks on some of their faces clearly conveyed their outrage at her high-handed demand. Yet
Palpatine himself betrayed not the slightest dismay or surprise. His face, as always, bore the same sober, quietly dignified
expression with just a hint of sadness that had become so beloved of political satirists. He glanced at Pestage and Moore, and
then pursed his lips. “Very well,” he said quietly. “I will have a word or two in private with the Leader of the Official
Opposition.”
This announcement was followed by stunned silence from his staff, and then by the mass exodus of the room’s occupants,
with the exception of him, and her, and his Red Guards. She glared at him all the while as his official family departed the war
room.
“Call off your dogs,” she said, gesturing to the Guards.
“Whatever can be said to me can be said in front of them,” he answered.
She exhaled deeply, annoyed at this little defeat. “Fine. Have it your way.” She held up a datapad. “Did you think you could
get away with this? This outright disregard for the Senate?”
“I am routinely accused of a great many things, Senator,” he said dryly. “I’m afraid you’ll have to be somewhat more specific
before I can answer.”
“Does the name ‘Victory Project’ mean anything to you, Palpatine?”
His facial expression didn’t change, but his eyes did. His soft blue eyes seemed to harden somehow. The room seemed to
become just a little bit colder. “Where did you hear this name, Senator?”
“Do you think I’m a fool? Do you think I don’t read every report your lackeys send to the Procurement Subcommittee? You’
ve hidden this dirty little secret very well, I’ll give you that. I had to cross reference three-dozen separate documents from
Screed, Trommer, and Il-Raz to find it, but I did find it. You’ve been diverting funds and resources into an unreported military
project without the consent or even the knowledge of the Senate.”
Palpatine’s mouth might have pursed a little more tightly than normal, but it may also have simply been a trick of the lighting.
“The Victory Project was approved by my office under Section 125 of— ”
“Of the Emergency Powers Supplements? Those were passed by the Senate over a thousand years ago. They’re not
applicable today, and I’ll have you know that what you’ve done is blatantly illegal according to Gerdinaton vs. Anaxes— ”
“— which was overturned twenty years ago by Xasdflalfdsa’asdf vs. Galactic Republic, Senator,” he answered. “I need not to
mention Section 7 of the Binks Emergency Powers Resolution, which clearly states – “
“Oh, the void take your Binks Resolution, you mountebank!” She snapped. “You can’t bandy that thing about like a mandate
to openly violate the Constitution and the Charter in a single stroke! That misbegotten thing can’t give you powers that the
Senate doesn’t have! You can’t just ignore Alqadsalbatrus vs. Qubbassakhira, it’s a fundamental part of the foundation of the
Republic!”
“Senator, I direct your attention toward Article III of the Charter, and Article IX, Section 7, of the Constitution. The exercise
of emergency power is lawful in the event of an emergency declared by a three-quarters majority of the Senate with the
unanimous concurrence of the High Council. My authorization of the Victory Project was fully within the bounds of my
authority under the Emergency Powers Supplements and the Special Security Act.”
“Lies!” Mothma roared, sensing victory; he had just trapped himself by mentioning the Special Security Act. “The Special
Security Act requires the notification to all parties involved that a project is being approved outside the authority of the
Procurement Subcommittee. I have here – “ she raised her datapad – “a confidential memorandum to the Supreme Defense
Council from Vice Admiral Jerjerrod to the extent that he did not receive prior notification that the Victory Project did not
receive approval from the Procurement Subcommittee. You acted illegally, and there’s nothing you can— ”
“A confidential memorandum,” Palpatine repeated softly, arching his eyebrow. “Do you not find it at all strange, Senator, that
you have on a non-secure datapad a confidential memorandum, of which you are not the intended recipient, regarding a project
classified Top Secret?”
Mothma’s heart skipped a beat. How could she have been so foolish? In her eagerness to deal the coup de grâce, she had said
too much....
“It occurs to me,” he continued quietly, “that this may represent a major security violation, and possibly even a criminal
offense, under the Internal Security Act. As I have not actually read what you claim to be a confidential memorandum, I do
not have substantial reason to believe that you have in fact violated Republic law. If, however, you were to raise this issue
before the Senate, I would of course be obligated to have your sources investigated quite thoroughly.”
“Curse you,” she whispered, her hands clenching at her sides in impotent rage. “You will not blackmail me into silence,
Palpatine.” She lifted her jaw. “I will now be cowed by threats to my integrity or— ”
“I thank you for coming to see me, Senator,” he interrupted, changing the subject quite suddenly. He gestured toward a
datapad on the table in front of him. “I had planned to contact you regarding this message. It is a letter from Senator p’Ren-
Kendleton – you know her quite well, I believe; she is the leader of the Popular Reform caucus.”
If her heart had skipped a beat earlier, her blood ran ice cold now. The Popular Reformers were one of the most crucial blocs
in her Opposition coalition. There was no reason for p’Ren-Kendleton to be communicating directly with Palpatine, the leader
of the Coalition, unless....
“The good Senator informs me that she is withdrawing her caucus’s support for your Opposition, and wishes to join the
Coalition. I believe that breaks your Opposition, does it not?”
No.
No, how could he? How could he have done this to her? Without the Popular Reformers, she didn’t have the votes to be
Leader of the Official Opposition. If they were joining the Coalition, that gave them enough votes to force her Progressives
out of all the major committees. It would give Palpatine the votes he needed to run roughshod over the Senate completely.
“I am not interested in silencing you as an opponent of my administration, Senator,” he said with sympathy. “Although
Senator Rïis is now the ranking member, I am quite prepared to allow you to remain on the Defense Committee. However,
you will of course be required to vacate your seat in the Procurement Subcommittee. I trust you understand.”
Her face was contorted with outrage. Her hatred for him had reached a boiling point, and she opened her mouth to give voice
and utterance to her loathing of this man.
At that particular moment in time, she looked directly into his eyes.
— COLD DARK HATE HUNGER EMPTY FEAR COLD HUNGER
Mothma reeled. Her mind struggled to process the overwhelming rush of black emptiness that washed over it. It was far too
much, far too fast. Her brain locked up and shut down. She nearly died. Instead, she collapsed into a powerless, helpless heap.
For something less than an instant and more than an eternity, she had looked into Palpatine’s eyes, the windows to his soul;
years later she would say that there were no words to describe what she had found there....
To say that Palpatine regarded Mothma’s crumpled form with the same lack of interest with which he might have regarded a
broken chair would be untrue. Palpatine found chairs useful. As it was, he felt nothing at all, registering only the factual
information that Mothma had suddenly collapsed without warning. He saw nothing terribly interesting or alarming about it;
the information was filed along with his observation that morning that Dangor sometimes chewed on his pen, the observation
a few minutes earlier that Isard was wearing a new chronometer, and the observation he would make in a few hours that the
Lady Tagge’s hair looked better when she wore it up. Three seconds after Mothma passed out, Palpatine made a mental note
to buy more cat food, and then summoned the paramedics.
As the paramedics removed the unintelligible, semiconscious Senator from the war room, a small party of Jedi entered.
“I apologize for being late for our appointment, Supreme Chancellor, but— ” Mace Windu stopped short in mid-sentence. He
looked warily at Mothma, then at the Supreme Chancellor. “We’re not interrupting something, are we?”
“No, of course not,” Palpatine said, smiling wearily. “Senator Mothma was just leaving. She seemed to have suffered some
sort of collapse.”
“Ah,” Windu nodded his head, and exchanged glances with the diminutive green Jedi Master at his side.
“No, you are indeed quite on time, my friends,” Palpatine said, standing. “Ah, it is good to see you again, young Skywalker!”
The weariness of his earlier smile was replaced by genuine warmth at seeing the young man with the group of Jedi. “Come
here, come here,” he said as he gestured at one of the viewscreens behind his chair. “I seem to recall you had an interest in
cybernetics. I think you’ll enjoy this. I have such wonderful things to show you.”
Mace Windu’s heart skipped a beat.
I have such wonderful things to show you.
Those very words had been whispered to him once upon a time, on a distant planet swept by rains. He had been a Padawan at
the time, and yet that black-cloaked specter had known his name. It had offered to make him powerful beyond his wildest
dreams, if only he would embrace the dark side of the Force...
“Master Windu?” Obi-Wan Kenobi placed his hand on Windu’s elbow. “Are you all right? What’s the matter?”
Windu shook his head. It had been over thirty years since his chance encounter with that phantom menace in the bowels of
the Krath’s hidden fortress. Why in all the stars had a random comment by this honest statesman jogged that memory?
“Nothing,” he said, clearing his thoughts. “Nothing. I was thinking of an unrelated thing.”
On the other side of the room with Anakin Skywalker, Palpatine laughed.
senators. They had both been little more than children, really – she had been twenty years old, while he was a little over
twenty-two. She was a hothouse prodigy, long on theory and principle but short on practice; he had five years’ experience as
a backbencher in the Sector Assembly. She had benefitted from the finest tutors and proximity to her world’s center of power;
he instead had spent much of his time abroad, holding two doctorates (history and moral philosophy, and economics) and
even briefly an associate professorate. They’d first met when he sheepishly asked her if she would mind terribly if he asked
her to move; she’d been stepping on his foot.
They’d been quite the pair, back then; she, the fiery, iconoclastic radical – he, the introverted, cautious moderate... He avoided
the spotlight as carefully and successfully as she courted it. There seemed to be nothing at all in common between them. As
always, gossip made its rounds; did she plot to turn his academic and diplomatic credentials to her advantage? Did he hope to
use her to compensate for his apparent timidity? Where they perhaps trying to force a realignment of voting blocs in the
Senate? Perhaps she was merely using his known, firm placement in the Center to try to conceal her own far Left leanings.
Nobody knew why they seemed to be so close, only that they were. For a time.
In later years she would claim to have opposed him on principle from the beginning, that she had immediately recognized
some unspeakable, nameless evil in him that filled her very being with revolting. This was merely rhetoric, and demonstrably
false. One had only to ask anyone in the social circles in which she moved to learn the truth: For all his intense privacy, for all
his bookishness and reticence to speak, she was quite taken with him. Indeed, some of her friends began to suspect that she
might have been falling in love.
At the time, she blamed their split on his closest and most intimate of friends – something quite incredible, considering how
few close friends he had – Sanya, Baroness Tagge. Jealousy and prejudice, she claimed, had driven the pampered prima donna
to turn him against her. In fact, it was the sheer lunacy of her politics that accomplished that; take for example her proposal to
repeal all laws after twenty years, so as to ensure that bureaucratic morass could not build up. Or her proposed seventy
percent tax on luxury speeders. Or the time she moved that the Republic require periodic re-application for admission to the
Galactic Union, so as to prevent convention and privilege from becoming entrenched.
And split they did. He retained his masterly inertia, she continued her radical ways. She extended a few half-hearted
invitations to him asking him to join her Progressive caucus, but as always, he remained a cross-bencher. When their split was
finalized, it was characterized by such vitriol on her part that many thought her totally irrational, obsessed; he never uttered
an ill word against her. She would go on to describe him both in public and private as “that monstrous thing disguised as a
man.” There was no surer way to ensure her vote against a bill or resolution than to reveal that he was voting for it. She had
come to hate him with the white-hot fury of a thousand suns. It was a bizarre position to take on a man that was universally
respected, but thought to be singularly unambitious. How evil could a man be if he repeatedly turned down appointment to
prestigious commissions or powerful committees?
When he was elected Supreme Chancellor of the Republic – the first cross-bencher in 457 years to hold the office – she began
in private to talk revolution. In public, though, she allied her Progressives with a group of other caucuses and voting blocs and
became the first recognized Leader of the Official Opposition since Supreme Chancellor Alhakim’s impeachment. The
influence of her position enabled her to force her way into becoming ranking member on the Defense Committee,which
automatically gave her a seat on the Defense Procurement Subcommittee. It was a position she used to be a thorn in his side
for years.
On this particular day, Senator Mon Mothma (Progressive - Chandrila), Leader of the Official Opposition, was convinced she’
d found yet another of the grotesque mockeries of democratic process perpetrated by that monstrous thing disguised as a man.
As she stalked through the halls of the Presidential Palace, the administrative center of the Republic, a fire burned in her eyes
that cleared a path through the crowded passageways for her. Aides and senior officials stepped aside, not eager to come
between her and her hated enemy. She looked every bit the predator swooping in on wounded prey.
She swept into the anteroom outside his war room – keh! A war room! Whoever heard of the Republic needing such a thing?
– and brushed aside the other Senators she found waiting there. She knew them by sight – Garlan Limoth, the Viscountess
Romodi, Iskander Bey, Shayla Paige-Tarkin, Khalid Ozzel... lackeys, sycophants, and political hacks, all of them. All of them
enthusiastic supporters who could be counted to deliver their votes on demand to whatever abomination might emanate from
the sick imagination of that monstrous thing disguised as a man. She bypassed them completely and headed directly to the
door leading directly into the war room. As she drew near, the Executive Secretary to the Supreme Chancellor, an impeccably
dressed Rodian named Dar Wac, stepped in front of her.
{Excuse me, Senator, but there is an important meeting in progress,} he said calmly. {If you wish to speak to the President – }
“The Supreme Chancellor,” she interrupted sharply, cutting the Rodian off. That was conceivably one of the most annoying
things she’d noticed about his administration; despite a thousand years of the Basic title “Supreme Chancellor of the
Republic” being in common use, members of his Government frequently insisted on using the much older Galactic Standard
version, “President of the Republic.” That title conjured up images of the powerful chief executives of yesteryear, the grand
leaders of a bygone era. It conjured up images of greatness and glory. She was sure he was behind this tendency to refer to him
by that title.
“Senator,” from behind her came the voice of an unremarkable-looking human dressed in generally nondescript clothes who
bore the forgettable name of Ars Dangor. His personal inconspicuousness belied his cunning; as the Assistant to the Supreme
Chancellor for Legislative Affairs, Dangor’s sly machinations and adroit wheeling and dealing had foiled Mothma countless
times. He was, second perhaps only to his employer, one of her most hated enemies. “Madame, as you know, His Excellency
has a very busy schedule. It is customary for Senators who wish to speak to His Excellency to arrange appointments through
my office.”
Mothma turned over her shoulder to fix Dangor with a steely glare. “Mr. Dangor, I am not some freshman hoping to impress
your boss, nor am I some corpulent politico hoping to snatch bits of largesse from his table. I am the Leader of the
Opposition. You can make time in his ‘busy schedule’ to speak to me.”
But Ars Dangor was one of the most powerful men in the Republic, and her piercing glare and imperious tone, which could
terrorize lobbyists and Senators, were as nothing to him. “Madame, we are a society of laws, not of men. Or, in your case, of
women. Custom dictates that you should arrange an appointment through my office.”
“Now, now, Mr. Dangor.” A third man approached, the senior of the three. He was a balding human of average build, but he
wielded even more power these days than even Dangor, whom he had only recently surpassed as that thing’s left hand man.
Kinman Doriana was the Assistant to the Supreme Chancellor for Galactic Security Affairs. “Exceptions can be made in
matters of urgent importance. Madame, what is the matter that must be brought immediately to His Excellency’s attention?”
“It is not a matter I wish to discuss with underlings,” she answered loftily. Who did these drones think they were, to detain
her with their useless talk? But Doriana was too powerful, Wac too punctilious, and Dangor too cunning for her to bluster her
way through all three at once; better to play the Senatorial privilege card. “It is a matter of privileged information regarding
confidential testimony given before the Senate Defense Procurement Subcommittee, and as Ranking Member I have the right
to exclude any person from discussion of the details who is not a member of the Subcommittee or a responsible minister. As
none of your appointments are subject to confirmation by the Senate, I exclude you under Rule XXIII of the Senate Rules. I
demand to speak to the responsible minister and the Supreme Chancellor, under Section 5 of the Sensitive Information and
Special Security Act. If you do not comply, I will report you to the Committee of the Whole for contempt of the Senate.”
Dangor’s eyes narrowed. He knew the Senate’s politics as well as any Senator; in fact, he knew the passions and prejudices of
that body better than most. She couldn’t make the charge stick – there was just no way that the Committee would find three
senior members of the Office of the President guilty of contempt in a time of war when that same President already held
dictatorial powers. But it was the President’s reputation as a fair-minded, reasonable man that made it possible for the Senate
to trust him with dictatorial powers in the first place; only a man with impeccable integrity and immaculate reputation could
lead the galaxy in these trying times, and accusations of contempt at the highest of levels could undermine the President’s
reputation, the fact that Mothma couldn’t force them through notwithstanding. It was best to avoid even the appearance of
impropriety whenever possible.
In the fast-paced politics of intrigue in the Galactic Republic, bare seconds could contain in their entirety entire plots and
counterplots. No more than a heartbeat passed after Mothma’s threat escaped her lips before Doriana conceded the round to
her. He spread his hands in a gesture of openness. “If the matter cannot be discussed with senior members of His Excellency’s
staff, then surely it is important enough for a minor interruption of schedule. Mr. Wac, on my authority, kindly admit the
Senator to the war room.”
Mothma allowed not the slightest hint of satisfaction that her gambit had succeeded. She could threaten them with contempt
of the Senate, but Dangor in turn could spread the story that she thought herself too important to bother with such time-
honored traditions as arranging a meeting in advance; knowing Dangor and his spin doctors, given enough time they could
portray even her as some tyrannical empress in the making, irrationally lashing out at senior administration officials. He might
even drive a rift between her Progressives and the Ishtarakists’ Union – or, even worse, the Rights of Sentience Party. The
latter would break her coalition and force her out as Leader of the Opposition. If she could bring Dangor down, he might be
able to do the same to her. But she had won this hand, and Wac compliantly opened the door to the dictator’s war room.
Mothma entered without so much as a word of thanks.
And so Mothma entered the katarn’s lair.
It was an enormous room, with vast viewscreens stretched out across the walls and the ceilings, each depicting in varying
levels of detail the operations and campaigns of the Grand Army of the Republic, the Republican Guard, the reconstituted
Republican Army, the Republican Navy, the Security Forces, and the allied powers’ own navies and armies. Staffers and
interns and aiguillette-wearing aides de camp and others bustled about like drones in an enormous hive; blood-red cloaked Red
Guardsmen, the Supreme Chancellor’s personal bodyguards, flanked the entrance and were positioned throughout the room.
In the center of this room was a huge conference table, around which were arrayed many of the senior leaders of the Galactic
Republic.
Here among them was Admiral Terrinald Screed, the Chairman of the Supreme Defense Council; here was Captain General
(Retired) Indutiomarus Trachta, the General Minister and Head of the Government; here was Ranulf Trommer, the Minister
of Defense; here was Ishin-Il-Raz, the Minister of Finance; here was Ardus Kaine, the Minister of the Interior; here was
Laddinare, Lord Torbin, the recently-appointed Attorney General; here was Armand Isard, the Director of the Senate Bureau
of Intelligence; here was Admiral Josef Holt, the Commander of the Republican Guard; here was General Wyte Corvae, the
Chief of Staff of the Republican Army; here was Admiral Farid Banjeer, the Chief of Naval Operations; here was 000001, the
Commanding General of the Grand Army of the Republic; here was Sly Moore, the Assistant to the Supreme Chancellor and
Chief of Staff; here was Mas Amedda, the Vice Chair of the Senate; here was Sate Pestage, the Assistant to the Supreme
Chancellor and Senior Advisor to the Supreme Chancellor.
There, at the center of the room, his subdued presence eclipsing the grandeur of them all, sat he.
Supreme Chancellor Palpatine.
A long time had passed since they had first met, when he had politely asked her not to step on his shoe. Back then, he had
seemed a meek individual, respected by all on the somewhat rare occasion that they thought of him; he said little and did less.
Yet now he bestrode the galaxy like a mighty colossus, the dictator of the galaxy, charged by the Senate to take care that the
Republic should take no harm. Now vast armies and navies were at his beck and call, as he waged war to bind together the
thousand-year Republic. She hated him now with every fabric of her being.
He regarded her from his chair with a lack of interest that approached outright boredom. “Senator Mothma,” he said in his
quiet and subdued voice. “To what do I owe the honor of your unexpected visit?”
It was a mild rebuke for a dictator to give to someone that had just unceremoniously invaded his war room.
“Don’t try to fob me off with diplomacy, Palpatine,” she warned, her face displaying clearly her opinion of his pacific
opening.
“There are seven correct modes of address for the President, Senator,” Pestage said. “Addressing him by surname alone is not
among them.”
“This doesn’t concern you, Mr. Pestage,” she snapped. “As Leader of the Official Opposition, I want to speak to the
Supreme Chancellor immediately. Alone.”
The shocked and apoplectic looks on some of their faces clearly conveyed their outrage at her high-handed demand. Yet
Palpatine himself betrayed not the slightest dismay or surprise. His face, as always, bore the same sober, quietly dignified
expression with just a hint of sadness that had become so beloved of political satirists. He glanced at Pestage and Moore, and
then pursed his lips. “Very well,” he said quietly. “I will have a word or two in private with the Leader of the Official
Opposition.”
This announcement was followed by stunned silence from his staff, and then by the mass exodus of the room’s occupants,
with the exception of him, and her, and his Red Guards. She glared at him all the while as his official family departed the war
room.
“Call off your dogs,” she said, gesturing to the Guards.
“Whatever can be said to me can be said in front of them,” he answered.
She exhaled deeply, annoyed at this little defeat. “Fine. Have it your way.” She held up a datapad. “Did you think you could
get away with this? This outright disregard for the Senate?”
“I am routinely accused of a great many things, Senator,” he said dryly. “I’m afraid you’ll have to be somewhat more specific
before I can answer.”
“Does the name ‘Victory Project’ mean anything to you, Palpatine?”
His facial expression didn’t change, but his eyes did. His soft blue eyes seemed to harden somehow. The room seemed to
become just a little bit colder. “Where did you hear this name, Senator?”
“Do you think I’m a fool? Do you think I don’t read every report your lackeys send to the Procurement Subcommittee? You’
ve hidden this dirty little secret very well, I’ll give you that. I had to cross reference three-dozen separate documents from
Screed, Trommer, and Il-Raz to find it, but I did find it. You’ve been diverting funds and resources into an unreported military
project without the consent or even the knowledge of the Senate.”
Palpatine’s mouth might have pursed a little more tightly than normal, but it may also have simply been a trick of the lighting.
“The Victory Project was approved by my office under Section 125 of— ”
“Of the Emergency Powers Supplements? Those were passed by the Senate over a thousand years ago. They’re not
applicable today, and I’ll have you know that what you’ve done is blatantly illegal according to Gerdinaton vs. Anaxes— ”
“— which was overturned twenty years ago by Xasdflalfdsa’asdf vs. Galactic Republic, Senator,” he answered. “I need not to
mention Section 7 of the Binks Emergency Powers Resolution, which clearly states – “
“Oh, the void take your Binks Resolution, you mountebank!” She snapped. “You can’t bandy that thing about like a mandate
to openly violate the Constitution and the Charter in a single stroke! That misbegotten thing can’t give you powers that the
Senate doesn’t have! You can’t just ignore Alqadsalbatrus vs. Qubbassakhira, it’s a fundamental part of the foundation of the
Republic!”
“Senator, I direct your attention toward Article III of the Charter, and Article IX, Section 7, of the Constitution. The exercise
of emergency power is lawful in the event of an emergency declared by a three-quarters majority of the Senate with the
unanimous concurrence of the High Council. My authorization of the Victory Project was fully within the bounds of my
authority under the Emergency Powers Supplements and the Special Security Act.”
“Lies!” Mothma roared, sensing victory; he had just trapped himself by mentioning the Special Security Act. “The Special
Security Act requires the notification to all parties involved that a project is being approved outside the authority of the
Procurement Subcommittee. I have here – “ she raised her datapad – “a confidential memorandum to the Supreme Defense
Council from Vice Admiral Jerjerrod to the extent that he did not receive prior notification that the Victory Project did not
receive approval from the Procurement Subcommittee. You acted illegally, and there’s nothing you can— ”
“A confidential memorandum,” Palpatine repeated softly, arching his eyebrow. “Do you not find it at all strange, Senator, that
you have on a non-secure datapad a confidential memorandum, of which you are not the intended recipient, regarding a project
classified Top Secret?”
Mothma’s heart skipped a beat. How could she have been so foolish? In her eagerness to deal the coup de grâce, she had said
too much....
“It occurs to me,” he continued quietly, “that this may represent a major security violation, and possibly even a criminal
offense, under the Internal Security Act. As I have not actually read what you claim to be a confidential memorandum, I do
not have substantial reason to believe that you have in fact violated Republic law. If, however, you were to raise this issue
before the Senate, I would of course be obligated to have your sources investigated quite thoroughly.”
“Curse you,” she whispered, her hands clenching at her sides in impotent rage. “You will not blackmail me into silence,
Palpatine.” She lifted her jaw. “I will now be cowed by threats to my integrity or— ”
“I thank you for coming to see me, Senator,” he interrupted, changing the subject quite suddenly. He gestured toward a
datapad on the table in front of him. “I had planned to contact you regarding this message. It is a letter from Senator p’Ren-
Kendleton – you know her quite well, I believe; she is the leader of the Popular Reform caucus.”
If her heart had skipped a beat earlier, her blood ran ice cold now. The Popular Reformers were one of the most crucial blocs
in her Opposition coalition. There was no reason for p’Ren-Kendleton to be communicating directly with Palpatine, the leader
of the Coalition, unless....
“The good Senator informs me that she is withdrawing her caucus’s support for your Opposition, and wishes to join the
Coalition. I believe that breaks your Opposition, does it not?”
No.
No, how could he? How could he have done this to her? Without the Popular Reformers, she didn’t have the votes to be
Leader of the Official Opposition. If they were joining the Coalition, that gave them enough votes to force her Progressives
out of all the major committees. It would give Palpatine the votes he needed to run roughshod over the Senate completely.
“I am not interested in silencing you as an opponent of my administration, Senator,” he said with sympathy. “Although
Senator Rïis is now the ranking member, I am quite prepared to allow you to remain on the Defense Committee. However,
you will of course be required to vacate your seat in the Procurement Subcommittee. I trust you understand.”
Her face was contorted with outrage. Her hatred for him had reached a boiling point, and she opened her mouth to give voice
and utterance to her loathing of this man.
At that particular moment in time, she looked directly into his eyes.
— COLD DARK HATE HUNGER EMPTY FEAR COLD HUNGER
Mothma reeled. Her mind struggled to process the overwhelming rush of black emptiness that washed over it. It was far too
much, far too fast. Her brain locked up and shut down. She nearly died. Instead, she collapsed into a powerless, helpless heap.
For something less than an instant and more than an eternity, she had looked into Palpatine’s eyes, the windows to his soul;
years later she would say that there were no words to describe what she had found there....
To say that Palpatine regarded Mothma’s crumpled form with the same lack of interest with which he might have regarded a
broken chair would be untrue. Palpatine found chairs useful. As it was, he felt nothing at all, registering only the factual
information that Mothma had suddenly collapsed without warning. He saw nothing terribly interesting or alarming about it;
the information was filed along with his observation that morning that Dangor sometimes chewed on his pen, the observation
a few minutes earlier that Isard was wearing a new chronometer, and the observation he would make in a few hours that the
Lady Tagge’s hair looked better when she wore it up. Three seconds after Mothma passed out, Palpatine made a mental note
to buy more cat food, and then summoned the paramedics.
As the paramedics removed the unintelligible, semiconscious Senator from the war room, a small party of Jedi entered.
“I apologize for being late for our appointment, Supreme Chancellor, but— ” Mace Windu stopped short in mid-sentence. He
looked warily at Mothma, then at the Supreme Chancellor. “We’re not interrupting something, are we?”
“No, of course not,” Palpatine said, smiling wearily. “Senator Mothma was just leaving. She seemed to have suffered some
sort of collapse.”
“Ah,” Windu nodded his head, and exchanged glances with the diminutive green Jedi Master at his side.
“No, you are indeed quite on time, my friends,” Palpatine said, standing. “Ah, it is good to see you again, young Skywalker!”
The weariness of his earlier smile was replaced by genuine warmth at seeing the young man with the group of Jedi. “Come
here, come here,” he said as he gestured at one of the viewscreens behind his chair. “I seem to recall you had an interest in
cybernetics. I think you’ll enjoy this. I have such wonderful things to show you.”
Mace Windu’s heart skipped a beat.
I have such wonderful things to show you.
Those very words had been whispered to him once upon a time, on a distant planet swept by rains. He had been a Padawan at
the time, and yet that black-cloaked specter had known his name. It had offered to make him powerful beyond his wildest
dreams, if only he would embrace the dark side of the Force...
“Master Windu?” Obi-Wan Kenobi placed his hand on Windu’s elbow. “Are you all right? What’s the matter?”
Windu shook his head. It had been over thirty years since his chance encounter with that phantom menace in the bowels of
the Krath’s hidden fortress. Why in all the stars had a random comment by this honest statesman jogged that memory?
“Nothing,” he said, clearing his thoughts. “Nothing. I was thinking of an unrelated thing.”
On the other side of the room with Anakin Skywalker, Palpatine laughed.
| This site is for informational and entertainment purposes only. No copyright infringement of any kind is intended. Star Wars and related materials are © Lucasfilm Ltd., which reserves all rights thereto. All original material is © Julius Sykes. Please do not use without permission. |
This short story was originally published in late 2004. It was republished on 26 January 2007.