Summary:

Random Star Wars short fics that I cannot justify as being connected to Fork in the Road enough to put in the Side Stories. Each chapter will have its warnings + pairings at the start.

Prompt by OwlFlight in response to A Little Help (which is posted on AO3 but not on here because of rating) that I write "One about Obi-Wan and his baby escaping and hiding out on Tatooine, because Obi-Wan guesses, correctly, that it's the one planet Anakin would never, ever, suspect he would run to?"

Hopefully this satisfies?

If I continued this he wouldn't be staying on this planet for long, and TBH it'd probably end up with a dark ending (and I mean darker then the fucking original).

Warnings: mpreg, Dark!Anakin,

She seems to be constantly crying these days.

Obi Wan knows the cause of it. He pretends it is hunger that makes her cry. Keeps feeding her as if it will solve the problem. He knows it is not actually anything he can fix.

It is the weather.

She is used to the temperature controlled weather of high tech space stations. Used to the cold weather of space. She is not used to the constant heat that comes with living on desert planets.

He hopes she will get used to it soon, that she will acclimatise to it. They are not going to leave the planet anytime soon.

It is a gamble. A gamble to return to Anakin's world of origin (it is not his home world, he hated it too much for it to really be his home world) but Obi Wan prays it will pay off.

Prays it will pay off because they have already gambled enough (sacrificed enough) for him to get here. A gamble that wagered their lives (all their lives) for the potential payoff of one of them being free.

He wishes it had been Padme that escaped. Wishes it had been her and the twins that they managed to smuggle out from under Anakin's nose. It had to be him though; he had "a better chance of surviving." He was more trained then her for this, more able to know how to stay hidden and be able to fend off threats (not that she was completely incapable, she still amazed him at her ability to switch from politician to fighter to survivor). Plus, one child was easier to keep secret than two (than three).

He promised to come back for her and the twins but first needed some time to hide. Time to allow Anakin to search all the universe (except, hopefully, this planet) and become blind to his missing lover. Time to allow their daughter to grow a bit, grow enough to not need his constant attention. He knows he cannot wait too long, cannot leave Anakin with his wife and children alone for too long. He had promised he would come back and save them despite Padme's protests that they would be fine. That he needed to go so the universe had some hope of defeating whatever it is that Anakin will eventually fall into, eventually become. Of defeating the man really in charge and possible (hopefully) saving them all.

"I will try to talk him around," she had said during their one face-to-face meeting about that matter. During the one time that her handmaidens (the ones Anakin had left alive, the ones he trusted wouldn't betray him, he apparently underestimated their loyalty to Padme) deemed it safe enough for them to meet without Anakin finding out. He knew then and he knows now that she doubted her ability to do so. That she had been lying to him in order to convince him to agree to her plan. He also knows that she still has hope she will succeed (that he has hope she will). They hope his escape will prove unnecessary. He knows they wouldn't have done something so dangerous if they both didn't know it was necessary (didn't know that any other possibility would likely fail).

He had offered to take the twins with him but she had refused. It would be too hard for him to keep three babies alive (and himself) while also trying to stay hidden, trying to stay under the entirety of the Empire's radar.

She was right. He can see his body slowly waste away as it turns what remains of his storage into food for the one child he already has. The food he can obtain would be enough to sustain him, but with his daughter draining it from him every time she feeds it ends up taking away from the stockpiling he unwilling did during the days when he was being too well fed (apparently Anakin's want to spoil his lovers did have one advantage). If he tried to keep three alive there wouldn't be enough to go around.

Shmi (Anakin named her, didn't even give Obi Wan the chance to have a say) grizzles again and Obi Wan holds her to a breast hoping in vain that maybe this time that will be her problem. That maybe this time she will eat and sleep soundly like she did back before they fled, back when the temperature was the one she was born into, the one she always had known. She suckles a little before pushing away to sob and cry. There is no comfort to offer her. She will just have to learn to deal with the heat (so will he).

There will be a time (hopefully soon) that Obi Wan will find the chance to make good on his promises. For now though they have to survive and stay hidden. And for that to work she needs to get used to the heat.