“You’ll have to step back now, ma’am,” the droid said.
The medical droids were rustic, but efficient. Before long, Anakin was unconscious and they were working on his legs. Shmi had to look away when the bones started moving. There was only so much her heart could take.
“Someday it won’t be always,” she said. And it was a promise to them both.
Yoda sat in a small garden in the Jedi Temple where he was usually left alone. Today, however, his meditations were interrupted by Mace Windu, who had come all the way out to talk to him even though they had just been in the Council chamber a few hours before.
“Questions not fit for the others, you have?” Yoda asked as Windu took a seat on the grass beside him. “Embarrassing, are they?”
“No, Master Yoda,” Windu said. He had never responded well to Yoda’s particular brand of humor, even as a youngling. It was one of the reasons Yoda kept it up.
Yoda let him sit on it for a while longer, until finally the younger Jedi cracked.
“You sense something,” Windu said. “Something you haven’t told anyone else about.”
“So clever you are, Master Windu,” Yoda said. “And so close to the truth. But think you not in the right direction, I say.”
“What other direction is there, Master?” Windu asked. “Either you sense something or you sense nothing.”
Yoda took another moment to not reply. If he waited long enough, they almost always figured it out on their own. It was his favorite method of teaching.
“You sense nothing,” Windu said after a while. “Master, there is always something.”
“Open your mind, Master Windu,” Yoda said. “If sensed nothing is, something must it be.”
Windu leaned forward, resting elbows on knees and chin in hands. He managed to make it look graceful, which was not always easy for human males.
“No,” he said finally. “Nothing can never be something. They are opposites.”
“So sure you are,” Yoda said. “Reassuring, it is. Never so sure of myself am I.”
“You think differently?” Windu said. It was starting to feel like a debate with Qui-Gon, and neither of them really enjoyed those.
“I think I sense nothing,” Yoda said. “Presume anything after that, I do not.”
Yoda waited while Windu thought through his next question. There was no point in asking if Yoda was afraid, because he would only turn the question back, and Windu didn’t enjoy that sort of exposure. All he could do was follow his lessons, the ones he had received as a boy and given as a Knight and Master in the Temple. He must let it go. The Force would tell him when it was time, and he must not allow himself to be distracted by Yoda’s behaviors.
“I trust your judgment, Master Yoda,” he said at last. “I know if there is an answer, you will find it.”
Yoda didn’t respond. Instead, he closed his eyes and reached for the calm of the living Force flowing through him. After a few minutes, he felt Windu get up and leave him alone with his thoughts, which was his favorite place to be.
The light surrounded him, the dark a comfortable distance from the limits of his perception. And yet there was something; rather, there was nothing. And it eluded him completely.
The sunlight through the windows of the throne room gave the marble an opalescent sheen. The glass had been treated to throw rainbows against the ceiling when the light caught it at certain angles, and the wall hangings were muted colors to allow anyone in the room to fully appreciate them. Occasionally, the decorations in the room served as a distraction from what was going on within it, but today no one was looking anywhere other than at the Queen.
Amidala was clad in purple. Her underdress was completely covered by the stiff velvet of her outermost layer, except at her collar, where soft lavender curled around her neck. For the rest, she might have been a statue. The dress was embroidered so heavily that it weighed itself down, instead of using tricks around the hem to make sure everything stayed in place. A deep green sash completed the look. The style was a little severe, which was reflected in Amidala’s stoic expression, and the Queen was covered from wrists to ankles. Her headpiece was unusually simple, consisting of a wig that had been styled with coiled braids in a crown, each highlighted by purple and green gems. A silver comb had been tucked into the back of the braid crown, and a purple veil hung down behind her head.
It had taken Rabé and Eirtaé nearly an hour to secure all the pins that held it in place. Padmé was almost afraid to move her head.
Queen Amidala had requested the presence of the governor and several advisors today. None of them had turned her down, naturally, even though she had given no reason for her summons.
“Governor, representatives,” Queen Amidala said. There was no mistaking the voice now. It was pitched low and grated a bit, but it definitely attracted attention. “We thank you for attending us today.”
“Of course, Your Highness,” Bibble said.
“We wished to inform you that we will be hosting a summit at the Royal Palace in two weeks’ time,” Amidala continued. Since this was news to everyone, they all appeared a bit startled.
“A summit for whom?” the minister of internal affairs asked. After a moment, she added, “Your Highness.”
Amidala nodded to show there were no hard feelings.
“For our counterparts on other planets in the Chommell sector,” she said.
There was a long silence at that.
“Your Highness,” Bibble said reluctantly. He looked desperately uncomfortable. “You’re the only queen in the Chommell sector.”
“You misunderstand us, perhaps, Governor,” Amidala said graciously. “Allow a clarification: we will invite the politicians from those planets who serve as heads of state, regardless of the titles they hold.”
“Your Highness,” said Graf Zapalo, “why?”
“It has come to our attention that our trade overtures were not well received,” Amidala said. This was a slight understatement. Karlinus had immediately responded that they had no surplus, and Jafan had failed to respond at all. “We wanted to invite our counterparts here so that we might discuss matters in person and discover where the problem lies.”
They couldn’t actually stop her. They could make her life difficult, which was why she was telling them at all, but they couldn’t prevent the summit from happening. All they could do was voice their displeasure and make her explain herself in very small words.
“Your Highness,” Bibble said, “surely the matter of a bit of grain is not so important that we have to take such drastic measures. It could be seen as confrontational.”
She had expected Bibble to be her staunchest ally in this matter. It was well known that he was as interested in reopening interplanetary relations as she was. In a flash, she knew: he was letting her win them over. Once he stopped protesting, they wouldn’t have any defense left.
“It isn’t just the grain, Governor,” Amidala said. “I want to talk about all trade and relations between the planets in our system.”
“It’s a lofty goal,” Bibble said, conceding the point. “And a worthwhile one, I think.”
“Captain Panaka.” Amidala turned slightly to address him. “Do you have anything to say?”
There was no reason at all to ask her head of security to weigh in at this point. Panaka didn’t hold a legislative position, and he had no say in any decision the Queen came to in terms of policy. Rabé had suggested they ask him in public, however, and Sabé had agreed. He wouldn’t be able to argue too much if there were witnesses.
“There would be a lot to organize, Your Highness,” he said slowly. He knew what they were up to, and they could discuss the practical details later, with fewer witnesses. “In addition to any palace security, we would have to have plans in place for any excursions you took the visitors on.”
“We would take your suggestions into account for anything outside the palace.” It was her peace offering. “You know best the problems we might face.”
She waited to see what Panaka would do. He took a moment, and then proved Rabé correct.
“While I don’t think the security of the Queen has anything to do with the summit directly,” he said, “any relations in the sector would involve planetary security, and that affects both the Queen and the rest of you. It’s not an openly defensive move, but it doesn’t make us look vulnerable either.”
“Thank you, Captain,” Amidala said. She turned back to the advisors.
They looked uncomfortable, but they were out of arguments. She had won, so she could afford to be gracious. She’d do her best to make the summit bother them as little as possible.
“Your Highness,” Zapalo said. “We will await further direction on how we may assist you in this matter.”
“Thank you,” Amidala said.
Bibble reminded them that they had a legislative vote that afternoon, and they took their leave as a group. None of them was grumbling too noticeably, at least. Amidala waited for the room to clear before she turned back to Panaka.
“Captain,” she said.
“I don’t love it,” he said. “But I can see why you want to do it.”
“Thank you for your support,” Amidala said. “I’m sorry we surprised you along with them.”
She would’ve sworn she heard one of the other guards muffle a laugh.
“I do welcome your suggestions, Captain,” she said.
“I’ll come up with more than a few, I’m sure,” Panaka said.
Padmé didn’t doubt it for a second.
Panaka’s list was not as extensive as she had feared. Most of it was common sense. The blast doors that protected the throne room, for example. They were all tested, and when one of them was found to be faulty, the mechanism was replaced. A survey of the palace and grounds was conducted, looking for weak spots in Panaka’s grid, and right behind the guards came a small army of cleaning droids and gardeners to make sure everything was perfect for guests.
They had one argument about the throne itself.
“You want to tear apart a priceless antique and plant a blaster in it?” Amidala demanded.
The corridor outside her suite was not really the place for this argument, but Padmé had been so annoyed when she read the listed item that she barged out into the hall to talk to him about it. Padmé was not overly worried. It wasn’t like anyone on this floor was unaware of her stance on taking arms.
“I won’t tear it apart,” Panaka said. “I was going to let Eirtaé do it. She’s your engineer, after all, and she probably wants a challenge.”
Eirtaé had spent the better part of a month engineering the Queen’s new wardrobe to be as functional as it was ostentatious, and if the number of sketches crowding the desk in the sitting room was any indication, she was hardly bored.
“And the blaster?” Padmé said.
“It’ll be a small model,” Panaka said. “Just a little power cell. And only for emergencies. If you’re going to have foreign dignitaries in there with you, I want you prepared for the absolute worst.”
Padmé leaned back against the window and sighed. Sanandrassa hadn’t admitted very many offworlders to the throne room, and none of them had been violent. Surely no one would be so offended by two years of relative silence from Naboo’s monarch that they would attack her in her own throne room. Yet Panaka was usually open to modifiying his plans, if they discussed them with him. Over Panaka’s shoulder, she could see Sabé. Her face was carefully neutral.
“It wouldn’t hurt to expand your experience with weapons, Your Highness,” Sabé said carefully. It sounded like she was awarding the point to Panaka, which was not quite what she was doing.
Whenever Padmé complained that she felt pushed into a corner by the demands of her guards, court, or colleagues, Rabé would remind her that it was easier in the long run to agree now and then press her advantage later. If they let Panaka have this, then Eirtaé would design something Padmé approved of, and Panaka would still think he had won. This was how Sabé reminded her of that. It wasn’t a particularly subtle code, but the words they used were different every time, and so far, it had worked well enough.
“What if there were two blasters?” Padmé asked. Panaka was clearly surprised. “I mean, if I’m the only one who has one, there’s not much point. If we’re going to arm one person, we might as well arm two.”
“I can make it work with two,” Eirtaé said.
“I like it,” Panaka said, and it was decided.
“Very well, Captain,” Padmé said. “Eirtaé will have designs to you the day after tomorrow. Do you have anything else that needs to be done this evening?”
“No, Your Highness,” Panaka said. “Thank you.”
Padmé went back into the suite and sank with a huff into a chair in the sitting room as soon as the door was closed.
“Even if we never use it, I’ll always know it’s there,” Padmé said. “I’ll always know that we think we might have to be scared of our neighbors.”
“You’ll be the only one who can open it,” Eirtaé promised. That was something, at least. No one was going to break the blasters out willy-nilly. “And I’ll make sure I don’t ruin the throne.”
“Thanks,” said Padmé drily. She let Yané and Saché take her headpiece off now that they were in for the night, and accepted the facecloth from Rabé to clean her makeup off.
“The advisors are coming around,” Saché reported when she returned from the dressing room. “Several of them were asked about the summit after the legislative session today, and they all managed to answer without looking like they disapprove.”
“I guess there’s a reason Bibble keeps getting elected,” Rabé commented.
They watched Eirtaé sketch the blaster cabinets and listened to her talk out loud about her plans until Sabé began to second-guess them, and the conversation turned snarky.
“Just let me build a prototype before you dismiss it completely,” Eirtaé finally said. “You’re missing the whole point, and honestly, I’m starting to think you’re doing it on purpose.”
Sabé opened her mouth to make a reply, and then shut it firmly when she saw Padmé’s expression.
“Can you pick nonmechanical locks, Rabé?” she asked instead. Everyone breathed a sigh of relief.
“Well, it’s closer to slicing than picking,” said Rabé. “But of course I can.”
There were nonmechanical locks on several of Amidala’s jewelry boxes, so Rabé and Yané fetched them from the dressing room, and they all took turns trying to break in without destroying the box.
“At least we didn’t have to ask Panaka for these,” Saché said, laughing gleefully as she finally cracked a lock open on her own.
“I imagine he’d have a few questions, yes,” Rabé agreed. “Now see if you can do it in less than two minutes.”
It took another hour before their times were consistently within Rabé’s targets, and by then, Eirtaé had almost finished building a scale model of the throne with the modifications she wanted to add to the real one. Sabé tested the problem she thought she had identified, and found it didn’t exist.
“You changed it,” she said.
“Of course I did,” Eirtaé told her. “Just because I still don’t think it was a weakness doesn’t mean I’m going to let it pass.”
“You could have said something!” Sabé said.
“And miss the expression on your face right now?” Eirtaé replied. “I don’t think so.”
“This is why Panaka thinks he’s aged ten years since the election,” Saché said. “This right here.”
“Here’s to the next ten, I guess,” Eirtaé said, lifting her teacup in a toast.
“And the ten after that,” said Sabé.
Eirtama had planned every part of the day down to the last detail, and it was not at all her fault that everything went wrong. She’d built the hoverpod based on her own designs, which she had created as an homage (no, she had not stolen them) to a piece used in the fi
rst opera that former Queen Réillata had starred in after her term. She was working with a much more limited budget, of course, and she had to do the whole thing by herself because her parents had sent her to a workshop for actors, which was not at all the same thing as a workshop for stage production, which had been her request.
Her parents were very good at almost getting it.
The opera was a slightly updated piece about the end days of human-Gungan conflicts, the sort of play old people liked because it made them feel safe, which made them willing to donate money to productions put on by students, who universally hated it. The pod was used to represent a sando aqua monster, from whose back the main character attempted to rally Naboo’s tiny naval forces. Eirtama had designed the repulsor lift to accommodate four people. She had been very clear about the weight restrictions. And she had been ignored.
When the fourth soprano stepped up onto the hoverpod, it wobbled a bit alarmingly. But it held steady. In the audience, Eirtama had relaxed. This was going to be amazing. Surely someone would spend enough time looking at the singers to notice that what they stood on was a masterpiece.
Then a fifth soprano entered from the wings and began her ascent.
“Oh no,” Eirtama said. The old woman sitting to her left shushed her quite loudly.
The music began, sound filling the concert hall as the audience prepared itself to be transported to an iconic time in Naboo history that had absolutely not happened. The set piece wobbled again.
“No,” Eirtama said more loudly.
The old woman shushed her again, this time with an elbow to the ribs. Eirtama was pretty sure she was the lead tenor’s relative. He was similarly intolerable.
“No, you don’t understand,” Eirtama tried to explain. “The pod isn’t—”
Before the old woman could shush her a third time, or inflict bodily harm with her elbow, the loud buzz of an overtapped motivator sounded above the orchestra. One of the sopranos hit a note far, far higher than called for by the score as the pod careened wildly across the stage, bucking one of the singers off.
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