The Stars Fall Away
By Paul A. Broyles, III
"This is getting more than a little ridiculous," Anakin commented as he and Padmé Amidala were ushered aboard their third starship in three days. Crimson-robed Republican Royal Guards ushered them to their seats, and they strapped in for the ascent. Clouds billowed thickly around the landing platform, all but obscuring any of the towering buildings around them.
Padmé shivered, clenching her fists tightly, and Anakin understood why. This day looked like the day – so long ago now, it seemed – that her ship had been gutted by an explosion and she had stood by on the landing platform, watching, helpless, as her loyal handmaiden, Cordé, was killed.
Very gently, very gingerly, Anakin put his arm around Padmé's shoulders, pulling her to him. She shuddered involuntarily; she was still not used to the cold touch of that robotic hand. Anakin lifted his arm immediately, but Padmé swiftly raised her own delicate hand and held his mechanical one to her chest. She was still trembling, but her breathing seemed to steady somewhat as she buried her face in his shoulder and cried. Certainly, her presence in the Force was much less tremulous.
The ship pitched a little bit, and they were in the air. It had been difficult to persuade the local shipyards to rent them a Nubian transport after they had managed to get one blown up in an assassination attempt and the other destroyed in the clones' strike upon Geonosis, but Anakin had been able to procure Republic funds to ensure that Senator Amidala's journey home was comfortable.
As they watched through the window, the polluted atmosphere of Coruscant dropped beneath them and they were soaring among the stars once more. A voice from the cockpit sounded, slightly tinny over the loudspeakers. "Please make sure you're all fastened in back there. We're getting ready to make the jump to lightspeed."
Anakin and Padmé were already strapped into their soft seats, so they paid no attention to the captain's drawling voice. The acceleration as the ship made the jump pressed them back into their seats, but soon they were free of the pressure. They released their safety harnesses and stood, looking out the window as the swirling miasma of hyperspace streaked by.
Padmé touched Anakin lightly on the arm. "Come," she said, and led him toward her quarters. Their passage was silent, which was hardly surprising. They had not spoken of Padmé's confession of her love since they had survived the ordeal on Geonosis, but it was clear by the awkward silences that now took the place of conversation that it was in the forefront of each of their minds.
Anakin thought once more of breaking their unspoken pact not to address the subject, but found that he could not. Every time he tried to voice what he felt, it rose again to his consciousness, eating at him. I left her. We were together, she fell, and I left her for dead. He knew that his master had convinced him that it was the best thing to do, but just because it was best didn't make it right. And in every thought he had of her, every time he saw her, he knew he would never escape the idea that he had betrayed and abandoned her after she had opened her soul to him.
Padmé placed her hand on a panel by the door to her rooms and it slid open with a whoosh. Anakin stood for a moment just outside, shifting awkwardly from foot to foot. Of course he wanted to follow her in – he could not spend enough time in her company, as far as he was concerned – but he felt that it would be improper to enter, and in any event, he had not been invited in.
Padmé tugged at his sleeve impatiently. "Come in, Anakin! Don't just stand there! We need to talk before the ship reaches Naboo."
At this Anakin did move to enter, crossing the room in long strides as the door slid closed behind him. He joined the senator, who was already sitting on a small couch facing the window and was patting the space beside her to indicate that he should sit. He did, taking his place and sitting, staring out as hyperspace rushed by.
There was a long silence as the two scrutinized almost everything in the room except each other. Their eyes never met; neither could muster the courage to look at the other directly. Finally, Padmé cleared her throat and spoke. "Anakin, you realize, don't you, that things are going to have to change when we reach Naboo?"
The Jedi nodded mutely, staring at her.
"That things can't continue the way they have been once I'm a public figure again?"
He grunted his assent.
She sniffed. "Anakin..." She paused, biting her lip. "About what I said in the arena..."
Anakin cut her off. "Padmé, I realize now that it would never work."
"Oh." She breathed it more than saying it, a little gasping sound. "What I was going to say was: 'I still mean it.' But I don't know what to say now. You've quite robbed me of words." Her voice was shaking, her lower lip quivering slightly.
Anakin remained silent, breathing heavily.
"I love you, Anakin."
"I know," he answered. "I know, and I know I love you, Padmé, but you were right. We'd either be living a lie or betraying everything we believed in."
Padmé whimpered softly.
"I would give almost anything to be with you, you must know that, dear Padmé, but the Jedi Order is my life. It's my life!" He was screaming, the fury at his position evident in his voice.
"It's everything I've worked for. If I hadn't left, my mother wouldn't be dead." His voice had sunk to a whisper. "And I can't make her death be in vain. I have to finish my training, have to come into my power, before I can be at peace. And that means we cannot be together, because the Code forbids it."
He looked at her for a moment, begging her eyes to show some hint of sympathy, but there was none, only loss and hurt. "When you fell from that transport, I almost went after you. Almost. Every atom of my being needed to follow you, to find out if they're okay. But Obi-Wan said two things from me. One was that I would be expelled from the Jedi Order. And I almost jumped anyway. But he said something else. He reminded me that in my place, you would be strong enough to do your duty, not what you wanted to do.
"I have a duty, Padmé. I have a duty to my mother. I have a duty to Qui-Gon Jinn. I have a duty to everyone who died in that first battle of the Clone War, and everyone who may yet die. I have a duty to become the great power everyone says I can be, to become strong enough to slay Dooku, to become powerful enough to make sure that no one else will fall victim to this lunacy. And no matter how much I love you, no matter how it will kill you every minute I'm apart from you, I can't shirk my duty."
At last, there was a spark of understanding in Padmé's eyes. This was talk she understood; if there had been one constant in her life, it had been putting her own needs behind commitments to others. At last, she nodded weakly, tears still seeping from her eyes.
"I understand," she said. She paused for a moment, sniffling. "If you wouldn't mind, Anakin, I wish you'd retire to your own quarters..."
"Of course, mi'lady," he said, and left. As the door closed behind him, Padmé collapsed into the soft cushions of the couch, sobbing freely.
Padmé's carriage was regal and composed as she and her entourage walked away from the sleek silver starship, but her chest was tight and she had a knot in her throat. Tears welled up inside, threatening to drown her.
She had not been able to see Anakin Skywalker again, though she had knocked on the door to his quarters; Obi-Wan, he informed her, had given him strict instructions that he was not permitted to bid her goodbye.
She permitted herself a single tear as the silver Nubian transport rose gracefully skyward and sped away, taking him from her forever. Then, she cleared her mind, steadying herself to deal with other issues and forgetting, for a time, the powerful looks of that dashing Padawan that had made him the light of her life for their brief time together.
As the party approached the home in which she and Anakin had stayed while they were in hiding, she became choked up again. It seemed she could not escape his memory. A handmaiden looked at her questioningly, but the senator waved her away. The girl scurried off to help the others carry Padmé's luggage into her rooms. Padmé sighed in despair and resignation. She had expected her homecoming to be joyful, but without Anakin, she felt so empty that it was worthless.
As she lay in bed that night, Padmé found that she was too restless to sleep. Rising softly so as not to wake any of the staff who were staying with her, she slipped into a nightgown and left the villa. She wandered along the terraces for a while, the firm stones refreshingly cool beneath her bare feet. Then she descended wide stone staircase that led down to the beach below.
A breeze was blowing cool air across the sea as she meandered along the shore, feeling the sand trickle between her toes and thinking of the man she had lost. She did not cry as she thought back to the day when he had first confessed his love to her, as the tears were all dried up, but her heart raced and her chest was tight in anguish.
The moon high above her was nearly full, casting an ethereal glow upon the scene. The hairs on the back of her neck prickled. She turned and looked along the beach, peering into the darkness that stretched away from the villa, fully expecting to see a ghost standing there. She did.
"I don't like the sand," the figure said simply.
She cried out and ran to him, flinging herself into his arms, pressing herself to him, kissing him, kissing him over and over again, crying out of joy. She could not get enough of the touch of him, the feel of him, that she had missed so much.
Finally, Anakin lowered her gently to the beach. "I can't breathe," he gasped.
She laughed and then shook her head in disbelief. "But your ship... I saw you go away..."
"As we were getting ready to lift off, I realized that I would never forgive myself if I sacrificed what I was getting ready to sacrifice, for the sake of the Republic or anyone else. Curse them all, I can't live without you, Padmé. So I got off, and have been chasing you around Naboo ever since. I had to walk most of the way here, since there were no transports authorized to bring me..."
He pulled her back into his arms. "I can never lose you again. I think it would kill me." He looked straight into her eyes for a timeless moment. "Padmé Amidala, will you be my wife?"
She seemed to wilt there, while he was holding her, as if she had been expecting those words – and fearing them. She sighed, blowing her hair away from her face. "Anakin, I know right now is very excited. We've been drawn together from across the stars. We've satisfied ourselves that this is the way things ought to be. And right now, everything is sparkles and stars and glory. But what's it going to be like when the stars fade away, when the glamour is all gone, when we both have to live with the consequences of what we do? Can we make it last through the storm that will come?"
Anakin smiled. "When the stars fade away, Padmé, you'll be there, and that's even better."
Her face glowed as she pressed it into his chest, sighing contentedly. "Then yes, Anakin Skywalker, I will marry you."
They stood together on the balcony overlooking the beach as the sun rode high into the sky. There was no music, only the far more beautiful strains of birdsong floating to them across the breeze. No congregation was present, no well-wishers for they shared their union with all the universe. Only the droids, R2-D2 and C-3PO, stood by on the balcony.
The priest stood between them, his back to the sun as it broke across the mountains. He was slowly reciting the Canticle of Unification as they watched each other, the gentle wind tugging at Anakin's Jedi robes. Padmé was dressed in all white, including a small white cap which she wore pinned into her hair and which caught the sunlight magnificently.
The priest finally reached the end of the age-old ritual and addressed the lovers. "Do you pledge that from this day forward you shall love and protect each other, cherish and keep each other, and value each other above all, until the end of both your days?"
"We do," they said together.
"Then you are joined as one," the priest said. "May the best of all futures go ever before you, and may the Force be with you."
Padmé and Anakin leaned close and kissed, drinking deeply of each other. Then they turned toward the climbing sun, their hands clasped, and looked into a bright future.