Hi everyone! So much for posting this chapter sooner than usual, sorry about that. I'll try to post chapter 43 sooner though!

Thank you all so much for the reviews. Your words are heartwarming. :)

For angie : Was Monera really deceitful? After all, Padmé never actually discouraged him to overthrow Anakin, more about that in this chapter.

Some reviewers commented on the fact this was all Anakin's fault. The entire point of this story is how everyone makes choices but also how those choices have consequences. We've been seeing these consequences for some time now. Anakin isn't blind to what his choices entailed, that's all I'm going to say.

In the meantime, enjoy!


Chapter 42

Anakin fell to his knees next to Padmé's still body.

The panic was blinding him as he reached out to her, pulling her into his arms. He could feel warm liquid permeating his clothes. Without thinking, he put the light back on with the Force. The sudden lighting hurt his eyes.

The sight in front of him was even worse than what he had pictured.

Padmé was deathly pale. Everywhere around her was red thick blood... her hair, her gown, the floor, his own clothes. It was still flowing weakly from her wrists. Bending down, he tore apart bits and pieces of her gown to stop the bleeding.

Was it another assassination attempt? he thought numbly, pressing against the wounds. Then as he fastened the cloths around her right wrist tightly, he saw the shard of glass in her palm, making a deep cut.

Anakin couldn't think.

She had done this to herself.

She had done this to herself...

"Padmé?" he called out, feeling the panic rise when there was no response. He couldn't feel her through the Force. His flesh fingers reached her pulse point. There was a pulse, very weak, but Force, there was one.

With the Force, his commlink went out of his inner pocket to reach his hand.

"I need a medical team in the Empress' quarters now," he summoned quickly.

Then he threw the commlink to the ground, holding Padmé to him again.

"Why? Force, why did you do that?" he whispered hauntingly, stroking her lukewarm cheek.

A memory assaulted him quickly. Padmé's life force dwindling down after the childbirth and him saving her with the Force.

His gloved hand came to the side of her face. He could bring her back.

Immediately -naturally- the sheer fear and panic inside of him called out to the dark side, drawing it near. He almost brought her back with it right then, he couldn't think... he only knew he couldn't lose her, he couldn't, no matter what she did, he couldn't-

Then he looked at his gloved hand, felt the darkness rise inside him again.

I'm a slave to it.

Something in him rebelled. He hadn't used it in awhile, even in the aftermath of the bomb, he had kept himself in check. He thought of Luke and Leia.

Thought of Padmé. Whom he had saved with the dark side in the first place... to lose her to a fate worse than death.

He let out a scream of despair inside the room. The medical team chose this moment to arrive. The healer who had treated his injuries stayed rooted to his place for one second, taking in the sight before him before pulling himself together and kneeling down next to Padmé with a med droid.

"She lost a lot of blood," the young healer only said, taking measures with an instrument.

"What are you waiting for then?" Anakin spat, unable to let go of Padmé's body in his arms.

"I'm not sure we have as much blood as-"

"Take mine."

"But Your Highness, you just went through-"

"Take mine!" Anakin yelled, all but thrusting his arm into the healer's face. The med droid rolled towards him obediently, taking his blood. Anakin winced slightly at the feel of the needle stuck into his arm then relaxed. He watched as his blood was being put into another machine to make it compatible with Padmé's.

"Will she live?" he whispered, unable to let go of his wife's body, his free arm holding her to him.

The healer was watching his screen, entering parameters. "I believe so. Between your blood and the bank we have, she should recover." A pause. "She was found in time."

"If the information gets out of this room, you're dead," Anakin told the healer, staring at him earnestly.

The healer nodded, shaking slightly. He had understood.


Anakin paced in front of his wife's bedroom, distraught and tired almost to a breaking point. Why had Padmé tried to-?

He couldn't even bring himself to finish this thought. Had Monera lied? Maybe Padmé hadn't been involved with the attack. Or maybe she really had been and she had felt too much guilt. Or pain because it hadn't succeeded.

He raked his hands into his hair. He had thought Padmé to be gone. That his wife died the day he told her her father was killed. What if he had been wrong?

He had been so caught up in his own pain, his own guilt and the children he had barely looked for any signs. Or he had seen them but had dismissed them.

How could he have done that? Wasn't he evidence enough that behind a composed mask could lay guilt?

He fell down against the wall, sitting with his knees up to his chest, his head between his hands.

"Help me, please, Anakin!"

His dream taunted him even then in the first light of dawn. He hadn't listened. He had let her die. Again.

Anakin muffled his cry of despair against his knees. He couldn't hide from the truth anymore.

He loved her still.

In spite of everything. He loved her desperately.


A few hours passed. Anakin didn't move.

A small hand tugged at his sleeve. He looked up silently to look at his children who were standing in front of him, still in their pajamas.

"Why are you sad, Papa?" Leia asked him with a frown. Beside her, Luke was trying to reach the pad to open his mother's bedroom.

"What are you doing, Luke?" he whispered, catching his son's sleeve and bringing him back to him.

"Where is Mother?" he asked. "I want to see her."

"She's sick," Anakin's voice rasped. "She needs rest. You'll see her later."


"Help me, please, Anakin!"

The crowd was pulling her apart in front of the Jedi Temple. She reached out a hand to him in despair.

Obi-Wan came to stand beside him, his presence inexplicably calming. "It's too late, Anakin."

"I can't leave her!" he cried, advancing towards her. "Padmé!" he yelled.

I'm going to save you. Hold on. I'm going to save you.

The crowd was growing bigger. He fought against the arms and hands fighting him. He had to get to her.

Then Padmé's eyes widened in horror as she looked at something behind him, her hand still reaching out to him.

"Anakin!"

He frowned then turned around. There was no one behind him save Obi-Wan who was still watching the scene sadly. When he turned back, Padmé was being beaten up by the crowd, bleeding.

"No!" he cried out, fighting to get to her.

Then a hand on his arm. He looked to his left. Obi-Wan.

"Let her go," he only said.

Anakin snapped up from sleep roughly, feeling his head spin a little. Automatically, his wounds awoke, making him gasp in pain. He would have to put bacta on it again.

Then he remembered. Bacta... The one thing that was hard to acquire these days, what with the rebellion on Thyferra. No, his wounds could wait. Padmé needed bacta more.

Sighing, he looked at Padmé's body lying so still in the darkness. Lifting the bacta bandages on her wrists slightly, he inspected the wounds. They were deep. He wondered if she would keep scars. Then he took one of her limp hands and kissed the back slightly, putting it against his forehead.

They had given her some sedatives so she could rest and recover.

Anakin sighed again in the stark silence. He knew the world outside was a turmoil. In spite of his actions, the rumors about Padmé's implication in the attacks were numerous. When he had tried to get the media back into control, it had been strangely hard. All these years when he had let her do whatever she wanted... and she had dug her own grave. Giving more powers to the Senate and the Holonet had only decreased the Empire's popularity. Because there were voices against the system now.

Anakin passed a gloved hand on his tired features. Why couldn't she see that? Or maybe she had seen it and didn't care? He didn't know what to think of her actions anymore.

He had to get out there, try to stop the collateral damage. Badinta was making his voice heard from his cell, claiming Padmé was behind it all. What was with Alderaan and Rebels? He thought in annoyance.

With the Governor behind bars, it was also hard to maintain stability on Coruscant. The Governor who was rumored to be close to the Empress. Everything came back to Padmé.

Anakin thought of his dream, how she was pulled apart from the crowd, how real the vision had felt like.

He had to protect her.

Padmé stirred beneath him. He sat up, still holding her hand.


Padmé found herself slowly coming back to awareness.

Her throat ached. Her wrists ached even more. As her eyelids fluttered open, she realized the room was dark.

What-

Then the sensation of fingers caressing her forehead very gently, her hand pressed against rough stubble.

She blinked.

"You're safe, my love," Anakin spoke, still holding her hand to his face.

Padmé blinked. When was she? After her coma? Where were her babies?

Then she remembered.

Her eyes slid shut again. "Oh." A small silence. "I'm still alive," she said flatly.

She half expected Anakin to retort with sarcasm or a hurtful comment about how she wasn't even capable of killing herself properly but he only sighed and kissed the hand he was still holding.

"Yes, you are."

She struggled to get her hand away. "You saved me?" she asked incredulously.

"Of course."

"I thought I tried to have you killed?" she murmured, looking away. "Why did you save me?"

He didn't answer, only stroke her forehead again. "You'll be alright, I promise."

Padmé fought against the tears. Why couldn't he let her go? Die in peace?

"I didn't want to be saved," she said, hating the stupid tears in her voice. "Leave me alone!"

Anakin didn't stop his stroking. It felt strangely pleasant.

"No, I won't," he replied quietly. "I will never leave you alone again. Not until I'm sure you'll never do something like that again," he said between clenched teeth.

"I don't want to live," she said, her eyes fixed on the ceiling, unseeing. "You can't force me to live."

"You have your children to live for," Anakin whispered, his flesh hand now circling her face, tilting her face down so she could look at him.

"They hate me," she said flatly.

Anakin closed his eyes for a few seconds. "They don't really hate you. They're children. So when they hurt, they lash out. Be back to yourself and they'll love you again."

She didn't respond, kept staring at the ceiling in silence.

He stood up after a while, his shape casting a slight shadow on her. "I'll let you rest now. Artoo is going to stay with you," he then added for good measure before striding towards her door.

"Why can't you let me die?" she asked again.

There was a long silence.

"Because I love you," he whispered then left immediately.

Padmé blinked in the darkness even as she saw her droid's lights flash and heard a string of what sounded like sad beeping as Artoo took his place next to her bed.

She only frowned. Love. Did he know what it meant anymore?

Did she?


A few days went by.

Padmé stayed rooted to her bed, feeling incapable of standing up. Not even to make the health bill pass. She felt strangely tired all the time. Slept all day, burrowing into the darkness even when the handmaidens insisted on lifting the shades to make sunlight enter.

She couldn't stand the light.

Then one day, as she slept in the dark, she felt something pull her hair. Once. Twice.

Her eyes snapped open. Something moved on top of the covers.

Then a loud whisper. "Are you awake?"

Blinking, she saw small blue eyes peering into her face as small fingers petted her cheekbone and forehead. "Are you awake, Mama?"

Padmé turned away with a huff. "Go away, Luke."

She could feel the boy hesitate behind her. "Papa said you were sick," the boy went on, coming closer and pulling at her hair slightly again.

"I am," she said, her voice muffled against the pillow.

"When I'm sick, Leia gives me my favorite toy, what's yours? I could bring it to you!"

Padmé sighed, turning over again to face her son. She was about to tell him to go away a little bit more roughly when she spotted the look on Luke's face. He was afraid, watching her as if scared she would disappear.

His big blue innocent eyes were her undoing in the end. "I don't have a toy," she whispered.

"What do you want then?" Luke perked up, barely refraining from bouncing, she could tell.

Padmé hesitated. She really wanted to go back to the oblivion, not think, just be, forget who she was...

On the other side, she had been such a bad mother. Something inside of her was yearning for her son's presence. He was no longer hateful. Maybe Anakin was right.

"Do you have a game? We could play?" she asked hesitantly, sitting up against the headboard.

She muffled a groan. Her head was spinning a lot.

Luke nodded, bouncing from her bed and leaving quickly. When he came back, he was holding a holo. He stopped in the entrance, visibly frowning.

"What is it?" she asked in apprehension.

"Why is it so dark here? Can I open the shades?"

Before she could respond, he had bounced over to the shades control and inundated the room into stark sunlight. Padmé blinked, covering her eyes.

Her gaze caught the bacta bandages on her wrists in silence.

"Is that what made you sick?"

She jumped. Luke had made his way to her bedside without her noticing. He was already touching the bandages, poking at them slightly.

She nodded then refocused on her son. "So what is this game?"

Luke beamed before reaching up to sit down beside her and opening the holo.

After the game, Luke insisted on a story. Then another. Then the first story all over again. Padmé felt at once very tired and very...

Content.

After awhile, as she read the same story for the third time and Luke pointed at the holos, interrupting her for the umpteenth time, she could feel a presence. She looked up and froze as she spotted Leia standing in the entrance quietly.

"Hello, Leia," she forced herself to speak, her throat suddenly very dry.

Leia looked at her silently but didn't respond. "Luke!" she hissed. "Come with me!"

Luke stopped looking at the holos, his eyes torn between his sister and mother.

"Luke!" the girl asked again, visibly angry.

"Go, Luke," Padmé said. "We'll read a story another time." The boy hesitated.

"Really?"

"Yes, really, you can go play with your sister now."

Luke didn't need to be told twice, he left her bed with a bang then reached his sister almost fearfully. Leia only glared at her once before leaving, taking Luke by the hand roughly.

The door clicked shut again.


Padmé was still sitting up in bed when Anakin returned for his nightly visit. He would check in on her everyday.

Probably to check if she was still alive, Padmé scoffed inwardly.

Greeting Artoo with a slight stroke of his gloved hand on the dome, he took a seat and sat down beside her. He looked...

Happy?

"Luke told me about the stories, over and over again," he chuckled. "I'm glad the two of you have spent some time together." A pause. "You need to get out a little."

"Did the bill pass?"

That made Anakin's almost good mood pass. He looked down at his hands, visibly trying to force down whatever dark feeling was coming up again.

"I made the health bill pass, yes."

Silence. Anakin stood up to leave. Padmé was suddenly afraid of being alone again.

"I didn't order any attack on the Palace," she murmured. "It was supposed to be a staged attack against me so I could get rid of the Senators. Monera did this on his own. He-"

She paused. Could they be honest to each other? She shrugged inwardly. She supposed they could after all. "He wanted to be my lover," she murmured. "He wanted to overthrow you. I should've stopped him but I needed him as an ally. The promise of something more was what I was using to get him to do what I wanted. I never thought he could outmaneuver me."

When she looked up, Anakin was still standing, watching her silently. When he still hadn't responded, she huffed. "Do you believe me?"

"He was never your lover?" Anakin asked suddenly.

Padmé gaped at him. "That's what you're deeming important from what I just told you?"

He shook his head then cleared his throat. "Whether you're involved with the attack or not," she started to protest, he stopped her with a look and a gloved finger pointed at her, "everyone out there thinks you are," he paused. "You're in danger on Coruscant."

"What do you believe?"

"It's not important," Anakin replied. "We have to leave for awhile, the time it'll take for everything to calm down. Tomorrow."

He didn't wait for her response and left without another word.


Padmé couldn't sleep.

Anakin hadn't told her where they were going. He hadn't told her much, period. In spite of herself, she was dying to know what was going on in the Senate. If Monera had been executed.

She rose, standing on unsure legs, still feeling a little weak.

Artoo almost immediately rolled to stand in her way.

She sighed in annoyance. "I just want to see Anakin, lead me to him." The droid beeped uncertainly then decided she was sincere enough and led the way.

They went through several corridors, Artoo adapting his speed to her slow walk. Then Padmé recognized the guest wing, which was never used and where Anakin had apparently set his office.

"Thanks, Artoo," she whispered, "I'll take it from here." But before she could reach the office, the door opened in the semi-darkness. In reflex, she hid against the wall.

Someone was exiting it. Anakin's figure was standing next to the other person as they talked quietly. Then the figure moved as Anakin shut the door behind him.

Padmé's heart stopped. Literally.

It was Mina Katokellian. Anakin was taking her back to the direction of the main entrance, taking her arm gallantly. Then they stopped near the grand stairs. There was silence. Then the woman leaned closer to-

Padmé looked away, feeling herself near tears inexplicably. She made her way back into the corridor, feeling her way back with her hands until she spotted Artoo. Her gaze still filled with tears, she patted the dome, trying to bring her breathing back to normal.

What was happening to her? She shouldn't care. She suddenly wanted to be back to the oblivion, the dark and go back to sleep all day long.

"What are you doing out there?" Anakin suddenly said from behind her. She heard him take fast steps towards her. He stopped next to her, taking her arm gently.

"I'll take you back," he only said softly.

Padmé fought against the grip. Where was her coldness when she needed it? Her defenses had been strangely ripped apart after her breakdown.

"What is it?" he frowned.

"Has Artoo ratted me out?" she whispered.

Anakin chuckled slightly. "No, he didn't have to. I could feel your presence from a mile away."

Padmé frowned, looking up into his face. He was watching her calmly but visibly at loss over what she was thinking about. She was about to let it go, not saying anything, let the jealousy and the anger and the self-loathing boil inside of her but...

She was too tired. She didn't want to do this all over again.

"I saw you with the Corellia Representative," she said tentatively.

Anakin frowned. "You weren't supposed to see that," he only said after awhile. Padmé fought against the contradicting emotions rising inside her, that she didn't even understand anymore.

She wanted the numbness back.

Suddenly, his gloved fingers were under her chin, tilting her head back gently. "What is it?" he asked.

Then as if he could see right through her, he only let go of her chin. "Oh."

"It's stupid," Padmé said, the tears in her eyes betraying her. She cursed them. She felt so... weak lately. She hated it.

"No, I'm not saying it's stupid," Anakin replied earnestly before resting his blue eyes on her. "It makes me hope."

His gaze was so intense Padmé felt her knees buckle just ever so slightly. Suddenly she yearned for something she hadn't thought of in a long time.

Reconciliation, tenderness. His arms around her.

"But I can't afford that," he whispered next but with determination. She didn't have time to respond before he took her arm and linked it with his gently, walking her back to her quarters, Artoo in tow.

"Where are we going tomorrow?" she asked when they were half-way to her bedroom. He didn't respond.

"Anakin!" she whispered urgently. He shook his head silently, stopping her with a look. They came to a halt when they reached her bedroom's door.

"I'll tell you when we're en route there."

"Don't you trust me?" Padmé hissed, crossing her arms in anger. "You think I'm going to plan another attack or what?"

Anakin rolled his eyes slightly. "It's not that I don't trust you. The less people know, the better. You'll understand soon enough." He paused then added, "And don't worry, you'll like it there."

"You're back to treating me like a child," she only said before turning to her door. It clicked open. Anakin stopped her with one hand on her arm.

Then he came closer. Padmé's breath caught in her chest. Caressing one side of her face with his gloved hand, he only leaned down and kissed her forehead.

Padmé stared at his retreating back then the darkness long after he was gone.


Sneakpeak for chapter 43 (for those of you who thought Padmé was suddenly being okay again)

The morning came. Muted traffic could be heard from where Padmé sat inside the dark room.

The apathy was back. The numbness. When Luke came into her room again, she didn't respond to the loud whispers and slight shaking of her shoulder.

Silence came back.

Perhaps she could die this way. By staying here and letting herself rot.

Like she deserved.

Most of her nights had been dreamless but the night before...

She had seen her father.

Alive and accusing.

Bail Organa and his wife. Dormé. Who had turned away from her in disgust.

When she had awoken in the dark, tears streaming from her closed eyelids, the feeling of guilt, the pain had been too intense... she was suffocating, yearning for her father, her friends, sobbing, begging for their forgiveness. It had been too much. So she had reached for something cold and comforting.

For Anakin's darkness.

It had still been there when she probed experimentally. Comforting. The connection between them had flickered before she could feel Anakin cut if off roughly.

The numbness had started then.

She could only hear her husband's dark voice whispering in her ear.

You are nothing.

I should kill you...I would do you a favor.