Senate Rotunda

The meeting concluded, equally satisfactorily and unsatisfactorily for all the parties involved, the three Jedi took their leave from the Chancellor and exited the spacious offices.

The Sith Lord kept an eye on their passage through the Senate building long after the sliding panels had shut them from his physical view.

The young Jedi Master took the lead, his steps deliberate and graceful and his thoughts consumed with strong feelings of misgiving. His Padawan learner strolled lightly a half-step behind him, his head in the clouds and his feet almost walking on them. He was not oblivious to his Master’s despondency but he was determined to ignore them. The last of the trio, a diminutive, ancient Jedi Councilor, floated with dignity on his hover-couch and observed to two in front of him, pensively.

The journey from Senate building to Jedi Temple was taken on foot. The network of walkways and automated crossings for pedestrians in the city planet connected the dual seats of power in a single straight path. The silence of the journey was broken only once when at the approach of the Senate doors, the young Padawan dropped out of his euphoric state to ask his Masters of a mundane request.

“May I use this opportunity to pay a short visit to Senator Amidala?” The request was made with the utmost politeness and casualness.

The young Master paused in mid-step and faced his Padawan. “Is the Senator expecting you, Anakin?”

“No,” replied the apprentice, still casual. “But when I left her in Naboo she insisted that I could see her whenever the opportunity availed itself.”

“Was there a purpose behind the invitation, Anakin?” the Councilor’s hover chair came to float between the two men so he could observe the conversation more attentively.

“N… not particularly, Master,” the apprentice replied, his façade shaking a bit under the scrutiny.

“Then, I’m sure she will not be disappointed if you pass up this opportunity until the next one,” said the Master firmly.

The turbo-lifts opened and he stepped inside, the hover chair floated in right behind him. He was about to operate the down lever when he realized that his apprentice was still standing just outside the lift.

The apprentice’s mental shields were up and the expression on his face closed. He was as blank as a drawing board and the Master felt a strange revulsion rise up in him against his apprentice.

“Anakin?” he asked sharply.

The Padawan looked at his Master a moment longer with shuttered eyes. Then obediently, he stepped into the lift.

The Sith Master smiled in the privacy of his chambers, a wide shark-like smile that was utterly incongruous with the façade of the Chancellor. He COM’s his aide and gave some specific instructions, instructions that would further instigate the events that he had just set in motion. Then he returned to his desk and went back to the grueling task of conducting both sides of a galactic civil war.

Office of the Naboo Delegation, Senate Rotunda

We’d be living a lie. I couldn’t do that, could you?

“Well, Anakin, I am learning fast.”

“Mesa pardon my lady?”

Padmé looked up from the surface of the conference table to the concerned Gungan face staring at her. “Nothing, Jar Jar,” she said, “I was only thinking out loud.”

“Yousa not look too good, mylady. Maybe yousa take day off.”

“No!” she said firmly. Jar Jar was taken aback; then he turned back to the datapads he was studying.

“I’m sorry for shouting, Jar Jar,” Padmé said, contrite. “I overreacted.”

Jar Jar mumbled something in reply without lifting his face from his work. He was obviously still hurt which was odd for Jar Jar. Padmé felt that she knew why but she could not just bring herself to remember now. So she just shrugged mentally and turned to the sheaves of parchment that she was supposed to be studying for the next senate session. She had not turned a page since she opened it half an hour ago.

Her mind was not on her work. It was on her husband.

Husband. She had barely seen him since he had left her at Naboo to return to his responsibilities at Coruscant. For the first time since she had taken up her responsibilities of Galactic Senator, Padmé had not longed to prolong her short stay at home. Instead, although outwardly she had been attentive during long council and private meetings with the Queen and her cabinet, and she had been diligent with her affairs in her office in Theed and devoted at home with her parents (Sola, thankfully, had returned home with her daughters), internally, she had been loathing every minute of her stay in Naboo; her beautiful world that filled her with so much joy and dedication repulsed her. It was as if when Anakin left, he had taken with him her pleasure in the simplest of things. It had been a constant act of will to get up each morning and get through her day knowing fully well that when she woke up he would not beside her and that there was no chance of seeing him or communicating with him during the day. Their time together had been so brief- it was barely a month ago when her only mental image of him was the poignant recollection of the little Tatooine slave but now he was so insinuated into her existence that she felt like if she had never – and could never – be without him. It was as if all this while she had been a prisoner and Anakin had come and freed her and she had tasted the sweet sense of freedom, only for him to leave but not before locking her back in her cage. It might have been better not to have ever been freed than to have known it and had it taken from you.

Her stay in Naboo had seemed interminable but really it had been very brief. In less than a week, she was en route to Alderaan to attend a meeting of the Loyalist Committee on their position during the ongoing Wars. Then she was in Malastare, campaigning against a bill that placed embargoes on refugee transport exiting from Separatist systems. Then she was back in Coruscant, pitching her case to the ad hoc committee set up by Chancellor Palpatine to deal with matters of ‘secondary importance’ to the Senate because with the new emergency powers of the Chancellor, issues concerning the Clone Wars – including the placement of embargoes on refuge ships – were vetoed directly by the Chancellor and at the same time, he was too busy to deal with most of these matters directly so he had delegated some authority to a committee of selected advisors to do so. Some of the advisors had been Jedi Masters.

The moment she arrived on Coruscant, she had sent out her feelers for Anakin – where he was, what he was doing. Padmé Amidala had gained a new respect for the Jedi. When they wanted their operations – and their whereabouts to be kept secret, they succeeded. All her spies had been able to find out was that Master Kenobi and his apprentice were sent on assignment off-world. Where? For how long? In relation to what and most especially for how long? – were questions to which they could give no answers. She had tried using her skills on the numerous Jedi that suddenly seemed to populate the Senate – there was a time not so long ago that she had noted their number without any marked interest, now the swish of a brown cloak, the twist of a braid made her heart jump in her body – but nobody could be persuaded to part with information about Kenobi or his apprentice. After a while, for fear of conspicuousness, she had ended all inquiries. After all, he should be able to contact her.

But he had not.

“It’s time to go,” Jar Jar said.

Padmé fell out of her reverie and glanced at the chrono in alarm. Hours had passed since they sat at this table. She looked down at the notes that she had not even glanced through.

This was an impossible situation.

She followed Jar Jar into the Senate Hall and perused the notes carefully while the Bill was argued. Jar Jar was surprised that Padmé did not speak up during the session because the matter concerned the taxation of refugee transport and it was a matter close to her heart. It was only Bail Organa’s call just before the matter was put to vote that saved Padmé from voting for the wrong constituency.

Still heavily distracted, Padmé rounded up her day in the office as quickly as possible and made the uneventful trip back to her empty home and emptier bed.

Jedi Temple

Anakin had been unable to shake Obi-Wan off all day. His Master's stern presence had hovered over him almost as if Obi-Wan suspected his Padawa's intentions and was trying to thwart them.

When night finally came and the Jedi Master was forced to retire into his own private chambers, Anakin breathed a sigh of relief, and not just because his patience had been stretched thin. If he had borne just one more of Obi-Wan's suspicions, interfering glances, he believed he would have strangled his Master.

Anakin waited a few impossible seconds to sense his Master's somnolence, then quickly dressed. He had retired early in an effort to shake off his Master.

He climbed out of the window of his room in the Jedi Temple and made his way down to the plaza in front. Anybody that might have looked up by chance at that point in time would have seen nothing. He was cloaked in darkness in more ways than one.

He landed lightly at the edge of the plaza and took off on feet. He could have conveniently taken a speeder but where would have been the fun in that?


500 Republica

Contrary to what most people might assume, Padmé Amidala knew her way round the small kitchen of the official apartment. It was small by necessity because most of the time, food was either ordered from the elaborate restaurants contained within the building or consumed at work at neighbouring cafes around the Senate building or at more exotic places during not-all-trivial social gatherings. A few of her staff used it occasionally: Dormé, for one, insisted on cooking traditional meals whenever she could; but most of them had accepted Coruscant’s multi-ethnic cuisine.

Padmé lit the lily dish on the flame and searched for the wild oshii flowers in the cabinets. They were running low in supply. It was strange of Dormé not to have spotted that earlier, especially as she knew how therapeutic Padmé found cooking them. Padmé finished spraying the ground flowers with water and placed them on the burner. Almost immediately, the strong aroma filled her nostrils and her head cleared momentarily.

Still there was a soft pressure of tears in her throat as she lay down in her bed, her arms immediately curling around the empty space that only her husband could feel.

Ambassadorial District

The routes in Coruscant were best suited for air travel but there was a complicated maze of walkways and turbolists that connected all but the most secure buildings in the city planet. The route Anakin followed was a complex join of lifts and corridors and paths through public arenas but he knew it so well that he could have walked it in his sleep. Instead he ran with super-human speed, passing pedestrians like a wind-causing shadow. When he finally reached the restricted Ambassadorial District, he slipped into the Alderaan Private Botanical Park, shimmied his way up a riser and jumped to the nearest low-rise building. He landed on his feet and quick as a wildcat, he was running across the roof. After that, the rest of the journey was a series of runs and jumps as he made his way to the centre of the District, climbing steadily from one elevation to another. He finally reached the high roof 500 Republica and he shimmied his way down the building, finding impossible footholds and handholds in the smooth durasteel wall until he was peering down at the balcony that opened out of the apartment of the Naboo Senator. He made one last drop and then he straightened up to stare at the transparisteel before him. He nudged the closed blinds with his thoughts and they opened before him. He slipped through the open window and stepped into the darkness of the room.

Anakin almost did not make it to his wife’s side. No sooner had he landed on the balls of his feet, than a shrill beep came from the corner of the room and the click of a blaster being set filled his ears.

He had barely tucked into the roll before the laser hurtled towards him, missing the tip of his ear by micro-meters.

The bright beam tracked him as he rolled across the room.

“Don’t move!” His wife’s shrill voice had never sounded deadlier. Nor had he realized how deadly her aim was.

Don’t move? Why? So I can be a sitting duck? He wondered, still rolling. He came to a stop behind the tall column where she hung her cloaks, and never was he so grateful to Naboo fashion and architecture. The laser beam bounced off the edges.

Not quite catching his breath, he bellowed: “Padmé, how are you going to explain my corpse if it’s found it in your room!”

There was a sharp gasp. “Anakin?”

“Not quite. Your other husband. Will you stop shooting?”

Padmé gasped again, and the barrage of missiles stopped. He felt strangely bereft. Apparently, near-assassination-by-wife scenarios were disturbingly sexy.

“Anakin!” she cried again, and his heart tightened at the wonderful mixture of surprise and joy and horror. He could hear her getting to her feet – does she sleep with a blaster under her pillow? – and he wanted nothing more than to run to her arms but…

“My lady!”

Dormé burst into the room, blaster drawn and ready to shoot.

For a moment all three were frozen. Padmé in her white gown, poised on the balls of her feet, one hand still holding a blaster, even though her arms were wide open. Anakin, peering cautiously around the column, and Dormé, weapon arm outstretched and pointed dangerously at Anakin's head.

Dormé broke the silence first. "Jedi Skywalker!"

The spell shattered and Padmé dashed to the handmaiden, pushing away the weapon. "Keep that thing away!"

"My lady… I heard shots…"

From beyond the door, there was the sound of running steps.

Padmé spun to stare at her husband with desperate eyes. "Captain Typho… the security detail…" She felt faint. If anyone were to find Anakin here…

Anakin seemed to have read her mind perfectly. With one quick nod, he moved. Fast. One moment, he was standing by the column. The next, one leg was loped over the edge of her window. "Excuse me, ladies."

He jumped.

A heartbeat later, the two women screamed.