"I am afraid it is beyond her now, Xeth," says Gralus.
"Xeth," says the Commissar. "We employed you in a mission to trace the droid shipments of the Trade Federation army that invaded Naboo. As well all know, that army was ordered to be decomissioned after the occupation was ended but a huge portion was instead stolen by the Hutts and then sold on to other interested buyers. We sent you undercover into the organisation of the Hutt involved- Shareth- with hopes of tracing who their inside man was that was able to arrange the theft and wherther it was to order to a particualr buyer who helped her. Unfortunately, you were not able to find any evidence of any such inside man and you found she was seeling to petty tyrants like Faylar who had neither the wit or resources to pull off, or even help pull off, such a heist. After your cover was blown you went off to help your Jedi friends, and we were unable to use you further. Your original mission for us was done so we did not feel in a position to protest. And like I say, we are now thankful. You see, Xeth, you were not the only agent we employed on that mission. No less than 27 expert operatives- some our own men, some, very talented freelance workers like yourself- were working at all levels of the chain, throughout the Galaxy, to try and find that hole and build a case against the perpetrators."
"Please excuse us, Xeth," says Gralus, "but we know you, not them. We'll tell you first and then we can talk about widening who we tell."
"We couldn't work it out for a long time," says the Commissar. "The only point the shipments were near Hutt Space was when they left Naboo itself, and nothing happened to them there. We found no evidence of violence anywhere along the chain- no-one was killed, nothing boarded, nothing forced. If it wasn't a Heist, it HAD to be an inside man but you, and the four other agents in a position to find one, found nothing. It was like Shareth had somehow just caused the shipments to vanish into thin air and re-appear in her palace.
"But then I got an interesting report from our man in the Baktoid workshops where the droids are made- and also where they were due to be decommissioned. What he said he thought he had found shocked us very severely.
"He told us, that according to a transport worker he had befriended... the shipments were not actually stolen at all. At the orders of Baktoid Armament's superiors... they were given to Shareth."
"Simple," says Gralus. "Everyone who in any way had anything to do with it, was in on it."
"The term we are looking for here," says the Commissar, "is conspiracy, Xeth. And a huge one, that reaches to the very highest levels of the Republic. With people so important that the Jedi cannot touch them, and so callous that they think nothing of, say, deliberately giving a droid army to the Hutts just so they could note their combat performance when they are inevitably used- just as we have heard happen after Naboo. And ruthless enough to think nothing of killing Jedi should the need arise."
"Evidence is of course the first thing I wanted. All of my operatives were re-assigned to that area to get me proof and to get me people. I sent Gralus here to contact you but you were apparently engaged in some mission outside the Republic by this time. It didn't matter- with your cover blown it would have been hard to get you into somewhere else. By the time you got back to Coruscant it was too late to arrange anything else for you.
"Unfortunately, a rather insoluble problem has prevented my case from getting anywhere."
"Technological malfunctions, Xeth. And not the slightest evidence of sabotage. But a common link that is interesting when you look at our intended target for prosecution, and where Baktoid's orders would have come from..."
He lets that hang in the air. Gralus speaks up.
"Baktoid is a subsidiary of the Techno Union, Xeth. Aside from being one of the largest and most powerful organisations that exists, the Techno Union is also one of the most powerful Senatorial lobby groups, with a power derived from the fact that half of the Galaxy depends on its services. They are no lovers of my planet, of course, because they covet our technical skills, but we refuse to join their conglomerate."
"We value our independance," says the Commissar, by way of explanation.