Midnight in the Garden

Chapter 30: The Tipping Point

The Horuz system.

Far from the Core, a lone Jedi starfighter detached from its hyperspace ring and made its way toward a wall of space dust infinitely high, infinitely wide. Its gray clouds reached out like menacing fingers to grip the tiny ship. For a moment the fighter hovered there, yellow against the grasping dark; then it nudged the clouds aside like a velvet curtain and disappeared within.

Anakin Skywalker could not hear the synthesized bleeps of his droid companion, but the words appeared on his viewscreen: I CAN'T SEE A THING.

"I know it's a little unnerving in here," he said. "Don't worry, Artoo. We'll be through the other side of this in a quarter of an hour."

Things had moved quickly since the Chancellor's announcement. The day after, nominations were taken for an election to be held in three weeks. The delegates of the Senate would be choosing among four candidates: Malastarian senator Aks Moe, Eriadan senator Valeria Ryn, Bail Organa, and Anakin's own wife, Padmé Amidala.

Sereine Valorum, whom Palpatine had promptly fired after his speech and replaced once again with Sly Moore, had plenty of time on her hands and no shortage of ideas. Padmé had been adamant that she didn't want to be Chancellor, but Sereine invited Bail to Padmé's, pretending to have brought Finis over with her, and presented them both a game plan they couldn't refuse.

Pacifist senators were in the minority, she said, so if either Bail or Padmé ran separately, they would lose, probably to Moe, whom Palpatine had endorsed. His statement for the record was that he believed that it was "time for a change," and that "I never intended for this office to become a Naboo oligarchy."

Of course, the real reason for the endorsement was that Moe was one of Palpatine's puppets, and Ryn as well, probably. If either of them were elected it would be as bad as having Palpatine still in office, and possibly worse.

Sereine's solution was to have Padmé and Bail join forces and run as a ticket -- Padmé for Chancellor and Bail as Vice Chancellor, with herself as their campaign manager. Not only would this displace the troublesome Mas Amedda, but with Padmé's vast appeal as the wife of the valiant Hero with No Fear -- enormously popular after such unjust treatment by the Jedi -- her victory would give Sereine four years to groom the less popular Organa to succeed her. Padmé would be free after one term to retire to the private family life she craved, and Bail could serve two terms as Chancellor, for a total of twelve long Palpatine-free years.

When she put it like that, it was impossible to refuse, and both Padmé and Bail had reluctantly agreed.

The announcement was still under wraps. Sereine had three weeks to engineer a victory. She smiled mysteriously and told everyone she had a plan, but so far she hadn't disclosed any of it. For now, she had both Bail and Padmé "considering their options" and making laudatory speeches endorsing each other. Phase II involved Bail's wife, the Alderaanian Queen Breha, who was en route to Coruscant right now, to what purpose no one knew. Sereine had made the Skywalkers and the Organas two dinner reservations at Coruscant's two finest and most exclusive restaurants, and ordered that they must get themselves holographed by the society journalists at all costs. The men must look their most dashing and handsome, and the women their most beautiful, while appearing not to want the attention.

Anakin had a bad feeling he might have to make campaign speeches, and he was not looking forward to it. He wasn't looking forward to being without the twins for a month, either. Citing the previous attempts on her life, Padmé had formally requested that her little ones receive sanctuary in the Temple nursery, and the Council had readily agreed. Although Anakin knew it was for their safety and that they could visit whenever they liked, it had been wrenching kissing them goodbye, and Padmé cried into her pillow every night.