The Senator And The Jedi

Chapter Twenty-Seven: A Shocking Discovery

Ahsoka

Ahsoka watched as Count Dooku stepped out from behind one of the tall, stately pillars that stood at intervals across the Throne Room. Immediately, six commando droids, but he waved them away. Everyone present knew that he was more than dangerous enough on his own.

"What do you want?" Ahsoka demanded.

Dooku raised an eyebrow. "I hope you are aware that is a very unspecific question... with a very broad range of answers."

The count waited for a moment as if expecting a reply, but Ahsoka wasn't about to give him the satisfaction. She had to watch her step – Dooku was the type of person who could find a way to use anything you said against you.

"There are a lot of things I want, Ahsoka Tano," he continued. "I want the Jedi to see the error in their ways; I want to reform the governments of this galaxy into a system free of the corruption of the higher orders; I want the war to come to an end with the Republic coming to terms with the mistakes they have made."

"No. What do you want with him?" Ahsoka gestured back with a nod of her head to where Lux sat behind her on the floor, not daring to move for fear of being shot by the dozens of blasters trained on him.

"My only wish is to finish what I started." Dooku smoothened out his cape behind him and seated himself on the Queen's throne as if it belonged to him. "But how that comes about is your choice entirely."

She looked back at Lux again. He was partially obscured from Dooku's sight by her skirt as if trying to hide, but, much to her surprise, his features were totally calm. He had the look of someone who had a plan on his face.

And in a moment, she realized why: slowly but surely, his fingers were inching across the floor, getting closer and closer to her left boot holster. Ahsoka just had to keep Dooku talking long enough for him to reach it.

"What does that mean?" she growled.

"As you are probably aware, there is quite a bit of bad blood between the Senator and myself. He orchestrated a Death Watch attack on Raxus Prime, and assisted a band of terrorists in overthrowing a legitimate Separatist government." Dooku leaned back in the throne, putting the tips of his fingers together as if deep in thought. "But I am a forgiving man, Senator. I would be more than happy to overlook the... less desirable parts of your record, should you decide to join the Separatist Alliance on the behalf of Onderon."

"If you think I would join you after what you did to me – after what you did to my mother – then you are a fool," Lux spat.

"But you see, I did not think that. But for the sake of diplomacy, I knew there would be no harm in asking," Dooku said, rising to his feet once more. "In fact, I took the precaution of providing you with some alternative means of persuasion."

"How do you mean?" Lux asked, his voice considerably softer now but still every bit as spiteful.

"Every day you have spent in the last few weeks here on Naboo, you have been administered a dose of a lethal virus by one of my operatives. By this point, it will have propagated itself all over your body."

Behind her, Lux froze.

"But have no fear, Senator. The virus remains dormant... for the time being. Whether or not it becomes active is your choice."

Ahsoka knew they had both heard the unspoken question at the end: the choice Dooku was offering Lux would join him, or die. And although she knew Lux would rather die than join the man who had seen to his mother's death, he still had people who needed him alive. Onderon needed its Senator to keep them safe, and the Republic needed strong voices like his to advocate justice and righteousness.

Lux was silent for a long moment, his face a mask of calm but his grey eyes afraid. "Well, I always wanted to go out with a bang," he murmured, so quietly she almost didn't hear it. But she definitely didn't miss what he said next. "Ahsoka, now!"

He grabbed her shoto from the boot holster and leapt to his feet. He lashed out with the lightsaber, and four of the droids went down before their processors could even input the commands into their robotic limbs to fire.

"You're not half bad," Ahsoka admitted, using the distraction to summon her other blade and ignite it. She and Lux stood back-to-back, squaring off against the remaining commando droids.

"I did a lot of fencing when I was younger – it's close enough."

Lux leapt forward again fearlessly, slicing through two more droids while Ahsoka deflected incoming blaster fire away from them. It was certainly a change to be wielding only the one lightsaber again to provide cover fire, but perhaps she needed the practice.

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Lux make another swipe towards another droid. But, unaccustomed to the weight of the hilt as he was, his blow were clumsy, and before he could get close enough to hit the skeletal humanoid machine, one of its fellows grabbed his hand and wrenched the blade away.

The lightsaber Ahsoka was wielding followed suite, but this time it was the unbreakable grip of the Force that tore it away from her. Dooku brought Ahsoka's fallen shoto to his side a moment later, the ghost of a smile on his features.

"Very brave of you, boy," Dooku said, looking down the bridge of his nose at where Lux was still trapped in the commando droid's grasp. "But foolish."

Ahsoka raised her fists again. Despite being without a weapon, she was not unarmed: she still had the Force and years of training in hand-to-hand combat. She would take on Dooku, a Sith Lord, with those alone if it would protect Lux.

Dooku turned towards her, inspecting her primary lightsaber. "But there is one thing two pair of you did not take into your calculations: all of the servants in the ballroom have been replaced by my forces." A small, tight-lipped smile crossed his face. "Even though the holograms protecting their identities are far from perfect, no one ever notices a waiter... much less suspects them of being a front meant to conceal a MagnaGuard."

Ahsoka suddenly felt a little sick. As absurd as it was, she realized had been served champagne by the droids that had tried to kill her so many times... and had more than once come close to succeeding.

Her nails dug into her palms as queasiness turned to anger. "So you'll kill all those people if we don't comply?"

Dooku said nothing, but the glint in his eyes was all the answer she needed.

"We'll do what you ask," Lux said, twisting one way and then the other in hopes of freeing himself of the two droids holding him. Dooku nodded to them, and Lux shouldered his way past them, coming to stand beside Ahsoka

A smile that bordered on amiable came to the Sith Lord's face. "Good. We have a lot to discuss."

*LUX HAS BEEN POISONED!! With this shocking information brought to the table, what other propositions could Dooku make as Lux tries his best to bargain for his life... as well as those of all the other party guests? Is there any chance at all that someone will come to their rescue? Or do Ahsoka's friends and allies remain in the dark as to their predicament?

*deep announcer voice* You'll find out in the next chapter...

Hello all! Lux is in mortal danger, Ahsoka is weaponless and in the middle of a bunch of enemy forces, and the party goes on. Fun stuff, fun stuff...

*ducks below lightsabers being thrown at me*

Yeah, I know the thing about Lux using Ahsoka's shoto lightsaber was random. But it looked cool in my head, and I could picture Lux being one of those kids whose parents got him instructors for that sort of thing.

I'll try to get the next chapter written soon. We're getting into the exciting part now as the story is coming to an end. I'm trying to get this book finished by the end of the winter break, which, considering that I don't have much left to write, I think is very feasible.

Next on the list of updates is Stuffy.

Bye guys :D