The air stank of moldy towels left to rot on the ground. Or perhaps that was simply the pressing atmosphere of a hundred diplomats trying to out prove the other. He tried to play nice, but even Obi-Wan's easy nature was beginning to crack. While making a third pass across the alley behind the Queen's dais, his head dipped low so she wouldn't catch sight of him, he nearly ran face first into someone.

His hands lashed out fast, grabbing the younger man's arm before he fell to the ground. It wasn't Obi-Wan who apologized but the young man with tan skin and a distractingly memorable face. "So sorry, Sir. Didn't see you there," he gasped, trying to regather all of what he'd been carrying on a silver platter.

"What are you doing back here?" Kenobi asked. Far as he was told, this area should be cleared of all non-essentials until after the vote. Whenever they'd get around to it.

Eyes dark as space widened at the attention, the man swiping over his shaved head as if to try and cover himself. When the slightly bulbous nose flared to take in a steadying breath, he admitted, "Her Majesty requested sustenance."

"Ah," Obi-Wan stepped back and sighed, "then I shall not keep you."

As he rounded about towards the audience side, his eyes drifted from the humbled servant bowing to her Highness towards the woman herself. Amidala smiled, lifting a small cake from the platter to her painted lips. She hadn't censured him after the misunderstanding of last night, but her eyes had certainly turned cold. That bothered him more than he expected, leaving Obi-Wan unable to meditate and forced to walk the winding halls alone with only his conflicting thoughts.

"Kenobi," the comm in his ear lit up.

He touched it to answer, "Here."

"Have you found anything?" Lan'vass asked, her tone cool as usual.

"No, seems to be all quiet down here."

"The same is true up here as well."

Turning his head, he caught the glint of her oiled hair brushing under a banner. She was moving through the upper balconies, most of which were emptied save a few of the non-voting diplomats who still were afforded a seat. Those were searched hardest of all, but none turned up. It was beginning to seem as if this entire mission was a farce. Perhaps even the gungan a plant to lure them away from the real target.

"I still say we should have put someone on the roof," Obi-Wan commented, his eyes drifting skyward towards the multiple windows. Multiple entrance points. Multiple threats. They were a danger, but the Queen wouldn't hear of retracting the dome for such an event.

"There is no concern there," Lan'vass said, "They are laser proof. I inspected the building plans and checked the veracity myself."

"As you say," he wasn't in the mood to start up another lively discussion. They didn't argue, not Jedis who reached the rank of Master. But their discussions and debates could often become heated enough someone might wind up in the infirmary.

From the wafting podium stepped down the representative for the Separatists, the waddled man slipping to his seat. He'd made no mention of the Jedi in attendance, to the point he refused to even acknowledge them. The arguments all came from Naboo citizens, a wise strategy given the climate. Was he coached to anticipate the Republic sending them?

"I believe the Queen is about to give her speech," Obi-Wan announced, his eyes trailing the line of handmaidens all bursting to business around her Majesty. It was odd to think the woman who appeared more of a gilded statue was that same girl he traded rations with in the back of a shop on Tattoine. To even imagine a woman that poised and primped laughing so deeply some erupted from her nose was impossible.

"Kenobi…"

He shook his head, realizing he'd fallen silent as Lan'vass called to him. Had she seen him watching the Queen brush off her lap? There was no concern, he'd…he'd followed his training at all times.

"Obi-Wan, you are staring rather intently," she spoke.

"I am trying to keep track of her Majesty." It was the truth, after all.

"In that dress, it cannot be difficult," Lan'vass chuckled to herself, the woman of smooth lines and dark fabrics unimpressed with the fashions of Naboo royalty. "You were close with Queen Amidala during the troubles after her coronation?"

"It was… She is more formidable than she lets on. More resilient as well."

The line in his ear fell silent. Perhaps Lan'vass was thinking of her own apprentice — the two bore much in common beyond the same round face and heartfelt eyes. Which was not something he should notice in either woman. Padmé would always be the child to him while Ballari…

"You have regrets," Lan'vass spoke as if she was reading not his mind but his heart.

"It is a challenge, to place all of that away. To never think or wonder…" he tried to shake his complicated feelings away. To soothe his heart from the fickle flames with a cool dose of logic. It worked when he left her behind and never against contacted this planet. What was making it so difficult now?

"I wish," Obi-Wan whispered to the ether, "I wish I could walk the steps so assuredly I'd never even stumble."

Lan'vass sighed, "Seems to me, it is those who can stare temptation in the face and have the fortitude to turn away that fare much better than those who do not even see the temptation before them. If they are never tested, how will they know if they are strong enough to pass?"

"Sounds as if you speak from experience," Obi-Wan tried to volley back her thoughts stripping him away. He hadn't suffered so since Quigon.

Her steady voice, as certain as a metronome, cracked, "I do, and she was more lovely than all the sunrises in the galaxy." The wistful nature snapped instantly as Lan'vass shifted, "Her Majesty is approaching to speak."

"I'll draw closer," Obi-Wan began to shift through the throng but when Amidala reached her spot, every damn person in the audience stood. The gungan heads easily obscured her from his view, only a sliver of her extended hair and the wide hips of the dress visible. Obi-Wan tried to slide back and forth to keep eyes on her, but it was proving difficult.

"We have heard the debates, the arguments for both remaining," she pointed to the Senator who nodded warmly, "and leaving." To show no bias, she then pointed to the Separatist politician who folded his arms and tipped back in his chair. Did he know he'd already failed? "Naboo has long celebrated its perseverance, its autonomy from those that would try to drag us from our true future."

Obi-Wan finally slipped around the enthused audience, his eyes narrowing at something off. The colors blossomed around the Queen, blues, greens, oranges, yellows all dancing against her white face. It was quite lovely, some of the hues almost piercing through her thick paint to the skin below. The effect seemed to be striking the others in the audience as well, Obi-Wan hearing a few gungans openly weeping at their ruler's words or beauty.

It should be white.

He whipped his head over, his eyes darting from the focal point directed straight where the Queen stood. This room was designed so every colored window would strike with light forming a rainbow that became pure white. But it wasn't.

"They took out a window!" Obi-Wan shouted to his earpiece.

"What?" Lan'vass called back.

Moving through the audience, he tried to ease up to the stage. His eyes darted from a steady head to the ceiling. He couldn't look straight up or it'd give away that he figured it out. "One of the windows, it's a hologram. They must have removed it so they could get a sniper in place!"

"Which one?" Lan'vass whispered to herself.

Both Jedi stared down at the kaleidoscopic rainbow, and at the same time agreed, "Red." Lan'vass took over, "I'm on it." From above he could hear complaints at the woman trodding quickly over toes, but Obi-Wan had a bigger problem.

The Queen parted her hands wide, nearing the end of her speech. This was it, their last chance. "I implore you to vote not only with your future in mind, but those of your children and grandchildren. We want Naboo to survive long after each of us is gone."

The stage creaked below his feet, when he caught a white muzzle prodding through what appeared to be solid glass. Digging his foot in, Obi-Wan took off running. Some of the audience caught the Jedi, their polite claps breaking into gasps and confused whispers. With one eye on her Majesty, and the other upon the gun above, Obi-Wan unsheathed his lightsaber.

A blast ripped through the throne room, voices falling dead. Leaping off his feet, Obi-Wan spun forward, his arm locking and rebounding the laser shot back towards the heavens. It struck real glass, shades of blue raining down upon the now panicking diplomats, but he didn't care about that.

Mid-air, Obi-Wan twisted his body in place and fell right on top of her Majesty. Together, the tumbled behind the podium, Obi-Wan trying to shield her head from another round. Those once laughing eyes were wide in fear, her face closer to him than it'd ever been before.

"What…?" she gasped, seemingly in shock that their dire warning proved to be accurate.

"Stay here," Obi-Wan ordered, his arms waving to the flock of bodyguards now rushing to surround the Queen he knocked to the floor. He risked a glance up to the air to see the assassin shifting on his feet and rising into the sky. They were going to lose him!

As the bodyguards provided cover for her Majesty, he rose to his feet just in time to watch Lan'vass leap from the balcony. Her hand lashed out, one grabbing onto a rafter, while the other stabbed her lightsaber upward. More glass shattered, but it was the assassin's jetpack that she aimed for.

It sliced the ends clean off, sending the assassin tumbling back through the windows. Diplomats shrieked, the sound of tinkling glass hidden behind a burst of a jet engine with smoke spewing from the back. The assassin tried to right it, but he was coming in for a crash landing directly into the ground. Perfect chance for the two Jedi to get him.

Obi-Wan swiped on his lightsaber, moving towards the impact point. Suddenly, the assassin yanked his arms out of the pack and fell the last few feet to his knee. The face-obscuring helmet looked up, eyeing down the Jedi with panicking politicians trapped between them. It tipped in surprise, almost laughing at this turn of events, and the assassin began to run.

"Lan…" he shouted just as the woman descended. Hordes of diplomats clogged the aisles. With a lift of her fingers, Lan'vass began to push them aside, Obi-Wan picking up the slack as they chased after the bounty hunter.

Dashing headlong into the open courtyard, he caught the dribble of blood trailing below a door's threshold. "He's gone to the left," Obi-Wan announced, increasing his pursuit. Beside him, he felt Lan'vass turn away as if she had some other matter to handle.

"Where are you…?" he began before shelving the thought. Leaving behind the soothing fountain of the courtyard, Obi-Wan turned down a wooden hallway and found himself trapped in the hapless maze. Blood led him to the left, then right, his ears straining to pick up the labored breathing of an injured man.

"You cannot hope to escape, assassin," Obi-Wan threatened. The blood dripped into a puddle right beside a left junction, denoting the assassin had to pause here. Lifting his lightsaber close to his body, Obi-Wan eased towards the wall then leapt out.

A dead end?

Nothing but four blank walls met him, no bleeding assassin, not even a hint of an access point recessed into the wood panels. Damn this place! He snarled, wafting his blade around as if that would deign him an answer when he heard a chuckle rounding through the wall.

He was getting away! Obi-Wan shoved on the area where the blood pooled, but nothing. That wall was reinforced in place. The others…

Another laugh erupted, much closer than before. On instinct, Obi-Wan jammed his lightsaber forward straight through the wooden wall. As it quickly burned away the edifice, he said, "I'll pay for the damage later."

A red-hot outline of a portal hissed in the wall. Kenobi flattened his hand, and — with the Force — shoved apart the sheetrock and splintered wood. As it all erupted forward, he stepped through his cheat of the maze, his head turning to find the fleeing assassin.

That seemed to surprise the man, a hand fishing out a blaster at his side. The assassin fired twice, Obi-Wan rebounding each one as he resumed the running. "You cannot hope to escape," the Jedi warned him. "Surrender now and you will live."

"Nice try, Jedi," the man behind all the white and blue armor taunted. "But I know what happens to people who work against the Republic. And I know all the secrets of this place."

He fired at Obi-Wan's head, the Jedi bouncing that blaster shot into a portrait of a previous King. Then the assassin turned towards a wall, his palm out to do something. In the rising smoke of the burning walls, Obi-Wan couldn't see what it was. Couldn't hope to keep slicing his way through this maze before catching the bastard.

The assassin waved his hand to his helmet in a cocky salute and moved to slip through the narrow opening. Which was when a purple lightsaber nearly cleaved off his head. Lan'vass advanced through the gap as if she didn't feel gravity. While the assassin dodged the first attack, he had no hope of the second.

Up close, she drew her blade clean through the armor's gut, its violet ends hissing from the blood it burned to vapor. With one hand upon the assassin's shoulder, Lan'vass shoved the dying man to the floor, her lightsaber falling silent.

"Nice work," Obi-Wan said, receiving a curt nod. Then he glanced down at the man piled at their feet, "Who are you?"

Even with blood gurgling out of the hole in his intestines, all the assassin could do was laugh, "You think I'd tell you?"

"That is Mandalorian armor," Lan'vass pronounced, her hands stilled as she stared down at the man.

"Mandalorian?" Obi-Wan whipped his head over in surprise to the fellow alien beside him. "I thought you were pacifists."

"Not all. This belongs to the house of Fett, a very old family." Bending over, she disengaged the helmet and lifted it clean off the dying man's head. The face struck Obi-Wan instantly, the same shark-like eyes, a duplicate of the bulbous nose. But the hair was longer, and a scar ran down the cheek that hadn't been there.

Coughing up blood, the assassin Fett tried to slink away. His elbows dug into the floor, but his body was too weak to find purchase. With a plop he landed on his back. "Who do you work for?" Lan'vass began.

"You Jedi," he spat, trying to strike the Jedi who took him down, but only a stream of bloody bubbles dribbled off his chin.

"Your assassination attempt has failed," Obi-Wan said. They should have taken him in alive and trussed up before both the Republic Senate and Naboo's elite to prove how dirty the Separatists played. But his corpse would suffice. They were all in the same room, watched the same attack. It would be enough.

Obi-Wan expected the man to groan, fall silent, but his chest undulated, his lips raised in a smirk, and those dark matter eyes burned into the Jedi's soul. "Has it?"

Twins. Duplicates. He hadn't been in two places at once, but was two people. "The servant!" Obi-Wan shouted, twisting away from Lan'vass and the dying man. He ran back through the damage he caused, his fellow Jedi asking where he was going. But there wasn't time.

If he was fast enough, if he…

His steps slowed upon his return to the throne room, most of the delegates having leapt to one side or the other. Clustered amongst a ring of bodyguards stood her Majesty. She raised her head to stare into Obi-Wan's eye, clearly wondering if he'd apprehended the villain, when her body pitched forward.

"My Queen," the bodyguards all reached out, a dozen hands racing to catch their falling monarch.

They were too late. Shoving over the broken benches, Obi-Wan tried to run to her side. "She's not breathing," someone reported, his ears falling silent. In the stillness he watched the Queen's eyes roll back into her skull, her fingers turn ice blue and her heart still to nothing.

"She's been poisoned!" Obi-Wan shouted, shoving through the fear constricting around him. "Call a medic, now!" He kept trying to dig through the bodyguards, the horde forming a protective barrier around the small woman crumpling under her own crown.

"Ballari," Obi-Wan whispered when a hand landed on his shoulder. He whipped around, his fingers fishing for the lightsaber, when he met Lan'vass' worried gaze.

"Who…?"

"A servant, with the same face as the assassin," he pronounced.

His fellow Jedi seemed surprised by such a fact, but nodded her head, "He will be attempting to escape in a ship."

"They'll be scrambling all the ports, locking them down."

"That takes time. Time for the second assassin to slip our grasp," Lan'vass said in a such cold tone it felt it belonged on a game field rather than while a Queen lay dying upon her throne room floor.

He couldn't stop his eyes from drifting to the woman convulsing on the floor. People were crying, begging for anyone to save her. Glares of incompetence swarmed around the Jedi who let this happen. Their priority was saving the Queen, they could…

"Obi-Wan," Lan'vass squeezed into his shoulder, reminding him where his duty lay.

"We can borrow a speeder off of the landing pad," he pronounced, his sight only upon the other Jedi. The cacophony around them faded, Obi-Wan's steps assured as he and Lan'vass walked away from the country panicking about their dying monarch.

"She may yet survive," Lan'vass pronounced before they stepped through the doors. Obi-Wan chose to not hear her words, nor let them touch his heart. He had far graver matters to settle now.