Ta daaaa! Behold, my coping mechanism from that STUPID ending of Revenge of the Sith. I do get that Padme had to die. I mean, she ain't in the ogs, and it was thematically brilliant that when she died Vader was born.
But sadness? SADNESS!?
It's the one part of Revenge of the Sith I canNOT stand. Like, I have to pause the movie and scream at the screen every time it happens. My family hates me. She deserves better. At least have the guts to say it's because Anakin damaged her throat and she can't get enough air or SOMETHING.
So here we are.
FYI. I did change the ending a little. Padme doesn't really interact with Obi-Wan during the birth. She just has twins, passes out and that's it.
A blaring overhead light burned into Padme's eyes. She shifted, bringing an arm up to block the light. Her breath shuddered in her lungs, unfamiliar to her own ears.
For a moment she leaned back towards sleep, to ease back into darkness.
Burning. The nauseating stench of charred flesh searing through her nostrils. And pain. Pain. Pain!
Her mind snapped back. Her bleary eyes opened and flicked around the room. She was surrounded by three tan walls that reeked of cleaning agents. The fourth wall was glass.
Bail Organa stood over a crib on the other side. He bounced a cloth bundle in his arms, mouthing some lullaby she couldn't hear.
"Padme. How are you feeling?"
She looked at Obi-Wan. He stood in the doorway, slick with sweat and ash. He favored one leg. The side of his face was bruised, and wet with bacta spray.
"Anakin." Her voice was little more than weak rasp.
His face hardened into a shield. He stepped forward, closing the door behind him.
Trouble. She pushed herself up on her arms. "Where is Anakin?"
All of a sudden Obi-Wan would not look at her. His eyes graced the floor, the bed, the shadows, but not her.
Her stomach churned. She gazed at him desperately. "Is… is he alright? What happened?"
Obi-Wan swallowed, as serious as she had ever seen him. "Do you not remember?"
She sorted through faded images. Nightmares, surely, but she has nothing else to go on. "I remember… the Republic cheering. Mustafar, the lava." Her voice wavered with a laugh. "You were walking down the ramp. And then… Anakin and I… we were… together. And then not."
She watched him carefully. He heaved an enormous, shuddering sigh, and brought his hand up to cover his mouth.
"Obi-Wan." It was a reprimand and a question at once.
He jerked his head up. He stepped forward, slid a hand over her shoulder. It was warm, solid, and comforting. Meant to soften the blow of his words.
Bad news. Very bad news. Anakin had been kidnapped. Grievously injured. He was-
"Padme. Anakin… is no more."
Anakin. Dead.
Dead. Anakin.
It wasn't possible. The words didn't go together.
Liquid ice pooled in her stomach, numbing all feeling and thought. She backed away from the man she thought she knew body and soul. Horror, at what he had transformed into without her realizing. Obi-Wan on the ramp staring down at Anakin with all the disappointment and anger a father could have, Anakin's furious face-
"You attacked him." Her voice said faintly.
"In his anger… he tried to kill you, Padme. For the good of the Republic, for the galaxy I- I had to."
"Had to fight him."
"Yes."
Something swelled inside her. A leviathan dragon shaped and born from grief, pain, horror. It breathed smoke and ash. Lava rushed through its veins. A fire rumbled in its throat, ready to burst at any moment. The dragon burned to hurt the man that killed its mate. And words, as useless as they had been to her recently, had always been her strongest weapon.
"How dare you."
She tore his hand off her shoulder and threw it at him. Obi-Wan jumped back, looking at her in horror as she'd looked at Anakin in horror not so long ago. How she will never look at him again.
"A Jedi!" She spat like a vengeful goddess. Somehow, she sat up on her hospital bed of a throne. Her chin jutted upwards, proud, cruel. "A keeper of peace. The negotiator. What a joke. Three years you have fought this war when there should have been peace. A thousand years you have babbled of mercy, of kindness, but this night shows me how little you truly care about such things."
He crossed his arms. "Padme, please. I had to. I had no choice-"
"He was in pain! He was in pain and you forced him away." She screamed, hands clutching at either side of the bed. "You turned him away. You pushed him into the darkness yourself. You killed him!"
Obi-Wan's face fell, and he looked away. "What I did I did for the good of the Republic." Despite the confidence of his words, his eyes were weak, his voice grew hoarse.
"The Republic is dead." She told him bluntly. "You were blinded by your hate of what you thought he had become. You! Who knew him best. You, who he loved like his own father- wouldn't even try to bring him back. But, of course." Her voice broke into sarcastic quips, imitating Obi-Wan's clipped speech. "He was already gone. No mercy for the Sith. No second chances for the fallen. For once you choose otherwise, once you slip- mare but one cloth of the Jedi ideal and you are lost forever."
His chin fell to his chest. "I'm sorry."
She pointed to the door. Her hand shook so hard from anger and adrenaline she could barely manage that simple action. "Leave me."
His blue eyes raised to greet hers. His cheeks sparkled with tears. The dragon purred in satisfaction.
"This… this is yours." He said.
And he held out Anakin's lightsaber.
She stared, eyes tracing up and down the sleek, silver surface. Her pointing hand snatched it away and held it close. She rubbed away a bit of ash along the handle, one among dozens. The dozens- hundreds of blemishes this blade bore.
The dragon cowered back, and her strength dissipated. She fell back against the head of the bed, clutching the hilt in her hands.
Obi-Wan stood in the corner of her vision. Watching her. Pitying her.
"Leave, Kenobi." She said flatly. "And if I see you again I swear I will cut you down where you stand."
Slowly, he turned, and walked out the door.
Padme stared listlessly at the ceiling. Unnoticed, the lightsaber slipped from her hand to the floor with a clatter.
Anakin. Dead.
Dead.
In that moment, all she wanted was to fall asleep again, to give up herself to the darkness. It seemed easy, almost welcoming, compared to the world. Whatever unearthed from the depths of her slumber would be welcomed with open arms. It could never create something worse than what is. What, every morning from that day on, every sunrise, each time she would wake until the day she grew old and died, she would face.
And there would be no escape.
"Padme."
She turned to Bail, and the squirming, whining baby in his arms.
"He's gone." She said dully.
"I'm sorry."
She snorted. "The Republic, Anakin, the Jedi, peace, the people, democracy. Everything I have worked for is gone or enslaved. We've lost."
"There is still hope, Padme."
The dragon prepared to snap out again. But the baby cried out, breaking down into sobs. In the next room, it's twin joined in, weaving a duet of pain.
She held out her hand. "Give them to me."
Bail cradled the child, bouncing it up and down in a fruitless attempt to quiet its sobs. "I'm sure they're just hungry, or something. The hospital has substitutes. You should rest."
"Give me my children." She nigh on ordered, her fingers stretching out in desperation. "If they are hungry I will feed them."
He only hesitated a moment longer before fetching the other and laying them in her lap.
Padme took her children, and held Luke and Leia for the first time in their nine hour lives. Their faces were purple and blotchy. Their fingers were tiny and plump. Leia had a dark lick of hair on its head. They both bawled incessantly for what she did not know, only that could never be as important as what she had lost.
It was for them that Anakin had nightmares. It was for these two he thought she would die. It was the twins that made him turn to the dark side.
Suddenly everything was a hundred, a thousand times worse. Not only would she have to live her worst nightmare, she would have to care and protect two babies too. Stand strong with them in a hurricane she couldn't even weather by herself.
For one horrible, awful moment, the dragon wished them dead. Gone. Buried and forgotten. Both of them, so long as Anakin was there. Anything for Anakin to be there to hold her down in the nightmare.
Then Leia screamed a glass shattering pitch at the top of her lungs. Her tiny fist waved in angrily the air, as if accusing her for such traitorous thoughts.
This baby is a blessing.
And just like that, the love blossomed in her chest. It broke through the pumping walls of her heart and grew like a cancer through veins and muscles. The dragon cowered and bowed back under its forceful current. Her whole body was filled with the warm, aching glow.
She leaned down and pressed a kiss to each one's forehead. "Hello, my loves."
They both soothed almost immediately. Leia quieted and settled into the crook of her arm, blinking blearily. Luke lasted a little longer. He gasped out a few more cries looking adorably confused before hiccuping to a stop.
Bail reached out. "Well, they're not hungry. Should I…?"
"No." She murmured. "I want to hold them."
She cradled them to her chest. So small, both of them, smaller than her nieces had been when were born. Barely bigger than the dolls she had played with as a young girl. Two tiny, perfect little beings.
Bail stood at the end of the bed, watching her almost anxiously. One would think he was the parent and not she!
"What allies do you have in this organization of yours, Organa?" Padme found herself asking.
He blinked, then straightened into his rather infamous neutral expression. "Just a small group of senators. Mon Mothma, a few leaders of systems have contacted us individually." He hesitated. "If you would be willing to lend your voice…"
Padme said nothing.
"It would be a great service to us. You were greatly respected by many, and if you supported us… it would give our effort credicency."
Naturally. If even the Condemner of War would support this rebellion, how could it not be justified?
"I will be unable to assist you in that. At least, not publicly." She murmured. "I stand by what I said, you must put up a front. Let there be no more enthusiastic supporter of the Empire than you. Trust only those you have to. All contact must be made with the utmost secrecy. The first few years will be the hardest, while the public is still enamored with his public visage. Before he starts taking powers from the senate in earnest."
Organa frowned. "But, with your support, we might even get the majority of the two thousand-"
"And be assassinated instantly." Padme said without emotion. "The only thing preventing Pal- Darth Sidious from killing me openly before was Anakin. Now he is gone. Should I reveal myself I will be made an example of. If one such as I could be killed so easily then-" she waved a hand lazily, "why not others? It will drive people away in fear. Let me be dead of unrelated causes."
"Then you- you're-"
She nodded. "Sabe and Dorme will arrange that. If you ask for them, use the name Naberrie instead of Amidala. They will trust you. Ask for my notes, they have a list of Senators and systems I believe you could approach. As well as some Seperatist contacts."
"The separatists-"
"Left the republic because they believed it was corrupt and weak." Padme sighed and sank deeper into the pillow, tucking her children just a little closer. "Though the leaders are dead, many will not want to join the Empire, I expect. Set an alliance with them. If others argue, simply point out the separatists left fearing exactly this would happen."
Organa watched her with dark eyes, then nodded, his mouth tight with determination. "And you? What will you do?"
For a moment, despair peaked through her shield of love and determination, and a tear fell from her cheek. "I-"
Anakin. A Sith. Dead. How could there be an after? Anakin was dead. Dead! The republic was dead. Democracy was dead. Justice, liberty, freedom. All happily murdered and forgotten in bloody, burned graves. How could there be anything after that?
Yet, she was here, wasn't she? She held two babies in her arms. Two tiny, perfect, blotchy babies that would need her. They needed her.
"I will raise my children." She finished.
*claps hands together* Thoughts?
I know Padme is supposed to be like, the embodiment of perfection, but she's been through a lot. Ya'know? Ya'know.