Leia had just finished and submitted her report to Sabé when the message came in, commanding her into Palpatine's presence at once.

Her heart was hammering against her ribs for some reason, but she didn't object. Didn't think about why she might be nervous. Didn't so much as consider Luke's kind, sweet, compassionate, insanely reckless behaviour with the Sixth Sister, and how it might reflect on them if it got around.

They could not seem suspicious. Not now. Not with everything so swiftly coming to a head.

She didn't do any of that. She just changed into something a little more presentable, in the blues and blacks spectrum she always wore, and set off.

She met Luke in the throne room proper, having been the last to be admitted. Him, her father, and—unnervingly enough—the Sixth Sister were already standing before the throne, Luke and Vader on one side, the Sixth Sister on the other. The division between them was stark.

Palpatine was taut on his throne, which meant he was excited about something. He smiled at her as she came in, and it made her skin crawl.

"Ah, Leia," he greeted. "We can begin."

Leia bowed briefly when she reached the dais, then took her place next to Luke, running a critical eye over him before she turned back to face Palpatine.

He tried not to grimace. He was well aware he was attending an audience with the Emperor dressed in clothes wrinkled and dusty from an afternoon in the Archives, but it wasn't like he could have gone home when he received the summons!

"I have good news, my friends," Palpatine intoned, his entire body language focusing on Luke and his family. He didn't so much as glance at Jade—she hadn't even been allowed to stand from the kneeling position she held on the floor.

Again, Luke had to fight not to look at her—her presence here made him. . . uneasy. . . in ways he couldn't quantify.

"You are aware of our belief that there remain spies in our midst?"

Luke assumed it was a rhetorical question, but Palpatine paused to let him answer. He glanced at Leia, then at his father, before answering on their behalf. "Yes. . .?"

"I believe I have caught them," he said simply.

The tension in Luke's chest tightened, like he had a ball of wire instead of a heart, and someone just yanked on the loose end. The wire wound its way around his ribs, his lungs; he took a deep breath, and hope it didn't seem too laboured.

Palpatine was wrong. He had to be wrong. If he knew, he would have thrown them in binders by now—no. If he knew, he would have summoned Vader first to regretfully inform him of their treachery, and Luke's father would have been his death from the moment he stepped into the room.

And your father cares more about you than the Empire?

Palpatine's gaze rested solidly on Luke for a moment, so he fought to keep his warring emotions off his face, but when he moved on he sagged in relief.

Palpatine rose from his throne, and took two slow, deliberate steps down from the dais. He stood over Jade, still kneeling, and said benevolently, "Rise, my child."

She did so, head still bowed, yellow eyes—but they'd been green before, hadn't they?—to the floor. Her subservience sickened Luke, surprisingly strongly; he hadn't realised he was that. . . vehement. . . about how his master treated his servants.

The man himself was indeed smiling faintly at the girl who deferred so completely to his will—he looked almost. . . satisfied with her, in a way he never was with the Inquisitors. He was usually cruelty incarnate when he interacted with them; it had always left Luke perplexed as to why they were loyal to him in the first place.

Unless they had done something extraordinary for him. Fulfilled his plans and desires in just the way to give him the edge.

Luke's blood ran cold. Had— had Jade reported what he'd said to her to Palpatine? His suspicious behaviour? Palpatine must know they were planning a coup of sorts; had he tasked Jade with getting close to Luke, and to report back?

Was this the final straw before Palpatine finally unleashed his wrath for the betrayal on Luke. . . and the rest of his family?

His heart was beating faster, and faster, and faster now, but he forced himself to stay calm. Tried to breathe through his nose, even as Palpatine approached Jade more, that disgustingly kind smile still on his face. Jade's helmet was open—a sign of respect she gave her master unquestioningly, while she balked so hard at giving his father the same—and Luke could read the wary hope in the taut lines of her face. She was so. . . devoted to him, so genuinely eager at the thought he might be praising her, and for just one moment she looked painfully, painfully young.

She was Luke's age, or thereabouts. A little younger. She'd never seemed particularly youthful before, through his eyes—if he could handle this stuff, so could she. But now Luke considered the fact that he still had Leia, and his father; he could still act his age in rare, fleeting moments if he wanted to.

Jade didn't have that. Inquisitors used familial terms almost mockingly, nowhere near the connection of Luke and his sister, Leia and her brother. She had never been allowed to be young.

Palpatine was directly in front of her now. His cane clacked against the floor and held still. He reached out a hand to take her chin, and she let him tilt her head up to meet his eye.

"You have always been so loyal, child," he murmured. "Haven't you?"

He threw blue fire at her.

Her scream was something unearthly, unholy. She was propelled back, hitting the floor hard, her helmet rolling away. She tried to drag herself to her feet, back to kneeling, but he electrocuted her again and her shaking arms collapsed beneath her. She whimpered.

Palpatine took up his cane again, and tapped it once. "I have to wonder," he said, "what spurred your betrayal? Fulcrum?" He spat the codename like a curse; Luke did his best to conceal his flinch.

She was shaking her head, almost automatically, "Master? No, master—I— I'm not—"

"I am displeased with you enough as it is, traitor. Do not displease me further." The barrage came again, violet and luminous in the perpetual twilight of the throne room. Jade shrieked and sobbed.

That ball of wire in his chest was prickling, dissolved, needles of metal stabbing themselves into the soft tissue of his heart and lungs. . .

Jade was innocent. She hadn't betrayed; she would never betray Palpatine, not on her own. She was entirely innocent, and their master was frying her like meat, like he didn't care—

He clenched his fist, shifting to take a step forward, to stop this—

—and another hand wrapped around his wrist.

Luke's fist unclenched at her touch; she could feel the tendons shifting in his wrist. Leia didn't dare glance at him with her eyes, fixated on the Sixth Sister's torment, but she hissed mentally, Don't.

Leia, he's—

He's onto us. If the Sixth Sister dies, that's one less acolyte of his we have to worry about, and takes the suspicion off of us.

But she's innocent.

Luke, now is not the time for your petty, insane crush. She regretted the words immediately after she said them, judging by the spike of anger they evoked, but they were necessary. The Rebellion needs us. You can't throw it all away for her.

But—

If you do, I'll pay the price right alongside you.

That shut him up.

They stood there in silence, watching the display as impassively as their father did behind him. Leia did not let go of her brother's hand.

Luke didn't know how long they stood there. It could only have been minutes at the most: by the end of it, Jade's pleas for him to believe her had long since petered out to sobs.

Palpatine finally stopped, looking down at her with disappointment. Her red hair spilled out across the floor behind her, like a deluge of blood.

"I have to say," he said to the silence, "I'm disappointed in you."

Jade didn't respond, face still contorted in a rictus of pain.

"I thought you were a better man than this, Luke."

Luke inadvertently stiffened, his brows creasing. Vader's mask shifted between them in confusion. Leia's grip on his left arm would cut off the blood supply to his hand in a moment.

"I never believed you were the sort of person to allow someone else to be so grievously punished for a crime you did yourself," his eyes cackled, "Fulcrum."

Jade spluttered something from the floor, woozy. Leia's grip had constricted even further. Palpatine looked highly amused.

But Luke's attention was on his father, behind him.

Vader took a breath out of sync with his respirator, the leather in his gloves creaking as he clenched his fists. Luke barely dared to turn to look at him; when he did, that terrifying death mask—the one that he'd thought was a monster when he first laid eyes on it—was fixed on him, unmoving.

Shock—then, understanding. A black, black rage was starting to build.

Luke whispered, "Father?" and watched Vader bring one of his fists up.

A shout of warning from the Force. Luke spun round and blanched at the sight of that crackling lightning, flinching back against his father and waiting for the agony—

A snap-hiss and red washed through his eyelids, the blue fading to nothing in its corona. Luke took a breath, and for a moment he indulged in the thought that his father might have shielded him anyway.

But no.

When he opened his eyes again, stepping away from Vader, trying to get some distance between him and that bonfire of fury, the burgeoning hate, it was not his father who'd saved him. It was Leia.

Of course it was.

It was Leia who held her lightsaber out in front of her, free hand stretched in front of him like she would block him with her body alone. His sister, who would always choose him, just as he would always choose her.

It only made Palpatine smile more. "Of course," he said maliciously, "the Skywalker twins always come as a set."

Skywalker.

So he definitely knew, then.

"If one is a traitor. . . so is the other."

Inevitably, Luke's gaze flicked back to Vader. He didn't know why—had thought he'd shed that all-encompassing need for his approval, his guidance. But if there was one person in this room he did not want to fight, it was his father.

"Father," he tried again, unable to keep the desperation from his voice.

That mask still studied him. It moved slightly to Leia, her rigid stance as she glared at Palpatine, then back to Luke's open pleading.

Although Luke could not see his eyes, he felt his gaze move to the lightsaber at his hip.

What happened next happened so fast Luke could barely comprehend it. There was a tug at the lightsaber. . . and Luke, buoyed and fuelled by years of sparring lessons where he'd done exactly this, instantly grabbed for it, keeping it solid in his hand as he backed away. He did not light it.

It didn't matter. Leia shouted at his sudden movement, and Palpatine sought to take advantage of it, casting that awful lightning about them like a web—and Jade split Luke's attention by hissing something undoubtedly vulgar at him and Vader stretched out his hand again—

Luke had no idea what he'd been trying to do—choke him, take the lightsaber, knock him unconscious?—but he staggered back anyway, yelped as one of those bolts scorched across his skin—

And then Leia's hand was back on his arm, pulling him, dragging him, and they were sprinting for dear, dear life because Luke didn't want to know what would happen to them if he stopped—

The red guards standing outside turned their heads at the commotion. A simple twist of the dark side was enough to make them turn too far—and then they were no threat at all, just oddly bent bodies littering the corridors.

The beat of his and his sister's hearts was the only sound he could hear.

Leia didn't know when she stopped leading Luke and he stopped leading her, but she did notice when his route took a very noticeable turn: downwards.

Not upwards, not towards any of the landing pads, or even to their own speeder. That was the obvious choice, so Palpatine and her father—oh Force, she was a fugitive from her father, what had they done—would no doubt be snapping out orders even now, locking them down, ordering the ships above planet to stop any vessel broadcasting an Imperial signal—

But it was the obvious choice for a reason: it was the only choice. Where would they go, if they went down? How would they get out?

She sent her query along their bond, too conservative of breath and time to bother voicing it aloud, and Luke sent his answer along as well. It wasn't in words: it was a memory that flashed from his mind to hers, of darkness and ice on the air and children's bones and Lacert Visz's terrified face in the yellow light of a saber.

And then she understood what Luke was doing.

The shadows had always been the twins' playmates.

They'd ducked into the secret passages between hallways at one point, so they encountered minimal staff, but they did encounter guards. They'd both summoned a blaster to hand and shot each one dead where they stood, reaching out with the Force. It made them a target for Palpatine and his Inquisitors and her— and Vader, but it meant it was easier for them to put distance between the target and the shooters, so it was worthwhile.

But then they plunged into the ruins of the Jedi Temple, and felt the confusing mingle of peace and death shroud them.

Like a mirage.

It wasn't until they'd scaled three crumbling walls, clambered over twenty-two debris piles and slipped on umpteen loose stones and bones that they finally stopped to rest.

Luke lit his lightsaber; neither of them had a glowrod on them. The red light cast his scared face in eerie, intimidating shadows. Leia shivered looking at him—it was such a paradox it tore her world apart.

His voice was quiet. "What do we do now?"

Leia crouched onto the floor next to him, mindful of how well sound carried in these undisturbed halls. If they'd already sent a search party down after them—and she didn't want to risk stretching out her senses and checking if they had—they didn't need to give them any help.

The two of them were already shielding as tightly as they could. Hopefully—hopefully—that mirage would throw enough doubt over their specific whereabouts that they could get out of here before potential search teams could get anywhere near.

"We get out of here," she said, extrapolating on her thoughts. Luke grunted; apparently, that had not been helpful.

"Well, I'm sorry, you're not exactly Mr. Useful right now, either," she snapped. "What—what do you think we can do now?"

"Get out," he conceded, "and join the main bulk of the Rebellion. If not spies, we're good pilots and tacticians."

"But how do we get there?"

"Ahsoka."

It was so obvious. So painfully, blatantly obvious— "She's still on planet, isn't she? She was supposed to meet us today."

"I'll comm her," he said, reaching for his comlink. At least he had that on him. "Maybe she can help us—hopefully she's got a big enough ship for it."

"She has. Didn't she say she'd be bringing someone else to this meeting as well?"

Luke didn't answer, but his lack of contradiction was answer enough. Leia watched with bated breath as he tapped Ahsoka's frequency into the comlink.

Like Sabé always did, she picked up within a minute. "Luke. What is it?"

"Palpatine found out about us. We need transportation off-planet."

There was a muffled curse; Leia could tell Ahsoka was trying not to say it directly into the comlink. Trying, and failing. "I see. Are you sure?"

"He made a show of it in front of our father and we just had to sprint for our lives through the Imperial Palace," Leia snapped, ignoring Luke's reproachful look. She was on edge, and she didn't have time for this. "Yes, we're sure."

Another quiet curse. "Alright—I can get you out. Can you meet me by the Works in the Industrial sector, at these coordinates? We have a ship there we can use to get to hyperspace."

Leia and Luke exchanged a glance, then nodded in unison. "Yes. We'll see you there as soon as possible. If we're not there by nightfall, and won't answer the comlink, assume we've been captured."

Captured. By her own father, in the heart of the Empire she'd spent her whole life serving.

Because she'd spent her whole life serving it, she knew exactly what would happen to her if she was—what would happen to Luke. Her stomach roiled.

"Let's go," she said, her sudden fear giving her energy she didn't really have as she shoved herself off the wall. It was still barely light enough to see in these corridors.

Luke winced—a moment later, Leia felt it too. It was massive, monstrous, and it hurt, the way it rammed against their shields with the sort of icy precision he probably employed during interrogations.

Leia didn't know. She hadn't been able to stomach watching her father's interrogations for a long time; she just thought Luke's were so much more efficient.

"Ignore him," she told Luke; the conflict in her brother was as plain as day. The part of him that would always be that little orphan boy she barely remembered, wishing for a father, would do anything to please Vader, despite recent developments. She knew that he knew better, would try to adhere to his logic and newfound growth, but she also knew it was tearing him apart inside. "Come on."

He nodded grimly, and pushed himself back to his feet.

Their first objective in order to get to the Works: steal a speeder.

They'd already left the Palace far behind, so they headed for an exit. There were few speeders that actually worked in the levels as low as they travelled, so they took the risk and headed up again, relying on the hope that the Jedi Temple had disguised their presences enough that their pursuers would be caught off guard when they finally reappeared.

They'd only be caught off guard for a moment, admittedly enough, but it might be enough for them to steal a speeder from one of the lower security landing pads and make off with it. Coruscant was massive, sprawling, and densely populated; if they could get far enough away and avoid any law enforcement, then even with a description and a warrant for their arrest, they could slip by into anonymity.

"Ready?" Leia murmured to Luke, squinting over the edge of the landing pad at the innocuous speeder parked there. She was highly aware of the fact that she was clinging to the edge of a Coruscanti building, with over five thousand levels between her and the surface of the planet if she fell, but sometimes it just didn't pay to think about these thing.

"Ready," he replied, just next to her. The surveillance holocams probably hadn't picked them up yet, clinging to the edge as they were, so it would be what they did next that painted targets on their backs.

Luke reached out a hand and the Force, and knocked out the guards watching the pad.

The effect was instantaneous. The guards collapsed, and Leia felt two very powerful, very dark, very angry presences zero in on them. Vader reached out—

—and she batted him away again. "Go, go, go!"

They swung themselves up onto the platform proper and sprinted for the speeder, more tumbling into the seat than climbing. Leia immediately reached for the controls, fumbled to get it started up—

—the doors hissed open, and white-armoured troopers poured out—

—Luke's blade snapped into life to deflect the first of the stun bolts—stun bolts, a part of her registered, so they're not trying to kill us quite yet—and Leia finally got the damn thing started—

—and they rocketed on the Coruscanti airlanes.

Leia sucked in a breath. Beside her, Luke did the same—but it was relief, not shock. He settled down into his seat and put away the saber.

"They'll have descriptions of us at the next checkpoint," he said, almost mildly.

Despite herself, she grinned, eyeing the gaps between the buildings. "Who says we're going through the checkpoints?"

She ducked between the buildings; Luke's momentary intake of breath was very gratifying, as was his grin. Steel struts loomed for them, but she weaved around them.

She wasn't even bothering to shield, anymore. She couldn't fly well enough to escape Imperial traffic patrols and search parties—and dodge big billboards, watch out!—without the Force, and her father would be able to pinpoint her presence to some degree anyway. Might as well blind him.

"How far to the Works?" she asked breathlessly—she wasn't tired, but she was exhilarated.

Luke glanced around and grimaced as he calculated, "About. . . twenty minutes? Especially"—he yelped as she swerved into an air-lane—"if you're gonna fly at these speeds."

"Of course I'm gonna fly at these speeds. Don't be boring."

He grinned. "Father would be proud of you."

His grin dropped when he realised what he'd said, and she sagely decided to never bring it up again.

She murmured, "Well, here goes everything."

They reached the Works in twenty minutes alright. The problem was, their pursuers caught up to them in ten.

"I thought"—Leia banked hard to the right, nearly tossing Luke out of the speeder—"they wanted us"—she dove down, and fire lanced above their heads—"alive!"

"They do."

"Then why are they trying to kill us?!"

Luke glanced behind him almost mournfully, then yelped and grabbed on as she took another dive. They were nearing the coordinates now.

"It might be revenge for three of them going fireball against that billboard back there," he commented.

"Great," she spat, "dutiful and jealous and vengeful Imperials."

"I have faith that you can do it."

"I will shove you out of this speeder."

"But then all this effort you've gone to in order to take the fall with me would be pointless, wouldn't it?"

Despite herself, she shivered at his choice of words, glancing below her. The mishmash of levels spiralled away below her.

Take the fall. . .

She glanced at Luke's lightsaber, deflecting the rare bolts that did pose a risk to them. Red bolts, as red as the saber itself.

Take the fall. . .

No. She wouldn't think about any of this right now.

"Coming up on the coordinates," she said instead. "We can't lead them straight to Ahsoka, or we'll never get out of here. I'm gonna ditch the speeder at this walkway here, and then we'll work our way through that scaffolding on foot; the speeders can't follow."

"Leia—" Luke said, and once again she sensed it a heartbeat after he did.

Vader.

Their father was coming.

She brought the speeder to a screeching, sudden stop on the walkway and practically shoved him out. Several of their pursuers shot right past them.

"Go! Hurry!"

Without another word, he took off running. She raced to catch up.

"The coordinates are just up there," she reiterated, ducking and leaping in swing succession to avoid slamming into a metal pole. "We—"

"Wait." Luke drew his lightsaber again and sliced—almost negligently—through two of the poles he'd almost rammed into. One fell with a clatter, before it plunged into the depths of Coruscant; the other. . .

There was a creaking sound from the scaffolding above them. Luke extinguished his lightsaber.

"Let's go," he said.

They cleared the scaffolding just as it collapsed behind them. The return path was impassable.

"Good thinking," she said.

"I am capable of it from time to time."

She pointed. "There."

He squinted for a moment, before he saw what she had seen: a figure crouched on the building opposite to them, tall, with a Togruta's silhouette.

"Ahsoka."

"We need to—"

A cold rushed through them. Luke whimpered. If the situation was any less dire, Leia would have mocked him for it.

Instead, she glanced behind them. She couldn't see anything—Luke's makeshift blockage still held—but the hum of a lightsaber through metal echoed.

"We need to go," she tried again. "We need to get across to that building. There's a bunch of struts; if we use them as stepping stones, we can—"

"No." Luke shook his head, sickeningly pale. "If we jump simultaneously, individually, it'll take too long. Trust me. We need to work together."

For a moment, Leia wondered why he knew so much about jumping through the airlanes of Coruscant, then decided there were more pertinent things to worry about. "And how do you propose we do that?"

"I'll throw you with the Force," he said simply, "and then you throw me."

She stood frozen for precious seconds. The lightsaber—her father—was getting closer.

"Come on, we've done this before."

"Fine, then. I'll throw you first."

"No—I'm the better thrower, you're the better catcher, remember? This is the best chance we've got." He glanced behind them, then cast his gaze back to Leia, eyes pleading. "Please—we're running out of time."

She took a deep breath. . . then nodded. "Alright."

She eyed the edge of the walkway, the jump she'd have to make, and took a few steps back.

"On three."

She crouched a little, readied herself.

"One—"

Her heart was hammering in her chest; tremors were running through the Force, playing through her body like vibrations on a viol's string.

"—two—"

She fixed her mind on Luke, ready for that push. Luke: steady, solid, dependable Luke, who she knew would see her to the other side safely—

"—three!"

She jumped.

There was a moment of terror, where she slowed in midair and crested the height of her arc and thought this is it, this is how I die—

And then the Force barrelled into her, knocking the air from her lungs and flinging her to the other side of that chasm. Ahsoka was there, running towards her; she hit the ground rolling, back on her feet in a heartbeat, already shaking off the bruises.

Because time was of the essence, here.

She turned, ignorant of Ahsoka running at her.

On three, she said mentally. One, two, three—

He jumped. She pulled.

He shot forward. Like a blaster bolt, like a starfighter, like a fist. A relieved smile broke across her face—

And then he was yanked upwards, and stopped.

Just. . . stopped.

He stared at her in shock—and mounting terror.

She pulled, and pulled, and pulled, but it did nothing.

He hovered in midair for a moment, clutching at his throat.

Slowly, dreadfully, desperately, Leia slid her eyes back to the walkway they'd jumped from.

Sure enough, her father stood there, the wreckage of her brother's blockage in red hot pieces behind him.

He stood like some dark knight amid the winds and chaos and descending dusk of Coruscant, a solid, unmovable shadow against its constantly shifting chiaroscuro. She couldn't tell where his mask was pointing—whether it was at Luke, or her, or even Ahsoka, still racing for her.

But Leia could see his hand.

It was held out in front of him, thumb and forefinger pinched together. And Luke, still hanging in limbo, struggled to breathe.