THE SENATE BUILDING CAME INTO VIEW, a dome of transparisteel with a tower atop its center aimed like a knife blade at the sky. Most of the windows were dark. The transport headed for the landing pad atop the building. Halogens washed the roof in light. Malgus saw a squad of Imperial guards, gray as shadows in their full armor, and a single, uniformed naval officer near the landing pad. The officer held his hand over his hat to keep the wind from blowing it off.

Malgus did not wait for the ship to touch down. When the transport was still two meters up, he leapt out of the open cargo bay and landed before the officer, whose eyes went wide at the sight of Malgus’s method of debarkation.

The young officer, his gray uniform neatly pressed, his hair neatly combed under his hat, had probably not so much as fired a blaster in years. Malgus did not bother to disguise his contempt. He tolerated the officer and his ilk only because they provided necessary support to those who did the actual fighting for the Empire.

“Darth Malgus, welcome,” the attaché said. “My name is Roon Neele. Darth Angral—”

“Speak only if you must, Roon Neele. Pleasantries annoy me at the best of times. And this is not the best of times.”

Neele’s mouth hung open for a moment, then closed.

“Excellent,” Malgus said, as the transport put down and its weight vibrated the landing pad. “Now take me to Darth Angral.”

“Of course.”

They walked across the roof to the turbo lift. Armored Imperial troops flanked the door to either side of it. Both saluted Malgus. Neele and Malgus rode the lift down several floors in silence. The doors opened to reveal a long, wide hallway lined with office doors to the right and left, and ending in a large pair of double doors on which were engraved the words:

THE OFFICE OF THE CHANCELLOR OF THE REPUBLIC

Two more armed and armored Imperial soldiers stood guard at the doors.

The arc-shaped reception desk immediately before the lift—presumably the domain of the Chancellor’s secretary—sat empty, the secretary long gone.

Roon indicated the Chancellor’s office but did not move to exit.

“Darth Angral has commandeered the Chancellor’s office. He is expecting you.”

Malgus exited the lift and strode down the hall. The offices to either side of him stood empty, all of them showing signs of a hurried evacuation—spilled cups of caf, papers lying loose on the carpeted floor, an overturned chair. Malgus imagined the shock the occupants must have felt as they watched Imperial forces pour out of the sky. He wondered what Angral had done with the Senators and their staffs. Some, he knew, had been killed in the initial attack. Others had probably been executed afterward.