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The frigate, Snowhawk, shudders as it descends through Orto Plutonia’s atmosphere. Senator Amidala stands by the viewport with both hands clasped — posture straight despite the frigid air creeping through their ship’s thermal seals. Her white coat at least has a dense synth-fur lining, in any case, aside from its silver embroidery.
The command deck buzzes with tension meanwhile. Republic officers mutter to each other in low tones. Clone troopers brusquely attend to their tasks. Even Threepio hovers far too close “Mistress Padmé. I must inform you that my internal sensors indicate the surface temperatures here are below a tolerable threshold for most humanoids.”
“Thank you, Threepio.” Anakin steps up beside her, his cloak still dusted with flurries from inspecting the shuttle’s hull “… but I’m sure we can handle it.”
Padmé gives him a sidelong glance without so much as blinking. “Coming from someone who complains about the temperature in my apartment every time he visits?”
He smiles. “That’s different.”
“How so?”
“Perhaps,” her husband Jedi protector leans in and pitches his voice low enough so only she can hear him “I just say that so you’ll keep me warm.”
The young woman’s lips twist into a smirk whilst — still hovering — Threepio’s photoreceptors flicker, all too scandalised “… I wish you two would remember that my auditory sensors are regrettably excellent.”
Behind them, in any case, doors hiss open and two Pantoran dignitaries sweep inside with all the briskness of those who have stewed for far too long. Chief Liaison Taris Varr approaches them first and bows curtly “Senator Amidala. General Skywalker. We appreciate the Chancellor’s swift response to our Assembly’s request.” His eyes flick toward Padmé’s ornate attire. “Though I’m not sure you fully grasp the severity of the conditions below.”
Anakin arches an eyebrow and folds his arms just as she offers a diplomatic smile. “I am here to serve the interests of peace, Chief Liaison Varr. I understand Pantora has concerns regarding recent border incidents.”
“Incidents?” He gawps “Two of our scouts vanished near Talz territory. Entire outposts were found abandoned. These savages have grown too bold!”
His deputy, a younger Pantoran named Vasso, steps forward to offer them each a datapad then. Padmé nods and quickly looks over the reports for whatever new details she hasn’t already studied earlier. “Outposts were ordered to maintain a specific distance from Talz territory,” she comments “Why were they moved?”
Varr hesitates. “They were conducting… perimeter checks,” he answers at last “The Talz grow increasingly aggressive. We needed a better sense of their movements.”
Padmé shuts the datapad and coolly meets his eyes. “You needed leverage.” She carries on even as they bristle at the flatness of her tone. “I’ve reviewed your transmission logs. They interpreted the outpost expansions as a threat.”
“Well, they are wrong because the outposts have merely been fortified. We cannot protect our borders blind.”
“Nevertheless.” Padmé gently interrupts “Intent does not erase perception — and that is what shapes conflict.”
A beat of silence follows until Vasso sighs. “We were hoping that your reputation for bridging… difficult divides, Senator, would earn an audience with Chieftain Thi-Sen.”
“Has the Talz leader given any terms?”
Both Pantorans exchange uncomfortable looks.
Anakin furrows his brow “What is it?”
Varr releases an obviously beleaguered exhale. “He demands that our mediator prove their sincerity through an ancient Talz rite.” Vasso taps his holopad and a projection flickers to life — a frozen river marked with an upright crystal outcropping. “This is their sacred site where many have attempted the Walk of Harmony.”
“Sounds dangerous,” Anakin murmurs.
“It is,” Vasso adjusts their holo to highlight exactly how far the path stretches “Talz warriors perform it as youths. Outsiders rarely do… and even then, they fail.”
Encouraging.
Behind them, the Snowhawk’s intercom chimes almost on cue: “Approaching Landing Zone Aurek. Surface visibility, low. Wind shear, moderate. Ice assessment, unstable.” She turns back toward the viewport where below, a vast expanse of pale blue ice ridges and frozen plains dust with drifting snow. Jagged crystalline pillars rise like the bones of ancient giants even from a great distance.
This world is both majestic and deadly — and deeply scarred by misunderstanding. Padmé takes a breath. “I will meet the Chieftain, and hear his expectations directly.”
Varr inclines his head just as Vasso beams “We hoped you would say that, Senator. The Talz have already accepted our request for neutral ground. They’ve agreed to meet us just beyond the ridge…” he points on the hologram “here.”
A cold pulse ripples through her chest then. Not quite fear, but a sense that they’re on the hinge of something larger. Thus as soon as the Pantoran dignitaries offer their brisk farewells? Anakin is already strategising, his expression storming with all that he’d been forced to swallow around an audience “I won’t let them jeopardise your safety this way, Padmé. It’s outrageous. The Chancellor would never stand for this and frankly, neither will I.”
“Anakin.”
“You’re their key diplomatic envoy. Just let me do the walk instead and I’m sure it will be—”
“It has to be me.” Her voice is soft but firm, the tone that always brings him up short. She steps closer “A gesture of trust can’t be made by proxy. If you go in my place, we risk turning a negotiation into an armed challenge.”
His jaw tightens, a dozen counterarguments sparking behind blue eyes “… and if it’s a trap?”
“Well, that’s why the Council assigned you by my side.” A smile nudges her lips for what feels like the first time this morning “I did ask for the Hero With No Fear.”
That eases some of the tension in him — never fully, not where her safety is concerned, but at least enough. He lifts a hand and hesitates before letting it fall to brush fleetingly against her sleeve in defeat “I don’t like this.”
“I know,” she sighs and the subtle teasing in her expression dissipates entirely “… but sometimes our only way forward is the narrowest path.”
The world drops into a shimmering plane of blue-white glass in that ice field. The air hums with distant winds slipping between crevasses like ghostly flutes. Frost clings thick on every surface, even the breathless quiet.
Padmé stands amidst it all as though sculpted from the same elements. Her ceremonial “foot-blades” had been strapped on by Talz attendants — curved pieces of polished bone fitted beneath her boots. Elegant in their simplicity, but treacherous to anyone who doesn’t understand the way ice breathes. She had asked as many questions as possible with Threepio’s assistance, but now must stand entirely alone, regal and severe.
Chief Liaison Varr whispers to his deputy then “This is madness. She’ll fall after two steps, and then we will be right back where we started.”
“Have faith in Senator Amidala, sir. She has conquered the impossible many a time before.”
Threepio frets in small circles, frost building inside his joints while Artoo noisily beeps for him to stop. “Oh dear, this ritual is far more precarious than — I can’t watch!”
Anakin remains silent several paces ahead of them nonetheless, focused on nothing else but the fierce serenity that narrows her eyes now. The fire in her expression, controlled, but unmistakably bright. They pull at each other the way gravity does with planets and so every instinct screams for him to help her somehow.
Yet he knows his wife isn’t just doing this to prove a point. Padmé is doing it because she believes in diplomacy as an act of courage. To her? Nothing can be more important right now than for the Talz to see her sincerity before they even hear a single negotiated word.
Her first step onto the frozen river is soundless.
Not even the faintest scrape of bone against ice disturbs its stillness when Padmé lets her weight settle into those foot-blades — exactly as the Talz had instructed — centred and posture aligned, straight into a seamless glide.
The motion is a silken sweep forward that repeats itself with one foot after another and behind Anakin, he hears a Talz warrior exhale a rumbling note of solemn approval. This sacred ritual demands discipline and serenity. Qualities they trust and thus expect from those who attempt to approach their hearth with.
Anakin tensely maintains a steady pace along the river’s edge to keep her in his line of sight, however, boots crunching against fresh frost. He reaches out through the Force and hovers just in case Padmé stumbles — but she only speeds up now that the obelisk, a polished shard of ice, looms ahead like a spire and comes into view.
Thus he breaks into a jog while snowfall begins to blur the world altogether, thick flakes muffling every sound. The distant commentary of Pantoran dignitaries fades. Even the Talz’s intrigued murmurs grow softer, swallowed by the elements. Then he senses it. A subtle break in her flawless façade. There’s this slight hesitation in how Padmé shifts her weight before pushing forward again. She’s moving a little slower now, conserving energy.
Anakin’s heart thuds painfully at the sight.
To anyone else, his wife must look ethereal. Yet he sees her fingers tighten around the carved lantern she’s been entrusted with — a delicate object of whalebone and glowing stones meant to be placed in the obelisk as a symbol of peaceful intent — and her hold appears too rigid. Her breath, accompanied by the smallest tremor. Cold. Pain, perhaps. The edge of human limitation against what has been designed for a species born to this climate.
“Come on, angel…” he fights the urge to run out there and wrap her in his cloak; end this entire ceremony with one sharp command or a swing of his lightsaber if necessary “Just a little farther. You can do this.”
Padmé doesn’t hear him, either way, but she feels her husband’s presence. His unwavering warmth at the edge of this river. A silent promise that he won’t intervene unless she falls — that he trusts her not to.
She doesn’t look back until a jagged line suddenly shimmers across the ice, stretching outward like a lightning bolt frozen mid-strike.
Gasps erupt along the riverbank when Artoo toodles something for Threepio to immediately translate, shrieking “Senator Amidala! The structural integrity of this river is not sound! I repeat, it is not sound!” Padmé hears the droid clearly, coming from beside Thi-Sen himself as his four eyes narrow and study her with renewed intensity.
Panicked, she can also hear the sudden cracks splinter another few inches and instinctively adjusts her tilt by several degrees as result — weight shifting onto a thicker part of the river — while the lantern sways gently despite her swifter glides. Ahead, the obelisk awaits beneath a layer of frost that reflects her approaching silhouette.
Padmé reaches the sacred structure just as that crack widens a final inch and stills entirely. She is off the ice to then face a towering shard of ancient frost, regardless. The wind howls around it, scattering snow in spiralling gusts, but she eventually lowers herself to one knee.
Both hands hover for a moment. They’re still shaking from the many near stumbles on her way over here, but she manages to steady them at last — lifting aforementioned stones and fitting them into a hollow carved at the base of this obelisk. It blooms immediately. A slow, spreading glow pulses out through the crystalline monolith and deepens into a brilliant blue across that frozen river to paint every face in shimmering colour. The surface underneath her vibrates meanwhile, humming with a Talz blessing which has now been invoked.
As awed murmurs ripple through the crowd, Padmé rises and places one hand over her heart. She then extends it over the light’s source, perfectly mirroring a gesture demonstrated to her earlier. An honoured custom. Chieftain Thi-Sen, along with everybody else, soon approach her position where he bows his head just enough to make every Pantoran envoy stiffen in disbelief.
With Threepio’s help, the words ring out: “You walk with a strong heart” and it carries forth as a proclamation of sorts. Negotiations may proceed from here.
The hut is a cocoon of warmth, its domed walls stretched tight with thick animal hides that glow softly from a central fire pit. An entrance flap settles behind them while harsh gales claw at their exterior — rib-like support beams carved from great bleached bones creaking as the storm rages on. Snowmelt slides from Padmé’s cloak and patters onto the layered furs beneath her boots, in any case, right before she sinks onto a low seat by aforementioned fire.
Adrenaline drains from every limb as soon as she stops moving, like the cold itself has slipped its grasp from her spine at last. Gloves catch at the knuckles when she tries to pull them off, but Anakin is there in an instant; ignoring the stiffness of his own joints when he carefully gathers her palms together to warm them up.
“Here…” he murmurs, enveloping her icy fingers in the warmth of both his leather glove and flesh hand. Thus the heat achingly seeps in until she can exhale again with relief. Watching him rub and blow on them, the bone-deep exhaustion in her sigh can no longer be masked “Please tell me they didn’t notice how much I was shaking.”
A smile nudges at his lips when he finally looks up, thumbs drawing circles over her chilled knuckles. “All they saw was strength, my love. I promise.”
Padmé huffs a breath that might almost pass for laughter, or perhaps just a release of everything she’s been bottling inside this entire trip. Regardless. She leans over till their foreheads find rest against each other, letting herself fold around him (and him alone) as always. “I used to skate all the time on Naboo. There were these winter festivals by the lakes, you know? I thought it would help today.” Her eyebrows draw together a little sheepishly “… but I think the ice is very different here on Orto Plutonia.”
Anakin’s expression softens and so, he presses a reverent kiss to each of his wife’s frozen fingertips. “You were brilliant out there. Terrifying, yes, but brilliant all the same,” his voice is a low and molten whisper against her skin “They saw your heart. That’s what matters.”
The world outside is still howling, but this intimate space they’ve carved for themselves is at peace for now. Somewhere they’re finally allowed to breathe. He runs his fingers through Padmé’s curls and kisses her forehead “Rest. You’ve done more than enough today.”
Smiling softly, she tries to let herself believe it.