Precipice by shadowsong26

Captain: Chapter 7

It wasn't the fact that Palpatine was trying to trap her that bothered Padmẻ . Or, at least, not much. No, what bothered her was that it was so obvious. That wasn't like him-like the man who had spent at least a decade and a half quietly accumulating power and setting the stage for the war and his ultimate takeover. A clumsy, obvious setup like sending her off in Anakin's wake…

There was something buried here, something she wasn't seeing. Probably, to her chagrin, because she'd been caught off guard, distracted by the very recent video of her officially-presumed-dead husband.

She didn't know how the Emperor was reading that, either, so she wasn't sure how worried she needed to be. She knew her surprise must have shown, despite her best efforts. At least to him. Fortunately, she had long since resigned herself to the fact that Palpatine knew about their marriage. Clearly, she and Anakin hadn't been anywhere near as discreet as they'd thought. At least that was a reaction she hadn't had to scramble to guard against.

And then there was the content of the video itself. Anakin had looked...he had looked good. Healthy and strong and confident, moving with that sure, easy, almost predatory grace she so loved; comfortable in his own skin in a way that he so rarely was. And, all right, maybe (probably) a lot of that was just her extrapolating, filling in the gaps of a very poor-quality surveillance recording with a combination of memory and wishful thinking, building him up into the man she saw in her dreams.

The good ones, at least. Not the nightmares, where he was pale and broken and too, too still. Like he'd been the last time she'd seen him-the last time she'd touched him-more than two years ago.

Maybe, if she was lucky, seeing that recording-seeing him whole and healthy and active again-would banish those images forever. But for now, all it had really done was open those wounds all over again. To have him so close, just meters away, but only a hologram, not something solid she could hold-in fact, something she could barely look at without risking giving herself away…

She missed him, so much that it actually, physically hurt.

His letters helped, a little-she was supposed to burn them; he always closed by telling her to burn them, but she hadn't been able to do that. She had a small and growing cache behind a false wall at Varykino, along with her japor pendant and his Padawan braid. Little pieces of her missing love, things he had touched, things he had created; scraps of flimsi covered in his spidery handwriting and endearingly idiosyncratic spelling.

She'd teased him about that once, in better times. He'd grinned a little sheepishly at her and admitted that Artoo always went over his reports or anything else official before he submitted them. Because unless you were used to it, it sometimes took a while to parse anything he'd written. She liked it, though. Partly for practical reasons-it added an extra layer of security to anything Ani wrote-and partly because it made his letters purely him. So much so that she could practically hear his voice, whispering in her ear, when she reread them.

So, they helped, but even they were only pieces. And even that small comfort was lightyears away from her now.

All in all, Padmẻ was grateful that she had a driver to get her safely back to her apartment. If she'd had to drive herself there, after that audience, lost in those thoughts, she was almost positive she would have crashed.

By some miracle, she managed to mostly compose herself by the time she arrived. All four of her handmaidens were gathered in the sitting room, waiting; all four of them visibly relaxed when she came in through the balcony door-still shaken, but unharmed.

"Welcome back, milady." Motee found her voice first, while Dorme rose to check on the counter-surveillance measures so they could speak freely.

"Thank you," Padmẻ said, finding a spot on the end of the couch and curling up there. "Is Luke still asleep?" She'd just settled him down for a nap when she'd been summoned, and waking him up unexpectedly was about as good an idea as it was with any toddler, but…

"Yes," Elle said. "I just checked on him a couple minutes ago."

"Right." So, she wouldn't go pick him up and hold him close for a while, as much as she desperately needed to. She would wait 'til he woke up.

"What did the Emperor want?" Motee asked. "Did something happen?"

Dorme hadn't signaled the all-clear yet, but any listeners would be expecting that question before too long. And they could at least get started on the logistics of her assignment. With that in mind, Padmẻ said, "His Majesty is sending me to Vydrex IX. There was an...incident at the mining facility there earlier this week, and he would like me to oversee the relief efforts."

The three still sitting with her exchanged a long look, then Motee nodded. "Will you send Luke to stay with your sister?"

"Yes." She obviously wasn't bringing him with her, but she could have left him here, in their care-she trusted them absolutely, of course. But if he couldn't be with her, she thought it was probably a better idea to keep him somewhere remote and safe. Her handmaidens would still split up. Sabẻ and most likely Dorme would come with her, and the others would stay with Luke, take him home and protect him.

And then, finally, Dorme said, "Clear."

Padmẻ took a breath, and filled them in on all the rest of what had happened as quickly as she could-every detail of how the Emperor had staged the audience, Anakin's involvement in the incident in question, everything.

"So," she said, after she finished. "What am I missing?"

"I'm not so sure you're missing anything," Elle said slowly, after a moment when none of them spoke.

"What do you mean?"

"Well," she said, then paused to gather her thoughts. "What if this- exactly this-is what he wants? Send you on a twisted, inward path, second-guessing everything, get you so worked up and paranoid, looking for ulterior motives, that you stop paying attention to the obvious and make a mistake."

"Huh." She thought about it for a minute, toying with a strand of her hair that had come loose. "That...actually makes a lot of sense." Palpatine was a master of subterfuge, of weaving plans within plans, but if he knew she knew that was how he operated...well, keeping her off-balance going for something simple, contrary to all previous patterns and expectations, might be his best move.

"I agree, to a point," Dorme said cautiously. "In that I'm not sure this is overly complex, but-what if the trap is just as simple as it looks, but you're not the target; you're the bait?"

Padmẻ winced and curled a little tighter. That's what I'm afraid of. Because maybe Anakin was smart enough to not go right back to a place he'd just blown up because she was there and so much closer than she had been in years. Maybe. But if there was even a whisper of a hint that she was in danger there, somewhere he could actually get to and do something about it…

"Maybe so," Motee said, "but if that's the case, there's nothing we can do about it, other than hope that cooler heads prevail."

"Or that the General simply renders him unconscious for the duration," Sabẻ murmured. And, if it came right down to it, Padmẻ was sure Obi-Wan would do exactly that. And he'd be right to do it.

"As I said," Motee said dryly, "we can hope that cooler heads prevail. My concern is that this isn't a trap, so much as a way to get you off Coruscant. Either to remove you temporarily while he does something you could stop, or to take you somewhere less secure."

And remove me permanently, Padmẻ finished for her.

"That may be the case," Dorme said. "But it's what we plan for every time you leave the planet."

She nodded. "Of course. Thank you. So, we file that away as 'possible-shading-probable,' but continue as if we haven't picked up on it anyway?"

"More or less," Motee said. "We usually do. I mostly brought it up because of the quick turnaround, and the fact that he's arranging it this time. So it's likelier than usual."

"RIght. Anything else?"

"Yes," Sabẻ said. "He may be trying to use the inevitable collateral damage to force a breach. Either a...personal one, or a larger one, between the political and military arms of the movement."

Well, the first wouldn't be a problem. The recording hadn't shown much, but it was far from the worst she'd seen from Anakin. Nothing she'd seen in the audience chamber was remotely like that awful day in his stepfather's garage. Besides, the simple fact was, no matter how justified, no matter how careful, collateral damage happened in war. A philosopher she had read once-she couldn't recall his name-had said 'All wars are crimes.' She'd lived through enough conflict to know that to be true. It was simply a matter of degrees. And she trusted Anakin-at least in his official capacity-to do everything in his power to minimize it. There were things that made him lose all sense of perspective, but there shouldn't have been anything at that mine to do it. And if there had been, it would have shown.

I really, really hope that this isn't a trap for him, like Dorme said.

As for the second…

It could happen. Someday. Extremists would rise, as they did in any movement. Barriss Offee was only the harshest example that came to mind. And some of them would, almost certainly, part ways with the larger movement. In both directions-because they were too militant, or not militant enough.

But she doubted that this moment would do it.

"I don't think it'll happen. Not this time," she finally said. "But that might be his goal. And it is something to watch for, in the future."

Sabẻ nodded. "I think we've covered the likeliest ulterior motives," she said. "And any further speculation risks running us into Elle's trap."

"I agree," Motee said.

Padmẻ nodded, and reluctantly uncurled. She had a task to complete, and preparations she had to make. Fortunately, it was midafternoon in Theed, which made her first task a little easier. She and Sola had discussed having Luke stay with Sola in situations like this before, at least in abstract, but a little notice would almost certainly be appreciated. "I have to call my sister. Please take care of the rest of the arrangements. I want to-" Saying 'get this over with' felt wrong. There were people there who needed help. And it was, at least in part, because of people she worked with. People she loved.

But this was a trap. And there were too damn many reasons Palpatine might be sending her into it, and Bail hadn't reported back about what the Jedi had said about the Dark Side assassin, and this might be putting Anakin at risk, and...

There was too much at stake, and yes, this was important, but she needed to be here, doing her real work. Not chasing her husband's ghost and trying to pretend it didn't hurt, to be where he'd been, to have missed him by days.

But her handmaidens understood. They always had. And she would do her duty. She always had.

"We'll be ready to leave in a few hours," Sabẻ said. "Do you have a preference for who goes with you and who goes with Luke?"

"No, I trust you." And she'd have to get Luke ready to go, and hope he wasn't too upset that Mommy wasn't coming to Aunt Sola's with him. "Let me know if there's anything you need from me."

"We will," she said.

Padmẻ left them to it, heading into her study to call Sola and get this-

And get to work.

Original Author's Note: ay for handmaidens! Wanted to feature some besides Sabe. Plus, a little bit of backstory/headcanoning/etc.

Also! I will be doing a bonus fic of some kind for Star Wars Day (May 4). A bit more info on that on my writing tumblr. Feel free to let me know if there's something specific you'd like to see, on that list or otherwise!

Thanks so much for sticking with me through this! 3

~shadowsong