To Heal Poignancy ■ TECH - The Bad Batch ■

Preparations

The charity event arrived quicker than Adla expected it to. Being back on Naboo was very much a stressful time for the Senator. There was so much to do and so little time. It didn't help that she had Sola Naberrie breathing down her neck. Sola did none of the work but spoke all of the criticism. Nothing was good enough for her; there was no pleasing the woman.

Adla had to pathetically duck out of the room any time she saw Sola. She was tired of listening to the older woman. She had even cut off a conversation she was having about the tablecloths to literally sprint across the room to the exit. Sola believed the color of the decorations should have been black and silver. Adla thought the colors would have been too depressing, and would resemble more of a funeral. The charity event was a way to celebrate Padme's life. So, she ordered white, orange, and green decorations. Each color had a meaning too. The white represented goodness and safety, while orange was for hope and optimism, and finally green was growth, renewal, and peace. Orange and green also happened to be Padme's favorite colors. They were also the Naboo colors, so Adla thought it worked perfectly.

Sola had not liked that one bit. It had been a massive argument where their arms were being thrown in all different directions, their faces got really close to each other and really red from the intensity of their exchanged words. Frankly, all of Sola's ideas were less than great. She had wanted a ten foot ice sculpture of Padme to stand by the drinks and hors d'oeuvres table, which was just too flashy and expensive. Ten foot ice sculptures were reserved for extravagant birthday parties, not humble banquets. She also wanted the servers to wear Padme's Queen headpiece and be styled in her Queen makeup. There had been an argument after Adla reminded Sola that most of the servers were droids.

Adla had learned after a while to just do what she thought would be best since she was technically the one planning all of it. She had tried to compromise with Sola in the beginning, saying perhaps instead of white as one of the colors, they could do the silver that Sola wanted. Unfortunately, if it wasn't exactly how Sola wanted it then it wasn't sufficient at all.

Elegant streamers in those three colors hung and fell beautifully from the ceiling of the Queen's ballroom. Queen Apailana had been gracious enough to let them use the ballroom. The plates were white, the napkins were a brilliant emerald green, and the chalices were a burnt orange. The place looked quite lovely, in Adla's opinion. It almost felt comforting and peaceful to her, in a way. Which was good, because she believed it was the reason as to why she hadn't strangled Sola yet.

Adla had a hand stuck to the roots of her hair and was constantly running her tongue over her teeth. For preparations, she dressed down from her usual extravagant senator garb. She had on a simple and comfortable forest green dress to help her move around. Her elbows were pointed outward to air out the sweat that seemed to pour from her underarms, her fingers lightly pulled the fabric directly under her armpits away from her skin.

Three people surrounded her, each with their own question for Adla to answer. She wanted to scream as she stared wide-eyed at each of them. The box in her hands felt heavier every moment she stood stationary. They all crowded around her, trying to get her to answer their question first.

A Naboo guard approached the Senator and lightly tapped her on the shoulder. When she turned her head towards him he leaned in to tell her that the security team had entered the atmosphere. Her eyes lit up as she nodded to the guard and thanked him. She placed her box down before she turned back to the others surrounding her.

"If you would all excuse me, I have somewhere to be. Do what you feel is right. When I come back later, if I don't like it I'll just let you know, okay?"

She did not wait for a response before she quickly left the ballroom. She hurried down the corridors in a light jog. She passed by TC-6O and asked her to get the outfits ready. When she made it to a private hangar, the ramp to the Havoc Marauder had yet to finish descending.