The entire scene was so damned cliche, the dashing, handsome young hero rescuing the beautiful but hapless princess. Padmé herself would have laughed in a vacuum, if she wasn't sitting in the middle of it, and if there wasn't so much at stake. Helpless to do anything but watch the duel, hands still bound behind her, she found herself filled with pride as her husband put into practice the years of training under her against the fiercest of the Jedi, using every tactic and trick she had taught him to dispatch in short order two of the three he faced. He had identified Barriss Offee, the weak link first, and taken her out. He goaded on Master Windu, and though the senior Councilor had maintained his composure, he had nevertheless been affected, even to a minute degree, enough so that he could not help himself when Anakin then played his sense of compassion and duty against him. It was dirty, the way he killed Windu, and Padmé had to admit that, despite everything that had transpired, despite the bad feelings, Mace Windu had died nobly.
As for Obi-Wan, that was to be seen. Anakin was clearly winning the duel, slowly overpowering and exhausting the older Jedi. Strangely enough, Padmé felt no bloodlust towards the man who had taken away her freedom. There had been so much death already today, whether they died by Anakin's or the Droid Army's hand, so that the idea of any more left a bitter taste in her mouth. She just wanted it over, this last obstacle. And to be held by her husband again. And to be able to tell him, once they were both free, the thrilling news.
Anticipation turned to horror the moment the young Togruta girl ran into the room. So focused they had all been on the fight at hand, none of them had sensed the danger from the incoming droids. And deadly they would be, at least to her, but peering down at her stomach, her thoughts were centered not around her own life. She watched as Obi-Wan made his move, setting the trap, and had to stingily admire the inherent cleverness in it, even his intent was her own death. And her unborn child, a secret she had kept from the Jedi, whether it be for practical reasons or spite. Now, because of Obi-Wan's ignorance of this, her stubbornness may now have doomed more than just herself. Reaching out towards Anakin with a panicked urgency, she felt back from him the stinging realization of Obi-Wan's decision, and then steely resolve.
The moment Anakin somersaulted in the air above him, Obi-Wan understood. He understood the deadly play, and that he had no choice but to let it play out. As the Sith whirled through the air towards him swinging both sabers furiously at him, Obi-Wan took the opening, because to refuse would have meant his immediate demise. Anakin swung wide at the Jedi with his right, bright red saber, and screamed in pain as Obi-Wan cut through his elbow to fend off what would have been the lethal blow. And yet, gritting through the pain, Anakin completed his second motion, swinging his left blade through Obi-Wan's shoulder before the Jedi had a chance to pivot back from his defensive strike. Their screams joined each other in unison, and seconds later Anakin felt himself crashing onto the floor, Obi-Wan's crumpled body under him.
He acted instantly, throwing his blue blade at Ahsoka, who caught it despite her shock at what had just transpired. Rolling away from the dazed Jedi, he took his left hand and used what strength he had left to Force shove the man violently against the nearest wall, knocking him unconscious. Trying to focus despite the building pain, he moved the fingers on his remaining hand, groping Obi-Wan's prone body until he found the keys, extracting them and hurling them rapidly through the air towards the young Padawan.
"Hurry, Ahsoka," he shouted. "We don't have much time left."
They could hear the drumbeats of the droid battalion, and Ahsoka somehow managed to not fumble the keys as she opened the doors to the Sith lady's cells. Staring at her eyes, she paused a half moment before running behind her to unclip her binders.
"Thank you," she heard Padmé whisper, and in an instant the Sith was gone from the cell, disappearing with a gust of wind as she called both lightsabers from the grips of their respective amputated hands, grimacing with distaste thinking about the one that had been Anakin's less than a minute before. Immersing herself in the Force as deeply as she ever had, Darth Mirayya cut through the newly arrived droids like an untamed storm, her body lost in the blurry dance of light and death. Ahsoka helped too, dispatching what droids she could, and even Anakin contributed, shooting dark Sith lightning out at stray droids from where he lay sprawled on the other side of the room, trying to aim away from the two immediately engaged combatants. But for the most part Ahsoka stayed out of the way, watching with awe as this Sith lady destroyed with deadly precision the entire onslaught of the attack.
It took a long time, but then it was over, and Amidala ran over without prelude to Anakin, hovering over him less than a second before the last dismembered droid torso clanged onto the ground.
"Does it hurt," she asked tenderly, stroking his face repeated as she kissed his forehead and his lips.
"I'll survive," Anakin said, chest heaving as the high of the battle dissipated away, leaving him with a fatigue he had never experienced before in his short life. Reaching his senses outward, he got the sense that the siege against the droid army was also coming to an end. "We did it, Padmé. It's over."
"You did well, Ani," Padmé whispered, beaming proudly even as she felt her heart gasp in pain at her husband's suffering. She reached gently for his surviving hand, pulling it towards so that he was palming the small of her stomach. "You saved me. You saved us. Never again will we have to face this. Will I let us face this."
She had anticipated for so long Anakin's reaction, from the moment she found out herself en route to that fateful summit on Coruscant, but her husband's knowing smile took her by surprise.
"They are amazing, Padmé," he said, amplifying her confusion. "You will love them so, so much."
"They?"
"Twins, Padmé!"
"How? How did you know?"
Despite the pain and exhaustion, Anakin laughed, feeling as lightheaded as he was when he was a child, trying to become the first human to win a podrace. It was rare for him to get one over his wife like this, and he intended to savor it. "I saw them in a vision. Luke. And Leia. They are our everything. They gave me the clarity of mind to pull this off."
"Luke. Leia." Padmé said the words softly, testing them out, grasping how they felt on her tongue. It seemed surreal that her own children already had names, but it felt so right, as if these names, etched permanently in the Force itself, were what she and Anakin would have picked out on their own, together, had they the chance. Joining her husband in joyous laughter, the Dark Lady of the Sith marveled in the miracles of the Force. "That's so wonderful, Ani. Luke. Leia. Luke. Leia."
Ahsoka watched awkwardly the two Sith exchange kisses and whispers on the floor, lost in their own world for what seemed to her an eternity. What the hell was going on, she wondered? She guessed it was better that they weren't trying to slaughter more Jedi, especially considering that she was most complicit in their triumph over the Jedi, but this was just weird. Did they realize that they weren't alone, that she was still standing here, nothing to do but watch them whisper sweet nothings? Force, how did these Siths manage to accomplish anything? How did they even manage to get out of bed in the morning, much less take over a galaxy, the way they acted around each other?
Ahsoka breathed a sigh of relief as she approach of several familiar Clones, and sure enough, the entrance of Kix and Appo were enough the break the two siths out of their lovesick reverie.
"General," Kix ran apologetically up to the fallen Sith, "Consular. I apologize for the delay. We saw the Droid Army enter the tunnels but had to fight our way through."
"We took care of it," Padmé said, rising and brushing off the creases of her dress. "How goes the battle above?"
"The droid army is destroyed," Appo relayed with pride. "We await your orders on the final siege on the Jedi temple."
Padmé paused in thought. As she surveyed the grisly remains of the room, she noticed for the first time the bodies of the fallen Jedi Masters amidst the wrecked droids...as well as the still unconscious form of Obi-Wan Kenobi.
"Let's see what the Jedi have to say now that they have brought the war to their own doorsteps," Padmé decided, the war-hardened politician's voice replacing that of the doting wife and mother. She motioned back towards the tunnels from where the clones emerged. "And we need to get my husband to some bacta on the Liberator."
Appo nodded, walking immediately to pick up the young General. Padmé looked over to Kix. "Take him with us too," she said, pointing at Obi-Wan. "He needs treatment as well."
The emerged before the front steps of the Jedi Temple in the middle of the silent standoff, Padmé leading the way. Beside her Anakin walked limply, though he was helped by Appo or another clone at all times. With Obi-Wan already shipped to the Liberator, Ahsoka stood uncertainly beside the two Siths, their own Jedi companion. She fought the urge to look at Master Plo Koon, who stood with Shaak Ti and Eeth Koth at the head of the Temple's defense. Facing them were Rex and Dooku, both of whom looked at her for direction the moment she arrived.
"It's over," Padmé said calmly but authoritatively to the Jedi gathered. "Surrender, and no one else need die."
Studying Dooku, the former Jedi now standing before his old brethren, she sensed a lingering sadness in his eyes. He did not want to have to turn his blade against more of his own, but she knew he would, if given the order. One which Padmé really hoped she didn't have to give.
"You ask us to trust the word of a Sith," Shaak Ti shouted aggressively, blade still lit in her hand. "How can we believe you won't slaughter us all the moment we surrender?"
"The Galaxy is watching," Padmé answered evenly. "I ask you to trust me has a politician whose word is her most valuable commodity. I ask you to trust your former colleague and Council member, who wishes as much as I to end this fruitless conflict before it escalates to more dangerous places. I ask you to trust General Rex and his brothers, who chose to defy their very essences and follow us to Coruscant for the sake of principles and loyalty, rather than bloodlust."
"We have never been the ones to instigate conflict against your kind," Anakin stammered out, hurt but stubbornly standing at the forefront of the confrontation, "but our abilities should not preclude us from the right to defend ourselves from those who seek to destroy us."
Plo Koon stepped forward, and Ahsoka noticed him look at her for a brief moment before he turned back to the soon to be Sith dictator. The emotions she felt from him, the Jedi who had rescued her from bondage so many years ago, had been concern, not disappointment as she feared.
"What are your terms of surrender then," the Kel-Dorian Jedi asked.
"Understand that in lieu of the illegal actions taken against me by members of your Order, the Clone Armies will need to secure the Jedi Temple as well as all sensitive areas on planet such as the Senate building, with an immediate integration plan subsequently put into place with the Coruscanti Guard, under the authority of the Alliance. The Order may keep their weapons, and Clones will refrain from intruding into the Temple with the exception of basic medical and logistical needs, if required. In return, a complete ceasefire between the Jedi Order and Alliance forces."
Eeth Koth spoke up for the first time. "Do you still speak for the Alliance, Amidala? I understood that Consulars Organa and Mothma removed you from your position."
Padmé looked around the wreckage of a billion droid debris parts, many of them still smoking, surrounded by some bodies of both fallen Jedi Knights as well as Clones, and replied with mirth, "I think in the current state of things I am the only authority in the Galaxy, period. Consulars Organa and Mothma defied both the will of the people as well as their own Senators with their actions. Mistakes will be rectified, and the Alliance will cease to exist once the new political order is determined by those who still retain the credibility in the eyes of the people."
"You, in essence," Shaak Ti said with dismay, still holding her saber beside her. "You alone plan to decide who gets to speak and who gets to rule." Her tone resentful and bitter, she nevertheless disengaged her weapon, Plo Koon and Eeth Koth following her lead as the highest ranking Council member present.
"As a Padawan, I never imagined that I would have been the one to surrender the Jedi Temple to the Sith," the Togrutan master continued, shaking her head in sadness. She couldn't help but flinch as Amidala took two steps towards her, but found in her eyes not anger or murderous intent, but maybe even compassion?
"Your failure is complete," Padmé whispered softly. "Too many have died for the mistakes of a few. Let pride be the last of what you lose today."
As all the gathered Jedi Knights and Padawans dispatched their weapons, following the lead of the three masters, Padmé breathed a sigh of the relief. There would be further offensives once her power was cemented, starting with an expansive campaign against the Hutt Empire, but for the time being, the Clone Wars were over. The war that she had engineered, manipulated, almost single-handedly, the war that had cost so many lives, innocent or not, was won. Like so many whose lives had been affected by it, neither her nor Anakin would emerge from it the same person, her husband literally disfigured like so many of the war's actors, and she realized it was proper that they bore scars, a small price for what they inflicted upon so much in the galaxy. It was for the greater good, true, but it was for the sake of her power as well. It would be her duty then, to ensure that the two were one and the same for as long as she ruled.
The Dark Lady of the Sith seemed transfixed at the sight of the young man floating suspended in the bacta tank, naked from the pants up, the stump of his right arm still in the beginning stages of healing. The nearby tank holding Jedi Master Obi-Wan Kenobi she paid less attention to, though she had insisted that he receive the same medical care as her husband. It was a good gesture, she decided, a way to demonstrate to the galaxy, her galaxy, the lengths of her magnanimity, by sparing the very Jedi who behind the conspiracy, the coup, against her. And, Padmé admitted to herself in her mind, she did have a long history with this particular Jedi, and something told her that this old acquaintance...sometimes friend...sometimes enemy...had yet a role to play in the future.
"Magnificent, isn't he?" She barely noticed herself talking to the young Togruta girl, who had spared them all what would have been a very lengthy siege on the Temple, one which would have been so deadly for many on both sides.
"Eh, he's something I guess," Ahsoka said, trying not to roll her eyes. On their own, these two Siths seemed alright, and they had honored their promises to her to be merciful towards her old order. But everything about them together, the whole completely and obliviously and obsessively in love with each other thing, was way too much for her. Way too weird. "Too talkative for my tastes. And a bit too pale as well."
"Did you lose anyone you cared about during the siege?"
The Sith seemed to genuinely care about her feelings, and Ahsoka thought carefully before she replied. "No. I was lucky. But many others were not."
"Soon there will be a time for healing," Padmé said, and Ahsoka sensed that she did not mean that for just the Jedi.
"Once you declare yourself Empress or something?" The Sith had not made her aims explicit, but Ahsoka could guess just as much. The entire Senate building had been taken over by the 501st shortly after the Jedi's surrender, and most of the remaining Senators of the Republic were under detainment, including Nute Gunray, who apparently floated in and out of consciousness. Detained but in more pleasant quarters as well were Amidala's former allies, Bail Organa and Mon Mothma. Rumors had it that the Sith had personally executed several Senators the moment she walked into the Senate chambers where much of the remaining Republic members hid, huddled in fear. Including Rush Clovis, whom she apparently beheaded in the name of her husband. It seemed a bit distasteful, but it was not something Ahsoka, who had her own politician's blood upon her conscience, was in any place to speak up against. And she wondered how much she cared anyway. Politics had never really been her thing.
"Senator Wipper'lom's motion has yet to pass," Padmé said, shrugging. The twi'lek Senator, now considered her closest political ally after Bail and Mon's betrayal, introduced within minutes of Coruscant's fall a sweeping motion abolishing both the current Senates of the Alliance and Republic. Democracy was not completely wiped out, of course. New elections would inaugurate an entirely new Senate, but under the authority of one absolute power. It didn't take a political genius to guess who would fill that role, and who the new Senate would owe their allegiances to.
"It will," Ahsoka said plainly. "I think its pretty obvious that you could win any election between here and Chiss space, Consular."
"Please. Call me Padmé."
"Padmé," she said, enunciating each syllable, as if the way she said the words could help her come to terms with how she felt about this Sith Master.
"Be honest, Ahsoka," Padmé said, taking several steps towards Ahsoka until the two diminutive women stood closely face to face. "What do you think of me? What do you see in me?"
"I see darkness," Ahsoka started, trying to decide whether she should be honest, or diplomatic in her response, "...but I see light too. Light so bright it blinds me. Darkness so encompassing...that it dulls all my senses completely. I feel hate. I feel love. I mean, especially towards Darth Skyguy over there, obviously." She closed her eyes, trying to extend the reach of her feelings towards the soul of the Sith, and surprisingly, she felt little resistance from her. "I feel...weakness...and courage. I feel that...you are determined to accomplish everything you desire. Yet you...feel doubt, every single day, but you force yourself to face it every minute you are awake to achieve your goals. You feel...human, I guess. Sentient. Like all of us."
"Even the Jedi?"
Did they have to bring that subject up? Her former affiliation was the last thing she wanted to contemplate, but it seemed like the Sith was onto something. The sooner Ahsoka dealt with it, the sooner she could move past it. And that urge to move on was revealing by itself. She gave Padmé a slight nod. "Yes. Even the Jedi, though I doubt any one of them would admit it."
"Are you a Jedi?"
"I'd always thought so. Now...I don't know."
"What do you feel?"
Ahsoka remembered Master Yoda asking her the same question many times in the Temple, albeit in a different dialect. She figured some things didn't change, Jedi or Sith. "I feel...so many different things."
She still wondered whether she could trust this Sith. There was something different about Amidala in person, compared to how she portrayed herself before the holonets. The former Senator seemed much more subdued, withdrawn from her more public, very assertive, persona. But was the discrepancy just an act? Or was it possible, Ahsoka wondered as she delved deeper into her mind, that even this Sith lord had emerged changed from the recent war, and her brief detainment?
Sensing that she was at a loss of words, Padmé, surprisingly, confided in her instead. "From the moment I could retain memory I remember feeling fear. You would understand, wouldn't you? That feeling the Force whispers upon your ears, even though you're too young, or too naive, to understand what it's trying to tell you?"
"Maybe."
"As a Jedi, they mold such feelings to fit their Code. They teach you to repress your fears enough, and eventually you'll believe that you've released it. Removed and eliminated it." Padmé shook her head, her disgust at the Jedi doctrine obvious. "As a child on growing up on Naboo I just...I just let it be. I didn't ignore it but...I didn't think deeply about it either. But it taught me to be be wary. And it taught me to fight."
"What was that fear like," Ahsoka asked. Despite her better judgment, the introspection from this Sith master intrigued her. Was this how she had won over the Chosen One as well? "Could you...could you describe it? What did it center around?"
"That I was destined to play a victim," Padmé blurted out calmly but surely without any hesitation, "with no say over my fate, my agency. That I was destined to be helpless, subject to the whims of greater forces in the galaxy, unless I fought against it, scratched and clawed every step of the way. That's why I got into politics at such an early age, I think. In my mind, if I could mold the world into the perfect place, then I would not have to fear the unthinkable. It was not much later that I would learn how misguided that idea was...but it was also why I said yes when I was approached by Sidious, I believe now. He offered me power, and I thought that power would save me, help me conquer my fears. I was...so, so wrong...but the Force gave me a second chance to change the script. To kill Sidious. To save myself, to save Anakin, and claim him as my own. To claim control over my own fate."
"Now you control the galaxy." Ahsoka said this without any judgment. It was simply a statement of fact.
"I do not presume any such claim is permanent. I know I can't bend the Force entirely to my will. No one can, save maybe Anakin. But I do know that I have pushed the Force to my benefit as much as I possibly could. That is all I can ask of myself, and of what the Force will allow me."
Padmé looked back at Anakin, the young man not so much older than Ahsoka herself, as if she could not go half a conversation, no matter how deep or engaged, without thinking of her husband.
"He could teach you, you know?"
"What do you mean?" Her words caught Ahsoka off guard. These two Siths were so close knit, sickeningly so, that Ahsoka was surprised either one would allow aher, a complete outsider, to penetrate their tight inner cirlce.
"There is nothing more he can learn from me. In many ways, he has surpassed me in strength, and in wisdom. He is destined to be a teacher though, and it would do him good. Force knows I learned more than probably he did in our years of training."
Ahsoka heard not a small amount of pride in Padmé's words as she described her husband and student. "You...you're not worried?"
"About what," Padmé asked in a way that truly reflected a complete lack of concern.
"The Rule of Two. I...I snuck into the Temple archives when they announced you were Siths and looked up the history. You're not worried that I would turn against you? That...that I could turn him against you?" Even as she said the words, Ahsoka was answering her own question in her mind. These two Siths were bound together by the Force itself, and close as she may get to either one of them, she could never substitute either one of them. And that realization, surprisingly, made her feel secure in an odd way, the thought that they would bestow her approval when she earned it, but that she also did not need to overreach and lose herself in trying to prove herself. The same could not be said for her years under Master Fisto, whose typical Jedi passiveness...coldness, she realized now, had pushed her towards the very actions that got her abandoned by the Order.
"No," Padmé replied, confirming what Ahsoka had already come to conclude on her own. "I do not foresee that. I trust Anakin with my life, and I feel that I can trust you. Besides, he will not teach you to be a Sith. Not unless you want to."
"I don't think I want to...yet. I don't think I'd be ready."
"I thought that. No. He will teach you to be the best Ahsoka, whatever that word will come to mean. I will, too."
She saw the sincerity in Padmé's eyes, and felt for the first time a sense of acceptance. A sense of home. A thought came to her again, one that had been building for some time, that she was never meant to be a Jedi. And she felt relief that there was no pressure for her now to join the Sith Order, whatever those words meant these days. It felt right, she thought, that she could understand both Orders, and yet be separate from both.
Ahsoka smiled at Padmé, beaming in gratitude at the woman for knowing, for understanding that she needed to find her own way through her life. "You're going to be a great mother, you know?"
"Thank you, snips." Padmé smiled when she used the nickname her own husband had unknowingly bestowed upon his future student. Patting her on her head, the Sith moved to leave the room, and Ahsoka felt her aura hardening. "Now if you'll excuse me, I must take my leave, for there is but one act left for me to play in this charade."
PaulLenzen: Thanks! Only one lost limb. Phew.
Praetor-Canis: Obi-Wan got his, but so did Anakin.
1saaa: Sorry for that wait and this :( My travel schedule has been pretty hectic recently. Hopefully things should quiet down a bit, but it might still take a bit of time for the last chapter.
LaniSkywalker999: Not quite like ROTS, thankfully!
Nightshade's sydneylover150: Your feelings proved correct, though Obi-Wan never got the chance to see whether or not he may have saved a Sith in the end. He's survived, for now, but we'll see how much he actually likes surviving.
jckgwk: Padmé decided to be diplomatic in the end. But there may be some she feels less merciful towards.