Chapter Two
They left Geonosis two hours after the battle had ended. The transport was filled with injured clones and Jedi, most of them suffering from minor injuries but there were a few that would not make it. Obi-Wan and Padmé were quickly ushered to the medical ward to attend to the wounds they had suffered. He had wanted to stay close to them, to be able to know that they were all right but he had been pushed aside with the clinical professionalism that all healers seemed to inherit from their job.
Anakin refused treatment for his own injuries, despite the discomfort he felt. Instead of visiting a healer he wandered around the surprisingly large ship, his mind too busy to attempt blocking out every thought and emotion that filled the walls of the ship. The emotions of the clones and the other Jedi on board rattled against his skull, making his head ache in such a way that his very thoughts seemed to be shouting at him. There were times when being so finely attuned to the Force drove him crazy and this was one of those times, no one on board was making an attempt to shield their emotions and he was the one suffering for it. He found an empty corridor and sat down against the wall, his knees pulled up to his chest, as he tried to block everything out but his mind kept returning to a moment that had transpired nearly three hours earlier.
Master Yoda had insisted that Anakin come with him when he escorted Dooku to one of the holding cells aboard the ship, tearing him away from the sides of Obi-Wan and Padmé. They had found Master Windu already waiting outside of the cell with four heavily armed troopers.
"You did well today Skywalker," Mace said as he took over custody of the wounded Count. "The Council is pleased with your level of skill against such an opponent."
"The boy wounded an unarmed being," Dooku spat, his eyes blazing with anger when they met Anakin's. "Surly even you remember the punishment for such an offense, my friend."
"His duty to the Republic young Skywalker did," Yoda said as he marched his former student into the small cell. "Stopped you would not have, if unarmed he had been."
"Perhaps you are right my old Master, but even I would feel immediate remorse for such an action, the boy has felt none until now," Dooku said before the heavy door was closed and locked.
"We'll keep an eye on him," Mace said with a nod to the other two Jedi, effectively dismissing them with the action. "You should go rest Skywalker, you look horrible."
Anakin thought he caught the hint of a smirk on Master Windu's usually stoic face and it took him by surprise, halting him mid stride. Yoda had to impatiently tap his withered walking stick to get his attention again and with a shake of his head, trying to convince himself that he was imagining things, he followed the old Jedi.
"Master, he's right," Anakin said dejectedly when they entered an empty lift. "I should have been able to stop myself from attacking him after Pad- the Senator shot him. He was injured and unarmed and…"
"Still a threat he was," Yoda cut in. "Already proven he had that felt no quarrel he did with using the Force."
"Yes but what I did is not the Jedi way."
"Hm, concerned by that you have not been in the past. Much like Master Jinn you are. The will of the Force it was for you to do so. Doubt it you should not," Yoda said. "Even as a Jedi Dooku was not known for displaying compassion. Do not let this guilt you feel affect you, changed the outcome of this conflict you have."
"But Master-" he started to say.
"Nothing more to say on this matter I have," Yoda said. "Pleased I am with what you have done this day. Perhaps consider the trials we should upon returning to Coruscant."
"I… Thank you Master," Anakin said, stunned by the news.
"Now go see a healer you must," Yoda said when the lift came to a stop. "Injured you are."
"Yes Master," Anakin said, bowing to the diminutive Jedi before taking his leave.
Anakin lifted his head from his knees and glanced around before he slowly got to his feet. He had put it off long enough and an order from Master Yoda was not easily ignored, especially not with the promise of finally taking the trials within his grasp. And then there was the look Padmé had given him as the healers had taken her to a bacta tank, her eyes had booked no argument from him and he was almost more afraid of her wrath than the wrath of Master Yoda.
He decided not to see a Jedi healer; he was nowhere near feeling centered enough to be placed in a healing trance as he undoubtedly would be. He didn't even bother listening to the annoying voice of the medical droid he had been sent to see, his attention instead trying to focus on the presences of the two people he cared for most. He could feel that Obi-Wan had been placed in a healing trance, the lightsaber burns he had suffered were more worrisome than first expected, he'd heard a healer mention possible ligament damage in his thigh,. And Padmé had been released, he could feel her coming closer.
The words that Dooku had uttered before he was locked away were still circling around in his head, tormenting him. It was true that he had not felt any kind of remorse for wounding him in the heat of battle but now that he had seen the damage he had inflicted the guilt would not leave him. What kind of Jedi was he if within the span of only a few days he had been able to slaughter an entire tribe of Tusken Raiders and wound an already disarmed enemy?
Padmé found him in one of the small treatment cabins off of the main hall in the medical bay, his dark tunics had been cast aside to allow the droid to poke and prod at the angry looking bruises that covered his upper body. She knew that he could sense her; she had seen his eyes lift towards the door before quickly lowering back down to the hands in his lap. Something was bothering him, that much was painfully obvious to her.
"You have no serious damage to treat," the droid finally announced upon finishing its tests. "The ribs on your right side are bruised and you suffered deep tissue bruising on your right shoulder and back. All injuries will heal in time as long as you do not stress them."
"Right," Anakin said dismissively, standing up from the examination table and stretching out his back. "Thank you."
The droid left the room and Padmé quickly entered, closing the door behind her. He kept his back to her, still refusing to acknowledge her presence, and used the Force to call his discarded tunics into his out stretched hand. He grimaced in pain as he shrugged on his loose under tunic, the course material dragging over the little scraps he had received when he was thrown into the wall. She rushed to his side, unable to take seeing him in pain, and helped him pull the shirt on.
"I don't need your help," he snapped, shrugging her away.
She stepped away and frowned at his back. "What's wrong Ani?" she asked.
"Nothing," he said through clenched teeth.
"Don't lie to me Anakin Skywalker," she said her voice sharp as she grabbed his arm and forced him to turn and face her. "Something is obviously bothering you and I'd like to know what I've done to deserve being treated like that by you."
"I'm just tired, all right," he mumbled. He suddenly wanted nothing more than to collapse in a bed and sleep for the next year, everything was catching up to him and he found himself emotionally and physically exhausted in a way he had never experienced. He didn't want to have to think or feel and every second he spent around her made things worse for him. Her ability for compassion far outweighed his and he found himself wondering, not for the first time, what she would have been like as a Jedi.
She felt her anger melt away as she realized how truly exhausted he looked, his eyes were hollow and surrounded by dark circles and his face was barren of any emotion. But she also knew that there was more to his behavior than simply being tired, Anakin had never snapped at her for any reason in their time together and she instinctively knew something was bothering him on an even deeper level than he was letting on. She took a tentative step closer to him and laid a gentle hand along his cheek, soft fingers stroking over the slight stubble that lined his jaw. "Tell me," she murmured gently.
A heavy sigh lifted his shoulders before his eyes reluctantly met hers, something was breaking inside of him and that frightened her more than anything they had endured on Geonosis."I injured an unarmed man," he whispered. "I should have been able to stop myself, but I couldn't."
"Anakin, you couldn't have stopped your lightsaber even if you wanted to. You were moving too quickly, your momentum too great."
"I went against everything the Jedi stand for when I cut off his hand," he said, his eyes frighteningly distant. "I'm not fit to be a Jedi."
"Anakin, no," she said, her voice holding a gentle warning. "Dooku would have injured you if you hadn't. He had already proven that he would attack you with anything he could. What you did was self defense, anyone could see that."
"Stop trying to justify my actions!" he growled. "It's not like I mean anything to you…. As soon as this mission is over you'll go back to you life as a Senator and forget about me again." He hadn't meant to say it but now that it was out he was glad he had, perhaps if they were angry with each other that would make their inevitable parting easier to bare.
"Why would you even think that Anakin? If I didn't care about you, why would I be here now?"
"I don't know. Pity?"
Now she knew they were getting to the real heart of the problem, she just needed to push him a little harder to get her answers. "Is there something that you want to tell me?" she asked, her eyes meeting and holding his. "Is there something else that's bothering you?"
"I suppose you're going to tell me that what you said in that tunnel meant nothing," he said, his voice suddenly raw with emotion. "That it wasn't true and you don't really love me."
"How dare you!" she bristled, angered by the notion that he did not believe her declaration. Having Anakin doubt her feelings for him hurt more than she would ever have expected.
"It's the truth, isn't it? Tell a dying man what he wants to hear most."
She wanted to slap him for his assumption that she could ever be that heartless, but she would not hurt him like that. "Is that what you really think?" she asked quietly, her soft voice belying her anger.
"I don't know what to even think around you anymore," he replied. "You send out so many mixed signals that my head is spinning trying to keep up with them."
"Do you actually believe that I would lie to you about such a thing? After everything that you and I have been through together?"
"You're a politician," he answered. "Isn't it your job to try and appease everyone?"
"How could you even doubt my honesty after everything?" she demanded, moving even closer to him as her eyes flashed angrily up at him. "Do you honestly feel that I have lied to you? That I did not mean every word that I spoke in that tunnel?"
"I… I don't know," he faltered, surprised by her reaction.
"How dare you," she repeated. And then, with a suddenness he had not expected, she fisted one hand in his hair as she brought him down to meet her lips in a kiss filled with anger and urgency. He was shocked by her boldness but he quickly and eagerly began to return the kiss. Her hand left his hair to slip around his neck as she pulled herself closer to his warm body, his arms sliding around her to keep her there. "Don't ever doubt my love for you," she warned against his lips.
He looked down into her still angry eyes and brought his hands up to frame her face, the roughened pads of his thumbs sliding over the graceful curves of her cheekbones. "I promise," he said softly. "I love you."
Her eyes softened at his words and she smiled shyly. "I love you Anakin Skywalker," she said, standing on tip toe to meet his lips in another kiss. This kiss was softer, filled with their gentle explorations of how perfectly their lips moved together. He let one hand move to the back of her head so that he could tilt her back just slightly as his other arm moved down to slip around her waist, her own arms still looped around his neck as she instinctively tried to get even closer to him.
When he ended the kiss and pulled back enough to look at her there was a slight grin gracing his lips. "Thank you," he said softly. "For everything… If you hadn't shot Dooku when you did…"
"I couldn't let him hurt you," she said honestly. "And he would have."
"I would have lost my arm," he said. "I owe you."
"No," she said, "you have saved my life more times than I can count, think of it as me repaying you."
He smiled and she felt her heart lodge in her throat at the sight of it, she hadn't seen him truly smile since their picnic on Naboo. "All right, but it's going to take a while for you to square things up," he teased. "Especially with your knack for getting in trouble."
"Well, if I have you around to keep an eye on me I'm not too worried about that."
His smile dimmed at her words. "I can't always be there," he whispered, his voice filled with the remembered pain of failing his mother. He would never fail Padmé so spectacularly ever again, he vowed silently and even if he did stumble again he would never tell her, she never needed to be burdened with the knowledge that he had failed again.
"Ani," she murmured able to sense where his thoughts were taking him. "I know you can't always be there but I do know how to take care of myself."
"I know," he sighed.
"The Republic will need you now more than ever," she said softly, already thinking ahead to the coming days. They may have stopped the threat of a full scale war but the Separatist supporters still had an army at their disposal.
"But I thought there wasn't going to be a war."
"Not a war in that sense, but we will still need to draw the Separatist supporters back into the Republic and that will not be an easy task."
"Do you think there could still be a war?"
"No, but there will be battles," she said and a sudden wave of fear came over her. "You'll be out there, you'll be fighting..."
He could feel her distress radiating off of her and gently pulled her closer to him, his hands careful of the long gashes the nexu had left on her back. "Padmé," he murmured into her hair. She smelled of bacta and dust but there was still a subtle hint of the wildflowers in the Naboo meadow that lingered in her hair and he found comfort in that.
She buried her face against his chest, arms winding around him as if to never let go, as the realization swept over her that he would be out there facing more days like today and she wouldn't be there with him at the end of them, she wouldn't be able to comfort him and reassure him. She clung to him desperately as he tried to soothe her with meaningless words and a gentle hand stroking through the tangled curls of her hair. "I can't lose you," she whispered. "Not now…"
"How could you lose me?" he asked, pulling back enough to look down into her liquid brown eyes, startled by the tears he saw that lingered there, tears for him. "How can you lose me when you're the only one that holds my life in your hands?"
"Anakin, don't say such things," she scolded.
"Death can't have my life when it is no longer mine to give," he said softly, leaning forward to catch her lips in another kiss.
But she pulled away from him completely, wrapping her arms around herself to ward off the sudden chill that seemed to permeate her to her very core. Anakin was right there; his arms slipping around her waist as he gently pulled her back against him, offering his comforting warmth to her.
"You should not tempt the fates," she warned.
"Let the fates have me, so long as you know that my heart belongs only to you," he declared vehemently.
She sighed wearily and sank back against his chest. "I wish I could keep you safe," she said so softly that he wasn't sure he had even heard her correctly.
"You can. We could leave all of this behind us. We could start a life together on Naboo."
"You know that we can't, not now."
"Why?" he demanded. "What difference do two people really make?"
"The Republic needs you Ani, you're the hero of Geonosis," she said, turning back around to face him. "The people of the Republic will look to you as a symbol. You stopped Dooku, you essentially kept the Republic from falling into a civil war."
"I don't want any of that. I don't want any these titles the galaxy insists on giving me," he insisted. "All I want is your love."
"And you have it," she assured him.
They fell silent, lulled into a false calm by the low humming of the ship's engines and the comfort they found in each other's arms. She closed her eyes and could almost will herself back to Naboo where all of these troubles could not touch her. It felt right to stand there in Anakin's arms and try to forget the rest of the galaxy even though she knew nothing could ever really come of it for them.
"Padmé?" he asked softly.
"Hm," she replied, her head resting on his chest as she listened to the steady beat of his heart.
"I know that I have no right to ask this of you, that I have nothing I can give you beyond my name and my very soul but… Padmé, will you marry me?"
Her blood seemed to freeze in her veins. She had known that admitting her love for him would have opened this door, that Anakin was far too honorable to even consider anything less than making the bond they shared permanent, but she still dreaded it now that it had finally arrived. "You know that I can't," she whispered brokenly.
"Why can't you? You love me and I love you, surly marriage is the most logical step from here."
"Nothing about us is logical."
"Will you at least think about it?"
"Ani," she warned gently.
"Please?"
She sighed and nodded her head. "I'll think about it."
He kissed her cheek and pulled her that much closer to him. "You need rest," he said softly. "You're exhausted, I can feel it."
"So are you."
"I'll rest better knowing that you're resting."
She wanted to laugh at his logic, knowing full well that it was a lie. Anakin would not be resting, he would force himself to stay awake, to keep the dreams at bay unless she was there to keep an eye on him. "Come with me," she requested impulsively.
"That's not wise."
"No one would grudge us the comfort of a close friend after all that we've been through," she reasoned. "Please, I need you close."
He could sense she still feared for him and he knew she would not rest unless he went along with her request. "All right," he agreed. "Have you been given you quarters yet?"
After he finished dressing, she led him through the ship to the small room she had been given by the staff. Threepio and Artoo were already powered down in a corner and the room was blessedly quiet once the door hissed shut behind them. His eyes glanced around the room, his senses automatically searching for any sign of danger and finding none.
Padmé stood near the doorway leading to the sleep chamber, watching him closely and noting that he had not moved since entering.
"Are you coming?" she asked anxiously, breaking the silence.
"To your bed?" he asked breathlessly, suddenly nervous.
"I thought that was the idea," she teased.
He gulped nervously and took a tentative step closer to where she stood waiting for him. "Are you sure?"
"We both need to sleep and I refuse to let you sleep on that couch when the bed in here could fit both of us comfortably."
He glanced at the bed behind her; it was a stark military issued bunk that barely looked wide enough for two people sleeping on their backs. He bit his bottom lip and refused to meet her questioning gaze. "Are we just sleeping?" he mumbled.
She felt laughter bubble up within her as she finally understood what was bothering him, but she refused to laugh at him. She moved to him, her arms going around his lean waist as she looked up into his eyes. "Ani," she said softly. "I assure you that my only intention is to sleep with you beside me."
"Good," he sighed, relaxing.
"Why is that good?" she asked, quirking one graceful eyebrow in question.
"I… It's not… It's not that I don't… want that… because I do… I just…"
She giggled then, effectively halting his frantic babbling. "I want that too Anakin," she assured him. "But this is neither the time nor the place for it."
He nodded, grateful for her understanding. "I know."
She smiled and took his hand as she led him into the small room and over to the bed. "How do you sleep?" she asked.
"What?"
"I assume Jedi don't sleep fully clothed."
"Oh. Not usually."
She glanced down awkwardly before meeting his eyes again. "I was hoping to get out of these tunics," she started and for the first time he noticed that she was no longer wearing the torn jumpsuit from Geonosis, someone had given her a spare tunic that was too large on her petite frame. "It's a little big and it rubs against the scratches… You don't mind, do you?"
His eyes went comically wide and he shook his head mutely.
"All right then," she said, nibbling on her bottom lip.
"I'll leave," he blurted out. "Let you undress…"
"Stay," she requested softly.
He turned his back to her and began stripping out of his dusty clothes again, piling the bulky layers in a corner. He heard the sheets rustle and sensed that she was settling into the bed. Before he could stop himself he had slipped off his tight trousers and was slipping into the bed clad only in his undershorts.
She had her back to him and he forced himself to not look at her as he slid under the covers. He stayed on his side, giving her plenty of space as he tried to get comfortable and ignore the fact that he was in a bed with the woman he loved. He used the Force to lower the lights, plunging the room into muted darkness.
"Ani," she whispered.
"Mm," he replied, trying to sound as though he was close to sleep.
"You can move closer if you'd like, you're practically hanging off the side."
He opened his eyes, surprised that she knew how close he was to the edge and glanced over at her. She had rolled onto her other side without him knowing it and was watching him. He moved a little closer, still giving her plenty of space. When she sighed her frustration with him he moved again until he was near the center of the bed. She slipped closer to him, gently urging him to lie on his back so that she could rest her head on his shoulder and encouraged the tentative arm that went around her.
"Sleep Ani," she whispered as she pressed a kiss to his cheek before settling in at his side.
He stared up into the darkness, his body tingling from having her so close, so temptingly close. He doubted that she realized what she was doing to him with her bare skin pressed against his and her hand moving over his skin with infinite tenderness. A soft sigh met his ears as she curled herself closer to him, her face nuzzling against his chest in an attempt to find the perfect spot before her movements stilled and he sensed she was asleep.
He willed himself to relax and ignore the longing that he felt for her as he lay there in the dark. But the way her steady breathing warmed the skin of his chest and the way her body had wrapped itself around him with such sweet possessiveness made it impossible for him. He was acutely aware of every sensation she stirred within him as she slept. He sent a silent prayer to the Force to let him survive this unexpected torture as he closed his eyes and begged for the exhaustion he felt to claim him.