Darth Plagueis - James Luceno [171]
A look of sinister purpose contorted Sidious’s face.
Again, his eyes darted around the room, and the dark side whispered:
Your election assured, the Sun Guards absent, Plagueis unsuspecting and asleep …
And he moved in a blur.
Crackling from his fingertips, a web of blue lightning ground itself on the Muun’s breathing device. Plagueis’s eyes snapped open, the Force gathering in him like a storm, but he stopped short of defending himself. This being who had survived assassinations and killed countless opponents merely gazed at Sidious, until it struck him that Plagueis was challenging him! Confident that he couldn’t be killed, and in denial that he was slowly suffocating, he might have been simply experimenting with himself, actually courting death to put it in its place. Momentarily taken aback, Sidious stood absolutely still. Was Plagueis so self-deluded as to believe that he had achieved immortality?
The question lingered for only a moment, then Sidious unleashed another tangle of lightning, drawing more deeply on the dark side than he ever had.
“Let’s go over the second part of the speech, shall we,” he said, smoothing his tousled cloak. “You useless old fool.”
With a snarl, he threw the cloak back behind his shoulders and leaned toward Plagueis, planting his palms on the low table that was now puddled with spilled wine.
“It was Hego Damask as Darth Plagueis who came to Naboo, determined to suck the planet dry of plasma and set the Trade Federation up as its overseers. It was Hego Damask as Plagueis who then set his sights on a seemingly confused young man and, with meticulous skill, manipulated him into committing patricide, matricide, fratricide. Darth Plagueis who took him as an apprentice, sharing some of his knowledge but withholding his most powerful secrets, denying the apprentice his wishes as a means of controlling him, instilling in him a sense of murderous rage, and turning him to the dark side.” Sidious stood to his full height, glaring.
“It was Plagueis who criticized the early efforts of his apprentice, and who once choked him in a demonstration of his superiority.
“Plagueis, who denigrated him in private for hiring an inept assassin to carry out the murder of Senator Kim—and yet who allowed himself to be tricked by the Gran and nearly killed by mercenaries.
“Plagueis, who turned away from the Grand Plan to focus entirely on himself, in an egotistical quest for immortality.
“Plagueis who had the temerity to criticize his apprentice for having inculcated too much pride in the assassin he had trained.
“Plagueis who attempted to turn his equally powerful apprentice into a messenger and mere intermediary.
“And Plagueis who watched in secret while his apprentice tasked their true intermediary to reveal the reborn Sith to the galaxy.”
Sidious paused, then, in derision, added, “Plagueis the Wise, who in his time truly was, except at the end, trusting that the Rule of Two had been superseded, and failed to realize that he would not be excused from it. Plagueis the Wise, who forged the most powerful Sith Lord the galaxy has ever known, and yet who forgot to leave a place for himself; whose pride never allowed him to question that he would no longer be needed.”
Still struggling for breath, Plagueis managed to stand, but only to collapse back onto the couch, knocking a statue from its perch. Sidious moved in, his hands upraised to deliver another bolt, his expression arctic enough to chill the room. A Force storm gathered over the couch, spreading out in concentric rings, to wash over Sidious and hurl objects