Chapter 11
Be cool… BREATHE! Don't do anything stupid… BREATHE! Try to smile… BREATHE!
Padmé's thoughts hurt her brain. It was hard to focus on the officers' questions while her own mind kept telling her things.
"I'm sorry," she said, somewhat embarrassed. "What were you saying?"
Officer Ozzel released air in annoyance. "Miss Amidala," he said, out of patience. "Why didn't you tell us the strange phone calls came FIRST to your personal phone?"
Padmé hid her hands in her lap, less they could see how they were shaking.
"I just…" she stammered. "I didn't think it was important…"
"Miss, it all is important," Officer Piett said, his face soft and filled with understanding—the very opposite of his partner. "We need to know every detail you can think of, please."
"Well then," Padmé breathed. "I think that's really all…"
"Okay," Ozzel said, his wrinkly brow furrowing. "So tell us then, every single person—family member or not, friend or classmate—literally everyone you've given that phone number to."
Padmé almost forgot to breathe again. "I just… Just my parents."
Piett and Ozzel stared at each other and then at her.
Padmé could tell, they could very well see the big fat lie she had just said.
Even the kinder officer looked bother and offended.
"Miss Amidala… Padmé," Piett said, slowly. "Are you protecting someone?"
BREATHE!
BREATHE!
BREATHE!
STOP SAYING STUPID THINGS! Be cool… Act normal!
"No!" Padmé screamed, hating herself and her inability to being and appear calm. "I mean, of course not! I just… I don't even use that phone much. I never call anyone. My parents call me sometimes and that's all I ever use it for." She paused, steadying her voice and lowering her tone to normality. "Really, who would I call, officers? All my friends live with me… I see my classmates every day, and they live to almost walking distance. Only my parents call me. I swear. Sometimes my older sister Sola, but that's it, I swear… I… please, just…"
"Miss, relax," Piett said, erasing all signs of suspicion from his face, and with a simple glance telling Ozzel to do the same. "I think that's all for now. You may go to rest now."
Padmé stared at him. Did she or didn't she say too much? Her head was in too much of a storm to be sure or even remember what they had talked about.
The sound of a car parking outside brought their attention, and just a few moments later Dormé walked in with another, much younger and good-looking officer.
"Good evening," Officer Kenobi greeted, slightly and gallantly bowing his head for the two young ladies.
"I found him outside," Dormé said, smiling wickedly and blowing smoke from the cigarette in her mouth. "God knows where damn Luminara is but she didn't get the door."
"Well, it is quite late," Officer Kenobi said in an apologetic tone. "I'm sorry to disturb, I only came here to pick up Miss Sabé. Are either of you—"
"No," Dormé interrupted, moving closer to him. "My name's Dormé, and this is my roommate Padmé. Pretty, aren't we?" Dormé smiled again at him, smoke leaving her mouth like black clouds at every word.
Kenobi blushed ever so slightly yet remained serious and proper. "And where is that young lady?" he asked professionally.
"I'll go get her," Dormé said, winking and giving Obi-Wan a last insinuating glance as she left.
Padmé sighed. "I'm sorry," she said. "May I give you something to drink?"
"No thank you," Kenobi and Piett refused politely. Ozzel accepted a glass of whiskey, though. Padmé vacillated as she poured him his drink—the sorority girls never—maybe just Dormé—touched the whiskey. It was Mon Mothma's…
"Thanks," Officer Ozzel said, his voice completely devoid of any gratitude.
He finished it in one slip, then the door was opened. Dormé had returned with someone, but as was now usual in Kappa Kappa Delta, not the one she had gone looking for.
"No sight of Sabé," Dormé said. "But look who I found passed out in her own vomit outside," she mocked Luminara.
"Now, child, stop that!" Luminara cried, annoyed as Dormé was playing with her messy hair. It was more than obvious that she had been drinking and had just woken up.
Dormé laughed. "And she's not in her bedroom either," she said.
"What?" the policemen were worried.
"Has she been gone all day?" Kenobi asked.
"No, she was here just before."
"Good god, you mean she disappeared… after that Vader called?" Piett said, rubbing his forehead.
Dormé looked as if the idea had just reached her and it sink in her. "Well… technically, yeah, but… but she was inside so nothing could've happened to her. We have all doors locked."
Padmé put her hand on her mouth. She hadn't any proves; maybe Dormé just didn't look hard enough, but she suddenly got the feeling that she was never going to see Sabé again.
Her look of grieve didn't go unnoticed by the policemen.
"Well, we ought to go back outside," Ozzel said. "Keep looking for that girl. Call us if anything happens."
"I'll walk you outside," Luminara said in a voice that tried to be dignified.
"Me, too," Dormé said. "You might get lost, dear lady. Good lord, you smell terrible!" she laughed. "Why the fuck did you get drunk alone? You know we could all use a drink at these times," Dormé said at Luminara's ear yet everyone heard.
"I suppose you aren't familiar with the delightfully foul and classy aura that surrounds the sisters of Kappa Kappa Delta?" Ozzel bitterly snarled, looking at Kenobi's startled face.
Padmé and Dormé stared at each other and then they shared, for the first time in God knows how long, a true friendly and funny smile.
"Want one, my dear sister?" Dormé said, offering a cigarette to Padmé.
"No, thank you, my lovely sister," Padmé said, with equal mockery, unsure of why she acted in that immature way—perhaps because she needed to.
They reached the door, Luminara opened it, and before she could give a final goodbye to the police officers, something heavy hit her and she fell backwards, practically on top of Ozzel.
Kenobi helped Luminara get up but he dropped her as soon as he had grabbed her, causing all her weight to again fall clumsily on the enraged Ozzel, as loud desperate screaming startled him to the point of panic. Kenobi looked up and at once saw what had stumbled the drunk cleaning lady backwards—and what had caused the sorority sisters to scream so savagely.
"Good God!" Officer Piett exclaimed.
There was a body hanging in the front door. Lifeless and dripping blood from every possible place, mainly from the young girl's once beautiful and large feminine breasts.
"Oh my god! Oh my god!" Dormé screamed non-stop as Padmé's own shrilled screams covered them in a dark, eerie atmosphere of absolute horror.
Astonished, frightened to his very core, Officer Kenobi was the first one to snap out of it. He walked unsteadily and tried to help the girl—the corpse, free.
Ahhh! Ahh! Ahhh! Kenobi heard as he moved, the screaming girls almost stealing all his strength and paralyzing him. Yet he couldn't leave her like that. His pity surpassed his fear and shock.
The corpse hung by a rope on its neck. But the skin in that area was so damaged —at first glance you could tell from strangling and something sharp like a knife— the rope almost reached the bones and it looked like at any time the neck would split open, freeing the body from the rope's hold, causing it to fall on the floor. Sabé spun in circles in the main door, and Obi-Wan almost fell backwards like Luminara, when he tried to untie her.
Ozzel and Piett seemed to recover from the shock, Ozzel pushed Luminara aside and walked towards Kenobi. "Stop," he said in a hard voice.
Obi-Wan blinked, surprised. "We can't leave her like this…" he said, his voice pained.
"Obi-Wan…" Piett said, tears almost finding his eyes. Obi-Wan had tried to untie the rope from Sabé's neck.
The younger officer stared at the two partners with anger, then nodded, understanding duty comes first…That was a crime scene, and they shouldn't touch it or change it just yet.
"Go inside," Ozzel commanded the two sorority sisters.
Padmé took one last look outside, she stared at the blackness of the night, felt the chilly night autumn air… and a sharper, colder chill ran through her. Are you there? She wondered, her heart bleeding. Why are you doing this?
"Padmé!" Dormé screamed behind her. "Hurry the fuck up, will you!"
Padmé locked the door and walked, holding on to Dormé, towards the living room.
When the 'circus' ended, foresees, ambulances and police cars had gone, the corpse had been examined and taken away. The rest of the sorority sisters had learned of what happened, though they didn't get to see such terrible sight as Padmé and Dormé.
All the sisters in Kappa Kappa Delta had gone into the living room, arms together, eyes glistening with shiny tears, faces white and frightened. A silence that resembled peace— but was the complete opposite— covering them.
"You must all go home," Luminara said, a bottle of wine in her chubby hands, trembling as it reached her pale mouth. "Oh I'm so sorry, but it's obvious this is the end for this house!"
None of the girls said anything, but it was understood, by the next day, that house would be empty.
"You think so, too?" Ozzel asked Piett in a dry tone, both policemen inside their car outside Kappa Kappa Delta; cold three am wind barely coming from the car's windows; somber black night sky above them.
"I didn't want to believe it," Piett sighed. "She seemed like such a nice girl. Clean record, good grades and proper family… and she was one of the first to be attacked…"
"Yet ended up absolutely unscathed, if you remember. I thought it strange then, now it makes sense…"
"Let's not jump to conclusions," Piett's eyes shut and opened towards the sorority house.
"Why do you think she didn't mention her boyfriend at all when we interrogated her again? Eh?"
Piett was silent.
"And you remember the first time we saw him? She was screaming for help and then gave us the most ridiculous excuse ever! He was a big, tall fellow, too. I hear he plays football—what was his name… Anakin something…"
"Skywalker," Piett said.
"Yeah, that's the one."
"He looked like a fine young man."
"They always do," Ozzel said spitefully.
"Should we go interrogate him?"
"I don't know… Maybe it's too soon. Maybe he's not even home."
"Uh?"
"These kids usually live it up, partying."
"It's Tuesday, you know."
"Yeah, not much of a problem for these low-life, rich, entitled fellows. God, I hate frat boys!" Ozzel exclaimed.
"Yeah," Piett said. "You've made that clear."
"But perhaps it's not such a bad idea. I say we drop by his house tomorrow. And that professor that got beaten; I want to ask him some questions—Jesus, fucking Christ!" Ozzel jerked suddenly and pulled out his gun.
"What?" Piett muttered in a nervous whisper as he also grabbed his gun.
With a silent movement, Ozzel indicated Piett where to look: It was by the garden, lurking in the shadows, forcing the back door open, a tall, young man broke into Kappa Kappa Delta—so the sorority house is not that hard to enter…
"So did you see her?" one of the sorority sisters asked Padmé and Dormé.
Padmé said nothing and looked down, Dormé smoked her tenth cigarette of the night. "At least now we know for sure what happened to Cordé." Dormé said with supreme bitterness and irony behind soft aching tears. "Wonder which of us is next…"
By a corner, drunk and smothered, Luminara told her to shut up.
"Are you guys really leaving?" Dormé asked.
"I mean, if girls are disappearing, getting sent to the hospital and getting killed, even with the police watching us," a girl said, her voice filled with nervousness. "Guess that's an indication we ought to go."
"That's a good point, so we're leaving Luminara alone? You guys know she doesn't have any place to go—"
"Dormé!" Luminara cried. "For mercy: Shut up."
"Seriously," Padmé said, getting up. "I can't stand this," she said, her voice low. "I'm going to sleep."
"I thought we were having a slumber party," Dormé said, carelessly.
Padmé left, wishing she was dead.
As she closed the door to the living room, Padmé rested against it, with closed eyes, now dry from tears.
She tried hard, really, but she couldn't erase that sight from her mind.
How could anyone do that to another human being? She wondered, the pain on her chest almost choking her. Would she ever forget about what she had seen? What she'd been through?
Oh, she could still see Sabé's lifeless, harmed, body as if she still had it in front of her. That bloody, bruised, ripped skin. Those eyes, permanently opened…the mouth, forever drawn into a scream of fear...
Then the horrible thought reached her… Could Dormé be right?
Did Cordé suffer from that same awful fate?
And would there really be a next one? And who would it be—
Padmé's burning questions were erased from her mind. Every thought clashed within her as she was grabbed and pushed aside. She felt a big, strong hand on her mouth, preventing her from speaking; his other hand was on her waistline, as he walked her—pushed her, against a hidden corner, just by the staircase. Hidden in the shadows, their bodies linked together, he tried to get a hold of her—
"Anakin—" she tried to say.
"Shhh… Don't say anything."
She was shaking, caught in a world of irreality. She was not going to be silenced. She was about to ask questions—when just behind them, she saw the policemen, Ozzel and Piett, walking silently with their guns up—motioning Padmé to pretend she couldn't see them.
What was happening? What are they doing? BREATHE! BREATHE! Try to…
She couldn't.
And without a tear or scream, too exhausted for any sensible action, Padmé crumbled in Anakin's arms.