Chapter Text
This isn’t how she’d imagined dying. The times she had thought about it, which, admittedly, had been quite a lot recently, she had imagined it to be a sense of fading away. A feeling of cold clutching at her heart, gripping her lungs, as the details of the world became less sharp. Instead, what she got was heat, smoke, fire. The sounds of pain surrounded her, as her friends fell, and a confused jumble of light, and the slick of blood coated her skin. Her last thought as she floated away from her body was to wonder if her decisions would make any difference at all.
3 months earlier.
Poppy was always nervous going to her boss’ office. Not because of her boss. Her and Coltway Corstan had been friends for more than 10 years, ever since her first day working for the Coruscant News Network. No, it was always on the off chance that the owner of the biggest News Station in the galaxy would be there with her boss as well. As she stood in the elevator zooming upward, watching offices and lights flash past, she fidgeted with the edge of her holo nervously. Poppy had broken most of her nervous habits over the years, not wanting to appear weak or fragile in the cutthroat environment of reporting the biggest stories in the galaxy from the seat of leadership in the free world. This trip upstairs, though, she couldn’t quite shake the feeling that there would be an unpleasant surprise waiting for her. Something in the tone of Coltway’s voice when he called her upstairs from her desk had made her pause. A stiffness in the timbre of his voice that she couldn’t ignore.
She tried to shake her feelings of unease as the lift slowed and the doors opened. She walked around the corner, ignoring the jumbled files all around her, proceeded down the hall, paused for a deep breath, and turned the doorknob.
As she entered Coltway’s office, an unexpected sight met her eyes. There was her boss, the same as he always was. Straight backed, proud, with a roman nose, brown eyes that softened at the edges, and crimson hair that was starting to thin at the temples, but he was not alone. Sitting at the desk in front of him was the owner of the Coruscant News Network, Harum Nagata, and occupying the chair to his right was none other than Mas Amedda. The sight of the slippery Weequay and tall Chagrian made her skin crawl, as if the two men’s eyes were projecting greedy hands onto her bare arms, but Poppy did not give in to the domineering feeling. She offered a polite smile, stepped into the office, and closed the door behind her while attempting to suppress the horrible feeling that she was enclosing herself within a mausoleum.
“Hello, Coltway. You wanted to speak with me?” Poppy said cordially.
“Yes, Poppy. Please sit.” Coltway gestured to an empty chair set to the side, closer to Mas Amedda than she would like. However, she sat, repressing the urge to fidget with her holo tablet once more.
“Poppy, we have a new assignment for you. As you know, the war has been increasing in scale and violence all across the galaxy. We would like for you to go and document the Republic’s efforts in this crisis,” Coltway said bluntly.
Poppy paused for a moment, collecting her thoughts before spitting out every declaration and question that had just arisen. Document the Republic’s efforts? What about her life there on Coruscant? Her work? She had spent the last 15 months detailing the legality of the Clones as autonomous beings, working closely with Senators Padme Amidala and Bail Organa to have them recognized as sentient, independent beings. She had gotten to know many of the clones that were on the Senate Guard personally. Now she was just supposed to leave all of that work behind? What about the other journalists in the field already? What about her counterpart in the field who was embedded with a clone detachment? What about leaving behind her apartment? And her friends?
“Coltway, thank you for your faith in me giving me this assignment, but I’m not sure I’m qualified for it. After all, I haven’t done field work in years, and I’ve rarely been in situations as dangerous as this is-“
“We feel you are more than qualified for this assignment,” Mas Amedda cut across her protestations. “You did 5 years in the field, and you’ve documented pirates and uprisings in the past. This is no different overall.”
“I appreciate that similarity and your vote of confidence, Vice Chairman, but what about my counterpart in the field? As I’m sure you know, I am one of several journalists who are assigned projects directly relating to the Clone Wars, with a perspective from home and in the field. My counterpart is currently doing the field perspective,” she finished, somewhat awkwardly.
“Poppy,” said Coltway in a soft voice. That voice caught her entirely off guard. She knew what that voice meant, even though she had only heard it once before.
Her eyes met Coltway’s. “He’s dead, isn’t he?” She asked quietly.
“Ric Temperus gave his life to show the Republic the efforts of the Clone Wars and the Senate are not in vain. He is a hero of the Republic, and will be honored as such,” Amedda said shortly, and without feeling, reminding her to rein in her emotions in front of these two imposing, powerful men.
“I see. He was a brave man. He had much more field experience than I do,” she continued, but trailed off slowly at the look on Amedda’s face.
“When I say ‘We’ think you are the best choice for this assignment, I speak for Chancellor Palpatine as well. He has taken a personal interest regarding your reporting on Clone rights and autonomy, and has decided field work will help you come to a long-overdue conclusion on this matter,” Amedda said with a tone of complete finality. Poppy pushed the sinking feeling to the back of her mind to deal with later, and simply nodded.
“Your apartment will be paid for and maintained by the Coruscant News Network while you are out on assignment. All expenses relating to the assignment will be covered including transport, food, toiletries, and other necessities. We will also be giving you a stipend to spend on gear you will need for extreme environments. The Clone detachment you will be embedded with is expected on Coruscant in two days time. I suggest you get ready to join them,” said Harum, speaking at last. “The matter of Clone autonomy and sentience has dragged on through this project. The Chancellor, Vice Chairman, and myself are all ready to see this come to an end in the upcoming months. Coltway has reassured us of your levelheaded demeanor. I trust you will not let the Coruscant News Network down.”
“I understand completely, and I thank you for your trust in me,” Poppy said in a calm, measured voice, though her hands were sweating. This was not the moment to panic and show weakness. After all, she had been in the field before.
The two men stood, then Chris, and moments later, Poppy, followed suit, standing to the side as all three men shook hands, and two departed.
“Oh, my dear girl,” was all Coltway could say to her. “We’ll talk about this later, alright?”
Poppy nodded mutely yet again, refusing to let her emotions out in this strict, aggressive environment, and left the office as quickly as she could politely.
Half an hour later Poppy found herself sitting alone at the bar down the street. She did not typically drink alone, and never on a weekday at four o’clock in the afternoon, but she might as well commiserate and enjoy the last bit of time she had left to her in this planet-city. As she swirled the dregs of her second drink around the bottom of its glass, she kept going over arguments in her head, things she should have said, to convince Coltway and the others that she was the wrong choice for this assignment.
‘What if I’d told them that I’m afraid of flying? Or that I get homesick? What if I had told them that a woman wasn’t cut out to be out in the field? Would they have listened?’
Poppy mused to herself. But no, none of those excuses would do. The first two were outright lies, and she would never dare to say the third excuse. She knew that she was more than capable of field work, and the second she uttered a word of doubt, it would erase all the years effort she had put forth convincing a male-dominated field that she could handle herself just fine, not to mention the damage it would cause to future prospects for other women.
No, the thing that truly bothered Poppy more than anything was the fact that she had gotten used to her life in Coruscant, a life she had worked hard to build. She had an apartment she loved, a job she was good at, and she was surrounded by friends, some of them the very clones she had been basing her report around. Poppy had all these wonderful things around her, and she also had a nagging worry that the conclusion of her project had been decided for her already with this assignment. She was not afraid of the field, but the thought of leaving a life she truly loved, to journey into the unknown, was daunting.
Poppy moodily drained the contents of her glass, tossed a few credits on the counter, and slung her jacket over her shoulders as she left the bar. The bright sun dazzled her eyes unexpectedly, as she was not accustomed to having drinks before it had set. Wondering to herself if she would soon be somewhere with no sun or entirely too much, she headed off to her apartment.