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schmeesky · 1 year

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Child of the Beast

Opening - Chapter 1: Protostar

He had been given charge of the placement of a single stepping stone. Just one. Get the Senate's attention by blockading Naboo. And for just a moment Darth Plagueis himself had thought that maybe, just maybe, his apprentice had inherited his tenacity in seeing a plan through, but then came the first “complication”. Supreme Chancellor Valorum assured Senator Palpatine in a private audience that he’d be handling this matter personally since he’d headed the change in taxes that had spurred the federation into action. Informing him that he’d be sending two Jedi Knights as his ambassadors to the Trade Federation to assure a quick and peaceful resolution to the blockade of the senator’s home planet. Palgueis was not pleased and he was not pleased that Darth Sidious had let this come to pass.

“It is too soon for their involvement.” He hissed walking side by side with Sidious down the hallway that led back to the senate offices. “What should I have said?” The younger Sith asked with mild amusement “No, please do not send the best negotiators in the Galaxy to speak on the behalf of my people?” “You should have raised concerns about their involvement, sending the Jedi could be seen as an act of aggression.” “I assure you, my Master, I did,” Palpatine said in a voice he normally reserved for soothing his constituents while having to jog a little to keep up with the irritated Muun’s long strides. “Unfortunately Valorum is, as you well know, infatuated with their order. He could not be swayed and with the Jedi masters there in person assuring me as well I could not use the Force to help him see my perspective.”

Plagueis’s unseen grimace deepened. “The asset on Naboo must be removed.” He said finally looking down at Sidious. “I want it taken to the facility on Behpour.” “I will see it done.” They split, Palpatine going down the hall toward his office to do as his master bade and Plagueis carrying on to the lift that would take him down to a waiting speeder. Inside though he stilled and reached out into the Force for answers and possibilities. Receiving ill news clearest.

The moment the door to the speeder was shut beside him by his driver he flicked open the center console communicator. “Magister?” 11-4D answered on the first alert, reliable as ever. “Contact my agent on Naboo. I want him to have eyes on the Jedi the moment they land.” “Contacting him now.” “Tell him they will arrive with the droids and should be easy enough to spot.” “Yes, Magister.” Plagueis slammed the communicator shut and sat back in his seat to brood, looking up at the storm begining to gather over Coruscant, foretelling of the encroaching darkness.

“Pew pew pew!” On the surface of Naboo, in a lonely apartment in Theed on the outskirts of the city’s central square among messily painted images of Corasount’s Heaviside scrapers on delicate silk scrolls stuck with much too many adhesive strips to very expensive looking antique furniture played a child with a tattered old rancor plush.

“Raaaahr! RAAAAHR” It was missing an eye and a very well-loved, but that did not seem to be slowing it down in the mind of the child who was using it’s little arms to smack at the buildings and speeders made out of knickknacks and baubles once held in the furniture. “Aaaaaugh!” The child reared back and with all the strength in her little arms threw the creature into the ‘traffic’ she’d laid out in rows among the towers making the toy send things flying this way in that. “It’s a cat-ass-trophy!” That was the biggest word she knew and she could never quite say it right.

“Miss Cevé?!” “Nh?” She turned to see who was calling, very startled. No one was supposed to be there. Not until around six when the droid would arrive from her father’s favorite restaurant to deliver her dinner and it wasn’t that late yet. The child quickly picked up her stuffed creature and pulled open one of the cabinets her drawings were hung from, hiding inside before pulling the door nearly closed. It was a man’s voice, a familiar one, but not familiar enough for her to go running to it and so she went quiet and still.

Watching through the crack in the cabinet until the man seeking her stumbled onto her play scene, tripping over one of the ‘cars’. “Dammnit-” He barely caught himself, having to grab the cabinet she was hidden in. He had to quickly smother his growing frustration calling again to her in a honied voice “Miss Cevé? Your father sent me to fetch you. Are you,” He moved some of her ‘toys’ with his foot “Playing a game? Hunter and prey?” adding a little fake laugh at the end that made her frown. It was Greejatus.

She did not like mister Greejatus despite him being one of her father’s oldest friends. He said rude things about her grandfather under his breath when he thought no one could hear him.

Cevé was at her core, at least at this point in her life, a good girl and felt that obedient pull of her nature when he said her father sent him, but… she was also a little too much like her father and so she kept still and silent until he moved on with a low grumble of “Where are you, brat?” She crept out of the cabinet and tiptoed to hide behind a large planter.

Now the apartment backed up to one of Theed’s famous canals. She looked from the water to where the man had gone into the house and smiled just slightly. “Ah!” A loud CATHUNK echoed in the canal as something hit the surface of the water. By the time Greejatus came running out to see why there had been a scream, Cevé was gone and the only sign of her was the now soaked stuffed rancor she was always seen with floating slowly downstream “Oh…kark.” He ran to the edge, hands in his hair. “Kark, kark, kark! Cevé?! Cevé!” There was no answer, only a few bubbles lazily floating up from something that had recently sunk below the surface. “He’s going to kill me.”

He whispered, voice meek with horror. He was standing right on the edge. It felt like the wind, but it wasn’t. Something pushed him. Something without hands. The pressure just behind his knees made them buckle and he went careening down into the shallow water face first earning a loud slap when he broke the surface tension. Stunned by the push, the fall, the chill of the water, and coming face to face with a submerged potted plant, it took Janus took a moment before resurfacing. When he did he found himself looking up at that horrid cat-faced child, hugging her wet toy while giggling at him. Satisfied with herself beyond measure by the look of it. Her grandpa was sure to be proud of her shenanigans in his honor.

“There you are.” He snarled through clenched teeth. He didn’t know how, but he knew she pushed him. And he was right. Her head tilted as she watched him wade up to the edge of the canal and attempt to pull himself out. It took a few attempts and some struggling when he managed to get most of himself up, but he eventually managed to hop up high enough to roll onto the walkway. Cevé, of course offered, a helping hand. Grabbing one of his legs by his pants to pull it up with all the strength a single child’s arm could offer. Refusing to put down her toy for him.

“Your father sent me.” He repeated after taking a moment to crawl to his feet, straighten his hat, and collect what little of his pride survived the plunge into the canal. “Is he back from Coruscant?” She asked standing on her tiptoes in excitement. “No.” The child frowned but didn’t react otherwise. Used to that answer. “Oh.” “I’m here to take you to the hangar, he’s sent for you.” Sent for her? She couldn’t remember that happening before, but the joy that blossomed in her chest quickly overwhelmed any confusion and the prior disappointment. “Really?!” “Go pack your things.” “Yay! Yay! OH YAY!” She hugged the soaking wet man’s leg and then ran off, only tripping over her own feet once in her rush to her room.

She’d never packed her own things before. Her grandfather always packed her things for her. He was very good at it. Cevé grabbed her My Little Zalaaca backpack from under her bed and hurriedly began stuffing the few clothes she had into it and a silk satchel of something that jingled, only pausing for just a moment to carefully retrieve a large locket hung from a black ribbon from inside her bedside table and put it on, tying the ribbon in a big bow. Running back to Greejatus, she bounced on her toes. Ready to go.

Her collector was just relieved she was too happy about this blip of attention from her father to further torment him. She was somewhat known for it, but all the Palpatines were. Like daughter, like father, like grandfather he supposed. A linage of never knowing when enough was enough. He ushered her along, at one point picking her up by her backpack to lift her over a puddle and not being able to help, but smile at her excited “Wee!”.

Keeping her cheer was paramount, Greejatus thought, to get her across the city quickly, especially on foot. It would take hours and silently he found himself damning the performative decision of the Naboo elite to forbid speeders and such things inside the city walls, opting for foot traffic instead without any thought to public transport. Why would they thing of such things? They never ventured far from the palace. “Mister Greejatus, I’m hungry.” He groaned, but glanced down at the child. She looked up at him with a pair of plasma blue eyes. It struck him in the moment that they were just like her father’s and what was once an innocent gaze turned into something sinister. His chest tightened and Greejatus stammered “Right. Right- I’ll… we’ll get something.” What he did know is they didn’t have time to waste. The plan was in motion, a two-ton boulder just beginning it’s plummet down a hill.

#darth plagueis #star wars #darth sidious #sheev palpatine #hego damask #friend works #STAR WARS STANS #fanfiction #original character #oc #phantom menace #star wars legends

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