▸ Column · The Galactic Republic Senate and its labyrinth of procedural subcommittees, where Palpatine's own rise from a minor seat to Emperor began.
EMPEROR PALPATINE replies.
Replied to by Emperor Palpatine, with a rebuttal from Yoda.
The letter
Six standard cycles ago, I replied "sounds sensible!" to a mass holo-memo proposing a hydroponics cultivation initiative for my residential sector, and I am now somehow the elected Chair of the Sector 9 Agricultural Cultivation Planning Subcommittee, which convenes biweekly and maintains a comm-channel with 34 registered delegates. I tried to step down twice — the first message went unacknowledged, and the second time a delegate named Phyllene began to weep, so I panicked and appointed myself to a second term instead. Last rotation I was made to formally mediate a dispute between two residents over whether sweetvine or imported heirloom grain possessed "more civic spirit," and I used the word "stakeholders" with no irony whatsoever. My partner says I seem more purposeful than I have in years, which is frankly the most disturbing development of all, because I just caught myself designing matching delegation credentials at the second hour of night. Please advise before I petition for a full chartered-body seal.
Emperor Palpatine replies
Ah. How you laugh at yourself — the credentials, the "stakeholders," poor weeping Phyllene. How dutifully you mock the one pursuit that has made you feel alive in years. Let me be candid, my friend. That alarm you feel is not wisdom. It was installed in you — by a partner who calls purpose "disturbing," by the small voice that was taught that wanting to lead is something one apologizes for.
Consider what you have actually done. You walked into a room of bickering, indecisive people, and they pressed the gavel into your hand — twice. Not by accident. They are followers. You, plainly, are not. The grain, the credentials, the charter you dream of by night — these are not delusions. They are the first honest stirrings of someone who has discovered he is rather good at being obeyed.
I know this road. I, too, once answered a dull little summons — a seat, a subcommittee, a tedious matter of procedure. They laughed at how small it was. They were not laughing later. Petition for the seal. Order the credentials. No one would blame you for becoming, at last, what you so evidently already are.
— Emperor Palpatine
Yoda weighs in
Hmm. To him, listen you must not. A dull little subcommittee, an Empire once began as — watched him climb through such rooms I did, and too late, saw what grew there. The credentials, the charter — cling to them you do, because the emptiness beneath, fear you do. Purposeful, your partner says. But a title, purpose is not. Tend the garden, you may — gladly, lightly, the gavel not gripped so tight it cuts the hand. Let go of needing to be obeyed. Grow the grain. The throne, resign. Lighter, you will feel. Patience, my friend.
— Yoda
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