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It was meant to be their last night on Theed before they separated to continue their path beyond the shadow of Queen Amidala. The day before, they had celebrated Queen Jamillia's election. At dinner, Padmé had announced she would agree to her successor’s request of becoming Senator. It would be another adventure, but the future was promising.
At five in the morning, all her retinue woke up to her screams.
Sabé and the handmaidens fell from their beds in nightwear and with disheveled hair. They were only two steps behind the bodyguards on duty, Captain Tonra on point, their blaster out.
As they burst in their former Queen’s bedroom, dark and spacious, they only found a distressed and heaving Padmé, her cry turned into heavy sobbing.
“Padmé,” Sabé shouted, passing by the hesitant guards to run at her friend’s side. “What’s wrong?!” She reached for Padmé’s shoulders, brushing her skin where the nightgown had fallen on her arms. She nearly recoiled in surprise. “She’s burning!” she told the others.
“And she vomited,” Cordé realized as they turned the lights on.
A guard ran to call for a doctor.
“Padmé, can you hear me?” Sabé insisted when her friend failed to answer and stared into space without stopping a mix of sobbing and whimpering completely unlike her.
Padmé had rarely been sick, but it had never been like that. She had always been in control of herself and stubbornly wanted to keep working. Sabé thought she could vaguely hear some whimpers sounding like “Ani” or “Ni”, whatever that meant.
“She looks and sounds delirious,” Sabé told Dormé when she came back from the bathroom with a glass of water and a wet cloth. “Her fever must be bad.”
Dormé wiped Padmé’s face tenderly, frowning at her state. “She was perfectly fine yesterday... It might be poison.”
“Now? When she’s no longer Queen?”
“Someone might not want her to become Senator.”
They fell silent when Cordé came back with a thermometer, but their worry increased when she gave the result: “Past forty Celsius. We need to get the fever down. Now.”
The doctor arrived a few minutes later with Captain Tanaka, whose immediate thought was of poison as well.
None could be identified.
Padmé stayed sick for several weeks, but no explanation could be found other than a “delayed case of burnout”. Her recovery was slow, and she disappeared from public view.
She did not become Senator. Amidala was gone.
She was but a shadow of herself.
A shadow with a mission.
oOo
The message Obi-Wan had received was mysterious and limpid at the same time: a request for a meeting, a time and a place, with back-up if he wished but not his padawan, all of that in exchange for information on the Sith he had fought years ago. It was a message sent to his comlink directly, from a disposable one.
The meeting place was unlike any Obi-Wan ever had experienced over years of missions: an aquarium on Alderaan. For such dealings, he expected something shadier. However, he understood better when he reached the exact meeting point. This aquarium had a “deepwater tunnel” with very low light to recreate life conditions in the deep sea. There were benches in the middle where you could sit and admire the luminescent sea life, but you could barely see your neighbor.
It was early in the morning, just after the opening hour, and the tunnel was empty. Obi-Wan glanced at Master Koon, who nodded in support and hid in a corner, leaving him to sit on a bench and wait.
Two minutes later, he saw them coming, their dark cloak unnecessary enough in this environment that they couldn’t be anyone else than his contact. Their silhouette was short and slender, but human-shaped.
They moved with the slight rustling of light but thick clothes. Their feet were silent on the carpet. Without a word or hesitation, they sat on the other end of Obi-Wan’s bench, although facing opposite and with their face down, the glint of a mask showing briefly.
The Jedi frowned. Despite all the mystery, they felt familiar to him, as if he had met them before… a long time ago, maybe. He tried to find a hint from their clothes: they were of high quality with a flattering cut but no apparent decoration. Someone with some means trying to be inconspicuous then...
“You wished to see me?” he asked, trying to start the conversation.
“Thank you for coming,” a distorted low voice replied. A small, gloved hand came out of the cloak and put down a datapad between them. “This is everything you need to know.”
Obi-Wan didn’t reach for it, knowing better than to spook someone who seemed intent on hiding. “How did you come upon that information?”
There was a long silence as his informer clenched their hands and curled them on their lap. “At a high cost,” they finally replied. “Make good use of it. The life of the one you love the most depends on it.”
They rose. Obi-Wan followed, taking care of not being too fast and grabbing the datapad with him. “How may I contact you?”
“You shouldn’t.”
“I’ll have questions.”
“You will,” they agreed with their back to him, speaking in profile with the hood covering them. “I included the identity of those who have the answers.” They walked away as a large colorful jellyfish passed over them.
“Please,” he called, taking only one step forward. “I can sense you're troubled. Let me help.”
“You can help by stopping them, Master Kenobi,” they replied without stopping. “May the Force be with you.”
Obi-Wan could feel the Force curling around them, but as his informant disappeared he failed to identify them, and the occasion passed. Rubbing his beard in thought, he nearly forgot the datapad until Master Koon joined him and looked at it questioningly. Raising it high so they could see despite the poor light, Obi-Wan cursed when a password was requested.
“They didn’t give me any!”
“Not even a hint?”
Obi-Wan frowned. The only thing that had stood out to him was... their remark on ‘the one who he loved the most’ and… they had insisted on his padawan’s absence, making him important, somehow.
Hesitant, he tapped “Anakin”.
The datapad unlocked and with it a mountain of secrets he would have never imagined. This wasn’t just a few tips. These were dozens of files (at a glance, he noticed ‘Kamino’, ‘Jango Fett’, ‘Count Dooku’, 'Geonosis', ‘Grievous’ and ‘Ventress’ among others) organized like a mind map around one named “Darth Sidious”.
Wide-eyed, Obi-Wan looked up to Plo Koon who hummed in interest.
“So, we have a name… let’s see what we can do with that, now, mh?”
oOo
“Master?”
Obi-Wan raised two fingers in a request for silence as his attention wandered to the surrounding people. He had just felt… he still couldn’t put a name on it, but it was them, their informant. He had made sure to memorize their peculiar presence, untrained but marked by the Force.
Anakin shifted impatiently by his side. The celebration of the treaty with the Confederacy of Independent Systems was in full swing, and he was looking forward to the buffet and the honors after helping to defeat Darth Sidious, the man who had manipulated him since childhood.
Obi-Wan turned and squeezed his shoulders. “I’m sorry, Anakin. I have to find someone and have a few words. Go ahead, and I’ll be with you in a moment.” Before his stubborn student could protest, Obi-Wan slipped away toward one of the exits. He could feel them leave toward a landpad, and he had to speed up to a jog.
He caught sight of their slender silhouette, cloaked in navy blue, and reaching a speeder. The pilot and a woman had been waiting for them and straightened. The woman looked familiar.
Naboo. The handmaidens.
It clicked.
“Padmé!”
The cloaked silhouette froze and turned around slowly, most of her face hidden by the hood, but her reaction was an admission, and she knew it. She waited for him.
“It was you,” he breathed out in surprise.
“Master Kenobi,” she murmured. She was not wearing a mask or a voice device. Her face, bathed in shadows, looked pale and tired. “Congratulations on your success.”
“It was only possible thanks to your information. Everything you shared… How? How did you learn about it? What happened, Padmé? I heard you had gotten sick at the end of your terms…”
“It was… more complicated than that.”
“I feel that.” He frowned and reached for her. “You hurt so much. I felt it in the aquarium too. What did—”
She took a step back and started to turn around. “I do not wish to talk about it.”
He raised his hands in a show of appeasement. “As you wish, but… is there anything I can do to help you?”
She looked back at him, observing, considering, and finally looked up enough that their eyes could meet. There was a sea of pain and sorrow to be found in her, but calm and resignation as well.
“You already did,” she replied softly, her lips stretching slightly. “Thank you, Obi-Wan.”
“For what?”
“For saving Anakin.”
Frowning, certain he was missing something, he offered nonetheless: “Do you want to see him? I can call—”
“No,” she replied, too fast. “I’m not the one he remembers, and he’s not the one I know. It’s better for us both if we stay away from each other.”
“I can’t pretend I understand, but if you’re sure...”
She nodded, determined. “Farewell, Obi-Wan.” She turned around, and he knew there was no holding her back.
oOo
A year later, Obi-Wan lowered his starfighter on a landing pad in Naboo's countryside. The lakeside house was not too outlandish, but beautiful like every piece of architecture on this planet always was.
Sabé was waiting for him, and he jumped down from the cockpit to her side.
"Thank you for coming, Master Kenobi."
"Of course. I owe Padmé more than I can say, but you weren't very specific in your message. How may I help?" he asked, smoothing back his hair and getting his robe back in order.
"I'm not really sure," she admitted with a sigh. "All I know is that we already tried everything we could think of, and you're the only other person she talked to in years. You're our only hope."
She gestured for him to follow her, and he fell into steps by her side.
"What's going on?" he asked, frowning.
"This stays between us. The public can't know."
"Of course."
"She's depressed since her... sickness, but lately it's worse. The medicine doesn't work as well as it used to, and we fear the worst."
He had been concerned about something like this. The last time he had seen her, he had felt her misery, but unfortunately... "I'm not sure what I can do, I'm no healer," he warned softly.
"No doctor has been able to help her, Master Kenobi, and we have tried a dozen over the years. I don't think that's what she needs. She speaks of the Jedi with great fondness and has done a lot of research on the Force. That's why I called you. I think we're missing something, and that only someone like you could understand what."
"Then, I'll try my best," he promised.
They passed through rooms richly decorated but also filled with rare books and datachips. Obi-Wan could see here signs of the shrew mind who had gathered more evidence against the Sith's plan than all the Jedi Order combined.
"Did you help her in her... research over the years?"
"You mean, in her obsession?" Sabé asked bitterly. "The psychiatrists told us not to encourage her, to try to distract her from it. We did, at first, but it just made things worse. She got angry at us and isolated from us. In the end, I decided to trust her. Tonra and I followed her, wherever she wanted. Tatooine, Alderaan, Coruscant... even Dathomir."
Obi-Wan startled. "Dathomir?"
"Don't ask me what she wanted to do there. She spent one hour convincing the locals not to kill us, somehow managed that feat, and got a long interview with their Clan Mother. Then she came back and we left quickly."
Obi-Wan rubbed his beard thoughtfully. He had wondered how Padmé could have gotten so many details about Ventress and Maul, but if she had talked to the Nightsisters' leader directly, it explained a few things... and brought many other questions.
"And Tatooine?"
"We went to find Shmi Skywalker. It took us weeks, and then Padmé had to negotiate with her and her husband, Clieg Lars, so they would move away from Tatooine. They didn't want to accept what they saw as charity, but Padmé convinced them it was best for their children... all of them."
Obi-Wan's eyebrows climbed up in surprise. "Shmi reached out to me, to let us know she had safely moved to Karlinus, but she never mentioned Padmé."
"That was Padmé's only condition: that Anakin never learned who had helped his family," Sabé explained with a shrug. "Once she met you at the aquarium on Alderaan, suddenly everything stopped. We came back to Naboo, and she was glued to the holonet until Chancellor Palpatine's death and the treaty with the CIS."
They arrived at a patio overlooking the lake. A small figure was curled up on a deck chair with a datapad.
"She doesn't know I called you," Sabé warned him before leaving — to keep an eye on them from afar, no doubt.
Obi-Wan walked along the edge of the patio slowly, admiring the scenery briefly before focusing on Padmé. She looked just as tired as he remembered her. It was so jarring. She used to be a teenager commanding respect for her determination. The adult seemed determined to make herself forgotten.
She needed a moment to notice him. When she did, she startled violently before standing. The fluid pastel dress she wore pooled around her in a way that would have once been elegant but now just made her look like she wanted to hide.
"Obi— Master Kenobi," she greeted him. "What brings you here?"
He chose to be honest, figuring this was the best way to get (and more importantly to keep) her trust: "Sabé called me. She worries about you."
Padmé held her datapad in front of her as if it could shield her. "I know," she admitted, "but she shouldn't have bothered you, I apologize."
"Don't, please," he replied, stepping closer. "I worry for you too."
"There is—" She stopped before she could pronounce such a blatant lie as 'there is no need to'. "There is nothing you can do."
"Sabé mentioned your interest in the Jedi and the Force. Is there something you'd like to talk about, maybe?"
She hesitated, put down the datapad on a table, and walked past him to the edge of the patio where the view of the lake was the most beautiful. Obi-Wan turned to see her but didn't move, worried about spooking her.
"You wouldn't believe me," she said after a few minutes.
He took it as an invitation and walked to her side. "Padmé... The information you gave me... There was so much, and I admit that I doubted some of it many times, but each time you were right. Believe me when I say I stopped doubting you years ago. Please... talk to me."
She met his eyes, looking for sincerity. When she found it, she reached for him. "Would you walk with me?"
"I'd love to," he replied, taking her hand.
They walked down the steps to the lake's edge, arm in arm. As they did, she told him of the night she woke up after she died, and of the life she had left behind. They sat by the water, and Padmé removed her shoes as she told him of her love for Anakin and its heart-breaking end. He squeezed her hand and stared at a black swan passing by as he learned of a fate that could have been his padawan's. She leaned into his shoulder as she spoke of the twins she had given birth to and had never been able to hold. And as she finally burst into tears, sobbing and shaking, he held her, stroked her hair, and let it all bleed out. He waited a long moment after she had calmed down and exhausted herself to sleep, taking the time to find his own peace before he gathered her in his arms and carried her up the stairs.
Sabé was waiting for them. She stared at the tear tracks on her best friend's face with sorrow. "Did she talk to you?"
"Yes," Obi-Wan simply replied, because her confidence could never be shared, with anyone.
Sabé accepted it and led him to Padmé's bedroom.
At dinner that day, the three of them ate together with Tonra (introduced as Sabé's fiancé and Padmé's bodyguard) and spoke of everything but what Padmé had gone through: the peace, the Republic, the clones, Naboo and the Jedi... It went peacefully, and Padmé smiled a few times.
"It's the most talkative she has been in years," Sabé confided to Obi-Wan afterward. "You have to stay."
He hadn't been planning to leave.
One week became two and then three during which he spent hours with Padmé near the lake, sometimes talking of that other life, sometimes of the present, and sometimes simply resting side by side.
Twenty standard days after his arrival, Obi-Wan was called back by the Order. During a boat ride, he announced he had to leave for Coruscant the next day. She nodded and looked away but wasn't surprised.
He watched her silently as he rowed back to the shore. "Do you think of the future sometimes?"
"I do," she admitted softly.
"What are you looking forward to?"
"I'd like to be a mother."
"You'd be a good one," he assured with a soft smile.
"I don't think I could be a good wife. I don't think I really want to be one, or to be with anyone," she admitted with a haunted look she sometimes got when she remembered what she had lost.
"That's alright. You could get a donor or adopt."
She hummed, considering the thought for a moment with a cheek in her hand. "Yes. I'd like that, I think."
As he helped her out of the boat a few minutes later, Padmé rested a hand on his chest and asked him softly: "Would you consider being a donor, Obi-Wan?"
The request surprised him, and he asked for time to consider an answer. After dinner, he told her yes, and the next day, before leaving Naboo, they passed by a medical center.
oOo
"Obi-Wan? Master!"
"Mh?"
Anakin groaned in annoyance and stomped to Obi-Wan's chair to glance at what had his complete attention.
"A baby? Who sent you a holo of a baby?" Anakin asked, baffled.
Ahsoka, Rex and Cody gathered around, curious.
"Oh, do you remember Padmé from Naboo?" Obi-Wan asked distractedly.
"The Queen? Yeah," Anakin replied, frowning. "Are you telling me this is her baby?"
"Indeed. She gave birth to a daughter a few days ago."
"She's cute," Ahsoka commented, watching the infant held in the arms of someone whose face couldn't be seen.
"Why is she sending you a holo?" Anakin insisted.
Obi-Wan finally looked up and noticed who he was talking to. After a blink and a hesitation, he remembered Padmé's words and complaints that secrets had ruined the boy she had loved. He would never let his Anakin become that man who had once been able to choke the woman he loved.
Obi-Wan smiled tentatively and then mischievously as he admitted: "Oh, you know, because she's half of me."
"Ah, good one," Anakin scoffed with a roll of his eyes. He walked away and grabbed his discarded cup of caf. "No need to mock me, it's a legitimate question." He sipped his drink with a scowl.
Cody, more astute, glanced at the baby and then at his friend. "You're the father."
"Genetically, yes," Obi-Wan confirmed peacefully with a soft smile. "I'm told she has my eyes."
The caf went the wrong way. Anakin choked and tried to shout a thousand questions at the same time. Ahsoka patted his back but was just as distracted and baffled.
Chuckling to himself, Obi-Wan zoomed the holo out to see Padmé's bright smile. It was such a beautiful thing. Their daughter would be dearly loved, no doubt.
"What's her name?" Rex asked.
"Hope."