#star wars aus
Anakin and Padme in a Tam Lin AU for @the-far-bright-center
(because sometimes you just really wish RotS ended with Padme breaking the Wicked Spell on her Enchanted Knight)
I guess that if Palpatine kicked it early and Dooku was left holding the reins, he’d stay where he is and focus on carving out his sith empire from within the separatists? That’s his power base and he has no path to the head of the republic, and while he could surely conquer more of it- with the chips he can straight up just steal the republic’s army right out from under them and order 66 etc, they’re sitting ducks- he’d meet more immediate resistance from the poplace than Palpatine did, I guess. But the republic would take some heavy blows and have to recreate a military from scratch. Dooku had a strong hand.