Dormé slammed the received of the phone down so hard it slipped from its base again, with Saché right behind her to pick it up.

"Who thefuckis running PR over there?" she asked no one in particular. In a huff, she grabbed her work phone from her bag, tapping the screen so loudly Padmé could hear it while she pretended to be somewhere else.

Pretended to still be on the beach, sand between her toes and a cool, saltwater breeze on her cheeks. Imagined the gorgeous swirls of pink and purple, fading with the blue on the horizon over the water. Wrapped herself up in the warmth of the outdoor fireplace and the red wine. The laughs and long conversations and getting to know Anakin all over again. Forgetting about cable news, online news, tabloid news. Basically, any aspect of her everyday life was an afterthought behind which sunhat paired best with which pair of sunglasses.

She, regretfully, left Anakin in Boston two days ago and as soon as she touched down, 'the swamp' awaited her again.

She should've known things were going too well with her perfect getaway. Theaudacity to think she could have it all, have it in private, and cherish something for one, solitary goddamn moment before it was all blown to hell… And now there were a mix of headlines, flooding the newsstands she'd been pretending didn't exist. The internet articles plastered her face all over them like she was a celebrity and not a fucking US Senator.Andas if her being a senator meant she wasn't entitled to have a life that didn't involve standing on the floor in chambers!

This had to be one of the few times in her life she wished to be living in a different decade. Or galaxy.

It only made her migraine worse to focus on, but there wasn't a moment or a choice not to, either. So she was stuck with the throbbing at her temples, radiating down and around to the back of her neck, while she strategized with her team. They would focus on controlling the 24-hour news cycle, and she would figure out what to say to Anakin that wouldn't make him feel like a state secret.

It was his only request from their time away. And her only request was that he continue having some patience. Their agreement was a bit flimsy, and in court it could be argued that it was under duress given their state of undress, but… It was all she had at the moment. His reluctance to continue giving her time.

Dormé continued squabbling with Saché about where the news had originated and what exactly they had. As far as Padmé was concerned, this was all entirely overblown.

Some leaks-only Twitter account, a wannabe tabloid to dish on political news that was rarely secretive to begin with, seemed to have a collection of bare-faced photos of her in Boston. Not exactly earth shattering. And she questioned how many people could honestly say they were certain it was her. Her face wasmostlyconcealed by the scarves Dormé had trained her to wear, and that meant what they had were a bunch of rumors. Her damn office was just being caught in a shitstorm of them.

But that's what they were.

Rumors.

If it wasn't so ridiculous, she would laugh. And she might anyway. Half of the 'news' article—an insult to serious investigative journalists everywhere—contemplated if she were as icy behind closed doors as they proclaimed she was in public. The other half, and the comment section, speculated on her 'torrid affairs' that were seemingly taking place in Massachusetts. The latter truly made her roll her eyes.Torridwas the last word she would use to describe her fledgling relationship with Anakin. If you could call it that. Or… The relationship that might've been forming before he caught wind of all this. Then she was surehewould have the good sense she didn't and call the whole thing off.

The thought made her stomach drop, a panic sinking in that made her feel like she could lose her lunch and sanity in the same breath. She wouldn't think about it.Couldn'ton top of everything else. All she needed to do was figure out what to do next. And since her staffers, for the first time ever, seemed to be at a loss…

"They have nothing," she stated plainly. "Less than nothing. No name, no exact photo of my face, my family, an address… A series of grainy photos and vague travel plans of my time in Boston do not equal a story. If that isn't grasping at straws, I don't know what is. On what is evidently the slowest news day in America! And instead of writing a new policy that might actually help someone, this is what I'm dealing with. What iswrongwith people?!"

"If we knew that… We'd make a hell of a lot more money than this, P."

She looked at Saché and gave a weak smile. "I just… If it's not one thing, it's another. And making this much noise?" A whiny sort of sigh escaped her. A sound of defeat if Palpatine and co. could've heard her.

Anakin would lose it if they came up with something concrete.

If they figured out how often she'd been sneaking off to her boyfriend's house in the last month… Oh, they'd have a field day! For good reason. There was nothing like blowing up a single woman's personal life to add fuel to a fire.

Fortunately, though, that was not the situation. She hoped.

"Dormé?"

Her chief of staff stopped, turning with her palm pressed against her forehead and eyebrows drawn together tightly. Not a look Padmé particularly enjoyed seeing, especially not when Dormé was on the phone and she had zero idea what was being said on the other end of the line. She assumed it was Javin, and based on the response? It might not be so good after all.

Dormé hurried off the phone and dragged a hand over her face. "This is so stupid."

"To be holed up in our office with a phone pinging every five seconds? Yeah, I'm pretty sure we arrived at stupid about four hours ago," Padmé said.

Saché sat on the corner of the desk and sighed. "Speak for yourselves. I got my first call at 4:45 this morning and I don't even remember if I responded in English."

"If you responded in French, that could make for an interesting headline of its own," Padmé offered.

Dormé glanced at Padmé, laughed into her hand, and shook her head. "Something, something, Senator Amidala… Something… French diplomat…" She paused. "Fucking."

It was the last of her words that broke their collective resolve, laughter overtaking even the sound of ringing phones.

"Ifanyonewrites a headline about me and uses the word 'fucking,' I would like for that to at least behappeningfirst."

The thought of anyone saying that about her was comical, which was the only reason it didn't make her blush to consider. It was also never going to happen so long as half of America was convinced she was shrill, something her own staff found hard to imagine.

But she'd long since given up on trying to figure out public personas, in part from being subjected to several very nice ones that turned ugly in private. Her ex-boyfriend was the first to come to mind. Then there were people like Palpatine who she swore sustained themselves on the loathing he felt toward anyone not in his inner circle. How anyone put their faith in him was beyond her. If he lived to be 100, it would be fueled by the spiteful rage and practiced passive-aggressive niceties that made her skin crawl. No wonder Clovis found himself right at home.

She froze.Clovis.

What arat.

She interrupted her friends' more casual chatter over the state of her bedroom—something she was happy to tune out—with a realization. "I have a suspicion."

Saché and Dormé consulted each other's expressions and then turned her way. "Well…?"

"Two words. Rush. Clovis."

The trio of them stood bent over Saché's personal laptop, scrolling through these half-assed gossip sites. Honestly, the things they came up with should put them to shame. Padmé was aware of the more obvious conspiracies—like the supposed existence of shape-shifting lizard people being players in international politics, or those regarding the existence of birds (really, that one never failed to make her laugh)—but others were downright harmful about secret societies and assassination attempts.Thispage, though, was dedicated to the more petty offenses that reminded her of the celebrity tabloids she was caught up in once upon a time when she was rumored to be pregnant by a certain Mr. Jemabie.

As if.

"These are gross…" Saché said under her breath, scrolling further down the page through the notices about said senators' mistresses, escorts, speculation over face lifts, nose jobs, and—apparently—whether or not one of her colleagues was a clone.

Dormé clicked her tongue in disgust. "Problem is,someof them are true, and a few others are partially. Like… Every twentieth entry ends up being right and adds to their stupid credibility."

"Critical thinking skills are really approaching an all-time low, aren't they?" Padmé asked in an attempt at a joke while she read headlines before they scrolled off the screen. "I don't think one out of every twenty is really the kind of ratio I'd be bragging about…"

"Too bad none of them care. I mean, this headline says," Saché sat and extended the window full-sized before she read, "What they don't want you to know about Washington's secret elite, which is the vaguest headlineever, and if you click for more details… You get lovely ads for local hookups and alternative medical solutions in the margins while getting no actual story about whatever it is they hypothetically don't want you to find out."

"Maybe we don't want you to know how often we sit in offices and make fun of this shit when we have time," Dormé quipped. "Though… I really don't want to admit to anyone how much I rage tweet in my drafts and never post."

Padmé quickly shielded herself from the advertisement for stimulating activities that would supposedly advance men's sexual prowess and tried to stop imagining her face being printed on the same page as it.

"We're on a mission for what they say aboutmeand to look at the timing for the headlines… I last talked to Clovis at the gala, and then I was back to Boston. Then Saché ran into him in the lounge, meeting with the new staffer for Farr's office, and then Isawhim flash by like a blur when I was leaving Thursday after votes were finished. Is thereanycorrelation?"

"Let me…" Saché went on, searching keywords on the page, scrolling through the account.

The longer it took, the more worried Padmé became that he wasn't in the middle of it and they were all back to square one.

It just…Feltlike something for Clovis to have a hand in. However subtle. Especially after how he'd talked her head off when given the (stupid) opportunity to have her in his grasp on a dance floor when she was too drunk to cause a scene that wouldn't reflect poorly on the both of them.

"Wait!" Dormé exclaimed, grabbing Saché's wrist to hold it still over the trackpad. "Go back…"

Saché looked over her shoulder at Dormé, then Padmé, before scrolling back to one article titledThe Lucky Few.

"Is that—"

Padmé dropped her palm to the desktop, leaning close to the screen over her friend's shoulder, and felt the air leave her lungs. "Oh, god…"

So much for pure, unknowing speculation on the part of shoddy stalkers that call themselves journalists. One of them, that currently had her chief of staff spinning her wheels and doing deep dives into parts of the internet that should really be shut down, had something solid. Though she wasn't sure they knew it yet.

Knowing, or unknowing, that blasted article painted alovelypicture of Senator Amidala. Presidential Hopeful. Ex-girlfriend of 1. Her chief opponents campaign manager, 2. A known and well-acknowledged 'They're all bad' idiot musician, and… Current, sort-of girlfriend of a man whose voting record suggested he wouldn't vote for herif he voted at all, alongside a collection of photographs of him laughing with men who actively plotted her demise time and time again.

"This is bad," Dormé mumbled, putting a hand over her eyes. "This is so,sobad. Why is he there?"

"Why was he photographed?" Saché asked, slumping down in the chair on the other side of the desk.

"Why was he there?" Dormé asked again, with pointed emphasis on each of her words.

"When did that even take place?" Padmé asked, tilting the laptop screen to a more favorable angle. "He's in uniform, so that could've been—"

"Any time," Dormé stated plainly, taking a step back. "Any. Time. Three years, five years, last year. And worst of all? It doesn't even matter. It could've been taken two goddamn months after he returned from his first tour. The internet is forever. And that," she pointed at a blown-up photo of Anakin sitting around a table of alt-right news commentators and a few members she recognized from Palpatine's favored offices, "is your boyfriend rubbing elbows with the worst of the worst."

"There's probably a rational explanation," Saché said, bringing the hopefulness to the room of diminishing spirits. Dormé shot her a look and she raised her hands in defense. "I'm just saying, there are a lot of opportunities for bad photo-ops. We're well aware of that."

Padmé reached over and scrolled further up on the page. "Like that," she added, pointing to a horribly shot photo of her and Rush moving past each other in a hallway. A photo that was unflattering for all involved.

"Yeah. Exactly like that. If they can get their hands on some photographers' rejected photos that didn't cut it for a legitimate news article, who knows what else they have at their fingertips?"

Aperfectly rational explanation.

She was having difficulties wrapping her mind around it, but maybe that was true. It's not exactly uncommon for military events to overlap with those of her less liberal colleagues. And it wasn't unheard of for Anakin to be in attendance. If only the picture were at a better angle… If only she could see if his scar was present. How well defined the laugh lines around his mouth were. The depth in his eyes that she thought made him look older than he was.

But no. All that was noticeable was a shimmering name plate with A. Skywalker pinned to the front of his jacket.

"Saché… I love you, I do," Dormé started. "But rainbows and butterflies are not how anyone else is going to see this when they go public."

"And I'm just saying I'm not convinced." Saché stood up and started pacing around the desk. "Think of all the past candidates. Appealing to the moderates is practically the only way to win."

There was a thought. A terrible one, though. Anakin didn't want to be a state secret, sure, but she didn't need to have a conversation with him to know being a political favor wasn't his idea of a good time. And she didn't like the idea either! She'd lose the election before she let him think it was a campaign strategy choice for them to get back together.

Dormé crossed her leg over her knee and tilted her head. "So, you're suggesting we throw this out there? Spin it as some kind of win for democracy?"

"Well…"

"Absolutely not," Padmé said, squashing that thought before it gained any traction. "First of all, I want way more information about this photo, this website, thisarticle, before we even acknowledge it exists. And second, Anakin is not a political pawn."

Dormé and Saché both directed their attention to her, glanced at each other, and then back again. Dormé spoke first.

"I hear you. And I want to say you're right, you can have it your way like this is the Burger King headquarters. But—"

"That's not an option." Saché circled back around and sat between Dormé and Padmé. "Well, the first? We can handle. But there's no controlling public opinion, selective polling, or the pure talk show madness that Anakin is going to cause the second you appear in an official capacity."

"We thought you knew that."

Padmé sat back in her chair and let the words hang in the air. Both of her friends looked at her like they were telling her she had a month to live and to get her affairs in order. Their comments were enough to make her ears ring with a flash of dizzying panic. Somehow, in all the scenarios she ran in her mind, this hadn't played out. Probably because yesterday she had no clue there would be a can of worms to open with Anakin. She was blissfully unaware of any publicity he would bring her. But now that she did, it was really only a matter of time.Somehow,they needed to get ahead of it, that much Saché and Dormé were right about. Or at least figure out how to steer the narrative.

"What am I supposed to tell him? Toaskhim? How do I even bring this up?" Padmé asked, running through the onslaught of questions appearing in her mind. "I told him he had to be patient while I figured it out and now I don't even know what I'm figuring out!"

"To be completely honest? You need to figure out your announcement." Dormé put a hand on her leg, grounding her back to the moment before her head—and the room—started spinning. "That's not really the… Elephant in the room right now. But it's the move that's going to drive all the others. That can change the news cycle."

"Give us the where and the when and then I can figure out a much better press release," Saché said, flipping desktops on her computer to get back to business. "I can start making calls. How was your meeting with Valorum?"

President Valorum was many things, but he wasn't the most tactful person most of the time. She wondered how he prospered so much in politics to make it to the White House. Then she remembered how inconsequential most of his term had been—overruled by headlines and outdone by his cronies. But his straightforward nature was missing from her last encounter when he seemed to be holding back like he knew something she didn't. She wasn't sure if it was about her or one of her opponents. And she thought better than to ask.

Padmé sighed. "It was… Interesting. He danced around the subject, talking about Organa and how speculation is still looming on who else is going to join the race."

"Bail's early polling has been strong. Not to mention that he's had first dibs at all the press. But everyone is still looking at Mon. Andyou."

Padmé looked back to Dormé. This had all started with Anakin, but it was ending where every conversation seemed to lately. An announcement. There was a move to be made. A speech to be given. A launch party to be had. Or it was time for her to give it up and walk away.

Something Padmé had never done before. And didn't plan to now.

"How does an October launch play out?"

Saché and Dormé started rattling off timelines and names, flipping through the yellow notebook pages on the desk. It wasn't the most conventional time to launch, Padmé knew that. But she was already on an unconventional track so that hardly mattered. What it would giveheris time to see what fallout came from these stupid rumors, to put out a composed response, and prep Anakin for sharing her with the country. Their last night on Martha's Vineyard he'd said he was prepared, but after this afternoon, she had doubts of her own.

"That would give us time to do interviews. You could write an op-ed or two. Squeeze in an appearance alongside Bail if it works schedule-wise? To give some contrast?" Saché suggested, furiously scribbling notes while Dormé took another call Padmé hoped wasn't related to the tabloid trash. "And…"

"We could have time to clean up the Anakin thing. Yeah, I already thought of that."

Saché gave her a tight-lipped smile and nodded. "It's going to be uncomfortable."

"But it's going to be handled," Dormé said, jumping back into the conversation more chipper than before. "Now! Refresh the screen."

Saché went back to the site, and rather than loading, a 404 error flashed across the screen.

"What did you do?" she asked, eyeing a now-smiling Dormé. "Or who?"

"That's for me to know and you to find out much,muchlater," Dormé said. Padmé hated when she said things like that, but not today. "Anyway, it's only temporary and I've got to come up with a story theycanuse, so let's figure out some meaningless trash that won't fan the flame. Or… Not as much as that was."

"We could drop a tip about an announcement? A list of potential venues?"

Padmé let out a small sigh of relief. That was a suggestion she could get behind. "A list of potential cities."

"That'd work, too!" Saché said with a smile. She opened the notes tab on her laptop and started listing cities that were meaningful to the last two elections. Her friend was basically an encyclopedia for electoral fun facts. And in this moment, it was the thing she loved most about her.

Quickly, they got to work on a rough timeline for Padmé's vision. Of course, most of what they were feeding to the rumor mill was complete crap, but like Dormé pointed out—the secret is in the 20% of truth. Padmé just had to hope they'd beat the clock on decoding the fact from the fiction in the next month.