Chapter 55: Potential Allies

Summary: Oh, hey, it's a main character! Haven't seen those much...and it's the hot one this time! No, I don't mean the one Obi-wan lit on fire! The hot one with Boobs, silly.

*Warning* Chapters 52-55 were all posted back-to-back! Make sure you catch them all!

Chapter 55: Potential Allies

- Late 26 BBY – Naboo Royal Palace-

"Greetings, Queen Amidala. I admit, I'm unsure who or what I should thank for the pleasure of this meeting?"

Padmé Amidala shook her head at Izuku's politeness, having already done her own Royal folderol.

"It is I who should thank you, Master Midoriya. Both for answering this request for a meeting, and for the considerable boost in trade your various companies have provided to Naboo."

There was some truth to her statement and they both knew it. Izuku had no idea why the Queen had made a formal request for either himself or Aayla to visit Naboo's royal palace. It had not been a summons, and it had been very politely addressed to his official title as Master of Tythe. He hadn't even known he had that title, until the message arrived bearing it. Aayla had broken down into giggles and admitted to having put it on a form for official documentation when she'd been a bit punch drunk with exhaustion as she helped him with the massive stream of paperwork needed to take over a planet. She'd smirkingly informed him that he was lucky Mei hadn't joined them yet, or she'd have added Harem to the Master bit.

Sadly, he could believe it, as that was entirely in character. He still didn't know how she'd convinced his new Personal Assistant to make her Office Uniform a bunny girl costume nearly identical to those used at the Lucky Rabbit. It had taken months for him to give up trying to convince Asora that it was, perhaps, not the best uniform choice. The last time he'd tried, Aayla had somehow ended up under his desk, giving him a blowjob, as a way to disrupt the attempt. All while his PA suspiciously kept dropping things or leaning over his desk, large chest half popping out of her 'uniform' top to rearrange something on said desk. Better just to let Aayla have her mischief before it escalated even farther.

That particular 'rabbit trail' of thought wasn't a productive one at the moment, but Izuku admitted to himself he had no clue what this meeting was about. Padmé had clearly done her homework to even find that title. But, up until now at least, their interactions with Naboo had been nothing but increasingly positive. They were handling something like 53 percent of Naboo's carrying trade by this point, having stepped neatly into a void that had still existed after their understandable barring of any Trade Federation affiliated ship from running their plasma or other exports and imports. The Gungans had also taken a great liking to them, with some 9,000 of them having outright joined his military. They'd made for fantastic trainers for the Tythe military, as well as equally fantastic commandos for some amphibious anti-slave raids by the Shatter Shackle. None of that, however, seemed to be a logical reason for the Queen to request a visit.

"I'm sure you're quite confused why I've requested your presence here. The truth is that there are two reasons. One entirely personal, and another on behalf of my government. If not for the personal reason, I'd have left this in the hands of my capable Minister for Trade. As the personal reason was recently brought to my attention, however, I felt the need to handle this myself."

Cocking his head even as Aayla made a noise of inquiry, they both watched as the Queen stood from the couch in the informal lounge they'd been led to, feeling the tension in the slightly younger woman as she moved. Their surprise only increased when she bowed shallowly to them and stayed in that position.

"It is to my great distress that I never made the attempt to free Shmi Skywalker. I had, until the Jedi Order recently contacted me requesting what details I remembered of the event, previously assumed that the Order had done so after taking in her son. To discover that they themselves had experienced a lapse in records due to Master Jinn's death, and Shmi slipped through the cracks as a result, leaves me with deep regret that I did not follow up on the matter far more swiftly."

Padmé's eyes closed, regret and sorrow wafting off her in the Force, but she gathered herself and pressed on a moment later.

"When I enquired to make sure she was safe now, I was informed that Knight Secura had taken care of the matter on her own initiative, delivering her to one of the many programs you provide for freed slaves, Master Midoriya. Making her one of the, as I have discovered while looking to reach out to you, now hundreds of thousands of slaves you have granted aid to. This is the personal matter I spoke of. That I wanted to give you my personal thanks for doing what I should have. I cannot, in good conscience, offer the favor of Naboo. But if you ever require a personal favor from me, within reason, you have but the name it."

It was Aayla who reached out and placed a gentle hand on the still-dipped shoulder of the Queen, encouraging her to stand up. Then she grinned impishly, and Izuku nearly groaned sensing she was about to do something ridiculous to break the seriousness of the moment.

"Bikini beach party."

Padmé blinked, utter confusion washing over her face at the seemingly nonsensical phrase. Aayla, utterly undeterred, explained with a huge grin on her face.

"That's the favor. You and your handmaidens are going to have a Bikini Beach Party with us. All of you are seriously stressed, and I'm pretty sure I've already got your type nailed after just two meetings. You're never going to take a moment to rest, so long as you think other people need you to keep working and bear responsibility for all the galaxy's ills."

Aayla hooked a thumb at Izuku, who was barely keeping himself from burying his head in his hands. Maybe exposing Aayla to more Meiness by inviting Mei into their relationship had been a horrible mistake?

"So, since I consider freeing Shmi as something I don't need a favor for, my price for that favor you want to give us anyway is that you're going to take this upcoming weekend off. We'll have a Bikini Beach Party with your handmaidens. Play some volleyball while Izuku tries not to stare at our bouncing boobs. Eat some horrible for us food. And you are going to relax and recover. We can deal with whatever the serious thing you needed to handle with us is afterwards."

Padmé Amidala stared for long, uncomprehending moments. Then, when one of her handmaidens gave in and began to giggle uncontrollably, a slow smile spread across her face.

"Well, loathe though I am to take the time off…I've certainly done worse favors for others. I even have some relatives with a private beach and a wonderful beach house in the lake district we can use. Very well, Knight Secura, you shall have your party. Though I may require your help with acquiring a suitable 'bikini.'"

Aayla smiled winsomely, even as Izuku despaired that he was going to need a lot of meditation to prevent embarrassing himself this weekend…

... ...

The weekend had been heaven and hell for Izuku, with a gorgeous 20-year-old Queen and several equally beautiful handmaidens bouncing around in skimpy swimwear at the Naberrie Lakehouse. Given that those handmaidens ranged from 18 to 22 themselves and all had at least some biosculpt to look like their queen, the entire affair was like some sort of hentai about clones come to life. Something made all the more true as he'd discovered that several of the handmaidens had very mischievous personalities when they weren't pretending to be their monarch. Worse, apparently Padmé herself was the same, if you managed to dig under the layers far enough. Something which her handmaidens and Aayla combined had been determined to do.

By the end of the weekend, he'd seen five 'Padmés' topless, including the real one. He wasn't about to admit to her that he could tell which one was which, since he was pretty sure the fact that the two most frequently used 'decoys' were fantastically close to her own appearance was what had made her so daring as to try it. It had all been heaven to look upon…but a little bit hell to try not to react overly much to.

He'd failed to some extent, of course. Which had only egged all of them on in a way he didn't fully understand. Who knew that being exceedingly polite and willfully trying not to stare only made his reactions more of a compliment when he couldn't help it? Aayla had tried to explain the logic of that to him. But despite having literally been inside dozens of women's heads, he still didn't quite get it.

Whatever his own thoughts on the weekend had been, there had been no question that a quick-but-firm friendship had formed between Padmé, her handmaidens, and Aayla. That extended to him to a certain extent, but Aayla's brazen and outgoing nature had drawn them all in more thoroughly, making them relax and laugh right along with her as her antics only escalated over the weekend. There was also no question that it had done the stressed-out Queen a fantastic amount of good. While Aayla had realized just how bad it was, Izuku hadn't truly been able to feel how stressed the younger woman had been until she'd blown off steam…and still felt a little stressed. Even if she was a lot better.

Though, now that they were sitting down across the same lounge as before, they were finding out why she'd been so tense. Justifiably tense, as it happened.

"So, that's about the size of it. While my people are proud that we've been a major help to many of your anti-slavery programs, it fitting well into our existing ethos, it's also served as an even more stark wakeup call for the pacifist faction of Naboo than the invasion did. As I'm sure you know, given how many of my more disgruntled and angry citizens left for your own planet and companies, there was a major debate about if we should arm ourselves or not after the invasion was over."

Izuku nodded, he did know. Even aside from the Gungans, something like 47,000 human inhabitants of Naboo had ended up on Tythe or working in his various operations. Virtually all of them were from the faction that felt they'd 'lost' that debate.

"You ultimately ended up adding ion pulse canons as ground emplacements, along with expanding your starfighter wings, yes? A compromise solution that allows a half-decent defensive posture, but without the ability to project force outside the Naboo system in a serious way."

The Queen sighed and nodded her own acknowledgement.

"Yes. I'm only a little surprised you're aware of it, given that it was a compromise that left a good 15 percent of both extremes unhappy. Even so, it was the best solution we could come up with at the time, and I have to admit that your siphoning off some of the more radical elements afterward went a fair way to helping settle things down afterward. But…"

The Queen winced, looking like she was trying to find the right way to say what she needed to say, but a contemplative looking Aayla saved her from needing to.

"But the influx of freed slaves, while only a tiny fraction of your total population, have popped the bubble the more peaceful of your subjects lived in. Those same peaceful people are the ones most likely to work with the ex-slaves, helping them return to normal life. But, in doing so, they've been exposed to just how lawless much of our galaxy actually is. Truly, Naboo is among the closest planets to a utopia that I've ever seen. Even most of the Core Worlds have far darker overall…ambience, let's say. Coruscant can be just as criminal and nearly as dangerous as Nar Shadda, it just hides it better. Corellia is infamous for its smuggler culture, Kuat for its social castes. So on and so on."

Padmé looked genuinely troubled at those examples, pausing to internalize them for long moments. Perhaps even she hadn't quite realized just how far spread the danger in the galaxy actually was? Slowly, she began to speak again.

"Not quite the examples I'd have chosen, and disturbing to hear them used by a Jedi. But essentially correct. Many of the slaves we've handled have come from the Outer Rim, but a significant number are also from Mid Rim worlds like Naboo. The shock of such definitive, practical proof that the galaxy isn't a kind place as a whole has reignited the debate."

The Queen sighed deeply, grimacing as she added onto that fact with another point.

"The fact that the Gungans have become far more active with their own military, being a constant reminder that Naboo isn't nearly as unarmed as it appears to its human population, has only added to the turmoil. Before, in the shocked aftermath of the invasion, it didn't really register to anyone that the Gungan Grand Army wasn't some small security force. Now, as you've traded with them as much as the human population and the Gungans have thrived, it's become much more obvious that even the forces committed against the Droids Army was actually only a fragment of their standing military."

Padmé reached forward and tapped keys for a holodisplay built into the low table between them and her. Izuku and Aayla both blinked in surprise as a design they recognized appeared. It was a Mon Calamari built customs corvette, one they'd considered purchasing before realizing that the building principles of the species were a very poor fit for their mix of droids and organics.

Since, even within the same class of ship, every ship the Mon Calamari built was somewhat unique, it made it much harder to use droids with them. Every droid would need to have every variation in their databanks and need a mass update with every new ship they purchased. Otherwise, they couldn't just deploy the same droid with the same software universally. They'd nixed the idea early on as a result, instead simply upping the production run of their Defenders and buying the rights to produce a CR-90 variant from CEC to flesh out their needs for that class.

"I, and the rest of the planners for that matter, never really considered what would happen if the Gungans decided that the planet wasn't protected enough. This is their world, too…and with the money flowing in from trade with your companies, they decided to start buying starships of their own. They were already building a variant of our N-1s. But now they've purchased a number of well-armed customs corvettes from the Dac shipyards. Needless to say, this has caused some issues."

Padmé's voice was so dry that Izuku couldn't help but snort, even as his experiences and mental inventory of 'borrowed' skills from others was working through the political implications.

"It's created a perfect storm, hasn't it? You already had a significant amount of the population that weren't comfortable with the Gungans historically. Now those Gungans are arming up, with the legitimate point that they are doing so because they don't believe the defenses are good enough to prevent another invasion. All while your more peacenik population has had the blinders pulled away and understand just how precarious it is to be a Mid Rim world in the current Republic."

The Queen sighed and nodded.

"More or less? Yes, that's exactly it. Unlike the previous debate, this renewed version is turning out to be heavily in favor of increasing our own defensive commitment. But there is still a balance required, if we want to maintain our ethos and culture. We have the credits, due in no small part to the trade your operations have brought through Naboo. But simply expanding our ion pulse arrays and adding more starfighters is not enough. Leaving me in much the position you were when you first approached about our starfighter design."

Izuku hummed, mulling that over. Obviously, they were looking for ships comparable to the Gungans.

"Our Defender-Class Corvettes? Are you looking to buy them or build them?"

Amidala's wry smile told him he'd hit the nail on the head.

"Possibly both. In truth, part of the reason we are interested in the design is for the heavy ion cannon it has for its size. That makes it able to handle customs patrol actions defensively and relatively bloodlessly, much like our ground-based systems. We'd very much like to know if it would be possible to emphasize that even farther, stripping out everything but ion cannons and point defense. And if that's something you can build for us and are willing to sell, or if we'd need to make them ourselves…"

Running that thought through his head, grateful he'd copied understanding of the ship in question directly from Mei at one point, Izuku worked through the possibilities. Technically, their corvette production was well ahead of any of their other ships, enough so that they'd actually slowed the pace of building them in favor of more transports and carriers. Better yet, they could be built groundside, rather than needing orbital yards. Just as importantly, selling them to a few Mid Rim worlds represented a possible counterweight to future plans that might see the Republic a little bit miffed with them.

Making a snap decision, he leaned forward with a smile and opened negotiations…

... ... ... ... ... ... ...

A/N 1: Padme! I wanted them to see her again before the chaos really gets rolling. Speaking of which, however, from these last few chapters...I think you can see what the effect of being around Mei too much has had on Aayla :-p. Chaos Aayla is kinda fun to write, and she makes total sense when you consider who her original Master was. Quinlan Vos was very much a chaotic troll type personality. Add in frequent exposure to Mei...and you get Chaos Aayla, who will continue to make appearances when and where appropriate.

A/N 2: Padme is one of the very few additional girls that I'm considering adding to the pairing. Feel free to chime in on that thought. Though, be warned, if it happens? Kiss canon Padme goodbye as she's forced to embrace her true Chaotic Good alignment instead of pretending she's Lawful Good...badly.

A/N 3: I only mention this once per release, but my stories have a  page where some early access content is available. In example, I just released chapters 56-58 of Displaced Hero there, giving it just over an additional 15,000 more words which will remain in early access until next month. Similarly, there are at least a few Early Access chapters there for ALL of my stories, though NONE of them are ever permanently paywalled. All fanfiction content I make ends up here (or on Fanfiction.net and Questionable Questing) eventually, as new content for each story is released.