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Four Jedi Masters walked into the office of the Supreme Chancellor of the Republic. Several dozen Jedi Knights prowled below them, ensuring that none would interfere with their mission. They themselves were to not interfere, for no matter how many of them there were, none were remotely ready to confront a Sith Lord.
That was the grim task these hallowed four set themselves upon. Saesee Tiin. Agen Kolar. Kit Fisto. Acclaimed duelists all, war heroes from their tenure in the Clone Wars. At their head, Mace Windu, the greatest duelist in the Jedi Order, only living master of Vapaad, perhaps the most feared Jedi in the entire galaxy, strode grimly into the office before them. At their entrance, the luxurious chair turned from the view of Coruscant's skyline, revealing their quarry. Supreme Chancellor Palpatine of the Galactic Republic, a little old man with a thinning hairline of snow-white hair, wrinkled, paper-thin skin, and the kindly eyes more commonly found on doting grandfathers regarded them. It was difficult to believe that this man was the Sith Lord that had been orchestrating this whole catastrophic conflict. The Masters filed into the office, Windu at the centre, Tiin and Kolar on the right, and Fisto on the left. Palpatine broke the silence first. "Master Jedi! I take it General Grevious has been destroyed then. I must say, you're here sooner than expected..."
The Masters had discussed strategy on the flight over, for their victory against the Sith must be not merely martial, but political. Palpatine held a stranglehold over the Senate and the courts, one that could only be broken with direct admission of treason against the Republic. Therefore they would attempt to get him to admit his own falseness before they slew him. The security holograms could then be presented to the populace to expose him for what he was.
Master Kolar spoke first. "He has been, Chancellor. Master Kenobi was successful in his mission."
Palpatine grinned. "Good! Excellent news! Without his leadership the droid armies will swiftly crumble." He paused, and his grin faded. "But though I am honoured at your presence, is delivering such a message a task that requires the presence of four skilled Jedi Masters? Surely my good friend Master Skywalker would have been sufficient."
Tiin spoke next. "That is not all we are here for, Chancellor. At the beginning of the war, you promised you would lay down the emergency powers the Senate granted to you at the conclusion of the conflict. With any capable Separatist leadership killed, we have come to suggest you lay down those powers, now that there is no significant threat to the Republic."
Palpatine's face adopted a confused expression. "I'm afraid I'm unsure what you're saying."
Now Master Fisto spoke. "Chancellor, you have been in power for far longer than your term of office would normally allow. It is time for you to step down."
At that, something shifted about Palpatine. His face did not show any anger or fear, yet a subtle sense of menace exuded from him. "I must disagree. While both Dooku and Grevious have been eliminated, the main body of Separatist leadership still exists. I cannot step down while they still live."
Mace had had quite enough of this wordplay. "Enough of this. You will step down, Chancellor. Your leadership is no longer required."
For the first time, Palpatine's face showed anger. "Are you threatening me, master Jedi? I will not forswear my authority on the basis of intimidation!"
Mace shrugged off his outer robes, the other Masters following suit. Unclipping his lightsaber, he spoke in tones of finality. "In the course of my duties as a defender of freedom and justice in the Republic. By my authority as a Jedi Master. In the name of the Galactic Senate of the Republic, I place you, Sheev Palpatine, under arrest. Your crimes include unlawfully extending your authority past your term, bribery, assassination, manipulating the Confederacy of Independent Systems and the Galactic Republic into the Clone Wars, costing billions if not trillions of lives, and being the Sith Lord Darth Sidious. You will stand trial before the Senate."
Palpatine's face was the opposite of geniality - a twisted caricature of the face he'd presented on all their previous meetings, eyes flashing with hate. "I am the Senate."
Windu ignited his lightsaber. "Not yet."
Palpatine stood, a lightsaber handle suddenly in his hand. "It's treason, then." Suddenly a veritable wave of congealed hate rolled off of Palpatine, and the Masters could see the dark side of the force swirling around him in great clouds.
They ignited their lightsabers but it was already too late. With a bestial shriek more fit for a racnor than a human throat, Palpatine moved. By the time the other Masters' lightsabers had ignited fully, the elderly man had leapt across the room, letting out a wave of Force that shunted Mace down the entry hall, impaled Kolar through the heart with his gleaming red blade, ripped it horizontally out of his chest, bisecting Tiin in the same move, and locked blades with Fisto, who had barely avoided his own killing blow in time. Windu ran towards the duel faster than he'd ever gone in his life, but by the time he reached them Palpatine had first cut Fisto's arms off and stabbed him upward through the chest and into his brain. Three of the most skilled Jedi in the entire order, cut down in a literal eyeblink. For the first time in a very long time, Windu was forced on the defensive as the beast in human skin that called itself Sidious hacked at him in a frenzy, driving him out of the office and out into the lobby. But where other Jedi were incredibly skilled swordsmen (and women, and others) unmatched by any other in the galaxy, Windu was on another level entirely. Where other Jedi banished their inner darkness through intense training and meditation, Mace channeled his, and used it in Vapaad, that style which only he had mastered rather than letting it master him. He could feel the rage Sidious was using to fuel his strikes, rage that he was trying to knock him off balance with. It would've worked with other Jedi, who would've had no recourse but to attempt to resist his onslaught. Windu had a different option.
He marshalled all of his focus on the fight and plunged himself deeper into Vapaad than he'd ever gone before, channeling the thrill of the fight through his very bones. And then he went further. Vapaad harnessed the user's inner darkness into a weapon of the light; Windu took hold of the dark side radiating off of Sidious and coursed it through himself, leeching off the sheer power the Sith Lord was giving out to power his moves. His attention drifted inward. He no longer saw the furious strikes Sidious used, nor his own swift counters. All his focus was on resisting the pull of the dark side that even now thrummed through him like a snake.
To an outside observer, the both of them would barely even look human anymore. So fast were their sabres moving that they could no longer be distinguished as one blade or another, but instead circular spheres of purple and red fire, smoothly blending into one another. Even a skilled Jedi could not distinguish one move from the next: to them the two combatants would appear as towering figures with several dozen arms that held ten lightsabers in each hand, all striking at different angles at the same time.
They left a path of destruction behind them as they duelled their way across the Senator's suite. Any wall they drew near was swiftly covered in glowing gouges, and any furniture hacked to pieces by deflected strikes. Finally, however, they drew near the window, where it ended. Their whirling clouds of plasma shattered the panoramic glass and the high winds of Courscant's upper levels gusted through the room, threatening to throw both Jedi and Sith off balance. In response Sidious directed a minuscule fraction of his focus towards securing his feet and his strikes slowed down by a fraction of a nanosecond.
That was all Windu needed.
His boot shot out of the maelstrom of swords and struck Sidious straight across the jaw. His balance lost, the Sith Lord fell and scrambled backwards to the edge of the window, away from the unerring lightsaber of Mace Windu, who strode victoriously towards him.
"You are under arrest, my lord."