Darth Sidious (RP)

Darth Sidious, otherwise known as Sheev Palpatine

## Darth Sidious

**Darth Sidious**, also known as Sheev Palpatine, was a Force-sensitive Human male who served as the Supreme Chancellor of the Galactic Republic during the Clone Wars. A Dark Lord of the Sith in the Order of the Sith Lords, recorded by history as the most successful who had ever lived, his deeds resulted in destabilisation of the ancient Republic and the noble Jedi Order from within. Noted for his sadistic and self-serving intentions just as well as his ability to conceal them, Palpatine impacted the galaxy perhaps more than any other single individual, and it is likely that his impact on history, for good or ill, was immeasurable.

Born in 82 BBY on the planet Naboo to the aristocratic House Palpatine, Palpatine discovered the Sith at a young age as a collector of dark side artifacts. In 65 BBY, he met Hego Damask, a Muun businessman who was in reality the Sith Lord Darth Plagueis. Under Plagueis's manipulation, Palpatine killed his father and pledged himself to his new Master's dark side teachings as Darth Sidious. Palpatine lived a double life for many years, serving an untarnished career as Naboo's ambassador in the Galactic Senate while learning from his master and training a young Zabrak as the Sith assassin Darth Maul. Plagueis and Sidious, both exceptionally skilled and powerful in the Force, were able to conceal their identities from the Jedi for decades. As Plagueis privately searched for the key to eternal life, Sidious manipulated galactic politics, culminating in the blockade of Naboo by the Trade Federation. In the wake of the political crisis, the Galactic Senate voted to elect him as Supreme Chancellor, and around the same time, in accordance with Bane's Rule of Two, Sidious murdered Plagueis and usurped the role of Sith Master.

As Chancellor of the Republic and Dark Lord of the Sith, Palpatine orchestrated the outbreak of the devastating Clone Wars ten years after the Naboo Crisis. He himself headed both the Galactic Republic and, secretly, the Confederacy of Independent Systems. The public leader of this splinter faction was former Jedi Master Count Dooku, Sidious's second apprentice as Darth Tyranus in the wake of Maul's presumed death on Naboo. With the assistance of Darth Jar Jar, he was able to get the Senate to give him emergency powers.

Palpatine, in the wake of his plans being compromised in the wake of the portals, temporarily left the Senate for two months under the pretence of illness, while getting Darth Jar Jar to make sure he did not lose his seat of office. During his trip of discovering the source of the portals, Sheev would end up back on Naboo as the source of the disturbance. Finding a dark side Nexus under his old estate, he was able to use it to gain complete control of the portals, being able to manipulate space-time to a massive degree while acquiring great knowledge of the galaxy. He would later be led to Mortis using the knowledge from the Nexus, where he would trick the Mortis Gods into subduing themselves into submission.

Returning back to the Republic, Sidious would be enraged to find out the Jedi were discovering the Byss Lane and that pro-Jedi sentiment was higher than ever, undoing years of his work. He would induct Mandalore into his plans to subvert the Jedi's new reputation.

With the re-emergence of the Sith Empire, Palpatine sensed his apprentice's desire to join the group and finally overthrow his Master. Sidious, acting before Tyrannus could, wiped his and Jar Jar's minds of all details of the Sith Grand Plan. This setback would not stop Sidious, as he immediately formulated new plans to use the Sith Empire to his advantage.

## Biography

### Early Life

Palpatine was born on Naboo, the eldest son of House Palpatine's patriarch Cosinga and his wife. He was raised in his family's ancestral home, Convergence, situated in Naboo's Lake Country, and had at least two brothers and two sisters.

From an early age, Palpatine identified himself as different from his peers and siblings, recognizing a great power within himself, and believing that he was born to lead, which led to an uneasy relationship with his family. His father also perceived his eldest son as different, and would later claim to have divined his murderous nature from the time the latter was an infant. At some point early in Palpatine's life, Cosinga had his son tested to make certain that they were related. Until the end of his life, however, Palpatine's true nature remained a mystery to his father.

Intelligent and highly ambitious, Palpatine desired his family to take on a more active role in Naboo's politics, both to increase their own wealth and power, and also to help their homeworld make the transition into the modern galaxy. He was soon disappointed to learn that he was alone in this ambition, and that his father not only lacked the ability to improve his family's standing, but also arrogantly believed he had all the power there was to be gained. Cosinga's political ambitions never exceeded provincial Naboo—father and son attended two coronations in the capital city of Theed, and for years to come Palpatine would remember Cosinga's envy for the power the monarch wielded. Although Palpatine longed to kill his father, he grudgingly concealed his patricidal desires for years, hiding his true feelings under a mask of simple reactionary rebelliousness. Disgusted by his father's incompetence, and infuriated by his mother's willingness to tolerate the situation of their family, it was not long before Palpatine discontinued the use of his given name as an act of spite. From then on, he demanded to be referred to exclusively by the name of his aristocratic family.

Palpatine recorded, in his preface to the *Book of Sith* (c 19 BBY), that he took a vested interest in forbidden Sith lore as a child. Employing his family's vast wealth, the youth took to the black market, resolving to collect as many inscrutable runes and ancient texts as possible. Enraptured by the secrets revealed with each tome, Palpatine at once recognized the key to realizing his *true* ambition: the acquisition of absolute power. All that remained was opportunity.

#### Education

Throughout his education Palpatine attended some of the most prestigious and exclusive academies in the galaxy, but never remained for long, soon expelled for some petty misdemeanor. Palpatine's list of offenses, while usually minor, was extensive enough that—were he anyone other than a nobleman's heir—he would have been imprisoned in a correctional facility. Sure enough, whatever his son's crime, Cosinga was there, ready and willing to use his influence and credits to make it "disappear." Having been raised to believe that money could solve anything, Palpatine quickly dispensed with traditional notions of morality, instead forging a unique code of ethics for himself; a pedestal on which he placed himself, to be raised above all others.

Although he despised his father, more than any other member of his family, the two were not without their similarities. Aside from an inherited violent streak, both father and son shared an insatiable passion for speeder racing. Palpatine once fondly recounted an occasion from his youth when his father had bought him a state-of-the-art, prototype speeder, more as a bribe than a gift, but one he accepted, nonetheless. Indeed, the only time Palpatine thought well of the man who raised him was when they shared a cockpit together. This was not to last, however, as Palpatine soon crashed the machine, tragically killing two pedestrians in the process. As always, Cosinga bought his son a reprieve, and Palpatine himself never showed the slightest bit of remorse for the incident. Quite the opposite, in fact, if anything, the lack of punishment from the law only served to reinforce the boy's belief in his own invulnerability, and Palpatine insensitively chose this moment to announce his desire to become a professional racer. Cosinga initially banned his son from riding again, but even this feeble attempt at punishment did not last long. After many tantrums, Palpatine wore his father down, who eventually relented, and Palpatine went on to race competitively, and successfully.

### Darth Plagueis and Darth Sidious

In 67 BBY, the Sith Lord Darth Plagueis murdered his Master, Darth Tenebrous, on Bal'demnic. Tenebrous's disembodied consciousness accessed his apprentice's body and Force senses through the maxi-chlorian retrovirus and saw a vision of the future, in which Plagueis's apprentice killed him before he had the chance to complete his life's work, which Tenebrous believed was the creation of the Chosen One. The Dark Lord panicked and abandoned Plagueis's body. The mysterious apprentice in Tenebrous's vision was invisible to his Force sense, and he only perceived him as *the shadow*. On Naboo, the young Palpatine was waiting for a chance to join the Sith, and this turn of events was the first step towards bringing Plagueis to Naboo, and, 35 years later, realizing Tenebrous's vision.

#### First Encounter

As an adolescent, Palpatine studied at Theed University, and also enrolled in the Legislative Youth Program in accordance with Naboo's mandatory public service curricula. His family's social status provided him with high profile contacts, such as other aristocrats and even government officials. One such acquaintance was Vidar Kim, who was at the time an aide to the Republic Senator of Naboo. Although Palpatine regarded Kim as a political mentor, he secretly harbored certain views that conflicted with Kim's opinions. Palpatine's own father shared Kim's conservative beliefs and lobbied for Naboo's government to maintain an isolationist policy in order to protect their homeworld from interplanetary corporations that wanted to take advantage of Naboo. Bon Tapalo, a candidate for the Naboo throne in the 65 BBY monarchical elections eager to open Naboo to outside influences, was their main opponent in the political arena.

Palpatine, motivated by pride and a desire to see his homeworld become a part of the greater galaxy, sought to quietly undermine his father's political agenda during the 65 BBY election season. More importantly, however, it was the rift with his father that indirectly led to his future as a Sith. Palpatine released confidential information pertaining to the shady role certain royal houses (including, presumably, his own) in the Tapalo opposition had allegedly played during the mercenary conflict, despite the fact that he was well aware he could be disinherited for it. In aiding Tapalo's campaign, Palpatine brought himself to the attention of Darth Plagueis, Dark Lord of the Sith. The young man had craved for the power of the Sith since becoming a collector of Sith artifacts, and soon he would have his chance to join their order. Plagueis was publicly known as Hego Damask, the Muun Magister of Damask Holdings, one of the galaxy's most powerful and influential financiers and political lobbyists. Having survived an assassination attempt by an unknown party on Bal'demnic and having killed his Master during that same incident, he was also the reigning Dark Lord of the Sith in Darth Bane's line.

Plagueis learned from certain Gossam members of the Subtext Mining Group—the company that supplied the mining probe that was supposed to kill himself and Tenebrous on Bal'demnic—of a plasma reserve they had recently discovered under Theed. After ordering the Gossams' deaths, Plagueis instructed Larsh Hill of Damask Holdings to look into the situation. Hill contacted Tapalo, offering to support his bid for the throne in exchange for exclusive rights to transport the plasma from the Theed reservoir. Palpatine, by joining the covert war fought in the Naboo media for the public eye, had turned Damask's eyes on him—members of Damask Holdings traced the release of the information to the heir of House Palpatine, and Plagueis decided to meet this young noble who had helped him from afar. The Dark Lord arrived on Naboo in his public guise as Hego Damask and sought out Palpatine in Theed University. After asking after him, Plagueis eventually found Palpatine outside the Youth Program's headquarters in the university campus.

Though he was aware of Damask's reputation, the haughty Palpatine initially had little interest in conversing with the Muun. Through a small effort of persuasion on Plagueis' part, however, Palpatine reluctantly agreed to give him a tour of Theed. Plagueis was able to learn much about the young aristocrat in their first encounter; Palpatine had an interest in politics, but was shy to admit it; he enjoyed art, yet his modest tastes made him disinterested in Naboo's grandiose architecture style; the estrangement with his father was augmented by their different political opinions. Aside from art and politics, Plagueis also learned that Palpatine had a passion for expensive landspeeders and competitive racing. But he was unable to peer into the young man with the Force, which intrigued him. At the end of the day, Plagueis offered to recruit Palpatine as a spy in order to advance the interests of Damask Holdings by ensuring the election of Tapalo as king of Naboo. Palpatine accepted the offer, but only on the condition that he would report directly to Plagueis alone.

#### Initiation

Cosinga Palpatine eventually learned of his eldest son's friendship with Hego Damask. Due to his estrangement with the younger Palpatine, as well as Damask's support for Tapalo's bid for the throne, Cosinga immediately attempted to thwart any further contact between his son and the head of Damask Holdings. After Cosinga failed to coerce Damask with veiled threats, the Muun contacted Palpatine, who had been away on Chandrila with his class at the time. Palpatine, enraged by the revelation of his father's attempt to interfere in his affairs, desperately implored Damask for advice. Recognizing the potential that emanated within his young protégé, Damask took advantage of Palpatine's fear and hatred for his family, and thus insinuated that he had to do whatever it took to become emancipated from his father's control.

Palpatine's defining moment came when his father personally journeyed to Chandrila with the entire family in tow to retrieve his heir. Once the family yacht had left Hanna City Spaceport, Cosinga and his son clashed. In order to keep him away from Naboo during the elections and out of Damask's reach, Cosinga planned to send his son to Chommell Minor, where he would stay with the Greejatus family and complete the Legislative Youth Program locally with Janus Greejatus. Palpatine did not accept the arrangement, and verbally attacked Cosinga. The altercation brought out their long-standing yet barely concealed hatred for each other, until Cosinga revealed to his son that he had wanted to kill him from the start. Overcome by years of repressed anger and frustration, Palpatine instinctively drew upon the power of the dark side and slaughtered his entire family and their security guards. When the deed was done, he contacted Damask and was assured by his mentor that none would ever learn of his role in the slaughter of House Palpatine. Damask arranged for all evidence of the crime to be purged, and for Palpatine to return to Chandrila. In addition, Palpatine later sold Convergence and moved to a modest apartment in Theed. One standard week later, they met in a luxury cabin aboard the *Quantum Collosus*.

Having judged the young Palpatine worthy of joining the Sith after he murdered his family, Darth Plagueis formally initiated him into the cult. From the time of Darth Bane onward, it was common for Sith names to begin with the forename *Darth*, a moniker that was as much a title as it was a name. Many factors went into deciding on the second name. At least one, based on observed ceremonies, is that Sith masters would enter a kind of communion with the dark side of the Force, question it, and within it find inspiration, an answer. In Palpatine, Plagueis saw a being completely lacking in empathy, ambitious, arrogant, and insidious. Palpatine genuflected before his master, pledged his undying allegiance to the Sith Order, and the Dark Lord of the Sith proclaimed him his new apprentice under the name *Darth Sidious*.

#### Apprenticeship

The training of Darth Sidious was focused on the honing of his Force abilities and combat skills, as well as his natural talents as a politician. In the first decade of his role as an apprentice, Sidious accompanied his Master to Mygeeto, where he was subjected to intense cold and nearly froze to death. Darth Plagueis, unaffected by the planet's freezing temperature, forced Sidious to relate the slaughter of his family in exacting detail, as he did many times, with the goal of extinguishing any lingering feeling of personal connection. The Sith Lord's overall goal was to use his disciple's hate, anger and desperation for survival as a tool to destroy any vestiges of Palpatine the young noble from Naboo, and in his place create Darth Sidious, a true Sith. Were Palpatine to give up, he would prove himself unworthy of the mantle; the young Human endured, asking only when the trials would be over. Plagueis also demonstrated a use of the mind-clouding technique by having his apprentice struggle to reach him, only to discover he had been a dopplegänger, and also subjected Palpatine to deprivation of food, water and sleep.

In regard to the history of the Sith, Plagueis was more than aware of the fact that Sidious' desire to kill him would grow in time; only a true Sith Lord wanted to seize the mantle of Master by slaying his own mentor. But like many of his Sith predecessors, Plagueis was appalled by Darth Bane's Rule of Two, more specifically its tenet that commanded each Master to train his or her own eventual killer. Plagueis had no intention of dying by his apprentice's hand, or anyone else's for that matter. Instead, he intended to break the cycle started by Bane and Zannah a millennium ago. In order to do so, Plagueis wished for no secrets or feelings of jealousy and mistrust to exist between Sidious and himself. In the long run of the Sith Grand Plan, Plagueis envisioned himself as the "power behind the throne" while Sidious—in his public guise as Palpatine—carried out the Sith's interests in the political domain.

Sidious, ever the academic with a desire for knowledge, yearned to learn more of the Sith lore. However, his Master carefully concealed much information from his apprentice, and only intended to share his full knowledge at a gradual pace, depending on how much Sidious progressed as a Sith Lord. Among Plagueis' artifacts were holocrons that contained much of what Sidious desired to know. The Jedi mistakenly believed that these holocrons sat in the Archives room in their Temple, but those were actually clever forgeries, a form of Sith disinformation.

#### The beginning of Palpatine's political career

Owing to Plagueis and Palpatine's manipulations, Bon Tapalo became King of Naboo, and negotiated a deal to sell the planet's plasma through the Trade Federation. Around this time, Palpatine began his political career, carefully hiding his true persona of Darth Sidious. On Naboo, public service was mandatory from the ages of twelve to twenty, and he began his political career in this fashion (presumably 70–62 BBY). Unlike most of the Naboo, however, he elected to stay in public service beyond the normally accepted age and entered local Naboo politics (62–52 BBY), working his way upward.

After a five-year stint in the Apprentice Legislator program, he was appointed Ambassador in the reelected Senator Vidar Kim's retinue. Kim was a vocal critic of Tapalo's policy towards the Trade Federation, pointing out that the Trade Federation would sell Naboo's plasma on for ten or even twenty times what it paid for it.

Palpatine lost more elections than he won in his early political career, missing out on a string of political appointments. He elected to keep a low profile so as to not undermine his Sith master, and to allow him to discreetly disappear from the radar in order to focus on his Sith training on such worlds as Mygeeto, Hypori, Buoyant and Kursid, and rendezvous with Plagueis on remote planets where they did not have to risk being seen together by beings from the political sphere.

### The training of Darth Maul

During his apprenticeship under Plagueis, Sidious traveled to the planet Dathomir and met with the Dathomirian Nightsister Mother Talzin. Intermingling his knowledge of the Dark Side of the Force with Talzin's knowledge of Nightsister magicks, Sidious had considered to make Talzin his apprentice and right hand. However, Sidious chose her infant son, the Zabrak Nightbrother who would become his true Sith apprentice. It was not without precedent that Sidious should have chosen a Zabrak for his apprentice. In ancient times, the Sith, taking notice of the martial prowess of the Zabrak, made lucrative contacts on Iridonia, and spent exorbitant sums to hire Iridonian Zabrak as mercenaries. Long after the Sith culture died out, the influence of the Sith remained a part of Zabrak culture. Zabraks were known to endure extreme amounts of pain, but nothing could have prepared young Maul for the brutality of Sidious' training. Despite Sidious' harshness, Maul held the utmost respect for the man, and was fanatically loyal.

When Darth Maul was very young—so young that he had few memories prior to this—Darth Sidious took him to the Jedi Temple, both of them disguised as tourists. Sidious' command of the dark side was sufficient to keep both himself and Maul from being sensed by the Jedi, as long as they did not enter the Temple itself. As the building was not open to tourists, there was very little risk of discovery. For the better part of a day, they stood there, and Sidious pointed out to Maul the various faces of individual Jedi as they entered and left the Temple, whispering into his apprentice's ear of the Jedi Order's ultimate destruction. Maul would long remember the thrill of seeing his foes, standing in their presence, hearing about their downfall, as they walked past, not one of them aware of the fate that ultimately awaited them.

In 37 BBY, the time came for Maul's final test. Sidious sent him out to Hypori, where he was hunted by assassin droids for a month. At the end of the month, Maul found Sidious waiting at the mouth of a cave. He had not eaten for days, and was exhausted. Regardless, Sidious challenged Maul to a duel, in which he easily evaded each of Maul's attacks. He stood over the broken teenager, and told him that he had been preparing another apprentice, should Maul fail as he had. Enraged, Maul gathered all the dark side could offer within him and flew at Sidious with murderous intent. Sidious was caught off guard, but had managed to struggle through the onslaught before disarming Maul. Even without a weapon, Maul continued to attack, even going so far as to bite Sidious' hand before being ultimately defeated. Pleased, Sidious announced that Maul's training was complete, and that he was now a Sith Lord.

### The rise of Senator Palpatine (52–32 BBY)

#### The Death of Vidar Kim

Around the year 52 BBY, as a critical vote on seating several "client worlds" of the Trade Federation approached, Darth Plagueis and Palpatine decided during a Gathering on Sojourn that the galaxy was ripe for more direct forms of manipulation. The stage of decadence required by the Grand Plan had been reached—disaffected with political corruption, both the citizens of the Republic and the beings of the lawless Rim yearned for strong central leadership; for tyranny. So, in order to place Palpatine in the Galactic Senate, Plagueis ordered his apprentice to arrange the assassination of Senator Vidar Kim. To this end, Palpatine availed himself to the services of a professional assassin named Sate Pestage, a man who would later become one of his most trusted agents. Palpatine's only stipulation regarding Kim's assassination was that it be an obvious and publicly witnessed murder.

When Senator Vidar Kim was assassinated by a never-identified Maladian gunman on a passing airspeeder in 52 BBY, the thirty-year-old Palpatine stood for election to succeed him. However, the assassination had nearly been a disaster thanks to the presence of Vidar Kim's son, Jedi Knight Ronhar Kim. The Maladian had attempted, for reasons unknown, to kill both Kims, and while she had succeeded in killing Vidar, Ronhar had escaped her attack and captured her. Fortunately for Palpatine, the assassin committed suicide before she could be interrogated by the Jedi Knight, and Palpatine's role in the affair was never revealed. The people of Naboo elected him as their sectorial Senator, to represent Naboo and the thirty-five other affiliated worlds of the Chommell sector.

When Palpatine first came to Coruscant to begin his service in the Senate, a number of his personal effects came with him from Naboo, accompanied by a manifest. The manifest was submitted to Republic officials as part of a standard security scan. This procedure was mandatory for all equipment and furniture to enter the Senate building. One of these items was an abstract sculpture of Sistros, one of the Four Sages of Dwartii (these were controversial philosopher-lawgivers who lived during the early days of the Republic—the others were Faya, Yanjon, and Braata).

Palpatine's manifest clearly stated that this sculpture was a single piece of solid-forged neuranium with a bronzium finish. But the sculpture was not solid; it contained a small cylindrical cavity, in which rested one of his Sith lightsabers, sealed within the sculpture at the time of its forging. The security scan did not detect this cavity; neuranium was so dense that any piece more than a millimeter in thickness was impervious to sensors, and since nothing unusual was found in the scan, no one questioned it further. An advanced gravimetric detector would have revealed that one small section of the sculpture massed slightly less than it should have, but no one thought to use one at the time. The sculpture was admitted and placed in Palpatine's Senate offices (the floor had to be specially reinforced to bear its weight), and when Palpatine was elected Chancellor it was moved into the anteroom of his Suite in the Executive Office Building. Only after thirty-three years would Palpatine extract the blade within. In addition, he also gave his interior decorating the colour crimson. He also used his family status as a convenient excuse for utilizing that as the color of choice (as his family prominently used crimson for their seal).

#### The senator's first "friendship"

The new representative of Chommell sector wasted no time in forming relationships that could help him in the future. The first was the son of the man whose death ensured his own election. Ronhar Kim, who had been with his father at the time of the assassination, had attended the funeral despite both having hardly known Vidar and having had little interest in forming a relationship with him. Palpatine approached the younger Kim even as he stood before his father's body, and under his mask of sorrow and condolence, he studied Kim carefully. But he said little; instead, he demonstrated an art that would serve him well, and give him access to the powerful: his ability to listen, to serve as a confidant for others.

During their conversation, it quickly became clear that, rather than finding whoever struck down the father he had barely known, Kim was more concerned about himself and his own choices in life. In fact, Ronhar appeared to be more preoccupied by his personal failure to detect and thwart the assassin than he was with the fact that his father was now dead. Vidar Kim, lacking any other living family, had wanted his son to honor his bloodline by following him into politics. With Ronhar apparently giving the matter some serious thought, Palpatine quickly suggested that for a Jedi to become a politician would be a waste. Instead, perhaps the best course would be an alliance *between* a Jedi *and* a politician.

Kim agreed, and struck up a "friendship" that would last some three decades. Ronhar Kim would be the first of Palpatine's "alliances" with individual Jedi, but this particular alliance would be of great use. Kim would eventually be used as a pawn in a scheme that resulted in the creation of the feared Red Guards (32 BBY), and his eventual death in battle on Merson (21 BBY) would be used as propaganda fuel to further Palpatine's war aims.

#### Palpatine in the Senate

By the time Palpatine stepped onto the Senate floor for the first time in 52 BBY, he already knew that the prominent power-brokers in the Senate looked down their noses at the more provincial delegates, expecting little to nothing of importance from them. He knew that he, too, was lumped in with the other hopefuls from Rimward worlds, those who, having never ventured far from their homeworlds before, would in short order be overwhelmed by Coruscanti politics.

Rather than do anything to prove the elites wrong, Palpatine encouraged them to keep thinking this way. Again, he failed to take advantage of opportunities that could have landed him on important advisory boards and powerful committees, and unless pressed, he never shared his observations with his colleagues. Instead, he purposely sought to keep his advancement slow, knowing that the more he did so, the more harmless he seemed to potential rivals. The performance evidently worked; the powerful Senators, wrapped up in their own petty power struggles, initially laughed at the small and quiet provincial, and otherwise paid him no mind.

Palpatine surprised everyone as he became increasingly popular. He wrote extensively, his notes on power became popular texts among political and military science students. Soon, his theories became well known enough for them to be taught at leading universities throughout the galaxy. Despite this growing influence, Palpatine remained unassuming, and would spend many hours alone reflecting in his modest, yet well-appointed quarters. People remarked on how he remained a private man, rarely attending social functions, devoting all his time to his work. In fact, he spent much of his time in the training of Darth Maul and the furthering of his private Sith agendas; it was left to his senatorial aides and to droids, such as TC-4 to do much of the day-to-day work and maintain his guise as the mild-mannered representative of Naboo.

After a little more than two standard months on Coruscant, the Senate convened to vote on whether or not to seat Felucia, Murkhana, and half a dozen other planets. The vote was highly controversial as the planets in question were considered by many to be client worlds of the Trade Federation. Approaching the Senate Building on the day of the vote, Palpatine had a brief conversation with Senator Pax Teem of the Gran Protectorate, who eagerly anticipated the Trade Federation losing the vote and expected Palpatine to vote against the motion. Shortly afterwards, Palpatine met Plagueis (in his public guise as Hego Damask) and Ronhar Kim, who introduced him to Jedi Masters Dooku and Sifo-Dyas. As they spoke they were spotted by Teem, who realized Palpatine and Plagueis were working together: Teem had hated Plagueis for nearly ten years after the Sith Lord had supported Gardulla the Hutt's plan for a new podrace course on Tatooine and had financed the exploitation of Naboo's plasma reserves, both of which threatened to seriously affect Malastare's finances.

During the debate, Palpatine followed instructions from both King Bon Tapalo and Darth Plagueis: Tapalo wished to placate domestic critics of Naboo's agreements with the Trade Federation, which many saw as corrupt and exploitative. Plagueis, meanwhile, wanted the new member-worlds to be caught in between a Republic that heavily taxed them and a Trade Federation that exploited them, in order to foment discontent and pave the way for a future secession crisis that would destroy the Republic. Palpatine's speech addressed the issue of the Trade Federation gaining too much influence in the Senate, and the criticisms of Naboo's agreements with the Federation. He then implied that the Trade Federation may have been responsible for the death of Senator Kim, a vocal critic of Naboo's trade agreement, and concluded by declaring that in protest of the way the investigation into Kim's death had been handled, King Tapalo had instructed him to abstain from the vote.

#### Attempted abduction

Palpatine's speech and abstention tipped the Trade Federation towards victory and the client worlds were subsequently seated in the Senate, where they indeed proved to be aligned with the Federation's interests. The speech was regarded as career-making by many: Supreme Chancellor Thoris Darus even sent Palpatine a personal message stating that he had instructed the Judiciary Committee to use its wide-ranging powers to investigate the Kim assassination.

In retribution, Pax Teem arranged with Santhe Security and a group of disgruntled Naboo nobles to organize the kidnap of Palpatine. Under the guise of a meeting with a lobbyist from Silvestri Trace Power, Palpatine was lured to the Shimmersilk restaurant in the POTU before being escorted to the abandoned LiMerge Power Building in the Works. There Teem addressed him by hologram, declaring that he was aware of Palpatine's role in Bon Tapalo's election, the death of Vidar Kim, and of his relationship with Hego Damask. Before he could carry out his threat to kill Palpatine, however, the building was raided by Plagueis' Echani Sun Guards: Plagueis had learned of the plan from Ars Veruna and had used his agents to encourage the kidnap so he could arrange Teem's death, as well as to give Palpatine another trial.

However, Plagueis had been so focused on preventing his apprentice's kidnap that he had neglected his own safety: during the induction of Larsh Hill into the Order of the Canted Circle at the Fobosi Lodge, the ceremony was attacked by Maladian assassins. Sate Pestage had learned of the operation from the commander of the team that had assassinated Vidar Kim, who was embarrassed at the complications that had surrounded Kim's death and wished to make amends. Pestage immediately informed Palpatine, who had in turn felt Plagueis' pain and anger in the Force. The two arrived at the Fobosi Lodge as Plagueis, gravely injured and barely holding himself conscious, was lashing out with the dark side against his attackers. All the others, including the Muuns who made up Damask Holdings, had been killed. Larsh Hill was the first victim of the attack, his head sliced from his neck.

With the Sun Guard distracted following Teem's fake signal to the Panoply Orbital Facility, Palpatine followed Pestage's information to the Gran Protectorate Embassy, where Teem and his allies were celebrating the Sith Lords' assumed deaths. Palpatine proceeded to slaughter every being present, saving Teem to last: using the Force, he ignited the room's curtains and collapsed them on to the Gran, burning Pax Teem to death.

#### Friends and allies

Plagueis withdrew into seclusion in the aftermath of the attack, leaving Palpatine to be the main executor of the Grand Plan. With his star rising on Coruscant, Senator Palpatine wasted no time in establishing relationships with respected public figures in key positions of government. As it grew, the list of friends included Senators both weak and powerful, military officers, members of the great organs of commerce, and even members of the Jedi Order. Many of those with whom he formed friendships would eventually have prominent positions in the Empire, the most loyal of whom were rewarded with power, prestige and gifts such as worldcrafts, personal artificial planetoids. Others would meet radically different fates.

Palpatine served as part of a Republic task force sent to monitor the demilitarization of Ando, where the two native species had resumed a long-standing feud over mining rights. It was here that he met Jorus C'baoth, a Jedi who was also a member of the expedition. Palpatine took advantage of the encounter to establish what would become a long-standing "friendship" with C'baoth. Upon returning to Coruscant, they often met to discuss politics, philosophy, and the state of the Republic. Eventually, at Palpatine's request, the Jedi Reassignment Council sent C'baoth to act as his personal advisor, and C'baoth became part of his staff. One thing they discussed during their time together held promise for the future: they spoke of the ExGal Society, a small, dedicated group of scientists studying the possibilities of life outside the galaxy, and the idea of an excursion beyond the Galactic Rim. It would be conversations like this that would result in the ill-fated *Outbound Flight* project.

Janus Greejatus, then a politician on Chommell Minor, had established himself as an isolationist—in fact his political language concealed a virulent anti-alien prejudice that stemmed from his earliest formative years—with a significant popular following on his homeworld. The Greejatus family had had friendly relations with House Palpatine of Naboo, and Cosinga Palpatine, based on the rapport he perceived between his son and Janus Greejatus, had decided to send Palpatine to stay with the Greejatuses in 65 BBY. Years later, Palpatine became senator, and Greejatus came to his attention as a result of his political achievements on Chommell Minor. Palpatine did not echo Greejatus's more divisive statements, understanding that they would only do harm to his own long-term plans, but he did see a use for Greejatus and took him under his wing. Palpatine's own feelings are a mystery, but Greejatus labored under the impression that theirs was a firm friendship. That friendship, if such it was, would endure for more than three decades.

Commander Terrinald Screed, then a young officer in the Republic Judicial Department, was contacted by Palpatine, and found that his own ideas easily meshed with those of the Senator. With the coming of the New Order, Screed, now an Admiral, would become one of the highest-placed officers in the new Imperial Navy.

Lieutenant Governor Wilhuff Tarkin, a government official on Eriadu who was descended from a ruthless and ambitious family, was contacted by Darth Sidious, who convinced Tarkin that they actually shared many of the same sentiments on government. It is not known for certain if Tarkin ever was aware that Palpatine and Sidious were the same person, but he served both faithfully and long. Even as the New Order was inaugurated, Tarkin was placed in charge of the construction of Palpatine's most secret weapons projects.

Lord Crueya Vandron, the head of a noble house in the Senex sector, also secretly joined Palpatine's camp. After the Empire was inaugurated, Vandron would become an advisor and the head of COMPNOR.

In addition, Senator Palpatine brought his own loyal aides with him from Naboo and elsewhere. They served him in legitimate political and legal roles, but they also worked his will in darker and more secretive ways. It would be these functionaries who earned the greatest rewards (with the exception of Palpatine's Sith accomplices) that could be bestowed in the New Order. Sate Pestage was one of Palpatine's most useful assets, and perhaps his longest-serving ally. Initially, he was contracted by Sidious as an assassin, a profession that he apparently excelled at. After Pestage arranged the murder of Senator Vidar Kim on Palpatine's orders, Palpatine took him on as an aide, and Pestage would retain this dual function throughout Palpatine's rise to power. He typically performed the day-to-day duties of a senatorial aide, but he also was fully aware of Palpatine's secret identity of Darth Sidious and willingly served Sidious as a covert operative. Palpatine treated Pestage's colleague, Kinman Doriana, in a similar fashion. Doriana had something of an unspoken wish to be a spy, and Sidious indulged this by assigning him to perform covert work, but unlike Pestage, Doriana was not informed of the secret connection between Sidious and Palpatine. As far as Doriana was aware, they were separate people, and he performed tasks for both without realizing the truth. Ars Dangor was also an aide to Senator Palpatine at this time.

#### Destabilization

In 33 BBY, Sidious's shadow ally, Lieutenant Governor Wilhuff Tarkin, helped Sidious to engineer the murder of the Trade Federation Directorate, which were on Tarkin's homeworld of Eriadu for a trade summit. The pirate raids on the Trade Federation that had led to the summit had also been orchestrated by Palpatine, as was Nute Gunray's rise to power as Viceroy.

Shortly afterward, Palpatine secretly arranged to have several million credits, believed to have been stolen by the criminal organization Nebula Front, funneled through the Bank of Aargau and into the accounts of House Valorum. Sate Pestage ensured that the exchange was uncovered by Valorum's political enemy, Senator Orn Free Taa, who revealed it to the Internal Activities Committee. This action served to critically weaken Chancellor Finis Valorum's already tenuous hold on power.

During this time, Sidious also made his first attempt on his master's life. Sidious, as Palpatine, contacted King Veruna of Naboo and manipulated him into allying with Black Sun and the Bando Gora terrorist cult, which ultimately culminated with these groups annihilating Damask's personal residence on Sojourn with a nuclear weapon. However, Sidious had not anticipated that Plagueis had an ally in the form of the Hutt gangster Jabba Desilijic Tiure, who warned him of Veruna's plans and enabled him to escape. He managed to cover up his involvement before Plagueis, and only revealed his role in the assassination plot a year later when he made a second, successful attempt on the life of his old master.

Around the same time as the doomed trade summit, Palpatine and Plagueis arranged for Veruna to abdicate the Naboo throne, as a means to ensure the already irate Neimoidians would become even more enraged at the circumstances, and as revenge for his role in Plagueis' near death. Palpatine initially intended to send Maul to kill him, but Plagueis decided instead to personally ensure his death. Due to this turn of events, Palpatine also was responsible for the coronation of Padmé Naberrie/Amidala.

In 32 BBY, Sidious convinced the Neimoidian leaders of the Trade Federation to blockade the planet Naboo, in protest of Senate resolution BR-0371, a measure that levied a tax on the major Rim trade routes. Sidious kept his identity of Palpatine unknown to the Neimoidians, although he revealed that he was a Sith Lord and made it quite clear that he held some power in the Senate.

### Final preparations

Before the first overt moves of the Grand plan could be initiated, Palpatine and Plagueis first had to deal with a variety of rogue dark side practitioners and organizations. The Sun Guard and the Dark Force practitioners were all brought into line, and under Palpatine's direct control. The Dark Force adherents, who were led by former Jedi Master Kadann, would later be reorganized by Palpatine as the Prophets of the Dark Side.