Chapter 57
When Obi-Wan and Leia arrived on Naboo, Obi-Wan was surprised to see a thick blanket of fog covering all of the capital city of Theed. The fog would no doubt make it difficult to land here, but he figured it couldn't be much harder than flying through the rain on Kamino or the sandstorms of Geonosis. He was nowhere near as skilled as Anakin, but he was still an exceptional pilot, and a little mist wouldn't stop him. Finding permission to land here had been difficult, but the Queen was apparently an admirer of Padmé Amidala as well as a Jedi supporter, so they landed without trouble inside the Royal Hangar. Naboo was one of the only planets in the Inner Rim that had never celebrated Empire Day, which had somewhat hurt the reputation of Emperor Palpatine when it got out that his birth planet refused to celebrate the Empire's rise, but he had considered it insignificant. He had cared little what people thought of him, and he always celebrated Empire Day on Coruscant.
As they left their ship, Obi-Wan froze upon seeing the giant, closed metal doors that led into Theed's power generator. The last time he'd been in this spot, those doors had opened to reveal Maul, and Obi-Wan and his Master had battled the fiend until Qui-Gon had been killed in the room just beyond those doors that he now saw. Leia walked up behind him and looked to where Obi-Wan's gaze had been drawn. She looked at him in sympathy and took his hand. She didn't know the full story, but she could guess why Obi-Wan was reacting this way. He smiled down at her and gripped her hand tighter, then the two of them began to walk out of the palace. As they walked down the streets of Theed, their identical brown robes and hoods moving with the swirling air, Leia noticed that the fog seemed to clear a path for them, like it was repulsed by their presence, but she could sense that Obi-Wan wasn't doing it. Why, then, the moisture in the air seemed to split for the two of them, she didn't know.
The Queen had given Obi-Wan a list of directions that would lead him to the Tomb of Amidala, but they took a few wrong turns getting there. Obi-Wan simply couldn't focus. He was distracted by the eerie silence that filled the whole city. It was like the fog had drawn all people from the streets. He would expect to see someone, at least one person, doing their shopping or maybe a Naboo Royal Guard standing protectively at street corners, but there was no one to be found anywhere. Finally, they eventually found the Tomb. It was well-kept and beautiful. Clearly the Naboo had loved their former Queen and then Senator. Obi-Wan recalled an obituary that had been written for Padmé, authored by Governor Sio Bibble, that had spoken of the Naboo condemning the Empire and specifically this particular day for the loss of Padmé Amidala, the person that best represented the ideals of all Naboo. Was that why the people now stayed in their homes all day? Was that why the entire city had fallen silent? Obi-Wan couldn't help but think that this was not how Padmé would've wanted her people to react to her death. She would want them to be happy, to remember her but still move on.
They entered the Tomb and walked silently down the steps. Leia noted that neither if them had spoken since they had arrived on the planet. Seeing a completely silent city simply made it feel wrong to speak, like breaking the quiet would be a criminal act, something disrespectful. The whole area was covered in something more than fog, it was a city of gloom and misery, like the whole place had changed to reflect a cold feeling of death that perfectly matched the corpse that they had come to visit. Strangely, Leia didn't feel scared to see her mother, but she also wasn't exactly happy. She didn't know how she felt. She had heard stories for years about her true mother, but she didn't know her. This moment felt like a privilege, but it was also frightening to be facing such a truth after all this time. After all, all her life she had never lacked a parental figure. This would just make her true heritage more real, which could be both good and bad.
They arrived in a large room with a central hoverlift casket, clearly shaped to hold a deceased person, but they weren't alone. Inside the room were two figures in black robes similar to the ones worn by Leia and her Master. The two figures both turned to face them as they arrived, and Leia and Obi-Wan both moved their hands down to rest on their lightsaber hilts. Oh boy, Leia thought as Vader and Scion both walked, glaring, towards them.