Elesse nods. "Which may also contribute to the feeling that the problem is actively growing."

"Hm... The galaxy isn't - the type of place to be in a steady equilibrium, though, and lots of things are getting worse. But it's been bad for a long time, too, and it's important to know how recently problems started and how they've changed to know how to address them."

"Indeed."

And then the room is rattled by the blast of an explosion.

She moves to Elesse, hand on her lightsaber, and taps her communicator to ask for updates. 

"What was that?" Elesse asks at the same moment, jolting upright.

There's a lot of confusion on the comms immediately but- it seems like one or other of the diplomats' rooms may have been targeted.

"An attack," she says, and the Force twists around her, reaching out. "Lily's coordinating a response. I need to get you to safety."

"Who got hit? Where are we going?"

"There was an explosion nearby the Ossian delegation's suite, and a lot of confusion on the ground."

"We're making our way to the ship."

"All right, lead the way." She stands- just in time for another bomb to go off.

"Sithspit!" she hisses.

She doesn't wait for the comms - reaches out to Lily, casts her awareness out in a blazing net in the Force - identifies the blasts' location, and relays it into her comm with an eerily even tone.

It was pretty close to the path to their ship.

(Anakin starts trying to identify minds that might be enemies, though she doesn't relay that to anyone other than Lily just yet - she's always been faster at this than her teacher, even as a child. Lily holds herself within her own skin in ways Anakin doesn't.)

She turns to Elesse, then. "Follow me." And she starts towards a side door, following a hunch in the Force.

Elesse follows, slightly nervy but keeping things under control if Anakin checks.

She successfully gets them pretty far even as the overall situation deteriorates - and then they come up to the outskirts of some fighting. It looks like several of the diplomatic staff have been cornered, and there's not enough guards to really push away the attackers. 

Anakin and Elesse haven't been seen yet, and Anakin hesitates, visibly torn. 

(Hm. She could turn this further to her advantage...)

"We should help," she says to Anakin. "They'll be slaughtered."

She nods, jerkily, and takes a deep breath, clenching her unlit lightsaber more firmly. "There's spaces you could take shelter nearby," she says, quietly and quickly. 

"I'm not going to leave you to fight alone. And these are my staffers."

She relaxes a good bit, then holds out a hand and stealthily summons a dropped blaster to them. "Can you use this?" she asks.

"In theory." She takes the blaster, checks the safety and the charge level, sights down it, then holds it loosely at her side.

Approving nod.

And, a quick moment to plan - Anakin clearly understands combat very well, even in a chaotic situation like this - and then they're moving, Anakin igniting her deep amethyst lightsaber to deflect a cluster of bolts aimed at the staff she just jumped in front of. She fights well, too - she's using Shien right now, supplementing heavily with the Force, and she's pretty quickly altering the tide of battle. Her lightsaber blurs as she blocks further shots, and she begins to advance.

(Her attention is very much focused on the enemies in front of her, though - she's not perfectly keeping up her awareness of her surroundings right now.)

Elesse covers her from the side, aiming high and keeping the attackers' heads down.

Until (with a subtle pulse of influence) a pair of men break off to circle around and come at Anakin from her blind spot. They line up their shots and she gets a sudden intuition of danger almost too late-

-And Elesse steps forward and drops them both, blaster bolts whizzing past Anakin's head.

Sithspit.

She flinches only a little, then sends Elesse a grateful look and turns back to the fight. 

That seems to be more or less the turning point of the fight- these men didn't think they would be against a Jedi directly, and the two that fell took the group's morale with them.

She arrests them, naturally, once they realize the wisdom of surrender. They can explain their plans to the nice polite girl with a laser sword and then go cool their heels in a locked room (with no weapons or communication devices), how about? 

They're not the biggest fans of the idea, but the girl is both very nice and polite, and very does have a laser sword. So. They're amenable.

How good of them to see reason like this. 

She also helps make sure the injured staffers are identified and triaged - and she glances at Elesse before deciding if they're also going to escort the injured to the medical area. 

"We seem a bit less needed, right now," she murmurs.