A month later, Padmé's cover had been perfected, Artoo had been coerced into letting himself be temporarily painted dark red, and the other necessary arrangements had been made for the first Kamino mission. Oddly enough, the most difficult part of the preparations had been readying Padmé's Nubian starskiff to serve as a crime lady's transport.

Padmé was privately rather amused at how her once-sleek Senatorial ship had been reduced to a dusty, sandblasted mobile playroom. It had spent most of its early time on Tatooine as a hideaway for adults driven to distraction by twin infants, but had evolved into a playroom when the twins were old enough. There hadn't really been any better use for the ship, and it had helped to prevent overcrowding in the Lars farmhouse. As a result, however, it was now permeated by the essence of playroom, from the colorful flimsi drawings stuck to the walls, to the two mattresses that had been propped up on their sides to serve as the walls of a fort—which, evidently, provided shelter to a few stuffed banthas in varying conditions, one decidedly tattered stuffed tooka, and a collection of quartz rocks. Ah, those were probably meant to be kyber. Someone had also painted a large, blue blotch in the middle of the floor in one area, because, "We needed a pond for our animals, Mama." (Neither Luke nor Leia had ever let on whose idea the pond had been.)

Ahsoka, helping her to clean out the ship, made a face as she tugged out a piece of bantha jerky that one of the twins had apparently wedged into a crevice. "Why—?"

"I don't even know," Padmé said. Sixty-odd percent of the things her offspring did in their playroom, she did not know the reasons for. Why was there a hoard of socks shoved under the copilot's seat? She couldn't fathom. (Although it did answer the question of where all their socks kept getting to.) Why were there smears of what looked like at least five different types of goo on one of the viewports? She really didn't want to know. (Even less did she want to know what exactly those various goos consisted of.) And why was there a box of dead insects (no two of the same species) in the 'fresher, Leia? She knew who was responsible for that one, at least, because the culprit had written her name on the box's lid in large, wobbly letters, along with a smaller, even wobblier message: LUK STA OWT.

"What's this?" Ahsoka held up a sheet of flimsi, whereon a stick figure with a shock of brilliant orange on its head and most of its face was brandishing a blue stick at a long, grey, winged and many-legged creature. "That's obviously Obi-Wan—looks just like him—but what the heck—?" She gestured vaguely at the creature. "What is that? It looks like someone stuck insect wings on a bantha-sized centipede!"

Of Obi-Wan, who came up just then, she inquired, "Have you had some adventures you haven't told me about?"

"A few, very likely. Which ones did you have in mind?"

"Anything involving this?" She held out the flimsi.

Both Padmé and Obi-Wan peered at it, the latter rubbing his beard thoughtfully.

"Ah, that. I've been informed that is none other than General Grievous."

Ahsoka stared at the drawing again. "But—the legs!"

"Lightsabers," Padmé said. "We think."

"That many?"

"We can only conjecture that young Luke thought the general carried his entire collection with him at all times."

"And this one?" holding up another sheet, this one adorned with a large, dark, fanged blob with legs, attached to the hand of a small, dark-haired figure.

"Krayt dragon. Leia decided she wanted one as a pet."

"Well, that would be one way to kidnap-proof a child."

Padmé laughed. "I wish. We'd never have had to worry about the Hutts, or anyone else, again."

After more explaining, and some reminiscing, and a bit of grumbling, the ship was finally cleared of the evidence of juvenile occupation—flimsi, crumbs, goo, and all.

And then it was time for Padmé to don her disguise, time to assemble in the hangar for last goodbyes—time to hug and kiss each twin, to tell Leia to be good for Uncle Obi and Luke to remember to pick up his toys—time to promise she would be back in a few days, and to pray to all gods living and dead that it was an oath she could keep.

She entered the ship, followed by Artoo, and took the pilot's seat, waving every few seconds to the group assembled below, who waved back. Luke, with his brave face on so Mama wouldn't worry; Leia, retreating behind the regal bearing she had already begun to adopt under duress; Ahsoka, saying something she couldn't hear, but it looked like May the Force be with you; and Obi-Wan, calmly raising a hand in salute, appearing for all the worlds to be the tranquil Jedi master, though she knew the crease of his brow was a tell for worry.

After a time, Artoo took over flying the ship so Padmé could have a break. She went to the 'fresher, where she stood in front of the mirror, surveying the woman reflected therein. She was a stranger. Criina Reth, head of the Bloodrise syndicate. Her black hair hung loose, sleek, with only the merest hint of a wave. Intricate tattoos curled around her hazel eyes, spanning her nose, tendrils reaching down over her cheekbones like trailing vines. She wore a dark jacket over a loose black tunic and pants. An array of vibroblades adorned her belt, and a small blaster was secreted inside each of her boots, with a larger one proudly displayed on her hip.

She bore little, if any, resemblance to either the elegant Senator Amidala or the simply-clad Dempa Maaldai—known as Padmé only to her intimates—who had on Tatooine taken to wearing strictly plain, practical things. It was necessary, but all the same, it was disconcerting.

The strangest thing of all, however, was definitely that her jacket actually belonged to Asajj Ventress. Whom Ahsoka had somehow persuaded to attach herself to the Rebellion, some years back. Ventress had no love for Palpatine, and the enemy of an enemy, after all, tended to make a decent ally. Or, in this case, friend? Padmé couldn't quite wrap her mind around that one. After the reports she had heard of Ventress during the war, she couldn't picture the woman being anyone's friend, let alone Ahsoka's.

She tried to ignore thought that kept running through her mind: Ventress was a Sith acolyte. Ventress was a Sith assassin. Ventress is helping the Alliance, and she's Ahsoka's friend. She was Dark, and now…. She didn't want to think such things; she didn't want to know what she would do if the point had any relevance. But it didn't, so there was no reason to consider it further!

Padmé met her eyes in the mirror. Criina Reth. She didn't have to deal with any of Padmé Amidala's problems. Her life was so simple—scam here, rob there, stage a coup and grab power somewhere else. Simple. No messy relationships, no memories to plague her—or—no, that probably wasn't true. If Criina were real person, she would have to deal with just as many of the messy aspects of sentient existence as Padmé, or Ahsoka, or even Ventress herself. Everyone had ghosts. No one started out a villain.

On that cheery thought, Padmé left the 'fresher and returned to keep Artoo company in the cockpit.

A peculiar cocktail of excitement and guilt fizzed through her veins. She was out, on her own, for the first time in six years! But she was leaving Luke and Leia alone—well, not alone, they had Obi-Wan and Ahsoka—but without her for the first time in their lives. The longest they had ever been without her before had been when she and Beru had occasionally gone to one of the towns for a day of errands. What if the twins were too young for her to go away for a few whole days?

She tried to ignore the inevitable followup to that question. What if it wasn't just a few days? What if the Empire had a larger presence on Kamino than they believed? What if she was apprehended?

No one even knows you're alive, she reminded herself. No one is going to look at a crimelord and think, "Oh, she must be that woman who's been dead for over six years!"

She tried to focus, instead, on the flip side of being away from her children. It was the first time in so long that she would have several days to herself, and herself alone. The first time in so long that she had ventured into space alone (but for Artoo), with a mission and an objective. After half a decade of living more or less quietly among the dunes, reading reports and analyzing findings, it was more than a little bit thrilling to enter coordinates into the navicomp, to watch the blur of hyperspace and know that a purpose lay beyond, to review the details of her mission and check over her cover story.

Artoo also felt the thrill of it, and he twittered occasionally in excitement.

"We got too used to excitement during the war," Padmé told him. But he wasn't convinced.

[Speak for yourself. I was made this way.]

Maybe she was, too. Really, would she have gotten into—and out of—as many scrapes as she had, without some innate disposition toward adventure?

Not that her task on Kamino turned out to be much of an adventure. It was almost absurdly easy, from arrival to departure. Nala Se had become most communicative and accommodating, once "Criina" had dropped several broad hints about her solvency. When she inquired as to information security, Nala Se proudly explained, "Our confidential project files are stored solely on non-networked computers, which are manually backed up twice a day on the central mainframe. There is no chance that slicers will be able to access your information, unless they come to Kamino and slice directly into one of our computers. The chances of that succeeding, of course, are quite slim. Only project managers know which computer holds their project's information, and each manager only knows what is on their own project's computer. It would require no small amount of luck for a slicer to choose the correct computer for the information they desired to steal."

"What about the mainframe?"

Nala Se smiled condescendingly. "At the center of the research complex, constantly under guard, and constantly under surveillance. I don't think you need to worry about anyone stealing your information off our mainframe. Confidentiality and discretion are two pillars of our institution."

The third, Padmé thought, must be profit, because it certainly wasn't ethics. It was doubtful that Nala Se would know ethics if they accosted her in broad daylight and slapped her in the face. (True, that didn't sound like the sort of thing ethics personified ought to do… but with Nala Se, it might be justified.)

Padmé hid an involuntary laugh in a cough, schooled her features into a properly sober expression, and continued along behind the head scientist, taking appropriate interest in the facilities highlighted on her tour, while Artoo, rolling at her side, surreptitiously recorded the layout of the research institute and its security capabilities.

At the end, Nala Se provided her prospective client with the comm code she used for business dealings. "Please, do not hesitate to contact me with any questions. We look forward to doing business with you, and we wouldn't want you to be anything but satisfied with our products."

Artoo stifled an insult. Padmé suppressed a shiver of revulsion, thanked Nala Se, gave the revolting woman's hand a cordial shake, and departed—resisting the urge to wipe her own hand on her tunic.

Getting away from Kamino had gone astonishingly smoothly. They had even passed an Imperial checkpoint without issue when they stopped to refuel. That, perhaps, ought to have signaled that the trip was bound to become interesting, for fate is never satisfied to leave well enough alone, and indeed, seems to take exception to the very concept of "well enough," or maybe just "well," in general. This prejudice became apparent as Padmé and Artoo dropped back into realspace after the hyperspace jump following their refueling stop.

Their drop-jump point was near a world with an active Rebel cell, from which Padmé had taken intelligence on Imperial movements several times over the past couple of years. As they came into realspace, Padmé saw with dismay a host of TIEs swarming an elderly cargo ship. Her hand moved to halt her own ship's progress. Perhaps, if they hung back while waiting for the hyperdrive, they could jump away without being noticed. Last she knew, the cell hadn't been under Imperial suspicion. The cargo ship wasn't necessarily a Rebel vessel; it could just as easily belong to smugglers, pirates, or another valid target, in which case it would be ridiculous to intervene.

A message came over the ship's comms, hailing it.

"Hello, Nubian starskiff," said the voice on the other end. "Can you spare a credit?"

It was the Rebellion's current phrase to identify allied ships.

"Cargo transport, I have credits for all my siblings," she replied.

"Thank the stars! Our cell on this planet has been compromised. Fulcrum arranged for us to evacuate to another cell on Lothal, but our hyperdrive is slow, and we're taking too many hits for our shields to hold much longer. Can you help us?"

They could; her ship had shields and weapons appropriate for defense of a high-ranking member of government. She wasn't supposed to get involved in anything that could easily result in her cover being blown; being shot down and taken captive would, of course, do just that. But her defenses were good, and there weren't enough TIEs to pose a major threat to her ship. There would be some risk, of course, but she didn't think it would be anything worse than she had dealt with during her time as a Senator. If she could get the attention of the TIEs and then lead some away from the cargo, the latter should have time to jump into hyperspace before its shields failed.

"Artoo? What do you say?"

[Karking do it!] he chirruped. [Can I use blasters.]

"Go ahead." She should be able to manage the piloting required to lead a couple of squadrons on a chase.

With the warble that served him for a cackle, Artoo accessed the ship's astromech port.

After a few minutes, the TIEs began to retreat. Perhaps the unit's commander had decided that their losses were too heavy. With the TIEs returning planetside, they only had to wait for the old cargo ship to make its jump, and then jump themselves, and they would be home free. Padmé let out a sigh of relief—only to catch it back in a gasp as a massive ship dropped out of hyperspace some distance away. An Imperial star destroyer.

Artoo shrieked in annoyance. [Shavit, just when we had them beat! Empire is a cheater.]

"That's for sure." A whole star destroyer against one cargo? It was a completely unnecessary show of Imperial might, just to drive home the message that treason was regarded as one of the highest crimes in the Empire's view. In the Emperor's view. Oh, the irony.

Several fresh squadrons of TIEs deployed from the ISD, making for the cargo ship, led by a fighter that resembled a TIE, but larger and more elaborate. That could mean it was also better armed, and if it was a commander's ship, it might also be shielded, unlike the standard TIE model. And its pilot was probably not a standard, expendable TIE pilot of average training and ability.

"Artoo, fly the ship!" she commanded as she slid out of the pilot's seat to make her way to the rear of the ship. Her piloting skills were decent, for a non-Force-sensitive politician, but as an astromech with several years of combat flight experience, Artoo stood a better chance of seeing them through this fight. Which left Padmé to man the ship's guns, where, as with a blaster, she was an excellent shot.

The TIEs surged forward, the leader heading straight for the cargo, while a single squadron split off to deal with her. That was a mistake. Between Artoo's maneuvers and her aim, the squadron was disabled within a few minutes, and the Nubian ship was free to defend the cargo. They picked off a few more TIEs, disabling instead of destroying wherever possible, but it soon became clear that the strange fighter presented the greater threat. It was well-shielded, and its pilot was indeed skilled far beyond the Imperial standard.

Padmé gritted her teeth.

"Artoo, get us between the cargo and that fighter. Maybe if we can annoy them enough, they'll follow us instead."

Artoo swooped in front of the strange TIE, and Padmé let loose a torrent of blasterfire directly at its front viewport. If nothing else, that should at least make it difficult for the pilot to see where they were going. It worked for all of two seconds, and then the fighter moved out of her line of fire, and she couldn't get a solid fix on it again. At least, however, the distraction worked, the pilot evidently deciding that the persistent Nubian skiff was a threat, or maybe just a nuisance, which must be dealt with.

They led the strange TIE a merry dance, both ships weaving expertly round and about, above and below the standard TIEs that lingered around the cargo. Padmé spared shots here and there to take them out when she could, but her attention was mostly absorbed by the fighter hot on her own ship's tail.

Coming out of a series of evasive maneuvers, she realised that the cargo had disappeared, and the standard TIEs were returning to the ISD. Thank the stars—now she and Artoo could focus on getting out of here! The strange TIE was still behind them, and it was taxing both of their abilities to the limit.

"Artoo?"

A questioning chirrup.

"Looks like we're clear to leave?"

[Affirmative, but this karker's not giving up.]

"Can we fly crosswise through the retreating TIEs to shake them?"

Artoo let out a disparaging blat.

"Well, do you have a better idea?"

[Of course.]

The ship decelerated quickly, paused at rest for just a moment, and then leapt once more into motion. In reverse.

"How is this a better idea!" Padmé screeched, plastered against the back of her seat as the ship shot backward, on course to plough into the TIE. Neither ship swerved until the last possible moment. They were so close that she could see the reflections of the lights on the TIE's controls, glinting off the pilot's… clothes? armor? The lights didn't illuminate the dark cockpit enough to tell. In any case, even that was far more detail than one was supposed to be able to observe across the distance between two ships in space.

Recovering her presence of mind, Padmé scrambled to her feet, stumbled to the front of the ship to take over the front guns, and aimed a stream of blasterfire after the TIE—which, however, ducked deftly away from the bolts, no matter where she fired or how well she thought she had anticipated which direction it would veer. The pilot must be Force-sensitive, if they could avoid her shots every time.

That problem paled, however, as Artoo swung the ship around, shifting the engines into forward once more, and Padmé stared with horror at the star destroyer some distance in front of them, directly in the trajectory along which they were currently speeding.

"Artoo Deetoo, what the kriff are you—"

[Don't worry. Jump will occur 0.53 seconds before collision with the ISD.]

"Artoo!"

[Would you rather be shot down by that sleemo.]

A line of blasterfire sprayed around them. Artoo somehow managed to avoid most of it, but several shots struck. While the ship had some shielding, it wouldn't be strong enough to weather a heavy attack.

The ISD loomed through the front viewport. If the TIE behind them, which had by now swung around and continued its pursuit, managed to get a shot at the hyperdrive and prevent the jump to hyperspace, they wouldn't have enough time to veer, and so would splatter against the behemoth's hull like an insect on a speeder.

As this went through her head, the ship rocked with the force of blaster shots from the TIE, which the system registered as having landed near the hyperdrive. The pilot must have guessed what they were trying to do—granted, it wasn't all that difficult, given that one would have to be suicidal to play chicken with a star destroyer. But the shields held, at least, and, thanks to Artoo's lunatic piloting, they were hanging onto their lead over the TIE—just barely, but that was all they needed.

Until a single shot from the ISD put out the shields.

"Artoo, how long until we jump?"

[Fifteen seconds.]

Surely the TIE behind them would veer off. Yes, the pilot was reckless, but if they had any value for their life whatsoever, this pursuit had to stop—

[Ten seconds.]

Still the TIE pursued them—faster if anything, coming up quickly now, closing the gap—

Another spray of blasterfire took out one of their sublight engines, and the Nubian ship went into a spiral. Padmé was thrown to the side, and Artoo had to employ his rocket boosters to keep from being ripped from the astromech port and flung across the cockpit. This was it. It was a tossup whether they would smash into the ISD or be blown up by the TIE, but they were certainly not going to make it—

The ship lurched, and the last thing she saw before they reached hyperspace was the TIE, whipping away from the ISD at impossibly close range, in an impossibly tight turn.

Padmé peeled herself out of the corner into which the ship's spinning had hurled her and picked her way carefully to the copilot's seat on noodle legs. "Artoo, would you mind flying us to the next drop-and-jump point? I think I'm going to need a few hours to recover."

She sank into the seat, berating herself for undertaking the "simple, low-risk" mission to Kamino. To be fair, the Kamino part of the mission had been simple and low-risk. But somehow, everyone involved had failed to consider that it was possible that dropping out of hyperspace to make a second jump would drop one right into the middle of a conflict. And, true, she hadn't been ordered into the battle—she was fairly certain High Command would, in fact, have ordered her to stay out of it—but she couldn't just ignore a cry for help. And, thanks to her, the Rebel cell had gotten away.

All the same. She and Artoo very nearly hadn't. It was an eye-opener, apparently much needed, for it seemed that several years life on Tatooine had dulled her perception of how dangerous the Empire really was to those who opposed it. Warding off the occasional gang of pirates or slavers or Jabba's minions had been simple, compared to the battle she and Artoo had just barely made it out of alive. Maybe they should have stayed on Tatooine. Parental instinct warred with principle. Luke and Leia needed her, but so did the Alliance, but the Alliance had other agents, and her children only had one mother.

But, muttered memory, if they're going to lose you, which is not unlikely if you're an active Rebel agent, then maybe it's better if they do so before they can use their powers against those who kill you. Before it sends them down their father's path.

Arriving at Yavin IV, they had to call the base to send up a shuttle to fetch them, as Padmé absolutely refused to allow Artoo to attempt landing a ship lacking one sublight engine. "You can't even fly it in a straight line. How do you think you're going to avoid hitting something, even if you somehow manage not to completely crash?" Thus, the crippled ship was left in orbit, where it would be repaired to a landable state.

Ahsoka met them in the landing area, already running onto the field the instant the shuttle touched down. She fairly smothered Padmé in a hug as soon as she had reached the bottom of the ramp.

"Great Force, what were you thinking, engaging with a destroyer?"

"We didn't realise there would be a destroyer," Padmé replied, as soon as she had breath to speak.

Ahsoka's fearsome glare softened. "I know. I just… I just got some of my family back, and I don't want to lose you again, not yet. I mean, not ever, but—" she knew the cost of war, of course she did, "—not yet, okay?"

"I'm still here." Padmé reached up to touch Ahsoka's cheek. "Artoo and I are here. We're not planning on doing that again. We'll be okay."

Of course, they hadn't planned on doing it this time—but neither she nor Ahsoka commented on that.

Ahsoka sniffed. "Well. Command is waiting, so come and tell us about your adventure, then."

So Padmé did, with occasional commentary from Artoo. When she came to the strange TIE fighter that had led the squadrons from the star destroyer, the room stilled.

"That sounds like…" Bail's hologram looked to Ahsoka. "Fulcrum?"

She reached for her datapad, pulled up an image, and passed it to Padmé. "Is that the fighter you're talking about?"

"Yes."

"Padmé, according to our intel, that's Vader's personal fighter."

Artoo was the only one who seemed to take a favorable view of this news.

[Take that, kriffin' asthmatic clanker Imp!] he blatted, rocking back and forth in glee. He also threw in a raspberry for good measure.

Padmé, for her part, felt a return of the wobbliness that had plagued her for at least an hour after the fight. One month. They had only been off of Tatooine for one month, and already she had somehow managed to cross paths with the Sith apprentice. The only reason she had survived was that she had been accompanied by an insane astromech who once had flown with an equally insane pilot. So, Obi-Wan was a magnet for villains, and Padmé was a magnet for insane pilots. Good to know. There was now no way she was letting Luke fly before the age of fifteen. Maybe twenty. And certainly not before that Sith was eliminated, because she just knew her son would somehow manage to get into a dogfight with him.

When the too-familiar shape of the Nubian skiff disappeared into hyperspace, Vader considered—for an instant—flying onward anyway, straight into Devastator's hull. But there was no point. His Master would merely pick up the pieces and reassemble the wayward apprentice, and would probably deprive him of another piece of his dwindling autonomy at the same time. Lord Sidious had already had the control panel in Vader's suit rendered purely ornamental, when he had tried turning off the life support functions in a fit of anguish after yet another vision—or perhaps nightmare—of Her, a leathery corpse half-buried in the sand, her neck twisted at an angle he knew all too well, the soft curls of her hair bleached by the relentless suns.

The Nubian ship defending the pathetic, decrepit Rebel cargo had brought back that vivid imagery. The ship had been weather-beaten, as if it had been scoured by years' worth of desert winds, but still it had so obviously been the same make as Hers—the very sight had enraged him. How dared the pilot fly that ship—flaunt it—in front of his very eyes! He had wanted to crush its hull around the pilot inside until their effrontery was become their grave, and had only resisted because his Master would be displeased if he killed a solitary Rebel instead of interrogating them for information about their cell. But they had escaped, leaving him with nothing but the familiar ship's outline, seared across his memory, and a vow to locate and destroy them for their insolence, and their cell with them.

So it was that Vader was in an extraordinarily foul temper upon his return to Devastator. Her residents, conscripted, enlisted, and officers alike, had scattered like sands before a stiff breeze—curse the desert for being so ingrained in his very bones that its analogies still came quickest to mind—and even droids had sought shelter in the nearest maintenance closet. On the bridge, the crew was skittish, bending nervously over their various tasks, radiating fear into the Force like a herd of frightened shaak. Good. Through the Dark Side, he drew power from their fear.

One man, however—a young Axxilan—dared to approach him. This was always a risky venture, but it was especially perilous today. "My Lord?"

"Lieutenant Piett." The address was a threat all on its own.

The lieutenant paled, but he stood tall and looked Vader straight in the eye (to the best of his ability). "My Lord, the Rebel ship did not destroy all of our fighters; a good number were only crippled. Shall I dispatch crews to collect any survivors?"

That feeble-willed Rebel in the Nubian ship hadn't even been decisive enough to kill the pilots of half the TIEs they had disabled—the merciful, idealistic coward. And as for Lieutenant Piett—Vader was undecided. In his present mood, he was tempted to strangle the man for so much as daring to address him. However, it did show that the lieutenant possessed initiative, which would serve him well, and would make of him a far more effective captain than the incompetents whom Vader currently had to tolerate, the Emperor having been less than amused to find his navy going through a captain every month or so. But this inclination toward mercy for the incompetent pilots unable to deal with two Rebel ships—it would have to be trained out of him. Mercy was for the weak. It was for those who lacked the power to crush their opponents, and so had to let them go under some grand moral pretense. Skywalker would have combed the debris field for survivors until every last living vod had been collected.

Vader was not that man—that callow boy.

"No," he told Piett. "Tell the captain to set course for Ryloth."

The lieutenant's discomfort polluted the Force around him, but he was not a fool, and did not protest, merely nodding stiffly. "Sir."

Author's note: This chapter was written before I became invested in doing research for fanfic. I now know that Padmé's ship is unique in the Legends continuity, but the canon Wookieepedia page on it doesn't say, so... I guess we're going with the canon page, and saying that the dearth of information means it's plausible that the ship isn't totally unique. I kind of like the idea that the general ship model isn't unique, but hers being covered in chromium was unique. So then, as a Rebel, she paints over the chromium with some really bland greige or something to disguise it.