Before - Legends Senator Palpatine goes to Coruscant

Author: Noelie
Timeframe: Pre-TPM
Characters: Palpatine, DarthIshtar's OC
Summary: Palpatine gained influence quietly and slowly. Just a little vignette showing a possible how.

Disclaimer: I only borrowed, I put everything back nicely!

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All good things come to he who patiently waits. He has been sighing that mantra for all his life. The generational long plans of the Sith were coming nicely. Although the original plan was only for domination, he had made a few changes to those ideas of his predecessors for the destruction of anyone that could possibly get in his way. To make a fine point of it, this was not about revenge. It was about winning.

It helped that for the most part the Senate was as he portrayed in his cover life. They, like fowl from agrifarms scurried to and fro, each trying to stuff as much grain into their grasp as possible. Senators for the most part were greedy for the wealth and prestige they felt owed them more than they cared for their homes and constituents. Oh, there were some important exceptions, but they too could be easily dealt with.

Take for example his esteemed colleague from Alderaan. Even now his admiration of her battled with his knowledge that if she made any headway with the fundamental changes in how their constitution was worded, it would set back his plans to a degree. She was honest to a fault, and believed utterly in almost anyone?s ability for good, except for interestingly himself. It wasn?t so much what she said, but the palpable barrier she would put up between them and the fact that in all the years that he had worked with her in the senate, he couldn?t remember her willingly touching his hand. Strange, as she was willing to greet almost anyone in her warm embrace of friendship, even the accursed Jedi.

For a distressing short time, he almost thought that he would have to have a bounty hunter take care of her in his own fashion, but the advent of a suitable marriage prospect and the future possibility of her stepping down for family and children, made it possible for him to wait. Her words and ideas were intriguing however, and in the perfect world that he intended to create for all survivors, they might even fit to a degree. However, in his perfect world the archaic and decaying Jedi religion would no longer be a problem with separation of church and state, it just would not exist.

?My esteemed Senate, please understand I have nothing but the warmest regard and highest respect for the Jedi order, but I believe it was detrimental both to the Jedi, and to our Republic. I agree with the need for security and protection. I would agree that as citizens of our great Republic they certainly have a place and their voice should be heard and influence felt. What I question is why one group of people is to take on our responsibility to keep us safe, to mediate between worlds, and make decisions based on their faith? My gratitude is with the fact that for the bulk of that time they have kept that faith admirably, but is it not time for us to grow up and embrace true principles of freedom and democracy and stop funding a state religion??

He gauged the response around him as she continued on this vein, and with growing alarm began to realize that not only was her reputation gaining attention, which of course he expected with her years of long service, but that the benighted idiots that filled the seats were actually able to hear the wisdom she was quietly teaching.

He would have to handle this most carefully. It would do no good to savage her as he might other, less deserving targets, but he was not above a few low blows.

He spoke up, the model of gentlemanly courtliness and gentility. ?Does my lady mean to keep our galaxy without its best, its highest protection? Do you mean to keep us weakened because those that have sworn to serve their fellow beings with their sabers will no longer have visible means of support??

?My dear Senator from Naboo, do you suggest that there would not be a way for us to go forward with our already trained milita

 

That was really quite profound. I liked the way that Palpatine manipulated the other Senator's argument for the separation of church and state into an more direct villification of the Jedi. You raise some thought provoking issues here.

Nice work!

 

Thank you, that means a great deal coming from you! I have admired much of your work.

 

Noelie, darn you for posting this when I was in Wyoming for the weekend! Was that senator from Alderaan our favorite or a different one? The perspective of Palpatine was particularly wonderful. I'm so glad that you're taking on more writing!

 

Quite provocative, and very interesting. A good story and a subject little tackled. Very good. I like it.

 

To make a fine point of it, this was not about revenge. It was about winning.

How very true.

You've done a great job of showing how the silver-tongued devil manipulates no matter what "face" he's wearing. Good job.

 

Very interesting vignette. I don't think many people write about Palpatine.

 

Ish: Okay, yes you were way, and yes I know I told you I wan't a writer for so long, you had started to believe that. Just remember I still have no clue what I am doing, I have been a reader for so long! When it comes to this I am the child!

Hello Valairy_Scot! You can ask Ish and at least one other person on the board: They always say I think too much about such things. This and other questions have been kicking around my brain for sometime.

Bale:Yes indeed they to tend to do that. On the vein of my thinking too much, I have often wondered at a "real" Palpatine and the true paper and money trail such a person would leave, if you knew what you were looking for.

Just-Plain-Shmi: I thought the whole point was that Shmi wasn't really so "plain" ::grin:: Welcome to the board. Glad you read my little scribble.

 

Superbly done, Neolie! I am always fascinated by politics and when it is written well, it can really be thought-provoking. You did a wonderful job painting the contrast between Palpatine and the Senator. Palpatine manipulates the masses by appealing to their baser fears while the Senator tried to influence individuals by appealing to a higher intellectual or philosophical ideal. They both are very effective tools in the right environment, of course. Our Senator simply didn't realize that you can't appeal to individuals when one who will rouse the masses is right in the room.

Really well done.

 

Great work Noelie!

I liked the analogy of the Senators being like chickens all fighting for the same grain a lot. That idea seems to fit very well with Palpatine's assesment of the Senate in TPM when talking to Padme, when he said something like there being no longer any interest in the common good and everything being run by the bureaucrats.

The separation of church and state is an interesting idea to translate across to the Star Wars universe, and you explored it really well.

And Palpatine, sinister as ever, yet in a more understated way, came across brilliantly. Good job!

 

Superbly done, Neolie! I am always fascinated by politics and when it is written well, it can really be thought-provoking

Me too my friend. There is quite a bit that I do think about, maybe someday it might all come tumbling out...if and when I quit thinking TOO much!

Sorry I had no idea you had responded.

I liked the analogy of the Senators being like chickens all fighting for the same grain a lot. That idea seems to fit very well with Palpatine's assesment of the Senate in TPM when talking to Padme, when he said something like there being no longer any interest in the common good and everything being run by the bureaucrats

Yup, it feels like that watching things these days. EVen if we are on different sides of the ocean and fence I imagine we all sit in frustration at simliar stupidities.

And Palpatine, sinister as ever, yet in a more understated way, came across brilliantly. Good job

I have been long convinced that he pulled off what he did over time, playing it like it was a huge chess board, and yet on hindsight many would see it for what it was.
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That was indeed incredibly profound. I am most impressed, Noelie--quite the intricate weaving of political banter and an amazing focus on Palpatine. He's cruel and sadistic, yet he milks it down with such statements as those. Even for someone like me, it was hard to see beneath his sweet covering (which said what I wanted him to say) to see what he really meant (which was what I didn't want). I can only imagine poor Anakin in the same situation. Great job! For the first thing of yours I have ever read, I don't see about your shyness in your signature. I believe you have quite enough talent of your own.

 

That was indeed incredibly profound. I am most impressed, Noelie--


Thank you so much Luna! I am glad you found it.