Author's Note: Yes, another story, I am so sorry! This one is kind of special. I have two ideas for it but I want your opinions. Should I make it into a time travel story - which is turning into one of my specialties, it seems - or a Padme lives story. Either story could work for this, so I'm curious to see if you guys will be interested in either of those for this story! Let me know what you think! I'm excited to see where this goes! Enjoy!

Disclaimer: I own nothing.

Warnings: Language, OOCness, unbeta'd.

Word Count: 5,708

It was strange. Just so strange. It's hard to explain. Even harder to understand. She loved him. She really did. It was something that just came naturally to her. Loving him, that is.

"You betrayed me!"

In her heart, and her mind, she knew this whole-heartedly. She knew this solely. She knew this truly.

"N-No!"

But it was like that moment, when they were finally reunited after all of the scary news that had been circling around Coruscant and the Senate alike, she thought that everything would start to work out somehow. She didn't think that it would be easy, but she thought that with everything going on, it would all finally start to sort itself out when she returned to Anakin's side.

She may be the older of the two of them - Anakin and herself - but there was always something about him that made him seem so wise and mature that she couldn't help falling for him. She loved him. She knew that she did. With all of the fear and uncertainty around her, she naively thought that by finally being with him again, it would all somehow be okay.

There was just something about him. Somehow he was able to make her feel better. He was always able to make her feel better.

She can easily recall a time, almost thirteen years prior, to when she, her entourage, fellow Nabooian and Jedi guards basically crash landed on Tatooine and went to a junk shop to try and find the pieces they needed to get their ship working again. She remembered the cute little boy calling her an angel. She remembered the sand storm they were almost trapped in had that same little boy not come to their rescue. He brought them - them, strangers! - to his home with his mother to help them out and get them out of the storm.

That night, Qui-Gon slept on the couch, Jarjar slept on the floor in the living room with R2-D2 in the corner while Padme and nine-year-old Anakin squeezed into his little bed together. It was their first night together. No in the manner of sex, seeing as he was nine and she was fourteen, but she had never shared her space so intimately with another person. It was cold and his shutters did little to keep the chill out. Anakin's little body curled up in her arms, because there was no room otherwise, she felt relatively warm.

Anakin acted like a little furnace.

Padme wasn't a fan of someone in her space, but Anakin was so cute and innocent, she didn't mind it too much. She felt bad for him and his life - and felt so pretentious for thinking that, which made her feel even worse - and only wanted the best for him. He was a good little boy that was going out of his way to help strangers when he didn't have to. He grew up in a harsh environment that didn't promote much enthusiasm in helping others, yet he didn't even bat an eyelash at any of it. Any time they needed help, he would jump in.

Padme didn't get much sleep that night, worried about all of the people of Naboo. It didn't feel right that she would be somewhere, relatively warm, well fed with a good home-cooked meal - Shmi was a wonderful cook - while her people were starving and wondering if they were going to live to see tomorrow. It just didn't settle well with her and left her feeling sick to her stomach.

At some point that first night she pulled herself from Anakin, trying hard not to wake him so that she could move closer to the window, letting the cold air sooth her a bit. Her body was flushed and her throat was constricting. There is this horrible pit in her stomach that she's had since she laid down for sleep earlier that night. It just isn't right. She should have been there, on Naboo, with her people.

She knew that her suffering with them wasn't going to help them - anyone - but it felt wrong otherwise. She was having a hard time adjusting to not being on Naboo with her people while they are suffering. She just kept thinking about them, wanting to go back there and help them. It just didn't feel right. She knew that she had to stand before the Senate and reveal the Trade Federation's occupancy of Naboo. They needed to see that.

Anakin woke up at some point during the night, Padme was so lost in her thoughts. Maybe it was because she was also his source of warmth in the cold night, or perhaps he just woke for another reason, but either way he woke up and went to her. He asked her why she wasn't sleeping and if she had a bad dream. It was so sweet of him to worry about her, but it also made her feel bad. His life was so much harder than hers overall, but she still felt back that he was trying to comfort her. Yes, her people were in danger and frightened by the occupation, but this little boy with no grasp of such things was still worried about her.

It just felt like too much.

She told him that she was fine. That she would be fine once they reached Coruscant and the Queen was able to speak to the Senate. Once they heard from her, they would understand. She had to believe so, at least.

The people of Naboo wouldn't last much longer if the Senate decided not to help them. Thankfully, luck was on their side and she was able to convince them. With a little luck from a cute little Tatooinian boy who came to wish her the best of luck even if he didn't know he was directly speaking to her when he wished them the best of luck that he was talking to her.

She enjoyed that little moment, as fleeting as it was, when he wished her luck with the Senate. She wanted to pat his head or give him a hug and thank him for working so hard to help get her there. He did so much for her and she didn't want him to think that it went unnoticed. His sole focus wasn't Queen Amidala, but Padme, and that meant so much to her. Since she was a little girl she had been working tirelessly to be Queen of Naboo that she had somehow already lost her name by the time she had finally made it. For someone to see her as Padme and not Queen Amidala, it was refreshing and something that made her very happy.

But at the same time, she knew that she couldn't be Padme at that moment. She couldn't be the Padme that wanted to go home and make sure that her home and her people were okay. She had to be Queen Amidala, tough and angry, trying to help her people. It wasn't enough to hope that they are okay, she had to go the extra mile and make sure of it.

So the façade had to stay in place for the duration of their time on Coruscant. But as they were leaving, she was in the handmaiden garbs and able to be Padme once more.

She was scared when they returned to Naboo. She was scared that she wouldn't be able to convince Boss Nass to help them get back Naboo. She was scared that they wouldn't be able to stop the Trade Federation and that the people of Naboo would, not only continue to suffer, but would also die by the hands of those brutes. It just wasn't right. That was the last thing that she would want to happen.

When they won and Qui-Gon was killed, she knew that they would be separated for a long time. She thought that he was so adorable and pure but knew that he had a life outside of Naboo. He was to be a Jedi and while she would never claim to be an expert on Jedi, she knew that the life that they've chosen is one of sacrifice and solitude.

Kind of like her - giving of one's self for the good of her people as the Queen - but on such a wider scale and much more strict.

She stood on the landing pad with her guards and handmaidens a few feet behind her, watching as Anakin and Obi-Wan were walking toward the borrowed Nabooian vessel for their trip back to Coruscant. Obi-Wan kept looking down at Anakin as the little boy would look over his shoulder at Padme, then up at Obi-Wan as if feeling his eyes, before looking back at her.

Right before the ship, they stopped and Obi-Wan said something to him. She doesn't know what, though, she couldn't hear them over the harsh wind pulling at her long, elegant dress. She can guess what he said, though, because Anakin turned around and ran to her, throwing his arms around her waist. She was surprised for a moment, forgetting that she was Padme at that moment with that little boy before lacing her fingers through his hair and hugging him close for just a moment before letting him go and kneeling down.

"Goodbye Padme," Anakin had said softly, tears wetting his pretty gray eyes.

"Not goodbye," Padme had said softly back, caressing his cheek with the pad of her thumb. "Until we see each other again. Okay, Anakin?"

Anakin smiled, a truly beautiful and wonderful smile that lit up his entire face. She didn't know that that would be one of the last times she saw such a big and beautiful smile on his face. At nine years old his number of big, true smiles were limited.

"Ana-" Her throat closes up. She can't breath. She's going to die.

Seeing him again after ten years was unlike anything that she imagined. The chemistry between them in just a moment - the single moment in which their eyes locked together - was enough to ignite the space between them. At first she was shocked to see him. She hadn't expected to see him as he was. Yes, many years had past and logically she knew that he would have to grow up, he wouldn't be that little boy anymore, but he wasn't as she expected he'd be. He was so tall and handsome. She wasn't expecting to see him as he was.

In a sense, he was beautiful.

When those bugs were in her room, she didn't want Anakin or Obi-Wan there because she didn't want to face the chemistry between herself and Anakin after all these years and she didn't want Obi-Wan standing over her while she slept. She just wanted to be alone. She's thankful that Anakin and Obi-Wan were able to come in when they did and stop those poisonous bugs from getting her, but the moment Anakin flew into her room, scaring her awake, landing over top of her with his blue lightsaber spinning around his body, she was paralyzed.

Was she afraid? Sure, her life was in danger and suddenly her guards were in her room as she slept. But as he stood on his knees over top of her, one leg on either side of hers with his arms spread wide and his eyes locked on her, she felt the connection stronger than she had just hours before. Obi-Wan shattered that moment where their eyes were locked with his body flying through her window and onto the droid that administered the bugs Anakin had killed.

Then he was gone.

They went to Naboo not long afterward, Anakin and Padme. It was a mixture of steamy because of the chemistry and awkward because Padme knew, logically, that it wasn't right for Padme and Anakin to be together. She was five years older than him, as the least of it, but she was a Senator now - ex-Queen - of Naboo and he was a Jedi. They did not belong together. They shouldn't be doing this - whatever this is - and they shouldn't be feeling the way they were. She told him no. She told him they can't be together, yet they shared two kisses during their time there.

"Anakin!"

They went to Tatooine after Anakin told her about his nightmares. His mother's death, she just couldn't imagine it. Ever since she was young and became Queen of Naboo, she lost genuine contact with her own parents. She didn't have any sort of time for them anymore. As horrible as it sounded and made her feel, it stopped being about her and her parents and became about the people of Naboo as a whole. Her parents understood and said goodbye happily to her, knowing that she would be a great Queen and be away from them to protect everyone, but when her two terms were up and she was offered to continue being Queen for a third term, which is against the rules but the people were willing to look the other way because they viewed her as the best Queen Naboo has seen in a long time, she turned them down.

She believed that her time as Queen came and went and now it was time for her to pass the torch as they have had Queens do for as long as time has permitted. But she also believed that her calling came elsewhere. As much as she loved the people of Naboo, she believed that she would still be able to help them, no longer as their Queen but as their Senator.

Being a Senator takes her away from Naboo completely, so her time with her parents - now that she is no longer Queen - has vanished completely. She didn't mind as much as she would like to. She had gotten letters from her parents, but was never very close to them. The short time she spent with Anakin and Shmi Skywalker, she knew that their bond ran deep. So much deeper than her own connection with either of her parents - both together and separate.

She could only imagine how he felt, so she didn't give him a choice in the matter and basically said that he could do his job by coming with her to Tatooine or be left behind. He went with, and maybe it wasn't a good idea. Shmi died, Anakin saw it. He was there for it. Padme doesn't know which is worse. That he was there and actually saw the life leave her eyes, or if he hadn't been there.

If she hadn't made him come with her, then maybe Anakin wouldn't have killed all of those Tuscan Raiders. She wasn't sure she believed that they deserved to live to continue to hurt and kill other people, but she wasn't sure that they should have just died. That Anakin should have been the one to kill them. He told her the truth, that he killed women and children along with the men. He wanted to scare her, she thinks. He was so upset over the death of his mother and his own rage that he wanted her to hate him too.

But she couldn't hate him. He was in so much pain and... she loved him. She loved him and didn't want to let him wallow in his pain. Not alone. She was going to be there for him if no one else would. He felt so alone in that very moment, she wasn't going to let him be in that place by himself. She would never forget what he did for her and her people. He saved them in many ways. She wouldn't betray him, ever.

"Let her go!"

Everything just kept going. The call from Obi-Wan about the clones. Geonosis. Their kiss and confessed love. She gave in. The arena. Count Dooku's involvement with the Visroy. The Jedi coming to the rescue. The battle. They were getting surrounded. They were going to die. Everything is happening so fast. She wasn't scared. Not to die. Yoda. He was there with troops. Clones. Padme and the remaining Jedi managed to escape and chased after Dooku.

Anakin lost his arm in the ensuing battle against Dooku. He's lucky it wasn't his life. Padme was so scared. Anakin was placed under, the trauma from losing his arm was causing him to slip into shock. When he woke up he was so ashamed. Padme was there by his side, having refused to leave for anything. Not a single moment was he alone by choice. Obi-Wan was there too. They had a lot of time to talk.

They spoke quietly to one another while Anakin was in surgery to get his mechanical arm implanted at the end of his right handed stump. It was nothing important. Obi-Wan didn't ask her about her time with Anakin on Naboo, or when they were suddenly on Tatooine. In fact, they spoke about the weather and recent news: the war, like it was any other day. Perhaps Obi-Wan would have wanted to talk about more important things if he wasn't also heavily medicated because of the saber burns on his leg and arm.

Their talking stopped once they were allowed into Anakin's hospital room. They were so preoccupied staring at Anakin's sleeping face as the lifted the drugs they had him on and he was started waking up. After he woke up and remembered that he agreed to a mechanical arm, he was ashamed and immediately did everything he could to hide it. He was actually ashamed of losing his arm. To Dooku of all people, like Dooku was a newly minted Padawan and not a one time Master. He just kept it under the covers and refused to move the arm at all, in the slightest less it draw any attention to it.

He had to go through extensive rehabilitation for that arm, like Obi-Wan had to for his leg, having cauterized some of the muscles there. His surgery wasn't until a day or two later, but his rehabilitation was a lot quicker and ended before Anakin's did.

They went to Naboo together, Anakin and Padme. She asked him to marry her. She wasn't going to waste another moment. She was so scared before that she had lost him without ever really having him. She wasn't scared to die, but she was scared to lose him. He was so depressed and upset by the turn of events that when she asked him to marry her as they made their way back to Naboo, he was so happy, smiling so brightly that she knew that she made the right choice. She knew that she already loved him. Sure, they would have to live in secret, but if he was willing to live in the lie with her, she will with glee.

She loved him. She did. When they stood there at the alter, alone, staring into each other's eyes, she knew that she would love him forever. He was the only one for her. She was so happy, and scared, for what the future could possibly hold for them, but knew that she would be able to face it, regardless of whatever it happened to be so long as he remained by her side. Together, they would be fine. That much she knew.

She was so happy she couldn't breath.

Couldn't breath...

Couldn't...

Can't...

Can't breath.

"Anakin!" Obi-Wan yells so loud over the searing heat and boiling magma around them. Padme felt the intense pressure on her throat loosen until it's gone, as she is pulled away from her thoughts. Or, perhaps, was her life flashing before her eyes? That wasn't all of her life. There was all of the moments that followed her marriage to Anakin. Their first night together. The war. The accidents in one person's judgment or another that drove them together in the thicket of battle. Him calling out to her, or her to him. The sneaking glances and careful moments when they would slip away from those around them and meet up somewhere dark and empty so that they could wrap their arms around each other. The whispers.

"Ani."

"Padme."

Every moment they were both about to die and they would lock eyes with one another, unable to say aloud what was so strong in their hearts. Padme loved Anakan. She loved him so much it burned hotter than the magma boiling on the surface of Mustafar inside of her. All she wanted was to go back in time, not too long, though. Just to the moment she told him that he was going to be a father. The look on his face; wonder, worry, happiness. When he ran into her, pulling her so tightly into his arms and spinning her around, laughing so happily in her ear, unable to contain his jubilance.

The softness of his hair in her left hand as it woven it's way into the soft, curly locks. Something that she enjoyed doing. His hair was always so soft and curly and she loved it. He grew up such a simple life that he never cared to measure his appearance or tend to it one way or the other, but she always thought he was the most handsome man around.

She thought for certain those three years prior that she had loved him when she asked him to marry her. These last few years, every moment that they had together was in varying degrees of wonderful. They spent every moment that they could together, no matter what. Whenever he came back from the war, she would push her meetings back or align them with his meetings with the council so that they could spend as much time as humanly possible with one another.

They were so happy. They were together. The war was over. They were finally able to be together. They were going to have a family. A child of their very own. Now was their time to really be together. To finally get passed the honeymoon phase of their relationship since they were away from one another so often it felt like their lives could finally, truly start.

They loved one another. That was all that they needed.

The last thing she saw was Anakin's angry sulfur yellow eyes - so ugly and marring in the place of his one time beautiful bluish gray ones - stared back at her and it felt like in the moment, she had truly lost him.

As her eyes rolled up into the back of her head, her heart shattered into a million pieces. She collapsed onto the hard ground and blacked out.

Padme woke up, still on Mustafar to the sound of Obi-Wan quickly running toward her. He drops down next to her, yelling something to C3P0 that sounded like, "Start the ship!" before he pulled her into his arms in a smooth, quick movement before he carried her onto the ship. She opens her eyes slowly, her breathing is rough and ragged and her throat is hurting.

Padme blinks a few times, trying to clear her bleary vision as she looks over Obi-Wan's shoulder to see a smoldering ball of fire off in the distance and two figures moving toward them. The larger, taller one is moving much quicker, a red lightsaber swinging at his side as he tries to close the gap. The other is much smaller, hunched over and draped in a dark cloak, and moving much slower. Each movement is dainty and purposeful, as if they wanted to stay back and watch as the scene played out in front of them.

"Padme!" The man charging toward them yelled, so loud it was like an animal's roar. She didn't know who it was, but they were somehow familiar to her. She just can't think of how. She doesn't remember ever knowing any sort of wild animal. She didn't know wild animals could speak, let alone know her name. Why is it so hard to think? Why is she so weak? Who is that? What does he want?

She takes a deep, ragged breath in realization. Wait... was that..? "Ani..?" she rasps, lifting her right arm, reaching out over Obi-Wan's shoulder toward the charging figure. Her movements are so slow and sluggish and she feels all of her energy fading, even though she isn't doing anything great. The figure moves faster, letting out a loud, angry bellow that sounded like her name but the darkness consumes her once more as the pad of the ship retracts, hiding the figure from sight completely.

The next few hours, when she awakened, she was in complete pain. Her stomach and crotch were in searing pain. The baby was coming. It's too soon! Too soon! They can't come now! She lost Anakin, she remembered with great agony, and now she was going to lose her child too. Everything was spiraling downward and she won't be able to do anything to stop it. She was going to lose everything.

Obi-Wan carries her inside, she remembers. She didn't know where she was, but there was a doctor there and a medic droid. She was giving birth to a child that wasn't ready to be born, and she was completely alone. Somewhere in the middle of pushing the baby out, she felt someone's hands wrap around her own. She looks over, tears streaming down her cheeks. It's Obi-Wan.

Him being there is bittersweet. She's happy that her friend is there with her so at least she's not alone, but she wished that it was Anakin instead. She wished that her husband, the father of her child was there with her. She would give just about anything.

Her children were born; Luke and Leia. They were so beautiful. They were perfect. If Anakin was at her side at that moment, then she wouldn't have turned her head away. She wouldn't have been unable to look at their beautiful, pure little faces and seen their handsome father in them. She would have been happy rather than forlorn. She would be proud instead of in pain.

She hated herself more than anyone else in that moment. She's not sure if Obi-Wan felt the same, but he looked surprised by the action. She shouldn't have turned away from her children, they did nothing to her. They were all she had left of Anakin. She should love them wholly and completely. And she does, in her heart, but at that precise moment, it's just too much. She will wrap them in her arms and love them without question, but in a moment. She needs a little bit of time.

Obi-Wan steps out of the room. She can see her friend, Bail Organa, and Jedi Grandmaster Yoda outside the observation window. She couldn't face them either. She had to turn completely away. She could hear the babies whining in the corner of the room as the doctor and medic droid tend to them carefully. She feels so weak and drained. She wishes she could just fall asleep now and wake up three years ago. Do something different somehow. Find out what and when everything went wrong and change it. Salvage their relationship, save the Jedi and stop Palpatine's rise to power. It was her fault to begin with that he was even there. She was the one who let the Dark Lord in.

She killed them all. Every Jedi, clone and civilian that has died because of Palpatine's rise to power was all on her head. She elected him Chancellor, like he wanted, and in some way these last few years she thought that they were allies, their ideals aligned and gave his every decision her full support. In some ways, it must be her fault that Anakin fell to the dark side and committed such horrible crimes against the Jedi.

It left her feeling broken and weak. All this hopelessness surrounding her made her feel like maybe... maybe she didn't deserve to be alive any longer. She shouldn't be there. It wasn't right that she be there and Anakin wasn't. She shouldn't be alive now when so many weren't. If she was to blame for everything, indirectly of course, then she should have to pay for it.

A little whimper from one of the babies pulls her from that darkness almost immediately. She looks over at the corner of the room, unable to really see Luke or Leia with the droid and doctor in the way, but there was a bit of wiggling and flailed limbs in her sight every once and a while. She couldn't leave them alone, Luke and Leia. They were just babies. They did nothing wrong. They didn't deserve to lose their father, only to be abandon by their mother. That wasn't right. She wasn't going to do that. She wasn't going to be the one to contribute to any more suffering. She was going to have to somehow make all of this right. She just... didn't know how.

But it started with living, she realized. She had to live.

"Padme..."

Padme's dark brown eyes rise a bit to the figure standing next to her. She hadn't noticed him there a moment ago, but now that she sees him, she can't believe she missed him. The moment her eyes spot the dark cloak, her stomach plummets and her heart rate rises. The crinkled, cruel face of what was once Palpatine stands over her, grinning down at her as if greatly pleased by something. She wanted to open her mouth, scream, maybe. Or perhaps push herself away. Anything to put distance between herself and the man who ripped her family, and her life, apart. But she couldn't move, couldn't speak. All she could do was stare.

Obi-Wan, Bail and Yoda stare in at her. Obi-Wan's eyes are wide in worry and pain, Bail looks mortified and concerned while Yoda's forest green eyes narrow a bit, contemplatively, his head tilting as if trying to see something.

It's then that Padme realized that she appeared to be alone in this room. That Palpatine was only visible to her. The doctor steps through Palpatine and doesn't react, he keeps talking to her, but she can't hear him. Her eyes locked on Palpatine's sulfuric yellow eyes.

Palpatine looked like the grim reaper at that moment. A god of death about bring release unto those that either desire it or not. No choice in the matter. And he appears to be taking glee from it.

Palpatine reaches out toward her with a crinkly, shaking hand, so pale and lifeless in color. Every centimeter closer to her it got, her chest started tightening as her heart pounded, making it harder and harder for it to beat and for her to breath. She could see darkness surrounding her vision as Palpatine's smile grew more cruel. She wanted to cry, scream at him to stop, but she couldn't. She was weak and helpless. She was but a mere ant next to this monster. She never stood a chance.

She wanted to live in that very moment. For Anakin, who lost himself. For Obi-Wan, who lost everything. For Luke and Leia, who now only had her and nothing more. And for everyone else, because she want to help change the galaxy. She wanted to bring the peace she always dreamed of as both a Queen and a Senator. But she's so tired and heartbroken now that it seems like she doesn't have the strength to even try and fight him.

Palpatine has won.

Padme's eyelids grow heady and they fall as soon as his hand touches her chest. There is this horrible pinching pain as her heart is squeezed before nothing. Absolutely nothing but darkness. A chill about it unlike anything she has ever felt. The chill sank so deep into her bones and her soul that she was far beyond shivering. She had become so completely numb, so quickly. This was it. It was all over.

Padme wanted to curl up into a ball. She wanted to hold her children, apologize for turning away. She wanted to hold her husband and never let him go. She wanted to see her friends; her handmaidens, Mon, Bail, Obi-Wan. She wanted to apologize for everything, bit and small to everyone. She just wanted to go back to the moments where she could do something to help someone. Where she could change the course of their horrible history. She could make it better, make more people happier, stop Palpatine from destroying it all.

The darkness and the chill settles for a moment. Padme feels it. Someone is right there with her. She can't see them, but she can certainly feel them as clearly as she would have been able to see them if she wasn't surrounded by darkness.

"Hello?" Padme calls, looking around, confused. "Is someone there? What do you want?" She's desperate and sad. More than anything else, she just wants guidance. Someone to help her figure this all out. Anyone. Even a disembodied voice, if there is one.

"Want for you to live, I do."

Reminder: Would you like a Padme lives story, or time travel story?