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Leia shoulders the burden of rebuilding the Republic. It is not her task alone, but she willingly bears most of its weight. Amidst all she has to do, she finds time to conduct the search for their mother through the incomplete (destroyed) records of the Old Republic.
She looks for their father too, but has no more luck than he did.
Ahsoka’s memories and stories are a blessing they never counted on. They help, but they do not come at regular intervals nor do they fill all the gaps.
The image of their parents slowly comes together. Pieces, which didn’t make sense before, fall into place. Old questions have answers. But answers lead only to more questions.
Luke’s heart sinks as Leia pushes aside another pile of useless datapads, “Nothing.”
Leia selects a new stack and begins the process again.
He’s only halfway through the pile in front of him, knowing in his heart it won’t yield anything.
They sit on her office floor, surrounded by documents and records; mountains of information to sort through for only a few traces.
“What if there isn’t anything else to find?”
Not taking her eyes off the screen, “There has to be.”
“You said it yourself: the Empire was good at destroying evidence of people they didn’t want to exist.”
“She was a senator – her name must be attached to all sorts of bills and legislation.”
But none of that will really tell us anything about her, he doesn’t say it aloud; he doesn’t want to discourage her.
The truth is: Luke doesn’t need this as desperately Leia does. Or, at least, he doesn’t feel like he does. He never had a mother; he doesn’t know what it is to have a mother. It was a lie, but believing she died in childbirth taught Luke to live without one.
Even Aunt Beru, though she loved him, would not stand in that place.
Unlike Leia’s foster family, Uncle Owen and Aunt Beru did not claim him as their own. It was always Uncle Owen and Aunt Beru (never anything else); as if calling him Skywalker (not Lars) would protect them, ensuring he didn’t think of them as more than they were.
They never accounted for how much he loved them anyway.
“Maybe we’re looking in the wrong place,” Leia allows, “but there has to be something more.”
He wishes he shared her determination to find all that they can. Luke wants to know, but his heart does not yearn for a mother. There’s no hole of unimaginable depth, no ache. The lie served its purpose well.
What they’ve already learned is more than he ever thought he would know.
Somewhere a clock tolls.
“We should get some rest. You won’t find anything if your exhausted.”
“You go. I’m going to stay a while longer.”
Luke exhales, but doesn’t argue. She won’t be dissuaded.
Taking one last disparaging look around the cluttered office, he leaves. The darkened corridor is deserted, but Luke is not alone. (His ghost is never far behind him now.) He doesn’t want to speak to him – to any of them. Not now. He’s tired. But they speak only when they wish to; their words should not fall on deaf ears.
“There was a time when all I wanted was to know you, to know my mother; why don’t I feel that anymore?”
“I don’t know.”
“Are we ever going to know who either of you were completely?”
“I don’t know.”
The ghost of his father moves in and out of the shadows, stopping only a few feet from him. His face partially obscured by a hood.
“Can we speak to her?”
Scars are pulled tautly; he frowns. “No.”
As in life, his specter towers over Luke, but terror no longer accompanies the looming figure. His presence is a comfort; even when he cannot provide the answers Luke and Leia seek.
“I come on her behalf tonight. There’s something she wants you to see.”
----------
In his eyes, it is the most beautiful place Luke has ever seen. Mountains on the far off horizon beckon as stars once did from the empty desert. A river cuts a narrow pass through them to the lake country.
In his heart, he knows he is home.
From the mountains peaks, he breathes in the sharp, night air. Theed sits grandly in the valley behind him. Ahead of him the landscape stretches on for miles.
He has never felt the Force as true and as real as this, not even in the ruins of the Jedi Temple.
He feels a new presence surround him too.
And he knows her warm embrace from years ago.
She points him to a place where the sky and the water meet, but he doesn’t go there – not yet.
He will come back, but he will not come back alone.
----------
“Luke, I don’t understand. What’s so important that we had to come here?”
“You wanted a new way to search for our mother and I found one. You were right; we were looking in the wrong place.”
Her brother leads her by the hand through the trees.
“We’re not going to find anything out here.”
When he suggested they come to Naboo, she thought he meant they would go to Theed, to look for more information there. Surely, their mother’s homeworld would have more records of her than the seat of the Republic.
But they didn’t go to Theed. Luke landed their ship in the middle of nowhere and they’ve been wandering through the woods for hours.
“Do you even know where you’re going?”
“Not exactly. I’m trusting my instinct.”
By ‘instinct’ he means the Force. She wonders why it doesn’t call as loudly to her.
But the moon rises and stars alight. They are a pathway in the night, she doesn’t know where they lead, but she trusts them. She knows Luke does too; he is already guided by their glow.
Though the Force may not speak so loudly to her, Leia recognizes its whisper. She quickens her pace to walk beside her brother; they both know where they are going now.
The trees thin and spread as they follow the Force’s path. Leia hears the quiet lapping of waves and finally the trees open to a clearing. A lake of deep blue lies at their feet, stars reflect on its surface.
Leia looks to Luke for some sign this is where they were meant to come; she feels in her core that it is, and Luke stands transfixed. Leia follows his gaze.
On the opposite bank sits a house so absolutely suited to the surroundings it may as well belong there.
The feeling is unmistakable: it is their mother’s house.
Her heart reaches out, elated.
The house stands empty, long forgotten by records or documentation; unoccupied for decades, it has been well-looked after. The branches of the forest shield sandstone walls and tiled cupolas from the horrors of their war-torn galaxy.
(A lost remnant of their parents.)
Leia starts forward; she wants to see it closer. Luke follows, just as eagerly; she doesn’t think he has ever been so keen in the search for their mother.
As they near, a feeling of wholeness overwhelms her; another space in her past her filled. The story is still far from complete, but they will discover so much here, about themselves, as much as their parents.
They are lost children of people lost to history.
Night wanes and the sky pales as they finally reach the house and climb the stairs onto a vast veranda.
Their father’s ghost waits for them there. (Their mother waits there too.)
Dawn stretches out over the water.
----------
She would have liked to have married in the morning, as her parents had been, with the sun peering over the mountains. But the moons and the stars bear witness to their union just well and, perhaps, even better.
Shiraya blesses them with her holy light and Anakin is home, backdropped by the heavenly sky.
The pontifex performs the ceremony with the names of ancient legend without question. His brotherhood will hold onto the only record it ever took place.
(For all the time he devotes to looking out at the stars, Anakin pays them no mind tonight. She outshines them all and he is utterly absorbed in her.)
Scars are fresh and tender on their bodies, the touch of the mechanical arm is unnatural to them both, but they are whole.
Padmé holds his gaze.
She’s his and that’s it, forever.
(He’s hers and that’s it, forever.)