فصل 23

UNDER THE MIDNIGHT SUN

Just arrived on the Hunters Moon, Sidious studied Plagueis as the Sith Lord and his droid, 11-4D, viewed a holorecording of a black-robed Zabrak assassin making short work of combat automata in his home on Coruscant, some hovering, some advancing on two legs, others on treads, and all firing blasters.

Twenty years had added a slight stoop to the Muuns posture and veins that stood out under his thinning white skin. He wore a dark green utility suit that hugged his delicate frame, a green cloak that fell from his bony shoulders to the forts stone floor, and a headpiece that hewed to his large cranium. A triangular breath mask covered his ruined, prognathus lower jaw, his mouth, part of his long neck, and what remained of the craggy nose hed had before the surprise attack in the Fobosi. A device of his own invention, the alloy mask featured two vertical slits and a pair of thin, stiff conduits that linked it to a transpirator affixed to his upper chest, beneath an armored torso harness. He had learned to ingest and imbibe through feeding tubes, and through his nose.

Seen through the Force, he was a nuclear oval of mottled light, a rotating orb of terrifying energy. If the Maladian attack had weakened him physically, it had also helped to shape his etheric body into a vessel sufficiently strong to contain the full power of the dark side. Determined never again to be caught off guard, he had trained himself to go without sleep, and had devoted two standard decades to day-and-night experimentation with midi-chlorian manipulation and attempts to wrest a few last secrets from the Force, so that he—and presumably his human apprentice—might live forever. His inward turn had enabled him to master the equally powerful energies of order and disorder, creation and entropy, life and death.

You have made him fearsome, Plagueis remarked without turning from the recording, as the athletic Zabrak cleaved a Colicoid Eradicator droid down the middle and whirled to cut two others in half. The yellow-eyed humanoids hairless head bore a crown of small horns and geometrical patterns of black and red markings.

Fearless, as well, Sidious said.

Still, they are only droids.

Hes even more formidable against living beings.

Plagueis looked over his shoulder, his eyes narrowed in question. Youve fought him in a serious way? Reconstructed vocal chords and trachea imparted a metallic quality to his voice, as if he were speaking through an enunciator.

I stranded him on Hypori for a month without food and with only a horde of assassin droids for company. Then I returned to goad and challenge him. All things considered, he fought well, even after I deprived him of his lightsaber. He wanted to kill me, but was prepared to die at my hand.

Plagueis turned fully to face him. Rather than punish him for disobedience, you praised his resolve.

He was already humbled. I chose to leave his honor intact. I proclaimed him my myrmidon the embodiment of the violent half of our partnership. Partnership? Plagueis repeated harshly.

His and mine not ours.

Regardless, you allowed him to believe that he is more skilled than he actually is.

Did you not do the same for me?

Plagueiss eyes reflected disappointment. Never, Sidious. I have always been truthful with you.

Sidious bowed his head in acknowledgment. I am not the teacher you are. Plagueis spent a long moment observing the holorecording. The Zabraks fists and legs were as lethal as his lightsaber, and his speed was astounding. Who applied the markings?

The mother did—in keeping with rituals enacted shortly after birth. An initiation, during which a Dathomirian Zabrak infant is submerged in an oily bath, energized with ichor conjured by the Nightsisters use of magicks. A peculiar decision, given her hope to send the child into hiding. The Nightsisters rarely leave Dathomir, but Nightbrothers are sometimes sold into servitude. I believe the mother wished him to be aware of his heritage, wherever he ended up.

On seeing the Zabraks lightsaber produce two blades, Plagueis drew in his breath. A saber-staff! The weapon of Exar Kun! Did he construct that? The prototype was two lightsabers he had welded pommel-to-pommel in imitation of the Iridonian zhaboka. I furnished the knowledge that allowed him to improve on the original design and construct the one he is using. Plagueis watched as droid after droid was impaled on the opposing crimson blades. It strikes me as unnecessary, but I wont deny his mastery of the JarKai technique. Again, he turned to Sidious. Niman and teräs käsi will never substitute for dun möch, but I appreciate that you have trained him to be a fighting machine rather than a true apprentice.

Thank you, Master.

Plagueiss eyes wrinkled—in suspicion? In amusement?

I agree with you that he should bear witness to the Yinchorri attack on the Jedi Temple.

I will tell him. He already thinks of the Jedi as abominations. The sight of their sanctuary being violated will quicken his blood.

Even so, hold him back. Let his anger and hatred fester. Sidious bowed his head.

Plagueis deactivated the holoprojector. The gift you requested for him is nearly complete. Raith Sienar has agreed to have the vessel delivered to Sojourn, and I will arrange to have it brought to the LiMerge Building. He made a beckoning motion with his fingers. Come, Darth Sidious, there is much to discuss.

The ancient fort had never felt more forlorn. A company of Sun Guards still resided on Sojourn, escorting visitors to the surface and keeping the groundbased turbolasers in good working order. Authentication codes were still required for ships entering Sojourn space, but the moons coordinates were no longer the secret they had once been. For the most part Plagueis had lived like a hermit among his droids, seldom venturing offworld, though continuing to use his vast wealth and influence to support those organizations that furthered the Sith cause and crush the plans of those he opposed. For the first year following the attack, rumors swirled that Hego Damask was dead, but word gradually began to circulate that he was merely living in seclusion on Sojourn. Four years later, the annual Gatherings had resumed, but only for five years, and now there hadnt been a Gathering in more than a decade. Fewer and fewer beings had attended the events in any case, many having distanced themselves from Damask in the wake of the murders on Coruscant.

During the long period between the Grans sneak attack and the first Gathering of the new era, Sidious had spoken with Plagueis only by holo. Left to progress on his own, he had trained the Zabrak in secret on Mustafar, Tosste, and Orsis, visited several Sith worlds, and spent considerable time studying the Sith texts and holocrons that remained under guard on Aborah. From the Sun Guards, Sidious heard that Damask had locked himself away in the fort and was scarcely seen. On the few occasions Damask had summoned them, they had found the living quarters in shambles, some of the experimental subjects dead in their cages or cells, and many of the droids malfunctioning. Creatures from the surrounding greel forests had invaded and taken up residence in the place, making nests in the turrets and devouring anything edible. While Damask— unwashed, emaciated, erratic in his behavior—had seemed capable of speech, it was 11-4D who had communicated Damasks orders and requests to the guards.

At one point, the guards had been ordered to install more than two hundred holoprojectors in what had been the forts armory, so that Damask could both monitor current events and immerse himself in historical recordings, some of which dated back hundreds of years.

Sidious knew that his own powers had increased tenfold over the decades, but he couldnt be certain he had learned all of Plagueiss secrets—his sorcerers ways, as the Sun Guards referred to them—including the ability to prevent beings from dying. He sometimes wondered Was he a level behind? Two levels behind? Such questions were precisely what had driven generations of Sith apprentices ultimately to challenge their Masters. The uncertainty about who was the more powerful. The need to test themselves, to face the definitive trial.

The temptation to take the mantle by force, to put ones own spin on the power of the dark side—as Darth Gravid had attempted, only to set the Sith back countless years …

And so it had been left largely to Sidious to bring the same fervor to the manipulation of events in the mundane world that Plagueis brought to the manipulation of midi-chlorians. Instead of challenging each other, they had both dedicated themselves to executing the Grand Plan. Political mastery and mastery of the Force. Someday soon, the Sith would wield both, with Sidious the face of the former and Plagueis behind the scenes, advising him about the latter. Like Plagueis, Sidious had moved judiciously, for unintended repercussions in the real world could be as damaging to the Sith imperative as blowback from the Force.

The fact that the Force had not struck back argued that their partnership was something unique and in accordance with the will of the Force. Plagueiss selfimposed isolation had taken a toll on some of the plans he and Sidious had engineered for the Trade Federation and other groups. But Plagueis had made what amounted to a full recovery from his injuries, and the dark side was no longer simply on the ascendant but risen and climbing toward the zenith.

The Yinchorri Crisis was the first time that Plagueis had sanctioned Sidiouss direct involvement in galactic events. Until then, events manipulated by the Sith had been accomplished through the use of intermediaries. But when Sidious enlisted the aid of the Devaronian smuggler to instigate the Yinchorri, he had not only made contact by holoprojector—without revealing his Sith identity, of course—but also put him in touch with Pestage and Doriana, who had assisted in the dumping of the bodies of the dead Jedi on Valorums threshold and had facilitated the insertion of the Yinchorri warriors tasked with infiltrating the Jedi Temple.

Initially the plan had been devised as a test, to see whether the Forcesuggestion-resistant reptilian sentients could be fashioned into an anti-Jedi army.

But in the same way that repeated attempts at replication by cloning had failed, all efforts to fashion them into an obedient army had proved futile. Custom-made for aggression they were, but also unpredictable and unruly. As a result, a redesigned stratagem had been put into motion to test Valorums ability to manage a crisis and the Senates resolve to end one. But neither Plagueis nor Sidious had expected the Supreme Chancellor to involve the Jedi, and now the modified plan was at risk, as well.

Its well and good that Jedi have died, Plagueis was saying as he, Sidious, and 11-4D entered his cluttered study, but we must guard against revealing our hand too soon. Was it wise to have the corpses shipped to Coruscant? They had the intended effect on Valorum, Sidious said.

Nevertheless, we may have misjudged him.

Hes more concerned about his legacy than he is about the Republic, but he may yet win a majority of the Senate over to his side, even at the cost of all his political cachet.

We need to engineer a crisis from which he cant recover, Plagueis said.

I have set just such events in motion.

Plagueis nodded in satisfaction. Then perhaps there is a beneficial side to this. If the Senate approves an embargo, he will be indebted to you. Sidious smiled tightly. A blockade enacted for a blockade broken. To that end, we must begin to move Viceroy Nute Gunray and King Veruna into position. The Neimoidian was partnered with Valorum during the Stark Conflict. This time we will pit them against each other.

I knew Gunray slightly when he served as a Senator. He is acquisitive and ambitious, but oddly immune to intimidation. We will need to win him over. And so we shall with procurements that will earn him a position among the seven who make up the Trade Federation directorate.

How should we approach him?

The gift you requisitioned for the Zabrak prompted an idea, Plagueis said.

Gunray is fond of pylats, which the Neimoidians associate with wealth. The avians are abundant on Neimoidia, but Sojourns forests support a rare redspotted white one, which the Kaminoans supplied. He will never identify it as a clone.

A gift from Hego Damask or Senator Palpatine?

Plagueis looked him up and down. From Darth Sidious, I think. Sidious stared at him in doubt. By name?

Not merely by name, but by title, as well. It is time we make our presence known to a select few.

Will the Sith title have any meaning for him?

When we make his dreams come true.

Plagueis began to pace the cool floor. No Sith have ever been in the position in which we now find ourselves, Darth Sidious in step with the reemergence of the dark side, fortified by the signs and omens, certain that revenge and victory are near at hand. If the Jedi would abide by their philosophy of acting in accordance with the Force, of doing what is right, they would roll over for the dark. But they resist. Yoda and the rest of the Council members will double their meditation sessions in an effort to peer into the future, only to discover it clouded and unknowable. Only to discover that complacency has opened the door to catastrophe.

If indeed they have been acting in accordance with the Force, how could we be succeeding in tipping the balance? How could the dark side be gaining ground? In fact, the Jedi have fallen away from their self-assigned duty, their noble path. Could they have prevented it? Perhaps by having remained in control of the Republic, by electing and reelecting Jedi Supreme Chancellors. Or perhaps by absenting themselves completely from the affairs of the Republic, and attending to their arcane rituals in the belief that right thinking by them would keep the Republic strong and on course, the galaxy tipped into the light, instead of having allowed themselves to become marshals and enforcers. He cast a questioning look at Sidious. Do you see the grand error of their ways? They execute the Republics business as if it were the business of the Force! But has a political body ever succeeded in being the arbiter of what is right and just? How easy it is for them to bask in self-assurance in their castle on Coruscant. But in so doing, they have rendered themselves ill equipped for the world we have spent a millennium bringing into being.

He cleared his throat.

Were going to back them into a contradiction, Darth Sidious. Were going to force them to confront the moral quandary of their position, and reveal their flaws by requiring them to oversee the conflicts that plague their vaunted Republic.

Only Dooku and a handful of others have grasped the truth. All those years ago when I first met him on Serenno, I thought What a blow it would be to the Order if he could be enticed to leave and embrace the dark side. What a panic it might incite. For if one could leave, then ten or twenty or thirty could follow, and the hollowness at the center of the Order would be plain for all to see. The Muuns eyes narrowed. One cant be content to abide by the rules of the Jedi Order or the Force. Only by making the Force serve us have we prevailed.

Eight years ago we shifted the galaxy, Darth Sidious, and that shift is now irreversible.

Approaching, he rested his bony hands on Sidiouss shoulders. On my first visit to your homeworld I recognized it as a nexus in the Force. And I remember thinking how appropriate it was that the dark side should be hiding on such a beautiful planet. He paused, straightened, then asked with sudden gravity, Is Veruna ready, Sidious? Im concerned that he might be as uncontrollable as the Yinchorri, and that a more malleable leader would better serve our interests. Sidious considered the question. It may not be necessary to remove him, Master. Like Gunray, he favors wealth over honor.

Plagueis nodded his head slowly. Then nudge him, Darth Sidious. And let us see which way he leans before we decide his fate.