R cloak that hid most of his face from his allies Mysterious Mysterious and powerful Nute reminded himself Somehow Somehow the thought was not as reassuring as he had intended it to be Beside him Daultay Dofine stammered objections and explanations to the Sith Lord’s hologram The ambassadors are Jedi Dofine finished We dare not go against them The holographic image of Sidious shifted You seem more worried about these Jedi than you are about me Dofine came the soft menacing voice I am amused Dofine seemed to shrink Sidious turned Viceroy Viceroy Nute’s skull ridges went cold and he had to force himself to step forward Yes my lord I don’t want that stunted slime in my sight again Sidious said Do you understand Yes my lord Nute said and glared at Dofine until he ran off the bridge This turn of events is unfortunate Darth Sidious went on as if nothing had happened We must accelerate accelerate our plans Begin landing your troops Nute stared completely taken aback Thousands of battle droids stood ready in the holds of his battleships battleships but he hadn’t expected to actually have to use them Ahh my lord is that legal Nute asked tentatively I will make it legal the hooded figure said flatly
Nute shivered Sidious tone left no room for doubts or questions If he can make an invasion legal legal what else is he capable of And the Jedi Nute asked The Chancellor should never have brought them into this Sidious said Kill them immediately Y-yes my lord As you wish Nute stammered automatically Oh no Even he can’t make that legal legal He stared at the dark figure in the hooded cloak and swallowed hard But if I refuse he’ll be angry And facing Darth Sidious is terrible enough when he’s pleased The figure chuckled as if Sidious knew what Nute had been thinking The hologram winked out Nute took a deep breath of relief then turned to the ship’s interior controls A touch of a button switched the main screen to a view of the docking bay where the Republic cruiser sat Another button brought a gun to bear on the cruiser Nute barely hesitated before he pushed the button down The gun fired and the Republic cruiser exploded That was easy enough Nute muttered to himself himself Now for the Jedi Qui-Gon felt the deaths of the cruiser’s crew at once Immediately he sprang to his feet lightsaber in hand He noted with approval that Obi-Wan also sensed the disturbance in the Force and reacted quickly Together they scanned the room weapons R
ready No threat appeared only the protocol droid dithering over its spilled drinks Qui-Gon nodded at Obi-Wan and they turned off their lightsabers The hum of the weapons died In the quiet Qui-Gon heard a faint hissing Gas he called to Obi-Wan He took a deep breath and held it They would have to fight their way out quickly or be overcome R
CHAPTER 2 The holocam in the conference room showed only a-thick green cloud Nute Gunray studied the pic-ture carefully The Jedi must be dead by now he thought He switched to a view of the hallway outside the room where a crowd of skeletal battle droids waited Go in and blast what’s left of them he ordered The droids readied their weapons One of them opened the door and the deadly gas billowed out Nute tensed seeing movement in the cloud but it was only the protocol droid The Jedi are dead he thought with satisfaction He reached to shut off the screen Two humming bars of light one green and one blue swept out of the fog They passed through the nearest battle droids without pausing The droids collapsed cut in half Alarms began to sound Nute leaned forward trying to make sense of the 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 R 18 L 19
