Panaka shook his head. 'Most of our people are in the detention camps. A few hundred officers and guards have formed an underground movement to resist the invasion. I've brought as many of the leaders as I could find.'
'Good.' Padme nodded appreciatively toward Boss Nass. 'The Gungans have a larger army than we imagined.'
'Very, very bombad!' the Gungan chief rumbled.
Panaka exhaled wearily. 'You'll need it. The Federation army is much larger than we thought, too. And stronger.' He gave the Queen a considering look. 'In my opinion, this isn't a battle we can win, Your Highness.'
Standing at the edge of the circle, Jar Jar Binks looked down at Anakin and rolled his eyes despairingly.
But Padme was undeterred. 'I don't intend to win it, Captain. The battle is a diversion. We need the Gungans to draw the droid army away from Theed, so we can infiltrate the palace and capture the Neimoidian viceroy. The Trade Federation cannot function without its head. Neimoidians don't think for themselves. Without the viceroy to command them, they will cease to be a threat. '
She waited for them to consider her plan, eyes fixing automaticallyon Qui- Gon Jinn. 'What do you think, Master Jedi?' she asked.
'It is a well-conceived plan,' Qui-Gon acknowledged. 'It appears to be your best possible move, Your Highness, although there is great risk. Even with the droid army in the field, the viceroy will be well guarded. And many of the Gungans may be killed.'
Boss Nass snorted derisively. 'They bombad guns no get through our shields! We ready to fight!'
Jar Jar gave Anakin another eye roll, but this time Boss Nass saw him do so and gave his new general a hard warning look.
Padme was thinking. 'We could reduce the Gungan casualties by securing the main hangar and sending our pilots to knock out their orbiting control ship. Without the control ship to signal them, the droid army can't function at all.'
Everyone nodded in agreement. 'But if the viceroy should escape, Your Highness,' Obi-Wan pointed out darkly, 'he will return with another droid army, and you'll be no better off than you are now. Whatever else happens, you must capture him.'
'Indeed, we must,' Padme agreed. 'Everything depends on it. Cut off the head, and the serpent dies. Without the viceroy, the Trade Federation collapses.'
They moved on to other matters then, beginning a detailed discussion of battle tactics and command responsibilities. Anakin stood listening for a moment, then eased his way close to Qui-Gon and tugged on his sleeve.
'What about me?' he asked quietly.
The Jedi Master put a hand on the boy's head and smiled. 'You stay close to me, Annie, do as I say, and you'll be safe.'
Keeping safe wasn't quite what the boy had in mind, but he let the matter drop, satisfied that as long as he was close to Qui-Gon, he woUldn't be far from the action.
In the Theed palace throne room, Darth Sidious loomed in hologram form before Darth Maul, Battle Droid Commander OOM-9, and the Neimoidians. Smooth and silky, his voice oozed through the shadowy ether.
'Our young Queen surprises me,' he whispered thoughtfully, hidden within his dark robes. 'She is more foolish than I thought. '
'We are sending all available troops to meet this army of hers,' Nute Gunray offered quickly. 'It appears to be assembling at the edge of the swamp. Primitives, my lord-nothing better. We do not expect much resistance.'
'I am increasing security at all Naboo detention camps,' OOM-9 intoned.
Darth Maul glared at nothing, then shook his horned head. 'I feel there is more to this than what we know, my Master. The two Jedi may be using the Queen for their own purposes.'
'The Jedi cannot become involved,' Darth Sidious soothed, hands spreading in a placating motion. 'They can only protect the Queen. Even Qui-Gon Jinn cannot break that covenant. This will work to our advantage.'
Darth Maul snorted, anxious to get on with it.
'I have your approval to proceed, then, my lord?' Nute Gunray asked hesitantly, avoiding the younger Sith's mad eyes.
'Proceed,' Darth Sidious ordered softly. 'Wipe them out, Viceroy. All of them.'
Chapter 20
By midday, with the sun overhead in a cloudless sky and the wind died away to nothing, the grasslands lying south of Theed between the Naboo capital city and the Gungan swamp lay empty and still. Heat rose off the grasslands in a soft shimmer, and it was so quiet that from a hundred meters away the chirp of birds and the buzz of insects could be heard as if they were settled close by.
Then the Trade Federation army's bubble-nosed transports and armor-wrapped tanks roared onto the rolling meadows, skimming the tall grasses in gleaming waves of bright metal.
It was quiet in the swamps as well, the perpetual twilight hushed and expectant beneath the vast canopy of limbs and vines, the surface of the mire as smooth and unbroken as glass, the reeds and rushes motionless in the windless air. Here and there a water bug jumped soundlessly from place to place, stirring puddles to life in the wake of its passing, bending blades of grass like springboards. Birds swooped and banked in bright flashes of color, darting from limb to limb. Small animals crept from cover to drink and feed, eyes bright, noses twitching, senses alert.
