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"They proceed apace. Both sides have begun to present their cases in front of the judge already. I picked Judge Laofey personally. He's a good man who will not be swayed by money." Palpatine coughed delicately, looking away. "Unlike so many judges who are forced to rule on senators or other powerful individuals."
The man in question was in Sidious's pocket already, of course. That was why he wouldn't be swayed by money, and he would hand out precisely the penalties and restrictions that Palpatine demanded of him with the proper amount of anger and sadness at how the trials would turn out. It would be the start of what Sidious would publicly claim was a campaign to do away with corruption, which would, of course, run into lots and lots of problems. With that he could begin the work of slowly shifting public opinion in the Core Worlds to a more authoritarian, centralized government, giving his position as Chancellor more power while removing it from the Senate in a very subtle manner.
"Good," Piell nodded firmly. "In that case I will have Gunray released to my purview tomorrow, and he and I will travel to Coruscant that same day. I realize he would normally travel with you, but this way we provide defense on his journey and prevent rumors of collusion or bribery. He will stand in that courtroom and face the crimes he is accused of."
Palpatine nodded. "Indeed, a good idea. I should have thought of that before this. I also have to offer my condolences once again to you and the Order as a whole for your losses here on Naboo. Who would've thought the Trade Federation could ever have come up with a military force dangerous enough to defeat two Jedi?"
"Indeed," the Jedi Master said coolly. "Who would've thought it?"
"Yet surely there were other mitigating circumstances that stayed Master Jinn from performing to his full abilities," Palpatine blithely went on, watching the Lannik Jedi Master's expression and body language closely behind his veneer of sympathy.
The Jedi Master, however, gave nothing away then or during their walk to Palpatine's temporary quarters. So, the Jedi plan to play their cards closely, the fools. They are so predictable! The longer they keep it a secret, the more their actions will seem simply paranoid to the rest of the galaxy, and I can use that backlash against them in the court of public opinion. Yes, all is going to plan. Now I just need to head back to Coruscant and start to influence Anakin, find out who he has been assigned to if anyone and…perhaps perform a personal task…
OOOOOOO
Having returned quickly to Sorenno, Harry and Aayla heard about what had happened, but there was little they could do about it from so distant a position, and they had their own training to concentrate on. This wasn't all lightsaber training for the two padawans, of course. Master Fay helped teach Aayla several healing techniques that she had already taught Harry, Harry's own attempt at teaching them having fallen somewhat flat since he still had quite a bit of trouble with them himself. They continued to learn about galactic politics from Count Dooku, and they learned more about Force Stealth and criminal investigations from Ayla's master, Quinlan. Master Unduli, after giving Knight Vosa a clean bill of mental and physical help, had left Sorenno.
However, Quinlan was often busy helping Knight Vosa in her investigation into the pirate scourge afflicting the D'Astan Sectorand two of its neighboring sectors, Daedalus and Glythe. Quinlan did much of the legwork, heading to the various planets whose shipping was suffering under the pirate attacks and turning any data he discovered over to Komari to go over. She then compared it to data already in the Jedi Order's hands, as well as what Republic Intelligence, a very limited, highly politicized agency, had discovered or not discovered.
He also gathered data directly from local investigators, because most of the planets weren't actually talking to one another. The sectors didn't talk to one another at times. Even planets in the same sector didn't talk on the judicial or investigative level. They left that kind of thing to either the Republic as a whole (who, as Harry put it, obviously weren't doing it so well), or the Bounty Hunters' Guild if a specific criminal escaped from one planetary jurisdiction to another. But as a Jedi, Quinlan could talk to all of them one after another, gathering information and passing it on to Komari to correlate.
Normally as his padawan Aayla would've gone with Quinlan on those missions, but the two of them had decided to leave her with Harry and Master Dooku. Master Dooku's instruction in both galactic politics and lightsaber training was a step above Quinlan's own, and it was not the first time that they had separated from one another short amounts of time.
So generally speaking, the two padawans fell into the same sort of routine that they had before their trip to Coruscant. Master Dooku's days, however, were somewhat different after his talk with Master Windu. He began to organize and then oversee the construction of a much larger training area, the actual construction being carried out by teams of droids and workers. He also ordered lots of different training tools and talked extensively with Lily about teaching and organizing classes.
On top of their daily training, Harry and Aayla used their limited spare time to begin to get a handle on their relationship. The two of them each had a small threadbare room to themselves, separated by a bathroom that they shared. Lily, however, had given them a lecture on going too fast that left both their ears ringing, so for the most part the bathroom was simply a thing rather than a rendezvous point for their relationship.
However, the bathroom did lead to the bit of discord between them, however minor.
Sighing and groaning, Aayla rolled out of bed, not quite awake yet. Last night Master Dooku had decided to wake up the two padawans three times to work on their reaction times in an ambush environment.
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