Disclaimers: They...all...belong...to...GL-man himself!
"Luke," Amidala called. There was a sweetness in her voice, the kind people only adopt when they have a child under their care.
The tiny blond baby looked at her, brightening the dismal week with a toothless grin. Eventually, her son would have to disappear. Obi-Wan would take him, watch over him, protect him. That fact made their inevitable separation a fraction more bearable.
So, Amidala loved Obi-Wan. Oh well. It hardly seemed to matter now, when there were so many other things to do. I had so much to look forward to, didn't I?
My leg throbbed, a reminder of what I had done to myself.
Such a pleasant dream. This time, it had been a vision of my Master's death. No longer would I be a servant to such a miserable, wrinkled weakling. Darth Sidious? Weak? Perhaps not; only when in comparison to myself. The Chosen One.
In a heavily secured hospital wing, there isn't much to do. I could no longer sense Ami or...him...out in the hall. A few large guards, but they didn't have the strength of mind they would need to keep me from escaping.
I limped over to the door and leaned against the frame. Yes; there were two massive guards out there. I wrenched their minds into my control. "Open the door."
They stumbled over each other in their haste, but finally it was unlocked. I hoisted the two men up onto their toes, without moving an inch. "Where is Senator Naberrie?"
"Senatorial Chambers, room...155," one answered monotonously.
I let them drop, not envying them the headaches they would wake up to.
"Senator Skywalker!" Amidala rose from her place on the floor, where she had been playing with her two children, and let the guard in. "Anakin has escaped. We're setting up additional teams on this floor and around the building."
"Have you told Obi-- Master Kenobi?"
"We sent someone over to the Jedi Temple. Here's a com; if you notice anything, press that button there, and we'll come."
Amidala sighed as the door shut after the guard. She looked down at the small, black com and shook her head. Then the shutters-each one in the three-room chamber-swung shut. Simultaneously.
She spun around, instinctively looking for the danger nearest to her children. Anakin was sitting in a chair facing her, looking perfectly relaxed. "Who are these?" he cooed at the twins.
Amidala choked on the words 'Get out'. "Luke and Leia," she murmured. Anakin, if she hadn't told him, would likely have plucked it from her mind anyway.
He painfully lowered himself to the floor, gingerly stretched out his left leg, and watched the two babies. Luke looked up at him, babbled something, and attempted to push himself up off the floor and onto his hands and knees. Instead he fell back, to try again a few minutes from now.
"Aw, learning to crawl's so difficult, isn't it?" Anakin smiled. "What about you, Leia? Are you a princess?" he held out a gloved hand to the two month old girl. She swatted it, then grabbed his index finger and examined the exquisite black leather.
Anakin raised his eyes to Amidala, and then to the hand that clutched the tiny alarm. "Are you going to press it? Call your lover to come throw me out?"
"How many times do we have to do this?" she felt as if centuries had come crashing down upon her shoulders.
"Until you stop denying it?" he glared at her. "Why do you continue to deny what I saw?"
"Anakin, I've told you, I'm sorry! It was nothing-"
"Yes, and that's what the two of you were doing, is it?"
"It was just a stupid...mistake! I love you, and part of you can't possibly doubt it!"
"Really. So tell me; are these his spawn, or not?" he was surprised by the hot, bubbling anger that remark rose in her.
"They're yours," her voice shook, but not from tears. "They could not be his."
"How do I know that?"
But even as I said it, I touched Luke's mind, and that was how I knew. His sister, Leia, was also mine; so much like her mother already.
Ami saw the change, somehow. She could always tell what I felt.
No. I was wrong; she couldn't know what I was feeling. Beneath the joy at seeing these two infants, there was something she could never understand. I am the Chosen One. With my Master, we will ultimately bring down the Jedi, and the Republic she represents.
And whether or not these two were mine, she still betrayed me.
I gently pulled my hand away from my daughter and stood up. "Good bye, Amidala. Call the guards if you wish; I'm sure I will meet them outside anyway."
Without another glance, I brushed past her, careful not to limp too noticeably, and threw open the door.
The guards were all weak-willed, far too disciplined for their own good. The crumpled as I passed, a twisted sort of bow before my power.
