STAR WARS: FEAR, WAR, EMPIRE

A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away...

The Clone Wars are in their final stages, and if all goes according to the plans of DARTH SIDIOUS, they should soon be at an end. The people of the galaxy are still clenched tight in the jaws of fear, suspecting their neighbors as Separatist spies and watching their backs when any droid--especially a security drone--comes their way. All pray for peace, sooner rather than later. Little do they know that unless SIDIOUS is stopped, peace will come at a price beyond comprehension.

A small cadre of scholars and revolutionaries, collectively known as the Four, has come up with an astounding theory: Galactic Senator PALPATINE is indeed the Dark Lord of the Sith! As they prepare to brief the Jedi Council on their findings, SIDIOUS contemplates. He has heard of the Four via an underground "crackpot conspiracy theorist holonews" channel, and he wonders: Can the Four be used to his advantage? Can they serve as instruments of his plans for outright dictatorship? Most of all, can they change the course of history, or are they powerless to stop it?

A busy cantina was hardly an uncommon sight at this time of night on Coruscant. Serving droids swiveled and whooshed around, handing customers their drinks and whatever strange concoctions they'd managed to cook up as food. Syera Vekeva and her three revolutionary comrades, collectively known as "the Four", clinked their cocktail glasses together in a celebratory cheer. They had just finished putting together their presentation for the Jedi Council on the possible identity of Lord Sidious, which they would reveal tomorrow. True, there was the chance that they were all fools and had been wrong, but if they were right...If they were right, there was no way the Council could ignore their findings. They would have to act; it was their duty to the galaxy. "Guardians of peace and justice" never dismissed a good lead as spurious.

"Are you sure, Four?" one of the others asked Syera. There were two males and one other female besides Syera in the group. "Are we all sure?"

"We haven't spent thousands of hours combing the Coruscanti Library and the Holonews Archives for nothing," Syera replied. "We've dug up everything we could possibly find on Lord Sidious, and then some. Yes, we could be completely off-base in our theory as to who he is, but I don't think so. Palpatine is a crafty one. He's got designs on Chancellor Valorum, that's for sure. I wouldn't have suggested that we go before the Council if I had bigger doubts. I still have them, but they're growing weaker and weaker by the day." She took a sip of her clear ale. "It's Palpatine. If not, who else?"

The other three nodded, and a "female" serving droid suddenly dropped her stack of plates. "Oh, I'm terribly sorry," she said, starting to pick them up.

Little did the Four know that A-T19 had a camera inside of her metallic eye, surveying them carefully. Senator Palpatine would certainly want to see this.

[Note: Slots for the Jedi Council and the rest of the Four are still open!]

Darach Bakar's lips were pursed in silent contemplation. On the one hand, there was probably a bit of insanity required in the accusations they were intending to level against Palpatine. Perhaps, they all had death wishes. But Syera was right. They'd done a lot of investigating these charges before this point.

"Whether we're right or not," he finally said, "we're undoubtedly crazy. But really, that's what worries me. In studying history, I've noticed that the people who appeared the most out of their minds in their time were the ones who actually had something right. I hope we're wrong... but something tells me we're not."

"Exactly," Syera replied. "I also hope that we're wrong, that the Jedi Council has a theory of their own that completely contradicts ours. You don't know how big a part of me wishes it weren't Senator Palpatine against whom we were levelling our suspicions. However, in pursuing the truth, we can't ignore it if our personal feeling show that we admire Public Enemy Number One." She turned to her fellow comrades in the Four.

"One?" she asked, turning to Darach. "Pretend I'm the Council. How are you going to start out?" She gazed at him intently. "Just go for it. Don't try to remember everything."

Whilst the people codenamed One and Four role played a meeting with the council, Adryn Trever patriotic business and fellow conspiracy member had his attention somewhere. It was a sound he heard shortly before number One started to talk. It was the sound of crashing that confused him. An A-T model droid dropped the plates, and that shouldn't happen. His company had reviewed the droid model in hopes of retrofitting it to become a mine sweeper droid, it's main feature was balance. He watched the droid carefully however still contributed to the conversation.

"Look into the past as much as you like, however I feel that the clone troopers should be looked at. I don't trust soldiers that are manufactured, I believe their being manipulated by Palpatine in his plot."

Syera folded her hands on the table in front of her, nodding slowly. "The clones definitely figure into this, somehow and some way. Manufactured soldiers just--scare the living daylights out of me, in more ways than one. I suppose it shouldn't; after all, we have cloned animals, cloned plants, cloned bacteria and viruses, and cloned fungi. How much more of a step would it be, really, to clone a sentient being and make it do your bidding?" She turned to the others. "That figures into our presentation. We all have our own separate 'angles' of what to cover and when. 'One'? I'd like to hear your introduction, if I don't mind. This is just practice before we face the Jedi Council."

Darach shook his head slowly. "I don't trust crowded places, Four," he said. "You know that." He sighed. "I understand that you're only asking because you want to be sure we all have our parts solid, but there's a time and a place and this is not it."

"You're right," Syera replied. "Not only is this place too noisy and crowded, but that serving droid over there sure is taking a long time to pick up the plates she dropped." She raised a skeptical eyebrow. "Let's go back to the hotel after we tell the manager of this cantina that one of his waitresses needs some routine maintenance." She winked, rose up from the rickety table at which the four of them were sitting, and waved a beckoning finger. Darach, known as "One", Adryn Trever, known as "Two", "Three," and herself wandered up to the bar and asked the bartender droid if they could see the owner. After an affirmative nod and confirmation, they came face-to-face with a fat man. He wiped his hands on his apron and asked, "What can I do you--four--for?"

"We'd like to tell you about one of your serving droids," said Syera. "That one over there, the 'female' one, was waiting on our table when she dropped a huge stack of plates! It might not be anything unusual, but we thought it was. Perhaps you should call 'her' over here and check her out. She might need some fine-tuning or upgrades, sir."

The manager blinked. "That's strange. A-T19 has always been one of our most reliable serving droids. 'She', if you can call her that, has been working at this cantina for over twenty years! Maybe it's time for her to retire, be taken out of commission, but I'd hate to lose her just because she dropped a few dishes. Or a lot of them, come to think of it. Hey, A-T!" he shouted out over the merry chattering of the crowd. "Come over here."

"R--right away, sir," intoned the droid as she minced over toward the manager. "I do apologize for the mishandling of the plates. I shall not do so again. I shall perform more satisfactorily next time, sir," she said, a note of human-like humility in her "voice".

"I'm sure you will, A-T," smiled the manager. "Shut down for a second. Let's open you up." She did so, and the manager opened a large panel in her mechanical torso. "Hmm. There doesn't seem to be anything wrong here, except for the occasional patch of rust. I don't see any kind of mechanical defects that could have caused her to drop the plates." He turned to the Four. "Any suggestions? I'm busy, but I'm also intrigued."

"Erm do ya mind?" Adryn said before using a small handle device over several screws that held what was essentially the droid's brain to the droid's chassis. After several seconds, the screws twisted out was placed by Adryn on the table. He then slipped his fingers around the brain, flicking several switches that disconnected the brain from it's body, and then slowly pulled the device out. Once he was holding the device probably, he lifted it to test it's weight. It wasn't right, too heavy. It must have had some new equipment that was upsetting the balance. But this didn't prove anything, only raises suspicions. He couldn't completely dissemble the droids hardware because the manager agree to it. Instead he slid the hardware back into the droid and made a simple offer to the owner. "I'll give you 700 credits for the droid."

"Deal," said the manager after a very long pause, not sure why his customer wanted to buy the droid instead of fix it. Nevertheless, his cantina was one of the seedier eateries in this section of Coruscant, and any credits he could get his hands on were considered blessings. "She's yours," he said. "We'll miss her, but we can always buy or build some more serving droids. Good luck to you. Hope you find out what the problem is!"

Darach, Adryn, "Three", and Syera paid for their meals and drinks and wandered back to their high-rise hotel, the Galactic Hub. It was an impressive-sounding name for an unimpressive dive, but the Four figured that the more disreputable and anonymous a place of lodging was, the better. Palpatine and his ilk would far prefer luxury hotels like the Imperium, although they might not be above sending their henchmen here.

"We'd better watch our backs," Syera said, "and our fronts, too. If anyone asks, we're freelance technicians, in case anyone's wondering why we're carrying a droid's head."

At Syera's suggestion, Darach frowned. The heir of a multi-trillion credit hotel and resort operation, he was not likely to be believed if he claimed to be a freelance technician. He supposed that, if he was recognized, he could simply answer, "I'm not, but I get that a lot." But as soon as the thought entered his mind, he dismissed it. No one would believe that either.

"I'm a very recognizable face," he said softly. "No one's gonna believe that about me. If anyone asks, you all can be technicians, but you work for me."