Chapter Text
“Hey, Skyguy. Do you feed the press these lines yourself?”
Anakin smiled at the nickname and looked away from the passing city street outside of the window and towards the seat facing him where Ahsoka is waving today’s newspaper in his face to get his attention.
“I don’t have to, ‘Soka,” he plucks the folded paper out of her hands, “I really am just that great.” He looks down at the paper and ignores the gagging noise that she makes.
“They are being exceptionally kind this time around,” Shmi chimes in from the seat next to him.
He is thankful that his valet only sent along the Tatooine State paper. Unlike the more conservative domestic papers (and every other foreign paper) it focuses only on his coronation.
“Exceptionally kind and exceptionally boring. How many other papers do you think have this exact same headline?” he smiles as his mother snaps her head from where it was gazing out of the window and glares into his shit eating grin. He holds up the paper and shows her the headline before looking down at it himself.
The Boy Who Would Be King!
How trite.
Reading the headline in a memo from the public relations team the evening before hadn’t prepared him for the full page photo of him.
He looked damn good in the black Tatooine Air Defenders uniform. There was no doubt about that. The golden braided aiguillettes that represented his two tours in the royal military fall from where they are pinned under the epaulet on his right shoulder into the golden buttons of the dress uniform. They drape over the eight pointed silver and gold star of Ghomrassen. Ribbons of green, purple, blue, and yellow hang on the left side of his chest, weighted down by a few medals customarily given to the heir apparent. A high red collar decorated with gold filigree climbs up to just below his adams apple and keeps his chin high.
Damn good.
He stops admiring himself and looks up at Ahsoka, who has her eyebrows raised. Had she asked a question? He looks over to Shmi, but she has gone back to looking out of the car window. There was no way Ahsoka could tell that he had been admiring his own picture, was there? She was good, but she wasn’t a mind-reader.
“I look like an idiot,” he deflects, folding the newspaper in half and placing it on the seat between him and his mother. Ahsoka rolls her eyes and picks up her phone.
Shmi picks it up from the quilted leather of the seat between her and Anakin and unfolds the paper to get a glance at the whole photo.
“Don’t say that, sweetie. You’ve had worse photos in the paper, remember your spring break trip to Cabo?”
“Thanks Mom,” he huffs and reaches over to take the paper from her. She holds it out of his reach. In their town car, this means that she’s against the door of the car, holding the paper between her head and the window. He retreats strategically into his own seat so that he can try again after her guard is down.
“I mean it,” she laughs as she holds the paper up towards him and looks between the paper version of him and the one in the seat next to her. “The only thing keeping this from being an official photo is how bored you look. When do you think this was taken? Not during one of my speeches, no?”
Anakin swipes for the paper, but Shmi is faster (when the fuck did his mother get reflexes like that?) and pulls it away again.
Ahsoka laughs and looks up from her phone, mouth open to tattle on him, her lips pulled into a shit eating grin. Anakin shoots her a look that has her closing her mouth quickly and sinking back into her seat.
Two months ago, Shmi had secured a continued trade agreement with Geonosis, the country that bordered them to the south, and hosted a state dinner to celebrate.
In his own defense, it wasn’t Shmi’s remarks (which clocked in at just over two and a half minutes) that made him look like a mindless twit as much as it had been the twenty minute long speech given by the Tatooine minister of trade.
Anakin, forced to stand beside his mother and the minister at the front of the ballroom that had hosted the cocktail hour, had valiantly followed along with the minister’s speech for the first ten minutes. When the minister took a five minute tangent on agricultural trade precedents during the last war between Geonosis and Arkanis, Anakin wanted to scream.
Tatooine hadn’t even been a part of the Geonosian war!
Instead of storming out or breaking down and asking the royal guard to put him out of his misery, he had made his spine rigid and let his eyes glaze over. He hadn’t heard another word until his mother, the smartest woman alive, took advantage of an extended pause and led a round of applause.
He wouldn’t have noticed a meteor crashing through the ceiling in those ten minutes, much less his photo being taken. At least he looked good when he was bored.
Anakin sighed and held his hand out for the paper, “No. I’d tell you if you were that boring Mom, promise.” He grinned widely. She narrowed her eyes and gently slapped the paper into his hands.
Silence filled the back seat of the car as the three of them retreated back into their own thoughts.
~O~
A few minutes later their car rolled to a stop in front of the National Museum of Art. The crowd that had gathered was a mix of reporters, photographers, the royal family honor guard, and excited members of the public.
Shmi smiled out the car window and the flashes blinded Anakin from the other side of the back seat. She turned her back to the artificial lights and faced her children.
“Alright my lovelies, game faces on.”
Ahsoka placed her phone in her clutch and nodded seriously at Shmi. They both looked at Anakin.
He smiled charmingly at them and gestured towards where an attendant was standing ready to open the car door. “Ladies first.”
Anakin felt like he must have met every citizen of Tatooine by the time that the trio made it into the atrium of the museum. His eyes slowly adjusted from the harsh sun and flashbulbs of the paparazzi to focus on a small elderly woman waiting to greet them.
Madame Nu was a head shorter than Anakin, always had her white hair pulled back into a tight bun, and wore warm and comfortable - but professional- clothing. If he didn’t know any better, he might have thought that she was a grandmother getting ready to show her grandchildren around the museum.
But Anakin knew better.
Madame Nu had been the director of the royal archives longer than Anakin could remember. Maybe even before he was born. She had been born a Duchess and managed never to marry despite the wishes of her parents.
Anakin hated gossip, but even he had heard the nasty rumors among the court. They said that her mother had gone to her deathbed cursing her for ending their family line. He didn’t like to speculate, but he couldn’t help but notice that the Duchess was quick to brutally redirect conversations around what would happen to the family Duchy after her death.
Madame Nu had terrified Anakin since he was young. She was the only one in the royal household - outside of his parents- who had ever scolded him. At this point, he couldn’t remember what he had done as a child that had pissed her off enough that she still carried a grudge.
If it weren’t for her title as Duchess and Royal Archivist, Anakin was sure that she would have attempted to murder him by now, royal guards be damned.
Shmi walks forward and grasps Madame Nu’s hand with both of hers, Ahsoka sticking close to their mother.
“Your Majesty, welcome. Your highness,” Jocasta greets both of them with a smile and a curtsy.
“Madame Nu, I’m excited to see the hard work that your team has put into this project,” Shmi pointedly doesn’t look at Ahsoka as she sneaks a quick hug from the stern Duchess. Though the few photographers that Madame Nu has allowed to be present from the archive staff do catch her fond expression.
Anakin stands back as his mother discusses the few final details of the public event tomorrow, not at all perturbed that he hasn’t been greeted yet. It’s almost a game that he and Madame Nu have between them, to see who will be forced to greet the other first.
The old goat, stubborn to a fault, hasn’t let him win.
Nevermind that in two weeks time he will be her King and that, by tradition, members of the royal family should always be greeted first by lower ranking nobility. It’s become some of the only fun he’s had in the past six months as everyone realized that his mother was serious about her abdication.
The pages and office clerks that had been some of his only friends in the palace even told him that they found it hard to see the kid that bummed cigarettes and filched alcohol from the kitchens as the king that they would be beholden to. Even that small group, something that was built solely on his own merit, started to pull away as he took on more responsibility.
He closed his eyes and started counting his breaths.
Madame Nu gestures to let Shmi and Ahsoka take the lead toward the wing of the museum that holds the Hall of Royal Portraits. She takes a few sure steps with his mother and slows slightly to turn her head back to Anakin.
“Your highness,” Madame Nu said, addressing Ahsoka, “Please tell your brother to stay close. We wouldn’t want any mishaps.”
At least some things don’t have to change right away.
“Of course Madame Nu. I’m right behind you.” Ahsoka falls back to walk with Anakin. He offers her his arm and they follow behind their mother.
“She’ll never forgive you,” Ahsoka tells him.
Anakin leans down to whisper conspiratorially (he’s just paranoid enough by Madame Nu acknowledging him first to want to keep an eye on her) “There’s nothing to forgive. I broke one - one!- plate in her personal collection. Fifteen years ago. It wasn’t even an antique, I’m pretty sure it was from Perigold.”
Ahsoka laughs quietly and puts a finger up to his face to keep him from getting any louder, “I’m talking about the fire in the -”
Anakin rears back and places a hand on his chest in mock offense, cutting her off, “You would shush your -”
“Soon-to-be king,” she barely makes it through the interruption while trying to laugh quietly enough not to get Madame Nu or Shmi’s attention.
“King. And I think maybe my first decree as king should be -”
“If you say a fucking word about my Foil grip-”
“Your grip isn’t the problem! No, you know what, it actually is because who uses a Russian grip on a Foil, but it doesn’t matter because the Sabre is obviously-”
“My dears,” Shmi’s voice cracks through their argument, raised more to get their attention than with anything to say. She gestures for them to straighten out of the hunched huddle that they’ve ended up in.
“Ahsoka, please don’t get him riled up. We have a full day after this.”
Anakin sighed and tried not to think about the two page schedule sitting on his desk at home. It was still a considerably lighter schedule than he’d had in the last few months as he attended policy discussions, parliament sessions, and sat with speech writers. The preparation was done, all that was left was the two week celebration-slash-press tour before he would assume the crown.
He’s spent his entire life preparing for this moment. Twenty-five years of his tutors, mentors, and peers all being picked with quiet precision by his mother and members of parliament to ensure that he grew into the type of man that could assume this role when asked. It was an honor and privilege to be born into this, they all told him. He was lucky, being given this gift, his life had purpose and meaning. Birth, Crown, marriage, kids. He was on a track that he would follow until…
Well, until he died.
His mother had followed the plan without question her entire life until nine years ago. Unil Qui-Gon Jinn came along.
He could do this. He had to do this. A lot more than just the country was depending on him doing well.
~O~
The four came to a stop in front of a covered frame on the wall. Madame Nu moved away from the three of them so that the photographers would have better sightlines and gestured for the attendants that had been waiting next to the portrait to remove the cover.
The sheet fluttered to the ground and shutters clicked. Shmi raised her right hand to her mouth and tears filled her eyes. Ahsoka, to her left, took her other hand into both of hers.
Anakin looked at the portrait.
His mother had sat for the artist for a few hours one evening in her study three months ago. Most modern portraits were photos, but Shmi had invited one of Tatooine’s foremost artists to paint her official portrait. It had taken most of the afternoon and a portion of the evening for the artist to gather all of the reference photos that she would need and two and a half months to finalize the painting, but the results were worth the extra time.
His mother was posed working at the desk, papers and her laptop joined by family photos. The artist had set the portrait to catch Shmi turning to the viewer in semi-profile, catching most of the right side of her face. The desk, normally a frantic mess only kept semi-organized by the four secretaries that Shmi kept, had minimal paperwork - really only what Shmi held, a few pages underneath, and a large stack in the outgoing pile.
The part that had even Anakin - and if the subtle swipe at her face was any indication, Madame Nu, - tearing up was that the artist had included his father, posed in opposite profile, sitting in the chair that his mother kept against the side of her desk.
Anakin himself had sat in that chair before. He had walked in on Ahsoka in that chair, sometimes in deep conversation with their mother but more often dozing with her head on the table. It was the chair that she kept so that they could meet with her without sitting across the desk. A signal of both the separation that came with being the sole ruler, and how much Shmi valued her relationship with her children. They were the only two that used it now, but once it had only been his.
“This is much more than I expected,” Shmi didn’t let her voice waver with any of the grief that was plain on her face.
The photographers circled to the back of the family, initial reactions forever captured. Family memories and heartache forever placed in the annals of their country’s history.
Anakin wondered what his face would tell future historians. What thoughts or feelings they would prescribe to the young prince being reminded of his dead father on the eve of his coronation.
He couldn’t figure it out himself.
“Oh, Anakin.” Shmi took her left hand in Ahsoka’s grip and replaced it with her right. Her left arm came around Ahsoka to grip Anakin’s shoulder. “You look so much like Cliegg.”
Anakin’s hand came up to his shoulder to hold onto hers. His gaze never left the portrait. A young blonde, forever thirty-four, Cliegg Lars gazed lovingly at his mother. Growing up, Anakin couldn’t understand why everyone would always mention how young he had been when he died. Nine years old, Anakin had assumed that thirty-four was plenty of time to live. Ancient even. Now at twenty-five, he could appreciate the tragedy.
“You know, we met when he was only a few years older than you, Anakin. You wouldn’t believe how scandalous it was; me, only nineteen, marrying a man a decade older than me.” Shmi was smiling now and had turned her head to look at Anakin.
“So soon after I took the throne too. They all worried that he would use me as a puppet,” she scoffs. “I have yet to meet a man who hates politics more than your father did. He was so happy when my advisors told him that he would have to relinquish any claim to the throne in Dantooine.”
“Dad didn’t like being king consort?” Ahsoka asked. She had been born three months after their father died. Anakin, only three at the time, couldn’t help but be curious too.
He’d heard stories about his dad from other people in the court, but few who had been close to him. Shmi rarely talked about him and the five years that the two had been married.
Tears freely flowed down Shmi’s face now.
Anakin pulled the pale beige handkerchief from his blazer pocket and passed it to his mother.
“Thank you darling.”
She gently dabs at her face and Anakin turns his head to subtly motion the photographers away. Jocasta has her own tissue to her face now and grabs the arm of the attendant closest to her to lead them away.
The room cleared of all but the three family members, Shmi blows her nose properly and gives a small laugh.
“He absolutely hated it. The pressure of the role, the attention that we got anytime we set foot outside our house,” She looks back up to the dead man in the portrait.
“He sacrificed so much just to marry me. Before we met, the only time his name had been in a newspaper was when he was born.”
She looked at Anakin, “Don’t get me wrong, he loved that he could really help people. He really liked being in charge of the crown’s charitable giving.”
Anakin looked down, unable to hold her gaze.
“But the other stuff; all of the meetings and legislation, the members of parliament that are only out for their own self-interests. He absolutely detested it. He wanted to be out helping people or flying, both if he could figure out how.”
“You don’t even realize how similar you are to him, Anakin. Sometimes I hear you speak and look up expecting to see him.”
Anakin looked up again at his mother. He barely remembered Cliegg, knew so little about him because of how much his loss still resonated with everyone that knew him personally.
And yet, everything that he considered his - even the way he spoke - came back to him.
“I’ll never forgive myself for forcing him into this life that he hated.”
She turned fully to Anakin, looking up to him with her eyes red and puffy. Her tone turned hard, “I know I’ve told you this before Anakin, but you don’t have to do this yet. I can wait if you need more time before you're ready. I can talk to Qui-Gon. He’s so patient, he’ll understand.”
Anakin turned and brought her into his arms for a hug. Ahsoka, caught in between the two of them, squirmed in mock protest.
“Mom, you deserve to be happy. You’ve given up so much, I’m happy to do this for you.”
“I just don’t want you to resent me for forcing you to do this.”
Did she think that? That she was forcing him to do this?
They had this conversation last year after Qui-Gon had brought him and Ahsoka aside during a family dinner and asked for their permission to propose to Shmi. Ahsoka had happily given her blessing and ran out of the room to ‘definitely not tell mom’.
That had left Anakin to break the news to Qui-Gon. By law, anyone ruling or in the immediate line of succession for the throne in Tatooine could not marry outside of a member of the landed gentry.
Qui-gon had been disappointed, but nodded and accepted that he could never marry Shmi. Anakin had not been convinced that was the end of their story. His mother had already taken enough of the burden for him.
Shmi hadn’t been convinced of their plan easily - barely at all and only with Qui-Gon’s help. Anakin knew that she didn’t think he could handle it.
Maybe he couldn’t.
He became aware of his own heart beating loudly in his chest. He closed his eyes and tried to slow his breathing in the rhythmic way that his therapist had recommended. He stepped back from Smi and Ahsoka, suddenly feeling like he couldn’t catch his breath.
“Anakin?”
Ahsoka was too young, barely 22. He wouldn’t put this on her. He couldn’t put this pressure on her. He had lived his entire life knowing that he would become king. He had been raised for it. His classes and tutors and years of formal international and domestic education couldn’t be put to waste because he was nervous he wouldn’t like being king.
“Anakin.”
“I just need a second,” he managed.
He hadn’t even done well in school. Hadn’t completed more than a semester of college before joining the Royal Air Defense. All the papers had said for months after was how he was a flunkie, needing special tutors to keep his attention and make sure that he wasn’t too dumb to run the country when it was his turn.
It was his turn.
Oh fuck.
“I’m going to - I need to - “
He opened his eyes and looked at his sister. Ahsoka had her eyebrows furrowed and had dipped her head to look better at his face. She had grabbed his arm at some point when he had his eyes closed. He looked away from her and up to his mother. Shmi was now looking at him with concern.
She knew he couldn’t do this.
“Restroom,” the word was shortened by his sudden outburst, sounding more like ‘rstrm’ than an actual word.
He turned abruptly away from the two of them and marched out of the hall. He kept his steps even and purposeful until he passed the guards at the entrance and quickened his pace into the next wing of the museum.
~O~
No one had ever accused Anakin Skywalker, Prince of Tatooine, of being indifferent to art. No one had to, everyone knew. He hadn’t been to the National Museum in years; hadn’t wanted to attend any of the new gallery openings or galas held there.
Consequently, he had no clue where he was or where he was going.
Surely the restrooms had to be clearly marked with some light up sign or otherwise. Even that old demon Jocasta couldn’t get around building codes.
Anakin walked for another minute and found two things; One, there weren’t any bathrooms in this entire wing of the building. Two, the green light up ‘exit’ sign proved that even Jocasta Nu had to conform to the Royal Corps of Engineers.
The sign mocked him. All he wanted was a moment alone to compose himself. A confined space to build back the mental fortitude that had gotten him this far; that had convinced him to talk his mother into being selfish and marrying the first man she had loved since his father died. Even if it meant that things would change. His mother deserved to be happy. To think of herself for once.
Anakin could do this.
He just needed a moment.
The exit sign didn’t blink at him - Madame Nu would never have allowed a faulty light in one of her facilities. He stared at the green light and the two-page schedule danced in the back of his mind.
He could take one day, just one, to himself before his entire life changed.
He slipped his phone from the inside pocket of his blazer.
Getting some fresh air. I’ll be home tonight.
He sent the text over to Ahsoka and then turned off his phone as he stepped through the door.