I finally updated, lol. Watch out, non-slashers, there's a bit of "tension" in this chapter! ;) Someone is in for a challenging day. Thanks for the reviews, Warrior of Twilight and Gin Hanelle and Sodorland!
Not in His Plans - Chapter 3
"What?"
Anakin's mumbled words did not fully register until Palpatine felt a powerful hand along his jaw and the sweep of a full mouth covering his own as Anakin boldly leaned forward and closed the distance between them. The young knight seized him by the shoulders, and Palpatine was too stunned to offer any resistance. His own hands lifted aimlessly, fingers curling to deliver an automatic response and then falling away in his confusion.
To say he was surprised would be an understatement. He tried to think, to organize his mind, to pull away, but Anakin's blinding Force presence overwhelmed him in a heartbeat of madness, crushing his ability to strategize, to create opportunity, and stealing the air from his lungs. Palpatine tried to take a breath, but Anakin seized the opportunity of parted lips and slipped his tongue into the older man's mouth, curling the soft weapon around his front teeth and tugging gently, tilting his head up into the kiss.
Palpatine could not help the gasp that slid from his throat at this intimate invasion. His calculating mind reeled, for he had calculated nothing of the sort into his plans. It brushed against the animal in him, the intensity of Anakin's power. It twisted at him too, his lack of control as Anakin probed against him in the Force. These feelings that poured from the boy were impulsive, instinctive, volcanic, and in direct opposition to everything he was. He struggled to contain the power of the Dark Side, to keep his own signature buried deep beneath the empty veneer of the Chancellor.
The boy's tongue pushed against his, and he recoiled at last. The feeling was alien and unwanted. He pushed Anakin back with both hands, and the Jedi reluctantly released his lips. They both gasped for air in a long moment, the young Jedi Knight still gripping him by the shoulders.
Palpatine felt his mind begin to form once again, his thoughts shifting to adapt. How badly he wanted to open himself to the Dark Side, to gauge the reaction of the Force to this unforeseen development, but the boy's presence burned too brightly. In uncertainty, he could risk nothing.
"Anakin," he inquired softly, injecting an air of indignation, eyes sparking with disapproval, "What is the meaning of this?"
The younger man's eyes had grown crystal clear, and now his desire was evident to see along with the dancing amusement that infused the Chancellor with a helpless irritation. "Thought you appreciated straightforward action, sir," Anakin eyed him ravenously, appreciatively, and for the first time in many, many years, Palpatine felt an unplanned hot flush travel across his face.
"I would hardly call this straightforward, Anakin," Palpatine attempted to comprehend this new development. He sensed immense danger here, as well as opportunity. But which action would lead to which result? He stalled with a soft chuckle. "I would say this complicates matters quite a bit."
Anakin's lips parted in a wide, almost devious grin. "I think it simplifies things, sir, at least for us. I've always admired you, and recently I've found that I can't stop thinking about you."
"Isn't obsession rather an un-Jedi-like emotion?" Palpatine reached up and gently detached the Jedi's hands from his arms. "I can't imagine the Council would be pleased to find out - "
"The Council doesn't have to know everything that goes on," Anakin interrupted, a tendril of possessive heat slithering into his low words. Actually, the Council knew very little at all, Palpatine thought and moved to stand in front of the wide vista window. The Sith Lord could sense the other's hard gaze, the sharp flame focused on his thin frame, and he suppressed a shiver.
Such dark emotions! Such forbidden desires could bind the boy even closer to his destiny, or it could destroy them both. The Grand Plan held no place for dalliances of this nature, and he himself could not honestly say that he relished the thought. His tastes had always geared toward the wonderfully diverse women of the galaxy, but Anakin possessed the unique ability to turn everything in the galaxy upside down. Inside out. Unnatural to natural.
He needed time to think, to plan. He shook his head again and spoke to the window, refusing to glance back. "It's not appropriate, Anakin. We stand in far different arenas. You are a Jedi. I am the Supreme Chancellor…"
"And I know what I want, Chancellor," Anakin's voice sounded from close behind, and he ignored the faint urge to turn. "You've blamed the Jedi many times for holding back, for not experiencing what the rest of the galaxy does. I can prove you wrong, if you'll give me half a chance. I've always wanted to..."
Palpatine stared at his faint reflection in the window. The shiny reflection of the Jedi's eyes gleamed over his shoulder. "Wanting is not the Jedi way, Anakin." How ironic that right now he almost agreed with his mortal enemies. Perhaps this was why they clung to their Jedi Code with such stubborn blindness. It was less messy…
"I don't care." Suddenly the younger man was at his side, snaking his muscular arms around the Chancellor's waist and tugging the politician flush against his solid torso. Palpatine flinched, bringing his hands up to Anakin's broad chest in silent protest. Anakin ignored the motion, leaning down, bending him slightly back and capturing his lips in a superheated kiss for a second time. His hands clutched tighter around the Chancellor's hips, twisting in the draping folds of the long black-green robes.
Palpatine felt the first whisperings of anger at this treatment, and he pushed back, nipping at Anakin's lower lip. The young Jedi hissed with delight and redoubled his efforts, forcing the Chancellor's mouth open roughly and plundering its depths with his tongue. The Sith Lord bit at the appendage, drawing a tangible trickle of crimson, tasting the salty sourness and drawing satisfied power from it.
Anakin yelped softly into his mouth and pulled back, using the fingers of one hand to feel gently along his tongue, the other hand of durasteel still firmly planted on the older man. The expression on his face was wounded, but Palpatine was unmoved, his victory nearly complete. He needed time to think and meditate. "Anakin, this is not the right - "
He cut himself off with a sharp hiss of breath as Anakin moved in again, this time pressing his lips against the edge of Palpatine's jaw, along the side of his neck. The soft moisture slid lower to his throat, and the pressure became almost painfully unbearable. His head fell helplessly back to give Anakin clearer access. The Force hummed faintly with some dangerous, slick edge of dark promise. "Anakin," he growled, feeling the young Jedi stiffen all along his body, muscles going taut with triumphant pleasure. "Anakin…"
Anakin responded with all the enthusiasm of a young man in his prime, fingers gripping tighter on the cloth over his waist, mouth covering the soft indent at his collar bone, just above the clasp that held his collar in place. Palpatine felt his own pulse beating wildly under the hot, full lips.
It must have been the heady presence of Anakin's illicit desire in the Force, because he had never experienced such terribly alive emotions that now gripped him. In fact, he was not entirely certain where his own thoughts ended and Anakin's began. They melded together with sickening ease, and each time the light brushed against him, he wanted to vomit.
But darkness existed here too, darkness of such levels that left him fighting his own growing arousal, left him wanting nothing more than to writhe his way into its dark embrace, to let the Dark Side have its way with him, consequences be damned! Never had he hovered so close to the edge of his iron-willed control.
But he had to, because Anakin could not know. Not yet.
Anakin's teeth nipped gently at the base of his neck, and he shivered as the knight whispered, "Please, Chancellor. I know you want me too…"
And he did, curse him. Just not in the way that Anakin thought. He would have had the boy, mind and soul, never suspecting that Anakin would offer his body as well. His thoughts unraveled when Anakin lifted one hand to fumble at the small clasp that held his collar. The soft plinking of the metal on the smooth tile floor sparked a wave of realization in him. He seized the knight's hand in both of his.
And then he gasped, strangling, as the Dark Side suddenly roiled in deadly warning, screaming into the void that had caught fire, emptiness that now flickered along the edge with shadowed flames.
Palpatine felt all the air sucked from his lungs as the visions descended in a horrific collision of futures. "Chancellor!" he heard Anakin call out in the distance, terrified as Palpatine slid boneless to the floor, Anakin gripping at his arms to keep him upright.
Danger! Stop… Stop everything before you are destroyed! We are undone!
Laughter seeping in from the netherworld, laughter from the shapeless form of his late master, mocking and dark and entirely without humor. He knew that his body was shaking, that Anakin was panicking and calling for assistance from his guards, and he recognized that his visions had not taken him in this way since he was a small boy.
Serious matters, then. He should really pay attention. The Dark Side had seen fit to send him a warning. Indulge the boy, and pay the price. Thousands of years of planning and plotting and power might be unspooled in the span of days, hours, minutes. The Dark pressed him until he felt he might suffocate.
Then the power dissipated as abruptly as it descended.
Sensation slowly returned to his body, a Red Guard leaning over him, a medpac in hand and a heart-rate monitor pressed to his clothed chest. "I'm all right," he muttered, shoving the equipment away and sitting up. His head pounded with the beginnings of a migraine. "I just, my knees gave out. Just give me a minute."
"Your medical team is on the way," the guard told him, matter-of-fact. "We'll need to do a couple tests to make sure, sir."
Palpatine eyed him with a cold stare. "In the meantime, why don't you wait outside until they come? Jedi Skywalker will remain with me if I should require additional assistance. He is well trained in the healing arts."
The guard was a smart man; he knew an order couched in a suggestion when he heard one. As he retreated reluctantly to the outer atrium of the office, Anakin approached and knelt at the Chancellor's side, his face a mask of guilty anguish. "Are you all right, Chancellor? What happened to you? I felt something terrible was happening. I don't know how to explain it!"
Palpatine looked away. "On rare occasion, Anakin, I am susceptible to intense episodes. It is an old condition, one to which I have long become accustomed, but I've not experienced it for many years." He reveled in the Jedi's misery for a long moment, and then added, "It is no fault of yours."
"I didn't?" Anakin's relief flared across the Force and tightened his headache. Palpatine rubbed slowly over his eyes and released a long sigh.
"Of course not," he resisted the urge to scoff. "I'm not that old, Anakin, and in fact my doctors say I am in peak condition for a man of my years. Regardless, what happened just now was entirely inappropriate, Anakin," he let the sternness of his voice carry the weight of his words. "It can't happen again."
Anakin looked at his boots, properly chastened. "I'm sorry, Chancellor. I shouldn't have done that." But the fire still burned in his eyes when he lifted them again.