Chapter Thirty-Six: One Last Shot

As Anakin approached the double doors to the Executive Office, he inhaled deeply, taking in as much stale air as his lungs would allow. It didn't help. Releasing the breath, his chest felt as tight as it had all morning.

You will be sent for when I am in need of you, the chancellor had said to him. Not before. And that need, it seemed, had yet to arise. He'd heard not a word from Palpatine since—no summons, no calls, not even letterhead from his damned office. Merely communiques from middlemen; staff members sending him away on petty assignments. Hand deliver this letter, escort that dignitary from the landing pad to her hotel room. Be a good boy.

It was time to change that.

The redrobes made no motion to bar his entry—Bel Iblis's stunt notwithstanding, Anakin's security clearance was high enough that he didn't have to worry. As their expressionless gazes passed over him, he forced himself to march with his head held high, armed with a tray of tea in one hand and a file folder tucked under the other arm. He hoped the masks prevented the guards from looking too closely—beads of sweat formed on his brow, and though his mechanical hand should have held the tray of drinks perfectly steady, it wobbled ever so slightly with each step.

After all, he had not, in fact, been sent for. There had been no summons of any sort, certainly, no order to bring afternoon refreshments to Palpatine's office. The drink tray he'd swiped from outside a senatorial office on the way up, as effective a way as any to slip past the droid at the reception desk.

As the redrobes stepped aside, the doors to the office swept open of their own accord, beckoning Anakin to enter. Their motion conveyed a sense of welcome that he certainly did not feel—for as he crossed the threshold into the office, he realized that Palpatine was not alone.

Dammit. Any chance of speaking openly snapped out of existence—and now, he was intruding on a meeting.

As he moved through the room, the crimson carpet threatened to swallow him up. Each footfall on the plush flooring should have felt luxurious, like gliding across a cloud—but today the threads seemed to prickle. Anakin was an invader, an houseguest who had overstayed his welcome.

Or, in this case, hadn't been invited at all.

"Vice Chair Sapir!" he said, the name leaving his mouth automatically as he recognized the multicolored crest across the desk from Palpatine. He had to get rid of her, to get Palpatine on his own so they could smooth things over. "Please excuse the interruption. I didn't realize—ah, that is to say, I thought Palpatine, er, the chancellor—"

Anakin didn't have to try hard to exaggerate his nervousness—but his choice to heighten it appeared to be having its intended effect. Sapir's headcrest bloomed into a pale purple—embarrassment, Anakin knew. He kept his gaze locked on the Fosh, half hoping the stare would drive her out of her chair.

"I thought he was alone," Anakin continued. "I only brought tea for one."

"That's quite alright," the Vice Chair said with a stammer, glancing sideways as Anakin moved closer and deposited the tray onto the executive desk. Against his will, he found his eyes sliding toward the floor, then dancing up to Sapir's sleeve—anywhere but the face behind the desk.

The tea deposited atop the stone slab, Anakin plucked the file folder from under his arm and extended it toward Palpatine, keeping his gaze lowered. "A message for you, sir."

He felt the packet of flimsiplast get snatched from his flesh hand in one brisk motion. Looking reluctantly upward, Anakin watched the chancellor—silent, lips pressed together in an uncomfortable shape—lay the folder on the desk, unread.

Palpatine stared.

Anakin shuffled, inhaled, then played his best card.

"Executor Vader wishes to speak with you."

A forced cough emerged from Sapir's beak. "I should be going," she said—her talons shoved against the arms of her chair as she rushed to her feet.

"That would be best, I think."

The first words to emerge from the chancellor's lips were strained, barely above a whisper. When Anakin looked back at Palpatine's face, the tip of his nose seemed to twitch slightly.

Sapir glided toward the office exit, the world seeming to hang motionless as the doors swung shut behind her.

When they clicked shut, the stasis broke.

In an instant Palpatine was on his feet. "What," he asked, the folder's corner crinkling under his clenched fist, "is this?"

"I came to ask for an assignment, sir," Anakin began, doing his best to keep himself firmly upright despite what felt like an eroding spine. He had heard Palpatine irritated before—but not to this physical extent, and there was a growing fire in the chancellor's eyes that the young man didn't like at all. "A real one." Using his mechanical hand to seem steady, he pointed to the folder in Palpatine's hand. "I took the liberty of selecting a couple possible targets for Executor Vader. I can handle more than what I'm being given now."

"I wouldn't be so sure of that, my boy," Palpatine said, moving around the end of the desk and taking several steps in Anakin's direction. Without thinking, Anakin took an equal number of steps backward. Palpatine moved slowly, deliberately, like a cat weighing every footfall. "Unless your idea of 'handling it' is opening your mouth and making a fool of me during a domestic policy meeting. I am already dealing with an opposition party forming in the Senate; I don't need opposition coming from within my own office."

"Chancellor, I—"

"As for these," Palpatine said, tossing the stack of flimsiplast sheets to the floor, "you seem to have misunderstood the point of your title. You are not a strategist. You are not a tactician. You do not select the targets. You are an instrument. A weapon. One which I choose where to point. One which I decide when to shoot. No one else. Not even you."

Anakin opened his mouth, but no words emerged. Rising heat bloomed throughout his body; the red of embarrassment creeped up his neck as moisture welled behind his eyes—he squeezed them shut, forced them open again. His flesh hand shook as it formed into a tight ball.

Take control, you fool. It was the voice in his head again. The one from before. Taunting him. Mocking him.

Offering guidance.

You know things. Prove your worth. Show him.

You have to do something, now, or he'll kick you out of the executive office, said the voice of his own thoughts. What did the other voice mean? Tell the chancellor about Valis's invitation? That he knew where the pirates were hiding?

NO!

He searched the depths of his memory, but nothing came to the surface. If there was something that would turn the tide of the conversation in his favor, he couldn't recall it.

So he asked. You have to show me, he thought, reaching out into the depths. Beckoning the voice to answer.

And then it dawned on him.

"What about the Jedi investigation?"

For the briefest moment, he saw a crack in the mask that was Palpatine's face. A curl at the edge of the chancellor's lips, one that would have become a frown had the man behind it not wrestled it under control. Palpatine's expression became neutral, measured—and then he spoke.

"What of it?"

"You're investigating Jedi involvement in the war, aren't you?" Anakin asked, careful to ponder each word. He was in unknown territory now, grasping at fragments of information as he formed each sentence. He only hoped he sounded like he knew what he was talking about. "I saw the documents when you were meeting with Tarkin. And I've . . . heard things."

Things that scare me, he didn't add. Things that you've kept from me.

His thoughts turned to Obi-Wan—to his old friend's assumption that Anakin was somehow involved in a secret Republic investigation. Good question, he realized now, too late.

Why not ask it?

"So," he continued, "why didn't you ask me for help?"

Palpatine's eyes narrowed, his jaw tightening as he clenched his teeth. "My boy," he began, "are you certain you wish to explore this line of questioning? You may not like where it leads."

Is that a threat?

"I think I would, yes."

Palpatine took a step backwards, then turned and strolled back to the chair behind his desk. Lowering himself into it, he rested his elbows on the stone and steepled his fingers.

Are his hands shaking?

The chancellor took a deep breath before he spoke again. "You assume you deserve to be in the loop on this investigation because you were once a Jedi."

It was not a question, but Anakin interjected anyway. "That's right."

"Consider for a moment what the Jedi involvement in the war entails, Anakin. The atrocities they were complicit in—"

The atrocities you were complicit in.

"—when brought into the public eye, may not so easily be forgiven." The chancellor steepled his fingers and looked intently down at them, speaking as though he still held Anakin in his gaze.

"With due respect, sir, I know the Jedi. And the scale of what's been happening—it just seems a bit drastic to—"

"You are correct, Anakin," said Palpatine, his voice giving no acknowledgment that he could hear the words the young man was still stumbling over. "You know them. That, in the wrong light, might carry certain implications. Especially in the light this investigation may shine on recent affairs. Since, at the present moment, you seem incapable of considering these things for yourself, I took them into consideration for you. I thought it best if you kept clear of this business."

Reaching for the file folder atop the desk, Palpatine took it in his hands and continued. "And now, I'm afraid, I think it best you keep clear of all executive business. At least for a time. With the war in the shape it is, and with Bail Organa's new coalition likely to vote against any attempts at progress—"

Wincing at the image of his past self thundering at a sitting senator, Anakin bent his head back to the carpet. "Sir, I'll admit I screwed up the meeting with Bail, but—"

"Do not interrupt me!"

The thud of a fist slamming into the desk underlined what was, as far as Anakin could remember, the only time he had ever heard Palpatine raise his voice. The young man's peripheral vision drained black, his heart hammering with sudden, consuming panic.

The chancellor looked down at the stone and released a long, exhausted sigh. When he returned his eyes to Anakin, they were steel. "Until I can be certain you will make no further mistakes of that nature, you are not welcome in this office. Do I make myself clear?"

Anakin could barely manage the words. "Perfectly, sir."

"Very good. Now, either escort yourself out of the building or I'll have the Red Guard do it. You'll be hearing from my staff regarding any further assignments."

It was only when he was through the doors and halfway down the hall that Anakin allowed the tears of anger to finally flow.

The lights were off when Anakin entered the flat that was technically his home—they had been for days. He'd taken to spending nights in his cabin on the Arbiter, too afraid to face the emptiness of the apartment.

Tonight he had no choice. It was the only place he was welcome now.

As for what he would do . . . there was no reading material, no food for him to cook, not even a bottle of something for him to get drunk on. Bed, maybe—when was the last time he'd gotten a good night's sleep?—but then again what was the point.

Welcome home, Executor, he sneered at himself. Home from a long day of delivering mail.

He should have made the redrobes take him. Should have thrown the tea tray at a wall, screamed, something, anything to make Palpatine listen. Now here he was, as alone as he'd been the day she—

Awareness cut through the haze in his head like a blade.

At first, Anakin just stood there, motionless, flesh hand poised an inch from the lightswitch above the kitchen counter. In the darkness, he could hear only his own breathing, see nothing but the silhouettes of the possessions he'd abandoned here long ago.

Then he flicked the switch, flooding the whole of the apartment with artificial light.

There she sat at the dining table.

"Hey."

So casual. Not cheery, not even pleased, but . . . relaxed. As though their last conversation had never happened.

Where have you been?

He wanted to ask. More than anything, he wanted to ask.

Instead, he took a seat across from her.

Anakin's eyes met Padmé's—and beneath the calm surface, there was pain, a nervous hurt that rolled off her in waves. He could feel it in the Force—oh, how good it felt to feel her presence again, to truly sense it. Not the hollow echo of years past, but the true and rich and full feeling that he'd grown to know and love before he'd lost his way.

She was here. She'd chosen to come back. Right now, she was the only person that really, truly wanted him.

"I've been hiding something from you," he began; the words were shaky and unstable as they left his mouth. She said nothing, merely nodding and reaching out to grasp his flesh hand—so he continued. "I've been doing work for Palpatine. Dangerous work, out across the galaxy. Fighting in the war."

She nodded. "I know."

"You do?"

Padmé smiled, glancing down at the table, and he felt her aura flood with the same rueful amusement he'd felt a thousand times over. "We lied to a lot of people over the years, Anakin, but you never got any good at lying to me. I knew something was up. I just didn't know what."

She'd known him, without having to ask—when was the last time he'd had that with anyone besides Palpatine? Even those he loved?

Trying to grasp on to that certainty for himself, he continued. "He calls me Executor Vader. I soften up targets—military installations, mostly—so the Grand Army can move in and finish them off. While I was on a mission I came across some information. Information that could end the war." And oh gods, saying it was a goodness he'd never known, better than the Force, maybe even better than their love—just making an honest confession without having to weigh what it would mean, whether it would get him what he wanted.

Padmé leaned forward, squeezing at his flesh hand. He could sense her curiosity, her need to know.

Last chance to turn back.

"I know where Maul and Valis are.

"I know where they're hiding, and where their pirate fleet is. Valis invited me there to talk—well, she invited Vader. She doesn't know it's me. They'd let me walk right into their fortress. I could kill them both."

His wife's eyes narrowed in apparent confusion. "I—Palpatine doesn't know this?"

Anakin shook his head. "If I tried to tell him, he wouldn't listen." Not a lie, but a truth that left out so much that he rushed forward with the rest before he had time to feel guilty. "I have to take care of this myself, but I can't do it alone."

Inhaling deeply through his nose, he looked her in the eyes. Remembered her on the Spice Dancer, mocking him as he left. Remembered the voice on the other end of the call, the panic in her eyes as she'd lied to his face.

Tossed it away.

"Will you help me? Together we could find a way. It's our chance to make them pay for what they took from us."

Who they took from us, he finished silently as his gaze wandered to the apartment windows—to the pane of transparisteel that was slightly newer than the others. To the place where their droid had met her end.

Further out than that, to worlds billions of miles away.

She was silent a moment too long, and Anakin felt belated alarm at what he'd been willing to tell without thinking, without even asking why she was here, start to bubble up. "I know we could pull it off together," he said, aware he was talking too fast, "but we'd have to go right now—"

"Okay."

He'd been so primed for her to snort in derision, to call him a reckless idiot, that for several seconds he just sat there. ". . . what?"

"Okay," Padmé repeated herself, rising to her feet. "Let's go kill them."