Sacrifices

Chapter Three:

A Matter of Culture

Moving on, is a simple thing, what it leaves behind is hard.
Dave Mustaine

Every wall in her room aboard the Tantive IV was the pure white of correction fluid; sterile, clean, and impersonal. Staring at them, Padmé couldn't help but be reminded of the vast emptiness of space, black and cold. In a way that was her life now. Void of any warmth but the few pinpricks of light that were her children, her stars.

Not even her family would be a part of her life now.

She found the thought bitter and biting as she held the single vial of powder blue liquid in her fingers. The moment she put the smooth glass to her lips, she would pass from consciousness, dead to the world and all its vial-reading machines. There was enough here to keep her under for three days—the maximum time Naboo tradition allowed its dead to remain unburied.

She knew how this would hurt the family that had raised her—supported her as she sacrificed everything in service to the people. It killed her to wound them so, but there was no other alternative. If the galaxy knew she was alive, then so wouldn't Palpatine and if she was alive then he would stop at nothing to find her, if only so he could get his hands on her children, corrupting them until there was nothing left of their innocence, of their souls.

It was a fate worse than death and if it required her demise, then so be it. Her family was strong; they would survive this pain.

"It's time." Bail said, looking at his crono.

"Thank you Bail," she said, unsure exactly what she was thanking him for; that he was going to be the one to deliver her to her family instead of some impersonal lackey who could do nothing to ease their misery? For all the help in this big, convoluted plot to hide her and the children? For not asking any question that wasn't completely necessary? Or perhaps it was for all those things and more.

"Of course, Padmé. You would have done the same for me."

She smiled a sad broken smile. The most genuine she could muster under the circumstances. Bail sighed, and Padmé looked up, knowing he had something to say, something perhaps not as kind as his last words.

"Are you sure this will work?" He asked, trying to keep his voice as gentle as possible despite the uncertainty that leaked through. "If your family looks too deeply into this ruse, it will not hold up."

He wasn't the first to ask the same question. When the idea to fake her death using the same compound Obi-wan had used to foil a plot against then chancellor Palpatine (a plot that, in hind sight, he should have let play out) had first been introduced to the conversation, many thought it would not work. It had Padmé who had assured them of the validity of the plain.

"If I did not tell them, they will not look into it. They would not invade my privacy in such a way, especially in death."

Most other cultures did not understand Naboo in that respect. They did not understand how nobody on that planet seemed to care about scandal or anything of the like; how the local press never printed stories of public officials cheating on their spouses or anything of the sort.

The people of The Naboo were a privet people. If it did not affect anyone else and did not lead to harm, then it was no one else's business what anyone did. Her family would not violate that, not out of mere curiosity. She hoped.

She could not put them in any more danger. Not for her sins.

Bail looked as if he wanted to ask again, to ask if she was sure, but he thought better of it, and for that Padmé was grateful. The truth was that, no, she wasn't sure. She wasn't really sure about anything anymore. The last few days had shaken every truth she had once held sacred.

Her entire life had shattered on that hellish world and she was too surrounded by the ash of what had once been her world to find anything left in the wreckage. There was nothing left of her old life to comfort her. Even her children were worlds away, waiting with Obi-wan and Ahsoka, so she had nothing to pull close and hold in an attempt to keep herself together.

She mentally cursed herself. Of all the times for her to fall apart…

The numbness and shock that had defined her being over the last few days was melting away, vaporized as if it had never been to begin with. All the pain, all the betrayal, all the agony, was all crushing down on her with the weight of a disintegrating battle cruiser.

Her breath came faster and in smaller burst and she could feel her chest constricting. It like she couldn't breathe; couldn't move, couldn't think.

"Padmé?" Bail asked, crossing the room when he saw her distress.

"Why?" She asked, burring her head into his shoulder, not expecting an answer. She wasn't really sure what question she was asking anyways. Why did this have to happen? Why did she have to hurt her family so? Why, after all she had sacrificed to the greater good, could she not have that one thing for herself? Why couldn't Anakin…

Her breaths got shallower and shallower as her mind raced.

Bail grabbed her shoulders and looked her straight in the eyes. Even through her emotional state, Padmé could tell that he was frightened for her. That this breakdown was so out of character for her, and he wasn't sure what he could do to comfort her against the tide of madness and agony.

"Padmé, I know it hurts and I couldn't even image the agony you are going through right now, but you are one of the strongest people I know. You are stronger than this tragedy. You are strong enough to survive this."

Padmé dried her eyes and looked at him rather surprised. Here he was comforting her despite all the lies she had told and the secrets she had kept. More than that, he was putting his life and more on the line to help her and her family.

He had always been a good friend despite the fact that Padmé had always kept him at arm's length. She had allowed none of her friends from the senate to become any closer than professional friends. Yet that didn't seem to matter to him and for that she was truly thankful.

After a moment collecting herself, she looked up and asked the only question her heavy tongue would allow.

"It's time, isn't it?" She said, fingering the vial.

Bail gave a sad little smile and nodded, and Padmé could hear the unspoken 'I'm sorry' resting beneath the surface.

She pulled the cork out and gave a weak, ironic little smile of her own.

"Cheers."

The now ex-senator downed the contents and knew no more.

Moments like these had always been some of the less savory in the life of a Jedi but Obi-wan had accepted them as a natural extension of his role as a peace keeper. Sometimes prisoners had to be interrogated and sometimes he knew the prisoner personally. That didn't make it any easier for him to see Captain Rex—a man Obi-wan had long regarded as a personal friend—securely tied to a chair in cargo hold of the Tantive IV.

"Why were you going to kill me?" Ahsoka demanded, unable to keep the anger out of her voice as she leaned against a supply crate. Obi-wan looked at her out of the corner of his eye and could not help but wonder if he should worry about this anger rising within her. He could not watch her fall...and yet, given the circumstances, wasn't it only natural for the child to be more then a little angry?

Rex looked up at her, his face the blank and unreadable mask of a professional soldier but, underneath it all, Obi-wan sensed something. Defiance and a hint of remorse and he wasn't sure quite what those emotions meant for the issue at hand.

"I was following orders." He spoke as if it were the only explanation needed and for another clone it might be, but not for Obi-wan. The Jedi master needed to be able to make at least a little since of something that had happened over the past few days and this seemed to be the one thing he was likely to get an answer for.

"Who's orders?" Rex clenched his jaw and lock his teeth in defiance and a small trickle of terror spread down Obi-wan's spine. He almost didn't want an answer in fear that it would be the one he couldn't take.

How had he missed this as well? How many of his friends had been willing to give up everything they had once believed in? How many had just been waiting in the shadows to stab him in the back?

For a second he closed his eyes and attempted to let his building anger flow into the Force. It was a difficult task, even for him, but not impossible. Once his mind was free and clear of the darkness, he could listen to the whispering voice of the light and it was telling him something rather interesting.

Rex hadn't answered Obi-wan's question but there was something resting underneath the surface. A subtle current—of doubt, perhaps?-that even the Captain may not have noticed.

Obi-waved a hand in front of the clone's face and reached out with the Force, imposing a little more of his will upon the man's mind then was strictly necessary but not enough to cause damage.

"You want to answer all our questions."

"I want to answer all your questions."

"You want to tell the truth."

"I want to tell the truth."

the moment Rex's mind was sufficiently pliable, Ashoka stepped forward, and Obi-wan noticed a hardness to her eyes that did not really belong there. She put her hands on Rex's thighs and leaned forward until not even a single piece of flimsplast could fit between her nose and his.

"Who. Gave. The. Order?" she hissed, her voice taking on a dangerous, hunting tone. "Tell us. Tell us now!"

"Ashoka." Obi-wan snapped. Her head snapped sideways, looking at him; she met his eyes and then looked down, understanding the warning and chastisement there.

"It was the Emperor." Rex said. Had Obi-wan not been so worried about what this little outburst might mean for Ashoka, he would have breathed a sigh of relief at the answer, but it would appear the Force had already met it's quota of small blessings for the day, and this one would not come free.

How long had it been since he heard those exact words fall from Anakin's lips as they were watching a bounty hunter die on the streets outside a Courisanti club? Had that been the first sign he did not see or had there been others? How many chances had Anakin given him to save him and he just hadn't seen it?

And what did that mean for his apprentice?

Ahsoka removed her hands and turned to face the door, rubbing her upper arms, looking so vulnerable and for a second Obi-wan was ashamed of himself. It was easy to forget that her world was crumbling just as much as his was and she was, in many ways, just a youngling.

"Were you actually going to kill me?" She asked, almost whispering.

There were a few painful seconds of silence in which Obi-wan could feel her pain as if it were his own, twisting and constricting around his heart.

"I don't think so, no." Rex whispered almost just as softly.

Obi-wan reached out with the Force, checking that their prisoner was still under compulsion to tell the truth.

Ahsoka glanced at Obi-wan out almost imperceptibly, but he had worked with her enough to catch the micro-expression plastered across her face. She was asking if Rex was still under the Jedi Master's control. If he was still under compulsion to tell the truth.

He nodded, not bothering to hide his actions from Rex's sight and Ahsoka took a deep, calming breath as she stood there in the doorway as if she were stone. Obi-wan got and put a hand on her shoulder in what was meant to be a comforting gesture.

"Why don't you go see if Master Yoda requires your assistance with anything?" They both knew the suggestion to be more then a command from a Master to a Padawan; it was an out, an excuse for her to get away if that's what she needed.

Surprisingly she did not argue, she merely nodded and gave Obi-wan a loaded look, her eyes communicating more thanks then the simple act deemed necessary.

Once the door closed behind her, Obi-wan turned back to face Rex. "Now, where were we?"

"It's not safe, is it?" Padmé asked, staring out the window of the small cruiser that was to carry them to their next destination. Her hand twitched, desperate to hold on to something anything to keep herself together—to fill the cold void that had settled in her heart and would not go away. Ideal one of her children would be in her arms right now but they were all napping to peacefully to be disturbed. "All of us being together, I mean?"

She was grateful really, that after her initial refusal neither Yoda nor Obi-wan had brought up the suggestion to separate her children again. Yoda hadn't liked it, he had pressed his old, wizened lips together and sighed when she had made it clear that she wouldn't consent. It wasn't hard to see that he was worried she was throwing away the galaxy's best hope at redemption, but he didn't seem to be worried enough to forgo self imposed exile on a swamp world no one had really heard of.

Padmé's fears were of the same thing, but she was more worried about the fates of her children then what they could possibly do in the future. The rational part of her that had spent so long in the arena fighting with words and innuendos worried if she was not dooming them all by her stubbornness. Padmé doubted that she would ever say it aloud, but she had considered their words, even if only for the briefest instant. In the end, however, she could not do it and it was not just because the children would need one another...it was because she needed them now that Anakin was dead and the Republic was burning. They were the stitching in her seems; the only thing that kept her together.

"It's a risk we're going to have to take. The children need protecting." Obi-wan said as lightly as he could muster.

Padmé looked over at him and knew that he felt as dead inside as she had. It was so easy to forget that she wasn't the only one hurting, feeling the absence of the bright, all consuming star that had so easily pulled in everyone around him.

"And the captain?" she asked motioning to the cockpit, where both Rex and Ahsoka sat, in an effort to change the subject, "is he an undue risk?"

"I don't think so. He says he had his doubts about following orders and the Force tells me he is being truthful." Even to a non-force sensitive it was clear that he had his doubts. He was beginning to second guess his instincts. But then again, weren't they all questioning the very fabric of their realities now that everything was twisted and burnt?

"How did it come to this?" She whispered, unable to bring herself to be more specific.

"I don't know," Obi-wan said, putting a comforting hand on her shoulder as he joined her near the window, "And I don't think we ever will."

Okay, so it's a bit of a filler chapter, and a bit short. Sorry, but next chapter should make up for it. Here's a bit of a spoiler: you get another piece to the puzzle of just how the two worlds are connected.