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Before a further word could fly from his mouth, Shaak Ti and Stass Allie were in motion; Shaak Ti tackling Palpatine to the floor, while Allie ignited her blade and brought it vertically in front of her.

Without warning, the gunships closest to 500 Republica were lanced by plasma bolts. Their door gunners blown into midair, the two ships veered and began to fall through the clouds, trailing plumes of fire and thick black smoke.

“Unhand me!” Palpatine said. “How dare you?”

Shaak Ti kept him pinned to the floor and called her lightsaber into her hand.

A shrill sound overrode the window’s noise cancellation feature, and a Separatist assault craft rose into view from somewhere below the suite. Crowded at the side hatches and ready to deploy stood a band of battle droids and others. As the craft hovered closer to the window Shaak Ti gaped in disbelief.

Grievous!

“Down!” Stass Allie shouted a moment before the entire window wall blew inward, filling the air with permaglass pebbles. Through the shattered window, droids leapt into the room, opening up with blaster rifles.

Stass Allie stood immobile in the rush of wind, noise, and blaster bolts. Six Red Guards raced to her side, their activated force pikes humming in concert with Allie’s lightsaber. Droids fell armless, legless, headless before they made it two meters into the room. Blaster bolts deflected by Allie’s flashing blue blade blazed out of the window opening, ripping into the other droids waiting to hurdle the gap between craft and building.

For a moment Shaak Ti was certain that Allie was going to throw herself aboard the hovering gunboat, but there were simply too many droids standing in the way. Keeping Palpatine in a crouch, she grabbed a handful of his robes and began to guide him deeper into the room, her upraised lightsaber parrying bolts that ricocheted from the walls and ceiling.

Beaten back, the battle droids broke off their attack. Outside the window, the gunboat was taking heavy fire from a surround of patrol skimmers. As Allie and the Red Guards were felling the final few droids, the Separatist craft dropped back into the clouds, with bolts from the skimmers chasing it.

Releasing Palpatine to the custody of two guards, Shaak Ti raced to the window and gazed down into the clouds. By then, there was little to see but angry exchanges of cyan and crimson light.

She turned to face Isard. “Alert Homeworld Security that General Grievous has broken through the perimeter.”

Elsewhere in the room, Pestage was helping Palpatine to his feet.

“Ready now, sir?”

Palpatine returned a wide-eyed nod.

“These familiarization drills you’ve been conducting,” Stass Allie started to say.

Isard gestured to one of the side rooms. “The suite is equipped with a secret turbolift that serves a secure, midlevel skydock. An armored gunship is standing by to transport the Chancellor to a bunker complex in the Sah’c District.”

“Negative,” Shaak Ti said, shaking her head. “Grievous knew enough to come here. We have to assume that the escape route has been compromised, as well.”

“We can’t just take him to a public shelter,” Isard said.

“No,” Shaak Ti agreed. “But there are other ways to reach the bunker complex.”

“Why not use Republica’s private turbolifts,” one of the security guards suggested. “Ride them to the basement levels and you’ll have access to any number of landing platforms.”

Stass Allie nodded, then glanced at Palpatine. “Supreme Chancellor, your guards are going to encircle you. You are not to attempt to leave that circle under any circumstances. Do you understand?”

Palpatine nodded. “I’ll do whatever you say.”

Allie waited until the Red Guards had gathered around him. “Now—quickly!”

When everyone had moved into the hallway, Shaak Ti used her comlink to find Mace Windu.

“Mace, Grievous is onworld,” she said the moment she heard his voice.

The response was noisy but intelligible. “I just heard.”

“The Chancellor’s escape route may be in jeopardy,” she continued.